(12) Dylan Nicholas Dane reviews by Melvin Burgess

This is the opinion of Dylan Nicholas Dane Melvin Burgess. WARNING: This book is very mature and is not intended for young adolescents. (17 + rating) Dylan's personal channel: www.youtube.com book of Dylan channel: www.youtube.com

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What's Happening @ your library - March 2007

Lunch @ your library with Professor Andrew Halford discussions Off the Shelf The Kite Runner evenings Upstairs Boy Scouts in Paducah Paducah Area Painters Alliance with Bill Black Paintings now on display Teen Tech week activities for Read Across America Celebration parties refer to treasure with Captain Book Challenge McCracken County Public Library

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A Civil Action (Turtleback School & Library Binding Edition)

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If you're interested in the law, and have little or no idea how complex cases are brought to court, this is the book for you. ACA is equally gripping as human story (what a story!) and legal procedural (what a case!). I never realized what lengths some lawyers will go to to see a case through, what sacrifices they make along the way, and how much can be personally at stake for them. ACA is ultimately about families -- who lost family members on account of the willful negligence of major corporations -- and a town in Massachusetts. But the lawyer who fought their case is near the center of this telling, and rightly so. Were it not for his extraordinary efforts -- and those of his colleagues -- justice might never have been done in this extremely disturbing case. Kudos to Schlichtmann et al for a job very well done (the judgment against Beatrice and Grace should have been much much higher), and to Harr for an outstanding book.

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A Lesson Before Dying (Turtleback School & Library Binding Edition) for $24.55

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The older and, one hopes, wiser I grow, the more I admire and respect simplicity. Simplicity is not simple. Simplicity means clean lines, all that is unnecessary pared away. Simplicity means choosing that one golden word where ten would only confuse the issue. And, that one word can be clear and true.

Ernest J. Gaines is a master of simplicity. A Lesson Before Dying is clean and clear writing, descriptions that say just enough to evoke an entire scene with all senses engaged, all heart and mind present. His dialogue is bare bone, sparse as the dialogue I so admired as a young writer-in-training, enthralled with that other Ernest--Papa Hemingway, and his unique way of capturing the way that people actually speak rather than the stilted narrative voice of the author him or herself.

"It don't matter," I heard him say. He was looking up at the ceiling.

"What don't matter?"

He didn't answer.

"What don't matter, Jefferson?"

"Nothing don't matter," he said, looking up at the ceiling but not seeing the ceiling.

"It matter to me, Jefferson," she said. "You matter to me."

He looked up at the ceiling, not seeing it.

"Jefferson?"

"Chicken, dirt, it don't matter," he said.

"Yeah, it do, Jefferson. Yeah, it do. Dirt?"

"All the same," he said. "It don't matter." (Page 73)

Ah yes, there is that mastery, like a reincarnation of Hemingway, with an artist's understanding of the way that life moves--not in straight lines, but in circles, ever circling on the same spot, trying out its parameters until it is known, only then shifting to the next circle, a slight distance this way, or that, or even back again. I admire this accuracy portrayed in the written word. The novel becomes life.

The life portrayed in this novel is based on two main characters, set in 1940s Louisiana, the deep south, when racism and segregation ran deep, and a black man was imprisoned just for being in the wrong place at the wrong time, innocent that he might be. Jefferson is a simple-minded man who inadvertently ends up in the middle of an armed robbery, and although he has done nothing wrong, is sentenced to die by a legal system that has nothing to do with justice but everything to do with enforcing the status quo. Grant Wiggins seems, at first, Jefferson's opposite--a black man who is educated and intelligent, a teacher at a church school. Both men, however, live in a prison, even as only one of those has tangible bars.

When Jefferson is called "same as a hog" by his own defense attorney, likening him to a dumb animal in the hopes that the jury will deem him innocent out of sheer lack of enough intelligence to commit a crime, his aunt, Grant's grandmother, can accept the final verdict of death, but not the image of her nephew dying like an animal. She calls in a favor from Grant, who reluctantly agrees to visit Jefferson in prison and teach him to die like a man.

If this injustice, the death sentence of an innocent man, cannot be changed in a deeply racist society, then one's attitude about it can be. Jefferson bitterly accepts being called a hog--"it don't matter"--but the story unfolds in those gorgeously clean lines with the meetings between the two men, some of which are nothing more than sitting together in a prison cell for an hour and staring at the ceiling. There are no lectures, no fist-pounding diatribes, no soapbox rantings to vaguely disguise the views of the author in need of getting something off his chest. There is just this fly-on-the-wall observation of two men sharing space, different yet same, both locked into place, both suppressed by their life sentences to a destiny neither deserves but inflicted upon them because of their race.

So how does a man become a man? What differentiates a man from a dumb animal? Our teachers are not always those with the highest intelligence quotient. Our leaders are sometimes those who are silent, but walk to their destiny, however unfair, with clean conscience and straight spine. Whatever is done to a man matters little. What a man does to himself, and how he handles the circumstances of his life, is all that matters. Live or die, a man does so with honor. Just or unjust, a man answers to himself if he has lived with integrity. If he has, he can walk through any trial, toward any fate, with his head held high.

Edward J. Gaines was born on a plantation in Louisiana, where he is now writer-in-residence at the University of Southwestern Louisiana. Previous books include The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman, A Gathering of Old Men, and several others.


~Zinta Aistars for The Smoking Poet

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Breakfast Of Champions (Turtleback School & Library Binding Edition) for $26.95

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Although I do not share many aspects of Mr. Vonnegut's view of life, I can still appreciate how well he expresses it. This novel, ostensibly about the fateful encounter between an obscure sci-fi writer and a car salesman who is slowly going insane after reading one of his stories, is really about life and politics according to Kurt Vonnegut. Often transparently so. Using minimalistic and hilariously bad doodles the author relates his view of humans as creatures largely determined by genetic and environmental factors (Hitler, according to this book, was "full of bad chemicals," for instance) and his view of politics and society as the tyranny of these influences exerted through systemic means. There is, of course, no organized expression of this thesis, and this ties into my chief criticism of the work: it is rambling. Remarkably so. The narrative is a very chain that just barely binds together the various observations made by the author. His presentation is as irreverent as much of the content. And yet, this work is still very cutting, and the almost child-like explanations of everything from racism to the cold war range from silly to profound. I think, to Mr. Vonnegut's credit, that, as a whole, it is closer to the profound side of things than the silly side, and that's why I've rated it fairly highly. I think the author is wrong on a lot of things, and he could have expressed his views in a more organized fashion without robbing this work of its entertainment value, but there are too many pearls here to dismiss this book. The characters are well-drawn but not particularly deep: par the course for the genre of satire. I recommend this book for what it does right. Yet understanding where Vonnegut goes wrong can be a worthwhile process as well, because, no matter what he may be, he is never boorish or typical in his thinking.

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Save the SAP Library Books

In the summer of 2009 working KDHX Community Media and St. Louis County Library to offer three fields of video production for young people. Participants learned the concepts of media education, but my experience with the use of cameras, audio equipment and editing software for the entire movie to make it intelligible. The end result was a public library Service Announcement Trailer and a book produced in each field.

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Voyage Out (Modern Library Classics (Sagebrush))

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For me, after having read Mrs. Dalloway, I quite loathed Virginia Woolf and her experimental style, which defied all styles. This novel was not easy to get through, though much more manageable than her later works because it mimics an actual novel style, rather than her signature, stream of conscious. Then again, I have yet to fully realize this first woeful tale by Woolf, other than to truly appreciate this woman's incredible talent.

To be honest, the only reason I bothered with this first venture of Woolf's was by design rather than my choice. A friend and I decided to form our own book club, and her favorite, of course, was Woolf. And thus, I was committed.

Meet Rachel Vinrace, a twenty-four year old young woman, adrift and impressionable, considered very 'unformed' and vague by those around her. Under the care of her aunt and uncle, Ridley and Helen Ambrose, she journeys across the ocean from England to a resort town in South America, and thrust into a world of humanity and emotion, nature and variegated personalities that are at once overwhelming and instructive. Her birth of understanding, which are both strange and exciting experiences, Rachel begins to conceive and formulate herself through a series of experimental interactions with her relatives, especially Helen, as well as with colorful, if not seemingly stolid characters from the nearby hotel. Unshaped perceptions leave her breathless yet wiser, and barely does she scrape the surface of life, experience and self-understanding before Rachel herself is extinguished.

This is a haunting, romantically tragic tale of something gained and then fleetingly, it is all lost, leaving everything, and everyone in turmoil and yet, continuing on. At first, the story is incoherent, boring, at times scattered and frustrating to read. Characters and events which seemed, at first, to have no purpose, at times appearing to be trivial, begin to take shape and form. All these intricately woven pieces which become the very basis in which Rachel can experience her world, the real world and herself, slowly and so powerfully are pieced together and you may not even realize it until much later on, like I did and still piecing together. These descriptions of other British people in a remote exotic port is a contrast to Rachel's own growing sense of awareness and independence, each interaction is carefully placed and not random. This is where Woolf excels, providing the seemingly unimportant and even dismissive scenes and making them relevant, later on, when the reader has read the book.

A few chapters are painfully aware and poignant and wonderful, heady and traumatic in its sharp intuitive vocalization of human emotions and realization of defects in human nature itself. And all against the beautiful backdrop of a South America that I, as a reader, have never experienced. You will ask yourself for the first whole half, What Is The Point? And then, like a train wreck, it's there, hitting you in the face, as Woolf weaves people and experiences, emotions and underlying tones of social mores and scripted human behaviors, all of which presses upon every character like a net, and ensnares the reader. It is layer upon layer and easy to miss the subtle influence and connections that Woolf effortlessly weaves and throws right before your eyes. Call it genius or magic, you will be astounded, or numbed. And if you're careful enough, you'll glimpse what Woolf was trying to say. You will look upon pain, and will flinch. Don't look away, or you may miss it.

I for one am still reeling from the sensory onslaught, her words like water over rocks and I have to admit, I loved this book, and I was utterly perplexed by it. It is, like most rare and profound stories, an emotional voyage, filled with symbols and allusions, and something which leaves THAT something inside you, burrowing and forever embedded in your very thoughts. I want to read it again, mark the pages and remember those eerie descriptions of human frailty and human experiences rendered in such a way to leave me breathless and engrossed. It's safe to say, that I am quite taken and can't wait to read the next Woolf story. So read on, good reader, read on, if you dare.

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Jubal Sackett: The Sacketts (Turtleback School & Library Binding Edition) for $16.00

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I found myself completely enraptured with this story and could not eat without reading and dozed out on the couch in between reading binges. I devoured the book in less than 24 hours, it was that good! Follow Jubal's many ups and downs through a world where few white men had trod. In my opinion this is Louis L'Amour's second best book he's ever written, which is saying alot because he is such a superb author. I recommend this as a read when you have a couple of free days or much free time because it will consume you with wanting to know what will happen to Jubal next!

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Goldsphere - Eye4YouAlliance Machinima from the islands of Teen Second Life Library

GOLDSPHERE: Plan flv resolution recovery profile than quicktime blip.tv Blip.tv moved warriors alliance Iceland-7. Teleports were closed and cross-communications were disabled. The healing had finally begun, but recovery would take much longer. In the kingdom of 9,000 years of alliance, had fought the Hero-ites and remained leaders of the Second World War. But with this latest attack was the Hero ITES has taken all that was the core of the Alliance ... Book-7 and what they call "WarriorReader. "Generations of wisdom now lay in the hands of the Hero-ITES. With the last gold light of day, was a small group of Alliance for the search is to search for answers ... Hero-ites ... 7 ... Book Search searching for the wisdom of the ancestors and all the fundamental values of Alliance, expression, literature and art. Dreyfus, Go brother Fleet and Nathaniel, Navigators of the Alliance here for the alliance. sure that gold. Majenna Harmony Destiny Unit, daughter of Lorelei, educatorin the writings of Arts & Culture Alliance. Zoaan, daughter of Linden and warrior elder and leader of Book-7 circle. Majenna HVX Voyager combines the sailors, a subsidiary of Silver Star NASA Space Station and the call of Harmony (HVX) great navigators: Nathaniel & Saryn Dreyfus, mother of Storm, Daniel Libby, Jon, Come on, CJ & Bebo First Knight of Alliance . Dreyfus, the brother of Fleet and Nathaniel, Navigators of the Alliance BeobaTrench, 1 World Warrior and Marine Recon Bath: BassWarrior ...

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Ninth Grade Slays (Turtleback School & Library Binding Edition) for $19.65

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Like the first book in the Vladimir Tod series, I loved this book. It's the second book. Vlad is a teenage half vampire, his mother was human, his father a vampire. His best friend is his drudge due to an accidental biting when Vlad was 8 years old. Like all unpopular teenagers, he's got a crush on the prettiest girl in school and is harassed by bullies on a daily basis.

In this book Vlad has made a new friend, Henry's cousin, Joss. There's also trouble in town, a vampire slayer has come. He's been hired to hunt down Vlad and kill him. But who's the slayer? You won't find out until close to the end, keeping the suspense up. Vlad will also travel with this uncle to Siberia to learn a few things about mind control and he discovers along the way he's the Pravus; a legendary vampire who up until now was only a myth.

Friendships will be tested and feelings will be hurt. Vlad will have to make choices with his new powers as to whether he's going to do good or follow the myth of the Pravus. I was very saddened to find out who the slayer is and felt for Vlad in this book. He just wants to be normal. What I don't understand though is why does Otis insist on paper letters? With the internet and cells phones, etc why use snail mail?

Like the first book, it's a page turner and the characters are great. This is a good read for teens and adults. Can't wait to read the next one.


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