Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury

The Big Read is a program to encourage reading and discussion of the same book in a geographical area. This year’s Big Read title is Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury.

In Fahrenheit 451, firemen no longer put out fires, they start them. The reading of books is forbidden, and any home containing books is burned to the ground. One fireman, Guy Montag, begins to question his life and his job before rebelling against the society he lives in.

First published in 1953 and set in a future U.S., this classic dystopian novel rings true today. Bradbury successfully predicted some aspects of 2013 America. For example, when Guy returns home from work, he finds his wife stretched out on the bed: “And in her ears the little Seashells, the thimble radios tamped tight, and an electronic ocean of sound, of music and talk and music and talk coming in, coming in on the shore of her unsleeping mind.”

This passage brought to mind the many people I see walking around today who are so focused on the music coming out their Ipods that they pay no attention to their surroundings and are almost incapable of interacting with others. Some people don’t seem capable of existing in silence for even a short period of time.

One of the key themes of Fahrenheit 451 is how television (which Bradbury calls the televisor), not even widely found in homes in 1953, keeps people from enjoying the natural world and conversation with others. Bradbury certainly had that right!  He writes, “The televisor is ‘real.’ It is immediate, it has dimension. It tells you what to think and blasts it in. It must be right. It seems so right. It rushes you on so quickly to its own conclusions your mind hasn’t time to protest, ‘What nonsense!’” Bradbury was certainly a visionary when it came to imagining the addiction some Americans have to electronic devices and how we buy in to the opinions we hear through the media rather than thinking for ourselves.

If you like a book that challenges you to think about your own life and society, I recommend Fahrenheit 451. Free copies of the book are available at the Galesburg Public Library while supplies last.

In April you are invited to join one of the discussions of Fahrenheit 451 sponsored by the Galesburg Public Library:

Tuesday, April 9, 1:00 pm upstairs at the library

Thursday, April 11, 6:30 pm at Knox College’s Kresge Hall

Friday, April 19, 6:00 pm at Alternate Realities.

The Big Read is an initiative of the National Endowment for the Arts in partnership with Arts Midwest.

The Woman Upstairs by Claire Messud

Nora, an elementary school teacher in Cambridge, Massachusetts, refers to herself as "the woman upstairs" -- that benignly amiable person in everyone's life who kind of hangs around the outskirts of the action. In her younger years she dreamed of being a successful artist and having a family, but those dreams have long since stopped seeming attainable.  Then the Shahids move to town: Reza, the shy, bullied new student in her classroom; his mother Sirena, a glamorous Italian artist; and his father Skandar, a Lebanese college professor in town on a fellowship. When Sirena invites Nora to share an artists' studio with her in Somerville, Nora doesn't know what's more exciting: the space to once again explore her artistic dreams, or the friendship with the mysterious newcomer. Before long, Nora finds herself deeply involved with the whole Shahid family, even falling in love with each of them individually. But how real are the relationships, and what does she really know about the Shahids?

My favorite thing about this book was the voice of Nora. As a narrator, she was nervous, flawed, and incredibly vulnerable. I found myself physically invested -- as in, I would cringe with every awkward moment, and feel my face get red every time she experienced shame or self-consciousness. I enjoyed that for as well as the reader gets to know Nora, the Shahids remain really evasive as characters, so the reader is put in the same position as Nora -- curious, attracted, and completely unsure. I would recommend this to readers looking for contemporary fiction a few steps more complicated than your average beach read.

The Woman Upstairs will be available April 30, 2013.

Gulp by Mary Roach

Gulp by Mary Roach follows the entire alimentary process: the journey of food from one end to the body to the other. A book for the more adventurous reader, Gulp answers questions the reader never knew she had.  Why do dogs lick their wounds? Why can we light our farts on fire? What does partially digested food taste like? Roach divides the book into chapters, each covering a different strange anecdote about the study of the digestive process.

                Rather than a scientific overview of the “alimentary canal” Gulp is a series of mostly humorous stories, more about the people who study digestion than the actual study of it.  Roach’s descriptions of the scientists whom she has met can become a bit silly: “If a man can be said to resemble a tooth, van der Bilt is a lower incisor” (Roach, 130).  A person searching for a serious scientific study should not look to Gulp.  However, a reader with a strong stomach and good sense of humor, will love it.

33 Minutes by Todd Hasak-Lowy

Submitted by Drew, teen reviewer:

33 Minutes is about a boy named Sam Lewis. He is in 6^th grade. He has 33 minutes before his old best friend beats him up. Sam doesn’t know what made Morgan mad enough to beat him up. Was it Chris a kid that just moved next door to him? Will Sam get his friend back or get beat up?

I recommend this book to 3rd-5th graders who like mysteries. I give this book 3 stars out of 5 stars.

33 Minutes is available now.

Buddy by M.H. Herlong

Submitted by Reagan, teen reviewer:

Buddy is about a boy named Lil’ T and his buddy, Buddy (the dog). Buddy and Lil’ T have a very friendly relationship, only it doesn’t start that way. In fact, he didn’t even start out as Lil’ T’s dog. After they meet by coincidence, they become best friends. They go through a lot together, VERY thick and thin situations. Buddy isn’t your normal dog either, but you will have to read why.

I would recommend Buddy to all junior high school kids because it is remarkably amazing. I give this book a 4.5 star out of a 5 star rating. I give it this because the book was near perfect. This book is so real you will see yourself in it. I really recommend Buddy to all ages from 11-18.

Buddy is available now.

The Golem and the Jinni by Helene Wicker

I read a lot of books. Very rarely while I’m reading a book do I think to myself, “I’ve never read anything like this before,” but that happened while reading The Golem and the Jinni by Helene Wecker.

This debut novel is set in New York in 1899 New York. It revolves around two unlikely characters and their unlikely friendship. In the part of Lower Manhattan known as Little Syria lives a tinsmith named Arbeely. A local woman brings him an old, battered, copper flask. She asks him to knock out the dents and polish it up. As he begins to repair the delicate scrollwork on the flask, a jolt knocks him off his feet, and a naked man appears on his shop floor. The naked man is a Jinni, a creature of fire from the Syrian Desert who has been trapped in the flask for a thousand years. Although released from the flask, an iron bracelet that cannot be removed keeps him from resuming his natural form.

Meanwhile, in a different part of New York, a rabbi encounters a Golem – a woman fashioned of clay in Prussia who travelled to New York with the master who commissioned her but then died on the steamship. She is sentient, but lost, with no master and therefore no purpose.

The author’s prose is often lovely and lyrical. As the steamship carrying the Golem approaches New York, after her master Rotfeld has died on board:

“The deck was crowded with people, and at first the Golem didn’t see what they were waving at. But then, there she was: a gray-green woman standing in the middle of the water, holding a tablet and bearing aloft a torch. Her gaze was unblinking, and she stood so still: was it another golem? Then the distance became clear, and she realized how far away the woman was, and how gigantic. Not alive then; but the blank, smooth eyes nevertheless held a hint of understanding. And those on deck were waving and shouting at her with jubilation, crying even as they smiled. This, too, the Golem thought, was a constructed woman. Whatever she meant to others, she was loved and respected for it. For the first time since Rotfeld’s death, the Golem felt something like hope.” (p. 15)

The author spends considerable time introducing us to the Golem Chava and the Jinni Ahmad, their neighborhoods, and their neighbors. I don’t know much about turn-of-the-century immigrant New York, but the descriptions of the people, their jobs, their homes, and their pastimes rang true. The passages set in Syria and Prussia also felt right. I was very caught up in the characters and the setting.

The plot drags a little after we’ve met both characters but they have not yet met each other. But that soon passes. The two meet by accident late at night and recognize a completely different yet kindred spirit in the other. As I continued to read entranced, I had no idea what would happen next. So often with novels, especially first novels, I am not happy about the ending, but I was very satisfied with how this tale ended.

The cover compares The Golem and the Jinni to The Night Circus, A Discovery of Witches, and Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell. I thought it was considerably better than all three.

Nantucket Blue by Leila Howland

Submitted by Sharon, teen reviewer:

You would think that having your mother die would bring you closer to your best friend rather than drive you apart. Instead, Jules Clayton and Cricket Thompson go through what feels like the worst summer of their lives. For Jules, her summer is ruined by her mom's death, but for Cricket, it's having to spend the summer without her best friend.  I loved this book!  It was addictive!

Nantucket Blue will be available May 7, 2013.