This is me immodestly promoting two events at which I'll be speaking. One of them specifically asked me to, so I'm not entirely betraying the library code of anonymous servitude. The first is the NY Art Book Fair, where Alycia Sellie, Susan Thomas, and I will be talking about zines in libraries.
I just spent 400 pages in the mind of the mother of a teenage mass murderer, and I'm here to tell you that is not the nicest place to be. Mama Eva and sociopath Kevin's story is told in the form of letters from Eva to her husband/baby daddy Franklin. (Don't you love the name Franklin, btw? Why is it so much more appealing than Frank or Francis?) The basic premise is that Kevin, born to a mother who has a hard time bonding with him, is pretty much a psycho from birth, but somehow while this is apparent to Eva, Franklin can't or won't see it, which leads to some strife in their marriage. At points that stress was so hard to take because it seemed so unjust to me that I might have put the book down if I weren't reading it at a friend's recommendation.
Rivington Street starts out in pogrom ridden Russia and follows one family to the early twentieth century Lower East Side, with its pushcarts and Yiddish socialism. It is to some extent a tale of two sisters, one a garment factory union organizer and the other an aspiring clothing designer, a boss. The other strong women characters are the daughter of a selfish and sexist rabbi, a gentile suffragist, and Hannah, the old world mother of the two sisters, Sarah and Ruby Levy. I've read it a bunch of times, and it never disappoints me. I love entering the world of my grandfather's Lower East Side and the early struggles of the women's labor and suffrage movements.
We work as hard as any man; we think as well as any man; and we want every right and privilege the men have, including the privilege of making fools of ourselves every four years as they do by voting for capitalist parties that keep the chains fastened around their necks! p.255-56
In my review of Welfare Brat I remarked how impressive it is when people can remember so many details of their childhood. Scully, unfortunately, doesn't have quite the mastery that Childers does, but she reports that her sister has no memory of their childhood whatsoever, so I guess she's not doing too badly. The quality is a little uneven; some of the short, poetic chapters (64 of them in a 219 page book) are far more compelling than others.
Since this is kind of important to me, I'm ignoring the rest of Week 35 to focus on what I think was a spectacularly dumbass decision.
* 150 Fanzines CANCEL
(A) 150 Fan magazines [May Subd Geog] [sp 85047176]
680 Here are entered works on professionally and nonprofessionally published magazines that are intended for the fans of a particular aspect of popular culture.
450 UF Fanzines [EARLIER FORM OF HEADING]
550 BT Periodicals
I saved this batch of links on August 10 for my next link digest. I've got probably a dozen more, now, so you can see I'm a little behind.
Thinking about my zine, I realize that I need to start writing shorter reviews, like I did when they debuted on paper. So, this will be quick. Night World no. 1, consists of three novels: Secret Vampire, Daughters of Darkness, and Spellbinder. They all take place in the same universe but have few characters in common. I'm hoping that after we've met everyone (There are nine novels in the series.), they'll interact. However, I suspect that they'll stay as they are, primarily about the forbidden soul mate pairings of humans and supes.
October 6 will be Sandy Berman's 76th birthday. To celebrate and to thank him for everything he's done so far, you might want to consider sending him a birthday card, like a lot of people did last year.
Send cards in the mail to:
4400 Morningside Rd.
Edina, MN
55416-5043
A new alternative library grows in Brooklyn: the Branch Library in Clinton Hill is a project driven primarily by designers I believe, but they were respectful enough of the library profession to talk to some librarians, including the NYC Radical Reference collective.
A picture from opening day
Don't tell anyone, but I've never taken a women's studies class. I knew Dworkin was a controversial figure and anti-pornography activist, but not much more than that. Unfortunately, she turned me a bit against her in the first couple of chapters, with sentiments like:
