Books for a brand new reader November 5, 2009
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Today, as I went about my regular bookstore business, I was also keeping an eye out for my own shopping. In a few weeks, I’m going to be an aunt for the first time, and that means that I get to buy lots of picture books for my brand new niece!! It’s so exciting to think about all of the stories that are waiting for her to discover, and it’s something I’ve been looking forward to, every time I’ve helped a customer select baby gifts. Of course, I’m happy to give recommendations to other people, but how will I choose books myself?!
Do I go for the classics? Do I steer clear of those, since she’s likely to end up with duplicates, and pick out some lesser known gems? Most importantly, how do I stop piling up the books? There are so many good ones, and it’s hard to stop at two, or five, or ten…
One that I have already set aside is Bear’s Day Out. This book by Michael Rosen just came out in board book format, and the bouncy call and response rhyming tale is perfect for read aloud time.
I already gave my sister-in-law a copy of Ten Little Fingers and Ten Little Toes. This is another new book that’s destined to be a classic. Mem Fox’s rhyming story about babies all over the world is perfectly illustrated by Helen Oxenbury, who created a lovely multi-cultural portrait of babies doing the things babies do, no matter where they are from. Oh, an additional endorsement came from my friend, whose 4 month old got excited every time she pulled out this particular book!
Dwell Studio (which is apparently a home furnishings company and not the likeliest of candidates for producing a good book) has, in fact, developed a nice little line of beginning board books. My favorite is LOOK, which is wordless and features a single image per page, simple, bright, and sharply contrasting with its background.
So, these are some of my favorite new books, but there are so very many classics–some of my favorites growing up–that my niece has to have. Where do I start? Which ones should wait for later? I can’t wait to pass along Pippi Longstocking and Anne of Green Gables (apparently, I had a weakness for red-headed orphans), but those might be better gifts when she’s old enough to read them herself. But what about Winnie the Pooh? What about Beatrix Potter and Richard Scarry? She might not be able to understand the stories yet, but she’ll grow into them.
One of my biggest challenges is finding the very best book of bedtime stories–I had a bunch of books full of stories and poems when I was a kid, and I think almost all of those are out of print. It’s time to find something new for this new baby girl to love and ask for, night after night.
[Early morning additions] Obviously, I missed many wonderful books, but I
woke up this morning and realized there were a few I couldn’t leave off: Madeline, Ferdinand, The Poky Little Puppy and The Tawny Scrawny Lion (for that matter, just about any book in the Golden Books collection), Green Eggs and Ham, Corduroy, From Dusk Till Dawn, Strega Nona, Jamberry, Chicka Chicka Boom Boom, Tacky the Penguin, Mike Mulligan and His Steam Shovel, and The Belly Button Book are just a few of the books that I couldn’t let my niece grow up without.
Thank goodness I have years of being a book-giving aunt to look forward to!
What are your favorite books to give as baby gifts? What did I miss? What book should no baby’s library be without?
Bookseller trick or treat! October 30, 2009
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Possibly the most fun literary ghost story I’ve come across: AbeBooks lists the top 10 ghostwritten books. You might be surprised by the names of some of the ghostwriters!
There are now four “episodes” available in the Library of Congress’s Exquisite Corpse Adventure–part 1 by Jon Scieszka, part 2 by Katherine Paterson, part 3 by Kate DiCamillo, and part 4 by Susan Cooper. Check in every two weeks for more exciting installments!
If you’re like me and far behind on all sorts of reading, you may not have had a chance to read the New Yorker excerpt from Wild Things, Dave Eggers’ novelization of Where the Wild Things Are.
Not really literary, and also an older article, but it seems like a good time to pull out this story about a scientific study of the odds of humanity surviving a zombie attack. Remember–aim for the head.
DON’T FORGET: For a Spooktacular time tonight (Friday, October 30) – 
head to Stardust Books for their POE-try Slam. It begins at 7:00, the suggested donation is $1 (all donations go into a pot that will be awarded to the best poet of the evening by specially selected judges) and costumes are encouraged!
Poets: Bring one spooky or seasonal poem and one poem on a subject of your choice to perform for the audience.
We’ll start the Slam off with a dramatic reading of Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Raven.” It’s guaranteed to be a Fangtastic evening!
Happy Halloween!!
Read-a-Thon Wrap-up October 23, 2009
Posted by Galaxy in Book news, Local Happenings, Store Events.Tags: community events, event, fundraiser, Read-a-Thon
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For our first Read-a-Thon, in 2008, we had prepared by talking with other booksellers who had hosted Read-a-Thons in the past. We had no particular expectations going in. We were bowled over to have 38 participants, mainly ages 12-17, raising around $830 for Hardwick Head Start.
This year, we’d been through the whole process and had a good idea of what we were getting into. We recruited extra volunteers to chaperone and set some new ground rules to make sure everyone was on the same page as far as what was expected and what was off limits during the 24 hours we’d be spending together in the bookstore.
Yet again, our expectations were blown away–we had 53 participants (including chaperones, many of whom found time to do some reading of their own) and, as of five days later, have raised $1040.98 for Hardwick Head Start and Early Head Start! According to several phone calls, emails, and drop-in visits, we are expecting to reach over $1,100 when all is said and done.
And what did the Read-a-Thonners do to honor the pledges they raised? Reading, of course, played a big part. Just from the participants who chose to keep logs of the books they read, we had a count of 14,063 pages read. In visual terms, that’s the equivalent of a stack of 18 copies of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows–in hardcover! Our winner for most pages read logged over 4,000 pages in her 24 hours here!
Of course, these voracious readers also had an appetite for food, and this is another way in which our community showed generous support for the Head Start programs. Hall’s Market donated several bags of fruit; Patchwork Farm & Bakery gave us a discount on delicious pizzas for Friday night’s dinner; Connie’s Kitchen delivered some fresh baked muffins and cinnamon bread for breakfast on Saturday; and Grand Union gave us a gift certificate that we used towards lunches and snacks.
We also wanted to give people a chance to take breaks from their books from time to time, and activities such as storytelling and Literary Jeopardy were popular diversions. Susan O’Connell–the children’s librarian at 
Jeudevine Library–created a special “library annex” here at the store for anyone who ran out of reading material, and at midnight led a Raid on the Library that let people stretch their legs and stock up on additional books.
A 5 a.m. scavenger hunt through the bookstore found very few takers (two, to be exact), since nearly everyone else was fast asleep.
In the morning, however, they were awake and ready to hit the books again.
A moment of Zen October 15, 2009
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It’s hard to focus on much when it’s less than 24 hours before our 24 Hour Read-a-Thon, so enjoy these sleeping kitties until I’m able to write more! Stop by the store this weekend to check out our Read-a-Thoners; I’ll try to post stories and photos from the event next week. ~ Sandy
Up all night, read all day October 9, 2009
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IT’S TIME FOR READ-A-THON 2009!
The Galaxy Bookshop’s Second Annual 24 Hour Read-a-Thon is set to kick off Friday, October 16 at 4 p.m. and run through Saturday, October 17 at 4 p.m. The Read-a-Thon is a fundraiser for Hardwick Head Start and Early Head Start and promotes the importance and the enjoyment of reading at all ages. Hardwick Head Start and Early Head Start provide education, nutrition, health, community, and social services to low-income children.
Read-a-Thon participants collect pledges–all of which will be donated to Head Start–and can spend up to 24 hours at The Galaxy Bookshop reading and enjoying a variety of activities. Last year, thirty-eight readers participated in the Read-a-Thon, raising just over $800 for Head Start and collectively reading over 10,000 pages and dozens of books! Head Start used the money raised by our readers to purchase furniture for a reading area and books for the program’s students.
Admittedly, Read-a-Thonning is tiring work, but lots of fun! You’re welcome to stay for the entire 24 hours (as Morgan, above, did last year) or come join us for a short time. We also invite you to stop in during the day on Saturday–the store will be open for normal hours–to cheer on our readers and make a donation to Head Start.
Kittens at the Bookstore September 25, 2009
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Written by Sandy
For a lot of people–and I’m one of them–books and cats fit together. That, and a good cup of tea. It’s not unusual to find a kitty curled up in some cozy spot in a bookstore; even a library might become a home for a cat. So, when Linda agreed to take in two kittens, there was some excitement at The Galaxy Bookshop about the possibility of adopting a bookstore cat. For a little while, at least, they’ve found a home in our bank vault, and they are the most adorable things you’d want to see.
The benefits are obvious (at least, to a cat lover): Cats are good company and, on a bad day, can be therapeutic; they attract other cat lovers; a cat would catch any stray rodents or flies that might find their way in; cats are good lap warmers (and it does get chilly in here during the winter.)
Of course, there are also draw-backs, the most obvious of which is that there are plenty of people who are allergic to cats. We certainly don’t want to make those people uncomfortable about visiting the bookstore. We really don’t want to cause an unsuspecting customer to have a serious reaction, such as an asthma attack.
I have to admit, it’s a bit hard to be objective when the matter at hand is a kitten–they’re just SO CUTE! Just look at those tiny faces!
Despite the overwhelming cuteness, our goal is to provide a welcoming place for people to spend time browsing and buying books, and that gives a lot of weight to the “con” side of the debate. Still, I keep hoping to discover the secret to having a cat that won’t irritate allergic customers. How do other stores handle that? (Besides adopting a hairless cat, that is. I have a feeling those wouldn’t do well here during the winter.)
We had a number of responses to our polls about a bookstore cat, both at the store and on Facebook. If you’d like to weigh in, or have any suggestions as to how we might be able to have a cat and give all of our customers a happy bookstore experience, please share!
Wallace Stegner Weekend September 11, 2009
Posted by Galaxy in Local Happenings.Tags: community events, events
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Robert Gray–a bookseller at Northshire Books and columnist for Shelf Awareness–wrote a great article last week about the upcoming Wallace Stegner Centennial weekend at Highland Lodge. With his permission, we’re reprinting the article here.
Vermont Foliage Season with Wallace Stegner
A sound like a big crowd a good way off, excited and shouting, getting closer. We stand up and scan the empty sky. Suddenly there they are, a wavering V headed directly over our hilltop, quite low, beating southward down the central flyway and talking as they pass. We stay quiet, suspending our human conversation until their garrulity fades and their wavering lines are invisible in the sky.
They have passed over us like an eraser over a blackboard, wiping away whatever was there before they came.
“Oh, don’t you love them!” Charity says. “Sometimes when we stayed late in Vermont, or went up late for the color, we’d see and hear them like that, coming over Folsom Hill. Someday you’ve got to visit us there.”
Maybe it’s just the time of year, but I recalled that passage from Crossing to Safety (not word-for-word, of course. I had to look it up for the exact quotation) when I heard about the upcoming Wallace Stegner Centennial. This “literary weekend” will be held during foliage season, September 25-27, at the Highland Lodge, Greensboro, Vt., a town where Stegner often summered and the model for scenes in his celebrated novel. Featured speakers include Philip L. Fradkin, author of Wallace Stegner and the American West, and Stegner’s agent, Carl Brandt, of Brandt and Hochman.
Galaxy Bookshop, Hardwick, Vt., is one of the co-sponsors and will sell books at the event. Owner Linda Ramsdell notes: “Stegner’s works, especially Crossing to Safety, do still sell well, and better because of the local reference points. An earlier novel, Second Growth, also has many local reference points. Wallace Stegner was a great supporter of the Galaxy Bookshop, and in an earlier iteration of community collaboration, we were fortunate to sell books at the Greensboro Public Library when they presented him with an award.”
Anne T. Molleur Hanson, organizer of the celebration, explains that the genesis was “threefold.” Four years ago, the inn hosted a Reading Greensboro weekend, with a focus on Crossing to Safety and the belief that “acknowledging the many writers like Wallace Stegner who have summered or spent time in Greensboro (or even live here year round, like Anne Stuart) would be a wonderful way to celebrate Greensboro’s literary legacy.” In addition to Stegner, John Gunther and Margaret Mead are among the noted authors who called this village of fewer than 1,000 people their Green Mountain home away from home.
“Our Crossing to Safety night was well attended, especially by folks from here,” Hanson adds. “After the event, many people–several from afar–remarked on their hope that we would do another such event sometime.”
About six months ago, Hanson and Willie Smith, one of the Highland Lodge innkeepers, discussed hosting another literary weekend focusing specifically on Stegner, “who is known as a Western writer, but who had a clear fondness for the northeast, particularly Greensboro, to which his and wife Mary’s friends Peg and Phil Gray (portrayed as Charity and Sid Lang in Crossing to Safety) had introduced the Stegners in the late 1930s/early 1940s. My interest in hosting a Stegner event was in part due to my nearly 20-year long regret that although I grew up here, I never attended a Wallace Stegner reading, which he offered during many of the summers he was here.”
The final piece of the puzzle fell into place when Hanson learned that Philip Fradkin, “who had stayed here while researching his biography on Stegner, was, like me, a graduate of Williams College. I e-mailed Philip and asked if he would join us for a literary weekend celebrating Wallace Stegner. Philip agreed. He suggested we find sponsors to help us with the event. At that point I contacted our friend, neighbor, and favorite independent bookseller Linda Ramsdell, to ask if the Galaxy Bookshop would like to co-sponsor. Linda was enthusiastic and immediately on-board.”
Ramsdell adds that the “Hardwick area is becoming a model for ways that businesses and organizations work together to do things that no one entity can do alone. Attention has focused on the agricultural economy, but there are many examples outside of that sector too. Especially in this economy, the importance and benefits of collaborating are extremely tangible. The other aspect of the Galaxy area, which differs from many cities with local alliance organizations, is that it is a small place where people know each other and are friends. We have a vested interest in each other’s viability and success. It is very easy to see how money stays in our area and benefits accrue when we work with each other.”–Robert Gray (column archives available at Fresh Eyes Now)
Is this game tax deductible? September 4, 2009
Posted by Galaxy in Linkage.Tags: distractions, games, let's say this is true, links
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I think that it’s safe to say that people who love books are people who love words. For all you word junkies today, some excellent free word games you can play at your desk. On your lunch break, of course.
Although, if you play Free Rice during work hours, it seems like you and/or your company should get some sort of tax write-off. After all, you’re earning grains of rice to feed the hungry!
Less altruistic is Must Pop Words, which pits the player in a race against an ever increasing shower of letters.
Lexulous (the game formerly known to Facebook users as Scrabulous until Hasbro sued for copyright infringement) continues as a fair imitation of Scrabble (TM), and is still free. You need to create an account in order to play against other people online and save games, but if you’d rather not have yet another user name and password to remember, you can choose to play solitaire or against the computer in a practice game.
Of course, after realizing how popular the Scrabble-esque game was, Hasbro did launch its own, official Scrabble application for Facebook. (I have to admit, being able to play Scrabble with friends and family in other states is the real reason I joined Facebook.)
From one of the ultimate authorities on language, Merriam-Webster’s website offers a number of fun, quick, and of course free word games.
Happy Spelling!
P.S. And now for a commercial announcement: The Galaxy Bookshop now carries Bananagrams! It’s a portable, simple word game that people of all vocabulary levels can play together. Come by the store to play a demo game or two with one of us anytime.
Book Review: Graceling August 28, 2009
Posted by Sandy in Book Reviews.Tags: book review, fiction, YA
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Graceling, by Kristin Cashore
On the back cover of Graceling, you’ll read a snippet of a review comparing the book to Twilight, and of course the publisher would want to appeal to the legion of Twilight fans who are hungry for something new to read, now that Stephenie Meyers’ series is finished. If I were to compare this book to anything in the pop culture consciousness, however, I’d lean towards Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Yes, it is a fantasy novel with a romantic vein, but this is above all a book about a young woman who is strong and independent and who wants to empower other girls to take care of themselves.
Gracelings are indentifiable by their eyes, which are of two different colors, and each Graceling has his or her own unique abilities. Some are more mundane than others–they can range from an affinity for cooking to psychic knowledge of weather patterns. Katsa’s Grace manifested itself when, at eight years old, she killed an uncle who was making inappropriate advances toward her. Since then, Katsa has been employed by another uncle, King Randa of the Midlunds, as his personal assasin and enforcer. She has trained and honed her superhuman skill for killing and maiming until she can take out an army of men on her own.
Although she is forced to deliver horrible and often unfair punishments to her uncle’s subjects, the injustices Katsa sees all around her lead her to form a secret Council that works to save victims of tyranny and abuses of all kinds. On one such mission, rescuing an elderly prince from the dungeons of a neighboring kingdom, Katsa meets a stranger who will change her life and everything she believes about herself and her Grace.
Prince Po of the island kingdom of Lienid is also Graced with fighting abilities, and he is searching for his grandfather–the same prince that Katsa helped to rescue from prison. Together, Po and Katsa seek to discover who kidnapped the elder Lienid prince and for what dark purpose.
I was thrilled to read this book, with a heroine whose strength and independent spirit does not give way at the entrance of a handsome, romantic young man. Though she doesn’t always understand it, Katsa embraces her strength, protecting others and teaching them to protect themselves. The men she allows close to her are not intimidated by her power but respect and love her for that very strength. This is a book I am very happy to recommend to young women–and young men–looking for a story full of action, adventure, and romance, with characters they can cheer for and admire.
[Note: Graceling has just been published in paperback. Fans will be eager to read Cashore's next book, Fire, which is about different characters, but still set in Katsa's world.]
[Note, part II: Check out Kristin Cashore's website and blog for more information about the author and her books and books-in-progress!]
With my glass half-full August 21, 2009
Posted by Galaxy in Store Events, Uncategorized.Tags: good people, the cautious optimist, unfortunate circumstances
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There are pessimists who will note, with some pride, that their view of the world ensures that they are never disappointed when things go wrong and often surprised when things go better than expected. I prefer to be optimistic, but as it turns out, a bit of pessimistic planning ahead might have been a good thing this week.
As some of you may know first (or second) hand, our anticipated event with Bernd Heinrich this past Tuesday didn’t take place because the author was unfortunately unaware that he had a speaking engagement at The Galaxy Bookshop at all.
It was, certainly, an uncomfortable situation for everyone involved. For me, it was also a learning opportunity.
Lesson #1: ALWAYS re-confirm events with the author or publicist near the date of an event. The publisher may have a whole department working on author tours, and the event may be posted to the official website, but that doesn’t mean that things can’t slip between the cracks.
Lesson #2: Be prepared for contigencies. Within minutes after I made the announcement that Bernd would not be attending, I began thinking of ways in which I could have softened the blow and created some organization for everyone as we worked on our Plan B. Because I didn’t get people’s contact information, I have to hope that we will be able to reach them through our website, via our email newsletter, here, on Facebook, in advertisements, etc., in order to let them know that….
Lesson #3: Know that there is a way to rectify the situation (i.e. Don’t Panic!). The happy outcome of our canceled event is that Bernd Heinrich made a point of stopping by the following day, on his way to Maine, to sign books for us. We now have a number of signed copies of Summer World and some of Bernd’s older books that we’d be happy to exchange for unsigned copies for any of the people who were here on Tuesday evening.
We are also working on rescheduling this event, which will either take place in October or in the spring, when Bernd’s next book (Nesting) is published. We will let everyone know as soon as we have a date–and promise (barring emergencies) that we’ll get the author to the book signing on time.
One more thing I took away from Tuesday evening–our people are good people. Though it would have been understandable for folks to get angry, annoyed, frustrated, vocal…it didn’t happen. At least, they didn’t show it. Instead, they were kind and understanding, voicing hopes of meeting Bernd here another time and offering sympathy for the situation we found ourselves in. Some people even helped us fold and stack chairs–a gesture that, on a hot and stuffy night, did not go unappreciated.
So, I will continue to be an optimist, but an optimist with a back-up plan.
