This coming May marks the 100th anniversary of the birth of author Rachel Carson, whose 1962 book Silent Spring alerted the public to the dangers of pesticides and helped lay the groundwork for the modern U.S. environmental movement.

 

Carson began her writing and science career in 1936 at the U.S. Bureau of Fisheries (today the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service). In honor of the Service’s most famous employee, the Friends of the National Conservation Training Center is launching the Rachel Carson Online Book Club. Starting March 1 and running through November 2007, participants will study Carson’s life and works. Each month features a guest moderator who will also offer his or her own comments on the text under discussion. Moderators include Carson biographer Linda Lear (Rachel Carson: Witness for Nature), Houghton Mifflin executive editor Deanne Urmy, and Cindy Van Dover, marine biologist and director of the Duke Marine Laboratory.

Besides Silent Spring, other Carson books to be discussed include Under the Sea-Wind, The Sea Around Us, A Sense of Wonder, and Always Rachel: The Letters of Rachel Carson and Dorothy Freeman, as well as a forthcoming anthology edited by Peter Matthiessen, Courage for the Earth: Writers, Scientists, and Activists Celebrate the Life and Writing of Rachel Carson (Houghton Mifflin, April 2007).

And if you want more Carson-related books to consider for a reading display or a book club, check out Priscilla Coit Murphy’s What a Book Can Do: The Publication and Reception of “Silent Spring“, Jim Lynch’s novel The Highest Tide, and The Gentle Subversive: Rachel Carson, Silent Spring, and the Rise of the Environmental Movement, a new biography by Mark H. Lytle. Both Lynch and Lytle will be moderators on the online book club.

 

 

Fiction, nonfiction, and a slew of graphic novels this week in our web-only, freely-accessible Xpress Reviews section. Here’s the list of titles reviewed.

Xpress Reviews for Week of Feb. 27th, 2007

FICTION
Jenoff, Pam. The Kommandant’s Girl. Mira: Harlequin.

Rentschler, Linda Ann. Mother. Madison Square Pr.

NONFICTION
Lindvall, Terry. Sanctuary Cinema: Origins of the Christian Film Industry. New York Univ.

Spivak, Alice with Robert Blumenfeld. How To Rehearse When There Is No Rehearsal: Acting and the Media. Limelight Editions.

GRAPHIC NOVELS
Benjamin, Paul (text) & Steven Cummings & Megumi Cummings (illus.). Pantheon High. Vol. 1: Demigods & Debutantes. Tokyopop.

Casey, Joe & Tom Scioli (text & illus.). Godland. Vol. 2: Another Sunny Delight. Image Comics.

Ennis, Garth (text) & Clayton Crain (illus.). Ghost Rider: The Road to Damnation. Marvel.

Fukuyama, Ryoko. Nosatsu Junkie. Vol. 1. Tokyopop.

Kang, Kyungok. In the Starlight. Vol. 1. Netcomics.

Kim, June. 12 Days. Tokyopop.

Kimjin. Lethe. Netcomics.

Kubo, Tite. Bleach. Vol. 17: Rosa Rubicundior, Lilio Candidior. Viz Media.

Linsner, Joseph Michael. Angry Christ Comix. Image Comics.

Melbourne, Drew (text) & Yvel Guichet & Joe Rubinstein (illus.). Archenemies. Vol. 1: Sinners and Saints. Dark Horse.

Morris, Steve. Blessed Thistle. Dark Horse.

Oshimizu, Sachi. Twin Signal. Vol. 1. AnimeWorks: Media Blasters.

Otsuichi (text) & Setsuri Tsuzuki (illus.). Calling You. Tokyopop.

Pope, Paul (text & illus.) & Jose Villarrubia (illus.). Batman Year 100. DC Comics.

Powell, Nate. Sounds of Your Name. reprint. Microcosm, dist. by AK Pr. & Dist.

Tennohji, Mio. The Sky over My Spectacles. 801 Media: Digital Manga.

Tanaka, Meca. Pearl Pink. Vol. 1. Tokyopop.

Way, Daniel (text) & Javier Saltares & Mark Texeira (illus.). Wolverine: Origins & Endings. Marvel.

Yamada, Norie (text) & Kumichi Yoshizuki (illus.). Someday’s Dreamers: Spellbound. Tokyopop.

Yuiga, Satol. E’S. Vol. 1. Broccoli Bks.

Riding the overburdened L train into Manhattan this morning, I looked up not to find a stranger’s sweaty face jutting into mine, but a faded mass market paperback featuring a dandelion spreading its fluffy seeds on the cover. It was New Poets of England and America: An Anthology (1957 first ed., 1962 2d ed., pictured below), and it was being read by a dewy-eyed young man of 25 at the oldest.

In my subway sightings of books (which I’m going to try to make into a regular blog series), I rarely ever spy poetry, much less poetry being read by a gangly hipster. What’s even cooler is that the book in question appears to be famous in poetry circles. Not only does it garner an entry on Wikipedia, but it also comes highly recommended by the Academy of American Poets. Edited by Donald Hall and Robert Pack, it was intended to introduce a new generation of talent. And as it turns out, the writers featured—e.g., Ted Hughes, Philip Larkin, Adrienne Rich, Sylvia Plath, and Anne Sexton—became icons.

Even more interesting are the introductions. Pack addressed the American poetry culture of the late 1950s/early 1960s, saying that it was divided between “the Academics and the Beats.” Clearly, the man’s aim was to push the latter, who did not find it necessary to drink themselves into the grave or strip in public to gain an audience. Their appeal was the caliber of their work, their “tight…and…free forms.”

If I can get my hands on a copy, I just might check it out.

Diaper-wearing stalker astronauts! Celebrity corpses awarded custody to six-month old babies! Judges weeping in courtrooms! Pop singers shaving their heads while checking in and out of rehab! Airline passengers trapped on blizzard stranded planes for 11 hours! Canine scrotums striking terror in the hearts of school librarians! I guess there must be something to this whole Mercury in Retrograde business in which everything goes wacky for three weeks. Come to think of it, my computer was acting oddly yesterday. Therefore I don’t plan to sign a contract, buy a car, or get married until March 8 when Mercury’s malevolent  influence on our lives eases up. Ah, but then we have the Ides of March to look foward to. 

As an adult circulation desk attendant at the Fargo Public Library, I spent a lot of time reshelving Zane Gray novels—or at least trying to. I’d be in the middle of putting a book back in its place when I’d feel a soft tap on my shoulder. Sure enough, one of the male senior citizen regulars wanted to get their hands on the title before somebody else. This was in 1998, but I would bet my nonexistent horse that Gray’s books remain top circulators.

Of course, we all know that in public libraries on the whole, mystery rules genre fiction (see Barbara Hoffert’s “Budgets Rebound: Book Buying Survey 2006″), but a call for Louis L’Amour readalikes this week on Publib reminded me of the appeal of Westerns. It may very well be that only “little old men readers,” to use one poster’s expression, devour them like biscuits and gravy at a Texas canteen, but they are part of the public and deserve more of the same, so to speak. 

So who to turn to when your patrons have exhausted Mr. L’Amour’s bibliography? Here are some names that were mentioned:

• Tony Hillerman (who, one poster pointed out, was born in the same town as L’Amour, that is, Sacred Heart, OK)
• Frederick Chiaventone
• Terry C. Johnston
• Douglas C. Jones (Hasford Family Saga)
• Elmer Kelton
• Larry McMurtry
• Howard Frank Mosler
• Douglas Hirt
• Don Coldsmith
• Dusty Rhodes (author of “clean” Westerns based in Arkansas)
• Robert J. Conley (Cherokee specific)
• Lauran Paine
• Ralph Cotton
• Ralph Compton
• Elmer Kelton
• Alistair MacLean
• Max Brand

 

 

Well, not mine, though oftentimes the nearer I get to that magic age, the more fascinated I become with never again having to set an alarm clock. No, as editor of Library Journal’s Video Reviews section, I have more recently been confronted with the retirement of my reviewers.

Having adopted the section in 1981, I was certainly the new “kid” on the video block. The reviewers who came with the job were wonderful at making it an easy transition. Some of them are still with LJ. A number of these hard-working contributors stop by LJ’s New York office on occasion or the LJ booth at the various conferences we both attend. Others I am yet to meet.

Those of you fast on your mathematical feet will calculate that it is 26 years since I took on Video Reviews. As my reviewers mention their retirement or its approach, one thought that speeds across my brain is, “Great, now they will have more time to review. I can send multiple programs at once as their schedules are free and unencumbered.”

Wait, what did you say in that email? You are forgoing reviewing now that you are no longer working? How did that happen? I expected their retirement to make my life easier; now I will have to recruit more reviewers, break them in, deal with a whole new crew. This is not what I bargained for at this stage of my career. I had hoped we might all go out together in a blaze of glory—but a number of years down the line. In truth, I can’t begrudge these folks their hard-won rest from the reviewer routine. They have done more than their fair share.

Speaking of shares, my own stock portfolio might not be deep enough at this time to support my retirement. Instead, I will have to invest in my reviewer portfolio. Any librarians and academics out there interested in reviewing video/DVDs, please let me know. And retirees are always welcome.

“The world’s forgotten boy”—that is, Iggy Pop, born James Osterberg in Muskegon, MI, in 1947—has finally gotten a biography on par with his musical achievements and brain-blowing stage antics. For Iggy Pop: Open Up and Bleed (April, Broadway Books), British journalist Paul Trynka worked his contacts like a Russian masseuse to produce what our reviewer Matthew Moyer calls “a complete portrait of the man and his work—from mayhem in Detroit with the Stooges to making albums with David Bowie in Berlin.”

As if Matthew’s impassioned assessment of the book isn’t enough (for the full monty, see the April 1 issue), his illuminating interview with Trynka will appear in the same issue, about a month after the release of Iggy and Stooges’ first studio album in decades.

For Iggy-related books, see our reviews of Martin Roach’s Morphing the Blues: The White Stripes and the Strange Relevance of Detroit and Roger Crimlis and Alwyn Turner’s Cult Rock Posters. And this just in from Arts & Humanities Editor Mirela Roncevic: although then pushing 60, a few years ago Iggy posed, often in the buck, for a serious of striking photos collected in Gavin Evans’s Biopic. Too nude and rude for the pages of LJ, but we’re still punk rock.

The furor over 2007 Newberry Medal winner Susan Patron’s The Higher Power of Lucky rages on, now with the help of graphic novel god Neil Gaiman. In his blog entry from yesterday, he says he loves librarians “unconditionally” but sticks it to the “rogue” types who have kicked up a fuss over, well, a scrotum (the word appears on the first page of Patron’s novel). Gaiman even inclues a link to a list of YA books probably already shelved in libraries that contain the dastardly noun. All I gotta say is, eat your heart out, penis.

Interesting article in yesterday’s Washington Post, “Read Any Good Ads Lately?”, about the growing trend of marketers commissioning original novels to plug their products. Profiled is Los Angeles author Mark Haskell Smith who was paid an undisclosed sum of money and the use of a Lexus in exchange for writing Black Sapphire Pearl, a serial novel published in three installments in the Lexus quarterly magazine (sent to owners) and on the company’s web site, which features interactive features such as profiles of the main characters like Lydia Stark (see below), crime writer and owner of a missing Lexus LS 460.

Lydia Stark

“I bet you don’t even have a fedora.�

A best-selling author whose 10 mysteries starring ace detective Theo Rose have been translated into 16 languages and have sold millions of copies worldwide. Raised in the relative isolation and comfort of suburban Minneapolis, Lydia developed an interest in noir, hard-boiled detective fiction, and violent crime stories when she was left dateless for her high school prom.

Turn-ons: The Lexus LS 460, blue jeans, picnics, witty banter, a dry martini
Turnoffs: High school boys, Chihuahuas, diet soda
Favorite movie: L.A. Confidential
Favorite song: Anything she can dance to
Favorite book: The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold
Life philosophy: “To thine own self be true. That’s the best advice ever given.�

“I can tell fact from fiction,” says the narrator in the opening chapter, but I wonder if readers can tell the fiction (or is it “fictomercial”?) from the branding. Then there is Electrolux’s comic Men in Aprons, available as a paperback or downloadable audio at  audible.co.uk/meninaprons. The novel, which British journalist Alex Mattis (Alex is a she) describes as a story “about misguided twentysomethings trying to forge careers against a backdrop of nightmare flatmates, failed romances and bad housekeeping”, does not mention the Electrolux brand but vacuuming is obviously a key plot point. 

Of course, this is really not new. Remember the controversy that broke out five years ago when British author Fay Weldon admitted she was paid to mention an Italian luxury-goods retailer in The Bulgari Connection? And chick lit writers have been brand name-dropping for years. Think The Devil Wears Prada, Gucci Gucci Goo. The only difference is these authors now should demand the big bucks and a plug for their own books on the marketers’ web sites.

  

Hello everyone,

Here are this week’s titles in our web-only, freely accessible Xpress Reviews for the Week of Feb. 20th, 2007.

NONFICTION
Sellers, John. Perfect from Now On: How Indie Rock Saved My Life. S. & S.

Stepp, Laura Sessions. Unhooked: How Young Women Pursue Sex, Delay Love and Lose at Both. Riverhead: Putnam.

Tellington-Jones, Linda with Bobbie Lieberman. The Ultimate Horse Behavior and Training Book: Enlightened and Revolutionary Solutions for the 21st Century. Trafalgar Square.

Thyre, Sarah. Dark at the Roots: A Memoir. Counterpoint: Perseus.

GRAPHIC NOVELS
Bergting, Peter. The Portent. Vol. 1: Duende. Image Comics.

Cogan, Adam (text) & Ryan Cody (illus.). Villains. Vol. 1. Viper Comics. 

Goodwin, Archie (text) & John Byrne (illus.). Wolverine Classic. Vol. 4. Marvel.

Konomi, Takeshi. The Prince of Tennis. Vol. 18. Viz Media.

Kusanagi, Mizujo. Mugen Spiral. Vol. 1. Tokyopop.

Lee, Youjung. Let’s Be Perverts. Vol. 1. Netcomics.

Maeda, Jun (text) & Rei Idumi (illus.). Hibiki’s Magic. Vol. 1. Tokyopop.

Ridley, John (text) & Georges Jeanty & Karl Story (illus.). The American Way. Wildstorm: DC Comics.

Sakurakoji, Kanoko. Backstage Prince. Vol. 1. Viz Media.

Schaffer, Dan. The Scribbler. Image Comics.

Tsuda, Mikiyo. Princess Princess. Vol. 2. Digital Manga.

Ultimate Annuals. Vol. 2. Marvel.

Yamazaki, Housui. Mail. Vol. 1. Dark Horse.