Library or Community Center? Save Our Libraries!

This morning I was shocked and dismayed to see on WNYC that Queens library has stopped buying books at least until July.  As a frequent user of the Queens library system, this definitely affects my reading future.  I also belong to the New York Public Library, but it's a fairly far walk from work and, well, Queens is my library. 

What I don't understand is definitive end of buying books for the next few months.  I can understand only one or two copies, but to not buy ANY?  That's crazy!  I don't mind waiting for inter-library loan, in fact, I think it's a great idea, but to know that I can't get any new books unless I buy them or schlep over to the NYPL makes me incredibly frustrated.

Queens Library CEO (who knew libraries had CEOs?  I suppose it makes sense but I never thought about it before) says that libraries aren't exactly centered around books anymore.  They're more about community, a place for kids and seniors to go.  Now, this is something I get in theory, but what about the books?  I'm all for promoting community with libraries, but if we're not also promoting literacy at what point does the library become a glorified community center or internet cafe?  In a time when people seem to be reading less and less, we need a place where we can focus on reading and books.

I was recently in my local Queens library and kids were running around and teens were hanging out in the YA section (which is awesome...though I don't think any of them were reading...) and a guy asked where the quiet room was.  The librarian replied that they didn't have such a thing (she actually didn't seem to understand the concept) and the guy had to leave, rather than stay and get his studying/reading/work done.  I couldn't believe there wasn't one place in this newly renovated library where you could go and just focus on a book.  Maybe I'm just getting old and don't understand the way community needs are changing, but I would think a library would be the one thing that would remain constant for a community.

What do you think?  Are your libraries going through similar struggles?  Do you see libraries becoming less about books and more a place for people to gather?  Any librarians out there that can shed some light on the other side of this?

If anyone's feeling generous the Queens library system is running a Buy-a-Book program where you can donate $25 to the purchase of a book for an institution that is very clearly in need of some help.

Edit: It looks like Queens isn't the only library in trouble.  Texas governor Rick Perry is proposing to cut library spending in his state to just $100,000, that's practically nothing for an entire state budget!  If your a Texan, heck, even if you're not, please let them know libraries are still important!

Book Club Discussion -- The Imperfectionists

Ah, that time has come...


I hope you all enjoyed Tom Rachman's The Imperfectionists as much as I did! I sympathized with every single one of these characters. It's a great book focusing on a (sometimes) slightly dismal, but definitely captivating, sense of everyday life.

I hope you'll join us in this discussion. Most questions are from LitLovers , while a few are from our own lovely Daniela. So, curl up with some tea and your favorite blanket (yay Fall!) & let's get started!

1. The book is a series of vignettes about 11 people in the newsroom of an unnamed paper. Yet The Imperfectionists is more than collection of short stories. How are the chapters connected? How does the book manage to cohere as a novel? Or does it? Perhaps you found it difficult to jump from one character to another—did you?


2. We find out at the end of the book why Cyrus Ott began the newspaper in 1953. Did you have suspicions all along...or were you caught by surprise?


3. Talk about how the headline for each chapter ties in with the fate of the character involved—particularly, say, the seemingly unrelated headline for Lloyd Burko: "Bush Slumps to New Low in the Polls."


4. Who was your favorite character and why?


5. When you catch glimpses of one of the characters in a chapter other than his/her own, does the character show the same traits...or do you see a different facet of the personality? What is the effect of having characters reappear?


6. There is a great deal of wry humor in this book. Which parts did you find especially funny?


7. Did you spend time piecing together the full story of the Ott family as told in the italic sections of the novel?


8. What do you make of the title of the book?


9. The fictional newspaper in this work serves as a metaphor for the press in general. Talk about the fate of newspapers— their future survival. What do you think will happen to them and why? What will be the impact of their possible demise? How important is a well-trained, professional press corp to democracy? Is the egalitarianism of news reporting on the Internet a good thing...or not?


10. What do you think was the overall message of all the combined storylines?

Discussion - Where Has All the Chick Lit Gone?

A conversation in the comments of Janelle’s review of Lucy Sullivan is Getting Married got me thinking: is chick lit dead?

Six or seven years ago we seemed to be drowning in chick lit.  From Kinsella to Bunshell, Cabot to Weiner, chick lit was a force to be reckoned with.  I remember reading anything Red Dress Ink, published (a company, which, by the looks of it hasn’t published anything since 2008) and dreamed about writing for them myself one day.  Chick lit was everywhere.

What happened?  Sure, there’s still some out there, but the good stuff (in my opinion) is harder to find, and the pickings are slim.

An article last year in Slate cites the recession as the cause of decline in chick lit, and while the recession hit all book sales, I find it hard to believe that the recession killed an entire genre.  Are we supposed to believe that women can’t write fun, smart novels without talking about shoes and shopping?  Look at the novels of Jane Green and Megan Crane; none of their characters were especially wealthy or clothes obsessed.  Yet, it’s been over two years since Crane published a novel. (I’m aware she’s publishing under a pseudonym for Harlequin, but romance and chick lit are two very different genres)

NPR posted a sort of response to the Slate article saying that chick lit isn’t dead that the "shoe lit" of Kinsella and Bunshell was never an accurate portrayal of the genre despite receiving most of the attention and sales, which is true. 

What I’m starting to realize, the more I think about the present state of chick lit is that the genre has grown up.  The writers whose tales of fun and conflicted twenty-somethings once drew me in, now write about fun and conflicted marrieds with children and dealing divorce or marital issues, something I, as a still twenty-something myself, can’t relate to (maybe it says more about my life choices that at this point in my life I’m still eating ramen and worrying about both paying rent and buying groceries this month, but I have a feeling I’m not the only one).

There doesn’t seem to be a new generation of chick lit writers coming in to fulfill what I want in my chick lit:  stories that don’t pander to me, but represent a reflection of where I am in my life (while also satisfying the romantic in me).  At least, without the main character being a witch, vampire, werewolf or other fantastical creature (I love those books, too, but they’re not what I remember as the “golden age” of chick lit).  Perhaps its because chick lit is no longer seen as viable market, so publishers are buying up more YA, the current publishing craze.

Now, I read a lot of different genres and I know that an entire genre isn't just going to "die," despite my initial hypothesizing, but there is a definite absence of fun, smart women's fiction these days.

Since I feel like I'm on the verge of rambling, I turn to you, my fellow chick lit lovers, am I wrong?  Am I simplifying (or complicating) things?  What do you think about the current state of chick lit?

And, most importantly, have you read some new, good chick lit lately?