Nonfiction Book Reviews

Confession: I am just not into the internet memes that go around the internet.  They’re like a virus, spreading from blog to blog, tying up time that could otherwise be spent doing something useful, like watching paint dry.

I know, I know, I should tell you how I really feel, right?

But I just can’t help myself - internet memes just seem like such a waste of time.  And so it was with trepidation that I saw that there is a massive one happening today, called the International Thank All of Your Entrecard Droppers Day (or something like that) where everyone who uses the Entrecard system is supposed to write up a post, linking to the top droppers for the month on their site.

Well, I have to say that yes, I like Entrecard, and yes, I am glad that people come and visit my site through the EC system.  But a thousand times better than a simple drop from EC is someone taking the time to write up a comment and leaving it for me, to give me some feedback, insight, or even just give me some laughs!

So instead of writing up the list of EC droppers, I am going to list out the Top 10 Commentors (ie, the Ten Coolest People You’ll Ever Meet) on my site this month.  That, to me, thanks the people who really added something to my site, instead of the people who just drop and run.

Of course, this meant that instead of just going to my EC admin panel and looking at my stats to see who I should link to, I’ve actually had to go through and count my comments by hand.  You can give me lots of pity - I’ll let you, promise.

Actually, being the obsessive compulsive spreadsheet maker that I am, I put together a spreadsheet so I could make sure to keep everything straight (not to mention that I just like making spreadsheets.  Everything is so neat and orderly in a spreadsheet.  It’s okay - you can call me crazy if you want to.  Most people do.)  So honestly, this was kinda fun.

Now we’re back to the whole crazy thing, aren’t we?

Well anyway, after compiling the numbers, I found out the following:

I’ve had four family members leave comments on my site (so much for making fun of my family behind their back…) plus five coworkers comment on here (how am I supposed to make fun of them behind their backs, either?!) and a whopping 65 unique commentors total.  That was pretty cool to see - that means that although my family and coworkers obviously love me (as they well should) that there are other people in this world who love me too.  Who knew?

So onto the list.  I’m focusing here, really.

First Place goes to Stephanie Barr of Rocket Scientist, without a doubt.  Apparently she’s spent enough time on my site, I might as well put her on the payroll and keep her here permanently.  With 34 comments, she rivals even me in chattiness.  Not something people can normally accomplish - well done, Stephanie, well done.

Be sure to go check out Stephanie’s site - she has an unusual blog topic (yes, she really is a rocket scientist) and her posts are simply awesome.  I don’t comment on her site nearly as often as she comments on mine, but that’s probably just cause she’s way cooler than me.

Second Place goes to Ruthie at A Jedi’s Musings.  Despite what you might think, she doesn’t actually put up YouTube videos of Star Wars videos, but instead writes reviews of books in the sci-fi and fantasy genre (with the occasional mystery book thrown in for good measure).  If you’re into that genre, then you’ll definitely want to go check her site out.

Third Place goes to Callista of SMS Book Reviews.  She writes reviews of nonfiction and children’s books, and it was from her that I heard about The Knife of Never Letting Go by Patrick Ness.  I thought it sounded like an interesting book, so I checked it out of the library, and yeah, it was fun. :-)  I love books that stay with you long after you close the book, and Knife does that.  I keep looking at my dogs, expecting them to talk. Anyway, if you love book review blogs, SMS is another great one to check out.

Fourth Place is Ravyn at Exchange of Realities.  If you’re really into RPG or D&D games (and if you don’t know what those acronyms stand for, then HINT: You’re not into them!) then you’ll love Ravyn’s site.  She is a talented writer, so go enjoy!

Fifth Place goes to my sister, Sariah, and her fun blog called Sagebrush and Hollyhocks.  I actually helped her set the site up, but she’s since done a ton to it that I never even had to show her how to do - way to go, sis!   She started that blog as a blogging newbie, but she’s really done awesome things there.  She’s a homeschooling mom, so if you do that yourself, be sure to check her site out.

Sixth Place goes to The Secret of Newton, a blog that I found through Rocket Scientist, actually.  Brian is pretty new into the blogging world, but it doesn’t show.  His posts are funny and informative, and you leave feeling like you’ve actually done something constructive with your time.  Two thumbs up for Secret of Newton.

Seventh Place goes to laneerg at The Single Frugalton.  Along with great tips on how to make your dollar go farther, she also has funny stories and a great writing style to boot.  Not to mention that she’s a readaholic like me, so really, what could be better?  Be sure to swing by her site.

Eighth Place goes to Flit at Flitting on Fiction.  Flit makes me laugh - she is in college too, so I get to read all about all of the fun she’s having (her English class sounds like H*ll on Earth!) and then there’s her rants and raves about her local library…It’s surprising that she wants to come to my site at all, considering how bad her local library is.  I’m just glad that my library has it together a little better than that.

To round out the top ten, I have two people who do not have websites themselves, but still deserve thanks because they’ve spent a lot of time leaving comments on my site. Ann and Chris, you know who you are.  You guys rock.

Want to be on this list next month?  Well, good luck, ’cause knowing me, I won’t put one together next month.  But just in case, you ought to leave a comment every day, on the very off chance that I’ll sing your praises next month.  No really, you should, I promise.

Thanks to all of my commentors for their insights and humor - it’s been real.  It’s been fun.  Heck, I’ll go the whole 8 yards and say that it’s been real fun.

Hava

PS Today.com has changed it so we can play around with our colors and stuff.  Whadaya think of the new look?  I’m open to any and all suggestions!

PPS For any Today.com bloggers out there reading this post, be sure to vote in the Blogger’s Choice Award of the Month thread on the forums.  Somehow, I strangely managed to get on that list, so even better than just voting would be to vote for me.  I’ll slip a $5 later, k?  And if you’re not a Today.com blogger, sadly enough, you will not be able to access that forum, but thanks for wanting to try anyway.  I appreciate your willingness to be bought for $5.

Although I tend to focus on adult nonfiction books, I do occasionally review children’s nonfiction books too. This is one of those books - if you’re interested, you can find other reviews of children’s books here.

Before I started at the library, I had never heard of the “You Wouldn’t Want to…” series, but now I see the books pass through the library all the time.

You Wouldn’t Want to be an Aztec Sacrifice by Fiona MacDonald is just one of many in the series - other examples are You Wouldn’t Want to be a Viking Explorer or You Wouldn’t Want to Work on the Railroads.  They tend to focus on the more gory aspects of history; the things that a boy in elementary school would think is fascinating, but which the “normal” textbooks tend to pass over.

In You Wouldn’t Want to be an Aztec Sacrifice: Gruesome Things You’d Rather Not Know, the author takes you from the beginning: Who the Aztecs are and who “you” are (yes, everything happens in the present tense, and it all happens to you - the author tells you “Now you are doing this.  Now you are feeling that.”  Etc.  Except not in a boring way, promise.)  Eventually, you get captured in battle and eventually end up as a human sacrifice to the gods (and in case you were wondering, no, no last minute save happens - you really do die as a sacrifice.  I had kinda thought that a “But wait!” moment would happen, and you’d be saved.  Nope - you die.)

The illustrations are bright, colorful, and eye-catching.  I found a two-page spread online that I could download, so here’s two pages in the middle of the book:

I found that the book was both gruesome and humorous. That’s not normally a combination I find in reading materials, but I think the book will strike just the right chord for its intended audience - 4th to 6th grade boys. It is historically accurate (okay, not so much the pictures per say, but the facts and history in the book) and for kids who normally find history “bor-ring!” and “Can’t we do something else?” this might be just the ticket to spike their interest.

MacDonald’s right - I don’t want to be an Aztec sacrifice, but I did enjoy this book, and I would want to read more in the same series.  With an eye towards my eventual job as a teacher, I have to say that I’m excited about this series - I think this is a great way to connect with kids who might not otherwise care.  I give it 4.5 stars out of 5.

Hava

I watched the video below a couple of days ago, and have been trying ever since to come up with a smashing good reason as to why it fits my blog topic (ie, what excuse can I come up with to post it on here?)  Quite honestly, I never did come up with a segue. But, I’m sitting here on the couch, trying to recover from my cleaning spree, and my in-laws are going to be here in three minutes, and I just thought, “Oh heck, why not?”  What’s the fun of having a blog if you can’t post off-topic every once in a while, right?

Now bear in mind when you watch this: It was done by the fine folks at The Onion, and they make their living by putting together satirical videos - one big joke from beginning to end. Basically, whatever you watch with The Onion logo on it is sure to be nothing but a big pile of B.S. They make it look real though - they never break from character, and an unsuspecting (and pretty thick-headed) person might fall for it.

After you watch it, make sure to scroll down for The Rest of the Story.

Hilarious, yes? Well, what made it even funnier is the fact that I found this on another blog, posted by someone who took the video very seriously.  I won’t name the website - protect the innocent (and the dense) is my motto.  Or something like that….But it gets better: Not only did the person posting the video think it was serious, so did (to date) 7 other people who all left comments on the post. Things like this were said:

Not sure about this. I think I had to try it myself first but maybe it can help some people.

It’s very innovative, but I agree I think I would miss my keyboard.

I think I would miss my keyboard! Neat idea though!

You cannot make this up if you tried.

I left a comment on the site, stating that relying on The Onion for real news is like relying on Saturday Night Live to supply your evening news, but not two days later, along comes someone else, all excited at this “great” idea. I’m guessing that not only are people completely gullible, but they also don’t read the comments written by others.

Well, I’ll be back tomorrow, and I might even write a book/library related blog then.

Maybe.

Hava
Who’s prayin’ the MIL doesn’t show up with white glove in hand, ’cause her house just ain’t that clean…

Before I left for work tonight, my husband says, “When you get back, we’ll need to work on straightening up the living room and dining room.  I’m going to vacuum and sweep while you’re gone.”  Umm…okay.  I didn’t see the reason why he felt the sudden need to clean the house, but hey, who am I to look a gift horse in the mouth?  Clean away, babe, clean away.  And off I went to work.

When I got back home, I straightened some things, put my mountains of books on the bookshelves, etc, and figured, hey, good enough for tonight.  We can always finish tomorrow.  I went in to tell my husband that, and he says, “Well, I guess that gives us enough time.  My parents will arrive around 4:00.”  My jaw dropped to the floor.  “Your parents?!  Your parents are coming here, tomorrow?!  When were you planning on telling me this?!!!!”

“Oh well, uh…I thought you’d remember.”

Apparently, I was informed of this plan a while ago.  Hmmph.  I gave my husband the steely glare.  “You honestly thought I’d remember that.  Me, the wife with the attention span of a gnat, would remember something you told me weeks ago.”

“Well…ummm…”

Yeah, that’s what I thought.

You see, it wouldn’t be so bad, if my mother-in-law were a normal person.  By that, I mean tends towards piles, let’s things “get away” from her, doesn’t do all of the dishes every single day - you know, a normal person.  But no, bless my mother-in-law’s heart, she’s a clean fanatic.  Dust would not dare come into her house, for fear of instant annihilation.  You know how some people have a talent for sewing or playing the piano?  My MIL has got the cleaning talent.  Seriously.

So in honor of my MIL’s arrival tomorrow afternoon (bad Husband, bad!) I’m reviewing a favorite book of mine, Sink Reflections by Marla Cilley, otherwise known as The FlyLady.  This book lays out how to go from a super messy cluttered house to a sparkling clean house, in just baby steps every day.

Unfortunately for me, my love of this book doesn’t extend to actually following the principals and ideas laid out inside (that would require self-control and at least one less job) but the fact that I don’t actually do anything she tells me to in the book doesn’t stop me from enjoying it anyway.  And every time I read it, I do go on a clean spurt that lasts at least a week.  Maybe more if I’m really in an ambitious mood, (and have less than three jobs at the same time.  That’s always helpful.)

The thing I absolutely love about Sink Reflections is those baby steps.  In the first chapter, in nice bold letters, she states her mantra, “Your home did not get dirty in a day and it is not going to get clean overnight.”  I like a lady who thinks like that.  So many of the books on cleaning and organizing is just so overwhelming - you look at all of it, think “I have to do this all right now!” clean for five hours, collapse on the couch like someone who just ran a marathon, and don’t clean again for another three months.

Or maybe that’s just me.

The FlyLady just rocks though - she starts you off in small steps that you take over time, and as you do them consistently (my downfall!) your house gradually becomes a beautiful home.

Sink Reflections deserves 5 out of 5 stars, for sure.  If you’re not sure her personality and writing style fits you, or if you’re wanting to get started right away, be sure to check out her website, FlyLady.net.  There, you can sign up for daily email reminders, join the online forum with other FlyBabies, and read testimonials of others who have used the FlyLady system to finally regain control of their home.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I have a husband to kill and a living room to clean.  If I’m really talented, I might be able to multitask and get the two done at the same time. Wish me luck.

Hava

PS Are there any FlyBabies in our midst?  Do tell!  Leave a comment below.

Okay, so a while back, I wrote a review of The Woman Who Can’t Forget, right?  It’s about Jill Price, a lady who can remember almost every single event that has ever happened to her in her entire life.

Well, today I ran across an article about her entitled Brain scans reveal possible source of woman’s super-memory.  Intrigued, I checked it out.  Apparently, Price has two abnormally large parts of her brain that the scientists think is the reason why her memory is so incredible.  On top of that, they have also found and verified three other people (all men) who have this same capability, and have several others that are possible prospects.

All of this got me thinking the obvious: Is this the first wave of X-Men to hit the world?  Work with me here - there seems to be a scientific reason behind their ability to remember the most minute details of the most mundane day of their lives, so could we consider this a “super power”?

Of course, this brought me to my next thought: If I were to choose a super power, it’d be a lot cooler than remembering everything that ever happened to me.  Heck, almost anything is cooler than that.  Hmm…Scratch that.  Superusless Super Powers came up with a whole list of pretty uncool (and useless) super powers.  I guess that remembering your entire life from beginning to end is a tad bit better than rendering all liquids you touch a nice lukewarm temperature.

But still, there are much cooler choices too.  So I started pondering them - what would I pick if I could choose to have any super power in the world?  Anything from flying, to seeing through walls, to have gigantic amounts of strength, to shooting laser beams out of my eyes…what is it that I’d want?

Well, the answer surprised even me.  I honestly would want to have the ability to never need sleep, nor ever get sick.  If I could stay awake 24 hours a day, seven days a week, and never ever get so much as even a sniffle, do you know how much I could accomplish?  Do you know all I could learn and do with my life?  I could work all day, study all night, take 20 credits a semester and get A’s in all of them.  I could have three jobs, and save up the moolah so the hubby and I could travel the world.  In short, I could stop wasting much of my life lying horizontal with my eyes closed!

I know my super power is pretty lame in comparison to others (c’mon, you have to admit that shooting lasers out of your eyes is pretty cool) but it’s my super power wish, darn it.

I want to hear it from the peeps - what would you choose as your super power, if you could choose anything in the world?

And don’t tell me that you’d want to remember every single thing that has ever happened to you.  That hasn’t exactly worked out well for Jill Price.

Hava

When Rabbit Howls by Truddi Chase is, by far, the most unusual book I have ever read.  It was recommended to me by Stephanie of Rocket Scientist as a good book to read if interested in multiple personalities.

I have to say, I haven’t ever read or watched anything about multiple personalities before, so I started this book with a clean slate.  Even so, this book blew me away.  I don’t even know where to start.  I guess the general outline of the book would be as good as any…

Truddi Chase was two years old when her mother left her father, and moved in with her stepfather.  This turned out to be a Very Bad Thing in Truddi’s life, because the stepfather was the biggest slimebag to ever walk the earth.  He raped Truddi, at age two.  The sexual abuse continued unabated until her teenage years, when her mother finally, finally, threw the guy out.

On top of that, Truddi was also subjected to emotional and physical abuse by both her mother and her stepfather.  Her mother knew what the stepfather was doing to her daughter, but instead of defending her daughter, she blamed the daughter for all of it, saying that she was a “dirty” person, and that it was all her fault that this was happening to her.  There were also step-siblings in the picture who were also being abused, although Truddi doesn’t focus on that very much.

There is much, much more to the emotional, sexual, and physical abuse than what I’m stating above, but it was hard enough to read the first time around - I don’t think I can bring myself to type it out.  The bottomline is, the overwhelming pain and degradation was so extreme, Truddi’s mind formed other personalities in order to deal with it all.

There are several things that are fairly common when someone has multiple personalities:

First, the core personality is the one that was present at birth, and that personality is still around and available.

Second, most counselors try to help the personalities reintegrate into one, so that there is only one person left inside of the body.

Neither of those statements are true in Truddi’s case.  When she was raped by her stepfather at age two, her core personality died, and her multiple personalities were born.  Two core personalities came into being: One that was the child personality, and one that eventually became the adult personality.  On top of those two came 90+ other personalities, all of them serving their own functions in support of Truddi.  Some personalities died, and only an echo of them was left.

Sound confusing?  Oh yeah.  This was a mind-bending book.  The multiple personalities called themselves as a whole “the Troops,” and it was the Troops who actually wrote the book.  If you look at the front cover, it says, “The Troops for Truddi Chase” as the author.

When the counselor talked to Truddi, he could see differences in her as he spoke to her, depending on which personality was controlling her.  She was tested, and there were measurable differences in speech pattern, brain wave activity, intelligence level, handwriting, posture, voice, etc, depending on the personality.  Even her eye color and cheekbone structure changed.

Get this: Some of the personalities had allergies, so during allergy season, they couldn’t come out front and be in control, because then Truddie would have been miserable.  Oh, and when one personality was in control, Truddi tested positive for pregnancy.  As soon as another personality took over, the pregnancy disappeared.

It was a mind-blowing book.  I had absolutely no idea any of this existed.  And because the book was written by the Troops, you got to see all of this from their perspective - talking to each other, talking to the counselor, doing the day-to-day tasks required to live.

I think one of the hardest things to understand was how utterly difficult this was for the woman.  The Troops created a personality that knew nothing of any abuse, so she could be the front to the world.  This personality did not think by itself, or have any desires by itself - it only did what the other personalities directed it to, which isn’t something you (or this personality) find out until late in the book.  That part just made my head hurt.

After the book was released, Truddi went on tour - she appeared on Oprah and the Phil Donohue Show.  I tried to find clips online from those appearances, but came up empty handed.  I did find out that a reporter from the Washington Post searched for Truddi’s family, and from there, found out that all of the step-brothers and sisters supported Truddi’s story, and even said that Truddi didn’t reveal all in her book: They said that on top of sexual abuse from the stepfather, she also suffered from sexual abuse from the mother too.

That was never once even hinted at in Rabbit Howls, so I’m guessing Truddi’s personalities suppressed that information very, very deep.  On the other hand (not surprisingly) the stepfather denied everything.  Wow, who saw that coming?

I tried to find follow-up information on Truddi - where is she now, how is she doing, are all of the personalities still there, etc, but came up with zip.  It’s as if she fell off the face of the planet.  If anyone has any information on what happened to her after the finish of the book, I’d love to hear about it.

I don’t know how to rate this book.  As with everything to do with it, I’m at a loss.  So I’m going to do something I’ve never done before: I’m not going to rate it.  I just don’t see how to attach a number to this book.

I will put this out there: Please, please, do not give this to your children or teenagers to read.  This is an extremely difficult book to read in terms of descriptions of different abuse that happened; if it were a movie, it would be rated X.  If language and sexuality bother you, absolutely do not pick this book up.

On the other hand, if you’re wanting to learn more about the multiple personality world, and are not easily offended, you’ll definitely want to read this.  As far as I know, this is the only multiple personality book written by the personalities themselves.  It is a rare glimpse into that world - not a pretty one, not an easy one, but one worth finding out about nonetheless.  It was hard enough for me to read this book - I cannot imagine living it.

Hava

PS If you’re interested in an in-depth look at When Rabbit Howls and multiple personality disorder in general, be sure to check out Trauma, Testimony, and Fictions of Truth: Narrative in When Rabbit Howls. It was an interesting (but long!) article that I thought did justice to the book.

A while ago, Stephanie from Rocket Scientist tagged me to write about my job, and hopefully come up with a list of things that the “average Joe” wouldn’t know about their local library.  Since I have never worked at any other library, and I am not actually a librarian myself (see below), I’m going to list out six things that happen to be true for our library, but I make no promises for any other library. With that in mind, here we go:

1) When we first process a paperback book, we put vinyl on the cover to help protect it.  It is ordinary vinyl (we buy it from a local store, actually) and is normally used to line the bottom of people’s kitchen cabinets.  Clear and strong, we use it to make our paperbacks last longer.  If you’re really rough with your paperbacks, you could easily do this at home to your own books.

2) We put thin metal strips (think roughly the shape and size of spaghetti noodles) in between two pages in the middle of each book.  This security strip is then activated, and the book is put on the shelf.  If someone tries to walk out the front door without checking out first, the strip sets off the security gates.  Most of the time when the gates go off, it’s because the employees at the front desk have simply forgotten to desensitize a book, but either way, the patron has to come back to the desk to get cleared.  Otherwise, we call the police.  Which really isn’t all that it’s cracked up to be, promise.

3) Not all library employees are created equal.  There is not a single person working at the circulation desk at my library who has any sort of library degree.  The only education requirement to work at the circ desk at our library is a high school diploma.  The reference desk is a whole other story.  There, two out of the three ladies has a Masters in Library Science, and the third one has a Bachelors, and is working on her Masters.  This is why we send all questions to the reference desk - they’re smarter than we are.

There is a debate in the library world as to whether or not a regular clerk like me should be called a librarian.  I have no library training, and no degree.  It’s like the secretary at the sheriff’s office calling herself a cop because she’s in the office with other cops all day long.  It doesn’t mean she actually knows how to be one. But on the other hand, it’s hard to figure out what to call me if not librarian - circ clerk works, but most people don’t know, off hand, what that means.  So the debate rages on.

4) The bigger a library, the more specialized each position is.  If you’re interested in working at a library, then you’ll want to consider what exactly is drawing you to it: Is it the idea of being away from patrons, just working on the computer and cataloging items?  Or do you want to be out and about, answering questions, helping patrons, etc?  In a really small library, one person does both, so if you’re interested in that, you’d want to find a job in a small town.

5) Each book in our computer system gets a code: tanfn, for example, stands for

T - junk code - doesn’t mean anything
A - adult book (as opposed to a child, junior, or young adult book)
N - non
F - fiction
N - new

tapbsf is adult paperback science fiction. tafn is adult fiction new. As strange as it sounds, I actually think in code - one time I found a book labeled tafn instead of tanfn, and instead of thinking, “Oh no, we’ve got a nonfiction book labeled as a fiction book” I thought, “Oh no, we’ve got a tanfn labeled as a tafn!” Which is a good sign I need a vacation.

6) If a book is lost or damaged, we only charge the cost of the item - what we paid for it ourselves, or if it was donated, what the cost would be to replace it. Despite what some patrons think, we do not make money off them. I had to explain this to a guy just the other day. He said that the library was a money making operation, and I told him that there were certainly a lot of people who would wish that were true, but it definitely wasn’t.

Well, I hope I didn’t put anyone to sleep. I don’t know how much wild and new information I brought up here, but hopefully this gives you a little better idea of how a library works. I’ll be happy to answer any questions I can, so feel free to leave a comment below!

Havs

Deep Survival: Who Lives, Who Dies, and Why by Laurence Gonzales is, as far as I know, the only book I’ve read and reviewed for this site because I’ve had to.  Well, I had to read it for my honors class at college - I guess I didn’t have to review it also, but what would be the fun in that?

Anyway, Deep Survival is probably not a book I’d normally just pick up and read, mostly because I haven’t ever focused on survival books before.  But after reading this one, I’ve decided that I’ve been missing out - it seems like there are some extremely interesting stories in the survival genre, and I’ll probably start picking up some books on the subject, starting with Adrift (a book that Gonzales talks about some in Deep Survival.)  So it was good for me to read something outside of my “normal” comfort zone!

Deep Survival is not what you’d think - it isn’t a book about how to survive out in the wilderness, and it isn’t simply a retelling of the stories of people who have lived through extreme conditions (although there is a lot of that in there).  Instead, it approaches survival from a psychological perspective - why is it that a well-trained Ranger would drown in a river while a five-year-old girl who is lost out in the wilderness would live for days?  Or why would a scuba diver pull off his mask while deep in the ocean, when the air tank was more than half full?

It all comes down to the mind, and things like “emotional bookmarks” and “cortisol in the hippocampus.” It was quite fascinating to find out that there was a rational reason for people behaving irrationally.

The style of writing is very poetic - he is almost lyrical at points.  It isn’t a writing style I normally encounter, so I found myself slowing down in order to understand what he was trying to say, instead of tearing through the book at break-neck speed like I normally do.

Here’s a good example of the writing style:

There goes another one now - ka-chunk-whoosh! - in a sleet storm of metal particles and this amazing hissing scream like someone’s tearing a hole in hell.  Then two angry afterburner eyes seem to hang motionless in the darkness, as the bat shape shinnies up a pigtail of smoke and is gone.
Deep Survival, page 23

I’ll admit it - I like being able to read stuff at break-neck speed.  It means I sure get through books a lot faster. So the writing style took some getting used to, but by the end, I was enjoying it.  It was probably a good thing I slowed down - there is so much in Deep Survival to digest that I suggest that you read it in small chunks if you end up picking it up.  This is definitely not what I would term a “fast read” nor a “read it and forget it” type of book.

Deep Survival made me rethink things I had done in the past, and realize why I did what I did. Case in point: A couple of summers ago, I was tubing down a river with my siblings when I got caught on a submerged log and was flipped out of my innertube.

All rational thought fled my brain, and I screamed my lungs out. I couldn’t get a grip on the river floor because the current was too fast, and I was sure I was going to get sucked into a whirlpool and die. For whatever reason, my brain took this as a good reason to scream. Maniacally. If I had spent half as much energy trying to get back into the innertube as I did screaming, I probably would have been fine. But no, I was completely and utterly panicked, and I could think of nothing but bellowing, as loud and as long as I could.

My brother eventually got over to me and helped me back into my innertube, but it wasn’t until hours later that I calmed down.  I was in a literal state of shock all that time.  Well, when I read the book, I realized something sobering: If I am ever caught in a really bad situation, I am not likely to live. The people who live are able to keep calm, cool, and collected, and are able to think rationally under extreme pressure. I am none of the above, and cannot think at all under extreme pressure, let alone rationally. Go me.

If you enjoy survival stories, if you like a poetic style of writing, and/or if you like discovering what makes the human mind tick, then you’ll thoroughly enjoy this book. I give Deep Survival 4.5 out of 5 stars.

Hava

Note: I talked about a strange patron before in my post entitled Pick Up Lines.  If you missed it, make sure to read that before continuing with this post…

So the creepy patron showed up again at the library tonight.  After being gone for weeks, bam!, there he was, haunting the upstairs, and the poor pages.  I never laid eyes on him, but I sure heard all about it.

Becky, one of our pages, was upstairs putting books away when she was asked by a patron to help find something.  She left her cart there, and walked off with the patron.  As she came down the stairs, who was coming up, but the creepy dude.  Keeping her cool, Becky finished helping the patron, then came over to the front desk immediately.  Leaning over the counter, she whispered to me, “The creepy dude is upstairs!  He’s back again!”

“You mean the one who stalked me before?” I whispered back.

“Yeah.  He’s back.”

Oh crap.  I wasn’t feeling well tonight (still not, actually) and I really didn’t want to mess that guy again.  He had caused enough trouble the last time he showed up.  Doesn’t he know to only be a pain in the rear when I’m feeling mentally up for it?  Can’t people start scheduling stuff around me?  Heck, doesn’t the whole universe revolve around me?

Yeah, that’s what I thought.

Anyway, I wasn’t going to take any chances this time - I had been chewed out enough last time he came into the library, thankyouverymuch.  I picked up the phone and quickly called Sally, the director of the library, and told her what was happening.

Without a moment’s hesitation, she said, “I’ll go upstairs with Becky right now.  Tell her I’m coming,” and hung up the phone.

Becky filled me in afterwards on what happened.  Apparently, as soon as she went back upstairs, she saw the creepy patron standing next to her cart, waiting for her to come back so he could talk to her.  Well, that’s what we’re guessing anyway - she wasn’t stupid enough to actually do that.  (Yay for smart pages!)  As soon as she saw where he was, she pivoted on her heel, headed back down the stairs, got another cart of stuff to put away, and went back up with that.  She left her old cart alone, and figured he could guard it all he wanted - she wasn’t going to touch it with a ten-foot pole when he was in the vicinity.

In the meanwhile, there goes Sally, charging up the stairs.  You have to imagine Sally in order to realize how almost funny this whole situation is.  Sally is a tiny woman - both in height and size.  Diminutive is about the best word I can come up for her.  But even though she’s in a small body, there’s no lack of courage in her, and she was bound and determined to make sure us staff were okay.  So off she went to guard us.  Before going up the stairs she held up her emergency pager and said to me, “I have this on me.”

That was her way of reminding me that if she held two buttons down on that pager for just a few seconds, an alarm would sound at the front desk, and that’s the signal for us front desk people to charge to the rescue (or at least call 911.  C’mon, how much courage do you think I have?)

Sally sat down at a table next to the elevator, and proceeded to watch the guy’s every move.  If he made even so much as a twitch in the wrong direction, she was going to intercept him.  To do what, I don’t know - I can’t exactly imagine Sally tackling him.  She’s old, and she’s tiny, and she’s…Well, I just can’t see her tackling people.  Maybe I have a lack of imagination, who knows.  That would be a first for me…

But luckily for all of us, he eventually left without doing anything.  I don’t know if he realized that we were watching him, and that took all the fun out of it, or if he just decided to head out for the night.  But I can say that I was pretty proud of Sally tonight.  She was willing to protect us from this guy, and for a gal who barely comes to my shoulder, that was a pretty big task to take on.

I still haven’t told you guys about the crazy Russian dude who wanted me to have an affair with him, nor the patron who comes in regularly, causes all sorts of problems, and (it turns out) is on the sex offenders list in our state.   Apparently, there is no end to the strange patron stories I have to tell.  Isn’t that just so exciting?

That’s what I thought.  ‘Til tomorrow,

Havs

I ran across another Today.com blog entitled The Librarian.  Delighted, I clicked on it.  How fun that there was another Today blogger who was a librarian!

She related the following story on her site - I’m pasting the most hilarious part below, but follow the link if you want to read the whole thing:

Two years later, she’s still coming in and still asking questions about her future, like we’re some kind of Magic 8 Ball come to life. I mean, I know the sign above the desk says INFORMATION, but that’s not really what it means. Her questions now are more specific, like “Do you think I’ll win $70 million from the lawsuit against my job?” She says she’s suing her boss because he’s mean to her. Or “Do you think I’ll marry a tall Italian man who drives a BMW?”

And while she used to just frown when you said you didn’t know or shrugged, now she gets ANGRY and huffs at you. Oh, yeah and she really hates me because I won’t answer her questions. She asked me not long ago if I liked working at the Library and I told her I did. She wrote me a sweet little note that said I DON’T LIKE YOU WORKING HERE.

Lovely.

I almost snorted my water up my nose when I read this (a hazard of browsing the internet and drinking at the same time). A patron who honestly seemed to think that the reference desk should not only be able to tell her where the atlases are at, but also peer into the future, and tell her what her fate is going to be?  Oh c’mon peoples, you just can’t make this kind of thing up!

I started to think about how, exactly, this was supposed to work. This is what I came up with: What if, after the librarian finishes school, master’s degree proudly in hand, she’s suddenly imbued with a magical ability to read palms and foretell the future?  Switch the tassel from one side of the cap to the other, and BAM! Here comes all of the psychic abilities.

I tell you what, I’m feeling significantly ripped off by the reference desk at my library, because never once has any of them told me what numbers to use when buying a ticket for Powerball, nor accurately foretold even so much as the weather. Hey, they are the “Information” desk - shouldn’t they be able to tell me anything and everything I want to know?

For any of you who are down on your luck, and need a bit of extra cash to make it through, be sure to stop by your local library before hitting your gas station, so you can have your lucky numbers in hand. Give yourself plenty of time though - when word of this spreads, the lines are going to be insane.  Forget the lines at Disneyland - this is so much better than a three minute ride through “It’s a Small World.”  We’re talking months of camping out here.  Black Friday times, like, a million.

Just remember, Almighty Reference Ladies, I was the first to know about this magical power, so you have to help me first.

Hava
Who is off to go plan how she’ll spend her millions of dollars…

I picked up The Polar Bear Waltz and Other Moments of Epic Silliness by the editors of Outside magazine because really, who could resist that cover photo? I thought it looked like a book I could get a kick out of, which would be a nice counterpart to some of the dark and depressing books that I read.

First, the idea behind the book:

The editors of Outside magazine put together a “Parting Shot” concept for their magazine, where each issue ended with a funny, mind-boggling, and/or breath-taking picture. Unlike most pictures in magazines where there are captions to explain what’s happening in the picture (or at least supply a funny line) these pictures are left to stand by themselves. The editors had this to say on the back flap of the book:

In many cases, the situations are so surreal or outrageous that they beg for more explanation. Yet at the same time, the viewer understands that captions would be a letdown, for the imagination supplies a better narrative.

I don’t know if I agree - there were more than a couple that I would have loved for some sort of explanation, but overall, I have to admit that it was fun to come up with my own ideas of what was happening in the picture.

Most of the photos were fantastic - I especially loved the one of the video camera sticking out of the mouth of a lion, taken in Kenya - but there were a couple of duds where I wondered what the editors were thinking. Who found that funny, and why?

The Polar Bear Waltz is short (less than 100 pages), with only 67 pictures, and no captions, so it ends up being a 10 minute look through, something to chuckle over, share with anybody sitting nearby, and then forget about by noon tomorrow. Don’t buy this one - if you really want a pick-me-up, check it out of the library and save yourself the money.

3.5 stars out of 5

Hava

So as of today, I’m back in school again.  Now I remember why I dropped out of college the first time: It sucks to give up your freedom.

When I go to work at the library, I am there, I work, and sometimes, yeah, crappy things happen, but for the most part, it’s just life at the library.  Here’s the important part though: When I get home, I’m done.  I don’t bring work home with me, I don’t have to think about work at all (other than to write stories on here, of course) and I am free to do and think about whatever I want.

Channeling Mel Gibson here: FREEDOOOMMM!!!!!

*ahem*

But when I’m going to school, all of that changes.  I go to work as usual, but this time when I get home, instead of kickin’ it with the hubby, I am a slave to school: I have class, or homework, or whatever else the teacher dreams up. Even when I’m not actually working on school work, it’s always “there,” like a specter in the back of my mind.

“I really need to start X paper.  I need to go see what is due this weekend.  I ought to go read the chapter for the week.”  Blah blah blah.  I can’t mentally get away from it, because there’s always something else I could be doing for school, and I always feel guilty if I’m not doing whatever it is.  All you college students out there know what I’m talkin’ about - I can see you nodding from over here.

So, I console myself with the idea that it will only be another five years until I graduate.

Except now that I think about it, that’s not exactly consoling. Hmmm…

Mentally, I’ve resigned myself to the fact that my time is not my own between now and May 14th; that it belongs to the horrid slave master, School. Although I will of course continue to post each day on here until the end of this month, things will probably slow down after that. There are only so many hours in the day, and I need to dedicate most of them to sleeping, so…ya know.

Well, I’m off to my first class of the semester.  It’s Elementary Ed Music, and for class, I had to buy a textbook that I’d honestly would have read if I found it at the library (about the connection between the music and the mind) and two CD’s full of music like Three Blind Mice and Itsy-Bitsy Spider.  Hopefully this teacher is as cool as it he appears to be…

Wish me luck!

Hava

PS Ava, if you’re reading this, I hope you feel better soon.  Curbs are trixy beasts, you know.

Well, it’s Martin Luther King Jr Day here in the US, which means that every federal agency is closed (post offices, courthouses, banks, and yes, you guessed it, libraries).  Normally I’m all for vacations - who wouldn’t appreciate a day to just relax and do what you want, not to mention the three-day weekend! - but since I’ve started at the library, I’ve gained a new outlook on these holidays.

It’s especially hard for the holidays that aren’t as celebrated, like MLK Day or Veteran’s Day.  Since all of the “normal” stores and businesses are still open, people tend to think that the library will be too.  When they come and see that we’re closed, they get grumpy (and tell us all about it the next day.  ‘Cause we’re just that special).

Then you’ve got the check-in situation - talk about insanity!  Our return bins outside are not connected in some super-cool way to our library through chutes or something (I’m imagining Batman caves right now for some reason) so what you see is what you get.

Once they are filled up, the only way to get those books inside is with a cart, where the library employee manually dumps books from the bin into the cart, pulls the cart inside, and does the check-in, only to go back outside and repeat the process until it’s empty. As breath-taking and exciting as that sounds, I promise that there are greater thrills in this world than doing outside check-in (like, say, a root canal.  Or watching paint dry).

Well, the problem comes with the fact that although the outside bins are big enough to last from Saturday evening until Monday morning without overflowing, much longer than that and there simply isn’t room to put any more books in.

You’d think that in this case, the patron would drive to the front of the library, walk inside, and return the books in the foyer (which is open 24 hours a day) but nooooo - instead they simply pile the books on top of the return bins outside, and then drive away.  (People who do this are several bricks shy of a load, and I don’t think they ought to have a drivers license, but as of yet, this isn’t on the questionaire to get your license.  I’m fairly sure the ALA is lobbying for it now, though).

Yes you heard me right, on top of the bins (sorry, I just can’t get over this).  Where, ya know, anybody could walk by, steal them, and nobody’d be the wiser.  Then guess who’s on the hook for the stolen books?  The patron stupid enough to leave the books out in the open in the first place.  As you can guess, they don’t take responsibility for this easily (’cause, after all, they did return the books! ::beat head against wall::) and it ends up being a yucky mess.

Have I mentioned yet that I don’t like holidays?

Then there’s the mail.  You can’t forget the mail!  All of the mail that we’d normally get over the course of two days is crammed into one day (which means twice the newspapers to catalog and put out) and then there’s all of the other mail we get in scads…Of course, we don’t have any time to work on putting the mail away because we’ve got busloads of patrons coming in to use the computers that nobody could use the day before. (Don’t get between a patron and their ability to check their email every day.  It isn’t a pretty sight).

Then the poor pages are going crazy because the carts are overflowing with books to be put back on the shelves (literally - books end up stacked on the floor because there is no more room in the inn cart - sorry, wrong holiday) so they’re expected to work a super human feat and get twice as many books put away than they’d normally have to.  They get this crazed look in their eyes when you ask them to search for a missing book on the shelf, and you find yourself mumbling that it’s no problem, you’d rather just look for it yourself, and scurry away before they show you what pages can do when armed with carts full of books.  (Believe me, you don’t want to know).

Because of this and more, my little tidbit of advice to the world is this: Don’t come into the library the day after a holiday if you can help it.  Your librarian will thank you.  Schedule your run either the day before the holiday or several days afterwards, in order to give the library time to settle back into its routine.  You’ll get better service and have more selection for books if you come on a normal day, not to mention a lot shorter lines and more pleasant librarians. Speaking of…

Pearls Before Swine rocks.

Every day after a holiday, we run around the library like insane people, occasionally stopping to ask each other, “Was it really worth it?”

The answer is always a resounding: No!

But since I get it off whether or not I think it’s worth it, I’m going to kick back and enjoy the day.  After all, I need to save up all of my energy for tomorrow.

Hava

A couple of weeks ago, I saw the headline for an article, Herman Rosenblat’s Holocaust memoir of love is exposed as a hoax. Worried, I clicked on the link.  I have read some Holocaust memoirs, and I didn’t like the idea of being duped.

Well, in this case, I was fine - Angel at the Fence: The True Story of a Love That Survived wasn’t scheduled to be released until next month. I hadn’t been hoodwinked after all.

Except, I have been before.  I read another biography called Bringing Down the House by Ben Mezrich, and it was only afterwards, as I did a couple of searches on Google, that I found out that much of the book was made up.  I was not impressed.

One of the latest cases of fake memoirs comes from Margaret B Jones (her real name was Margaret Seltzer, btw) who wrote a memoir that had absolutely nothing to do with reality. At least Angel at the Fence and Bringing Down the House had some vague resemblance to the real world.

Entitled Love and Consequences, it was supposedly about Margaret being a drug runner for the Bloods in LA, growing up as a foster child in the LA system, blah blah blah.  Not a word of it was true.  She was caught when her sister saw her picture for an interview done with the New York Times, and called in to tell them that it was all a lie.

I’d love to be a fly on the wall at their next family reunion.

And don’t even get me started on that Frey dude.  I think we’ve all heard enough about him to last us a lifetime.  Poor Oprah - she said that the Angel at the Fence story was “the single greatest love story…we’ve ever told on air.”  That, coupled with her initial backing and enthusiasm for James Frey, makes me think that she’s going to be a lot more choosy about which guests she has on the air from now on.

So comes the inevitable question: Why?  Why would authors take the chance at being revealed as fakes before the world, when they could write the story either as it really did happen (now there’s a novel idea!) or write it as fiction?  To me, the chance of discovery is just too great.

Do you really think you can go on a national book tour, have your book made into a movie, etc, and never have anyone catch on?  What, are all of your childhood friends living in caves, where they wouldn’t see the coverage on your triumphant book tour?  (And I am assuming here that if someone has the balls to completely fabricate a story and get it published as truth, that they’d also dream that the book would be a smashing success.  What would the point be if no one cared about the memoir after all?)

Here’s my armchair analysis: These people are whacked.  They have some inner need to be recognized beyond what their life would naturally give to them, and the only way to get that recognition that they crave is to make up a life much more exciting than the one they really lived through.

In yesterday’s review of Identical Strangers, I said that the book was not an interesting read, and in the comment section, Hindleyite jokingly suggested that they should have taken “creative license” with their story to make it more interesting.  Perhaps that’s what these fake memoir authors were afraid of: That if they didn’t “spice things up” that no one would care enough to read.

The bottom line though, is that fake memoirs give a bad reputation to the whole industry.  It is hard to trust what you read, when there have been so many bad apples passed off as truth.

By the way, Love and Consequences was published by the same publishing house as A Million Little Pieces by James Frey.  They don’t have a real stellar track record here.  (I bet Oprah is counting her lucky stars she didn’t invite Margaret Jones onto her show too.   How much bad luck can one talk show host have?)  Perhaps this publishing house and Oprah can join forces and hire an investigative team in an attempt to not get mud smeared all over their faces again.

So, to all of my easy chair psychologists reading this: Why do you think the authors of the fake memoirs do what they do?  Recognition?  Money?  To see if they can get away with it?  Because they’re flat-out nuts?  Tell me what you think below.

I picked up Identical Strangers: A Memoir of Twins Separated and Reunited by Elyse Schein and Paula Bernstein because the title caught my eye. Identical strangers? Wow - talk about a mind-bending idea!  How would it be to have a twin somewhere in the world but never know it growing up, and only finding out the truth as an adult? And when those twins first find out the truth, how do they deal with it?  And (question of the century!) why on earth would the twins be separated in the first place?

As you can tell, I was quite intrigued by the premise of the story, and I started reading it with high interest.  It was a lot like my reasoning behind picking up Mistaken Identity: Two Families, One Survivor: There’s really not that many people out there who have this kind of thing happen to them in real life.  It was a plot worthy of a Hollywood movie.

I’m sad to say my interest soon waned, and I ended the book feeling “ehh” about it.  Yes, you heard me - ehh.  It’s the technical term for “so-so/blah/or otherwise not inspired.”  Now you know.

First, a bit of background on what happened:

Elyse and Paula were identical twins born to a mental health patient who was not married and could not take care of her children. She gave the children up for adoption, but unbeknownst to her, the Jewish adoption agency, Louise Wise Services, had agreed to be part of a scientific study being conducted on twins.

The scientists had a goal in mind: They wanted to settle, once and for all, the debate between nature and nurture.  They decided that if they took identical twins and split them at birth, then they could watch them grow up and see how they turn out.  Would they still be similar, despite the different environments?  Or would they be molded by their families and show that nurture really does triumph over nature?

The book goes through chronologically, starting with how Elyse first found out that she had a twin sister, to contacting Paula, to meeting each other for the first time, and on to developing a relationship with each other.  The book switches back and forth between the two, first one talking exclusively in first person and relating an event, and then switching to the other twin who was also talking in first person and (usually) relating the same event you just finished reading about.

This style of writing allows you to “see” inside of each person’s head which gave me a feeling of immediacy, as if I was really living through all of this.  Unfortunately, with the repeating of information again and again, it got to be boring and repetitious.  (In reality, life is boring enough the first time around - almost no one except apparently Britney Spears has an interesting enough life that it bears being repeated again and again.  Paula and Elyse are not exceptions to this rule.)

Also, they spent much of the book upset about being a part of the study done, and working to uncover what the study was for, who was doing it, etc.  Although I understood their need to know this information, it honestly wasn’t that interesting to me.  Just because I knew they cared didn’t mean that I did.

Along with trying to find out information about the study, Elyse and Paula also spent much of their time looking for their mother.  That is what actually got me to the end of the book - would they find her?  Would she welcome them into her life, or say ‘No way, you’re part of my past’?  I won’t ruin the ending for anyone who picks the book up, so I won’t say what happens there, but I will say that that question was really the only thing that kept me reading.

It was a very honest and real book - the twins spend quite a bit of time talking about each other and their innermost thoughts that most people wouldn’t tell the world.  They didn’t always get along after they met, and they are genuine enough in the telling of their story to repeat all that happened.  I give them kudos for being truthful in their memoir.

But in the end, I guess I just felt like it was a book that could have been helped with some editing work.  I didn’t need to hear the same conversation repeated, this time just from another point of view.  Also, I had a hard time keeping the twins straight in the beginning (now which was which?) and so when the story would jump from one head to the other, sometimes it just plain lost me all together.

I think this would be an especially interesting read for anyone who was adopted, or was a twin (or, even better, both).
If you are a gigantic fan of memoirs everywhere, then you’d probably want to pick this one up, if only for the unique idea behind it.  But for the rest of the world, I’d probably recommend to just skip Identical Strangers.

Although there was plenty of interesting information in it (like some of the stories they dug up about other twins who had been separated and reunited - there are some doozies out there!) there was just enough uninteresting information and repeated “stuff” to make me yawn one too many times.

I give Identical Strangers 3.75 out of 5 stars.

Hava

PS If you are interested in memoirs about adoption, make sure to check out my review of China Ghosts by Jeff Gammage.  That is a beautifully told story of international adoption, and its impact on a family.