Do you really need me to say an anthology was uneven? Do I really need to say it? Unfortunately, I do. I loved some of the chapters and was less taken with others. You might chalk up the difference to writing quality and/or to my personal taste. I prefer the contributions that make their point by telling a story, rather than with a straight up essay.
A young adult novel about a smart loner girl's last summer before college, this book felt substantial while I was reading it, but ended up a teen romance. Not that a teen romance has to be a bad thing.
Ayun's first graphic novel (I can call her Ayun, because we're friends) is a story that should appeal to tweens about a girl who moves to a new school and tries to make herself more interesting by faking a dire peanut allergy.
Like lots of people who watched the Summer (for the northern hemisphere, anyway) Olympics, I was immediately enamored by Gabby Douglas. She's so talented! Pretty! And her being Black in a sport disproportionately dominated by White athletes, at least per this USA Gymnastics Diversity Study is part of her appeal, especially considering how biased the media coverage was. Consider that Jordyn Weiber was the girl-to-beat going in, but Douglas is the one who won the Olympic trials.
A.j.'s call for contributions to her Six Categories zine went more or less like this:
In the beginning of the novel Microserfs, Douglas Coupland has each of his characters list their dream Jeopardy! categories, fields of expertise such as "Career anxieties," "Cats," "Psychotic loser friends," and "Macintosh products." I can’t remember much else from this nearly twenty-year old novel, but these character "introductions" remain stuck in a shadowy corner of my memory. I’ve mentally made lists of my ideal Jeopardy! boards, with categories like "The Simpsons, Seasons 1 to 8" and “Postage” and "Job Dissatisfaction."
It's your turn to list your six ideal Jeopardy! categories that showcase your unique knowledge, quirks, neuroses, talents, habits, whatever.
Cartoonist Ellen Forney is completely forthcoming in her account of how she coped with getting diagnosed with bipolar disorder and accepting that she'd have to be on meds the rest of her life. Aside from her frustrations with her highs and lows and the drugs that often failed to smooth them out, the central thesis of Forney's graphic novel style memoir is her fear that medication will erase her artistic talent and identity.
I'm catching up on my pile of mail, and by "catching up," I mean turning it over and starting at what was previously at the bottom, instead of answering letters immediately or never.
The first thing I found was a copy of a 3/28/11 letter from Sandy Berman to the Cataloging Policy & Support Office of the Library of Congress, recommending they establish the subject heading READICIDE.
This is another book I wished I'd enjoyed more, as I did Griest's previous memoir Around the Bloc: My Life in Moscow, Beijing, and Havana. After having explored cultures foreign to her own, Griest decides to spend a year in Mexico, examining the roots of half of her bloodline. The parts where she explores her Mexican and mixed race identities are compelling, but the reportage in most of the book is less so, at least for me.
I made it well past the hundred page mark, thinking the book would eventually grow on me. The writing and story aren't bad; I just didn't care for the sisters, especially the younger one of the first generation.
College Book Arts Association Annual Meeting
art by & for change Felice Tebbe, artist, curator, & sales, Booklyn Artists Alliance.
Some artists and writers are moved to make things that change people, both personally and as a society. Understandably, these images are collected by public learning institutions. But, what do we do with them once they are collected? Participants will discuss issues such as the relationship
between socially engaged art work and public teaching collections, how the meaning of this artwork changes once it is held in a collection, and how these works are used by students, faculty, curators, and others.