What is a good book? Nancy Pearl's answer

Nancy Pearl, yup, the one that's the model for the librarian action doll, was recently named Librarian of the Year.  In Library Journal's article about this, Nancy discusses her idea of 'a good book'.  I've highlighted a couple of bits that particularly caught my attention.

What is a “good book”?



As part of the author tour for her newest book, Book Lust To Go: Recommended Reading for Travelers, Vagabonds, and Dreamers (Sasquatch Bks.; LJ Xpress Reviews, 10/8/10), Pearl went to Westport, CT, to “talk about good books” to librarians and library patrons. “By good,” she says, “I don’t mean any literary canon, but just books that you might enjoy. A good book is a book someone likes and a bad book is one they don’t like. When someone doesn’t like a book, it doesn’t mean they will never like it. They don’t like it for that moment,” says Pearl.


“We shouldn’t be afraid to suggest a wide variety of books to people. I think libraries are the last democratic institution, small ‘d’ democratic. It wasn’t always that way. Librarians were gatekeepers.... When it comes to readers’ advisory, though, I think we need to validate a patron’s reading,” Pearl says.


“When people ask, ‘What should I read next?’ we should always try to give them three books. One should be pretty close to the one they loved. The second should be a little bit different, a bit of a stretch. The third book is the real stretch book, the reach book. The book they never would have found because it is nonfiction and they only look at Westerns,” Pearl says.

“People come into the library and head straight to the section where they have found the most pleasure.... It is our job to take them around to the rest,” she ­continues.

“I do believe that the more well-written books you read, the less tolerance you are going to have for bad writing, but the hardest thing to define is a well-written book. When someone tells you they liked a book because ‘I love well-written books,’ they usually mean books like award winners, for instance the Pulitzers. Those books win awards for the writing. You don’t have to understand what somebody means by ‘well-written,’ but you have to go beyond the awards we all know and see which books won the Governor General’s Award in Canada, or [Britain’s] Man Booker Prize. No one who reads for the story will say, ‘I like well-written books.’ They will talk about page-turners, books you stay up too late to finish,” Pearl ­concludes.

Lots of food for thought there.  I'm going to try that three book idea... I think I've been more likely, when kids ask, to find three similar rather than that three book progression.  Not always, but often enough that I should be trying to extend myself, as well as my readers.  Always good to get a new perspective!  Read the complete article here.
 
Cheers
 
Ruth

PS.

A few more thought-provoking quotes from the article:

...she is a passionate and diligent advocate for old and important library ideas: literacy, reading, entertainment, enjoyment.... She is neither snobbish about the old ways nor disdainful of new ideas. Ask her about audio or ebooks or gaming, and you’ll get an earful about the importance of stories told in their myriad forms,” says Janes.
*
says Pearl. “My fear is that we don’t recognize or will forget that library service is like a three-legged stool: information, outreach and programming, and reading.”
*
The book will never disappear as a piece of narrative fiction or nonfiction, according to Pearl, but it is obvious that the format, the way it is delivered, is changing. She knows people will always need escape, stories, and ways to look at the world through the experiences of others.


“I think the more you read, the better person you become, because you can see how other people respond, the way they think, and the way they behave in various circumstances,” Pearl asserts.
*
“When you read a book, it is just you and the author. Even when people read the same title, everybody reads a different book.... When you listen to a book, a third person enters the equation,” Pearl says. “It is a different experience.”

My own holiday reading

Some of the books which have waited for these Easter holidays to find their turn... not necessarily from the shelves of the school library or teenlit.  For one thing, the kids have first dibs on what's in the school library, so if they want it and I want it, no contest - they get it; and for another, there's definitely a to-read pile for me at home unrelated to school (so don't assume these are all school library recommendations - many wouldn't necessarily much interest Young Persons).  What's a holiday without reading, after all?  Thus, in no particular order...

The sweetness at the bottom of the pie by Alan Bradley

and its sequel, The weed that strings the hangman's bag (if it arrives in time, it's published in April).  Flavia de Luce is eleven, and also a private detective with a particular interest in poisons - this sounded entertainingly written from reviews, so I've taken a punt.  (Not necessarily a school library choice, despite her age). 

The piper's son by Melina Marchetta (you're looking at my uncapitalised rendering of the titles and realising that I'm SUCH a librarian in some ways, eh?!) (Loved Saving Francesca; have to read this one, I so hope I enjoy it - I didn't like her last book, Finnikin of the Rock, a venture into fantasy).  Update: I DID like this one, very much.  More suited to older high school students, not only for some language but also ideas being explored.  A really satisfying read with well-drawn characters and well-constructed plot. 

Major Pettigrew's last stand by Helen Simonson (I think the cover was part of what got me in on this one - is that shallow?  Surely not, when I work hard to have lots of covers face-out 'selling' books to kids in our library) (ahem, coughcough)

The double comfort safari club by Alexander McCall Smith (further adventures of Botswana's lady detective, Precious Ramotswe)

Soulless by Gail Carriger (an adventure into steampunk/romance/mystery including vampires, werewolves and parasols - what's not to like about that list??). UPDATE: liked this one very much - a most amusing, light tone to it.  Considering it for the school library, though perhaps tagged for seniors.

Mr Rosenblum's list: or friendly guidance for the aspiring Englishman by Natasha Solomons.  There was an article about NS and this book in Saturday's SMH Spectrum section, but I can't find it online to give you a link.  Had a very funny conversation about holiday reading with a colleague - we both said "Mr Rosenblum" and "Major Pettigrew" almost simultaneously when discussing our Easter holiday choices.  So we'll have to compare notes after.

Comfort food by Kate Jacobs (I liked her earlier one about the Friday night knitting club, even if the ending was a tad manipulative, and I could have happily drowned, or at least read less of, at least two characters.  Hmmm.  That's not sounding like a ringing recommendation, but then again, I have invested in this one... well, I found a second hand copy and thought, why not?)

The girl who kicked the hornets' nest by Stieg Larsson (I've read the first two in the Millennium trilogy and am interested to see the Swedish version of the first book these hols).  Definitely NOT a series for the school library - deals with strong issues and ideas in sometimes difficult detail.  UPDATE: a satisfying, intricately-plotted finale to this trilogy.  Further evidence as to why Steig Larsson's own title for the first book was "Men who hate women", not the title given to the English translation, "The girl with the dragon tattoo".  I gather Larsson's partner is outraged at the change in title, but shallowly, I would guess that the second is a less confronting, more engaging, more intriguing, more reader-pulling title than the original.  Haven't yet seen the film.

The good mayor by Andrew Nicoll

The good thief by Hannah Tinti

This I accomplish by Kyra E. Hicks (on Harriet Powers' quilts - she was a black slave who made the most extraordinary applique quilts - nonfiction)

Love walked in by Marisa De Los Santos (recommended by a friend whose reading tastes I trust)

Still life by Louise Penny (another recommendation from that friend)

The winter vault by Anne Michaels (forget who recommended this, but someone did)

The blue plateau by Mark Tredinnick (nonfiction: hard to categorise, but it's a natural history with stories all about the Blue Mountains, west of Sydney.  Sorta.)

Etcetera: creating beautiful interiors with the things you love by Sibella Court.  I like her aesthetic, her style, even if it sometimes seems financially out of reach.  I get ideas from books like this for things to try in the library, to enhance the environment there.  Some kids lounging on one of the sofas the other day called our library 'homey', in a happy sort of tone - hard to make such a big varied space homey, but the word conjures comfortable, and friendly, and welcoming, and other such useful adjectives liable to encourage them to visit the library and hang about for a while, and I appreciated the compliment.

The wild things by Dave Eggars (didn't get this read when the film came out at the end of last year).

Can a book list be a biography?  I dunno.  It's taken a while to load all these covers, but I thought it would make the blog entry much more interesting than just titles/authors in a list.  I'm planning some leaflets for fiction promotion, and the more I think on them, the more I plan to use covers to help 'sell' the books.

Anything you'd like to recommend?  Leave a comment.

Enjoy your hols!

Skerricks will be back next term, on 19th April 2010, the good Lord willing and the creek don't rise. 

Cheers

Ruth

PS. I do not guarantee to get through all of these - there are other items on the holiday agenda.  But I do plan to make a Good Effort in that regard...

Image sources unless listed below
Soulless

The happy life of teacher librarians: one like Twilight, please

Sometimes it's hard to overestimate the impact Twilight has had on kids' reading.  Apart from the obvious (we have five copies of the first book, multiples of the rest and rarely any on the shelf, plus steady reservations going onto the computer) - it's become a touchstone.  I had this brought home to me again today when a junior English class was in borrowing free choice nonfiction for a class assignment.

"I can't find a book, miss".

"Any ideas, or topics that you're particularly interested in?"

"I want one like Twilight.  It's the only book I've read.  Something to keep me reading like that did."

There's an interesting challenge, isn't it?  We did some fossicking among biographies -  unfortunately Chinese Cinderella and Falling Leaves were out - all our copies of those.  We had one copy of Hana's Suitcase, and various other ones that caught their eye, and in the end they all found something. 

What would you suggest, for a nonfiction book "like Twilight"?  And I'm still thinking over all the implications of "the only book I've ever read".  Whether or not it IS, that's their perception.

Cheers, Ruth

Interactive best seller list

The Wall Street Journal, source of yesterday's article on vampires, has an extensive book section, including an interactive bestseller list where you can see how fiction and nonfiction rate against each other over time, as well as viewing past bestseller lists. Look at it here.

While it is American-focused, I find lots of useful ideas in the online versions of international newspapers. Had you expected the WSJ to range so far from economic and financial matters?