Book Review: Bringing Up Bebe by Pamela Druckerman

Bringing Up Bebe is written by an American mother living in France. She is intrigued by the difference in behavior between French and American children (read: American kids throw their food and French kids don't) and begins investigating French parenting. This book is about her discoveries.

The last thing many moms want to do is read a dry, preachy parenting book during nap time. The few nuggets of wisdom aren't worth the horrible guilt, self-judgement, and overanalyzing. Also, I like to think that underneath the supermom exterior there is a real human being who might just want to read something that isn't about sippy cups and sleep training.

But I heartily recommend this book to all moms - and less heartily I recommend it to those who aren't moms, because it is that interesting and well written...though it may not be as funny for you. Unless you find power struggles with beings one quarter of your size amusing.

This book is far from preachy and - best of all - it is hilarious. Well-written, self-deprecating, honest, and anecdotal, I found myself wanting to read this book. I tore through it in about two days (usually reading while I was nursing).

My favorite thing about this book though is that it opened my eyes to how cultural our ideas of parenting are. Most of what I took for granted as some universal agreement about what a good mother looks like is actually unique to us Americans. It took a lot of pressure off of me to be this so-called perfect mother. Realizing that the perfect mother looks very, very different in other cultures revealed that maybe there isn't a perfect mother. Maybe all these things that I felt like I had to do (go on playdates; go to story time; breastfeed my child; stay at home; alternately work a billion hours and look like I do it with ease; prep my child for college at the age of one; never take care of myself - always the baby first!) were actually just cultural ideals that I could reject, not a solemn, ethical parenting code.

There may be some moments in the book where French parenting is a bit idealized. But I can't really blame the author for this when babies in France magically sleep through the night around 3 months for no reason that French parents can recall other than that the moms had to return to work and "the baby knew mom needed her sleep." Meanwhile, American parents are still sleep deprived several months after the baby is born and often past baby's first year.

Maybe somehow our parenting ideals are working against us? After reading this book, as well as All Joy and No Fun, I'm starting to think that may be the case. And while I have no intention of making any sweeping claims about the right way to parent (I really don't believe there is one right way), I do intend to go easy on myself and let myself parent the best I can, sans cultural commentary.

Harper Lee's New Novel...Please contain your excitement.

I read To Kill a Mockingbird for the first time a few years ago when I had to teach it to my sophomore class. I was (and still am) in awe of Atticus - not because he was the perfect parent, but because he was so human and natural with his children. I remember thinking that if I ever became a parent, I wanted to be like Atticus. Except I wanted my children to call me mom, not by my first name.

A few months ago I heard the delightful news that Harper Lee had been harboring a sequel, a book that was actually written before To Kill a Mockingbird, but which takes place after the events in To Kill a Mockingbird.

The good news is we don't have to wait too long either (I mean other than the 55 years we had to wait already...) -- the book is scheduled to be published in July.

For more info, listen to or read this snippet from All Things Considered.

So just how excited are you about this? Let me know in the comments.

An Update in Reading

This month has been so busy that routine, along with all of the wonderful things that routine maintains including laundry and blog posting, has disappeared from my life completely.
Not surprisingly, I've still managed to read a few books. Because that's the second to the last thing to go (the last thing would obviously be breathing).
So here is a quick survey of my reading last month:

The Sandman: Preludes and Nocturnes, 4 stars. This is the first comic book/graphic novel that I've ever read! Reading comic books is difficult for me. My mind keeps trying to create the setting, the mood, to draw the characters and it gropes for information about these details - "Why is there so much dialogue! Why won't they stop and tell me where they are and what the air smells like and what the weather is doing?" Then I remember that it's all in a picture behind the words. So weird. But eventually I got into a good rhythm and didn't have to remind myself to slow down and look at the pictures. When I finished this collection, I had a few thoughts: That was a weird place to stop the story. Holy cannoli that was gruesome and creepy. There might have been a few sections that were pure genius. I wasn't instantly enthusiastic about it. I had to let it stew in my brain. I had to strain out the gruesome (I'm not prudish usually about violence, but for some reason, probably since there were pictures, it creeped me out) and absorb the great. Because there were two issues (I think they are called issues?) that Blew. My. Mind. One of them was an issue that switches to the point of view of a very minor character, a waitress at a diner who is a writer. She sees her customers as fuel for her writing. That's all I will say, but if you only read one issue, that would be the one to read. Neil Gaiman is extraordinary. If I was still teaching, I would seriously consider adding a lesson where we analyzed one or two issues of this text.

Anne of Green Gables, 5 billion stars. (The exaggeration is in in honor of Anne, of course.) I never realized that L.M. Montgomery was one of my favorite authors until a week ago. I got a sudden urge to reread Anne of Green Gables and now all I want to do is read Anne of Green Gables or watch Anne of Green Gables. Also, I plan on moving to Prince Edward Island. Seriously. My husband said he would do it.

Carry On Warrior, 3 stars. I can't enjoy nonfiction as much as fiction and so I always find it difficult to rate and recommend and talk about at all. Also, I have a weird voice in my head that is super judgmental when I read nonfiction. I haven't the slightest idea why. Anyway, this book was pretty hilarious, especially the anecdotes about the author and her children. I know it's cliche of me to enjoy reading about how a child threw a temper tantrum at Target just because I too may one day get to experience that joy, but what can I say, it's funnier on this side of things. The author of this text, Glennon Doyle Melton, is well known for her brutal honesty. I found this very refreshing and challenging. Sure, she had some ideas that were strange and that I disagreed with (which the voice in my head demands that I tell you), but I'd totally be friends with her. I read a review on Goodreads that said the prose was terrible. It wasn't. It was really funny. It was blog-prose or thinking-out-loud prose. But it worked for the book stylistically.

What are you reading currently?

"I don't care how well it's written, I only care if it's a good story."

These words were uttered by a man I spent an entire day with, but will likely never see again. Mr. Greenberg was a teacher at summer school and I was taking classes to get my teaching credential. He graciously allowed me to sit and observe in his classroom. I took away two things that day that have stuck with me: an interest in Doctor Who, and the quote mentioned above.

We were talking books during one of the breaks the kids get. Of course we were talking books. I was an English major on my way to becoming an English teacher. He was a writer and an English teacher. It was only natural that this discussion occupied our time. I don't know what prompted this comment from Mr. Greenberg. I think I was flexing my English-major muscles and made a negative comment about a new release that was getting lots of love from everyone.

So I was a little chastised when he said, "I don't care how well a book is written; I only care if it's a good story."

To this day I can't decide if I agree with him. I've read some books with an interesting story and awful prose, and some books with beautiful prose and a yawn-inducing plot. I prefer the books that have both an interesting story and beautiful prose. But I see what he was saying. Some books seem to be written for English majors - who else would willingly sit through Thomas Pynchon's The Crying of Lot 49? If you haven't read that gem, I can't even summarize the story for you because nothing really happens. I'm not kidding. There is a girl who is crazy and believes she has uncovered a conspiracy. She runs around discovering or imagining or projecting proof of this conspiracy. At the end of the book, you don't know if the conspiracy is real or if she is imagining it because she is crazy. But the prose is excellent. Very artistic and whatnot.

When I'm honest with myself, I don't want to read books like The Crying of Lot 49. I want to read books like The Lord of the Rings, or The Blue Castle, or Harry Potter, or anything by Mark Twain. Because those are really great stories.

Incidentally, they are also well written.

Which brings me to the other half of the equation: Books that are written poorly, but are great stories.

I'm reading The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo right now. (No spoilers, please, because I did just start it.) This novel has been raved about by tons of people, even fellow English teachers. Sadly, the prose is meh. True, this is quite possibly due to the translation, not the author himself. But it detracts from my experience. However riveted I am by the characters and the plot, the prose is awkwardly blunt, choppy, and has excessive chunks of exposition. So far, I am intrigued and I think I can safely say that I will really like it. But somehow the story doesn't feel complete without good, solid prose, perhaps a well-selected metaphor or a bit of elegant description.

So, Mr. Greenberg, I think I disagree with you. Story is arguably more important than how the story is told. But I'd say story is more like 60%, prose 40%, not story 100%, prose nil.

What do you think?

Time Magazine's Top 100 Young Adult Books

Greetings!
As is often the way of the world, whenever I turn my attention to particular topic, I suddenly see it everywhere, in the most random places, when least expected. It is delightful, and also not very surprising, since, well, I'm paying attention to it. To paraphrase Sherlock, I often see, but fail to observe. Once I start observing, I find lots of things around me that are suddenly full of meaning and importance.

Since I have recently been writing about books I read when I was younger, I was pleased that Time magazine did a story just for me about the Top 100 young adult and children's books of all time (in the first issue of 2015). In fact, Time even had a blurb from author Jesmyn Ward who said that Robin McKinley's The Hero and the Crown (prequel to The Blue Sword) was her favorite book as a child! To quote Ward, "The heroine [in The Hero and the Crown] is tough, stubborn, and smart, taking on a world bent on making her less than she is. I empathized." What excellent taste she has!

Enjoy browsing these lists. I was surprised at the number of books I hadn't read, pleased with the ones they chose that I had read, and disagreed about surprisingly few of them. I was also reminded of a few books I had forgotten I'd read (Johnny Tremain anyone? Loved that book!).

Here are the links:

Top 100 Young Adult Books of All Time

Top 100 Children's Books of All Time

I'd love to hear your thoughts when you are done looking at the lists. Any surprises? Remind you of any of your favorite books? Any that you think really shouldn't be on this list?

Pride and Prejudice: My first time

When I was a child, my method for choosing what to read was to go to the library and read every book by an author that I already knew I liked.

Obviously, this was a flawed method because I ran out of books pretty quickly.

If I wasn't already familiar with an author, I approached a new book like I might a strange dog. I would look at it carefully. I would read the back of the book, the inside flap, maybe scan a few pages, ready to drop it and run at the slightest sign of something I didn't like. I had to get a feel for the book, and it had to feel right. Otherwise I wouldn't read it. I turned away from the tawdry romances with their ubiquitous shirtless Fabios, and the garish covers of mystery novels, usually sporting some kind of intriguing trinket on a purple cover with yellow text, and many of the juvenile contemporary young adult novels that showed a photograph of a depressed teenager. I knew these were not the books for me; they didn't feel right. I wasn't interested in them - I felt I already knew all their secrets. Or that their secrets weren't worth knowing.

But if I was ever going to find new authors, risks had to be taken. I still remember the first Jane Austen novel I read. Inadvertently, I began with her most popular work, Pride and Prejudice. The copy I stumbled across was a red book, with gold lettering, the kind that comes in those fancy library collections where all the books match. I know it came from a collection such as this because the book was at my grandparents house, buried amidst other classics like Don Quixote and War and Peace.

I was probably only twelve at the time, though that sounds young, I couldn't have been much older because my mom was pregnant with my younger sister and my older sister and I had been sent to stay at my grandparents house for two weeks because we'd been exposed to the chicken pox and had to be sent away since my mother had never had them.

I can't stress how bored I was. So. Bored. It wasn't my grandparents' fault. They were enjoying their retirement and hadn't had kids around in years. They had a strict routine that involved working out before the sun was up, eating small portions of vegetables and cottage cheese, and falling asleep on the couch at 7 pm watching PBS.

I could have read any of the books on that shelf and I don't remember why I chose to look at Pride and Prejudice. Deprived of any picture on the front, any writing on the back cover, and no book jacket with helpful hints, I didn't have much to go on. I opened it and read a few lines. And didn't put it down. I remember a few chapters later thinking, How did I not know about this book or this author? By that time my father had already read us a few Dickens' novels, Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, and Wilke Collins, so it was a genuine question.

The wonderful thing about reading Pride and Prejudice so young was that I was truly taken in by the novel. When Darcy proposed to Elizabeth I was shocked. I hated him; I'd even pictured him like one of my classic ugly bad guys. Kind of like Gaston. Then when Elizabeth started falling for him I was gradually won over. I'm pretty sure I stopped reading and mentally changed his appearance to be more fitting of his new role as lead man.

That first read, I really experienced Darcy the way Elizabeth did. I'm not sure many people get to experience Pride and Prejudice like that, because most people know all about it before they read it and because most people bring some amount of maturity to the book and aren't fooled when Elizabeth despises him. If I read the book now, I know I would have identified Darcy right off the bat as the guy. After all, he was the richest and Austen, I learned later as I devoured all 6 and a half of her books, is all about the happy endings.

What about you? Did you know Darcy was the guy right from the beginning? Were you fooled along with Elizabeth? When did you first read the book?

The Blue Sword

I discovered Robin McKinley when my dad read us her book The Outlaws of Sherwood, a pragmatic and slightly depressing retelling of the Robin Hood legend. I remember attempting to read a few of her other books and not falling in love with them really, until I read The Blue Sword. 

The Blue Sword is about a girl named Harry. That’s right - a girl. You love it already don’t you? I couldn’t tell you why her name is Harry, even though I’ve read the book several times. I think it is a nick name. Harry is forced to move to a new town when her father dies, a town that is essentially a military outpost and is on the edge of a vast desert, home to a strange and foreign people. Harry is inadvertently swept up in a war between these foreigners and their long-time enemies. 

Spoiler alert: She gets a blue sword.

If you’ve been reading my blog posts about the books I loved as a child, you will no doubt notice a theme when I say that I loved Harry because she wasn’t proper and well-behaved. She preferred horseback riding to sitting daintily in a parlor and not to give anything away, she kicks some pretty serious keister by the end of the book.

This book fits squarely in the fantasy genre and is technically young adult, but McKinley is a talented author, so it is young adult I think mainly because it doesn’t have cursing, sex, and violence or other mature content.

If you don’t love fantasy, you might not enjoy this book. It’s fairly traditional in it’s fantastical elements and plot. If you do love fantasy, you will enjoy McKinley’s world building and the development of Harry’s character.

BabyLit books

BabyLit books are adorable, delightful books that make literature accessible for very small children. Or maybe they just make it more fun for literature-loving adults when they read these books to their little ones. Either way, I highly recommend this series.

I didn't read these books when I was a baby, so this post is a bit off-topic. However, my small one has many of these (thanks to many of my wonderful friends and family!) and I love reading them to her.  So some day, these books will be on a list of books she read as a child.

The books don't necessarily tell the stories they are named after; instead, they are a collection of "primers" (sound primer, opposites primer, ocean primer, etc...) so little ones can learn while they read. But there is often subtle humor included in the text or drawings for adults who have read the stories, or sometimes beautiful quotes.

I promise these will be a huge hit at the next baby shower you attend. Or the next time you snuggle up to read a bedtime story to your toddler. You can buy them on Amazon or on the BabyLit website.

Top 10 gifts for the book lover on your list

I know how challenging it can be to pick out Christmas gifts for someone you love. I am married to the gift-giving ninja, so I’m familiar with the panic that ensues when you want to get something meaningful, special, and unique, but you end up getting them a gift card. (Not that there is anything wrong with gift cards. I’ve grown to appreciate them for the guilt-free spending sprees that they are.) When it comes to gifts for book lovers, however, I consider myself an expert. Hopefully this guide is useful to you (and who knows, you might end up adding a few items to your own wish list!)

If you have any gift suggestions to add to the list, feel free to post in the comments below. Share your brilliant ideas and spread the magic of Christmas!

10: Mugs with literary quotes.

It is a truth universally acknowledged that all book lovers like to drink either tea or coffee. They also must do so out of beautiful vessels, because that is the most inspiring way to drink tea or coffee. Though your book-loving friend may already have several dozen mugs, they can always use more. These beautifully designed mugs made by an Etsy seller will be sure to delight.

9: Library candles

If you can’t have Mark Twain sitting next to you in your living room, at least your living room can smell like Mark Twain. Head over to paddywax.com (hehehe), and browse their collection of library candles that truly capture the essence of various famous authors and their books. Some of my favorites include Mark Twain, which has “tobacco flower & vanilla fragrance notes,” and Edgar Allan Poe, which has “cardamom, absinthe & sandalwood fragrance notes.”

8: The smell of books

As I mentioned in a recent post, almost all book lovers are enthralled by the scent of books. Now, you can bottle that scent and give it to them (sort of). Paper Passion is a perfume for book lovers that supposedly smells like “that peculiar mix of paper and ink which gives a book its unmistakable aroma, along with the fresh scent which a book opened for the first time releases” (according to amazon.com). I’m not sure if your book lover wants to smell like a book themselves, but they could always use it to freshen up moldy books or just sniff it like a junky whenever they crave the smell of books. If this seems too much like a gag gift, maybe stick with the old stand by, candles. The seller Frostbeard on Etsy has a collection of candles for book lovers that include scents such as Old Books, Bookstore, Sherlock’s Study, etc… Honestly, one can never have too many candles.

7: Book art

Get your bookworm a book made into poster, a shirt, or a tote. Over at litographs.com, you can find art made out of the FULL TEXT of various classic novels. My favorites include Hamlet and Pride and Prejudice.

6: Books about books (Meta books. Yep, that's a thing. I googled it.)

It seems obvious, but why don’t you get a person who loves books…MORE BOOKS. Because we can never have enough books. Ever. 

To put a creative spin on this suggestion, look for books that talk about books. I suggest Novel Destinations, a book about places around the world that have literary history, from authors’ homes and museums to locations that played important roles in classic literature. As discussed on a previous post, for Hemingway types who like a little booze to go with their books, you could purchase Tequila Mockingbird (Cocktails with a Literary Twist according to the subtitle). The Reading Promise is a memoir about a girl and her father who made a commitment to read for 1000 days without missing a single one. The Shelf: Adventures in Extreme Reading is a book about a woman who decided to experiment by reading all the books on one shelf of the library regardless of their contents and quality (or lack thereof). Or if you want to stress your friend out by essentially giving them a really really really long to-read list try Book Lust: Recommended Reading for Every Mood, Moment, and Reason. 

There are also many excellent works of fiction that focus on books (one of my favorites is The Eyre Affair by Jasper Fforde); a quick google search for "books about books" should give you plenty of options.

5: Magazines about books

There are a number of great magazines about books out there including Bookmarks, the London Review of Books, Publishers Weekly, and the New York Review of Books. Magazines make great Christmas gifts because they are literally the gift that keeps on giving.

4: Games about books

When I was little, my sister used to get mad at me when she wanted to play with me and I refused because I was reading. Maybe if she’d had some of these awesome, book-inspired games, I would have taken a (temporary) break from my paper world for a world of flesh and blood. Get these games for those bookworms that need a little encouragement to interact with others every once in awhile.

Haikubes is “a set of 63 word cubes that is attractive enough to display on the coffee table. Simply roll the cubes and use the words that come up to create an expressive haiku” (amazon.com). 

Bookopoly is a creative, book-themed Monopoly - in other words, way less boring than regular Monopoly. According to dodoburd.com, throughout the game, you “build book clubs and libraries on literary classics such as The Grapes of Wrath and The Great Gatsby; collect different genres; and pick up Knowledge and Explore cards for bonuses as you make your way around the board. But watch out for Book Club Fees and don’t get stuck Watching TV or you’ll lose three turns.” 

Another aptly named game, The Storymatic is a story generating game that can be played alone or in groups. As one amazon reviewer complained, all the game variations included in the box basically have you draw cards and tell a story — but for me, that’s a selling point, obviously. I spent lunchtime as a kid with my siblings telling increasingly absurd tales as we built on each other's stories. It was a blast, and I’m sure this game is just as entertaining.

3: Book lover’s basket

Sure, this isn’t exactly the most original gift idea (you can pretty much put “gift basket” behind anything and ta da! it’s a gift) but this might actually be a gift basket worth getting (and giving). Here is why: there is a reason why your friend is a book lover. They love books because they love to read them. And almost all book lovers like to read curled up with a blanket, a cup of tea, a good book, a cute bookmark, and maybe a snack that doesn’t get your fingers too dirty to turn the pages. Also, it should be raining. We read in millions of other settings too of course (peripatetic reading should be a sport), but this is our preferred setting. So why not make that dream come true for a reader you love? Put a cozy blanket, a bookmark, a gift card to their favorite bookstore, tea or coffee, a mug or teacup, a book, a snack, and some rain in a basket with a beautiful bow. Just don’t be mad if they vanish on Christmas day into the book cocoon that you so kindly purchased for them.

2: Their literary thumbprint

All book lovers would agree that certain books impact you in ways profound and become a part of your identity. Each person’s reading history is unique and what better way to capture that than with your thumbprint made out of your favorite book titles? Cherylsorg over at Etsy (good ol’ Etsy!) does just that; using a list of 50 - 60 of your favorite books and your thumbprint, she turns your reading life into a work of art. This is a pricey gift, but it would truly be a treasure.

1: Make fiction reality.

Obviously the number one absolutely most amazing gift you could ever give a book lover is a chance to step into one of their favorite books. I realize this is logistically impossible, but a close second to climbing into a book world is to go places that make it seem like you are climbing into a book world: take your friend on a trip to visit their favorite author’s old house or go to The Wizarding World of Harry Potter at Universal Studios in Florida. Depending on your location, this may be more feasible for some of you than others. 

A gift like this would be more than worth all the hard work and money you put into it; this is the best gift for any book lover, because ultimately, we seek a world other than our own when we read and standing in liminal places like 221B Baker Street or the Charles Dickens museum, these two worlds — the world that is our lives and the worlds in our books — find common ground and we experience the surreal moment where things imagined become tangible. 

So don't dismiss this suggestion too quickly. Spend some time researching your area if you can’t go very far; you might be surprised at what you find that is within a reasonable distance. Or check out Novel Destinations from your library for ideas. 

For those of you in the Oregon area, another option is to check out the Sylvia Beach hotel, a cozy hotel with author-themed rooms that would make any book lover swoon. 

For all my book-sniffing friends (you know who you are!)

Nymag.com has a list of reasons to love New York, including...

16. Because We’re Home to Not Only the Publishing Industry But Also to a Woman Who Spends Her Days Smelling Books

I think you know that books have captivated you in a unique way when you start smelling them. I think you can also tell who was raised with lots of books (or went to the library and bookstores a lot as a kid) based on rather or not they love the smell of books. It's like when people love the smell of apple pie because it reminds them of home. Why should book smelling be any different?

I still remember recognizing the smell of our local bookstore when we lived in a small town in Northern California. I was very young, so I can't picture the store very well, just a few odd shelves and parts of the children's section; but I remember recognizing that comforting smell as soon as I walked in the door - and loving it.

Not all bookstores smell great, and they don't all smell the same. We moved out of Northern California when I was around 8, and we found a new local bookstore. I still visit this bookstore on a regular basis. It has a weird smell that's a cross between Goodwill, your grandma's house, and old paper. I have one friend who won't even go to this store because she hates the smell so much. But I love it, because I spent lots of time there as a kid, trying to contain my excitement as I perused the mountains of books before me. For me, this store smells like possibility. As in, today I might discover the best book of my life or a new favorite author. Today might be the day I buy a book that changes my life.

So I breathe that smell in deeply. And I know that many of you out there do the same.

So let's hear from all those book sniffers out there. What is your favorite book to smell? Any book smelling rituals? Best-smelling bookstore? Do you prefer the smell of old or new books? Tell me all your book-smelling secrets!