I Have a What?

It was the Printer's Row Lit Fest this past weekend. It could not have been better weather for it. I went on Saturday. It was clear and sunny for the whole day with temperatures in the mid-70's. I have been down there, walking amongst the throngs, when it's been 90 so the fact that it was in the 70's seemed, to me, to be a talisman for excitement and discovery. The camera went missing the evening before. Of course, I found it in the pocket of my messenger bag on Sunday, so I had to take photos with my cell phone. It doesn't look clear but trust me, there was beautiful blue sky with nary a cloud in sight.

I like to get there early because a loathe the crowds that don't allow you to look. A book fair like this, in reality, isn't a place for someone like me. I go with a list of books I am on the prowl to buy. That list, this year, included Erik Larson's most recent which is, now, 2 years old with a paperback version out; any Discworld books I haven't read and given that there are upwards of 25 in the series and I'm really not half-way through them, I should find more than a few I haven't read; and anything by Flannery O'Connor. My best friend, Patt, (not to be confused with my best friend, Pam) sent me a brilliant article discussing some of O'Connor's work. I know 'of' her, but I never took "Contemporary American Literature" while in college so never read anything she wrote. After reading this article, I need to get something and add it to the stack.

Last year, I got a Godzilla poster which, sadly, remains unhung. I just haven't found the right spot for it. So, visiting places with posters is a waste of time. I have no wall space without removing something I currently have on the wall. I have a lot of things unframed that I want displayed, so I passed those booths by. With a list of authors I wanted, I was unmoved by the hardcovers at $5 or the paperbacks at $1. And the sheer crush of people means taking the time I want to browse mean inconveniencing people behind me who also want to see what's offered. So, I wound up doing a quick scan of titles and moving on. I also wish, but I'm sure it's quite impossible, that sellers would organize their offerings better. It would save time for me. I think they feel that if everything is jumbled together, it forces you to linger, to look and will, thereby cause you to find something you didn't know you needed.

I always, always head first to one tent, Lake Claremont Press. This small press is regional publishing at its finest. If you are interested in Chicago and its history, their extensive list of books are sure to have something you will like. My interest in this publisher stems from finding, years ago, a book called "Chicago Haunts" by Ursula Bielski. I get announcements from them and I'm always excited to see what they have on offer, so my first stop at the book fair has always been their tent...except...when I can't find them.

That was the case last year. I walked all over the fair looking for their name on the tent and it was nowhere to be found. What I discovered, the next day by checking out their Facebook page, was that they had been sandwiched into a tent with three other regional presses. I must have walked by them three or four times and never saw the name on the proper side of the tent.

This year was different. Viola.

There is the Lake Claremont Press tent. Four sides of literary goodness. I walked all around looking at the books. I did get "Wrigley Field's Last World Series", a book about the last time the Cubs were in the World Series, 1945. My dad often talked about this event. It will be an interesting read.

But what I really wanted was to check on the upcoming book, "Graveyards of Chicago". I have a copy of this. I've had it for years. It's in the stack to be read. In fact, I found it, pulled it out of the stack and brought it along to show them. I enjoy Ursula's books. I'm pretty sure there are two or three on the shelf in the basement.

As I was standing there, chatting with a gal, a woman came up and I was told to talk to her. So, I showed her the book and asked about the upcoming one.

She looked at my book and said, "Oh my gosh. This is a first edition. Do you realize this sells on eBay for $100 because it's out of print?"

I was floored. (A subsequent search reveals that my pristine copy, which I hadn't gotten around to reading, was worth $150, although it could go higher if I did a bidding war on it.) I have never owned a first edition of any book. I've seen them. I've drooled over the idea of having a first edition, but usually those books are, as this lady said, $100 and up, and I can't really justify spending that kind of money on a book. To possess such a thing, on accident, left me speechless. When I mentioned that I was embarrassed to admit I hadn't even read it yet, the lady said, "Oh don't bother. The new one is coming out soon. I'm really proud of it. We put a lot of work into updating it with more accurate information." That's when it dawned on me. (I can be, admittedly, slow on the uptake sometimes.) I was talking with Ursula herself.

I hope my subsequent comments were not too effusive. I don't run in the circles where the meeting of authors would be commonplace. To actually meet the author of books I have admired and enjoyed was a thrill. I wound up buying "Chicago Haunts 3". It's the next book to be read this summer.

What was also a huge thrill for me was to have Ursula autograph my books. Here's the "Chicago Haunts 3" autograph.

And yes, I had her autograph, personally, the first edition. That does diminish its value, but I am NOT selling it. This falls into the "prized possession" category now. I have a personalized, autographed first edition AND I met the author.

I didn't find anything else at the fair and, actually, I didn't really care. This was an amazing set of occurrences. This 15 minutes made my whole day. In the grand scheme of finding things to be grateful for, I can live off this event for weeks. That might seem like hyperbole, but it's things like this that make me really happy. Now I have to make time to find the other titles I own by Ursula and arrange all of these on a shelf where they are visible.

Beverage:  Yorkshire Gold tea

Deb

Day 29- An Author that you completely avoid/hate wont read

Never mind that he is considered an icon of American Literature. Never mind that everything he wrote is considered a classic by any standard. I suffered through several of Faulkner's short stories in my American Literature class in college. I found his writing dense, hard to read and understand. It was as if he was writing around what his topic was and never to the topic. I have to guess what this means? Sometimes, I don't mind, but when the whole story felt like that, I couldn't imagine reading a whole book written in that fashion.

Hence, thanks but no thanks. If you're a friend, don't buy me any Faulkner. Don't recommend any to me. I don't care if Go Down, Moses is your favorite novel of all time, I'm not interested in reading it. I'll be nice and polite when you hand it to me and say, "You simply MUST read this", but I'll "accidentally" leave it in a store somewhere.

Sometimes, I am willing to give someone another chance, as I did with Moby Dick. Other times, nope, not on a bet. Faulkner is an "other time".

Beverage:  Huckleberry tea

Deb

Day 26-A Book you wish would be written

I don't have an idea for this topic. It's been bugging me all morning. Do some work. Stop. Think about the topic. Do more work. Stop. Think some more.

On Wednesday, I said there's never not going to be a need or desire to tell stories as long as we communicate. The topics we use, the language we use, the manner in which we tell our stories reveal a lot about who we are and our desire to communicate our wants and needs to others.

The writing of a book is a very personal adventure, regardless of whether your book is set in the here and now and deals with the guy across the street and his vegetable garden or if it's set on a world where rabbits rule and humans are the ones who steal the carrots in the middle of the night. Every book, even the terribly awful one by John Travolta which I used at the beginning of the month, is a window into the author's soul, his or her thoughts and feelings and how they view life.

When I read fiction, I gravitate toward those books deemed "classics". This generally means something written before 1920. There are writers whose works have entered the literary pantheon and who lived and still live in current times. I might get to them some day.

I gravitate towards non-fiction. I believe part of that is my life-long desire for knowledge. One of my favorite aphorisms is "The truly educated never graduate." Non-fiction fills the desire to know and to learn.

When, in my infrequent forays into bookstores, I wander about, I realize there are books about pretty much anything. Cooking:  Vegan, Gluten Free, Making Cheese. I typed "Arthritis Cooking" in the Barnes and Noble search engine and up popped 32 different results. Some are the same book in hardcover and paperback, but there's a cookbook for what I'm going through.

I typed in "Counted Cross-Stitch" and up popped 45 results. And if I type in "Cats", I have over 700 choices to peruse. Erik Larson of Isaac's Storm and Devil in the White City fame has a new book out. I didn't know about that. I'll have to see if I can save up for it. So what could I possibly want to read that hasn't been written?

I thought of something as I was perusing the virtual stacks in the fields I enjoy. There isn't a biography of Terry Pratchett, author of Discworld. Perhaps that is by design, but someone needs to be working on that as he has Altzheimers. 

Beverage:  English Breakfast tea

Deb

Day 23- Favorite Romance Novel

You will never catch me reading a romance novel. I have, in my day, read a few 'bodice-rippers', but I find the whole genre distasteful. I can't even remember the name of the author of the book I read. I don't remember the book's title. I remember the cover graphics as some woman leaning against some man with the moon reflecting off the ocean. I think it was the ocean. Or maybe that was a flashlight and they were hiding from the police? I don't know. Girl meets bad boy. They date. He does something that honks her off. She can't stop thinking about him. They meet up. He tries to change but can't. She realizes that he's just misunderstood...gag. Sorry. If I want science fiction, I'll read Larry Niven.

So, what do I put for this category? Well, let's go backwards in time to the Victorian era. Not all 'romance' novels have to have Fabio on the cover. Some can feature an idyllic path through green grass next to a babbling brook. Two sisters and another woman probably could be considered the mothers of romance writing, but what they wrote falls under the "classics" section of the bookstore.

I choose Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte. This is the only book Emily wrote. If you don't know the story; girl, whose father owns the manor house, hires boy who is beyond rough around the edges. The two fall in love but because of his status, they are prohibited from marrying. Through a series of misadventures and ill-timing, they marry others, but their spheres of life intersect repeatedly. The boy leaves and returns rich and with status. The former lovers meet. She dies later after giving birth to a daughter. He has a son by a wife he detests. He falls into madness, hearing her ghost throughout the house. When he dies, his son and her daughter realize they are in love and will be wed on New Year's Day to start a new and positive branch of the forlorn tree.

It's taught in school as a book about revenge and how obsession and revenge comes back to haunt you. It played on the Victorian sense of anyone could raise themselves up through hard work to become a noble but the price paid could be loneliness. Neither of the book's main characters, Heathcliff and Catherine, get what they want and the decisions they make are not about being true to themselves.

It's a pot boiler, to be sure. You can sometimes see what's coming long before it gets there, but, with a sumptuous setting and well defined characters, the passion comes through on each page. Read the book and then go rent the movie starring Laurence Olivier and Merle Oberon. Although the second generation, Heathcliff and Catherine's children, are omitted from the movie, this is my favorite adaptation of the book. Olivier should have won the Oscar for his portrayal of Heathcliff. He was up against someone named Clark Gable for something called "Leaving with the Breeze" or something like that. (For the record, Robert Donat won for Goodbye Mr. Chips.)

Beverage:  Dr Pepper

Deb

Beverage:  Dr Pepper

Day 12- A book so emotionally draining you couldn’t complete it or had to set aside for a bit

I read this originally in high school and didn't "get" it. My high school English teacher, as I've mentioned before, felt I needed to be exposed to a wide variety of reading material. This, and Hard Times, were the two books of Dickens she recommended I read. I have no current recollection of Hard Times. I might not have any recollection of A Tale of Two Cities except I had to read David Copperfield, Bleak House and Great Expectations in college so I figured I'd reread this.

I owned a copy of A Tale of Two Cities so I could take my time reading it. Okay, it's about the problems with the French peasantry up to the French Revolution. There is no question Dickens is a good writer, but, boring. I had plowed through it in high school to move on to something else. Now, in college, I had the time to read and savor what I was reading.

There is a reason "classics" are so labeled. By the time I got to the third section of the book, I had bonded with Sydney Carton, Charles and Lucie Darnay and Dr. Manette. I was well aware of the ending but when Carton makes the decision to take Darnays place at the guillotine, I understood what he was doing.

It is a far, far better thing that I do, than I have ever done; it is a far, far better rest that I go to, than I have ever known.

I had to set the book down. There were only about 10 pages left but I couldn't read them at that time. Carton's sacrifice was too great. It would be almost a week before I picked the book back up and finished it. I remember telling a couple of people, "Now I know why this is considered a classic".

Beverage:  English Breakfast tea

Deb

Day 5- A Non-fiction book that you actually enjoyed

Non-fiction is my preferred genre. If you look at my stacks, you'll see more non-fiction than fiction. When I read fiction, I tend toward classics or other books by an author I've already read and like. I see book referrals as very subjective. What I like, you may not. Hence I hesitate to give someone an opinion on a book. I don't want to saddle them with a book they won't finish.

The list seems to think that people prefer fiction and that non-fiction is something people read because they have to, not because they want to. So, thinking of a book that fit this category has been hard. I have actually broken my self-imposed rule today and spent the whole day thinking about this because nothing popped into my head right away.

I enjoy historical fiction or books that take an event and expand on it, filling in details they really can't know. Eric Larson writes good non-fiction, historical fiction, books. I can heartily recommend his books Isaac's Storm which is about the Galveston hurricane, and Devil in the White City which is about the World Columbian Exposition in Chicago. They are very well researched and well-written. The topics appealed to me so I wasn't surprised when I enjoyed these books. I also enjoyed Galileo's Daughter by Dava Sobel. That is the story of Galileo's oldest daughter who supported her father through his inquisition and trial by the Catholic church. But, when I saw this on the shelf, it was intriguing so I was prepared to like it and wasn't surprised when I did.

I finally decided I needed to come home and look through my book journal. A lot of serious readers whom I know have one or two or three of these. Mine dates from the late 1980's. You can see it's a bit worn on the edges.

What does this do, you ask? In this book, I kept a record of about 15+ years of the books I read. There is the title, the author, a small review and the date I read the book. In the back is a section for books lent, which I don't do unless it's a book I don't care if I don't get back, and a pocket to put clippings of books I'd like to read. This book is a bit warped because that back pocket got overfull. I finally took all the clippings out and wrote them in yet another book as one massive "To Be Read" list.

The book is organized alphabetically. The alphabet is done in a collage format with references to books beginning with that letter and, the real reason I got it, each letter is a different typeface. A small history of the typeface is given. As an example, here is the page for "T".

"T"is for trees. 

Some letters, like "B" and "D" have their sections full so I've got a smaller-in-size book that I have turned to for the overflow. It's the same principle, alphabetical sections where you can discuss books. 

I spent some time when I got home from work, rereading over a decade of literature. "Oh yeah! I liked that book. Yup. That one was a stinker." There were themes, a whole bunch of the same kind of book read one after another. There were random books. There were kids and young adult books. In the end, I found the book that fits today's theme, John Steinbeck's Travels with Charley. 

The "Charley" of the title is Steinbeck's dog. I'm not fond of Steinbeck's writing. I think, like Moby Dick, it's because I had to read Of Mice and Men and then the teacher for that class over did the themes of the book. Too much time was spent on it. It was at the end of the semester and I think my brain was too fried to appreciate it. 

I don't remember where I got my copy of Travels with Charley. I was looking for something reasonably quick to read, something I could shove in my purse and something that didn't lose momentum if I only read it at swimming lessons. I saw this and thought, "Ewww. Steinbeck. Oh well, it's short. I'll try it."

I read this in January of 1990 and my review is,

I was rather amazed, as I read, that the observations made in 1960 are still relevant, poignant and real some 30 years later. He talks about garbage and growth and change in cities. He discusses racism and traveling and coming home. Maybe the more things change, the more they really do stay the same at their core. 

I don't know if I still have this book or if it has long since been given away. I am wondering, having read my review, if I would think the same thing some 51 years after Steinbeck's journey. 

Beverage:  Huckleberry tea

Deb

Day 4- A Book that reminds you of home

As I don't look ahead in the list, I don't know what the next topic is. I'm forcing myself not to over think these. What is the first book that comes to mind when I see the topic? This was the first head scratcher.

The first thing that popped into my head was My Antonia by Willa Cather. But, as I thought about it, it doesn't relate much to home. It's a good book and you should read it, but, for me, it doesn't fit this theme.

Well, what is home? I have lived in Wheaton for 30 years now. I need to do a blog post on that but I first have to find some representative photos to scan for the post. Thirty years is a long time to live in one place. We are a nation of wanderers. I remember reading that the average family stays in a home from 3-5 years before moving to something that more meets their needs. I am, it would seem, something of an anomoly in living in the same place for such a long time. What's interesting is I'm not the person whose been on the block the longest. But I will say that my block has quite a bit of permanence to it. We went through a time when a few homes were turning over every 2-3 years, but we now have families who are quite content to have their kids grow up here, within walking distance of an elementary school, and a short drive to everything else.

And yet, when I talk about "home", it's not Wheaton. I've blogged about this before, how I am indelibly attached to Iowa although I haven't lived there since the 1970's. I have a WOW friend (meaning I met him while playing World of Warcraft) who could not wait to leave when he graduated college. "Deb, if I don't get out, I fear I will be stuck here forever." Part of me identifies with that. Who wants to feel they are stuck? But I can think of worse, much worse places to be 'stuck' than in Iowa.

So, contemplating all these things, I remembered a book I have in the pile and selected it. This is the best of the images I could find online. This is an oversize book that is a reproduction of postcards from the turn of the 19th-20th Century Iowa. I thought the book cover was a light blue background, not pink. I'll have to check.

Why select this? Well, I grew up at a time and in a place where life was not the hectic and often brutal pace we find now. It still isn't. Yes, you can get WiFi, DSL, cable and all those other 'modern' conveniences we have come to take as necessities. But you can also find horse-drawn wagons, threshing machines, corn boils, kids playing stick ball in the park with nary a supervisory adult in attendance. Places shown on the postcards are recognizable and, "Hey! That building is still standing." For me, there is an instant connection to what I remember growing up.

Is this total nostalgia? Yes, yes it is. I don't wish for things to be like they were. We didn't have air conditioning and this summer would have been beyond brutal. I like visiting the past. I don't think I'd like living there again.

And that's what this book means to me. It reminds me of a past I lived and enjoyed at the time. I might have been 70 years removed from when the first Model T wandered down main street in Dubuque, but I knew people who remembered that event.

The title refers to the movie "Field of Dreams".

John Kinsella: Is this heaven?
Ray Kinsella: It's Iowa.
John Kinsella: Iowa? I could have sworn this was heaven. 

Maybe, in a way, it is heaven for some of us.

Beverage:  Edinburgh's Finest tea

Deb

Day 3-A Book that completely surprised you (bad/good)

This was going to be another easy book to pick. Moby Dick by Herman Melville.

I had to read it in "American Literature" class in college. We spent an inordinate amount of time on this, never really getting through the first 6 chapters. There was, in the instructor's view, so much to address, but we had at least 10 more books to discuss before the semester ended so she had us read the last 3 chapters and skip the middle. It fell into the 'loathed' category only because we spent way too much time on it.

But, three years after graduating college, I was looking for something to read and found the slightly battered copy in a box. As this is considered a classic, I felt I should give it another try. Low and behold, once I got past the chapter discussing the minutiae of whaling and the chapter on the different kinds of whales which were hunted, which fell into the first 8 chapters, I got to the middle and it was funny. As Melville discussed life on the whaling boat and added more nuances of character to Captain Ahab, Queequeg and Ishmael, he brought out the humanity of those on the boat and that humanity was, at times very funny.

I knew Melville had taken jobs on ships, including a whaling vessel, but the depth of that experience really comes through later in the novel. As Ahab's obsession grows, Melville weaves into the narrative just enough factual information that the story stays grounded in reality. It makes the ending all the more powerful. You've just got to get through the first 8-9 chapters.

In looking for an appropriate illustration for this post, I found this. This is NOT Moby Dick. First of all, the ship is not correct. That is not a whaling ship of the 19th Century. This is Jaws masquerading as Moby Dick. The only thing the two have in common is that they take place on the ocean. There are documented stories of whales attacking and sinking whaling boats. Early whaling was a very treacherous occupation. But this book cover doesn't relate to the story. Someone picking this up thinking they are going to get a book about a monster whale attacking ships in the 20th century is going to be disappointed.

This book is quite ingrained in our culture, too. My friend, Sheila, posted to my Facebook note about this that she became interested in reading the original when one of the Star Trek books she was reading had Mr. Spock go back in time and become the "Ishmael" who is the narrator. The opening line, "Call me 'Ishmael'" can be sometimes written as "Call me, Ishmael".

The online game I play, "World of Warcraft" is well known for slathering pop culture references throughout the game. One of the most interesting boss kills is the whale shark. When you kill him, you get the achievement, "From Hell's Heart, I Stab at Thee", which is a direct quote from Chapter 135, and are the final words Ahab says,

Towards thee I roll, thou all-destroying but unconquering whale; to the last I grapple with thee; from hell’s heart I stab at thee; for hate’s sake I spit my last breath at thee. Sink all coffins and all hearses to one common pool! and since neither can be mine, let me then tow to pieces, while still chasing thee, though tied to thee, thou damned whale! Thus, I give up the spear!

The World of Warcraft achievement says, "Kill a whale shark in spite of or because he drops no loot."  I hope this is just enough information that someone who plays the game will investigate more and, ultimately, pick up the book and read it. I hope they will be as pleasantly surprised as I was.

Beverage:  Edinburgh's Finest Tea

Deb