book ends book list: The Shame of the Nation

8. The Shame of the Nation, by Jonathan Kozol was another required classroom read for me this semester, and although it was a long, tedious book (over 300 pages), I ended up being heavily influenced by the book. Kozol has spent nearly fifty years working with children, teachers, and parents of our nation's school system, and has written over a dozen books about his experiences. In Shame of the Nation, Kozol speaks eloquently about the voluntary resegregation of our school systems in the years since the Brown v. Board of Education vote in 1954--and I'll admit that I was shocked to read about schools within walking distance of each other, one 95% White and another 95% Black and Hispanic. Not only does Kozol share very convincing numbers that paint a picture of a segregated America, but he also conveys horror stories about the quality of the education at the schools full of minorities. From things like forcing students to choose a career path during their freshman year in high school--and not allowing students to change their minds about that path later in their schooling--to the very conditions that the children were learning under--in rat-infested classrooms, and under instruction by teachers who are more like military drill sergeants than educators--this book was indeed an eye-opener for me.

Not only did I read this book for class, but I also was lucky enough to hear Jonathan Kozol speak at my school for Roosevelt University's 2010 One Book, One University lecture. As he stood before the packed room, seventy-something years old, and in fine-rimmed glasses and a striped purplish shirt, Kozol demanded the attention of the entire audience. He spoke of Pineapple, a girl he befriended and watched grow in the public school system of New York, and time he spent with Mister Rogers, introducing him to educators at these school systems.

When a member of the audience asked Kozol what those who weren't educators could do about the state of education as it stands today, he had one piece of advice: "Don't go easy on Barack Obama." Kozol, a supporter of Obama, said something that I don't think is said enough: to "be tougher on your friends than your enemies."

The end of Kozol's lecture brought many of the listeners to tears, as he said to the room, "My friends, life goes so fast. Use it well." It definitely was an inspiration to hear this from a man who has used his many years well, and will continue to do so, as long as he's here.

L. Stacks

book ends book list: Indignation

7. During the semester, I often struggle with finding time to read for fun. But I know that it's an important part of the writer's life--to read books that will inspire us and teach us something new. So, I've been restraining from trying to do homework on the train to and from school, and instead, I only let myself read something that's "for fun." Somehow, even with just ten minutes here and there, I finished my seventh book of the year in just over a week. (It helped that it was short.) My current fiction professor recommended Phillip Roth's Indignation to me after reading a chapter of my novel. It would help me better understand the mindsets of college kids in the mid-twentieth century, he said. And it really did. Indignation is a story about the most uptight kid you could ever meet--Marcus--and his experiences at an equally uptight Christian college in the midwest, all the while as he is trying to not get in over his head with a girl who had a history of problems with alcohol (gasp!). What I liked the most about this book was how deeply embedded we were into the mind of the main character, and how his motives were very easy to understand, even though they were murky and muddled, as motives so often are.

L. Stacks

book ends book list: Cultural Literacy

6. (Yes, I am including books that I read for class in this list. It seems to me that if I spent time reading it, it should count, no matter what it is about.) In this case, book #6, Cultural Literacy: What Every American Needs to Know by E.D. Hirsch, Jr., was about one main thing: cultural literacy (imagine that). Cultural literacy is all the "stuff" that makes up our culture, or as Hirsch explains, "the basic information needed to thrive in the modern world"--from superman to Custer's last stand to Elvis to the idiom "the pen is mightier than the sword." The first 140 pages of this book deal with the "problem" in our society today, the decline of cultural literacy among young people. To be honest, I didn't agree with a lot of what Hirsch says in this book: I don't think it's as easy as having one list that every American is expected to know in order to succeed in our country. However, I do agree that many without this knowledge do have a much harder time succeeding. I'm not sure that this is exactly fair, but then again, what is?

My favorite part of this book is the last 100 pages or so, which is a full list of everything Hirsch thinks that we should know. Some of the stuff is ridiculously simple (Denver, CO, Jack and Jill, Star Wars), some is indeed important (D-day, Leonardo Da Vinci, I Have A Dream) and some of these things I have never heard of (fiddle while Rome burns, Jolly Roger, The Secret Life of Walter Mitty). If you ever see this book in a bookstore or a library it's worth looking at the list of 5,000 "essential" names, dates, phrases, and concepts just to judge a culturally literate you are. And to laugh that "penis envy" is actually included in the list.

book ends book list: Gang Leader for a Day

5. This semester, I was given the opportunity to participate in a teaching internship for a composition course at Roosevelt. This internship entails teaching, grading, holding office hours, writing up a syllabus, and participation in class discussion. Sudhir Venkatesh's Gang Leader for a Day is the main text for this course, in order to push students to think about the process of writing about issues in their present communities, and the relationships between the researcher and the subject. While this was a book for class, I read it as quickly as if it were a book for leisure. In the book, Sudhir is studying sociology at the University of Chicago in the mid-1990s, when he becomes friends with a powerful gang leader. Not only does Sudhir get an inside look at gang life and living in the projects, he also receives valuable information about these gang members' financial lives and the ins-and-outs of drug dealing. As I read this account, I found myself greedily taking in all of the unique details of this life so many people never even begin to fathom. While at times I found myself a little underwhelmed with some of Vankatesh's writing, the story never ceased to hold my attention. I would definitely recommend this to anyone interested in learning more about gang life and the south side Robert Taylor Homes, or simply anyone looking for a unique tale.

L. Stacks

book ends book list: Mrs. Somebody Somebody

4. Lately, I've been in a funk in my novel-writing. My novel is set in the 1930s, 40s and 50s for the most part, and I've been having trouble getting the voice just right. Luckily, my professor Scott Blackwood recommended this lovely collection of stories by Mrs. Somebody Somebody by Tracy Winn. I think that if I hadn't just finished this great book, I would have enjoyed Mrs. Somebody Somebody a lot more--but it ended up being just a bit overshadowed for me. I really enjoyed several of Winn's stories, especially the first and the last in the collection, both of which contain Stella, the great main character of the novel, in my opinion. After the vibrancy of Strout's characters in Olive Kitteridge, some of the characters in Winn's stories fell a bit flat for me. However, I think that spending 180 pages in a small town in the mid-twentieth century has helped to give me more inspiration for my own work. If my work could be half as gritty as Winn's and a third as lovely as Strout's, I would be satisfied.

L. Stacks

book ends book list: Olive Kitteridge

3. While traveling between California locations, I read the Pulitzer Prize-winning Olive Kitteridge by Elizabeth Strout, and could barely put it down, even in the sunny California weather. In my creative nonfiction class this past semester, my professor had mentioned reading the book, and that she was amazed by the passion behind the novel in short stories. Needless to say, I need a little passion back in my own writing, and I think this book was just what I needed right now. Each and every story was poignant, incredibly sad, and so, so true. The characters were so real--not necessarily loveable at all times, but real, and thoughtful and sensitive. I can only hope to write one story that could be as touching as any of the nine within this book. I definitely recommend this book, and especially to my writer friends out there: and may we all put more heart into our stories.

L. Stacks

book ends book list: Me & Emma

2. Me & Emma had been recommended to me by several of my friends, and so I decided to start it yesterday morning while I sat in the sun by the pool. I'd never heard of Elizabeth Flock or any of her books, but I had an open mind. Me & Emma was an easy read. I haven't read a full book in one day in a loooong time, but I did just that with this nearly 300-pager. The book is written through the perspective of 8-year-old Carrie, and so is easy to fall into and to understand. However, I kept finding myself thinking that the ages were a tad off--sometimes Carrie would think and do things that I thought would be more like what a 12-year-old would, and at other times she would act far younger than 8. I suppose I could have been thinking too hard, though. Similarly, I felt that most of the character were simply shells of the stereotypes holding them together: abusive stepfather, beaten-down mother, white-trash children. While I didn't think that this book was particularly well-written, it was engaging. The plot held my attention throughout the book. However, I was a little annoyed by the ending. I don't want to emit any spoilers out there to the blog world, but let me just say that I had a small inkling of what could possibly happen around page 150, and thought to myself: I am going to be pretty upset if that's what goes down. And I was pretty upset, to put it mildly. And I'm still unsure of how I feel about that.

Balboa Island today, and we're off to L.A. tomorrow!! I can't wait to share my pictures once I'm back home.

L. Stacks

book ends book list: The History of Love

My friend and fellow blogger, Lori Rader Day does this really cool thing that I've decided to borrow for the year 2010. In 2009, she kept track of each book she read for the year, and blogged a short description/review of each book. For several years I have thought about keeping track of my reading each year, but always fail to do so. But 2010 seems the perfect time to finally do so.

So... I'm introducing my first "book ends book list" post!

1. My first book of the year was a novel, The History of Love, by Nicole Krauss. I had been pining after this book ever since I saw a quote from it on this wedding invitation: "Once upon a time there was a boy who loved a girl, and her laughter was a question he wanted to spend his whole life answering." Just like I suspected, I loved this book. It started a little slow (once you get past the first 20 pages, you will be smitten!) but Krauss' language and beautiful lyricism kept me going from the start. The History of Love is a story about Alma Singer, a teen trying to discover a way to make her widowed mother happy again, and leo Gursky, an old man who longs to write a publishable novel, hopes for his son's acceptance, and is obsessed with thinking about his own death. Vital to this book is another book (also titled The History of Love): one written, published, and held dear by many who had read it, or had the book read to them. I found myself racing through the book in order to figure out how Alma and Leo were connected, and ever-hoping for excerpt after excerpt of the original The History of Love. I loved how the book jumped from Alma's POV to Leo's, and the slightly experimental form. This book definitely rang in a new year in a good way for me.

(P.S. Isn't Alma such a great name?! I adore it.)

L. Stacks