What I read this summer

Here are my favourites among the books I read this summer.  They would be good in any season, and all are available at Laidlaw Library.

Run, by Ann Patchett
A riveting family story set in Boston in the winter.  Except for a prologue and epilogue, it all takes place in one 24-hour period.

The Prairie Bridesmaid, by Daria Salamon
It feels like “chick lit” (first-person narrator with a group of women friends, self-deprecating humour, a focus on relationships).  But whereas a lot of chick lit seems to be about how a woman finds the man of her dreams, this book is about how a woman extricates herself from an emotionally abusive relationship with the man of her dreams.

Olive Kittredge, by Elizabeth Strout
Sad, memorable stories about different characters who all live in the same small town in Maine (I read it while I was in Maine). Olive Kitteridge is a difficult woman who appears in all the stories, sometimes as a central character, sometimes not. The 2009 Pulitzer Prize winner for fiction.

Anosh Irani

There was an interesting interview on “Q” yesterday with Anosh Irani, who lives in Vancouver and writes about Mumbai. He’s the author of the play Bombay Black and wrote a very personal article for the New York Times about last November’s terrorist attacks in Mumbai.

“My Baby Loves a Bunch of Authors”

Perhaps, like me, you were mesmerized last week by the video of Jian Ghomeshi’s painful interview with an incredibly rude and uncooperative Billy Bob Thornton on CBC radio– which certainly raised Ghomeshi in my estimation!

If so, you might find it refreshing to watch this much less painful video featuring Jian Ghomeshi back when he was with the band Moxy Fruvous, doing a delightful song called “My Baby Loves a Bunch of Authors,” which should make all book lovers smile.

Naomi Klein wins the first Warwick Prize

UC alumna Naomi Klein is the first winner of the Warwick Prize for Writing, for her book The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism. This new £50,000 prize will be given every two years, focusing on a different theme each time; this year’s theme was “complexity,” and the 2011 theme will be “colour”. The prize is given by the University of Warwick, which I visited, along with nearby Warwick Castle, a few years ago.

More novels about war

Today I posted a list of about 50 novels about war on the Laidlaw website.  Suggestions for additions are welcome.

The Next Chapter

Starting tomorrow there will be a new show about Canadian literature on CBC Radio One, hosted by Shelagh Rogers.  It’s called The Next Chapter and will air Saturdays at 3 p.m.

Slings & Arrows

I’m currently watching the third season of Slings & Arrows on DVD.  This wonderful Canadian TV series is about a fictitious theatre company that’s a lot like the Stratford Festival. A Brazilian director recently bought the rights to adapt the series for Brazilian TV. For lots of information about the series see Spotlight on Slings & Arows, which is part of the Canadian Adaptations of Shakespeare Project. If you haven’t seen the show, I highly recommend it! Media Commons at Robarts Library has the DVDs.

This Ain’t the Rosedale Library

The independent bookstore This Ain’t the Rosedale Library is leaving its longstanding location on Church Street and moving into Kensington Market at the end of May. It will be in a terrific location for those who like the smell of fresh ground coffee: next door to Ideal Coffee on Nassau Street. What a great addition to the neighbourhood!

A little bit about me

I’ve been the University College Librarian for about a month so far, and I’m really enjoying it. I’ve worked at U of T since 2001 (at the Dentistry Library), and before that I worked at the Canadian Women’s Movement Archives, the CBC Music Library, the Toronto Reference Library, and the Canadian Health Network. Last year, during a research leave, I created the Canadian Women Film Directors Database.