Girl Detective

Sticky Burr: Adventures in Burrwood Forest by John Lechner, published by Candlewick Press, is another gem of a graphic novel-ish book for kids. I discovered it in the increasingly well-stocked shelves in the kids section at my comic store.

Sticky is an iconoclast in the burr community. He doesn’t like to prickle, he prefers music and problem-solving, to the annoyance of his nemesis, Scurvy Burr. Scurvy tries to get Sticky kicked out of the village and wacky adventures ensue. Danger! Romance! Music! Heroics! Plus really cute art and laugh-out-loud moments. The art, humor and style reminded me pleasantly of the Doreen Cronin and Harry Bliss “Diary of” picture books: Worm, Spider and Fly. This was a joy to read, and was requested repeatedly by my sons 5yo Drake and 3yo Guppy.

Good news! There are more Sticky Burr adventures online. Sticky has his own website, as does the author, John Lechner. Also, a sequel is due this September!

Otto’s Orange Day is another outstanding selection from Toon Books, a new line of graphic novel-ish books for kids. The line has solid artistic cred. It’s part of Little Lit, a division of RAW Junior, founded by Art Spiegelman, the creator of Maus.

Otto’s Orange Day, with three chapters and forty pages, is about a kitten who learns the hard way to be careful what to wish for after his favorite aunt sends him a dusty lamp. The particulars, and their depictions, are funny and silly, even as there’s a hint of deeper, darker things that older kids might pick up on. And Otto bears more than a passing resemblance, both in looks and behavior, to another beloved comic character, Calvin.

The book is available in both hard and soft cover. Both editions have thick paper, sturdy bindings, and attractive covers. My sons, 5yo Drake and 3yo Guppy, both loved this book and asked for it repeatedly, as they have with other Toon Books like Luke on the Loose and Stinky, which I wrote about previously. As a comic-book loving mom, I’m thrilled at the expanded selection of comics for kids, like the Toon Books.

I wasn’t able to read Unaccustomed Earth during the Morning News Tournament of Books this year; the reserve queue for it was too long at my library. Interestingly, the book didn’t fare well in the competition, though every judge only had good things to say about it. Having read it myself, I’m surprised at its poor performance; this is an engaging, well-written book of short stories, three of them linked.

Lahiri’s characters tend to be Bengali-Americans in relationships with non-Bengalis. Her writing has an emotional resonance that crosses cultures, generations and continents. Her characters are complex, and I found it easy to sympathize and empathize with them, even those whose circumstances were worlds away from mine. But as Lahiri’s stories ably demonstrate, experiences aren’t as disparate as some might think. A few passages in the book gave me that creepy, someone’s-been-looking-over-my-shoulder feeling, as they detailed unattractive emotions and feelings often left unsaid:

Wasn’t it since his [second child's] birth that so much of his and Megan’s energy was devoted not to doing things together but devising ways so that each could have some time alone, she taking the girls so that he could go running in the park on her days off, or vice versa, so that she could browse in a bookstore or get her nails done? And wasn’t it terrible, how sometimes even a ride by himself on the subway was the best part of the day? Wasn’t it terrible that after all the work one put into finding a person to spend one’s life with, after making a family with that person, even in spite of missing that person, as Amit missed Megan night after night, that solitude was what one relished most, the only thing that, even in fleeting, diminished doses, kept one sane?

I enjoyed and admired these stories, even as they sometimes brought pain and sadness. The ending reminded me strongly of another novel, A Suitable Boy by Vikram Seth, and made me curious if there might be a reason for the similarities. I’m certainly interested in reading both of Lahiri’s previous books, The Interpreter of Maladies and The Namesake.

We had dinner at a friend’s house recently, and she served smashed potatoes from a recipe in a recent issue of Gourmet magazine. I’ve subscribed to Gourmet magazine at two points. The first when I was just learning to cook in the early 90’s, and again when Ruth Reichl took over as editor, in 2000. I liked the magazine, but after a two year subscription the first time and one year the second, I felt I’d had enough. The trouble of a monthly magazine, of reading it, testing recipes, was more burdensome than the recipes were good. Since I also subscribed to Cook’s Illustrated and Cook’s Country at the time, I was fine with giving up Gourmet. (I’ve given up on Cook’s in the meantime; their overzealous solicitations did me in.)

Yet my friend’s potatoes were simple and delicious, so I thought I’d check out Gourmet again. My local library has it, so I checked out a few issues. Once I began to page through them, I found myself marking a very high number of recipes I’d like to try, many of which were simple, yet didn’t seem to skimp on quality ingredients and taste. It’s been several weeks, and several different issues, and I’m once again a fan of Gourmet. It has some great articles, like recent ones by Amy Bloom on Italian food, and Dara Moskowitz Grumdahl on little known treasures of the St. Croix River Valley in the WI/MN area (not available online). And it has a great selection of recipes, from simple to complex, from everyday to special occasion, that are well-written and turn out well.

A few of my family’s favorites have been Butterscotch Pudding, Chicken Tostadas, and Lasagna Bolognese with Spinach. I’m going to keep checking out the magazine from the library, rather than committing to a subscription of my own. Apparently it’s time for my once a decade go-round with Gourmet. Maybe it’ll last, this time.

Back when I lived on the east coast of the US, I had a ritual when I visited NYC. I’d stop in Hudson News after I got off the train, buy a can of Dry Grape Schweppes and the New York edition of the New York Times, two things I loved and couldn’t find anywhere else. I did the same thing before I got on the train home. Then I moved across country, and visit the east coast much more rarely. During that time, Dry Grape Schweppes has gotten even harder to find. Hudson News no longer carries it. Grocery stores might, but I have a hard time seeing myself hauling around a 2L bottle on a day trip to the city.

I was reminded of this loss recently when I did a google search for a lip balm, and saw there was a Dry Grape Schweppes flavor. I Googled the soda, and saw that it was still available, but only in very limited areas in the Northeast US. Instead of going through mail-order shenanigans, my usual MO when a strange craving like this arises, I decided to craft a facsimile. I bought a 2L bottle of Canada Dry (which I prefer to Schweppes as a not-that-gingery ginger ale; in general I like my ginger ale very strong, like Natural Brew’s) and some grape soda. I used Blue Sky’s Natural Grape Soda. I mixed them in a glass. Voila. Grape ginger ale. Right here in my zip code.

From Nicholas Taleb’s Black Swan, about Umberto Eco’s home library:

Read books are far less valuable than unread ones. The library should contain as much of what you do not know as your financial means, mortgage rates, and the currently tight read-estate market allows you to put there. You will accumulate more knowledge and more books as you grow older, and the growing number of unread books on the shelves will look at you menacingly. Indeed, the more you know, the larger the rows of unread books. Let us call this collection of unread books an antilibrary.*

My friend Jack, who blogs at Knowledge Volt, sent me the link, from Matthew Cornell, in response to my guilt over book-buying binges. In keeping with the antilibrary, my trips last week to Half Price Books and Barnes and Noble in St. Louis Park:

Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte (Oxford World Classics mini HC edition)

Terminator 2 dvd

Jane Austen: A Life by Claire Tomalin (spiffy vintage-look Penguin cover)

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies

Laura by Vera Caspary

China Mountain Zhang (gave our copy away years ago)

Curly Girl by Lorraine Massey (my own copy, since the one I have is from the library)

For the kids:

Starting School by Janet and Allan Ahlberg

Three Scooby Doo easy readers

The Firefighters Busy Day by Richard Scarry

Noisy Nora by Rosemary Wells

Sammy the Seal by Syd Hoff

It’s My Birthday by Helen Oxenbury

Anatole and the Cat by Eve Titus

I put the books on top of our built-in buffet, near the ceiling. My 5yo son Drake was so eager to get his hands on them that I barely got that photo taken before he started climbing, and dismantled the display:

Here’s 3yo Guppy, who can’t yet read, asleep on Sammy the Seal. Perhaps any book they can’t yet read themselves is part of the boys’ antilibrary.

For Mother’s Day, I de-crapified our back bedroom and unblocked the door to the closet/my office, which has been variously blocked over the past three years by a glider, crib, and changing table. I dusted, re-arranged, and brought order out of chaos.

This is the back room, which I envision as a reading room:

And the closet office:

The other side:

It’s small. It’s a closet. But it’s clean and well lighted. I’m reclaiming it.

It’s mine.

Spoon, written by Amy Krouse Rosenthal and illustrated by Scott Magoon, is a good example of an age-old story made fresh again with new details and engaging art. Little spoon has always been a happy utensil, until he feels like friends fork and knife get to have all the fun.

And Fork, Fork is so lucky! She gets to go practically EVERYWHERE. I bet she never goes stir-crazy like I do.

His friends respond, though, with what spoon can do that they can’t. The art expands on the text and makes it even funnier, and the ending is utterly charming.

I’m sure we’ve read several books with a similar theme, but the one that comes to mind is Lucky Little Duck, which I could hardly stand to read to my kids. The art was kitschy, and the story saccharine and unsubtle. That was a dud; Spoon is a winner.

A picture book for young readers, Matthew McElligott’s Bean Thirteen is that wonderful book that kids can enjoy on one level, and adults on another. Insect friends Ralph and Flora are picking beans for dinner when Ralph tells Flora not to pick a thirteenth bean. She does, and trouble ensues because they can’t find a way to divide the beans up evenly.

“Oh look,” said Flora, “there’s one left over. You take it, Ralph.”

“Bean thirteen?” gasped Ralph. “Never! It’s bad luck.”

“Ralph,” said Flora, “please don’t make such a fuss.”

“I’m not eating it,” said Ralph, “and you can’t make me.”

They begin inviting friends over, and Ralph continues to disparage the thirteenth bean. Eventually the beans get eaten, and the story works on multiple levels–it can be about division, prime numbers, sharing, and friendship. It also has lots of good kid dialogue that may cause parents to smile wryly in recognition. McElligott’s illustrations are colorful and inviting, and the beans look like edamame, which might be a good introduction to that snack for kids who haven’t yet tried it. My husband, my 5yo and 3yo sons, and I all really liked this one.

Zafon’s Shadow of the Wind, in hardcover, has been sitting on my shelf since I borrowed it from my mother-in-law several years ago. I suggested it for my book group, thinking that would force me to read it; I’m very persuaded by deadlines. But since I lost my reading mojo in the last few months, I didn’t finish in time for our meeting. We still had a good discussion, and overall enjoyed the book. And, I did finish it, finally.

A young boy named Daniel comes across a rare book in post-WWII Barcelona. He loves the book, and when he tries to find out more about the author, Julian Carax, discovers a mystery that will engage him for the next ten years. This book is a heady mix of horror, intrigue, romance, coming-of-age, and bibliophilia. I enjoyed it, but didn’t love it, perhaps because of the role of women in the book. They served mostly as objects of desire to motivate the men in the story.

That afternoon of mist and drizzle, Clara Barcelo stole my heart, my breath, and my sleep. In the haunted shade of the Ateneo, her hands wrote a curse on my skin that wasn’t to be broken for years. While I stared, enraptured, she explained how she, too, had stumbled on the work of Julian Carax by chance in a village in Provence.

This book reminded me strongly of The Thirteenth Tale, also a mystery from the past that encompasses romance, murder, and love of books. That, though, was told from a woman’s point of view, and seemed to me a “girly” counterpart to this, which I felt was a “boy” book by Zafon.

This week’s selection in Take Up Production’s “First, You Need a Crime” series was Hitchcock’s Strangers on a Train, which I’d never seen. It’s one of his earlier films, in black and white, and before his penchant for tormenting icy blonds turned into a fetish. Farley Granger is Guy Haines, a handsome, famous young tennis player approached by the garrulous Bruno on a train. Haines has marriage trouble; Bruno has some deep and abiding father issues and tells Haines he’d like to swap murders with him. Haines is understandably put off, and politely hurries away. Bruno, though, won’t be dissuaded.

The movie is full of fascinating, funny, creepy and disturbing stuff. Raymond Chandler worked on the screenplay, based on a novel by Patricia Highsmith. Hitchcock’s daughter Patricia is Barbara, who has some of the best lines and takes on the role of girl detective.

Senator Morton: Poor unfortunate girl.
Barbara Morton: She was a tramp.
Senator Morton: She was a human being. Let me remind you that even the most unworthy of us has a right to life and the pursuit of happiness.
Barbara Morton: From what I hear she pursued it in all directions.

Girls who wear glasses don’t have a good time of it, though. There are several iconic images, such as one of the crowd at a tennis match, a reflection in eyeglasses, and a merry-go-round scene that makes my eyes widen and jaw drop even in memory. There’s subtext on social and political power, and of homosexuality. This is a great Hitchcock film, and one I’m glad I got to see on film in a theater.

IMDB lists a remake slated for 2011, but a Google search turned up paltry evidence, so let’s hope it just goes away.

Top American designer Michael Kors shared a dozen pieces of style advice in “Secrets of Style for Right Now” from the April Issue of In Style magazine. It avoids the “r” word for the economy, but subtly advocates versatility and common sense for shopping in hard times. Tips include: Buy clothes that can be worn throughout the year. Beware indulgence on trends. Instead, focus on the best basics you can afford. If you splurge, do it on a sure thing like a great trench coat, or a fabulous item like gorgeous sandals that won’t get dated. Link to full text of article is from The Butlers Front Porch. If you’re able, try to get your hands on the magazine for the real article. The Kors items used to illustrate the points are striking and lovely.

April’s In Style magazine has “Ten Ways to Wake Up Beautiful“, a surprisingly simple list of tips to wake looking and feeling better. For example: Wash your face early in the evening, rather than later. Sleep on your back, with your head elevated. Have more protein and fewer carbs at dinner. The article includes brief explanations and the complete list, and falls into the “can’t hurt/might help/why not?” category for me. (Link at MSN Lifestyle)

The season of Terminator: Sarah Connor Chronicles has ended and the new film, Terminator Salvation opens on May 21, 2009. It felt like a good time to revisit the original films starting with The Terminator. The now-Governor is perfectly cast in a role where he has to look big, say few things, and not express emotion. The details of 1984 are accurate, but painful. The permed and feathered hair, the bad fashion, the flashing lights and electronic music. The look is dated, but that fits in a movie about a guy from the future who comes back to save a girl from the past. And the less said about the special effects, the better. They were good at the time.

Michael Biehn as Kyle Reese was much more skinny and effete than I recalled. I can see why they cast Jonathan Jackson in his part in the TV series. There’s a strong resemblance. I was extremely impressed when I noted how much of the material from the original had been skillfully woven into the TV series, like Sarah’s anecdotes from when she was a waitress. Even the bad movie soundtrack has some motifs that the current music echoes.

The movie, though, stands up. It’s suspenseful, creepy and involving. We care about Kyle and Sarah, and want Sarah to escape. I look forward to watching Terminator 2, which I picked up yesterday in a fruitful stop at Half Price Books. And I continue to hope that Fox shows some smarts and renews both Terminator and Dollhouse, both of which look promising if they’re given a chance to develop.

I agree with many viewers that Joss Whedon’s Dollhouse is getting better as it goes, and hope Fox has the sense to renew both it and Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles. I think they make a great Friday double feature, especially now that Battlestar Galactica is over (sniff) and when they’re on, they’re on.

In general, I think the best Dollhouse eps have been the ones that focus on the mythology, and not just Echo.

I have some questions about last night’s episode “Briar Rose”, and since Sepinwall hasn’t posted yet, I’m squirming with impatience to wonder online about them. Don’t read on if you haven’t yet seen it, though I’ll try to be vague.

I found my new hair stylist the best way–by asking a woman whose hair I admired who her stylist was. The new stylist told me another of her curly-haired clients recommended Curly Girl by Lorraine Massey, and had come in after reading it with her hair looking fabulous.

If you are even vaguely curly, there’s a lot to like about this book. It’s put together in a chatty, informational way. Testimonials from women who’ve learned to love their curls, after a lifetime of trying to tame them. Massey is a curly girl herself, who’s done the research to find the best way of caring for it, and there are some surprising recommendations. Most curly girls can skip shampoo, cleansing their hair through scalp massage with conditioner. Brushes are out, too. Massey’s tips and techniques are going to take some practice, and getting used to, but I’m already loving the increased curl and definition in my hair, as well as the ideas on putting it up and tying it back. I was a little too zealous, though, when I purged our house of shampoo. I kept some for the kids, but gave away one of mine that G. Grod used too. He was not amused.

When I tried to find this book at the library, it was not yet back on the shelves. I asked one of the librarians for help. I was a little abashed when I told her the title and that it was a teen beauty book. She found it, and smiled when she handed it to me. “I own this. It’s good,” she said, as I noted her salt and pepper curls pulled back prettily from her face. While the book may be shelved in the teen section, curly girls know no age boundaries.

Our family recently returned from a trip to Miami FL with my parents and sisters’ families. It was 5yo Drake and 3yo Guppy’s first trip to that state. The hotel property we stayed at had a giant pool area, with a zero-depth entry, giant slide and a little jacuzzi pool.

Our first day at the pool, Drake wanted to go down the slide. It was high, curved, and encased in rock. We couldn’t see the top from the bottom, and vice versa. I went with him, because the pool it ended in was 4′, over Drake’s head, and he doesn’t yet swim. We went down it the first couple times together. The next couple times I met him at the bottom and swam him to the shallow water. Then he ran up the stairs calling, “Let’s go down together again, Mom!”

I walked up the steps to the top of the slide. He was gone. A mom in front of me said, “He should wait till he hears the signal beep to go down.” I can’t remember if I even heard the last of her sentence as I turned to race down the steps, and dive into the pool where Drake was struggling under the slide. There wasn’t a lifeguard; it was swim at your own risk. Or that of your impulsive 5yo, in our case. The handful of other parents around the pool were just realizing something was wrong as I dove in and pushed him up and out of the water. He had swallowed some, but not aspirated it, and might have been more angry than scared. He screamed for a long time, as the other parents stopped by to offer sympathy and make sure he was OK. Drake eventually stopped screaming and we went down a few more times, always being very clear that he wait for me at the top or make sure I was waiting at the bottom, plus not rush down the slide too soon after the kid in front of him.

Within the hour I was taking a break and my mom was watching Drake and Guppy play on the steps of the jacuzzi pool. Guppy threw a ball in the water. Drake lunged after it, unaware that the water was over his head. My mom waded in to fish him out. Drowning #2 averted.

About this time we’d had enough and returned to our room. Drake and Guppy still had some energy to burn, so were racing around the space, which had a sliding glass door to the patio. G. Grod said “Stop running,” just as Drake ran full-speed into the glass window. Screaming. More screaming. A little more screaming, and some frozen peas on the huge goose egg that erupted on his forehead, and was so bruised that it eventually leaked internally down his face, giving him two black eyes.

My sister Sydney came to babysit then, and took good care of the injured daredevil. G. Grod and I beat a hasty exit for a noisy, but by comparison positively relaxing dinner out. No further disasters ensued. Apparently Drake just needed to get them all out of his system on the first day.

I recently returned from a week in Miami, FL. I was careful and wore sunscreen, hat, protective clothing, sunglasses, etc. Even so, I got a mild sunburn on the back of my legs where I missed some areas. Even so, I thought I did well for being a week in the sun.

Then I got back to MN, went to a party in the park on Saturday, and sunburned my nose, which is now peeling.

Miami sun: nearly nothin’. Minnesota: lobster nose, then snake nose. Nice.

From The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafon:

Once, in my father’s bookshop I heard a regular customer say that few things leave a deeper mark on a reader than the first book that finds its way into [their] heart. Those first images, the echo of words we think we have left behind, accompany us throughout our lives and sculpt a palace in our memory to which, sooner or later–no matter how many books we read, how many worlds we discover, or how much we learn or forget–we will return.

I am feverishly trying to finish The Shadow of the Wind in time for my book group tomorrow. My reading has slowed considerably, as my time on Facebook playing Lexulous has risen. Coincidence? I think not. But at least both are about love of words and learning.

I think what the quote implies is that there is some book that is each person’s first love, with that same devastating impact, no matter how many others come later. If I _had_ to pick _one_ (yanno–gun to the head) I think it would have to be Trixie Belden and the Secret of the Mansion, thankfully back in print after being MIA for many years. Hardly high lit, but the Trixie Belden series was so influential that it’s echoed here in the blog’s title and ethos decades later.

NB: I did not pick a fancy-schmancy award winning book, or geek-cred choice. I went back as far as I can remember, and picked one. Book-snobby comments about Gatsby, long lists, claims of how you fell in love when you started to read at age two, or some such will be disbelieved and mocked appropriately.

These shows make me laugh:

How I Met Your Mother
Better Off Ted
30 Rock
The Office (US)
Parks and Recreation

And at the end of a long day, I really appreciate that. I’m still laughing days later at Liz Lemon wrapped in a Slanket singing “Workin’ on my night cheese…”

Check them out if you haven’t, and give them more than one episode, too. The new ones, Ted and Parks, are still getting their legs, but look quite promising.

For those of you who miss At the Movies with Ebert and Roeper, Rotten Tomatoes now has a pretty good, pretty entertaining and informative movie show. (Announcement and link to show at Current.com)