What Book Would You Read 10 Times?

Over on our Facebook page, we asked "If you had to read one book ten times, what would you pick?" We got so many great responses that we decided to share them here! Click on the titles to view them in our catalog and place a request if you like!

I think I have actually read Beauty by Robin McKinley that many times over the years, starting when I was ten. -Mari

The help. Best book ever! -Rene

I think I have read the Little House on the Prairie series that many times -- several times as a child, and now with each of my children. -Carrie

To Kill a Mockingbird and a few others come to mind as well -Heather

To Kill a Mockingbird, my favorite! -Darryl

I've done that - Soldier of the Great War by Mark Helprin. The first time I read it I was so unhappy to be almost finished when I was 20 pages from the end that I just flipped back to the first page and started right over again. -Sarah

China Men by Maxine Hong Kingston, Love Medicine by Louise Erdrich, Song of Solomon by Toni Morrison, and I also agree with To Kill A Mockingbird -Sheryl

The Wizard of Oz. The plot has many layers to it. -Timothy

Killer Angels -Amanda

Goodnight Moon -Lawrence Habitat Restore

Suttree by Cormac McCarthy -Andy

Been there, done that. I have read 100 Years of Solitude 13 times. 4 times in english. -Christian

The Horse and His Boy by Clive Staples!! :) -Christina

Mary Stewart's The Hollow Hills -Jenn

Sarah Schulman's Girls and Visions and Everything -Moz

In Cold Blood, I believe I have already read it 10 times :) -María

Dune by Frank Herbert -Ryan

Little Women came to mind first. And I've read The Secret Garden every spring for decades. -Arwen

Pilgrim at Tinker Creek is one that I like to reread. If I was stuck on a desert island, I would bring a long one: The Brothers Karamazov. -Jennifer

That's why I keep the ones I like around. -Colleen

Breakfast of Champions -Lee

Jane Eyre. BTW, I have already read it at least that and more! My fave. -Bronwyn

Blood & Chocolate. Already working in time #3. -Cleo

Complete Works of William Shakespeare!?! (Is that cheating?) -Danielle

Robinson Crusoe, or Nine Stories by JD Salinger -Chris Kramer

It's a Magical World by Bill Watterson -Frank

Any Dr.Seuss book...I probably already have and it didn't bother me. -Squawk Box Marketing, Inc.

Meat and Greet: Sustainable Ranching in Kansas

On January 26th, you can celebrate Kansas Day at Lawrence Public Library by meeting Kansas ranchers practicing the art of sustainable animal husbandry!  Free tasting portions of beef, elk, turkey and buffalo will be provided by Local Burger.  In the meantime, beef up on your reading by checking out these recommendations by Hilary Brown of Local Burger:

All Flesh is Grass: The Pleasures and Promises of Pasture Farming by Gene Logsdon
Amid consumer concerns about how farm animals are bred, “contrary farmer” Gene Logsdon explains historically effective grazing practices and new techniques that have blossomed during the past decade.

Deeply Rooted: Unconventional Farmers in the Age of Agribusiness by Lisa Hamilton
Hamilton looks for solutions to a problematic food system by looking to a few of the people who actually grow our food: an African-American dairyman in Texas, a tenth-generation rancher in New Mexico, and a modern pioneer family in North Dakota.

Folks, This Ain’t Normal: A Farmer’s Advice  for Happier Hens, Healthier People, and a Better World by Joel Salatin
Acclaimed agrarian Joel Salatin discusses how far removed we are from the simple, sustainable joy that comes from living close to the land and the people we love.

 Grass-Fed Cattle: How to Produce and Market Natural Beef by Julius Reuchel
Cattle are wonderfully adept at converting grass into meat, fat and milk.  Here, Reuchel offers complete information on running a profitable, environmentally sustainable farm based on the efficiency of cattle and grass.

Holy Shit: Managing Manure to Save Mankind by Gene Logsdon
Logsdon provides the inside story of manure — our greatest, yet most misunderstood, natural resource.  A fresh, fascinating and entertaining look at an earthy, but absolutely crucial, subject.

The Last of the Husbandmen: A Novel of Farming Life by Gene Logsdon
A personal depiction of the personal triumphs and tragedies, clashes and compromises, and abiding human character of American farming families.

Real Food: What to Eat and Why by Nina Planck
Hailed as the “patron saint of famers’ markets,” here Planck suggests that ancient foods like beef and butter have been falsely accused, while industrial foods like corn syrup have created an epidemic of obesity and heart disease.

The Vegetarian Myth: Food, Justice and Sustainability by Lierre Keith
Part memoir, nutritional primer, and political manifesto, this controversial examination exposes the destructive history of agriculture and asserts that, in order to save the planet, food must come from within living communities.

Literary Loveliness

In the past year I’ve read books that are smart, strange, sad, funny.  Yet Mary O’Connell’s teen novel The Sharp Time takes the cake for “loveliest.”

First, there’s the heroine’s name: Sandinista Jones.  Next, you’ve got the frothy sweet vintage couture she wears to her job at The Pale Circus.  And did I mention her teenage crush on the boy with a tiny crucifix tattooed to the pad of his thumb?

Much has been made of the fact that O’Connell is a graduate of the same Iowa Writer’s Workshop that produced Kurt Vonnegut and Flannery O’Connor.  And sure, it makes sense when you consider how tightly each phrase of The Sharp Time is written, and the quiet poetry of seemingly inconsequential details like the fermented bottle of organic carrot juice that Sandinista keeps in her fridge to remind her of her recently killed mother.  But the part that seems so un­-workshoppy is the punk rock vibe of the heroine’s salty inner monologue.  Witness Sandinista on applying for a new job: “I was about to go all Marcel Proust on his @$$.”

Then there were the parts that surprised me – the monks and the saints, which shape the whole story in a sense, but in a way that will satisfy both believers and non-believers alike.  These religious, saintly figures serve as a parable for O’Connell’s core message that mercy and compassion exist, even for punk rock girls in vintage couture with dead moms:  “I can tell you’re full of sorrows.  But the sharp time passes.”

But my favorite reason for loving The Sharp Time is the sweet, magical little universe O’Connell has imagined on Kansas City’s 38^th Street – The Pale Circus vintage clothing shop.  The Second Chance? pawn shop.  Erika’s Erotic Confections.  The Trappist monks up the hill who make raspberry jam.  If you blink, you might miss it, but partway through the book O’Connell reveals that Henry Charbonneau, the impeccably dressed vintage connoisseur, and Arne, the rough-around-the-edges pawnshop proprietor, are in a book club together.  They’ve been reading the poem “The Monk’s Insomnia” by Denis Johnson: “A boy sets out like something thrown from the furnace of a star.”

I love The Sharp Time mostly because I want to go to 38^th Street and sit in on Henry Charbonneau and Arne’s book club.  Then I want to head over to Erika’s Erotic Confections for one of Erika’s eye-popping banana curry chocolates.  But I’ll avoid her pale green frosting.  You would, too, if you’d already read The Sharp Time.

Mary O’Connell will appear at Lawrence Public Library with Laura Moriarty on Saturday, February 4 at 2:00 p.m.  Books will be available for signing from The Raven Bookstore.

Rachel - Programs

Donald Ray Pollock: Brother Grim

donaldraypollock.com

When reading author bios, it seems like it is always Ivy League-this, prestigious fellowship-that. They invariably live in Manhattan (or Brooklyn if under 35) and are married to someone similarly upmarket.  That these achievements are touted on dust jackets is to be expected, of course, but the homogeneity of the blurbs can feel a little stale.  So I’m always excited to find authors who have led rocky lives, grew up in derelict trailer parks, or on hog farms, or somewhere similarly ramshackle, and have managed the statistically impossible feat of publishing brilliant books.

One such outlier is Donald Ray Pollock, the author of The Devil All the Time and Knockemstiff.  According to his website, he grew up in a holler in Southern Ohio, dropped out of high school at seventeen to work in a slaughterhouse, and went on to spend thirty-two years laboring in a paper mill (both jobs very smelly and therefore very authentic).  Pollock returned to school later in life, and in 2009 was awarded his MFA in Creative Writing from Ohio State University.

    

Both of his published works take place in the backwoods of Ohio, and both focus on the bleak, hardscrabble lives of the rural disenfranchised.  His first book is a series of short stories that follow various residents of the small town of Knockemstiff (also the title of the book, and the town where Pollock was raised).  The economic and cultural isolation of this forgotten place manifests in bizarre, often depraved, behaviors – drugs, incest, murder – all written in a darkly ambivalent tone.  The residents' depravity is exhibited with a slothful, crusty hollowness, suggesting a touch of black humor from the author, but without any judgment.  It’s reminiscent of the film Gummo, if the movie was quite a bit smarter.

Pollock’s more recent work, The Devil All The Time, is thematically similar to his short stories, but draws back from the grotesque a degree, leaving a far more dramatic and approachable story.  Also centered in small town Ohio, the prose follows a series of luckless, downtrodden souls – each sharing bleak pasts and no real hope for a sunnier tomorrow.  His characters include a crooked cop, disgraced and disgraceful preachers, and a serial killing couple roaming the highways to prey on young wanderers.  The first half of the book feels like a dysthymic trudge, but characters are eventually woven together and a protagonist revealed, ending with hints of a thriller.  Publisher’s Weekly named it a top ten book of the year, as did GQ.  It’s an amazing book, without a doubt, and highly recommended, but a word of warning:  The story has the power to sap the happiness right out of you.  I wouldn’t suggest reading it first thing in the morning, right before bed, anytime on vacation, or mixing it with alcohol - and maybe avoid reading Pollock altogether if you have a family history of depression.

Ransom - Reference

Patron's Pick Slays

Take a social club for wrongly acquitted murderers, add the house full of artists next door, stir in a dead body or two (that none of them want the police to find out about), and you get The Wooden Overcoat. This madcap murder mystery by Pamela Branch, originally published in England in 1951, is compared in the introduction to contemporary British film comedies such as “Kind Hearts and Coronets”. If you’re familiar with that movie (shown at the library as part of a film series a few years ago), you know what fun you can expect, and Branch’s descriptive storytelling brings the scenes vividly to life as the misunderstandings between the two groups escalate into increasingly farcical attempts to hide the crimes.  It’s a quick and enjoyable read that was every bit as entertaining as its cover copy made it out to be.

How’d I discover this obscure little gem, you might ask? While cataloging it for a patron suggestion—that’s right, another patron wanted to read it, suggested it for the collection, and now other readers are able to benefit from it, too! It’s a good reminder that community suggestions help build the collection-- if you can’t find what you’re looking for in our catalog, feel free to suggest it via our website or with one of our green “suggestion for purchase” cards … and if we’re unable to get an item, there’s also the option of interlibrary loan!

Branch only wrote four novels, most out of print for decades and unavailable in the U.S. until The Rue Morgue Press brought them to American audiences in 2006. In fact, I think I’ll make a patron suggestion for more of these Pamela Branch mysteries myself…

Dale - Tech Services