Like Magic
Sunday, February 14th, 2010
New Bookshelf. And that’s the Olympics on T.V.!
I strongly believe that everyone should have the experience of books that sneak up on them like magic. Loving books can feel lonely sometimes. Not every book is Harry Potter and not everyone understands when you need a week to recover after reading Ender’s Game for the fourth time or what it’s like after discovering Gone with the Wind at fourteen and feeling each of Scarlett’s losses like a physical blow.
One of the best ways to discover books is, of course, the library. I found The Secret Garden at a library and I felt like I was the first person to ever read it. I also spent several months when I was about seven re-typing it painstakingly into the computer, because I wanted to write something just as wonderful.
I got a new bookshelf this weekend because the built-ins were overflowing, and then my overflow bookshelf was overflowing, and then I had moved — seemingly all of the sudden — to a book-organizing system that involved piles of books stacked on my bedroom floor by subject. My roommate, Bonnie, and I purchased a flat screen digital T.V. last week so we could get the new digital T.V. signals and mounting it on the wall allowed us to get rid of the T.V. stand and put a bookshelf in its place.
Organizing the books (by color, as you may or may not have noticed in the picture) got me thinking about the problem of giving books away.
I can’t do it.
The only time I feel good about it is when the book is one I really love and I know the person receiving it will love it as well. For example, I no longer have my orange, hardcover copy of Ramona Quimby, Age 8 because I gave it away to one of the little kids who was in “Annie Get Your Gun” with me last Fall. She had cut her hair in a short, pixie cut for her role as an orphan in “Oliver” a few months earlier, and she looked exactly like Ramona.
I brought the book to rehearsal with me one night and showed it to her, and she stared for a few minutes at the line drawing of a pixie-ish little girl on the cover and said “Yeah, that does look like me!” I had intended to simply lend her the book, but she kept forgetting to bring it back and I told her not to worry. Go ahead and keep it. She gave me a big hug and ran off to be charmingly troublesome backstage, just like Ramona would have.
So. My new bookshelf has inspired me to do some virtual Ramona-type lending. I want to help you discover books that you haven’t read before, but that you will recognize, just like Katherine recognized herself in Ramona. In the comments, post a favorite book of yours. It doesn’t have to be children’s/Y.A. In return, I’ll do a blog post in the coming weeks that talks about a children’s or Y.A. book I think you might like to discover based on what you’ve already read (children’s/Y.A. because it’s my specialty and my favorite thing to read and to write.)
For the first three commenters, I’ll even mail you a copy of the book.
The obvious problem is that you may have already read what I recommend, but I’m hoping that I can get around that with some obscure choices and some pointed questions to commenters (all of whom I expect I will know.)
You may not love the book, but hopefully you’ll love the feeling of knowing that a book was chosen just for you. For readers, I think there’s something special about the books that find us, instead of the other way around.
Also. Today is Lila’s 2nd birthday.
