Raising a Reader: A Mother's Tale of Desperation and Delight by Jennie Nash

To say I was a little excited by the prospect of Aaron learning to read would be the vastest of understatements. Just before he turned two, I read a book called How to Teach Your Baby to Read by Glenn Doman (no, really, I'm serious). Although I didn't fully subscribe to his method, I did teach Aaron to read a big stack of sight words (much to the delight and amazement of the person sitting in the pew behind us at church). When Aaron was three-and-a-half, I just couldn't stand it any longer and began "formal" reading lessons using the book Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons.

As a mother, I don't know that there's any other single thing that has brought me more joy and filled me with more excitement than watching all three of my children develop a love of reading. (First steps? First words? So overrated.) 

I picked up Raising a Reader simply because the title caught my eye. I usually don't go for subtitles, but this one--A Mother's Tale of Desperation and Delight--described my own emotions so perfectly that I felt compelled to see what was inside.

It is a memoir of sorts: a memoir of reading. Doesn't that just sound lovely? It is broken into sixteen short chapters, each one of them focusing on a different attribute (characteristic? quality? element?) of reading. For example, in the chapter entitled "Obsession," there is a somewhat humorous and (for me) all-too-relatable story about the first time Jennie's oldest daughter tore the page of a book (out of frustration and spite). In her own words, Jennie "yelped" and drastically brought two large boxes into her daughter's room and began packing away all of her books. This story was meant to illustrate what can happen when we become a little too obsessed with our passions (although I think it made such an impression on her daughter that she never mistreated books again).
Through these different topics (abundance, delight, arrogance, togetherness, etc.), Jennie explores what reading has done for her family.

This will not be a five-star book for everyone. In fact, it probably won't be a five-star book for most people. But it definitely is a five-star book for me, for the simple reason that this is my story. Yes, I'm aware that I have three sons instead of two daughters and that I'm not a professional writer and that I do not live in California. But those things are all beside the point.

The point is, I have tried before to describe why I love reading so much and why I am so completely obsessed with guiding (a much better word than "forcing") my children to love it, but I haven't been able to find the right words. Jennie Nash found them.

When she said that their trips to the library weren't just about "getting something good to read at bedtime, it was about feeling like we were getting away with something too good to be true [my emphasis]," I knew exactly what she was talking about. (I currently have 55 items checked out from my library. That's hundreds of dollars worth of literature! You tell me that's not too good to be true.)

When she said they would bring "home fifteen, seventeen, twenty books, and pile them at the end of the girls' beds where they could, almost literally, wallow in them [my emphasis]," I looked at the state of my own bed and saw our own wallowing pile (which Mike sighs about almost every night as he's stacking up book after book to make room for himself).

When she told the story about the little girl in her daughter's class who was absolutely brilliant, and she realized that "a talent like Alexandra's [the classmate] that had obviously sprung fully formed seemed so much more pure than a talent like Carlyn's [her daughter] that had been coddled, nurtured, and maybe even tricked into fruition [my emphasis]," I recognized my own silly pride in Aaron's success with reading.

It was these examples and more that made this book cross the bridge for me from something that was just an enjoyable read to something that spoke to my soul. Her words resonated with my own ambition, passion, and interest. It's always nice to know that someone else, even if you don't know that someone else, understands exactly the way that you feel. It's even better when she can put those feelings into perfect words.

I will say that if you're looking for a book to actually help you "raise a reader," this is probably not the book you want. Although Jennie does give little tips or ideas at the end of every chapter (things like word games you can play or how much of a chance you should give a book before giving up), it is less a step-by-step guide and more just a recounting of one family's journey with books. Inspiring for sure, but maybe not very hands-on-helpful.

Also, even though it was written in 2003 (which really does not seem that long ago to me), some of it already feels dated. For example, her suggestion to keep a "What to Read" file where you can write down the names of future books you want to read. Um, ever heard of Goodreads?

If you find yourself reading this blog and thinking you and I might be kindred spirits, then chances are you will love this book, too. I think I'm just going to buy my own copy (since it's going for cheap on Amazon), so I can revisit a chapter here and there whenever I feel like it...or whenever I need a little reassurance that there are other people in this world who are as obsessed with books as I am.

The Center of Everything by Linda Urban

The Center of Everything has been getting some early Newbery attention, and while that is not in any way a reliable indicator of what will actually win the Newbery, or even what will be a favorite later in the year (remember the slow (and very unfortunate) demise of Wonder?), I wanted to get started on my goal of reading several potential-Newbery titles this year, and this looked like an enjoyable one.

Whew, nothing like beginning a review with a paragraph-sentence!

Ruby Pepperdine has had a bit of a rough year. First Gigi (her beloved grandmother) dies without Ruby having time to listen to her final advice. Then Ruby can't decide what to make of the attention from a nice boy in her class named Nero. And then to top it all off, Lucy, her best friend from forever, gets mad and abandons their friendship. Luckily, Ruby's birthday coin went sailing through Captain Cornelius Bunning's donut (long story...) AND she won the Bunning Day Essay Contest, so she takes both as a sign that her life's problems will soon be fixed.

I read Linda Urban's first book, A Crooked Kind of Perfect, a couple of years ago and thought it was okay. And I thought The Center of Everything was okay, too. Both novels are a little bit quirky (sorry, a donut-obsessed town is quirky in my opinion) while exploring typical middle-grade issues (friend-breakups, early romances, defining oneself, etc.). I enjoyed it, was even interested to see how it would end, but it's already fading from my memory.

And unfortunately as time goes by, the little annoyances I felt while reading it are the impressions that really seem to be sticking with me.

For example, for the life of me, I could not get used to this story being told in present tense. Lest you make a hasty judgement about me, let me point out that I am definitely not one of those readers that is highly distracted and irritated with present tense. Usually, I have no problem settling into it, and by the third page I've completely forgotten what tense I'm reading in. But this one was different. And I think it was because it kept falling out of present tense, but only briefly, so that when it went back to it, it felt like a jolt or a slap in the face. And this happened over and over again.

Here's one example: "And this year, for the first time in twelve years, Ruby had something really important to wish for. Not that her hair would turn curly or that she'd get a new bike or that she'd be better at soccer, but something really, truly important [all in past tense]. Something she hasn't stopped thinking about since she saw Nero's color wheel last week. And now she has missed her chance [back in present tense]."

I'm not saying that Linda Urban is wrong to be floating between tenses like that. Of course I'm not saying that. I'm also not saying that she doesn't have valid reasons to use both tenses in the same paragraph. What I am saying is that for me, as a reader, the use of both tenses in one paragraph was distracting. It made me stop thinking about the story and start thinking about sentence structure and grammar. I wish I could have just stayed lost in Ruby's dilemma instead of bothering with something as insignificant and boring as had and has.

Aside from the tense issue, I really loved the fact that the story was told from the point of view of an omniscient narrator. This is perhaps my favorite way to get a story; I love the way little details can be shared from the lives of multiple characters and how the reader is able to see connections the actual characters cannot. Linda Urban actually wrote a fascinating blog post on this topic recently where she shared examples from this book.

I did like all of the science and math that was mixed in with the story: circles and torus and homeomorphisms--concepts I've never even heard of before. One of my favorite analogies was when Nero asks their teacher what happens if you have only 359 degrees in a circle instead of 360, and Mr. Cipielewski says, "You do not have a circle." And Nero asks what you have then, and Mr. Cipielewski says, "Nothing." Then the reader gets this comparison: "A week ago [Nero] had been just another boy in her class. Then a few days later they were friends. Or about to be friends. Like 359 degrees of friendship. But that was before Ruby said what she said. Was it possible that now they really were nothing?" I thought the set-up to this analogy was perfect and that the analogy itself was also perfect.

I really liked Ruby, and I really liked Nero, but I really, really, really did not like Ruby's best friend, Lucy. Even after their friendship was patched back together, I still didn't like her. She was so selfish and self-centered, but even so, I don't think I was supposed to dislike her, which made me dislike her even more. I love it when friendships are real and best friends aren't perfect (one of the reasons I loved the friendship in Sharon Creech's Walk Two Moons), but I thought Ruby could do better than a best friend like Lucy.

One thing that caught me a little off guard at the beginning was the fact that Lucy has two dads. It was not explained or elaborated. It just was. (Which I appreciated since it was not a theme of the book.) I'm not going to get into a political or moral discussion here, but I will say that as a parent, this is a small detail that I would want to be aware of so that I would be able to discuss and explain and talk about it with my children. (Incidentally, and fyi, Lucy having two dads had nothing to do with me not liking her character. It was her utter selfishness I had a problem with).

I found The Center of Everything to be an enjoyable read, but I have to admit that I hope whatever ends up winning the Newbery is more of a standout than this one.

Sunlit Pages Turns One: Giveaway Winner and Future Plans

It's been a fun week for me celebrating the existence of Sunlit Pages and sharing a little bit about why I started it and why I love it. Thanks so much for your thoughtful comments! It's so much fun knowing that there are some other people out there reading this blog.

So, first things first, I am happy to announce the randomly-selected-winner of my first-ever giveaway!

Drum roll, please...

The prize goes to...

Susanna Leonard Hill

Besides being a great blogger, Susanna is an amazing picture book author. We've loved the books we've read by her (Punxsutawney Phyllis being one of them), and we currently have Can't Sleep Without Sheep in our stack from the library.

(And no, Susanna did not ask me to give her books a shout-out, but as long as she's the winner, I thought I might as well point them out to you!)

Next item of business: I know a few of you are dying to know what the book is in the header. I've had that picture at the top of my blog for a whole year, and no one has ever asked what it was, so I thought it was so funny that once I mentioned it, not knowing was driving a few of you CRAZY. So I won't keep you in suspense any longer. 

The book is...

To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee

Thanks so much to those of you who made a guess!

And finally, I wanted to mention just a few of the things I hope to do with Sunlit Pages over the next year:

• Join Twitter. I put this one first because I can actually already check it off! My brother helped me set up an account last night, but I still know next to nothing (no, really, I know nothing). I'm definitely not ready yet to tweet or follow or whatever it is you do. I've considered joining Twitter for several months and finally decided that the only way to know if I would like it or not would be to try it. So, we'll see...
• Facebook and Google+. In a similar vein, I'm also planning on creating a separate Facebook page for Sunlit Pages and becoming more active with Google+. I already have a personal Facebook account, but I'm getting a little tired of posting book reviews there when I know that 95% of my friends have no interest in this blog. And as far as Google+, some of my favorite blogs (What Do We Do All Day, for example) are big Google+ fans. So again, as with Twitter, I figure I might as well give it a try and see if it's something that enhances or diminishes my connections with people.
• New look. I'm getting a little tired of To Kill a Mockingbird up there at the top. I also want to update my "About Me" page. And also, give the social media buttons on the side a more uniform look. These changes are all entirely dependent on Mike finishing his dissertation and having time to help me since I am totally illiterate when it comes to technology. So this change could still be several months out.
• Learn to use Photoshop (or something similar). I might follow a tutorial, or I might just wait for Mike again (it would be a fun month of date nights, right?).
• Continue reading, writing, and exploring the world of literature!

Thanks for enduring a week of blog talk. Next week, I'm excited to return to book reviews and whatever else I'm in the mood for!

Sunlit Pages Turns One: Blogging Philosophy

You'd be surprised with how much thought I've given to why I'm writing this blog. At the end of the day when there are baskets of clean laundry overflowing all over my bedroom, I sometimes ask myself, Why did I spend two hours writing that review and consequently neglect this invasion  of socks and shirts and pants? Sometimes people will say to me, "I don't know how you have so much time to blog!" But it's not an overabundance of time that's making this blog possible. It's that I've decided to cut out other things that aren't as important to me so that I'll have time for it. It's the same for everyone.

Also, as I read other blogs with countless followers, I sometimes feel a little twinge of jealousy, but then I ask myself, Is that why you started this blog? Obviously not! Aside from sharing a few of my posts on other sites, I do very little to promote this blog, and that has actually been a somewhat conscious decision.

I don't know that the why of this blog matters to anyone else, but it matters to me, and this seems like the appropriate place to share it.

• I started this blog because I love books. On Tuesday, I explained more about the reasons for starting this blog.
• I think best when I'm writing. I've noticed this again and again, which is one of the reasons why I am so militant about writing in my journal every day. If I read a book and don't follow it with writing, the whole book is as good as gone to me in about three months. Sad, but true. But if I write about it? Then I've captured something that I can return to again and again. And that's really important to me.
• I want to connect with other readers in real ways. Last summer when I was reading Quiet by Susan Cain, this statement really resonated with me: "Here's a rule of thumb for networking events: one new honest-to-goodness relationship is worth ten fistfuls of business cards." That perfectly encapsulates the way that I feel! Over the past year, my blog has grown only a little bit. But I think it's safe to say that all of you who read this blog do it because you want to, not because I've begged you to follow me or bribed you to subscribe. Over the last year, I've made new friends and rekindled old friendships. I am definitely trying to reach out because I know it's unrealistic to think that people will find this blog just because it exists, but I try to connect on a personal, individual level.
• I write about what I want to write about. Even though this is called Sunlit Pages and was started primarily because I love books, I'm going to write about whatever strikes my fancy. That's why occasionally you will see some posts that have absolutely nothing to do with reading. I am not going to maintain five blogs (one for adult lit, one for children's lit, one for picture books, one for the occasional craft, one for spiritual insights, etc.). This blog is a reflection of who I am. And while it's fairly obvious that the greater percentage of my interests fall in reading and mothering my kids, I do have other things I love as well.
• It's impossible for me to separate reading from my life. One of the reasons I love reading so much is because of the way the things that I read impact and intersect with my own life. I gain new ideas; many of my old notions are challenged; forgotten memories resurface. When I read other people's reviews, I want to know the back story: why did they decide to read that book? why did they like (or dislike) it so much? why did they relate to that particular character? And that is why you now know about dancing at my family reunion, my parents' parenting philosophy, and my addiction to my space heater.
• I try to give very honest reviews. With picture books, I usually only review books that I want to buy (I've made one exception to this, and I've regretted it ever since), and with other books, I openly share what I liked and didn't like.

A few months ago, I read Palace of Stone by Shannon Hale. It was a wonderful sequel to Princess Academy, and I highly recommend it. But even if I hadn't liked anything else about it, I would have loved this paragraph because it spoke to my soul:

Lately she did not quite know what she thought until she wrote it down. Letter writing was a lot like quarry-speaking--a soundless call from far away. Would Marda have similar enough memories to understand what Miri was trying to say? How could she communicate the whole world to a quiet sister on top of a mountain? She would try. She needed a pen and paper and a way to see her thoughts.

Ultimately, I think that that is the real reason why I blog and why I've decided that even though it takes a lot of time, it is most definitely worth it.

Sunlit Pages Turns One: A Few Memorable Posts

I've rambled a little too much over the last few days, so I'll try to keep today's post more succinct. I thought it would be fun (for me at least) to revisit of few of my more memorable posts over the past year.

Nostalgic: My Hometown Library (Even though I love the sheer volume of books to be had from my current library, I will always have very fond memories of my "teeny-tiny library," as Aaron calls it.)

Star-struck: In Which I Meet One of My Very Favorite Authors (Shannon Hale is as awesome as her books.)

Rant: A Pet Peeve of Mine, or Why Parents Are a Big Fat Bunch of Hypocrites (This post felt good to write. I still agree with everything I said here, and I've been trying to personally apply my own advice.)

Habit: Running and Reading (This was one of the first posts I wrote. I still like to run with a good audiobook.)

Personal: What I Envy (I've already tweaked some of my dreams (maybe I'll do another post in the future), but this was still really fun (and enlightening) to think about.)

Holiday: Read Your Way to Christmas (We will definitely be making this activity an annual tradition. I've already acquired a few books to replace the ones I wasn't terribly crazy about last year.)

Book Review: Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier (I couldn't choose a favorite review, but this was my favorite book from last year.)

Preschool: Snowmen At Work (This was one of my favorite preschool lessons that I put together this last school year. I actually have gotten really behind with the preschool posts and have at least six that I still need/want to write up.)

KidPages: Cold Snap by Eileen Spinelli (This is one of the few reviews I've written on a whim with very little forethought. We read it in the morning, we loved it, and I wrote about it that very afternoon.)

Popular: Christ the Savior is Born: Advent Calendar (Sometimes I laugh when I see how many views this post has had (which I'm glad of, by the way). I'm sure anyone who comes to my blog for that post probably leaves disappointed when they realize that everything else here is about books. The runners-up for most views, but still lagging far behind this post, are The Boy Can Read and Bartholomew and the Oobleck.)

Not counting the reviews I put up before my first official post, I have written 167 posts over the last year. I can't wait to write another 167 (give or take) during Year Two.

Do you have a favorite post? Do tell!

P.S. If you haven't already, you can still enter the giveaway going on this week by leaving a comment on this post.

Sunlit Pages Turns One: The Story Behind the Name

Okay, it's not much of a story. It's not like I was relaxing on a beach in Hawaii, totally engrossed in a novel, when the sunlight suddenly glinted off the page and I thought, That's it! Sunlit Pages!

No, I'm actually embarrassed to admit what a long process the name selection was. If you know me well, you know that I do not make decisions quickly. I was not just going to slap on some bland title like Amy Reads Books and call it good. (Incidentally, amyreadsbooks was not even available on Blogger, even if I had wanted it.)

I wanted something that I would be happy to see every day when I got onto my blog. I wanted something that sounded nice, was memorable, and reflected the love I had for books.

The very first title I thought of was Kindred Books. (You know, like "kindred spirits" from Anne of Green Gables?) Books often felt like friends to me, so I thought this title would be perfect. But after just a couple of days, the name grated on me. It sounded too much like Kinder Books (as in kindergarten), and that was not what I was going for. So I scrapped that name.

Over the next couple of weeks, I came up with hundreds of possible names (Mike contributed his fair share, too.) I took words like "book" and "reading" and looked up every possible synonym. I thought of reading as a journey, as a blissful activity, or as a comforting blanket. I looked up common idioms and tried to change one word so it would sound more bookish. (Unfortunately You Are What You Read or Beating Around the Book just sounded contrived and stupid instead of clever and brilliant.)

When that didn't work, I read through hundreds of quotes about reading, hoping that one of them would contain a phrase that would ring true to me and be short enough to use as a name. I found lots of quotes that I liked ("A book is a gift you can open again and again" by Garrison Keillor or "A good book is the precious lifeblood of a master spirit" by John Milton), but it seemed silly to base an entire blog off of a quote I had just barely read.

So then I turned to the books themselves. Were there any really memorable lines from my favorite books that I could use for a title? I soon realized that this approach could literally take me months since it's hard to search for something as elusive as a good blog name among thousands of other words and sentences. (This is when I needed to suddenly remember a favorite line or randomly come across a catchy phrase, but that longed for "Aha!" moment avoided me.)

All this time, I was collecting names that I thought I might be able to use. These possibilities, together with idioms and quotes, made up an eight-page document (not kidding). I eventually narrowed it down and emailed the list of names to a few bookish family and friends for their opinions. This was the list (yes, this was the short list!):

Storied Steps
Words Meet
Sun-Dappled Reads
Book Content (using both definitions)
Mostly Sunny with Scattered Reads (one of the only idiom titles that survived)
Pages for all Ages
The Sunlit Hearth
Contentedly Bookish
Embraceable Books
Pages in the Sun
Books at Home

I think it's obvious from this list that I was leaning towards titles that were happy, cheerful, soothing, comfortable, and friendly. My idea of a perfect summer's day is lying on a blanket under a tree with a good book. (This is why I'm still kind of in love with Sun-Dappled Reads. I think the word "dapple" is so cute and fun, and the dappled light that filters through the leaves of a tree was the exact image I was going for. I nixed it though because I just didn't love the way it looked on the page.)

I wanted my blog to feel like that...something that would invoke those blissful feelings that were both familiar but also somewhat fleeting.

Writing this, I'm realizing that it's hard to put into words exactly why I named this blog Sunlit Pages. After weeks, I think part of me was just ready to settle on something and be done with it. Some days, I love it. Some days, I hate it. Sometimes I cringe when I hear it spoken out loud because it sounds so corny. But mostly, I'm just glad I finally found something that reflected at least one aspect of the way I feel about books.

P.S. So you see that book in my header? The one that is appropriately "sunlit"? Ever since I started this blog, I thought it would be fun to have people guess what book that is. So let's do it now. Leave a comment with your guess. (Hint: it IS a book with a review on this blog.)

Sunlit Pages Turns One: Before the Beginning

I have always loved to read. Always. I don't remember learning to read, but I do remember the first chapter book I read all by myself. It was Karen's Witch by Ann Martin, the first book in the spin-off series of The Baby-sitters Club. I distinctly remember carrying it with me when my family went out to eat at Olive Garden and curling up with it in the booth while I waited for everyone to finish eating. I was a very loyal reader of Karen's for a couple of years and probably got up to #2452 before I finally got sick of her two families.

After a childhood filled with books (and dozens of resulting memories, which I will be only too happy to share at a later date), I left for college and embarked on the Dark Years, that period of my life where The Goose Girl, Jane Eyre, and a few others were the only bright spots in an otherwise book-less existence. (Thankfully, there were many other non-book-related bright spots during those years which made up for the lack of reading. They were only dark as far as books were concerned.)

After graduating, I read regularly, but I wouldn't say avidly. It wasn't until Aaron was about seven months old that I started picking up books again in earnest. It was prompted by the intellectual rut I found myself slipping into. I thoroughly enjoyed being a mother, but I definitely needed something to occupy and stretch my brain, and books were my answer. It was at this same time that a friend recommended audiobooks as a way to make mundane tasks less mundane. Up until that time, I had been adamantly opposed to audiobooks (That's not really reading, I had sneered), but I quickly changed my mind when I realized how wonderful it was to fill up time washing the dishes with a good story.

That year (2009), I read 56 books (yes, I'm a nerd, so I keep track of these things). Had I ever read 56 books in one year before? I didn't know. But I had found my rhythm, and I couldn't stop.

After that, I found books creeping into all parts of my life: I happily took Aaron to baby story time at the library; I read to Aaron often throughout the day; I started making lists of books I wanted to read and books I had already read; I couldn't have a conversation with anyone without saying at some point, "So...have you read anything good lately?" I started wanting to share some of the great things I was reading with others.

I started not just rating books on Goodreads but writing about them, too. We had a private family blog where I would occasionally share favorite picture books (I called those posts "A and A's Favorite Books" because there was only Aaron and me back then). I also started reading a lot of book blogs for more recommendations.

The more I read, the more I wanted to have my own voice. I wanted to be able to comment on some of the blogs I was reading, but I wanted my name to be more than just a name. I was bursting with picture book recommendations, but honestly, I didn't think a single person who read our family blog cared one wit about our latest favorites. My reviews on Goodreads were getting obnoxiously long (hard to believe, I know), and I felt pressed to record them somewhere else. I wanted to weigh in on the Newbery, Caldecott, and other awards and book news. I wanted to share my obsession with the library. I just wanted to talk about books with other people who loved books as much as I did.

My frustration and irritation with not having an organized place to write everything down was driving me crazy. Every time I wanted to write about a book, I would think, See? You need a blog. A book blog. And then I would instantly come back with, I am not going to be one of those people with a million different blogs highlighting a million different interests and passions. I am not starting something so narrow as a book blog. But then I would find an awesome new picture book, and I would go through the same cycle of thoughts all over again.

Finally one day, I tentatively mentioned it to Mike: "I've been thinking about starting a book blog." I thought he would laugh at me or, more likely, just not give it serious attention. But he didn't do either of those things. I think by that point, he was well aware of how far my love of books and reading had gone, and he probably thought it would be an excellent outlet.

He started helping me think of a title (more on that tomorrow) and design a layout. And within a few weeks, I had a blog. It wasn't perfect, it wasn't impressive, but it was all mine.

Sometimes I feel self-conscious when people I actually know ask me about my book blog. A book blog! It seems so...so...insipidly nerdy. Some of them seem curious (what an unusual interest!); some of them seem baffled (you actually read and then write about all those books?); some of them seem genuinely interested (I love you!).

Regardless of what people think, I have just decided to own this part of myself. I love books. I love writing about them. I love talking about them. I love reading them. I love looking at them and holding them and feeling them. I love sharing them.

That is why I started this blog.

P.S. Don't forget about the giveaway going on this week! You can go here to leave a comment and be included in the drawing. Thanks so much to those of you who have already entered! I think one of my biggest fears was that only two people would comment, and that would have been such a lame giveaway.