Truths, universally acknowledged?

I wonder how Austen would re-write her opening line of P&P these days: maybe ""It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single woman in possession of a good career must be in want of a equality-minded spouse?" The words may have changed, but the rigidity of social convention has not in some ways.

I've been meaning to get down on paper (e-paper?) my thoughts about Sheryl Sandberg for awhile, but frankly haven't had a spare minute and also wanted to be able to give these thoughts enough time to coalesce into something coherent (well, hopefully) and not too personal.

First things first: I am a big poser. I haven't read Sandberg's book yet. But the world being what it is these days, I have been assaulted by interviews with her, and reflections on the book and said interviews, across different media for several weeks. Being a woman in her (almost) mid-thirties (wow, that's scary...), I am right at that point in life that Sheryl seems to be focusing her attention on. My contemporaries and I are at that moment of leaning in, or leaning back. And I am certainly feeling it.

So this is as personal as I am going to get: I have had acquaintances pat my stomach and wish me "all the best" in my future. Friends have been visibly deflated when I tell them I have news and then add that I am the youngest and newest manager at work. I've been told I have "plenty of time" and "not much time left - what are you waiting for?" Media tells me any future kids of mine, with their geriatric parents, will be at higher risk of autism and maybe schizophrenia. Even Margaret Wente chimes in with maternal advice (a sure sign the conversation is taking a turn for batshit-crazy). Meanwhile, I have friends who were told they committed career suicide when they "leaned back" ever so slightly for a bit after returning from maternity leave.

Even Sandberg got slashed: Gloria Steinem points out that some of the backlash against Sandberg might stem from the fact that "for a woman to be loved, she has to fail, and for a man to be loved, he has to succeed. That’s what the gender police say, and it’s inhuman and unfair to both men and women." Sometimes the world bites back either way: Lean in? Get criticised. Lean back so you don't fail miserably? Get criticised.

As Meg Seitz observed, "I'm harder on myself than anyone else could ever be on me [....] Then, it occurred to me: All my confusion had nothing to do with me. It was about other people. It was about what I thought other people would want me to do." Sandberg adds, via her 60 Minutes interview, that women are often pitted against one another, when ultimately "every woman I know feels guilty about the choices she makes."

And so....

I am becoming self-aware enough to know that I am freaking out, and that I do put more pressure on myself than anyone else ever could. I am comforted by the thought that I am not the only one freaking out. I find solace in thoughtful reflections by other women, most notably recently Elsa Walsh's piece in the Washington Post, a piece brought to my attention by an amazing American librarian friend of mine who works as a regional Foreign Service librarian.

Says Walsh about the recent feminist discussion populated by big names such as Marissa Mayer, Anne-Marie Slaughter and Sandberg, "I find it to be a narrow conversation, centered largely on work, as though feminism is about nothing more than becoming a smart and productive employee and rising to the top [....] I have to wonder if Sandberg does not realize that she is going to die someday.There is so little life and pleasure in her book outside of work."

And then I felt like I was doing ok. I don't have it all figured out. I'm not where I thought I would be, or even entirely where I want to be. I'm still on the right path, though. I felt a little less alone. I realised I at least am living a reasonably balanced life so far: yeah, I put in some extra hours, but not regularly and generally for a good cause. I love what I do, every single day. I find meaning and joy in it, and I feel valued and supported. When I leave work at 5 pm (ish), I have people waiting for me who also make me feel valued and supported, in different ways. Having seen good friends and close family die far too young, I am mindful of the fact that I will die some day, and I want to leave more than a few memos for senior management in my wake. I have tremendous role models at home and at work. I have a plan. It may not work out, and it has already changed a few times, but it's there, a work in progress. I am in control of as much as I can be, and I am training myself in habits that I think will stand me in good stead over the years.

Like Walsh, I agree with Sandberg's statement that "marriage is the biggest career decision you will make." Sandberg definitely makes that sound unromantic, but in a sense it's quite accurate: your partner is the one who will have your back, so choose wisely. You can't both be sprinting down the career highway without a rock-solid plan. Maybe you can't both be sprinting at the same time, period.

At the risk of being repetitive, here's a final quote from Walsh's article that really spoke to me, especially the part about planning, and the part about love:

"When it is time for my daughter to make her way through this culture of overwork, I hope she follows some of Sandberg’s advice. I will tell her to work hard and take a seat at the table, speak up and, of course, always negotiate her salary. But I will also tell her to set her own course and follow neither my model nor Sandberg’s [....] I’ll also tell her to make time for herself. Unplug from the grid. Carve out space for solitude. Search for work you love that allows flexibility if you want to have children. And if you do, have them when you’re older, after you’ve reached that point in your career when you are good enough at what you do that you will feel comfortable dialing back for a while. Don’t wait until it’s too late to start planning, because no one else is going to do it for you. And don’t quit completely because, as wonderful as parenthood is, it cannot and will not be your whole life. Learn how to manage conflict, because the greater the level you can tolerate, the more freedom you will retain. Making compromises is a healthy approach to living.  For a woman to say she is searching for a “good enough” life is not failure — it is maturity and self-knowledge.  I’d also tell her, if she marries, to work hard on her relationship. It’s not only much easier than getting divorced, it’s more rewarding and more fun. Love. Full stop. That’s what matters."

Half-marathon run update

Once again (third time is the charm?) I will be participating in the half-marathon on Sunday, May 26th, during this year's Ottawa Race Weekend. As in 2011, I will be running for Medic to Medic, a UK-based charity founded by my amazing cousin, Kate Mandeville.

My fundraising page is here. If you wish to donate, it will be much appreciated by both Kate and me, and the trainee health workers in Malawi and Uganda whose study is supported by Medic to Medic.

My goal is to raise $800 this year - in 2011, I was able to raise $730, which was amazing (and due to the support of many of you - thank you again!). I am confident that together we can get to a nice round number this year! Thanks to my uncle Ralph and many others, I recently passed the halfway mark to this goal.

... and speaking of nice round numbers, my other goal is to beat the 2h time (in 2011, it was 2h 10 minutes). I'm a little less confident about that, but we'll see. As some of you may know (from watching me stretch at the back of the room in meetings), I have been dealing with some hamstring and hip flexor issues resulting from overtraining and (frankly) a lack of core strength. I am battling that by massage therapy (my new RMT is a runner, which really helps) and yoga (I know, I snubbed it for years, but now is the time...), and I am hoping that I will be in race day shape. Yesterday I did a 15k and survived (OK, I took stretching breaks, and it took me 1h 45, but whatever).

Your support, whether via cheering (in person or online), encouragement, group stretching activities (stop by my office anytime, those of you who work with me!) or a donation to Medic to Medic, is greatly, greatly appreciated. Medic to Medic does some amazing work, so please consider donating.

Read recently: now with a stowaway to New France, a WW2 female spy, a mother of a god, an American Civil War vet, a Montreal taxi driver, two ballerinas, Hahvahd grads, and some regular normals

Hi, my name is Alexandra and I have a library book hoarding problem. I totally just returned at least five of these unread. Argh!

I like doing these posts because I get to talk about books that people might not have heard of that I enjoyed but that don't fit together thematically, and also because at times like these, when it seems like I spent an inordinate amount of time staring out the living room window, organising tax information, or watching terrible TV, the list serves to remind me that I am still an OK reader. Whew.

• The Painted Girls by Cathy Marie Buchanan: made me homesick for ballet (not uncommon). Not as great as I was expecting it to be, given the hype. An interesting exploration of Degas's Little Dancer Aged Fourteen using contemporary ideas about  physiognomy. For me, the most compelling aspect of the novel was the relationship between the three sisters and their common love of dance, as each strives to lift themselves and each other from the poverty of 1880s Left Bank Paris through a variety of honest and dishonest means.
• Indian Horse by Richard Wagamese: a book that should be read by all Canadians. Heart-breaking in subject matter and haunting in tone. Wonderfully, simply written.
• The Red Book by Deborah Copaken Kogan: one of my guilty pleasures, a novel exploring the lives of four female Harvard grads as they approach middle age. Did they make the right choices? Are they growing apart from one another? Have they sold out their dreams? The novel is structured around the 5-year updates provided by alumni for the "red book" of the title (srsly, I would kill myself if I had to write these). Funny, dramatic (if implausible!), and entertaining: like reading your high school yearbook if people's thoughts made it in there.
• Speaking From Among the Bones by Alan Bradley: I am a huge fan of Flavia, and this latest volume in the series doesn't disappoint. Again, as with The Painted Girls, but even more so in this case, the relationship between the three de Luce sisters is what absolutely makes this series for me. It's odd, nuanced, and full of real emotion. Speaking ends on a horribly tantalizing cliff-hanger. The next volume could mark a tremendous change in the series, but in a certain sense I think this was needed.
• Above All Things by Tanis Rideout: I have no patience for stories of athletes (hegemonic masculinity, competition is king, etc., etc.) But..... but. This little gem of a novel by a Canadian (!), written from alternate perspectives, traces Mallory's last Everest climb in 1924. One of my favourite time periods? Check? English boarding school ghosts? Check? Female perspective? Check. OK, then, I guess I will give it a shot. I mean, you could write a whole novel just based on this photograph, for heaven's sake. So this is about Ruth and George, and their love, and the choices they both make that lead George up the mountain for the third time, never to return. This is a book both about the consequences for George of his fascination with the climb, and the far-reaching consequences for those he loves and leaves behind.
• The Tinsmith by Tim Bowling: strange little novel about two American Civil War veterans (a Union doctor and an escaped slave) and "the kind of violence that we do" to one another. Many amputations and lots of salmon feature prominently.
• Carnival by Rawi Hage: I enjoyed this more than I thought I would, given the outlines of the plot (such as it it). Which is not to say it wasn't weird: it was.
• Mrs Queen Takes the Train by William Kuhn: another guilty pleasure, this one interesting for its ruminations on strange life choices, be it monarch or royal staff member. This is an odd but lovely book about Queen Elizabeth II escaping Buckingham Palace in a hoodie, in search of cheese, due to a sort of delayed mid-life crisis. The Queen's take on major historical figures, and modern society, including race relations in England, are treasures.
• Whirl Away by Russell Wangersky: great, if wistfully sad, collection of short stories.
• The Tale-Teller by Susan Glickman: historical novel about a young French Jewish girl who dressed as a boy to travel to New France. A latter-day Scheherazade, she weaves a wild tale to the authorities in an attempt to remain in the new world (suck it, Aaron Hart). This book makes you work for the truth, which is in some ways simply as Esther puts it: "I did not run away from my faith. I ran away from the limitations that faith subjected me to."
• The Book of Marvels: A Compendium of Everyday Things by Lorna Crozier: patron recommendation!
• Web of Angels by Lilian Nattel: fascinating exploration into dissociative identity disorder.
• The Art Forger by B. A. Shapiro: meh. I loved the art history and descriptions of the forgery process (a giant oven! Seriously!). I could have slapped the main character in the face for her romantic vacillations and delusions, though.
• Inside by Alex Ohlin: I stayed up until 2am finishing this, because I was so concerned for the main characters' well-being that I could not, in good conscience, close the covers on them. As the Post put it, a cheery little book with "multiple suicides, failed relationships, crumbling families, abortion, a homeless teen and, for good measure, the Rwandan genocide." Oh, and skiing on Mount Royal.
• Code Name Verity by Elizabeth E. Wein: delicious, delicious, delicious. I don't know what else to say. A teenage British spy captured by the Gestapo is forced to write out her confession: another latter-day Scheherazade. With more tense twists in the road than a drive through the French Alps, this one is truly worth the hype it received, and ignore the teen label. It's for any woman who has a best friend she would die for. As my friend Lina put it:
  "Code Name Verity is that rarity among rarities in Young Adult Fiction these days: it is a book about a friendship between women without any bullshit. They are not fighting over a guy. One does not become popular and leave the other behind. Neither is the other’s sidekick- Verity and Maddie are equally skilled in their different professions, they have equally strong personalities. There is no pettiness, no jealousy, no weird obsessions with each other. No need to spend every freaking moment together talking about asinine things (sorry. I obviously have a beef about how women friendships are portrayed in popular media)."
• The Testament of Mary by Colm Toibin: the mother of God suffers from post-traumatic stress, and is potentially held captive, in this oddly moving novelisation of the post-resurrection early church. Mary reflects back on her son's life, presenting a nuanced (sometimes painfully realistic) portrait of Jesus: sometimes selfish and always blindingly charismatic. The disciples don't get off any easier, either. Excellent review here.
  

I will go, if you lead me

OK, fair warning: this is probably the most theological I will be on this blog. I don't want to frighten you away, nor do I want you to think I have delusions of grandeur here, but ... well, here we go.

When I was a child, my parents explained to me that their vocation was a calling. As a result, a small blonde girl could frequently be found kneeling in her father's church, listening quietly (as though to radio static), half-heartedly hoping not to hear the voice of God calling her to the ministry.

So I am back at Main Library (or the tower beside it, like some latter-day bibliographic Rapunzel) starting Monday as the (round 3 with this team!) Acting Manager of Diversity and Accessibility Services for six months. And the normally reserved Alex is willing to admit here, dear readers, that she is a bit of a mess.

I am so totally excited and happy to be with the DAS and SWSI teams again (oh libraries, you have too many acronyms! DAS - see above, my department. SWSI - System-Wide Services and Innovation, our division). I love these people (and I mean staff and customers): they are committed, creative, passionate, collaborative, supportive, interesting people.

But I spent my entire afternoon today packing boxes (that would be corporate "move" #10 - if you count Rideau renos - and I am also on personal move -lucky?- #13 whenever we leave rue Bruyère). Needless to say, if we total that out I am on move #23 and the sound of packing tape makes me want to get into the fetal position (or go home to a glass of wine and some smokehouse almonds. Your call).

Today, I have had two songs running through my head (yoked by violence - sorry, Sam - together...): "Go on," by Basia Bulat (because maybe I "couldn't stand to lose" my lovely team at Carlingwood, however temporarily) and Here I Am, Lord, composed by Dan Schutte. That arrangement isn't my fav, by the way, just the least offensive I could find on YouTube on short notice (why do the right-wing evangelicals record all these videos? Why can't Sarah McLachlan cover more than just the Prayer of St. Francis? Honestly!). To truly feel what I'm feeling, you need to be singing this hymn in the snug chapel of Dio (nearly impossible) accompanied by the spectacular singing voices of both of my parents (50% absolutely impossible) and Davina on guitar (impossible ... debatably?).

Don't worry (and don't click away from this post!). I am still your favourite (very) lapsed Anglican. I'm not going to go all born-again on you. I just can't help that in moments of strong emotion, I cannot deny (three times, or less) my heritage.

"Here I am, Lord. It is I Lord.
I have heard you calling in the night.
I will go, Lord, where you lead me.
I will hold your people in my heart."

I am not saying that I feel called to my current role, or any other role I have had. I am not saying that that I believe it is entirely a divine hand at work as I make my way along this personal and professional path. I am not saying it is entirely fate, either, or karma, or Lord Shiva, god of destruction (who lives on my bookshelf, by the way. He's my favourite) or .... whatever or whoever you want to call it. And I will not take the cop-out attitude that Sheryl Sandberg is right to call women on (although I have other issues with some of her logic) that it is not because of my own talents, skills, or agency either. All of these factors have played a role (although Lord Shiva has been lighting a few too many fires for my liking recently).

I believe I am doing the right thing for me right now. It wasn't what I expected to be doing in 2013, but I am so pleased. I am grateful for my years at Rideau Branch and Westmount Library, where pieces of my heart will always beat steadily. I am glad I got to briefly experience life at Cote-St Luc, St Laurent, Vanier and Rockcliffe Park. I was transformed, and empowered, by my time with DAS (rounds 1 and 2) and Carlingwood Branch. I am frightened of the future, but confident that I can face it, with the tremendous support I have from all the people I have walked with so far along this road, and especially with The Husband by my side ("Their happiness was in each other's keeping and both were unafraid." I re-read this quote on our wedding day, and it is unchanging despite everything).

So. Off I go. Four boxes packed for the lovely Materials Delivery team to ferry over to Main Library. Too many goodbyes, a few hugs, many kind words. On Monday, a new calling, some happy reunions, and hopefully kind words and hugs, too.

This post makes me conclude I have been hanging out with my mum far too much (just kidding, Mum!)

Meanwhile, I have my ear cocked, like that little girl on the church kneeler. I am ready. I will go where I am led. I have a lot of work to do. I hold a lot of people in my heart.

(February and) March madness at Carlingwood Branch

I just realised I haven't given you all a recap of the fun and excitement at Carlingwood since last July - that's crazy!

So, without further ado, here's what's been going on recently:

• We founded our Carlingwood’s Senior’s Advisory Group, with many enthusiastic participants and lots of fantastic ideas for the library and for each other. They approve of the acronym, SAG, which bodes well for working together: I always appreciate a sense of humour. 
• Our English Conversation Group on Tuesdays and Saturdays continues to thrive
• Our eReader workshops continue to be popular: we recently helped people with their Playbooks, a Kobo Touch, an mp3 player, a Kobo Glow, an ancient touch-screen laptop, and some iEverythings (iPad mini, iPad, and iPhone). 
• My lovely colleagues filled in for me and allowed a local undergraduate student interested in library school to shadow them on a Saturday.
• I couldn't be there to mentor the student as I was in Montreal, with my lovely colleague Josée Tardif from Collection Management, presenting for the Corporation des bibliothécaires professionnels du Québec (CBPQ) about readers’ advisory (in French). I was really nervous about this for a variety of reasons, but it went really well and people from as far away as Trois-Rivieres and Sorel came to enthusiastically contribute to the session and discuss appeal factors with us! 
• We did two great inter-generational programs during March Break: Techno Buddies (11 Teen Volunteers worked with 6 older Adults using the following technology: E-mail, Facebook, Powerpoint, Twitter, Linkedin, Microsoft Word, and iPads) and Bridging the Generations (6 Teens highlighted 5 iPads to 17 Adults and 6 children using Rosemount’s outreach iPads). These were really popular, and had many touching moments. One teen whop was helping a newcomer Senior helped him take a picture with the iPad to send to his grand-daughter in Thailand. This patron wept with gratitude, and I wept when I read Courtney's report of this.



this little dude from the Museum of Nature
(a waxy monkey frog)
is clearly plotting world domination...

• I attended my last OPLA RA committee meeting on March 8th. Yes, you read that right. My stepping down from the committee was less of a personal choice and more of an organisational shift at OPL, and I have very mixed feelings about it. Part of the hard part of blogging these days is that so much of what happens at work for me now is un-bloggable: coaching and disciplinary work, especially, but a lot of working with employees is hard to generalise without compromising someone's confidentiality, or letting personal biases show. Lest this sound like the text is becoming too Barthesian, here, with the unreadable source etc., let's use the Mark Twain frog analogy that I have been employing with my team to tell them when I'm having a tough day or need some space:
              "If it's your job to eat a frog, it's best to do it first thing in the morning.
              And If it's your job to eat two frogs, it's best to eat the biggest one first."
  Recently, I have been eating some large and crunchy frogs, some I have adopted and some that have just hopped on over into my space uninvited, and let's just leave it at that.
• The CLA Book of the Year for Children award jury, of which I am chair, chose the winner and honour books for the 2013 award... Stay tuned for the announcement on April 15th, and check out the shortlist in the meantime.
• I had a bunch of meetings related to our upcoming accessibility upgrades. I'll be blogging for OPL about this soon, but basically we are closed Monday April 29 – Friday May 3, open Saturday and evenings the following week with limited access to certain areas, and resuming regular hours on Saturday, May 11. The work will include a new ramp (re-graded) with new paving stones and handrail, new concrete curbs and stairs, an additional handicapped parking spot and new paint in the lot, a new bus stop pad and bike rack pad, work on the accessible washrooms (new toilets, sinks, etc), improved elevator buttons (don't ask), and a new "green" drinking fountain. Not a ton of stuff, but some wonderful and much-needed improvements. Chaos will ensue when our front entrance and parking lot are both n/a during the work, so I am looking forward to lots of fun and excitement next month.
• The Teen Tech Commercial was released on March 13th. Lots of glowing comments about Carlingwood’s TAG. Here’s the link for the commercial.
• Did I mention our TAG is great? Look what they did for the SAG:

Bookmobile news: feel-good story of the day

Saw this, and it deserved its own post (aside from the Bookmobile news round-ups which are few and far between these days):

At A Pakistani Mobile Library, Kids Can Check Out Books, And Hope
""And I felt, in what way can we bring these kids back to the beauty of life, to the beauty of future, to be of value to fellow mankind and to themselves and to the country," he says. "And I started thinking in what way can we help the children." Malik felt books were the way to broaden children's minds, to introduce them to a whole world of subjects, and to help build tolerance for others. But he discovered that virtually none of the public schools in and around Islamabad had libraries [....] So Malik decided to take books to the children."

Seen reading on OC Transpo

Greenboro O-Train Station, sunset

• L'homme inquiet par Henning Mankell
• The menu for 3 Brasseurs (this was probably when they were interviewing for staff)
  (P.S. Processed cheese slices on a cheeseburger, 3 Brasseurs? Really? Quel dommage...)
• something by Steve Berry
• Fire from heaven by Mary Renault
• an issue of Teen titans
• Me:  The Art Forger by B. A. Shapiro (Divas pick)

News round-up

"Courtship Dance" carved by Koji Kareki of Japan, Winterlude 2013

• Thought-provoking: Quiet, Please!, by the Annoyed Librarian:
  "I guess a lot of librarians get bored with all the quiet. Not me. That’s one of the best things about being a librarian, walking into a building that isn’t rife with all the noise unavoidable on the street and in most public places. The noise of everyday life is getting louder, and without quiet libraries will be almost inescapable. But some librarians are too busy rocking to notice, or maybe they just don’t like silence because silence breeds contemplation and they don’t want to contemplate their lives."
• Celebrating: The Citizen Lab wins the 2013 CLA Advancement of Intellectual Freedom in Canada Award (which reminds me, save the date: Saturday, March 2, 2013 - Censored out loud event in Ottawa, the fifth annual local event to celebrate Freedom to Read Week!)
• Inspiring: The Ottawa Human Library event (I'm so proud of my colleagues, and Rideau Branch patron Sean!)
 

 
• Informative: "20 questions: Are you ready to be a manager?" from Globe Careers
• Disturbing (three times over): some seriously offensive blonde prejudice embedded in the (justified) rage over the new Anne cover? "This "updated" version of Anne looks like a new addition to Jersey Shore and probably spends more time partying than re-enacting book scenes with her friends." Hey now, no need to make sweeping generalisations! See also: re-branding The Bell Jar (but hey, you have to laugh, right?)
• Heart-wrenching: "Prison and Libraries: Public Service Inside and Out," from Library Journal (just try to scroll past the "Shakespeare in Shackles" picture of inmates in segregation without breaking down).
  "Prisoners read and discuss the plays. Inmates, many of whom lack strong academic records, often warm up to the challenge of learning the plays written by the intellectually demanding playwright. More than that, Bates asserts, many prisoners discover, sometimes to their surprise, that the questions posed by Shakespeare’s centuries-old plays may be more relevant than many would assume [....] Frequently, inmates will rewrite the plays to reflect their own changing perspectives. For example, Hamlet may spare Claudius’s life as prisoners reconsider their own thirst for ­vengeance.  Not every prisoner can be changed via humanities intervention, but Bates has met those who say they have not killed thanks in large part to exposure to works like Shakespeare’s plays. She says there should be a place for arts and literature programs in prisons and jails and their libraries."
• What I have been up to: reading the last of the 60+ books under consideration for the soon-to-be-announced CLA Book of the Year for Children shortlist, piloting some de-centralised projects for our Homebound Services department, working on some interesting new ideas for our Bookmobile service review (while the team maintains service valiantly while one bus is off the road waiting for parts), and entering a dialogue about our tremendously worthwhile Library Settlement Partnerships.

... and I thought I might have run out of rant posts....

But no.

Says England's Communities Minister Don Foster (via):

"Libraries play a vital role in keeping this going by bringing people together across communities, helping improve literacy for children and adults alike and developing a love of reading for millions of people."

Libraries don't improve literacy: librarians improve literacy.

Oh, and seriously? That picture? You're *totally* going to get a library that looks like that if it's volunteer-run. I bet they raised those fancy beams themselves, right?

< / end rant >

Happy blogoversary to me!

It's hard to believe that it was four years ago today that I published the first post on this blog. It seems like it was yesterday, in one sense, and so long ago in another. Some things in the blog, and in life, have stayed the same (best of the year lists; a passion for public library service and a wry sense of humour - I hope!) and some have changed (fewer awards announcements since these seem to be cross-posted everywhere; my job title, of which I have gone through at least four in four years!)

I find it infinitely tiresome (and terribly unoriginal) when bloggers apologise for their absence on the blogosphere, but here we go: I have been remiss lately! To catch you all up, well, it was the holidays, then I caught the Evil Flu From Hell, and then in the middle of the EFFH, I accepted an opportunity to be an Acting Manager with OPL for the next few weeks. The job is with my old team at Diversity and Accessibility Services, which is great.

So things have been weird: that's life, you know? Stuff gets thrown at you, good and bad, and you make the best of the bad stuff and are grateful for the good stuff. Sometimes, when you are lucky, great things fall into your lap (hopefully because you've put something good out into the universe) just when you need a little boost. Last week, I was called brave and resilient (I think resilient is my new favourite word) with respect to two different situations, work and personal, and tons of colleagues stopped by my new office or dropped me a note to wish me well on this new project. People are pretty amazing. Or, to be more precise, I am so incredibly fortunate to be surrounded by amazing people.

Right now my work brain is swimming with ideas, and projects, and things to deal with, and things to learn about. It's so cool to have an opportunity to shake up my thoughts, and delve into some new (or new/old) aspects of library service... and now, more than ever, my job involves the people on our team, and supporting them to the best of my abilities. It's fun to try to pick up the threads ... and, for a type A personality, kind of crazy to get a handle on it all in a few weeks! I have to keep talking myself back into work mode and out of freak-out-and-bite-off-more-than-I-can-chew mode.

So hopefully that's a sufficiently vague, mixed-metaphor reflective blogaversary post for you. Thanks for sticking it out on the wild ride so far, and stay tuned for more. As my uncle would say, it's been real.

Mark your literary calendars for the first half of 2013!

Here are some things I am looking forward to in the first half(-ish) of the coming year:

• The Last Runaway by Tracy Chevalier (January)
• The Painted Girls by Cathy Marie Buchanan (January)
• American Isis: The Life and Art of Sylvia Plath by Carl Rollyson (January)
• The Burgess Boys by Elizabeth Strout (March)
• Bone and Bread by (Montrealer!) Saleema Nawaz (March)
• Nocturne by Helen Humphreys (March)
• A Beautiful Truth by Colin McAdam (March)
• Lean In by Sheryl Sandberg (March)
• Z by Therese Anne Fowler (March)
• The Interestings by Meg Wolitzer (April)
• The Dark by Lemony Snicket and Jon Klassen (April)
• All That Is by James Salter (April)
• Life After Life by Kate Atkinson (April)
• Maya’s Notebook by Isabel Allende (April)
• The Woman Upstairs by Claire Messud (April)
• Americanah by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie (May)
• And the Mountains Echoed by Khaled Hosseini (May)
• Big Brother by Lionel Shriver (June)
• The Shining Girls by Lauren Beukes (June)
• The Ocean at the End of the Lane by Neil Gaiman (June)
• Night Film by Marisha Pessl (August)

Favourite children's and teen books of 2012

“Once there was a girl / an all-alone girl / in her own little bed / in her own little room / in her own little castle / who didn’t have a dragon for a friend.” 

This is going to be the saddest list ever. Nonetheless, here are the books for kids and teens that floated like jetsam past my desk this year....

Disclaimer: other more recent chapter books are embargoed because they are being considered for the CLA Book of the Year for Children and, as such, I cannot comment about them at this time.

1. Lovabye Dragon by Barbara Joosse: a lonely dragon with an overbite? What's not to love? See above.
2. Plant a Kiss by Amy Krouse Rosenthal (she of Duck! Rabbit! fame)
3. Sam et Julia dans la maison des souris by Karina Schaapman: This gem of a book is too beautiful to miss, even if you can't read the text. If you, like me, spent a childhood enraptured by dollhouses (my two favourites were the real-life one in Windsor Castle and the one in Beatrix Potter's The tale of two bad mice), this book is for you.
   
4. Oh No, Little Dragon! by Jim Averbeck: do I have a dragon thing? Perhaps! Little Dragon loses his fire-breathing ability when playing in the bathtub. Will he get it back? The suspense is killing me!
5. The Unforgotten Coat by Frank Cottrell Boyce: I did make a vague effort to stay current with international book awards news, and as a result read this winner of the Guardian children's fiction prize. An intriguing mix of Polaroids of unknown origin and a story about a mysterious immigrant family who are being pursued by a demon.
6. Howl by Karen Hood-Caddy: This book, and the next one on the list, are my under-appreciated underdogs from the 2012 CLA BOYCA reads. Howl actually appeared on our shortlist last year: this is a nuanced portrait of a young girl learning to cope with grief after the death of her mother, and a whole family's story of coming together to make something meaningful out of loss. Here's a review from Q&Q.                  
7. Saving Armpit by Natalie Hyde: In a world in which quality middle grade books are often few and far between, this is an overlooked solid Canadian title about a letter-writing campaign undertaken by a group of small-town children in order to save their local post office (and thus the postmaster, coach of their local baseball team).   
8. The Fault in Our Stars by John Green: again, the hype penetrated my consciousness, and I had to pick this one up. Friends and colleagues disagree over this one: someone pointed out that teens don't talk like they do in this book (fair enough!) and someone else, like me, found this book both hilarious and tragic. For those who grew up with Lurlene McDaniel (oh yes, I went there!), this is how a book about a kid with a terminal illness was meant to be written. Green knocks it out of the park.
9. Grave Mercy: His Fair Assassin, Book 1 by Robin LaFevers: Meet your new Katniss.
10. Monoceros by Suzette Mayr: Technically published as an adult novel, but I am including it here because I feel it has a real audience with teens, especially as a year filled with truly tragic stories of teen suicides due to bullying draws to a close. This book has a passage, narrated by the victim's mother, of such utter beauty that I think it might well be one of my favourite scenes ever. As a truly Canadian story of a teen suicide, told from different perspectives, this is another under-appreciated title. Read a review here. 

Previous favourite children's book lists: 2011, 2010, 2009, 2008.
Previous favourite teen book lists: 2011, 2010, 2009, 2008.

Favourite adult books of 2012

Happy New Year!

I read 93 adult books in 2012, up from 52 in 2011. My changing professional role was reflected in the fact that I only read 28 children's and teens books (compared to 77 in 2011).

In 2013, I hope to keep increasing those adult numbers, and since this is my last year as a judge for the CLA Book of the Year for Children, make the children's books I read great ones that I choose myself for a change! It has been a great joy to be on the BOYCA committee, but I will not miss the speed-reading of 60-odd children's novels by Canadian authors with varying degrees of talent.

Without further ado, here it is, my pretties: the top 10 of 2012!

1. Gold by Chris Cleave: Chris’s writing has a way of grabbing you firmly by the heart and pulling, hard. The protagonists in this story are three Olympic bike racers, getting a bit long in the tooth in their early 30s and facing their last Olympics (London 2012). Despite not being at all interested in competitive sport, I could not put this down. There is much about the competitive spirit of world-class athletes in here, but there is also a love triangle, a child struggling with cancer, and a sensitive exploration of the choices we make in life, and the paths we choose and can also change. There are some absolute gems of phrasing and emotion in here. Read it. Some readers have compared the relationship in this novel between two strong women as reminiscent of Atwood’s The Robber Bride (my favourite of hers), and that is somewhat apt. For other heart-wrenching tales, however (for you masochists who like to cry while reading), I would recommend Mister Pip by Lloyd Jones or The Tower, the Zoo and the Tortoise by Julia Stuart.
2. Joseph Anton by Salman Rushdie: You may or may not know that I heart Rushdie, but we have  a fraught relationship. On the one hand, Imaginary Homelands changed my life, Midnight's Children acted as a closing bookend of sorts to my thesis about E. M. Forster, and I will watch any interview / attend any reading Rushdie gives, because I find him a fascinating and erudite speaker whose perspective I often find completely refreshing. On the other hand, I didn't finish The Satanic Verses, and have a low threshold for some of Rushdie's bombast. So, I embarked on Joseph Anton unsure how we were going to get along. Turns out I couldn't put it down, even if sometimes it drove me crazy (which probably encapsulates how I feel about Rushdie overall, frankly). I didn't mind the 2nd person narrative, found his unravelling of the Gordian Knot of his time under the fatwa deeply moving, vehemently agreed with many of his conclusions and observations about Western society's complex relationship with Islam, and found his stories about the supportive friendships that sustained him during his time in hiding (including a lovely one about a trip to Canada, involving being hugged by Bob Rae and serenaded by Adrienne Clarkson) compelling (I kept following the Husband around saying, "Listen to this!"). As a thank you of sorts to those who stood by him, and a statement about East/West relations during a tumultuous time in modern history, this is a tremendous book. As an indictment of those who abandoned, or outright criticised him, this book is less effective: Rushdie doesn't mince words, and in many cases rightly so, but sometimes a more unflattering spite seeps out of the pages, which is a pity. This is still an absolute must-read, however. Frankly, it's hard to begrudge him a little spite sometimes.
3. 
   Astray by Emma Donoghue: These stories are all about people on the move: between identities, places, or lives. I read this on the train, which was unintentionally perfectly appropriate. All of the stories are based on real-life people, and Donoghue follows each tale with a description of the actual events, whether it be a newpaper clipping about a female con artist or a series of letters between a husband and wife separated by an ocean (that story made me cry). The Guardian used the word frustrating when talking about the brevity of these tales; that is something that often bothers me in short stories, but here I felt that each story was so perfectly crafted that I didn't mind. Plus, frankly, I am happy to see that the pre-Room Donoghue is still around.
4. South Riding by Winifred Holtby: see review here. Readers who enjoyed Emma Brown (completed from Charlotte Brontë’s draft by Clare Boylan), Muriel Spark or our own massively-underappreciated Gwethalyn Graham will enjoy this novel.
5. Shine shine shine by Lydia Netzer: see review here. 

6. Sleeping funny by Miranda Hill: Well, I already loved Miranda for Project Bookmark, and now I just love her extra. These short stories all have an element of the magical, or just plain odd, about them, from a suspicious neighbour who may just have dropped out of a fairy tale, to a group of children who are afflicted with visions of their own conception (some surprises there!). These stories made me laugh out loud, and also cry. Warning: the one that won the Journey Prize was actually my least-favourite in the collection.... 
7. This is how you lose her by Junot Diaz: no, your eyes do not deceive you. I, an avowedly lukewarm reader of short stories, have chosen three collections in my top 10 this year. In October, I admitted that I was, indeed, oddly sympathetic with the rat narrator of this collection, especially for someone who spent four years with her very own serial philanderer. These stories, about the Yunior you may be familiar with from Drown, will break your heart as they draw you into the flawed but somehow tender heart of a troubled young man.
8. The grief of others by Leah Hager Cohen: Ricky Ryrie blames her husband John for a lot, but she blames herself for more, in this story of family secrets and new beginnings. The Ryries, parents to two living children and one recently-deceased baby boy, are struggling to move forward through their grief when John’s older daughter from a previous relationship shows up on their doorstep unexpectedly. Cohen’s writing gave me goose bumps; speaking about the Ryries’ dead child, she writes, “He wore, during his short life, a white cotton shirt with a single covered side snap, a white flannel receiving blanket, and a white cotton cap. … He was given two diaper changes, the second proving unnecessary.” It’s easy to see how this gem of a book made it on the Orange Prize longlist. . It has been a long time since I have rooted so strongly for a young girl, as I did for the Elizabeth “Biscuit” Ryrie, who we first meet when she has stolen a library book about funeral rites and falls into the Hudson River after a ritual for her dead baby brother goes wrong. Everyone in this book is barely coping with their grief (over the baby but also over their own personal tragedies and changing relationships with one another), but the story is somehow still gentle, hopeful and beautiful. If the past is a foreign country, so too is the grief of others, even those closest to us. This one is for readers who enjoy Joyce Carol Oates, Julia Glass, Kim Edwards’s The Memory Keeper’s Daughter or Olive Kitteridge by Elizabeth Strout.
9. Everybody has everything by Katrina Onstad: Onstad captures perfectly the human spirit that lurks below a veneer of suits, heels, polished front doors, and shiny car windows in downtown Toronto. Ana and James are one such couple: half suit, half wrinkled artsy type, muddling towards early middle age childless and drifting apart (maybe). Into this mix falls small Finn, the young child of their good friends, left in their care after a car accident that claims Finn’s father and leaves his mother in a coma. Thrust into temporary parenthood (they wonder if Robert Crumb is appropriate bedtime reading as it’s the only illustrated book they have), Ana and James re-think their roles in their marriage, and the choices they have made without always realizing something was chosen. This is a character novel, and, to be frank without giving too much away, it’s about James wanting Finn desperately and Ana discovering that she doesn’t. Sure to divide readers, Ana’s struggles will hopefully spark meaningful book club discussions about what modern women can, or should, want for themselves.
10. Gillespie and I by Jane Harris: Also on the Orange Prize longlist, this jewel of a book perfectly captures the voice of its Scottish, Victorian-era (unreliable) narrator, 35-year-old nosy spinster Harriet Baxter. Harriet, living on her own and with a small income that allows her to be a patron of the arts (as she would put it), endeavors to set the story straight for us about her relationship with the members of the Gillespie family, to whom a great tragedy has befallen (although it takes Harriet awhile to spit out the details). By the time she is out with it, however, her story begins to look more like something by Wilkie Collins than the gentle memoirs of a thoughtful family friend. Interspersing the story of her friendship with dashing young artist Ned Gillespie with her present life as an elderly woman in a mysterious stand-off with a possibly deranged maid, Harriet keeps readers under her thumb, revealing only what she wants us to see – but with an occasional slip. This is chilling, masterful, psychological drama at its best. For fans of Iain Pears’s The Portrait or Sebastian Barry’s The Secret Scripture.

Previous lists:

• Favourite adult books of 2011
• Favourite adult books of 2010

Seen reading on OC Transpo

• Dante's war by Sandra Sabatini
• The alchemist by Paulo Coelho
• Something by Hunter S. Thompson
• Man's search for meaning by Viktor Frankl, Harold S. Kushner and William J. Winslade
• A book about Rosa Parks with a high school library stamp 
• The house I loved by Tatiana de Rosnay
• My life as an experiment by A.J. Jacobs
• Inside of a dog: What Dogs See, Smell, and Know by Alexandra Horowitz 
• The cardinal of the Kremlin by Tom Clancy 
• Something by Luanne Rice
• Me: a grab bag of a million different random things, including the Citizen and Globe, Quill and Quire, Chatelaine and lots of other things. It's not that I'm not reading books, they are just not in my bag right now.

RA in a day 2012: Keynote speaker: Patrick Brown, Community Manager at Goodreads.com

Keynote speaker: Patrick Brown, Community Manager at Goodreads.com

Patrick was an engaging speaker who outlined using Goodreads for readers advisory, either as an individual (inputting your books and using their “Recommends” feature for your own tastes) or as a library (creating an account for your library: Patrick cited Salt Lake County Library as an example of creative use of group space on Goodreads. There are many other libraries on Goodreads as groups, not to mention, ahem, librarians!).

Speaking about the importance of readers, and librarians who are readers, in the online environment, Patrick reminded us that “people want to connect with people, not brands.” In other words, your library may have far fewer friends than you expect on Facebook, in part because the online environment, and the experience of reading and sharing reading experiences, is about personal connection.

Patrick’s talk really brought us full-circle to Sandra Martin’s talk this morning, highlighting the importance of readers in the online environment, and the ways in which readers are reaching out online to one another to create community. I didn't take a lot of notes for this session - by the end of the day, I wanted to sit back and enjoy listening!

Some other interesting things happened at RA in a day. Most importantly, congratulations to my good friend Shonna Froebel, who is the 2012 recipient of the OPLA's Award for Leadership in Adult Readers' Advisory. Here she is with OPLA RA committee chair Sharron Smith.

We also had several great poster sessions around the room, including Oshawa Public Library and CNIB - Book Club Guides, Mississauga Public Library - Readers to Writers at MPL, the OLA Forest of Reading®, and a poster made by me about the OPLA RA Committee Core Competencies (read them! use them!). There were also wonderful vendor displays from LibraryBound, Random House Canada, Penguin Canada, HarperCollins Canada, and the OLA Store. 

RA in a day 2012: The role of fiction and reading in community-building

 

The Role of Fiction and Reading in Community-Building with Dr. Raymond A. Mar, Associate professor of psychology at York University.

This was a follow-up to Dr. Mar’s 2010 presentation at RA in a day (see notes). In 2010 he talked about narrative fiction as a “simulation” exercise: when reading a novel, for example, you imagine what it would be like to be in the book. With neural imaging, the areas of the brain that deal with social processing light up when subjects are reading. We develop socially when we read, absorbing complex social information in a format that is easier to understand, and there is a correlational relationship between reading and decoding social information.

In his talk this year, he expanded on his research and examined the role of reading fiction in community development (tying into our theme for the day). He outlined recent research his team has done which as found that the genres people read matter; in fact, their study showed that the two genres that best predicted social abilities were (somewhat surprisingly to many) romance and suspense/thriller. Dr. Mar proposed that the former can be perhaps explained by the fact that all romance is about social abilities, social context and relationships.

He also explored the idea of “embodied cognition,” and its relation to reading: even abstract thought (i.e. when reading about an experience) is rooted in perception/action in the brain. Just thinking about a character’s activities, for instance, will activate the areas related to these actions in the motor cortex. In other words, Dr. Mar said, “experiences were akin to reality.”

Reading also predicts more egalitarianism and reduced gender stereotyping; a reader is “forced” to take the character’s point of view in order to understand and inhabit the story, and he or she thus develops empathy. As always, Dr. Mar was a really fascinating speaker.

RA in a day 2012: Luncheon Speaker Deborah Harkness

Luncheon Speaker: Deborah Harkness

Deborah Harkness, author of the bestselling novels, A Discovery of Witches and Shadow of Night, was a great speaker: passionate, funny, interesting – you can tell she teaches! She enthralled us with background information about her novels, including the fact that Ashmole 782 is a real manuscript, and it is really missing. She told us “it’s the only alchemical manuscript I ever called up and wasn’t able to get.” Matthew Roydon is also a real historical figure, and she herself is most similar to Emily, not Diana (as many people often assume). She talked about how her students, who she sees at a time of great change in their lives, influenced her portrayal of Diana: “I teach a lot of talented young people who are desperately afraid of their own power.”

Deborah also told us about how the idea for the novels was born: she was on vacation with her parents, recovering from academic responsibilities that left her out of touch with pop culture. When she spotted a copy of Breaking Dawn in the airport bookshop, her parents had to explain the series to her. Her first thought was “what do vampires do for a living?” She mused that they would want a career with some longevity, but not in proximity to, say, blood. So, a geneticist might be an idea… Similarly, a witch would make a good historian, for example. She also outlined the structure of the series: while the first book was set in the present day, the second was more historical fiction, and the third will have more science-fiction aspects to it (she hinted about genetics).

Finally, Deborah talked about using her newfound fame and fortune for good: she observed that the ability to “have an opinion” was cool. “No one cares about what a history professor thinks about libraries,” she explained, referring to media coverage of library closures in the US and UK,” but now that I’m a novelist, well, yes, thank you for asking, I have a lot of opinions about that!” She made a room full of librarians happy when she told us of her early literary influences (including The Witch of Blackbird Pond, one of my childhood favourites), and the quality time she spent in libraries as a child. “I’m here talking to you,” she told us, “because you were here for me when I was little.”

RA in a day 2012: Getting Your Community Reading: Sharing Your Successes

This post is about the second session of the day, Getting Your Community Reading: Sharing Your Successes. 

As a member of the RA Committee, the host organisation of RA in a day, I chaired one of the table discussions during this session. From the committee’s perspective, we developed this session as a response to feedback from previous years: attendees wanted more opportunities to talk to one another. My fellow committee member designed this session so that delegates changed places and sat at a table named for an Evergreen-shortlisted title, everyone brainstormed and shared great programs at their libraries, and then each table presented their favourite adult reading program with the room.

At my table, we heard about:

• Mississauga Library System’s outreach efforts and Bingo game with literary genres (read them all to fill your Bingo card and win prizes!). 
• TPL’s Film Club, arts and history lectures, book clubs (including in Cantonese!), bulletin board with patron suggestions (we’re trying this at Carlingwood this month! Come in to the Adult Info desk and leave us a suggestion for a display we are building) and the Thought Exchange series. 
• Kitchener’s One Book, One Community program, and their participation in Word on the Street.
• Milton Public Library’s memoir-writing workshop for seniors, Lifescapes (see photos from their book launch). 
• Haliburton County Public Library’s “Chair yoga” for seniors, and their Shakespeare Club. 
• Vaughn Public Library’s Teen Summer Reading Challenge. 
• Someone (I forget who) had a GREAT idea about soliciting book recommendations from high-profile community members (eg. the manager of local business, councillor, school principal, etc). 

I asked the table about their “favourite” failures, and one library (I forget which) shared a story of a Book Club Boot Camp outreach program ("we’ll come to you, and help you design your book club") that didn’t have many takers in the community. We then talked about how marketing / program promotion happens at each library:

• Some wished they had a Marketing department, but several others at the table concluded having one was often a mixed blessing. 
• At Kitchener, the Marketing department takes care of travel costs and arrangements, etc. for speakers, as well as promotion. 
• We talked about paying for advertising in community newspapers (some do, some can’t). 
• Word of mouth is always the best way to promote a program: invite people who have their own network! Also, people trust their friends but may not trust/know us. 
• One library faxes programs to the management of apartment buildings and gardening centres in the area.

RA in a day 2012: Online Book Clubs

The 7th annual "RA in a day" workshop for adult readers' advisory wrapped up recently. This year, we had a theme, which was "Reading Builds Community," and the day was once again hosted in the lovely Bram & Bluma Appel Salon of Toronto Reference Library.

As vice-chair of the hosting group, OPLA's Readers' Advisory Committee, I was fortunate to not only attend, but get to participate in planning and delivering the day's events. Over the coming week or so, I will share some notes from the sessions.

Today, we'll start with our first session, Online book clubs, with Sandra Martin from The Globe and Mail, and Margaret Elwood, the Book Buzz Librarian at Toronto Public Library.

Sandra Martin (standing) and Margaret Elwood.

Margaret spoke first about Book Buzz, TPL's virtual book club. She outlined some of the preliminary research done in an initial survey, showing that book club members are generally 98% female and 88% retired (therefore likely over the age of 65). Book Buzz was an attempt to attract active, engaged adults under fifty (via anonymous participation, no formal meetings), and avoid the book club stereotype. Current Book Buzz members (of which there are 1281) are 84% female and 64% are under the age of 50! There is still high interest in reading fiction, but also non-fiction, mystery, and biography. There is a moderate interest in sci-fi/fantasy, graphic books. The original Book Buzz researchers also looked into other active, successful online book groups, and found that successful ones had an active facilitator/moderator, so they made this a core focus of the site. Book Buzz currently uses Web Crossing software as a platform, but Web Crossing will soon be discontinued, and they will be moving to a social network type of site within the year.

Margaret spoke quite movingly about how the online book club forum broke down barriers: they had teens participating, and one deaf person. Book Buzz, she said, “places no constraints on accessibility.” She also discussed participation inequality at length – the idea that 1% of your participants will post regularly, but many others will find significant value in reading other people’s posts.

Sandra spoke about the Globe’s recent foray into online book clubs, calling 2012 “the year of living experientially” after she was asked to be the online book club facilitator. Sandra, a long-time book lover and member of the Quadrangle Society’s book club at Massey College, was approached by the Globe about an online book club. This was framed within attempts to “entice people to read the Globe online,” a “corporate imperative.” The online book club now uses ScribbleLive.com to host the site. Interestingly, Sandra said that Globe staff thought people would want to read non-fiction rather than fiction (she credits this to journalistic bias!), but of course many book clubs are the opposite. So far, the book club has featured Half-blood blues by Esi Edugyan, Prisoner of Tehran by Marina Nemat (in part because of the Canada Reads controversy), summer picks, and The casual vacancy by J. K. Rowling. Books are chosen by popular vote via a poll on the website. Sandra’s favourite aspect of an online book club is “feeling like I am in a really good conversation and knowing I don’t have to drive anyone home.”

Seen reading on OC Transpo

Soon enough...

• Freakonomics by Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner (hmmmm)
• Something from OPL's Express reads collection
• Something by Robert Jordan on a Kobo
• Micro: A Novel by Michael Crichton
• Something by Kathy Reichs
• Still Alice by Lisa Genova: the person reading this was having a conversation with the person reading Kathy Reichs - strangers bonding over books!
• A man wiping away tears while reading The Economist (I hope it was a medical condition?) 
• Rue Saint-Urbain par Mordecai Richler (other ideas)