Getting Graphic

Have you read a graphic novel yet? I'm not talking about the old romance novels my sister used to keep under her bed. I think Shanna got passed around to all of us over the years--even my brother read it. They were pretty graphic. But I digress.

Graphic novels are sort of like comic books, only not so comic. They are a long way from my old stash of Archie, Richie Rich, and Casper and Wendy comics. They cover deeper subjects and are generally longer and less episodic. The story arc is larger. Take a look in the children's, young adult and even the adult sections at the library. The graphic novel shelves are growing and filling, and the books are getting a lot of use!

I'm a bit careful with them, because to me a visual image leaves a much stronger footprint on my mind, and I want to know what my kids are looking at. Like any other books, there are some better choices and some not-so-great choices. However, graphic novels are great for reluctant readers, because they get to move along in a story with a higher level of sophistication, and with a diverse vocabulary, without being bogged down in long paragraphs. This can be a great step into reading. Author Sue Stauffacher collaborated on a series of graphic novels called Wireman, with just this purpose in mind--to catch the imagination of older readers who needed encouragement to read.

Graphic novels have served another purpose in my household. When assigned reading takes up a lot of the spare reading time for my school-age kids, graphic novels can provide a nice side reading project. My son thoroughly enjoyed the Bone series by Jeff Smith, and he has been introduced to many classics--Frankenstein, Treasure Island, even a Bible story, to name a few--in graphic or manga formats (manga is the Japanese version of graphic novels). He usually hauls home several new choices when we go to the library. My daughter and I had a good time reading Rapunzel's Revenge, a wild west take on the fairy tale, and its sequel, Calamity Jack, both by popular young adult author Shannon Hale. She also enjoyed a book called Korgi by Christian Slade that involved a cute little dog, always a winning topic with her.

But these books can also be deeply-felt novels for adult readers. Today (yes, one day--another bonus of graphic novels for slow readers!) I read Stitches by David Small. He is a Caldecott-winning illustrator of children's books. This book is not fiction--it is Small's memoir. He grew up in Detroit, and he suffered many traumas in his childhood, including losing his voice when he undergoes surgery for cancer. No one told him he had cancer, no one told him he was losing a vocal chord, and no one seemed to care about his loss.

Stitches recounts many horrifying experiences, yet somehow it is bearable because of Small's ability to remember the details of looking at things through a child's eyes. Which is also what makes it so sad. The strange thing about reading this story in a graphic format is that you move through it all so quickly. You hardly have time to recover from one thing, and there he is moving on to the next. That may be precisely what it is like for a child in his situation. Yet it's a strange way to read about a tragic childhood, if you are accustomed to wordy recollections and pontifications in memoir.

It's a fascinating read--partly because of his story, and partly because of the format. It's the first graphic book I've actually sat and read from cover to cover, on my own, to myself. It gives you an intimacy with the mind and heart of the author that mere words could not conjure. I'm looking forward to trying another soon.

Added Note: About 15 minutes after I posted this, I realized that I had lied, but I was too tired to bother fixing it! I have read another graphic novel, and it might be one that interests many of you. It's a gorgeous, glossy, colorfully illustrated version of Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice, adapted by Nancy Butler and Hugo Petrus. The front cover is made to look like a women's magazine, but the words inside are directly from the novel. It's the perfect gift for P & P diehard fans.

Music and a Movie, Part II

This was the one I'd been looking forward to all summer. Tonight Natalie Merchant brought back memories with "Carnival," "Wonder" and "Kind and Generous." She also did an amazing thing--she brought people to their feet--dancing even--to poetry. Her latest album, Leave Your Sleep, features 2 discs of children's poetry put to her original musical compositions. She plays just about every genre of music, from Chinese-inspired to Cajun to nautical tunes. She did not, however, satisfy the 10,000 Maniacs fans in the crowd who were shouting for the numbers she sang with her former group.

The most interesting part of the concert may have been Natalie herself. She appears to be easily distracted, or unaccustomed to being able to see her audience as clearly as she could tonight at Meijer Gardens. She would lose track of her lyrics as she watched people talking on cell phones, which obviously irritated her. She was already a little out of her element because it was too bright for some of the projections of her show, and she was waiting for the sun to go down. Which it did eventually, but it meant changing up the order of her show. She was very interactive, launching into impromptu tunes such as "Dust in the Wind." She even sang the second verse after someone Googled the lyrics on his iPhone for her.

Mellow, beautiful and filled with great music, it was another lovely night at Meijer Gardens. And I think Natalie Merchant's voice could make the Oscar Meyer song sound fabulous. Even if people are walking around talking on phones or standing in line for popcorn just around the corner.

Also went to see "Inception" this weekend with our movie group. What a mindbender! Which shouldn't be a surprise, given that it was directed by Christopher Nolan, the same mind behind one of our personal favorites, "Memento." I don't think I can even describe the plot, but it was great to see with a group--plenty to wonder about. Though I haven't been that tense during a movie, or exhausted after, in a long time.

Get out there and enjoy some summer fun before everything starts over again!

Bedtime Stories

My 7-year-old and I finished yet another Junie B. Jones title by Barbara Park tonight. I have to admit, when my older daughter became old enough for such books, I avoided Junie B. because she seemed like such a smart mouth. Since I have given up on parenting the perfect child, my younger daughter and I have enjoyed reading these books together--there are many laugh-out-loud moments. We've come a long way from reading the same board books over and over, and though I love Goodnight Moon and Time for Bed, it's fun to explore wider worlds with her.

The youngest likes to read the books to me now, instead of the other way around. Since I am generally tired and ready to finish the bedtime routine as quickly as possible, this isn't always my favorite way. After all, I could read it so much faster! But when I take a deep breath, settle in, and give myself to enjoying the book with her, it's fun to hear her inflection and her sense of humor coming through. Some of her favorites right now, besides Junie B. and a multitude of picture books, are the Daisy Meadows fairy books--Weather Fairies, Pet Fairies, Flower Fairies, Dance Fairies--you get the picture. When she allows me to read to her, we've been laughing over Beverly Cleary's Ramona books. (We're looking forward to seeing Ramona and Beezus in the theater soon!)

One of my favorite read alouds to all of my kids at 7 or 8 years old is The Prince of the Pond by Donna Jo Napoli. This is the story of the prince who has been turned into a frog by an old hag, told by the female frog who finds this huge, inexplicably incompetent male frog and eventually falls in love with him. The book subtly teaches numerous facts about frog life, and it is very entertaining. All three kids loved it. My son liked one of his dad's old favorites, Flat Stanley by Jeff Brown. I did too, though I found the rest of the series, well, flat. Cleary's The Mouse and the Motorcycle was a good one, too.

Our older daughter is 11, and she still wants to read with us every night. Some of our favorites together have been Inkheart by Cornelia Funke, and The Thief Lord by the same author has her wanting to visit Venice sometime soon! The Princess Academy by Shannon Hale was another great one. Though the plot involves all of the girls from a small mountain village being sent to learn to be princesses because the prince will be choosing one of them for his own, the main character is a strong, smart young woman who is not interested in wealth or fame. Both of us were hooked reading this one. I have wept through parts of Because of Winn Dixie by Kate diCamillo, and I'm hoping to read Louisa May Alcott's Little Women with her soon, though again I'll probably turn into a blubbering mess!

The oldest, our son, recently turned 13 and has not had us read to him regularly for a while. This is partly due to the logistics. Often one of us is gone for a meeting or exercise or whatever in the evening, so bedtime is a one-man or woman show. Reading to three kids for any significant length of time can be a big commitment! The boy child is content to read to himself most nights, especially when he has a stack of new graphic novels from the library.

Every so often, though, I will sit down with whatever book he happens to be reading at that time, and I'll read 5 or 6 pages to him. This keeps me connected to what he is reading, and it gives him an opportunity to ask questions that the book has brought to his mind. And if he is reading a book that's been assigned by school, a few pages of read aloud sometimes kicks in his interest and he can move forward more eagerly.

Bedtime stories are a great way to connect with our kids. Choosing books that interest both the reader and the child being read to makes this a fun experience rather than a boring chore.

It's A Dog's LIfe

Narrow Dog to Carcassonne. If Bill Bryson (A Walk in the Woods, In A Sunburned Country) decided to take his wife and dog in a narrow canal boat to cross the English Channel and explore France, and if he decided to disregard almost all punctuation, this is the book he would write.

And the Fab 5 would read it all, given enough time. As it turned out, two of us almost finished it, and two of us merely got a taste of it. For the record, I am one of the two who almost finished it (and skimmed the rest). I report that only so you don't think I'm getting into a habit of reporting on books I haven't even made it halfway through. That will come later this year, when work picks up a bit!

Terry and Monica Darlington, along with their dog Jim--a whippet--made the journey through England, across the Channel, and through France in their 7-foot-wide English canal boat. Most travel books incite a renewed case of disastrous wanderlust in me, causing me to lose many hours of my life to Travelocity.com. The Fab 5 agreed that many months aboard a narrowboat (particularly crossing the Channel), waiting for locks to fill and open, isn't our next hoped-for adventure.

Sonya brought a catalog of canal boats along to the meeting. They look so cute and cozy, but yet so narrow. Perhaps it's having children at home that makes it sound so claustrophobic, or jobs that we must get back to, or the fact that most of our vacations are always fitted to the very limited time frame set for them. Terry and Monica are retired, which I realize doesn't mean they have nothing to do, but it gives them some freedom to take a leisurely pace if they so desire.

This book is hard to read. There are no quotation marks. And he jumps from topic to topic, allusion to allusion, event to event very quickly. I think he must have read Joyce's stream of consciousness novel Ulysses one too many times, or possibly even Finnegan's Wake. (Does anyone really read all of Finnegan's Wake?) But hard reading isn't necessarily unenjoyable. The book is hilarious, and the further we read, the more we liked it. It just takes a bit more time and concentration than we planned for a summer travel read.

Terry enjoys people, pubs and keeping his dog company. Monica, his tiny dynamo of a wife, keeps them moving in a straight line. Jim the whippet runs the show and keeps them on their toes. Jim encourages the pub habit and, sadly, hates boating. A couple of us might be next in line at the whippet adoption center. If you want to see a picture of Jim and his owners, you can look them up on http://www.narrowdog.com/.

I personally laughed out loud many times while reading, and I forced my husband to listen to many out-of-context readings that left me howling with laughter while he graced me with his patient smile, waiting for the opportunity to get back to his own book. Yes, I'm one of those people. But Darlington is a very funny writer, and his quiet exaggerations of certain scenes are worth the work of deciphering his paragraphs.

Talking about the book got us talking about vacations. Nancy is the opposite of Terry and Monica. While the Darlingtons are forever visiting other boaters or having them to visit, Nancy suggests that one good way to discourage strangers from talking to you at a campground is to display an Amway or Herbalife sticker in your vehicle--"Lose weight now, ask me how." She tried putting beer on the picnic table one time, but that only encouraged visitors. It would most certainly encourage Terry Darlington. Not so much a people person, that Nancy.

The follow up to this book is Narrow Dog to Indian River, in which they somehow take their boat (or at least a boat) down the United States to Florida. I definitely want to read this book, because I'd love to know Darlington's impressions of the American territory as he passes it by.

Next month we'll be getting our feminist groove on, reading When Everything Changed. It's something to do with the state of women in the US over the last 40 or 50 years. Get out the bras and the lighter fluid.

Music and A Movie--A Good Weekend!

This has been an unusual weekend for us. Last night we went to a concert, and tonight a movie. Can you tell that two of our kids are at summer camp? And the youngest one is thrilled to have "real babysitters," so we're making the most of it.

Friday night we went to see Umphrey's McGee at Meijer Gardens. This band is considered improg, or progressive improvisational rock. That means, as far as I can see, that within the structure of the song, the musician that is currently spotlighted is free to play whatever comes to them. We heard a lot of different influences in their music--Yes, Supertramp, the Who, a bit of world beat. I'm very lyrically-oriented when I listen to music (should that surprise anyone?), so the fact that they are not as strong vocally as instrumentally takes a few points from the grading scale. However, they really play well and it was a beautiful night, so all is good. Also, I think this may be the first time I saw a light show at Meijer Gardens.

We were, however, old fogies in the crowd. For once we got there in time to get seats closer to the stage, which turned out to be a problem for us. Umphrey's has a devoted following, and they were out in force. Mostly in their 20s or early 30s, well pierced and tattooed, wearing either homemade superhero costumes or flower-child meets Hollister outfits. All of the rows directly ahead of us stood up to become a mass of movement and skin. From our comfortable beach chairs, we were staring directly at a derriere covered by nothing but a very thin gauzy skirt. That might have worked for Brian, but quite a few were ignoring the no-smoking policy, which drives him bonkers.

Eventually we packed up our things and moved to a spot in the grass on the side, and from there we could people-watch to our hearts' content and see the stage at the same time. Obviously none of these kids had spent the day unpacking one kid from camp, getting her to a birthday party, then packing and shipping off the other two to camp. I think I might have had that much energy at some point in my life, but at this time, sitting in the beach chairs is much more appealing.

So that was Friday.

Tonight we met a portion of our movie group to see the movie "Please Give." This is the sort of odd, funny movie I like. It's not for everyone--too much talking, not enough plot, too much language for others. The movie starts in a jarring way, showing a series of breasts being placed on slides for mammograms in a decidedly unsexy way.

The story centers on a family going through midlife--a too-familiar marriage, a difficult 15 year old. They have a neighbor who is dying, and her granddaughter is caring for her. All of their lives become intertwined, including an extramarital affair.

There are a lot of themes twisted through the story, some of which are: how women see themselves, what makes someone attractive, our need to give and receive and what motivates charity. Always excellent, actress Catherine Keener plays the wife and mother of the family, who lives in a fog of guilt and sees only the sadness in the world. Her husband seems happily immune to guilt, until he makes his own mistakes. The daughter hates the way she looks and needs understanding and acceptance.

The caretaker granddaughter and her sister are a study in opposites--plain vs. beautiful, duty-bound vs. cold-hearted. The grandmother is as cold as her less caring granddaughter. There is a lovely scene where the kind, duty-bound granddaughter chooses to see the beauty in the world rather than to dwell on the sadness.

If you like your movie in blockbuster form, this one won't be for you. If you like smaller, quiet movies with interesting characters (and aren't offended by the bad language or other mature situations), you might give it a try.

Elegant Hedgehogs

Well, in my initial statements for this blog, I talk about how you can attend book club vicariously through me. I think I rashly mentioned something like "I read the book, I attend the book club..." I'm here to tell you I've let you down. I didn't finish the book. I didn't even finish half of the book. I got about one third of the way through. And it won't be the last time.

It was not even my desire to fulfill the rest of my commitment to my blog readers that goaded me to attend the meeting anyway. It was the presence of my children. With one coming home from summer camp this morning, and two headed out to summer camp tomorrow, things are in an uproar around here, and book club was my escape from the rabble. My husband, Brian, cast a sorrowful look my way as I headed to the garage.

The Neland Womens' Book Club gathered tonight to talk about The Elegance of the Hedgehog by Muriel Barbery. My failure to meet the reading deadline has nothing to do with a lack of interest in the book. This book has been a worldwide bestseller. It was originally published in France (in French, of all things), and, according to our diligent leader-of-the-night, Rita, it has been translated into 35 languages. Apparently it sold 1.2 million hardcovers in France alone!

I think it goes without saying, but the following thoughts and insights are hardly mine! These are things plucked from the group discussion.

A friend of mine sums this book up as a beach read for philosophers. If philosophers ever went to the beach, this is what they'd read there. I don't know the beachgoing tendencies of philosophers, but I can say that this book covers its share of philosophy. Tonight's leader, Rita, who has spent a lot of time living in France, said that the philosophical nature of the book is part of its appeal for the French readership--philosophy is still compulsory in high school there, and it is part of the general conversational atmosphere.

France is also a country that has a strong sense of classes, and this novel about people learning to step across barriers is intriguing. One of our members had recently heard a lecture by a professor here, Dr. James Bratt, who said that classism is going to become an overriding issue for the U.S. in coming decades. The rich are getting richer, and the poor are getting poorer. The gap between them will become a bigger barrier to cross. Even in the U.S. (land of opportunity and all that) it takes an extraordinary child to break out of the expected, no matter their class. Paloma, the young girl in the book, writes "But if, in our world, there is any chance of becoming the person you haven't yet become...will I know how to seize that chance, turn my life into a garden that will be completely different from my forebears?"

The book is told from two perspectives--a 50-something concierge of an apartment building, and a 12-year-old girl who resides there as well. This book got very positive reactions from many of the readers at the meeting, and one woman said she went back and read each narrative separately to get a different view of the story. It is hard to imagine a 12-year-old with this sort of insight into the world and the people around her, but most were able to get past that aspect of the story.

The Elegance of the Hedgehog is not a light read--part of the reason I have not finished it is that I have tried to read it while sitting at the neighborhood pool, and I've been too distracted there to dive into the story, if you'll pardon the pun. Reading time at home in the quiet living room has been much more successful.

The novel reflects on art and beauty, and what meaning those things add to our lives. It also shows the way that people hide part or all of themselves from the world. (I can't help hearing the lyrics to "The Stranger" by Billy Joel over and over in my mind.) When we are quick to categorize without looking at people more deeply, we miss the chance to really know them. And all of us have a longing to be known for who we really are.

Rita was able to give us more insight into the French context of the novel. In the past, starting in the 18th century, almost every apartment building in France came to have a concierge. The concierge sweeps the hall, polishes the doorknobs, takes the garbage bins to the street for pickup, and numerous other tasks, sometimes even keeping noisy residents under control.

Over the last decade, 10,000 buildings have given up their concierges. Cleaning crews from businesses sweep through many buildings a day for a lower cost than maintaining a concierge position. Many mourn the loss of this tradition and are campaigning to keep the positions. They are the only human connection that some residents have, especially elderly people who depend on them. Personally, I would very much appreciate a concierge in my home.

Also, there is one scene in the book that was more understandable (and more humorous) when Rita explained that France controls the "sales" that retail stores can offer. Sales can only occur in January or July, so everyone goes in to try to get a deal.

Beyond the specifics of trying to better understand a novel written in another country and language, there are universals here that make the book successful in so many places. As I mentioned, art and beauty and the desire to know and to be known are strong themes. The last page has some lovely words. "...Maybe that's what life is about: there's a lot of despair, but also the odd moment of beauty, where time is no longer the same. It's as if those strains of music created a sort of interlude in time, something suspended, an elsewhere that had come to us, an always within never. Yes, that's it, an always within never." Isn't that what we are all searching for in some way, an always within the never?

Mining for Gold, Coming Up with Copper

A couple of years ago, Ivan Doig's novel The Whistling Season became one of my favorites. Set in Montana at the turn of the century (the 20th, not the 21st!), young Paul narrates as his widowed father answers the ad of a woman looking for work as a housekeeper. Rose, the housekeeper, sweeps into town with the unexpected addition of her brother, Morrie.

Morrie's next chapter is the subject of Doig's newest novel, Work Song. A few years have passed, and Morrie has been travelling the world. He is looking to stake a claim on a new life in Butte, Montana, where copper mining is a lucrative business. Morrie is a bit of a fancy man--picture Frasier Crane in an earlier time. Fussy, verbiose, and a bit of a showman, Morrie has the knack of stepping into things at critical times, for better or for worse.

This novel did not live up to my expectations for it. Paul, the boy in The Whistling Season, was much easier for me to warm up to--his naive and innocent outlook set the tone for that novel. Morrie is a man with a lot of experience and a lot of mistakes under his belt. He's just not quite as sympathetic.

Beyond that, part of Work Song's plot seemed preposterous to me. The local copper miners' union is fighting the evil mining company, Anaconda, for fairer compensation and safety considerations. Morrie lands in the middle of it all, and the solution that he and the union leader, Jared, come up with seems flimsy at best. Beyond that, many of the characters feel too much like "characters"--for instance, the two retired miners who share Morrie's boarding house could sometimes pass for Larry's brothers Daryl, and his other brother Daryl, on the old show "Newhart."

My grumbling aside, I still enjoy Doig's style. He has a sense of humor. He describes Montana beautifully, and it's hard for me to resist a protagonist who is so taken with antiquarian books! I would love to visit the imagined library in this novel.

It's a curious thing to me how many books I've read recently that have to do with mining and miners, which is not a subject I set out to read about. Is this a trend in fiction or just with me? It's a topic with which an author can indirectly make reference to the state of our global environment as well as how corporations treat employees, as mining has such effects on the landscape and the people. Whiter Than Snow by Sandra Dallas, Emily's Ghost by Denise Giardina, any book I've read by Silas House--all touch on mining and the difficulties that miners face.

If you loved The Whistling Season, this might be worth reading just to follow up on one of the more colorful characters. However, Work Song would not be the novel I'd dig into as an introduction to the fiction of Ivan Doig.

The Art of Reading

As a girl, I was fascinated with The Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler by E.L. Konigsburg. What a dream to live in a museum--sleeping in the beds, splashing in the fountain, making it my own.

Later, reading The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger inspired me to look for the distinctive staircase described in the book. It is ostensibly in the Newberry Library, and during an anniversary getaway to Chicago, I thought this was perfect timing. Much to my husband's chagrin.

First, we went to the wrong library (my mistake). Then we went to the correct library, only to find that it is a genealogical research library. Undeterred, I signed up for a membership card (free), and we went into the research room to do some superficial family research before I attempted to find the staircase (breaching a few restricted areas as I went). If it exists, it is nowhere that a less-than-competent sleuth like me can find it. I don't think I embarrassed the two of us too much.

In spite of this history, we love visiting Chicago. The Field Museum and the Museum of Science and Industry are so family-friendly. The Adler Planetarium is stellar. But it's the Shedd Aquarium that attracts our children. Until now, however, we have never gone to the Art Institute of Chicago.

There are a couple of reasons for this. One of our female offspring, who shall remain nameless, professes to "hate museums." Brian and I, for that matter, have never been the type to spend a long time in an art museum. With a sadly lacking art education in my past, I never felt like I "got" art. Having a son with natural artistic talent and interest has changed everything. Still. Taking three children when only one wants to go has definite drawbacks.

Over the last couple of weeks I've been reading a new book aloud to 11-year-old Natalie at night. It's called The Sixty-Eight Rooms, by Marianne Malone. While I can't say I personally have been riveted (too much logistical description, not enough action), she has been drawn in by the premise. Jack and Ruthie, two sixth graders, discover a way to shrink down and explore the Thorne Rooms. The Thorne Rooms are a collection of amazingly detailed miniature rooms in the lower level of the Art Institute of Chicago. The idea of being small enough to explore them, and then walking out into the worlds they represent, has Natalie's imagination reeling.

She was thrilled to find out we were going to visit the Art Institute, and she insisted that we save the Thorne Rooms for last. We spent a lot of time looking at each tiny room, representing American, British and French rooms from many different periods, as well a few others such as Japan, China and a cathedral. This was the highlight of the trip for her.

The Art Institute turned out to be a highlight for the rest of us, too, with the exception of a certain control-freak 7-year-old who preferred not to be there. Monet, Matisse, Magritte, and Picasso were all wonderful. I was ridiculously excited to see, in real life, the Georges Seurat painting that Cameron closely admires in the movie Ferris Bueller's Day Off. Andrew's enthusiasm for architecture made the Architecture and Design section a hit, and both of the older kids were beside themselves when they recognized one of the paintings that Van Gogh was painting in a recent episode of "Dr. Who."

If you consider visiting an art museum, and you are uncertain of your children's interest, try some books beforehand. Chasing Vermeer and its follow-ups The Wright 3 and The Calder Game by Blue Balliett might open the doors to their imaginations just as Konigsburg's book did for me, Malone's book did for Natalie, and "Dr. Who" did for all of us.

A series of board books by Julie Merberg and Suzanne Bober introduce toddlers to famous paintings in titles like A Picnic with Monet and Dancing with Degas. Vincent's Colors, a lovely picture book using Vincent Van Gogh's own words, is another great choice.

And, of course, if you must drag an uninterested adult along, I suppose you could always try The DaVinci Code by Dan Brown. Perhaps the aforementioned adult could look for hidden clues to a secretive religious order, though there must be a better alternative! I tried Loving Frank, by Nancy Horan, about the mistress of Frank Lloyd Wright, but I can't recommend it. I know it's a bestseller, but it did nothing for me. Maybe it's time for me to re-read The Mixed-Up Files!