This week is turning out to be a mini-family reunion for me. My parents and two of my brothers are in town as are some aunts and uncles and cousins. Yesterday evening at a family barbecue near Venice Beach I fell into a conversation with my aunt and uncle about the reading habits of my young cousin, Tim, who is 10. He’s a very precocious reader and has finished off nearly all of the highly recommended children’s series that are out there right now: Harry Potter, Lemony Snicket, and Brian Jacques’ Redwall Series (I recommended Phillip Pullman’s His Dark Materials Trilogy since he hasn’t gotten to that yet.) The thing is, there’s a limited amount of high quality young adult fiction out there, so what do you do if your kid has read it all? Since I started working at the bookstore I have occasionally been posed this question by parents. It’s actually a crucial moment in the life of a young a reader, the point where they could very easily lose some interest reading because they have read all the kids’ books and aren’t allowed to read adult books. What folks sometimes forget is that there are quite a few books that, though they are shelved in the adult fiction section, are perfect books to help segue strong, young readers into the wider world that lies beyond the young adult section. Some people call these books classics, but they are perfect for challenging kids and keeping them interested in reading: The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, The Time Machine, 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, and Journey to the Center of the Earth, to name just a few. I would also recommend that these children read the books in their original forms, not the abridged versions. I remember reading abridged versions of various classics when I was younger, and I think lots of other folks do as well, but looking back it just doesn’t seem necessary. In fact, as an eleven or twelve year old, I learned a lot of complex things about the world around me from the books I read, and these important details, the harsh language in Huck Finn, for example, seem to be just the things that are excised in order to create the kid friendly versions. We challenge kids in many aspects of their lives, why not challenge them to explore the big questions that arise from reading the classics. I hope that the children’s book industry continues to move in this direction, and a lot of the intelligent and challenging kids’ books that are out there indicate that it will. On the other hand, my friend Edan pointed out to me the other day the upcoming release of a “Student Edition” of Yann Martel’s international bestseller Life of Pi, from which, one can assume, the editors have removed anything that might distress, and therefore challenge, a young reader. Here’s hoping that this doesn’t kick off a new trend.
Giving Kids the Classics
Gone West, LBC Week
Mrs. Millions and I are headed to Los Angeles for a few days starting tomorrow morning. We're excited to see how LA is doing since we moved away, and we're especially enamored with the idea of taking few days off from the Chicago winter (although it hasn't been too bad here these last few days.) Among many other activities, I plan to visit the book store where I used to work. That'll bring me back to the roots of this blog, remind me of the good old days. All in all, it should be a pretty busy trip; lots of friends to see and some family, too, and lots of In 'n' Out Burgers to eat. Wifi isn't free at the hotel, apparently, and we'll be staying with friends some of the time too - so expect little or no blogging.However, I implore you to please direct your browsers toward The LitBlog Co-op on Monday morning where the newest LBC pick will be revealed with much fanfare. The nominees will be announced over the course of the week, as well, (and there will be an appearance by yours truly.) Next week is LBC Week. See you then.
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To Live and Die (and Read About It ) in LA
I have a Bloglines account. Since you're reading this blog, you probably know what I'm talking about, but in case you don't, I'll explain. Bloglines takes all the blogs and websites you read everyday and bundles them together in one place, so you can check them without getting repetitive stress disorder from your web browser. Bloglines is like the newspaper of stuff I care about. There is no real estate section in my paper, no classifieds, only sports, food, the occasional political rant, and then an extensive cultural section that includes the blog you're reading now, and more than a few others that cover film, music and celebrity gossip (the lifeblood of the modern news media).For the last couple of months, my "newspaper" has included a metro section, and that section has been dominated by the Homicide Report, written by Los Angeles Times crime reporter Jill Leovy. The Homicide Report is a straightforward, factual account of every homicide in Los Angeles County. It runs five days a week. Most of the homicides only a get a line or two, a simple description of the facts, under a stark and pointed headline ("Man shot working on a car"; "Teacher Found Killed"), but more importantly, whenever possible, the identity of the victim is revealed. For most homicides, this is a few lines more recognition than they would get in the Los Angeles Times or in any newspaper, for that matter. As Leovy says, "The media often covers homicide as a statistic story, marking up-and-down jags in the rates." In an interview with the blog LA Observed (another of my daily reads) she explains some of her motivation for starting the blog:"At the very least, seeing all the homicides arrayed in a list like this will give readers a much more real view of who is dying, and how often. And for me, it means no longer having to confront weeping mothers who say their sons' deaths were never covered by the press."It seems fitting that LA would lead the way with a blog about murder (Note: other cities have followed suit; just this week the Houston Chronicle launched its own homicide blog (via bloghouston.net)). After all, this is the city of James Ellroy and Raymond Chandler, of Michael Connelly and Joseph Wambaugh, of Quentin Tarantino and Michael Mann. Crime is woven into the fabric of the city and its culture in a way that doesn't seem to be the case in the other American cities (except maybe Baltimore). While the classic noirists and the masters of the procedural used crime in the city to tell stories of the evil that lurked within it, the Homicide Report seems determined to tell of the innocence, as well. It remains to be seen what effect the blog will have on crime rates, if any, but it already raises my awareness on a daily basis.
Every Day The Same Dream
Even aside from the sad beauty of the game’s gray world, I was thinking about it the other day and I realized part of its appeal: it reminds me, in its very existence, of what the Internet used to be.
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Even David Foster Wallace Nods
Where Wallace probably went wrong was in confusing the Greek nomos, meaning “law,” with onoma, meaning “name.”
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Web site home to New Yorker rejects
The Village Voice has a profile of a Web site called Silence of the City, where stories rejected from the The New Yorker's Talk of the Town section are posted by Mac Montandon, whose own work has been rejected by the section more than once. There's only seven pieces posted right now, but its a fun idea. Among them is an article by Lisa Selin Davis (whose novel Belly I read a while back). Of another NYer reject, M.M. De Voe, the Voice writes that she "finds the experience of submitting her stories to The New Yorker oddly exhilarating in itself. Perhaps it's like that feeling you get when you buy a lottery ticket." I wonder if how many notable folks have been rejected by the NYer. I'd guess quite a few.(via)
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