First Sentences on my Desk Top

First sentences of the books stacked on my desk waiting to be read:

"It was my father who called the city the Mansion on the River." - South of Broad by Pat Conroy

"On the burnt-out end of a July day in Southwest Texas, in a crossroads community whose only economic importance had depended on its relationship to a roach paste factory the EPA had shut down twenty years before, a young man driving a car without window glass stopped by an abandoned blue-and-white stucco filling station that had once sold Pure gas during the Depression and was now home to bats and clusters of tumbleweed." - Rain Gods by James Lee Burke

"The sun sits flat against the blue sky like someone pressed it there with a giant thumb." - Wait Until Twilight by Sang Pak

"At one end of my desk sits a nearly four-hundred-year-old book cloaked in a tan linen sack and a good deal of mystery." - The Man Who Loved Books too Much by Allison Hoover Bartlett

"God has failed too many on this one, thought Detective Bill Wall as he ambled, soaking wet, toward he large home with the brick facade." - A Cold-Blooded Business by Marek Fuchs

"The shovel has to meet certain requirements." - Bad Things Happen - Harry Dolan

"It was summer several years ago when my 88-year-old Dad announced to my husband Marty and me that he and Mom were ready to move in with us." - In My Heart by Ursula Hanks

"Panic has a way of defining an individual." - Doubleback by Libby Fischer Hellman

"In the Antarctic, white sea-spiders sit in shallow blue waters under a thick layer of turquoise ice." - Selling Light by Effie Gray

"Parade coming." - City of Refuge by Tom Piazza

"Piers the Powerful, revered by men and universally desired by women, a legend in his own Armani suit, had waited fifteen minutes outside the fifty-story office block for the chauffeur-driven limousine that was to carry him to the meeting of the shareholders in the financial heartland of he City." - The Profit by John Karter

And, then, I'm reading these four already:

"I think I know who you are." - Glenn Beck's Common Sense by Glenn Beck

"Kate drove them to the station and now, as she and Clem put the bags down on the platform, Kitty looked around for someplace for them to sit." - As Long as He Needs Me by Mary Verdick

"The Church of St. Germain des Pres, at the start of what was supposed to be spring, was a miserable place, made worse by the drabness of a city still in a state of shock, worse still by the little coffin in front of the altar which was my reason for being there, worse again by the aches and pains of my body as I kneeled." - Stones Fall by Ian Pears

"On the wall of my rowing club at Cambridge University is a plaque on which are inscribed the names of every member of the club who perished in the mad chivalric contest that was WWI." - The Sky Rained Heroes by Frederick E. LaCroix

These first sentences pretty much run the gamut from beautifully constructed, complicated sentences all the way down to bare-bones ones. Two of them do jump out at me and would have enticed to me read on for sure. I'll let you guess which two to see if we agree.

Louise Brown Is the Hank Aaron of Library Patrons

One woman in Scotland has set what seems like an unbreakable record for the number of library books checked out in a lifetime - without ever having to pay a late fee.

Louise Brown is 91 years old now and she has been checking out about six books per week since 1946. That comes to somewhere in the neighborhood of 25,000 books and, amazingly, Louise has recently doubled her checkouts to twelve large print books every week.

From Mirror.co.uk comes the details:

She said: "My parents were great readers and I've always loved books.

"I started reading when I was five and have never stopped. I like anything I can get my hands on. I also like Mills & Boon for light reading at night."

Louise is now partially sighted and so mainly opts for large prints books.

But she gets through them so quickly she has almost exhausted the supply at the public library in Stranraer, south west Scotland. Janice Goldie, of Dumfries and Galloway Libraries, said: "We are amazed at Mrs Brown's achievements.

"When she first joined the library service, she was allowed to borrow six books a week. This has now risen to 12 and she always takes her full quota. The staff at Stranraer Library think she's a remarkable lady and look forward to her weekly visits."

Louise's librarians would like to know if anyone can break her record. If you know of someone who has even come close, do let the librarians at the Stranraer Library (Scotland) know about it - but I doubt that they're holding their breaths in anticipation.

(Photo is of Louise's library)

The Art of Racing in the Rain

Enzo, a lab-terrier mix, is tired of being a dog. He is looking forward, in fact, to the end of his life because of his certainty that, next time around, he will return to consciousness as a man. Enzo just cannot wait to have opposable thumbs and the kind of tongue that will allow him to form all the words he has rattling around in his head.

He knows how lucky he is to have been the one chosen from his litter of pups to live with Denny, a Seattle-based racecar driver and mechanic. Denny treats Enzo more as a friend than a pet and Enzo is smart enough to know the difference. He is not sure at first what to think when Denny falls in love with Eve and brings her home to live with them but, when a daughter is born to the happy couple, all is well again in Enzo’s world.

Enzo learns about life by listening to Denny talk about his car racing philosophy, a philosophy filled with observations that work just as well in real life as they work on the racetrack. He fills, what would otherwise be lonely days alone, watching television documentaries and The Weather Channel and, in the process, becomes more and more convinced that he is, indeed, prepared to take on human form in his next life. His evenings are so often spent along side Denny on the couch watching tapes of Denny’s past races that he even becomes somewhat of an racetrack expert.

When things take a turn for the worse for Denny and those closest to him, Enzo is there to suffer right along side him, and even manages to keep Denny from making a bad decision or two that might have cost him everything he loves most. Enzo is what we want to believe our own dogs are like. He is patient, loving, and totally aware of his place in the world but he remains capable of protecting us from ourselves and others.

And therein lies my problem with The Art of Racing in the Rain.

I could never suspend my disbelief to the degree required to lose myself in the book and, without that suspension of disbelief, I was unable to appreciate Garth Stein’s fable the way so many others have appreciated it. Enzo is the smartest guy in the room and, since the book is told from his point-of-view, he is almost always in the room. He understands Denny, his friends, his wife, and those who mean to harm him better than Denny ever will. All those hours spent in front of a television have provided Enzo with the equivalent of a college education, it seems. He not only understands everything he sees and hears, he is generally one step ahead of the humans around him.

I understand the appeal of The Art of Racing in the Rain. Denny’s race strategy and driving techniques easily translate into a coherent philosophical approach to life itself. It is a classic tale of courage, perseverance, love, and compassion, though, ultimately, it so closely follows the classic form that it holds few surprises. As in the case of many good books, however, the fun comes from the journey itself and not from the final destination. I dare say that most people who read The Art of Racing in the Rain are likely to enjoy it more than I enjoyed it, but I am not sorry that I spent a few hours with Enzo.

Rated at: 3.0

Barnes & Noble Announces Free WiFi at All Stores

Good news for those who are not already getting free WiFi via their personal AT&T contracts at the 777 Barnes & Noble bookstores across the country:

Barnes & Noble said on Tuesday that it had signed a strategic agreement with AT&T to provide free Wi-Fi to all customers in its stores.

Steve Riggio, chief executive of Barnes & Noble, said the company promoted its stores as “community centers” with cafes, comfortable seating and on-site events like book signings.

“It’s a gathering place and Wi-Fi access is increasingly becoming something that customers expect in public places,” said Mr. Riggio, adding that many airports now offered a similar service. “We’ve always considered our stores as quasi-public settings and public gathering places and thought this was the perfect opportunity to provide our customers with free access.”

As this New York Times article goes on to say, free WiFi in retail locations is the wave of the future, a sure way to attract customers and have them hang around to spend money for hours at a time. I suspect that this will become more and more common and that retailers not providing the service are going to suffer a loss of business to those that do.

I love it.

Friends Like These: My Worldwide Quest to Find My Best Childhood Friends, Knock on Their Doors, and Ask Them to Come Out and Play

(Photo: Danny Wallace, on left, and three of the childhood friends with whom he reconnected)


Danny Wallace, U.K. television personality and writer, is best known in this country for Yes Man, the book on which a recent Jim Carey movie was based. Unlike the movie, however, Wallace’s book purports to be non-fiction. He claims to have actually said “yes” to every invitation or opportunity put to him over a six-month period and seems to have largely benefitted from the experience. I mention this to emphasize the kind of wacky personality Danny Wallace seems to have and because Friends Like These is another of Wallace’s off-center memoirs.

Fast approaching thirty years of age in 2006, the calendar-age Danny Wallace considers the start of adulthood, Wallace finds that he has no desire to become an adult. In fact, the very idea of becoming an adult terrifies him. So when an old address book he hasn’t seen in years turns up, it seems only natural to him that he should look up his twelve best childhood friends. After all, they, too, are on the verge of turning thirty years old.

Wallace’s task is made a bit more difficult than it might have otherwise been by the fact that he spent some of his childhood years in Scotland, some in Germany, and some in England. Nevertheless, blessed with what seems to be a saint of a wife who encourages him to do it, he confidently embarks on a personal quest to “update his address book” before the birthday that will magically turn him into “a man.” How, he wonders, are his friends handling their own personal traumas of becoming adults with adult responsibilities?

On the whole, it appears that they are handling their thirtieths a bit more successfully than Danny is handling his. Despite having been warned that he would find all his old friends working in IT, Danny actually finds them filling a variety of roles. Among his personal Top 12, are a research doctor, a hip-hop rapper, a restaurant manager, a newspaperman, and one old friend who actually does work in the IT department of a major bank. Danny’s search, equal amounts adventure and misadventure, will ultimately take him across the world and require stops in the United States, Australia and Japan. Best of all for Danny, is that, for the first time in his life, he will come away from a project with the sense that he has finished something he started – a goal he never achieved as a kid.

Danny Wallace is a funny man, and a clever writer, and he fills Friends Like These with numerous incidents that will make the reader wonder how such a hapless adventurer could possibly accomplish so much. After all, a man who manages to wedge himself so tightly into a tiny Japanese toilet stall (Danny is a big man and he was wearing a backpack at the time) that he has to cry for help before sheer panic sets in does little to inspire confidence, does he?

Friends Like These is more than slapstick comedy. Wallace has a way with words that allows him to pepper the reader with little one-line zingers almost at will, one-liners that always produce at least a smile, and sometimes much more. No matter the situation, he maintains his sense-of-humor and laughs at himself as much as his readers will laugh at him. At 400 pages, however, some of Wallace’s efforts and friend descriptions begin to become repetitious and hard to distinguish from one another, a flaw that will have some readers wishing that he would just get on with it.

This is a funny book but it does prove the point that sometimes “less is more.”

Rated at: 3.5

Pat Conroy Coming to My TBR List Next Week

I remember what it was like a few years ago when I struggled to keep one book on my TBR list at a time. You know, the days before the internet and the big box book stores moved into towns all across the country. I would actually start to panic if I reached the last 50 pages of a book without having another one in-house ready to grab. And that happened a lot.

Times have certainly changed for the better since then. Now, my TBR list of in-house books is usually in the dozens and I struggle to make even a dent in it. Even a "good thing," like having too many books to read, can become a little stressful, but I'll take today's TBR list over yesterday's any time.

For example, on my "short list" (books I've either started or promised to consider for review) right now are these books:

1. As Long as He Needs Me by Mary Verdick - novel

2. The Sky Rained Heroes by Frederick E. LaCroix - nonfiction account of his father's WWII experiences fighting Japan

3. The Art of Racing in the Rain by Garth Stein - novel through the eyes of a dog

4. Wait Until Twilight by Sang Park - a horror novel, of sorts

5. The Man Who Loved Books too Much by Allison Hoover Bartlett - nonfiction account of a major book thief and the book detective determined to catch him

6. Selling Light by Effie Gray - one of the novellas in the "Great Little Reads" series

7. A Cold Blooded Business by Marek Fuchs - a "true crime thriller"

8. Bad Things Happen by Harry Dolan - fictional thriller

9. In My Heart by Ursula Hanks - memoir

10. Doubleback by Libby Fischer Hellmann - suspense novel

11. The Complete Fairy Tales by Charles Perrault - a new translation by Christopher Betts

12. The Profit by John Karter - another novella in the "Great Little Reads" series

13. Photographing Democracy by Joseph Sohm - a huge, 7-pound book of pictures and essays on Mr. Sohm's project to take pictures that represent each of the 50 states - over a 30-year period

I'm also reading these two books:

14. Stone's Fall by Ian Pears - an almost 600-page historical mystery that I finally got from the library Friday - as recommended by my friend the Class Factotum who comments here every so often

15. Glenn Beck's Common Sense by Glenn Beck - bought this one at B&N yesterday and I'm intrigued (and bothered) by what Beck has to say

So there you have it - 15 books on the list that will be getting my attention in the next few weeks.

If things were static, the list would not be all that intimidating and could be handled in about seven weeks. But the list is alive, folks, and it is multiplying. I got some great news Thursday that I have snagged review copies of the latest novels of two of my favorite writers, James Lee Burke and (or you ready for this?) Pat Conroy. I should have both books around July 31 and I'm sure that I will be able to resist neither of them, requiring me to adjust my reading schedule again because I cannot wait to get my hands on those two, especially the Conroy novel after a 14-year wait between new ones.

And, of course, the rest of my TBR list, consisting of at least 200 books is waiting out there, too. Ah, but life is good!

(Speaking of life, I just want to mention that my 10-year-old granddaughter broke her shoulder yesterday. She's the one whose picture I used to illustrate a post here a week or so ago (her on a lounger, pencil in hand). She decided it would be fun to "surf" down a 10-foot plastic slide while her brother and cousin sprayed water on it...not so much. Now she has six weeks of almost no activity ahead of her because the break is not in a place that a cast is easily placed. Thank goodness she's a reader. She is in a fancy sling that requires her to keep the arm protected and immobile while it heals. Lesson learned - I hope.)