I don't want to wait for our lives to be over.

Found in a box of paperbacks from 2004, intended as summer reading prizes:

Also in the box: a Buffy paperback about Cordelia, a Clueless tv show tie-in, a Sabrina the Teenage Witch (although not my favorite Sabrina, which features the world's saddest piratical eye patch. Like, I think they just took an old pictures of Clarissa and sharpied an eye patch on.*), and a Popular. Remember Popular?
Here's the back cover blurb of Bayou Blues

"No one is allowed."
Joey, Pacey, Dawson, and Jen shudder at the housekeeper's ominous words. It's dark and gloomy at one end of the Southern plantation where Jen's cousin Monique lives, and nothing's been touched in the off-limits wing since 1870. Isabella Percy, Monique's relative, died there of a broken heart, waiting in vain for her true love to return after the Civil War.
A spooky mansion, a secret tunnel, a romantic love story, and some voodoo: Dawson is convinced the group is in for the adventure on their lives.
But evil is near.

Jinkies!

*

Astronomy will have to be revised...

I just finished the book I want to win the Printz. It’s sad and funny and bleak and full of love.
And it’s terrifying.
I haven’t been that interested in this year’s discussion. I loved The Book Thief, of course, but I have a sneaking suspicion (based on my usual Oscar prediction methods) that Octavian Nothing will get the prize. Librarians love M.T. Anderson, you see. And though I’ve read a lot of books I’ve loved over the past year (examples: Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist, King Dork, Going Under),none of them really said Major Award Material. This has been much more a year for underground beloved books, those stories that you can imagine someone finding on their own (or with the help of a nice librarian, of course) and then feeling that deep kinship you feel with some stories.
Actually, what I loved about Looking For Alaska winning last year was that for so many people, there is that deep personal connection with the story. Almost a secret connection, like when you find out other people love it too, you’re a little jealous at first, and then realize how much you must have in common with that other person, that you both love this story that you had previously thought of almost as some kind of secret. I think that’s in part why Tiff and I reference Girl to each other so much.
(Of course, her laptop is making me listen to Fleetwood Mac right now…)

But anyway, back to the amazing, gorgeous, scary book I just finished. It’s called Life As We Knew It and is by Susan Beth Pfeffer. I had been wanting to read it for awhile—just another new book I was nice enough to let a patron check out before me at my last library that hadn’t shown up at my new library until this morning, when I spotted it on my way to yet another training session.
Yes, I started and finished this today. You know I read fast and have no willpower.
When the book opens, Miranda’s family is pretty standard small town Eastern Pennsylvania bleeding heart liberal. Her dad lives further east; her brother’s at Cornell. Her two best friends are completely wrapped up in their own 16yrold identity crises.
One May night, everyone who can see it looks up at the sky to watch an asteroid hit the moon.
The astronomers miscalculated density. The moon is bigger, closer than it used to be. The disasters start with things that are affected by the moon’s gravitational pull: huge tsunami waves take out coasts and islands. Having a huge body closer to the earth begins to mess with its core and magma comes out of all sorts of long-dormant volcanoes. And then there’s the other stuff, too: the food shortages, the fatality of the flu when there are no hospitals and no one’s had a proper meal, the scariness of being an independent American teenage girl when law starts to break down.
The thing that’s really disturbing about this book is how plausible it all is. I mean, not the moon-going-out-of-orbit part, but the chain of events. The mother, an avid gardener, is heartened by thoughts that she’ll be able to grow food until ash from the volcanoes starts blanketing and first frost hits in August. Girls who, pre-disaster, used older boys’ attraction to them to dream about leaving their small town and maybe get free booze now leave town with forty year old men, bartered from their parents by a dowry of bottled water and canned soup.
It’s strange—so much of the middle of this book is about the constricting of worlds when disaster strikes. This formerly generous, giving-to-strangers kind of family tightens into itself. The mother eats less so her children can remain strong, but gets angry at her daughter for forgoing an earlier place in a food line so she can tell a friend.
Is it just a pet peeve of mine, or can I call this the author’s commentary on how much of our country has become “Screw them; I’ve got mine”?
The end is very much about the family (and not horribly tragic, I’m sure many of you will be happy to hear), but it’s the Christmas Eve that struck me the most. Christmas itself would be familiar to any of you who are former Laura Ingalls Wilder fans like myself: in secret, everyone has been hoarding little things for months, just to be sure they have a Christmas.
But on Christmas Eve, all huddled near the woodstove this family is incredibly lucky to have, they hear something outside. Their neighbors have come caroling.

Sometimes, a story has a moment that just sticks with you, no matter where the rest of the book goes. Franny crying in a public bathroom stall. The Jewish wrestler painting his story on whited-over sheets of Nazi propaganda. I have a feeling the caroling episode is going to join them.

Standing in a queue of a school canteen.

Yes folks, the wait is finally over.
Introducing...The PoBaL Literary Crush List!
(oooo, aaaaah.)

• The first crush I can remember having on a character in a book was Peter Pevensie in the Narnia books. He's all responsible and noble and shit, plus, if I ever had a giant evil talking wolf that needed killed, he could totally do it for me. And really, isn't that what we're all looking for in a man?
• Zooey Glass. Sure, he's snarky to his mom, mean to his sister (kind of) during her big crisis of faith or whatever, and was quoted in Ally Sheedy's book of poetry, but how could you resist a guy that looks like "the blue-eyed Jewish-Irish Mohican scout who died in your arms at the roulette table at Monte Carlo"?* And you'd be snarky to your mom, too, if she wouldn't leave the bathroom when you wanted to get dressed.
• Carrying on with my trend of wounded, arrogant, asshole-ish boys who are also loyal, noble, etc., I've got quite the crush on Sirius Black (unlike my Oliver Wood or Weasley twin crushes, it has everything to do with J.K. Rowling and nothing to do with casting directors).
• ...and Bran from Susan Cooper's The Dark is Rising series. Totally arrogant, but, as his absent father is King Arthur, kind of understandable. And hot, if I'm allowed to say that about a fictional 13yrold. Which I'm probably totally not. But that's the thing about literary crushes, especially when most of what you read is teenlit. You have a lot of age-inappropriateness.
• Also, sometimes you get the species inappropriateness. I know Foaly, the smartass tech geek in the Artemis Fowl books, is a centaur, but I still crush on him. Insert your own awful "hung like a horse" joke here.
• I also like Ravus the Troll from Holly Black's Valiant, but he's at least human-shaped. Sort of. And there's this great scene where Val thinks he's about to make a magic potion and it's actually hot cocoa. If a boy made me hot cocoa, I think I could overlook the whole green skin and fangs thing.
• After I read Heavy Metal and You, I got a really big crush on Chris Krovatin, the author. That counts for this list because the book kind of smacks of thinly veiled autobiography.
• I can't tell if I have a crush on Nick from Nick and Norah or if I'm crushing on the whole crazy infatuated night the two characters have.
• Jacklyn Moriarty writes some pretty crushable boys. She's very good at the smirky charmers who are actually quite nice boys once you get to know them.
• If you're the sort of girl who can have a crush on a drawing, which I completely and unabashedly am, there are whole genres of manga dedicated just to you. Right now I'm all about Saiyuki. There's a lot of pretty, and a lot of jackassery.
• Speaking of crushes on drawings, Drake from Scooter Girl is totally my boyfriend.
• Because it's just not a crush list without a straightgirlcrush, Dess from the Midnighters series is awesome. She fights monsters with math! And snarks around a lot!

*Yeah, I had to grab the library copy of Franny and Zooey for an exact quote, but I had a good deal of it memorized. I always forget where the roulette wheel is.

seven weeks of staying up all night

Tale of 2 Summers by Brian Sloan.
I started reading this book, was charmed by a couple details, and started taking notes to remember things for a review.
Then I realized my notes were becoming a post all on their own. So this is kind of a review, kind of a commentary track.
I wrote all this while I was reading it, when the thought occured to me.

• There’s this future thing—takes place future summer—spiderman 3
  • Harold and Kumar sequel—KUMAR’S BARE ASS
• Ferris quote at the beginning
• Queer boy fart jokes
• “bloody”—some librarians are going to shit themselves, b/c they’ve apparently never met a pretentious teenage gayboy anglophile: “Why’s there British slang if it takes place in DC!?”
• LOL-ing?
• Lang use—dueling bloggers
• Keep referring to Henri as a “euro-punk”—in light of his not-at-all punkiness and the whole gay thing, kinda weirdly icky/funny
• I approve of the word tits.
• “I don’t really dig on guys who are uber-gay”=scary Ken flashbacks
• Unless you know what Lambda is, no clue that this is a GAY BOOK from the cover
• Weird anti-drug moment/channel 1 reference p41
• Yum, Nutella
  • Nutella DOES NOT TASTE LIKE DOUGHNUT FROSTING. However, it would be quite tasty on a doughnut. Like a cake one? Yum…
  • And now I want some Nutella.
  • Stupid gay boy and cheese-eating butt/surrender monkey.
• I think the 75% of the way through, big teenfic crisis moment is going to involve Joey—the guy no one likes
• “emoticoning”—heh
• uh-oh, Henri is breaking into a construction site. Is he bad news? Will he be horribly injured ¾ of the way through the book?
• Also, Henri is a stoner. Which GayBlogger seems to be against, but in a very low-key, TV told me you were bad kind of way.
• You know, this weird anti-drug commentary is making me wonder if someone is going to find their blog. ¾ of the way through, of course. b/c if they did, all those construction site trespassing pictures would totally make things sucky for Frenchie’s govt-working maman.
• Frenchie looks like StraightBlogger! The plot thickens!
• I’m getting a telegraph from the book…StraightBlogger winds up with unassuming MK stop
• Omg—they’re making driver’s ed kids DRIVE ON 495. THE BELTWAY AROUND DC. That’s just crazy talk.
• I think GayBlogger made a move on StraightBlogger on New Years Eve. This book has a terrible poker face.
• Ugh, box wine
• Jim Carrey—outdated reference?
• Frenchie’s dad is dead! That’s why all the death-defying and stonering! And the stupid mausoleum conversation! Or, at least, that’s my current theory.
• I’m finding myself caring less and less about these characters. Except Brett, the Joysey girl who refuses to learn how to drive. I bet there’s a great book in her whole story.
• These kids live around DC and StraightBlogger’s afraid of NYC b/c it’s a “terrorist target”?
• StraightBlogger doesn’t know it , but he’s totally trying to Vlad it up here.
• Such an asshole!!
• IS NO ONE GOING TO POINT OUT THAT MK ISN’T PISSED B/C STRAIGHTBLOGGER HAD A WET DREAM ABOUT HER, SHE’S PISSED B/C HE TOLD HOT GIRL HE WASN’T THAT INTO HER (MK)!?
• I’m also confused by the fact that no one is calling it a wet dream.
• Oh, Frenchie’s dad’s just an asshole. Anti-climactic.
• Frenchie says there’s no French word for bitch. Um, chienne? Look, I did research.
• So, in their tiny crappy boring suburb, there’s a locally-owned coffee place, a comic book store, an Ethiopian restaurant, and a gay bar? I mean, I know it’s around a big city, but yeesh.
• Why does 2 teenaged boys making out in a suburban gay bar sound like a REALLY bad idea to me?
• Also, GayBlogger just expressed surprise that an Asian guy didn’t have an Asian accent.
• You know, a lot of the nonstereotyped gayboy stuff in this book has become a moot point by what a stupid boy asshole archetype StraightBlogger is.
• Pot brownies
• You can’t see Before Sunset without seeing Before Sunrise—that’s just stupid.
• StraightBlogger thinks Julie Delpy was lying about not meeting Ethan Hawke because her grandmother died! I kind of hate this book right now.
• THE BOOK JUST GAVE AWAY THE ENDING TO THE MOVIE. I really hate this book right now, and you have no idea how pissed I’d be if I still hadn’t seen Before Sunset yet.
• I like this MK girl. She says she doesn’t want to “hit all the bases in one night”; she’s a big pushy drama girl; and she totally told StraightBlogger to his face that he “had his chance last Monday” to have sex with her. Why can’t I just read a book about her?
• What moronic bar owner would let 2 15yrold gayboys come to his bar on a Saturday night? Am I the only one who thinks this is a bad idea?
• Oh, it’s under 21 night. OK
• When your boy says to someone that he’s not your boyfriend and you’re an overly emotional wreck, this is not the time for a Long Island Ice Tea.
• GayBlogger thinks Frenchie said it b/c his mom’s back and things are weird; Brett’s got some weird Rules-based theory. Or, he’s a 15yrold boy who doesn’t want to admit he’s gay with a boyfriend. Anyone think of that!?
• I hate when I’m annoyed with a book but want to know what happens so I can’t stop reading. I would totally stop reading this book if I wasn’t so damn curious and 40 pages from the end.
• Now, maybe this is just wisdom that comes with age (oh, I am so age-ed and learn-ed), but he’s not your boyfriend until you’ve had The Conversation and he’s said, Yes. I am your boyfriend.
• Now there’s a hurricane coming!?
• Tornados!
• Apparently, summer romances/first loves aren’t drama-ful enough for Mr Brian Sloan. He’s gotta get Acts of God all up in there.
• MK is so not going to get to have the most fun a girl can have with StraightBlogger. In fact, I wonder if the mook even knows that a girl can have fun.
• And now GayBlogger is taking relationship advice from Dr Drew.
• OMG! Is Frenchie DEAD!? I thought they didn’t kill off teenlit characters just for being gay anymore.
• Oh, ok. He just disappeared for a few days. The Frenchie is still alive, folks.
• The moral of the story? Bros before hos. The moral of the commentary? I want my 250 pages back.
• No, wait--if the moral of the story is bros before hos, where's my girl Brett? What happened to her? And why'd they do so much complaining about that Joey dude only to have him not show up for the last half of the book. Way to not deliver on your foreshadowing, dude.

ETA: You know what's annoying? Blogger publishes drafts under the date you started the draft. Luckily, you can go in and edit to a more correct date and time, like when I actually finished reading the stupid book and writing this thing.

They're throwing a party and you're not invited.

(This is a librarianing post.)

How much of readers advisory services should be about bibliotherapy and how much is pure entertainment? How do you discern what a patron needs versus what a patron wants? If those two really are diametrically opposed, which do you go with? I know teen librarians tend to be all about the bibliotherapy (My life changed! Because of a book! The librarian gave me!), but does life really work that way?
The most dangerous question: Can one book really make that much of a difference, or are we all a sum of everything we read, view, and/or listen to?
Can you point to the parts of your personality or belief system that come directly from your favorite or most-read book? (Obviously, this question is a moot point if your favorite book has a major world religion behind it.)
I've been wondering all this for the last couple days, after someone on my trusty teen lit listserv asked for recommendations for a group of seventh grade girls looking for fiction about rape, abuse, incest, etc. Immediately, many of my fellow librarians went into bibliotherapist mode. Which is great, if that's indeed what these girls need. I can't argue with the idea that reading a story similar to your troubles could very well help you to at least begin to verbalize and heal from those problems.
But I also think I know a little something about middle school girls. I remember the kind of stories I was attracted to as a middle school girl. If you're a girl, think about what you read and watched in middle school. That's when soap operas first caught your eye, right? Did you have a friend surreptitiously pass you a copy of Forever, Go Ask Alice, or Flowers in the Attic? Did the "nonfictional" aspect of Go Ask Alice make a difference to you? Did you take a cursory glance over the new fiction before heading back to Sweet Valley High? Don't lie--that's when you started reading Anne Rice's books, isn't it?
My point is, middle school girls like trash. The trashier, more sensationalistic the trash, the better. It's something most of us go through. What harm are we doing by not acknowledging that guilty pleasures have their place as well? If you're shaking your head in disagreement with me, ask yourself this question: You have the day off, with nothing to do but sit in the world's comfiest armchair in front of a sunny window. You can read Noam Chomsky or V.C. Andrews. Which do you choose? Are you imposing a different choice on those younger than you, simply because you're older? Who do you think is the favorite aunt or uncle--the one who buys those paperback Nickelodeon tie-in picture books, or Patricia Polacco's latest adult-reader-oriented tearjerker?
Also, you'll pay attention to how I say begin to. There are many, many books I love and would recommend to a person in the same situation as the protagonist, or to someone looking for a genuinely well-written story, but that in no way can compare with counseling or other professional help. Sometimes, it's okay to say you're just a librarian, not a social worker. Or a doctor. Or a psychiatrist. Or a lawyer.
At its heart, readers advisory is about matching people with stories. To me, a huge part of that is finding out the motivation behind wanting a particular story. Rats Saw God fits the questions: I need 10 AR points; my son is suddenly flunking his senior year and screwing everything up; I'm a huge Veronica Mars fan; What have you got that's good to read? But is it necessarily the best answer to all of those questions for the person standing in front of you, or on IM, or through MySpace*?
And I kind of wonder if we're not doing a disservice to the not-trash by recommending, say, Leaving Fishers or Godless when what the patron is really looking for is some sensationalistic mass market paperback "about" "not Katie Holmes" being trapped in "not Scientology"?

Reading a book or watching a movie before you're emotionally and intellectually ready for it can ruin that book or movie for you. I think everyone has an example of something they thought sucked, but then went back and liked 5-10 years later. But what if no one went back?

Other random readers advisory anecdote:
The other week, one of my regulars came in and said he needed some stuff to get out of a reading funk. I had given him at least 5 books a couple days before (and when I say "given", what I mean is, "shoved at him and said, here--read this" and he did), but even the usual suspects weren't catching his interest. He's also slogging his way through a big thick classic for AP Senior English. So I headed into the juvenile fiction stacks. I asked how often he reread stuff, and explained that, when I'm stuck, or not feeling well, or cranky, I tend to go back and reread certain things. If I'm sick, for example, I want Mrs Grass's chicken soup and Narnia. So I gave him Susan Cooper's The Dark is Rising (he hadn't read it) and sent him on his way. Reading slump solved.
We can all talk about reading up, or down, or comfort level, or finding reflections of our lives in fictional work and the importance of that, but sometimes it's really as simple as What fits the best in this particular situation?

*Bringing up another question: Should you consider a person's MySpace page before recommending a book? If a girl's page was all faux-Girls-Gone-Wild and she asked you what was new and good, would it all be serious works about girls with bad reputations? Don't you think she'd get the hint, and do you think that would damage your credibility in her eyes?
Can you tell someone they should read Sandpiper (which, incidentally, I love and you should all read) without the underlying sentiment of, "this is book about a slutty girl who realizes maybe it's not such a great idea to be so easy. Hey, maybe you could learn something from it, if you catch my drift"?
And speaking of, when the hell is Sara Zarr's Story of a Girl coming out? I'd let you borrow my galley copy, but I might have to break some legs if I don't get it back.

Here's a truck stop instead of Saint Peter's.

Feed, if you aren’t a teen librarian, is a book about a group of teens, in The Future, and how vapid their Future lives are.
Well, actually, it’s a book about how smart M.T. Anderson is, and how, by extension, his fans are smarter than your average teenager (or adult, if you’re a YA librarian). I found the entire book to be condescending as hell; the worst, though, was the author bio, where Anderson claimed to get the idea for the language and dialogue in the book from overhearing conversations at malls.
Well, of course it’s going to seem like language and discourse are dead arts and people are becoming worse and worse at communication and vocabularies are shrinking if your “research” consists of listening to people while they shop. Imagine if he had been at a grocery store instead—every character would be obsessed with the firmness of their salad, the weird liquid around their meat. Seriously: think about the last time you were shopping for clothes. Were you having an intelligent, thought-provoking conversation about the world around you, life, love, etc., or were you insulting your friend by calling her Nina Garcia while trying to decide if light grey patent leather open-toe shoes are too old lady?
Yeah, that’s what I thought. They were cute shoes, though. Too bad they didn’t fit me right.
Anyway, the main character and his friends go to the moon and it sucks. (That, incidentally, is a paraphrase of the book’s first line. It’s a great line; book totally goes downhill from there.) It sucks because some jerks come and hack into their feeds, which are these computer things wired into everyone’s brain in The Future. Because that way everyone can know stuff without having to learn it is the theory, I guess. In practice, it’s so a thinly-veiled Abercrombie can make you want to buy stuff…in your brain! You can also watch tv in your brain and chat with your friends in your brain. But not in like a telekinesis, know each others thoughts kind of way. In an AIM is in your brain kind of way. I don’t know; I don’t understand the “science” behind all this, and I’m not sure MT does either.
Oh, and you also get advertised to in your dreams. Which, I would think, would make people’s lives easier, or at least more straight-forward. Like, if I go home tonight and dream about having split ends, I’m going to think it’s weird and confusing and wonder what my brain was trying to tell me. But if I was in Feed, I’d know it was just Loreal doing its job.
While our intrepid stupid teens are in the hospital, they meet a poor ickle sick girl, who is sick because her Future Luddite parents didn’t install her feed until puberty, or something. Because they wanted her to read books. Or something. Too late, in any case, for it to really mesh well. And I think they might be poor (so noble! Any minute now, she’ll be dancing on the tables in steerage with Leo!), so she’s got a crap model.
Of course, main character/narrator (remember, folks—it’s not YA if it’s not first person!) falls in love with ickle sick smart poor girl, because she’s pure and smart and thinks about things like the implications of having a computer wired into your brain and pollution and stuff. If they had a school dance, she’d totally paint a poster of the Earth that said, “Don’t tread on me.” And then vampires would come because they had to invite everyone.
But they don’t have a school dance, because she dies. (Plus, I think she might be home schooled or something. You know, by her Future Luddite/hippie parents.) And everyone learns a lesson. And every year after that, they celebrate Stargirl’s contribution to their lives.
Sorry, wrong hackneyed, “Let’s all learn something from the nice noncomformist because we’re stupid sheep” YA novel.
See, this is what really gets my goat about this book. It’s not just the condescension; it’s the feeding into the, let’s face it, natural condescension of your average smart teenager. Books like these buy into the idea that smarter = better, and that those who don’t feel comfortable doing what most of society does are somehow better, smarter, and have something to teach everyone else. Not only do I think that’s a pretty crap version of humanity, but people like that are fucking insufferable. It’s like if all the Smurfs suddenly deferred to Brainy. Or if everyone agreed with my assessment of this book because I’ve got an MLS.
I think, secretly, a lot of librarians like this book because they were teens who thought they were better and smarter then their peers. And, yeah, I did too, but then I made smart friends. And grew out of that shit.

Oh, and there are filet mignon bushes, which sounds kind of awesome to me. I’d totally be Homering it up, like in the episode where the Germans talk about coming from the land of chocolate and Homer fantasizes taking a giant bite out of a dog.
And the requisite flying cars.

He likes girls with names like Ashley.

At some point, YM collected the “best” of their “Say Anything” column.*
Of course I bought the book for my library! Yeesh, how could you think otherwise!?
Occasionally, I copy things out of books and tape them to the heater in my meager YA area. Display space is tight ‘round these parts, and I like the extra book-pushing this gives me. I figured I’d take some choice embarrassing bits from the book.
Um, what does it say about me that the choicest bits, the ones I keep laughing at, out loud, by myself in my office** are about farting?
Or losing control of your bladder while under a pile-up of friends, with your crush directly on top of you?
You know what’s weird, though? One of the chapters delves deep into the history of “Say Anything” for old embarrassing moments. In every single one of them the phrase “my face was red” or “was my face red” is used. Whether from 1967, 1987, or 1991.
But then, I’ve always suspected that these things were made up by the writers, designed to make spazzy teen girls feel better about their freakouts and/or less-than-confident teen girls feel better about themselves when they think, Hey, I wouldn’t be embarrassed by that. It’s similar to the women’s magazine phenomenon, which I’ve decided is not that women’s magazine readers are especially stupid because they don’t know the nipples are an erogenous zone. It’s that these magazines think their readers are so lacking in self-assurance that, upon reading sex “tips”, they think, Hey, I’m not that bad—I knew that.

*For the boys: “Say Anything” was a column of embarrassing stories. I changed out of my sweater and my tshirt came with it, flashing the whole school; I got my period unexpectedly during a ride in a hot boy’s white-interiored car; my date was all, what’s your dog chewing on, and it was a used tampon; my boobs fell out of my swimsuit; etc.

**Although, if I wasn’t by myself, I’d have to explain it to my officemate, so that’s probably a blessing. “Uh, I’m laughing at fart and period jokes, OfficeMate. Yes, I am 27.”

Words Like Violence, a Friday Rant.

Holy hell, I hate AR. Hate hate hate. It's not just the forced reading. It's not just the assigning points to books. It's not just the way PUBLIC SCHOOLS have to pay for each and every test, and don't even buy the same tests district-wide.
Nor is it only the way everyone just expects public libraries to be on board and change their organization practices (you know, like alphabetical. By author.) or the fact that I see a definite difference in the way reading for pleasure is viewed by my jr high kids (who have AR) versus my high school crew (who have a 20 minute free reading period every day).
The parents who ask, over the summer, whether we have AR tests their kids can take, during the summer, are up there on my reasons for hating AR (especially when they get shirty about the fact that we don't*), but even they aren't my biggest beef with the system.
My Biggest Problem With AR
I'm revising our copy of the jr high AR list, because my brain isn't functioning well enough right now to do any of the things I need/want to do that require thoughts beyond "cut" or "paste" or "alt tab".
An aside: Funnily enough, most of the books on the list that are part of our YA collection are also the books on my report for weeding, which goes to show you how the AR people and the test-choosers really have their fingers on the pulse of our fair town. And now I'm stuck with decisions like, Do I keep a book that I'm assuming the jr high library owns but no one even looks at here, and take up precious precious shelf space, just because someone might need it to get their last 5 points to get to the next grade? All that shojo manga's gotta go somewhere, people, and I'm guessing neither Stephenie Meyer's or Christopher Paolini's third books are gonna be exactly thin.
So, back on (sort of) track, I'm going through this excel spreadsheet of all the books. A lot of them are in kids' fiction, but some are in YA.
Some of the titles on the list in our YA collection:

• Perks of Being a Wallflower
• Hard Love
• Born Confused
• Of Mice and Men

Now I love all of these books (yes, even Of Mice and Men. I like Steinbeck, okay?), and recommend most of them whenever I can. Which is whenever it's appropriate. Let's repeat that, shall we? In bold?
Which is whenever it's appropriate.
The jr high stops at 8th grade. Hard Love is not a book for an 8th grader, no matter how smart they are (or how many AR points they need, as is more frequently the case).
Is it any wonder that we're seeing more challenges coming from 5-8th grade parents when these books are offered with no regard for the maturity level of their content? It's like saying James Kochalka's work, all of it, is all-ages-appropriate based on the simplicity of his drawing style and the small number of words he uses.
And, yeah, I was there when Aiden Chambers was all, this is how they learn to be adults! Read up-level, kids! but I think there's a difference between challenging oneself and reading something before you're old enough to get all the meaning it wants to give you.
And this is true for books aimed at 20- and 30-somethings placed in YA collections as well, from the other end. Paul Moves Out is an amazing book, and one that many teenagers probably enjoy. I would have really liked it at 16. But I don't think I would have enjoyed it enough if I had read it before being that age, living similar experiences, etc, myself.
Plus, I have to respectfully disagree with a man who wrote what is most possibly the most boring piece of fiction I've ever read not directly for a class.

Did this make any sense, or should I just go back to staring at the spreadsheet and thinking about yarn?

*And, hell, I don't even know if we could, or if it would count for the kid. Public libraries aren't part of the school district in most cases, including YOURS, you mook.

We have eaten all the cake.

This letter is in the most recent School Library Journal:

I felt since I have subscribed to SLJ for the past 19 years I should provide an explanation for canceling my school's subscription. Your edition highlighting books for students with alternative sexual preferences (January 2006) was indicative of the disregard you display for elementary school libraries and your blatant political agenda. Because my position as an elementary school librarian requires that I spend public funds with care, respecting the beliefs and tastes of the community I serve (in other words, it is not my job to impose my beliefs or politics on the people who pay my salary), I can no longer justify the very considerable cost of your magazine.

So, because of one issue, this junior high library will no longer have access to one of the highly and widely regarded review sources for childrens books.
Because of one fucking issue.
Here I'm going to set aside my gut reaction.* I may pick it up later. I just hate the idea that having ONE ISSUE of a magazine with a cover story about gay teen lit, which is a significant trend like any other significant trend in books for youth (ha! you thought I'd say kid's books, didn't ya?), means you've got a "political agenda" that shouldn't be imposed on her community. Because, of course, every single one of those junior high kids is as straight as the day is long. And they all hate fags.
Because, you know, I get annoyed, too, when I pick up a journal and every book reviewed is one that I know my crew wouldn’t pick up. Or when Booklist pulls their “This book has YA appeal for all those YAs out there interested in veterinary science” crap. But I still read them, because there are plenty of librarians with crews out there who like the stuff mine doesn’t. I don’t dictate the whole fucking world of collection development, and clearly this woman thinks she can.
And isn’t it a bit hypocritical to stop an entire magazine, and publicly (her name, by the way, is Sandra Keraghan, and her school is Jerling Junior High), because you respect what you feel are your community’s beliefs based on one issue? One issue that, if memory serves me correctly, wasn’t even entirely dedicated to the cover story?
***
When I like or dislike a book or series, that’s my opinion. I’m very aware of the fact that, to some people, my opinion counts as more because of my job, but I also take great care to not gush about something unless I’m as sure as possible that the patron I’m gushing to will feel the same way. Or is comfortable enough to disagree with me.
The other day, one of my regulars told me he read Cut My Hair on my recommendation, but didn’t like it. This just about broke my heart, but I don’t think any less of either of us for it.
I got into a big argument, kind of, with my YA lit professor in library school over the terms “high fantasy” and “low fantasy”. Basically, my argument was that thinking I’d rather stick a fork in my eye than read any more Tolkien didn’t make me less smart, or not as good a reader as people who know all the mythology and shit of Middle Earth. Isn’t that what we all paid Peter Jackson for?
I just don’t think this is talked about enough by those of us who recommend things to people who are younger than we are. How much are we just forcing our tastes and beliefs, whether those beliefs are that public funds should not be spent on So Hard To Say (which is adorable, incidentally), that the Gossip Girls are the sole reason teen girls are obsessed with appearances and brandnames, that smart kids will love the latest Printz winner because it’s literary, or that anyone who doesn’t think Douglas Adams is funny has no soul? I don’t like Sarah Dessen, but I still buy her books.
Does every book librarians, teachers, and other adults love have a Catcher Cult**? How do we avoid the cultishness of our favorite books, anyway?
--Or maybe I'm just cranky because the parents that gave up rules when they started living like freaky beatniks are here "parenting" their son, who is screaming. Why are high ceilings so valued in libraries, again?--

*Which really is probably your gut reaction, too. If you're offended by the idea that gay teens deserve everything straight teens take for granted, than what on earth do you see of value in anything I have to say?...Or, I heart preaching to the choir.
**Dude, read King Dork. Reading it doesn’t mean you’re smart or cool or whatever, but, if you think I’m worth reading, you’ll probably be a fan. Unless you aren’t. And that’s cool, too—just c’mon back and I’ll recommend something else you should read.

New Orleans, Where Even the Urban Outfitters Employees Are Friendly and Helpful: ALA 2006 bk 4

(Seriously, the friendliest, most helpful, and least hipstersnobby UO employee I’ve ever seen. Sidebar: I always wonder what UO employees have to be so hipstersnobby about. I mean, if they’re so hip, what are they doing working for a giant chain whose sole purpose, most days, seems to be taking DIY and thrift culture and charging an arm and a leg for it? Not, of course, that I don’t shop there; I clearance rack hop anywhere. Sidebar 2: Why is it so damn hard for me to find a straight, short-not-mini, basic black nonpencil, no ruffles, skirt?)

I love in the 2nd Scott Pilgrim when the free newsweekly is held up and one of the sidebars is “Comic Books Aren’t for Kids Anymore”.
Neil Gaiman talked about the graphic novel thing on his blog. Plenty of librarians argued with this, on both listservs I’m on.
Frankly, I do think that his complaint that one could be left with the impression that librarians are only interested in manga has some merit (don't hurt me, please). But I think that has more to do with the audience questions than anything else. Our crews want manga, so we ask other librarians, and maybe some of the indie and/or realistic stuff falls by the wayside because you just can’t cover everything in the amount of time given. Even with that, I thought it was a great and informative program. But then, I don’t need a primer; I just like some help keeping up.
I remain totally fascinated with the idea of boy-love manga (no one is surprised by my attraction to the boy-on-boy). However, realistic stuff (ie/eg not fantasy) doesn’t tend to circ with my crew, and I’m way too cheap to buy it on my own dime. Someday…
My favorite inside-Jessy’s-head Simpsons reference came at the graphic novel program. A mother of a teenager* was talking about some boy-love book in her daughter’s room and how she asked who was the boy and who was the girl.
“Girls, Lisa. Boys kiss girls.”

By Teens For Teens
My library doesn’t have a teen advisory board. When I made moves to start one, I got a big fat “meh” from my crew.
Unfortunately, most of these “by teen for teen” conference programs that I’ve been to have been all about the TAB. I’m constantly working on ideas for getting feedback/ideas from area teens, not just my regulars, in some sort of casual way.
The best part of this program was the Neighborhood Story Project people. Ashley Nelson is seriously one of the best speakers I’ve ever seen. I really need to read her book, and so does everyone else.
I think what really struck me about the NSP thing was the respect everyone involved clearly has for each other. It’s not, as was so often the case in my high school and I suspect lots of places, white adults with missionary complexes (and sometimes religious funding, making them kinda actual missionaries) coming into the ghetto to help the poor children there. It’s teachers and other adults using their talents and skills to start something somewhere. And that’s awesome, and something I think everyone should aspire to.

So that’s ALA. I know I left some bits out, but this was the general gist.
Jesus, storytime’s loud.



*Someday, somewhere, I will have a conversation with a group of my professional peers and we will actually talk about our actual teenage patrons, not anyone’s children. I can’t help but feel that somehow, somewhere in this “my son/daughter…” method of librarianship, there’s an undercurrent of “You haven’t raised a kid, so you don’t know how to librarian to them.” Or maybe it’s just time for me to move back to someplace where single, childless, and not uncomfortable with either thing girls aren’t such a rarity so I don’t feel like the only boyfriendless, no-kid-having-and-not-caring 27yrold in town.

I got dibs on Jigglypuff—ALA 2006 bk 3

I believe I’ve mentioned before my crew’s lack of interest in DDR. But I still want to have a gaming program, right? Here’s the new plan:
Super Smash Brothers.*
The weekend after all the freshmen orientations, so I can tell every 9th grader in town in just a few fell swoops. Of course, this plan hinges on the school librarian giving me more than a week’s notice for the orientations. Let’s all knock on some wood, shall we?
Thanks to all the gaming discussion people for helping me out with this one. I’m sure I’ll be bothering you guys for help more and more. And I mean that in the least annoying possible way. And the least grammatically correct, apparently.

Stephen Abram’s millennials thing was interesting and didn’t irritate me the way most generational discussions do. Mainly because it didn’t make value judgments, or act like trends in demographics mean EVERYONE born between certain years thinks and acts the same. The powerpoint is here and the handout is here.
The two hottest things I got from the program: Hennepin County has a catalog search box on their MySpace (and they’re offering the code to add a search box to your MySpace—how cool is that!?) and some libraries have text message reference.
Also, I was amused that, after 2 librarians whose questions for Abram were “…but I read this other thing that said that millennials were born after 3:15 PM June 7 1983…”, I bust up there like, “Hennepin County has the catalog on their MySpace? How do I do that?”

Sitting in the audience of the Quick Picks committee was totally fun, even if I was late because no one was exactly sure when Brent Hartinger was signing. I’d been saying to myself that I wanted to be comfortable with my job and what I’m doing librarian-wise, and then I’d look into committee work, and I think I’m ready to investigate. And I think we all know I can’t keep a secret well enough to be on the Printz or Best Book committees.
And I learned all about this book called Fuck This Book, which consists of photos of “fuck” stickers in humorous places. There’s a website, which is of course blocked by our new filter. Though I would find it HILARIOUS if it wasn’t. This is a great book. I totally wish I could buy a copy for school visits (b/c this kind of thing is great for getting teens to realize that libraries aren’t all storytimes and old people), but I like to think I’ve got better sense than that. The high school secretaries already hate me, and I suspect that the high school librarian already thinks I’m without a moral compass.



*I mentioned this to Lawyer Chris yesterday at Melissa’s dad’s picnic and, I swear, it was like Christmas morning. So don’t think I’m not relying on you to help me with this program, Chris. Also, I’m linking to you b/c I think you need to blog the story about Pikachu and the bully.

Luna was transgendered; Mike’s a lesbian: ALA 2006 bk 2

Dude, what is it with every librarian on the planet but me and Feed, anyway?
Actually, I suspect I know, but that’s a whole post unto itself. For a book with a 2004 copyright, it came up in conversation quite a bit at the 2006 conference. I feel like I could, in fact, discuss the programs I went to by describing how and why Feed came up at many of them. But I won’t. I’ll also attempt to contain myself when I start talking about the Neighborhood Story Project.

Alex Awards Program
I went to this last year and it was really cool, so I figured I’d repeat. And I totally got rewarded for not trying anything new, because Neil Gaiman was there. I’m also terrified now, because A. Lee Martinez (Gil’s All-Fright Diner, which is one of those books I swore I ordered, several times, and yet we don’t have it) was introduced with biographical information from his MySpace page.
Here follows A Little Jessy Professional Nightmare:
“Jessy enjoys picking junk up off the ground, thrift stores, clearance racks, public transportation. Drunkdialing AudioBlogger. "I Saw You" personal ads, and making an ass out of herself. She wants to meet a round little fellow who seems to be passed out from drinking too much milk.”
And, yes, I know that the easy answer is to not have any personal information on the internet that I wouldn’t want used to introduce me to a bunch of librarians. But where’s the fun in that? I also kind of can’t believe the intro’s writer. If I were writing presenter’s biographical information for my sister, I wouldn’t say, “Lara’s heroes are people who stand up for something…Oh, also Nick Lachey,” to a bunch of teachers.
I also noted that I should really read As Simple As Snow. I wondered a bit at Galloway’s slightly awkward (I thought) discussion of his “goth” characters (you know how sometimes you can hear quote-bunnies?) with Neil Gaiman sitting next to him, but, well, I don’t know if I could discuss anything with Neil Gaiman sitting next to me. I do, however, know that I wouldn’t read a passage from a fellow panelist’s work as part of my talk, like Galloway did at the YALSA President’s Program. But then, I was unimpressed by Postcards from No Man’s Land. Oh, and for an Iowa graduate, I was impressed at his lack of Poet Voice.

Audiobook Preconference
There was a contest to be in an audiobook! You had to audition and everything. I kinda screwed it up, which I think I wouldn’t’ve done if I had actually practiced out loud, but it was really fun nonetheless. The woman I sat next to thought so as well. Apparently, we were so excited by the prospect of being in an audiobook that somehow her ALA badge (which you need for pretty much EVERYTHING) wound up in my purse. Which I discovered hours and hours later, right before I discovered that her business card only listed her school number. Oops. Hopefully, she got to the exhibit hall lost ‘n’ found. Let that be a lesson to everyone that obsessively checking for your badge at every turn isn’t just me being insane and paranoid!
There were also interesting panels, like Bruce Coville, Listening Library, etc. talking about producing audiobooks and a couple of the kids from Full Cast Audio talking about being audiobook actors, and actually doing some audiobook rehearsing in front of us, which was super cool. Clips of audiobooks played (I tried to time my bathroom break to coincide with the clip from Feed, but no dice) that totally inspired me to make a mixcd to take on class visits this fall (what song should I “accidentally” add? “I Hate Music”? “Nic Fit”? Dub Narcotic’s “Fuck Shit Up”? [joking—I would never ever do that]). The woman I was behind in the lunch line is currently working on the audio version of Traveling Pants #4 and I tried to pump her for spoilers, but, again, no dice. I’m still terribly excited about reading this one.
Tamora Pierce does this great “I’m a terrible speaker” fake-out at the beginning of her talk, and it totally sounds like Delores Umbridge does in my head.
The awesomest thing from the preconference was the discovery that New York Public Library worked with Listening Library to get audiobook clips on their website. I’m really excited about biting this idea for my library, maybe even on the MySpace page. Kind of like how Ned Vizzini put an excerpt of It's Kind of a Funny Story on its own MySpace.
Some libraries (school ones, I think) shelve their audiobooks right next to the print version. I’m still thinking of the pros and cons of this idea for the teenhole, but I kind of like it. I mean, we’ve got the hardback and paperback copies together, why not the audio as well? My crew don’t go and look at the audiobook section as a rule, so it just might work. I wonder if I could do a test run?
Cool toys from the precon: audiobooks on memory cards and these Playaway things that my library (the one I use, not the one I work for) has and I keep meaning to investigate.
Upcoming in part 3: committees I audienced at, Printz speeches, graphic novels, and more rambly “goodness”.

Yay us; or ALA 2006 bk 1

So, I was in New Orleans for a week. I've never been anywhere where palm trees grow naturally before.

FAQ answers:

• No, I didn’t spend that much time on Bourbon Street. Do I strike you as the sort of girl who would enter a bar called the Frat House, or the sort of girl who would pick a sign up off the street instructing Frat House patrons that dress codes were to be strictly adhered to?
  
• Where I was (downtown-ish and the French Quarter) there was very little damage. There were still signs, like how all the street signs are bent and how, instead of Sporadic City Stench, sometimes I’d get a whiff of mildew. Or how many bright blue tarps I saw instead of roofs as my plane was taking off.
  
• Yes, I went to Café du Monde. I didn’t think that my beloved funnel cake could be improved upon (unless, of course, it’s by Kennywood and involves ice cream and strawberries). I was wrong. I was also wrong to wear a black shirt around all that powdered sugar. And I don’t know if it was just because I had been drinking crappy-pot-in-my-hotel-room coffee all week, but—damn. Best Cup of Coffee I’ve Had In Forever. Like, the kind of revelatory coffee experience your first cup is, or your first espresso. Or when you first realize that beans from different countries taste different. And now I sound like a junkie.
  
  
• Yup, everyone was pretty psyched to see us. In addition to the usual New Orleans tourist shirts (“Don’t Make Me Poison Your Food” and a lot about being drunk) and the Katrina black humor stuff (my favorites being the ones referring to the hurricane as a blow job), there were also “Librarians Do It By the Book” tshirts all over the place.

Mostly, I did a lot of librarianing, with some blatant fanboyishness thrown in for good measure. Everyone will be pleased to know that I didn’t embarrass myself in front of Sara Ryan, despite my giant Straight Girl Crush. Hopefully I’ll be equally lucky if I’m ever in the same room as Beth from The Gossip. Hopefully I will also actually have the balls to speak to her, since I didn’t with Sara Ryan.

I also bought my very own copy of Geography Club (and had it signed!), so expect me to be forcing that on all of my friends soon. Like, at Stacey et al’s housewarming party this weekend. I’d also have kickass Brent Hartinger temporary tattoos, but there was a summer reading mixup while I was gone (actually, back when I approved a form I shouldn’t’ve) and we were running dangerously low on prizes.
I also got some good gifties for some folks, and will be guest-blogging in Claudia’s Room sometime soon re: meeting ANM.
Lots of ARCs too, of course. I’m really trying to keep track of what I read with LibraryThing. And I’m chomping at the bit for my package containing, among other things, New Moon and Vampirates. Snurk.

More pictures are at my flickr account (see the badge thing over there?) and more actual conference detail is forthcoming.

I, on the other hand, love everyone.

While many of the shirts on this site make me really worry about how much hostility there is in this country, and how terrified some people are of anything that even remotely sounds like Socialism and/or Communism, this is just so damn funny.

Seriously fucking hilarious.
Almost as funny as vampirates.
*snurk*
Say it with me now: "VAAAAAM! PIRATES!"
I'm torn: part of me can't wait to get free vampirate booty (see, I can't even type that without cracking up) at ALA, and part of me hopes there's no vampirate presence, or I shall die laughing.
And no one wants a dead-from-mocking librarian.

OK, it's official: vampirates are my new Snakes on a Plane.
And now I think I need a shirt that says that.

you'll read it in a book tonight

I read all the damn time, and I read fast. Sometimes, I review things. Other times, I say I'm going to review something and then never get around to it. Or, I have a great review written in my head, while I'm flossing or something (someday, the fact that I never listen to "Health in a Heartbeat" is going to kick my ass), and then forget all the best parts when I can actually write it down.
This is why I would make a terrible actual writer. When I come up with the best stuff is when I physically cannot get any of it down, or even say it outloud half the time.
So I'm trying a new experiment. I'm going to use LibraryThing. You'll notice, once you link on over, that my tags are actually tiny little opinions.
I'll still be reviewing things here on occasion, but this seems like a way of keeping track of what I read that I'll actually keep up with.

I'm also planning on linking to my LibraryThing from my work-related stuff, as sort of a "see what the librarian is reading" dealie. Has anyone else done this?

Next, I'm going to find a sleeping dog to not let lie.

OK, I know I'm going to get shit for this one, but can someone explain to me what on earth possessed author, agent, publisher, etc. to name a "squeaky clean" (according to SLJ) book Sex Kittens and Horn Dawgs Fall In Love?
It just seems like asking for a banning to me. And--what a surprise--it has been.
And doesn't it seem like SLJ had to include that "squeaky clean" only because of the title?
You can read the SLJ and Booklist reviews here.
Book Description (from jacket flap):

Meet Felicia, 14-year-old student at the Manhattan Free Children's School (also known as the Pound). In Felicia's world, she and her best friends, Jess and Kat, like to refer to themselves as the Sex Kittens, and the boys they know as the Horn Dawgs.
Felicia is getting tired of waiting for a Horn Dawg to notice her uniqueness, however. So she devises a project she and the object of her affection, Matthew the Science Brain, can work on together. Felicia is determined to discover the Secret of Love with Matthew while winning both Matthew's heart and the science fair. But love has other plans.
(Doesn't it always?)

Now, before you get all riled up, YES, I bought this for the teenhole. YES, if someone tried to challenge it, I'd fight. But, you know, I almost didn't buy it. Think back to when you were in 6th grade (SLJ puts this book as for 6-9 grade; Booklist says 7-10), at the library with your parents. Or at the school library with your friends. Would you have picked up a book with the word SEX in big bubble letters on the cover? It's embarrassing.
It seemed then, and still does now, like this title was chosen specifically to perk up sales on what would otherwise be yet another nice girl romance. Read those reviews again. Go ahead, I'll wait. They aren't very good, are they?
VOYA's is better:

One of the better humorous and sexless chick-lit books, it might attract male readers. The book is a match for middle school and public libraries.

But, again, my middle-schoolers who want sexless chicklit AREN'T GOING TO GET A BOOK WITH "SEX" ON THE COVER PAST THEIR PARENTS.
Plus, how many damn times can SLJ say "light and fluffy" in one review? For reals.
Kirkus almost comes out and calls it false advertising, which is really my point, too:

Although the title belies something steamier, this is a tame offering for younger teens who enjoy Meg Cabot's and Sue Limb's books and are looking for pure entertainment.

If I pick up a book that says SEX on the cover, I've got certain expectations, dammit. This is what I don't like about most pulps, either. And I don't think your average teenage girl would disagree. Otherwise, VC Andrews' corpse is out of a job.
***
SLJ's on my shitlist right now, anyway, because they totally blew the ending of Pucker in their review.

Jeb's dead, baby. Jeb's dead.*

Am I too much of a nerd? Because I've been listening to the audiobook version of Maximum Ride: the Angel Experiment and I'm really distracted by some plot holes.
Pretty Spoiler Space Picture from LOC

Plot holes like:

• No one wonders how they found the Flock's secret hideaway on the side of a mountain?
  
• Max hasn't connected the CHIP in her ARM to Angel's kidnapping.
  
• Does no one wonder if the rest of them have chips?
  
• Of course they're being tracked! They're big expensive secret government experiments! I'm building human/bird hybrids secretly, I wanna know where they are.
  
• No one is going to kill a mind reader. Unless she mindread some big government secrets. (But isn't my familiarity with various Judd projects why I'm having troubles here? I keep trying to build a damn universe, and finding out that there are all these other bird/kids in other Patterson novels that aren't here isn't helping much.
  
• Um, the adult disappeared 2 years ago. How are they paying for food, internet access, and, oh, gee, I don't know--ELECTRICITY?
  
• And who taught them to read the internet, anyway?
  
• Max looks in the fridge and makes a crack about "food fairies" visiting. Then, in the next paragraph, someone's eating an egg. Where'd the egg come from?
  
• Are they raising chickens?
  
• Isn't kinda gross to eat eggs if your genetic makeup includes bird DNA?

I don't think this is just an age thing; I'm betting TeenJessy would have the same questions. Of course, she was also convinced that Krychek from The X-Files was an android.

Now why can't I just sit back and let the story unfold? I don't have this kind of problem with the XMen; I just take it for granted that nothing makes sense, people come back to life, and I have no idea who half the characters are or why their outfits are a certain color.

*Actually, I'm kind of thinking Jeb isn't dead, but the title was too good to pass up.

We're locked out of the public eye

I think I've figured out why Sarah Dessen's books aren't my cup of tea.
It's not just that their stories about normal girls (and we all know my normal girl issues).
--OK, I should stop and say I really haven't read very many of her books. I'm barely a 1/4 of the way through Just Listen* and I read This Lullaby a couple years ago. The only reason I picked that up was because, shortly after determining that, yes, teenlibrarianship is totally my calling, I grabbed the Best Books for YAs list and read my way down. So the rest of her books could be completely different: I don't know. Reading Just Listen was supposed to be me giving Ms Dessen another shot, plus the story sounded good. C'mon, who doesn't love "Owen Armstrong--intense, obsessed with music, and determined to always tell the truth"?**
Yeah, Owen's obsessed with music, but it's clear that this book's intended audience is not. It's not just the usual "he's wears black so it must be loud" passage (although tons o' props for the oxblood Docs mention--you really can't go wrong with oxblood Docs, can you?) It's that the narrator keeps mentioning his iPod without a lick of curiousity as to what's on it. Our girls Andrea Marr, Bleu Finnegan, Cyd Charisse, or Samantha Madison would care, just like I would. Bleu and Sam would make an ass out of themselves to find out, with slapstick hilarity ensuing. Just like I would, most likely.
When Owen gives Annabel a ride home, none of the cds he moves off the passenger seat are named. I think this might have been the point where I said to the book, out loud (in my apartment--don't worry, my next door neighbors were too busy blaring "We Didn't Start the Fire" and "Another Day in Paradise" at 11pm on a Monday to notice), "C'mon! What's he listening to!?"
Plus, all obscure bands are made up, so if some girl was reading this and wanted to get into weird unknown music, she couldn't just google any of the stuff Owen plays on his radio show. Doesn't Sarah Dessen have people she could sucker into doing this kind of research? Hell, I'd do it for free. (Suddenly, Owen becomes a HUGE Belle & Sebastian fan...)
Look, I know rampant playlists would make the book twice as long (at least) and naming real popstars dates a book like a bitch, but there's an argument to be made that it places it more in a specific place and time.
Actually, a big complaint I had against This Lullaby was its lack of a concrete place. I prefer books with definite settings, whether I like that setting or not. I hated living in Philadelphia; I love when they get Rita's water ice in Anyone But You (actually Jersey, but around Phila--you get my point).
And that's a lot to take for a girl whose work computer is full of things like the online Girlysounds songs and "All Songs Considered" podcasts.
Owen reminds me of a conversation Tiff & I have had several times about our growing impatience with Thurston Moore. When you're in high school and haven't met very many cool weird kids, Thurston was the best thing going. He's obsessed with records, he loves talking about them and weird pop culture stuff, and he's got such the Cool Girlfriend. Then you get to college, and every boy you meet is a Thurston, and an ass. Except they don't want Cool Girlfriends. They want girls they can teach all about records and "good" music.
Which makes the end of this book especially irritating. Annabel becomes a perfect little music pupil/girlfriend. Oh, yeah, her home life gets better and she learns how to deal and speak up a bit, so that's nice.
This doesn't mean I won't recommend this book to anyone who I think it would be a good match for. It's just when it comes to thoughtful normal girl fiction, my personal reading money's on Deb Caletti and/or Maureen Johnson (seriously, do yourself a favor and read Keys to the Golden Firebird).

*This is when I started writing; I've since finished the book. And realized that, if I want to get any projects done evenings after work, I need to stop taking home my current book.
**Anyone else catch Henry Rollins on "Wait Wait Don't Tell Me" this week? Awesome, and I'll buy Sarah Dessen a drink if she can tell me Owen isn't based on Hank with a straight face.

It's Not My Place (In The 9 To 5 World)

Did your high school have Channel 1? My high school had Channel 1.
Rob Thomas worked for Channel 1.*
He wrote a book called Satellite Down about a kid named Patrick Sheridan whose high school has Classroom Direct.
(Other things Rob Thomas has written: a YA novel called Rats Saw God [flashback!], Veronica Mars, Drive Me Crazy**.)
If your school didn't have Channel 1, and right now you're trying to figure out what the hell I'm talking about (more so than usual), here you go. Basically, it's a news show geared towards teenagers, shown in classrooms. It has A LOT of ads. All for stereotypically teenagery things. I remember a lot of pop and gum commercials, myself. And a really annoying one about studying abroad with the B-52s song "Roam" in it. In exchange for a captive audience to advertise to, schools get tvs in every room with a close-circuit-thingy, that they can theoretically use to broadcast stuff on their own.
Mostly what I remember about Channel 1 was everyone ignoring it. Homeroom is fuckin' early, most people are talking, etc. I always wondered what one extra subliminal Pepsi/Coke (see? I don't remember. I'm going to assume Pepsi, based on their irritating mid90s "Coke is for old people" pitch.) or Big Red (I remember this b/c I've always wondered what's so breath-freshening about cinnamon) would really change about everyone's consumption, and how much the ad rate would change if execs knew how little attention was being paid.
You know, when I didn't think the whole thing was the scum of the earth and terrifically offensive. I believe I've mentioned before that I went through my humorless feminist phase around 9th-10th grade?
I have 2 programming memories of Channel 1.

1. Being asked if the band they were talking about was the same one on my shirt the Monday after Kurt Cobain killed himself. (Yes, I wore the shirt then. Shut up.)
   
2. A couple of the Ramones guest-hosted one morning. Boy, if you want crap guest-hosts of a news show, pick some Ramones. Their cue card reading was OBVIOUS and HILARIOUS. And momentarily distracted me from the fact that I was the only one in the building who knew who they were. This is not an exaggeration.

Now that I think about it, maybe the huge advertising rates were justified. I mean, I almost always had my nose in a book/my journal, attempting to let the black coffee work its magic (you're getting a great picture of the kind of teen I was, aren't you?), but I can distinctly remember that damn Big Red commercial. People were, like, kissing. And smelling all cinnamony, I'm assuming. Which is, as I mentioned already, gross. And there was a UFO.

Obligatory "It's a Review! I Swear" Comment: Patrick's kind of a dumbass. And just when you thought he's learned to be less of a dumbass, he's pulls the world's biggest feat of dumbassery. I mean, I get not being able to say to Channel 1 head honcho-guy, No one watches, or, I hate this stupid hat, but the whole--SPOILER! SPOILER!--insinuating he slept with a female friend to her jackass crush to, what? save her from said jackass crush? I don't get it. I did enjoy the trip down Channel 1 Memory Lane, though.

*Not the Matchbox 20 guy.
**Which is actually based on a novel by a guy named Todd Strasser, which I didn't think was as good as the movie, but then, reading didn't involve staring at Adrian Grenier. Who I sometimes confuse with Rory Cochrane. Wait! They were both in The Adventures of Sebastian Cole!? Man, I get so easily distracted by IMDB.

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YA library book drive.