Favorite Books

[Mary Ann Bell <mbell@main.com>]

The favorite book/author/illustrator thread has really been fun. It
occurred to me that all this should be somehow compiled. Maybe an
article. I have some leeway in an assignment for a grad course I am
taking and might give it a try. I would want to mention some themes that
seemed to emerge, or messages from these wonderful accounts. Things like
the value of reading books again and again. The value of allowing
students to read "below their level" at times for their pleasure. The
comfort a book can offer if you are sick or lonely. The difference a
librarian can make. The importance of parents reading to children.
(Today a boy came in the library and wanted a certain book because his
dad always used to read it to him...Trapped in Death Cave. He went on to
say that now his parents are divorced and there is nobody to read to him
any more.)  Another theme might be the pleasure of reading somewhat
romanticized accounts of events as opposed to the heavily fact centered
biographies and other nonfiction books more common on our shelves today.
Also the importance of illustrations and illustrators.
        I know none of this is new information but many of the messages are
very striking, and it might be a different slant on the ideas, coming
from librarians talking about their own reading habits rather than those
of their students/patrons. I certainly would not mention any names or
specific places. If I get up the steam for this, does anyone have any
themes/messages/ideas to suggest.
        Just wondering if there is something to this idea...Thanks, Mary Ann
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"Try curiosity!"  --Dorothy Parker
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Mary Ann Bell, Librarian
York Junior High School
Conroe ISD, TX
Adjunct Reference Librarian
Montgomery College TX
mbell@main.com
mbell@conroe.isd.tenet.edu
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