Monday, March 31, 2008

Everything Looks So Good

Sometimes I can't find anything to read. It can be for many different reasons. I can't find a book fit my mood, or I am in a reading funk or whatever. Then there are the times like this when everything looks good. I always sneak a peak at the books in stockroom before they hit the shelf. The other day I saw three books I wanted to put @ top of my TBR list The Girl Who Saw Lions by Berlie Doherty, The Surrender Tree: Poems of Cuba's Struggle for Freedom by Margarita Engle, and Exodus by Julie Bertagna and later that day I saw Trouble by Gary D. Schmidt had come in. Also want to read My Most Excellent Year by Steve Kluger.
and 13th Reality by James Dashner. When I was leaving work today I saw two more books. The Patron Saint of Butterflies by Cecilia Galante and Cicada Summer by Andrea Beaty. Eight books isn't too bad, though it would be better if I was strong enough stop sneaking peaks at other books.

Sunday, March 30, 2008

My Book Blogging Credentials

I enjoy my books the same way I do a movie or a baseball game, I can get very emotional. I laugh, cry, curse out loud and sometimes I'll even close the book when the scary parts come. I can't remember not liking books. Though it wasn't until high school that I discovered the true strength of a good book. I won't if even try to put into words what a good book does for me because I can't do it justice. So I will just share the story of the first book that made me cry. This was before I knew some books were best finished at home. I was waiting for the bus, seven people away from the bus shelter, reading Mama Day by Gloria Naylor. Everything was going well, George finally started to believe Mama Day. He went into the rooster cage, next thing I now George is gone. It happened so quickly I had to read it again. When I realized that George really was dead, I cried so hard it hurt. Luckily I was in NY so no one gave me a second glance. After Mama Day, books became a little more special. It will always hold a special place in my book lover's heart, top shelf . Actually African American fiction will always have a special place in my book lover's heart (excluding urban/street lit). Seven years ago I started working at a bookstore. I rediscovered books I read as a child. When I saw Golden books, Frog and Toad, Judy Blume books again I smiled inside. I didn't mind going back and revisiting the young reader in me. Than I started reading books I missed the first time around like the Phantom Tollbooth. I was hooked, I had caught the kid lit love bug. I don't remember reading much YA. One minute I was reading the Babysitters Club and Hardy Boys ( I was a Hardy Boys girl but when the Hardy Boys and Nancy Drew got together, I was one happy chick), next I am reading Stephen King. A lot of the girls in my class were reading V.C Andrews Flowers in the Attic series not me I was stubborn and loyal to Stephen King. Now that I work in a children's section I am making up for lost time and reading a lot of YA. I resisted starting a blog for a long time, preferring instead to hop from blog to blog but now I am ready. I am still lazy and a little scared with the tech savvy of a 70 yr old but what the hell.