Reading Goals 2018

Update: February

This month I chose from my reading goal list: a book whose setting is in a bookshop or library.

The Library at the Edge of the World by Felicity Hayes-McCoy was a perfectly cozy read for February.  It was heartwarming to read about the struggles of librarian Hannah Casey, who plots and strategizes to save the library from the clutches of self-serving local politicians and greedy land developers.

image from Google

Hannah has returned home to her mother Mary after a disastrous marriage and has found safety and comfort managing the Lissbeg Library. Besides functioning as chief librarian in the brick and mortar library, Hannah rambles around the fictional Finfarran Peninsula of Ireland (oooohhh just love that country) as she delivers books in the mobile library van to the far-flung citizens. The scenery is lovely. It's Ireland for goodness's sake! The plot even features an old thatched cottage, complete with peat-burning fireplace set right on the edge of the ocean....just yummy. Let the dreaming begin.

personal photos from 2002 family trip to Cork and Ring of Kerry

In addition to the Gaelic setting, part of the book's charm is the many quaint characters that populate the peninsula, including an irascible builder (aptly named Mr. Fury), an equally stubborn nun, and a fledgling librarian who gently tries to push Hannah into the technology era.  Does Hannah's bruised and battered heart have the strength left to fight the political machine that threatens to destroy the tenuous new life she is making for herself? Can she adapt to even more changes in her life and embrace the techno age? Or will she discover it is easier to concede in the face of superior foes?  

I empathized at times with Hannah and felt her fears. It is not too far fetched to envision a time when books are no more, replaced with digital files and fancy e-readers. It is not too unrealistic to think her role as a librarian could become obsolete. This is just one of the many things I pondered as I read The Library at the Edge of the World. I'd love to know what thoughts it made you think about.

HAPPY READING!

2018 Reading Goals

Update: January

I set out at the beginning of the year,  to read twelve types of books in 2018. This month I decided to start by reading a book that has won a prize for excellence.

 A while back Amazon was offering a great deal on a YA book that had won acclaim, and I downloaded it onto my Kindle.  It has sat in my Kindle library for quite a while.  In scanning my library, I noticed One Crazy Summer by Rita Williams Garcia, had won five literary awards: A Newbery Honor Book, Scott O'Delll Award for Historical Fiction, Coretta Scott King Award, ALA Best Fiction For Young Adults and a National Book Award Finalist - a perfect pick for award-winning book.

image from Amazon

One Crazy Summer is actually the first in a series of three books about the Gaither sisters: Delphine, Vonetta, and Fern.  Delphine, the eldest sister, is the narrator and a very responsible one at that.  In true big sister fashion, she takes charge of her siblings as they travel from Brooklyn to Oakland, California to visit their mother who left them soon after Fern, the youngest Gaither sister, was born. Neither Vonetta nor Fern have any memory of their mother, and they have hopes of a tender reunion and visits to glamorous places like Disneyland. Upon arrival they are quickly awoken to reality.  Their mother did not ask to have them visit and is anything but welcoming.  She shoves them daily out the door to fend for themselves at a Black Panther Day Camp for kids.  The year is 1968.

Image from Google

FLASHBACK!  I soon found myself thinking back to my high school and college days- the age of protests and sit-ins. Back then the Black Panther Party was a scary thing to me.  I'm ashamed to admit, I do not know a great deal about it, other than it was not the peaceful Civil Rights movement of Martin Luther King.  But One Crazy Summer led me to learn a little more about it's co-founder Huey Newton and some of the workings of the movement. The historical perspective of this book alone is worth the reading, but the endearing Gaither sisters, especially Delphine, make the reading delightful.