"Kiddie Lit"

Much of my childhood was spent reading. One of my favorite elementary teachers, Mrs. Drachenberg, used to walk us across the street from the school grounds to a public park. We were each supposed to find a quiet spot to read or write in our journals, yet most of the boys spent this time challenging one another to long jump contests (over a small pond), and most of the girls were sneaked off in pairs, sharing secrets and watching the boys. I, however, rushed off to claim my favorite spot, next to a small bush hidden from the view of both Mrs. D. and my friends.

I would lie down in the sunshine and crack open a book while the voices of my classmates, the reprimands of my teacher and the noise of the traffic passing by would fade away completely. As cliche as it may seem, those books transported me into history, into adventures and into neighborhoods and situations that I would never experience in my hometown.

I read all of Beverly Cleary and Judy Blume books, then made my way through the Nancy Drew series. Eventually (unfortunately?) a "Sweet Valley High" book made its way into my hands, and for a year or so, my babysitting money went to purchasing all of the books of that series. The trials and travails of Elizabeth and Jessica Wakefield, in all of their blonde, California beauty, formed the basis for my understanding of teenage life.

This is not to say that I did nothing other than read during my childhood. In fact, I rode bikes, played in the alley with the neighborhood kids, spent summer afternoons at the pool and climbed my fair share of trees. But usually, even in the midst of these activities, I was looking forward to finding a quiet spot where I could pull out my book and leave the world as I knew it.

Last week, after not-quite finishing "A Gate at the Stairs," I took the advice of a fellow reader, who shared that, in light of her commitment to finish all the books she begins, she spends more time investigating them before just jumping in. I had the good fortune to spend and hour in 1/2 Price Books last week, and found myself first meandering back to the "juvenile fiction" section.

Young adult literature is one of my favorite "genres," and in spite of a British Lit. professor who repeatedly referred to it as "kiddie lit," (I think he was deeply envious of the popularity of another prof. who taught "Young Adult Lit."), juvenile fiction encompasses some wonderfully-crafted books. I was almost giddy as I drove home, four young adult books in tow.

*************************************************************************************

"Olive's Ocean," written by Kevin Henkes, is the story of Martha Boyle, a 12 year old girl on the cusp of puberty. Her relationships with her siblings, parents, and even her beloved "Godbee"--her grandma--are all shifting as she navigates the perilous territory between childhood and adulthood.

Days before Martha leaves to spend the Summer at her grandma's house on the ocean, she is startled by a visit from the mother of Olive Barstow, a classmate who had died in the Spring after being struck by a car while riding her bike. Although Martha knew Olive, her memory of the girl was "fuzzy and had no edges" (33). It seems that Olive had lived like a shadow among her peers, not making much of an impression--negatively or positively.

But Martha had made an impression on Olive, whose mom found a journal entry of her daughter's which expressed, among other things, her desire to be more outgoing, and to befriend Martha--"the nicest girl in the school" (27). She also wanted to go to see the ocean.

What transpires during Martha's Summer at her grandma's ocean house runs the gamut of adolescent angst: from questioning the role she plays in the life of her family, to shifting allegiances amongst siblings and neighbors, to first "love," and ultimately, to an uneasy awareness of her own mortality.

Toward the end of the season, Martha realizes that "the world can change in a minute, and at the same time remain unchanged" (167). One minute Olive was alive--a quiet girl, a loner, and mysterious--but alive, riding her bike on a warm Spring afternoon--and the next minute, she wasn't. Yet Martha's life remained the same, her classmates lives were unchanged, and Olive's mother mourned alone.

Kevin Henkes' book was not unlike other coming-of-age stories found in the category of YA Lit., but his ability to tell a really sweet story about the love between family members without going sappy on his audience leaves the reader with a subtle reminder to appreciate the people you love while you have them.

As I finished this book, my daughters awoke from a nap and shuffled downstairs bleary-eyed. We snuggled in our comfy "reading chair," and Soli rubbed my earlobe while Maya nuzzled her head until she found the perfect position right under my chin. I breathed in their sweetness, felt the heft of their warm bodies, and thanked God for that moment together.

*************************************************************************************

**This post is a week late. Although I began writing it over a week ago, our trip to NY threw me off of my schedule. I'll be posting again this week on the book I read during down time in the airport.

I have to be honest, posting once a week is a bit daunting. I'm realizing that I can't spend too much time revising. . .which is a challenge for me, and I continually have to be cognizant of how I spend my "free time." It feels good to be writing, though, and that was/is the purpose of the whole 52/52 challenge. So, I'll keep on. . .and hopefully, I'll catch up!

**Do you remember a favorite children's book? Is there a book that you read as a teenager that stuck with you? I've listed some of my favorite YA books below. Read one when you have a free evening!


My short list of"Young Adult" favorites
The Book Thief--Marcus Zusak
Walk Two Moons--Sharon Creech
Holes--Louis Sachar
Jacob Have I Loved--Katherine Patterson
The Giver--Lois Lowry
Ramona series--Beverly Cleary
Number the Stars--Lois Lowry
Athletic Shorts--Chris Crutcher
Stotan--Chris Crutcher
The Outsiders--S.E. Hinton
A Wrinkle in Time--Madeleine L'Engle
Chronicles of Narnia--C.S. Lewis
Tuck Everlasting--Natalie Babbitt
The True Confessions of Charlotte Doyle--Avi
Bud, Not Buddy--Christopher Paul Curtis
Because of Winn Dixie--Kate DiCamillo
A Year Down Yonder--Richard Peck
Joey Pigza Loses Control--Jack Gantos
A Long Way from Chicago--Richard Peck
Catherine, Called Birdy--Karen Cushman
Hatchet--Gary Paulsen
The Great Gilly Hopkins--Katherine Patterson
My Brother Sam is Dead--James Lincoln Collier
Bridge to Terabithia--Katherine Patterson
The Witch of Blackbird Pond--Elizabeth George Speare

And of course. . .The Twilight Series!

Dropping Danielle Steele

I made a decision at 4 o'clock this morning. I was lying in bed with a migraine, thinking of my crazy to do list for the week ahead, when "the book" popped into my head. In the past six weeks, when I've thought of this personal challenge--52 books/52 blogs--it has intimidated me a little, energized me a lot, and made me much more disciplined in the area of time management.

This morning, though, I was filled with dread--the "ugghhh. . .I have to finish that book" kind of dread. Honestly, I haven't felt that way since having to read "The Feminist Question: Feminist Theology in the Light of Christian Tradition" for one of my master's courses a few years back. (Loved the subject--not the book).

Yet there on the table lay the dreaded book, and at four in the morning with a migraine, it looked daunting.

"The Book," I should clarify, is Lorrie Moore's most recent release "A Gate at the Stairs." It is one of the books that I read about in the Kansas City Star a few weeks back, and I rushed to have it held for me at the library. I was thrilled when it came in weeks before expected, and last Wednesday I finally cozied down in my reading chair, hot cup of coffee at hand, both girls napping, expecting to be whisked away into protagonist Tassie Keltjin's life.

I knew I would love this book. After all, it is a coming-of-age story, set in the Midwest, told through the eyes of a farm girl who moves to a liberal university town. This book was right up my alley, so to speak.

But ten minutes and 18 pages in, I was thinking "Not exactly the page turner I expected." One hour and 87 pages into the novel, and I was antsy, thinking "Come on, come on, when's this story going to go anywhere?" One hundred and twenty seven pages in, and I quit.

The thing is, Moore's book was not going anywhere. Her characters were flat and boring--after 127 pages, I didn't feel anything for them. I didn't care if Tassie figured out who she was, what her life was about, and I didn't care whether the restaurateur for whom she worked as a nanny got into the groove of motherhood after adopting a toddler. Least of all, I didn't care if the restaurateur's older, academic husband decided to step into the role of husband and father. He was a creep, after all, and a boring creep at that.

When I was teaching, students would often come to me complaining about the book they had chosen to fulfill their free reading assignment. Sometimes they were shy, sometimes defensive, often nervous. After all, they were asking their English teacher's permission to NOT like a book--how dare they have opinions of their own about what constituted "good" literature.

I'd give a little shrug and a smile and tell them to put it down, give up on the book, choose another. My goal was not to get my students to love certain pieces of literature, but to love reading as a whole. After all, I knew that the girls who were reading, say, Danielle Steele books, eventually would move beyond that "genre," and move onto what I would consider better books. (No offense to any adult who reads Danielle Steele). So if they had to read 9 of Danielle's tawdry romances in a row to get to that point, it was all good. At least those girls were reading.

So at four in the morning, I gave myself permission to quit. Because after not liking four out of the last five books I've read, I really, really need to read something enjoyable. If I'm going to make it through 52 books this year, I need to not dread reading.

So does this post count toward my 52? I haven't decided yet. Maybe it will count as half, or maybe there will be a week when I will read two books and write two posts to make up for this week. Maybe not. We'll see how the year goes.

**************************************************************************************

So, dear readers (all 7 of you, according to my "followers" list), how do you feel about putting a book down? Do you feel like you have to finish, to mark it off your list (or to write it on your list)? What do you do when you're midway through a book, and you know you don't like it? I'd love your input (maybe it'll alleviate a bit of my guilt)!

Oh, and admit it--have you ever read any Danielle Steele?! I have!

"Unwound"

So I was at the dollar store last week, searching for some non-candy goodies for my kids' Valentine's Day party treat bags, when I stumbled upon the book section. They had a surprisingly large inventory, and most of them were hardcover, so of course, I had to stop and browse. I've often wondered what happened (or didn't happen) to a book that was good enough to find a reputable publisher, but that eventually ends up selling for a dollar. What disappointment the author must feel, knowing that their creation literally is not worth the paper it's printed on.

So I bought a hardcover for a buck.

"Unraveled: The True Story of a Woman Who Dared to Become a Different Kind of Mother," by Maria Housden caught my eye. Seriously, who doesn't want to be a "different kind of mother?" I know I'd like to be more patient, more organized, more flexible in my role as a parent. Maybe Maria Housden could give me some pointers.

The book started off well enough. Housden and her husband married right out of college, began having children, she became a stay-at-home mom, doing the typical stay-at-home mom things. Her husband continued in his career path, and Housden found herself feeling envious at times that he got to leave home every morning. She began to feel she didn't measure up with her peers, thought she was losing herself in parenting, and often wondered if there was more to life than what she was experiencing.

At this point in the book, I'm totally understanding Housden. There are days when I watch my husband backing his car out of the driveway, knowing that he'll be having adult conversations all day long, that he might even have a nice lunch "meeting," and that the whole drive to and from work will be filled with quiet(or music of his own choosing), and I am downright jealous. So believe me when I say, I'm right there with Housden.

After several years of mommyhood, a marriage that takes the backseat to children, and a nagging sense of discontent, Maria Housden decides she needs a vacation: 10 days by herself in a retreat center that espouses silence and contemplation, even during communal mealtimes.

Her first few days are spent reading, taking long walks through field and forest, and resting in a rustic log cabin, aptly named "Walden." Her days are long, her needs are simple, and Housden is able to spend time thoroughly processing her fifteen year marriage. And I, the reader, am thinking "that's what I need. . .I need ten days at my very own 'Walden.'"

Then, on day three, a mysterious, handsome stranger shows up at the communal dining table. Their eyes meet and, though no words are spoken, Housden explains

My heart was a mirrored pool as we gazed into each other without words, filled with a sense of joy and delight. And although I had never seen his face or his form before, in that single, timeless moment, I felt as if I knew the heart of this man and recognized both my separateness and my connection to him. He and I were the reason we were here, and whatever needed to happen between us, it was already done (Housden, 56).

Blech, blech, blech.

I'm sure you know how the rest of the story goes. . .Housden and the mystery man, also a writer, fall head over heels in love, the connection something "spiritual," and they justify their infidelity in all the new-age, Oprah-esque, to-each-his-own-truth kind of reasoning they can. I could hardly keep reading.

Housden and her husband had been having problems for years, so the author feels no qualms in leaving him for the other man. . .it's her children that pose "the problem." Falling in love with a writer has aroused the repressed writer in Maria, and she does not see how she can be a full-time mom and a writer at the same time. Yet, in her reasoning, putting writing on hold for the sake of her kids, or just attempting to write around her mothering, would be denying her own self-expression, and doing her children a disservice by not giving them the best Maria Housden possible.

Again, blech, blech, blech.

Although it troubled her deeply, Housden gave full custody of the children to her husband, moved into her own apartment and began a new chapter in her parenting life: The part-time, two weekends a month, mom. Her ex-husband became the full-time parent to their 3, 5 and 9 year old.

Now I know this parenting arrangement is not an unusual one, although it is typically the fathers who have weekend visitation, and for some divorced families it seems to work, but Housden's justification of writing as her primary commitment rankled.

Because for Maria Housden, it was all or nothing--writer or mom, lover or wife--and she chose to be "a different kind of mom." "Unraveled" is written, of course from Maria, the two-weekend-a-month mom's perspective, and she believes that the arrangement has been beneficial to her children. They see the weekends with her as a "vacation" from their day-to-day life, and the children benefit from having a mom that is "more of herself" than she was as a full-time mom.

And the writer boyfriend? Well, he becomes Maria's husband, and they settle in for a lifetime of bliss. Unfortunately, their home together falls short of "Walden," and in the epilogue Maria confesses that they have since moved into separate apartments, but that they still love one another deeply and are very committed to their marriage. It seems full-time marriage may not provide one with the best environment in which to write, either.

Journalist Maria Shriver was interviewed shortly after her husband, Arnold Schwarzenegger, won the gubernatorial election in California. She was asked about the fact that she had stepped away from her career to be the primary caregiver for her children, and now her husband's career was center stage. She said something that I've never forgotten.

Maria's mom, Eunice Shriver, always said that a woman could have it all, just not all at once.

I often remember that comment. When I'm knee deep in laundry, yet longing for the classroom, when I'm cooking yet another chicken dinner, but dreaming of a nice glass of wine and beef bourguignon (enjoyed, of course, in a quaint village in the French countryside), when I'm exchanging adventurous trips abroad for family trips to St. Louis, I remember that I can have it all. . . just not all at once. And I'm reminded to enjoy what I have right now.

I wish Maria Housden had seen that interview.

*************************************************************************************

**Some of you have asked how I choose my books, and I tell you truthfully, there is no rhyme or reason. Over the course of the year, I intend to read some new fiction, some old classics, some non-fiction, and some young adult literature. If you have suggestions, please feel free to let me know! I have a list right now, but it's a short list, so I'd love to add your suggestions to it.

**I can't wait to pick up Lorrie Moore's most recent novel, "A Gate at the Stairs," tomorrow morning. If you've read it, or want to read it along with me this week, I'd love to compare notes!