Grayson by Lynne Cox

Grayson is the story of a teenaged long distance swimmer who finds or is found by an infant gray whale who in turn is lost and separated from this mother. When Cox realized that a baby whale was following her, she continues swimming for hours in the desperate hope that the whales would be reunited.

I found the story, while ultimately redeeming, to be a slow read–which perhaps echoes the length of time that Cox spent in the water swimming back and forth trying to stay with Grayson and encourage him not to give up. Despite the slow pace, Cox does a great job of relating her swimming experience with Grayson, with pods of dolphins and with the mother whale.

Recommended for tweens and young adults as well as adult readers. THUMBS UP

Merle’s Door: Lessons from a Freethinking Dog by Ted Kerasote

Cute dog, yeah? Independent too. Merle lives in a co-equal relationship with his human. Merle is free to roam throughout his town and to decide if he wants to tag along with his human or not. If only life were like that in the rest of the world.

Here in my little rural town, loose dogs pack up and chase and fatally injure and/or kill deer and livestock–I met people who lost their whole small farmer chicken flock to a pair to loose dogs–, are killed by cars, and, if they are small, are favored puma snacks. We’ve watched our neighbor’s “sweet” loose dog snatch a cat off a telephone pole and break its back by smashing it against the pole over and over until we chased the dog off. The cat was picked up by an Animal Control officer and destroyed. There are a couple of loose chihuahuas on my walk route that bite kids and threaten to bite me every time I walk by.

So, as much as I loved reading about Merle, the perfect dog, I wonder what Nirvana he and his human really live in? After all, Merle had been shot (he was carrying a bullet), and one of his doggie buddies was killed by a rancher.

It’s well and good to have a philosophy about living next to animals, but I wonder if this philosophy is relevant in any other location than the little town where Kerasote lives. Oh well, it’s a good read, even if it’s irrelevant to my world.

ONE THUMB UP for enjoyment, ONE THUMB DOWN for practicality

Free for All: Oddballs, Geeks, and Gangstas in the Public Library by Don Borchert

Not as funny as predicted by the cover–I hardly think he is “hilarious”–nevertheless, he gives a great snapshot of the weirdness experienced working in a public library. ooh, imagine the scene when the librarian cracks and calls the middle school kids “sons of bitches” and “motherfuckers”–are librarians allowed to say that? Needless to say, the kids “backpedaled out of the library” and  “went outside more than a little stunned.” Not that I’ve ever been tempted to say such things to the m.s. kids at our library–nope, not me, not even once. Wow, I miss all the good stuff.

I loved the vignette about the drug dog demonstration when the dog, instead of finding his specially scented sock hidden by a kid-volunteer in the large print biography stacks, instead runs into automotive and rips the purse away from a shocked young woman and brings it back to his policeman handler. Little did she know that a police dog would snare her weed. I’ve got to say, the policeman handled the situation very nicely. He explained that he was in the middle of a demonstration and advised the young woman to go outside the library for a while–he could have arrested her–that would have made his demonstration really memorable for the kids–but he didn’t.  Nice.

Borchert also describes the summer reading program when they offered big prizes in a “who can read the most” competition. Who’da guessed that the little girl who claimed to read 15 new books every night would win???

If you’re a library regular or a library worker, you will enjoy the escapades in Borchert’s library. Sounds just like my library…. hmmmm

A People’s History of American Empire by Howard Zinng

Just read it–a people’s history in graphic nonfiction format.  Brilliant. If you ever had any questions about how this country really works–or how almost any country in the world has ever worked, reading Zinn will be enlightening. From the massacre at Little Big Horn to 9/11, Zinn covers many of our acts of aggression or subversion. Zinn shows the same scenario over and over played out in different areas of the world–Cuba, the Phillipines, Mexico, Iran and Vietnam.  Much too much information in a very accessible format.  Read it.

An excellent balance to high school textbook versions of American history AND it’s in graphic format.  TWO THUMBS UP