Lower East Side Librarian

This is a lovely and often moving story of a German-American mother and daughter. The former is trying to ignore her deeds good and not-so-good in Weimar, Germany before and during World War II, and the latter, a historian, trying to discover and understand her mother's generation's experiences and behaviors in the Nazi regime. The story goes back and forth between daughter Trudy's modern day interview project and mother Anna's youthful struggles with love and providing for her daughter.

I must have read Nancy Drew stories as a kid, but I have no memory of it. Isn't it funny that you can spend hours of your life doing something and not remember it? Anyway, for whatever reason I decided I needed to read a Nancy Drew and like any good book junkie, I wanted to start with the first of the series. Originally published in 1930, The Secret of the Old Clock is terribly quaint, but Nancy is no delicate flower. In this installment she changes a flat tire nearly rescues herself by force from a locked closet. The whole time I was reading it, I was seeing it as found theater. I am half tempted to stage a reader's theater version starring members of Radical Reference, including one person narrating.

When you're an anti-consumption mainstream-culture-eschewing car-hating vegan it's highly unusual and extremely gratifying to read a travel guide written expressly for your weird demographic. Even those who loved to shop and think no trip to NYC is complete without seeing Phantom and dining at the Hard Rock Café should find some stuff they'll want to do in here, much as I hope they don't. There are plenty of kid-friendly activities listed in the guide, but be warned, the f-bomb gets dropped 25 times in the book, more if you count Fly's signature spellings, "fck" and "fckn." While we're counting words, those orthodox in their food choices will rejoice as I did that the word "vegan" appears 85 times in the 256 page book.

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There are cyclons in Victorian England. Other dangers include emotionally unavailable hottie demon slayers, wayward brothers, and the usual supernatural suspects (vampires, warlocks, werewolves). 16-year-old shapeshifting Tessa Gray is a likable protagonist, and the other characters, both naughty and nice, are both naughty and nice, meaning that the good guys have their flaws, and you have some understanding or respect for the bad guys. This is the first installment in what the annoying (how do you turn off the sound?!?) website indicates will be a trilogy. It does read like exposition and denouements, but doesn't end.