Author: Loree Burns

NIGHT
Written by Elie Wiesel
Read by Jeffrey Rosenblatt
Audio Bookshelf, 2000

Category: Memoir for Young Adults and Adults

I listened to NIGHT while driving from Massachusetts to Delaware this past Sunday. I’ve been meaning to read it for ages, especially since I noticed, recently, that I have been reading a lot of Holocost-themed books. And now that I have heard it read out loud, I have to agree with this jacket quote: “undoubtably the single most powerful literary relic of the holocaust.”

There isn’t much that truly scares me. Oh, I have my fears, of course. The thought of harm visiting my children leaves me choking on my own breath; I worry about the health and well-being of my sister, my friends, and my extended family; I am anxious about global warming and the state of our planet; I do not dig traveling alone. Most days I calm these fears by focusing on the awesome complexity of life on Earth, the diversity of form and function, the incredible breadth of experience we humans are privy to, all that I know which is good and right in the world. As I was driving, though, and listening to NIGHT, my one true fear came into sharp focus: a world without Humanity.

That is a world I couldn’t bear.

That is the world Elie Wiesel survived.

I highly recommend you read his story.

 

A CROOKED KIND OF PERFECT
By Linda Urban
Harcourt, September 2007

Category: Middle-grade fiction

I must admit at the outset that it is hard for me to separate the fabulous-ness of this book from the fabulous-ness of its author…

I sat in on a workshop that Linda Urban gave at the 2006 New England SCBWI Conference, Creating Great Bookstore Events, and was struck with her sincerity, her straightforward manner, and her sense of humor. A year later, at the 2007 Conference, I spent an evening eating and talking shop with Linda (and several equally fabulous local writers). Sincere. Straightforward. Funny. My first impressions of Linda were borne out.

And now that I have read Linda’s debut novel for young readers (Thank you Cynthia Lord!), I am not at all surprised to report that it is also sincere, straightforward, and very funny.

Zoe Elias is a little girl with big dreams … piano-prodigy-playing-Carnegie-Hall-in-a-diamond-tiara dreams. And she is pretty sure that the only things holding her back are her wheezebag organ (so NOT a piano), her agoraphobic Dad, and her workaholic Mom. I loved the snappy format and the clever way the chapter titles and text worked together*. I loved how recurring elements crept up on me and, well, punched me in the stomach**. I loved how the book made me look at the perfectly crooked parts of my life and smile***.

Hooray for you, Linda!

* Reluctant readers will love this, too.
** Writing teachers will love this, too.
*** Who won’t love this?

 

THE LANGUAGE OF GOD, A SCIENTIST PRESENTS EVIDENCE FOR BELIEF
by Francis S. Collins
Free Press, 2006

Category: Adult Non-fiction

Francis Collins heads the Human Genome Project, a government-supported research program charged with sequencing the entire human genome. (This incredible feat was accomplished–with help from many national and international contributors–in 2003.) His book has been in my TO READ pile since its publication, but I have passed it over time and again. Why? Well, because this is a book I wanted to dwell on. This is a book I wanted to read slowly and carefully and with my full attention. This is a book I wanted to think about.

And here I am. Vacationing. Dwelling. Thinking. It’s bliss…

 

THE CHRISTMAS MENORAHS, HOW A TOWN FOUGHT HATE
By Janice Cohn
Illustrated by Bill Farnsworth
Albert Whitman and Company, 1995

Category: Illustrated story

Christmas in July? Well, sort of.

I am doing some curriculum work this summer. Firstly, I am working on a curriculum guide for TRACKING TRASH. Secondly, I am writing several curriculum stories based on the history of my Unitarian Universalist (UU) church. Both have been rewarding, if somewhat difficult, projects. It was while working on the UU lessons that I came across THE CHRISTMAS MENORAHS.

The book is based on actual events that occurred in Billings, Montana during the 1993 holiday season. A rock was thrown through the menorah-lighted bedroom window of a boy named Isaac Schnitzer. Isaac is shocked—to say nothing of frightened—to learn that his family was targeted simply because they are Jewish. When the local paper prints full-page menorahs, the Billings community responds in force: thousands of menorahs are displayed in windows—windows of all classes and all creeds—across the city. Take that, haters!

I like this book as a tool for framing discussions about hate crimes and standing together against bigots. And I like it for reminding me to stand up, too … in my own small way in my own small life.