Have you met Natalie?

If you use the library regularly, you no doubt have come across Natalie at the main desk. What you may not know is that she is our Head of Circulation which means she is responsible for a wide variety of things ranging from statistics to scheduling to making sure that anything and everything related to circulation is being done. If that isn't enough, Natalie is our go-to person for almost any question, idea or plan. If I had a nickel for every time someone says "I'll ask Natalie" we could have a diamond studded circulation desk!

Natalie has imagination, endless curiosity and creativity married to practicality, detail thinking, and the ability to think of all the issues and potential problems - a rare combination. Basically, if I make the most casual "Wouldn't it be nice if . . ." statement, within an hour or at most a day Natalie has a plan of attack with all the variables addressed and is ready for it to be put in place.

So it is no surprise that in the time between my asking if I had asked her the famous 5 questions (no) and coming back with the questions and a pencil, she was all ready with her answers:

1. When I am not at the library, you can find me: at home reading (and let me tell you, she reads alot of books).
2. Describe your perfect day: at the beach, uninterrupted, especially by kids (did you know she has teenaged twins?)
3. If you had to live somewhere else than NH, where would it be? San Diego, it is just about perfect. (She was just out there for a short vacation and discovered its perfection then)
4. What 3 things can you always find in your fridge? Grapes, yogurt and cheese.
5. You would be surprised to find out that I: like to skeet shoot.

Stop in and say hello to Natalie. She is always there for all of us.

Our AED

You may have noticed a new addition right at the front entrance. If not, I recommend you take a moment to look. The Town of Salem has distributed AEDs to most of the town building and the library is one of the locations.

An AED - automated external defibrillator - is an easy to use device to help when someone is having a heart attack or similar problem. It comes with easy to follow instructions and won't do anything if its sensors do not find the correct condition. It is an invaluable tool to help keep someone alive while waiting for an ambulance.

Several people on the staff have had training, but the device is out in the public areas just so that anyone faced with this kind of emergency can take action.

Please take a moment to locate the device - no one ever knows when it will be needed.

Reading and sharing

We were talking about what to do about the ripped upholstery on one of the big comfy chairs in the children's room. During one of our many rearraging of furniture here, we moved two down there in the window so that parents/grandparents and kids could snuggle together and share a book. They have been very popular - so popular that we are faced with what to do with the ripped upholstery.

I remember the hours spent reading picture books to my kids back lo these many years and how much fun we had, lying together on a bed, enjoying the books, discussing the artwork, and having a lovely, quiet shared moment at the end of each busy day. My older son continued to share with me and my daughter even when he was reading to himself, but ultimately there came the day that both were avid readers and no longer saw the charm of the picture books. Gosh that was a hard change to accept! But we did keep the tradition of reading several favorite Christmas picture books on Christmas Eve (Polar Express, Santa Cows and Harvey Slumfenburger's Christmas Present come to mind)whenever we are together at Christmas.

So I was delighted to come across this new book that has just come out about a father and daughter who read aloud together each night for nine years: The Reading Promise, by Alice Ozma. They started when Alice was in the fourth grade, with the intention of reading for 100 consecutive nights. Once they reached that goal, they wanted to continue, and did so until Alice left for college. They have worked their way through a wide range of books, but best of all they retained a shared experience through the most challenging age for kids. They were able to carve out a snippet of time to come together and share some meaningful moments together - with books at the heart of it.

There is something about sharing a book that is irresistable. While it is a very solitary activity in general - and my husband always grumbles about feeling ignored when I read - at the same time as you read you frequently are thinking of talking about it to a friend or family member, are reminding yourself to recommend it(or recommend against it) to others. Just now there are a few books where the authors have written to share their life changing experiences while reading a set group of books over the course of a year. Howard's End is on the Landing, by Susan Hill is all about Ms Hill decision to read all the books on her shelves that she never had gotten to before.

Another title just coming out is Tolstoy and the Purple Chair, by Nina Sankovitch. In this book, Ms. Sankovitch decides to deal with personal loss by reading a book a day. She discovered a way to connect with a lost loved one.

It never fails to amaze me the various powers of books.

Books to movies

I can't think of a topic more rife with strong preferences than the translation of a beloved book into film. There are those that were disappointing in the translation: The Shining, Bonfire of the Vanities, VI Warshawski. There are just as many that were quite successful: Roots, almost anything by Robert Parker, a few of the Agatha Christie series. But regardless, when we read a book we create a vision of the characters and the surroundings that is completely our own. It isn't always easy to articulate, but we know what it is, and we know when it is right on film. We are only truly satisfied when the film and the director's vision are close to our own.

Of course, we can always separate ourselves from the book and judge the movie as a stand-alone. I have done that on a number of occasions, with The Shining and even with Demi Moore's rendition of the Scarlet Letter (sorry none of the GMILCS library has this gem). If you just pretend that this is a new story that is totally unrelated to that book you liked so much, you might find much to enjoy in the film. The Shining is a good horror film, but it in no way reaches the intent or the true scariness of the book. When I read it way way many years ago, I had to stop before dinner, otherwise I knew I wouldn't be sleeping that night. The Scarlet Letter? There is a PBS version that is really good, but I found Demi's a guilty pleasure. It bore no resemblance to the book so I just watched for the B movie it was.

The Little House series by Laura Ingalls Wilder is a series of books I can reread at any time. I recall not too long ago on a quiet summer night in Maine, reading The Long Winter. At some point I got up to let the dog out and was really startled to see there was no snow outside. I certainly never got drawn into the story like that when watching the Little House series on TV.

So when I read that the cast had been set for the Janet Evanovich/Stephanie Plum movie - I was kind of worried. I love the series, and the characters are clearly imprinted in my mind's eye. Now that Sandra Bullock was too old, who could they decide to cast? Well, I have to admit, they made some great choices. I'm not sure about the choice for Ranger, but I think Grandma Mazur is going to be a hoot. What do you think?

How do you say?

I was looking through the review journals we use to select books, and came across the new Michael Robotham book that is coming out in June, The Wreckage. Whenever I have come across his name, I have wondered how exactly to pronounce it. This time I decided to try and find out, as I have been successful in the past discovering how to pronounce John Lescroart (Les kwah) and Jodi Pecoult (Pekoe).

A quick Google search lead me to quite a variety of sites that provide help in pronouncing author’s names. The first one at Teaching Books is nifty because it includes a number of authors saying their own names (my favorite was Vladimir Radunsky). A great resource, but focused on children’s authors, so I moved on. The next site I tried was Inogolo, a site that provides pronunciation help for names in the arts. Sadly, no entry for Robotham, but Vladimir, John and Jodi were there – and Jodi’s showed that this site also has some audio links. I moved on to Swisseduc.ch. This appears to be a webpage for students in Switzerland, but it is a nice site for a limited number of author names spelled out phonetically and with an audio file of the author as well. I guess Robotham is not on the reading list (nor John, Jodi or Vladimir), so I moved on to Book Browse. What a great site for readers! Well worth the time to browse through and revisit. But I was looking for pronunciations. They have quite a variety, my favorite on this page being Cees Nooteboom. Cool name, and we even have a book by him – will have to try it. But still no Robotham. So I did a direct google – how do you pronounce Robotham. I came across a brief discussion on Facebook, and apparently the problem is there is no single pronunciation, but at least there were some suggestions.

So was I successful in my search? Well, at least I have identified a way to pronounce the name, possibly not the right way, but a way. But the big bonus was coming across this article, a very interesting bit about Robotham’s background as a well-known ghost writer. Interesting what all you discover on the road to an answer.

By the way his background as a ghost writer reminded me of the great movie I saw recently . . .


Movies: Ghost writer

Hit or Miss

I have wondered for a long time why some books hit big, and others that come out at the same time, get similar reviews, are similar types of books, just miss.

One that comes to mind is The Dante Club by Matthew Pearl and Dan Brown's The DaVinci Code. I remember reading reviews of both when selecting books from the library's collection and thought they both sounded interesting twists on standard thrillers. They got similar reviews as well - ok but not glowing. So I bought them both, and really, The Dante Club was the one I remembered more from the reviews. But for some reason it was The DaVinci Code that took off and took off huge.

Richard North Patterson and James Patterson started off about the same time - again I remember noting the similarity in name and the fact that they were well-reviewed additions to the thriller genre. I bought both and marveled to see that while they both are best selling authors, James Patterson is crazy popular.

So what is that magical difference? Nowadays, it is often the marketing side, getting onto Oprah, etc. But back when the above examples occurred, each were similarly mild blips on the publishing scene, yet one in each became an overwhelming success. It comes down to word of mouth and having a theme or topic that just hits the public at just the right time. AT that point, success builds on success, it gets into the press and that just pushes it all into overdrive.

A recent example is the "The Girl Who" series. These titles have taken off like crazy - as anyone waiting on the waiting lists for them well knows. I am not sure why they are more popular than other mystery series as I have read equally good stories and series that don't see this kind of popularity. But wow, they are huge. Again - the pattern seems to have been word of mouth leading to heavy press coverage leading to monster success.

There are tons of examples - and I would love to hear yours. Share them so maybe we can start a bit of word of mouth magic. Here's mine - I dare you to read Small Change, by J. Belinda Yandell and explain why it or the author never saw the success of Richard Evans, Robert Waller, or Nicholas Sparks. Good luck finding it, no one in the system even has it anymore, but check the reviews at Amazon - if you are really interested, I can lend you my copy.

Fads vs Staple

We are all familiar with passing fads, those must have things that fade quickly. Pet Rocks or Parachute Pants come to mind. There are those things we think will be a passing craze that seem to linger to become, astonishingly, a staple - saggy pants come to mind on that. Who would think that Marky Mark would have set off a craze that is still with us today.

There doesn't seem to be a discernable reason for one to fade as a fad, and another to stay with us as a staple of life. A fad hits the public's interest at just the right moment, capturing the interest of consumers, pundits and journalists. But what makes it last? What ensures the enduring popularity making it a standard? If there was a way of predicting, marketers and investors would have a much easier time of it.

The idea of fads and staples has been on my mind for a while. Today I came across this video about Mexican Pointy Boots (really you have to stay for the whole video), and combined with a call from Barnes and Noble, it got me wondering why eBooks are showing significant signs of becoming a staple, this time. We librarians see eBooks as just a new format in our array of offerings, a great addition to the Large Print, audiobook, paperback, hardback choices intended to meet the varying needs of our community - that this time around is actually showing signs of staple-dom.

This time? You might well ask. eBooks are not new. I can remember back some 10 or so years when working at the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh, having the Assistant Director, Gladys Maharam, - a true visionary of library service - demonstrating this new gizmo that would allow people to read a book electronically. She saw such a future for them that she had invested in purchasing several, plus the books. She was sure that everyone would be as excited as she was, would understand the potential, and electronic versions of books would be, well, a staple. I guess you realize that it didn't. Didn't even show up as a fad. No one was interested, and nothing came of it - back then.

Fast forward to the present, and suddenly eBooks are the thing. Not a fad, and not the death of the printed book - but something comfortably in between - a staple. Everything has its golden moment - the trick is making the evaluation: fad or staple? The science is making the right evaluation and know where to invest and where to just enjoy the fleeting craze.

Book: Trendwatching: don't be fooled by the next investment fad, mania, or bubble, by Ron Insana
Audiobook: Microtrends: the small forces behind tomorrow's big changes, by Mark Penn.