Books Finished Since March 1

 Lost States, Michael J. Trinklein
I first saw this book while wandering around Borders (::sob!::), but it was too expensive for me (even during the liquidation). So you can see why I pounced on it when it turned up on a remainder table.

Everyone knows about the fifty states—but how about the states that "almost were," or ones that died "a'borning"? Thomas Jefferson, for instance, envisioned a group of states in the northern Midwest called Sylvania, Michigania, Metropotamia, and Saratoga (among others). Utah began as territory three times as large, called "Deseret" (honeybee). Northern Californians/southern Oregonians have considered a new state called Sonoma. Did you know Cuba and Greenland were considered to become states?

These "almost" states range from the founding of the United States all the way through the 1950s. Trinklein's narrative is a little bit more tongue-in-cheek than I would have liked, but his explanations are sound and each "state" is illustrated with either an actual map of the era or handsome reproductions. If you're a geography fan like me, you'll enjoy it.

 Those Angry Days: Roosevelt, Lindbergh and America's Fight Over World War II, Lynne Olson
My father fought in World War II, and my mother saw her brothers and nephews become soldiers. I grew up on my mother's stories and would beg her to "tell about what happened the day of Pearl Harbor" over and over again. World War II was as real to me as my childhood days in the 1960s. My parents, like most kids in the 1920s, were awed by Charles Lindbergh's historic flight, but during World War II they never forgave him (nor other Americans like Henry Ford) for "siding with" the Germans and the isolationist faction. When I saw this book I knew I had to read it to get more information on the isolationist movement.

Olson's absorbing book examines the tense years of 1939 through 1941, when Great Britain was hanging on by their fingertips from the Nazi onslaught and desperate for any type of help, be it equipment or munitions (but hopefully manpower), from the United States. Americans had been badly bruised by "the war to end all wars." Having marched home triumphantly after making "the world safe for democracy," they were disillusioned by the war dead and injured, the continued squabbling for territory in Europe, and the nonpayment of the Allies' massive war debt, especially after the Depression began. The isolationists had no better spokesman than the heroic Lindbergh, already an intensely private man whose subsequent fame after his 1927 flight and the following horrific kidnapping and death of his son made him even more insular. Meanwhile, Franklin Roosevelt and many of his compatriots believed that if Great Britain fell, the United States was next on Hitler's plate.

In the midst of the emotional battles between those wanting to stay away from Europe's dance of death and those who wished to fight the expanding sphere of Nazism, Olson gives us fascinating glimpses into the past: the British agency who operated covertly from Rockefeller Center to convince Americans that Great Britain was worth supporting; the Americans like Lindbergh and Ford who saw something different in German expansion; sensitive Anne Morrow, who married and loved Charles Lindbergh, but was increasingly alienated by him; the use of Hollywood films to show the effects of rising Nazism; the eugenics movement that underpinned "the final solution," the appalling weakness of the American army right up to the day of Pearl Harbor. This is a sizable book, but one with a sweeping, appealing narrative that presents all sides of the arguments (and, in the end, notes a startling footnote to the life of Charles Lindbergh). An enjoyable read for those interested in history.

 Europe on 5 Wrong Turns a Day, Doug Mack
Doug is at a book festival waiting for  his mother when he comes upon a tattered copy of Arthur Frommer's classic Europe on $5 a Day, one of the first books that convinced ordinary Americans that "the Grand Tour" of old wasn't just a fancy of the rich. Instead of seeing the book as the joke he intended, Doug's mom is thrilled: in 1967 she traveled to Europe with a friend using the same book as a guide and had a wonderful time. So Doug Mack thought it would be interesting to take the vintage Frommer book to Europe and follow his mother's trip, to see what the landmarks and restaurants Frommer pointed out look like today.

This is a fun travel book, if a little melancholy, as Mack discovers that most of the beautiful free sights noted by Frommer are today covered with strip malls and house developments, much like the United States, and that the roles once played by natives of each country have been taken over by new immigrants. He visits the fleshpits of Amsterdam, explores the relics of a formerly divided Berlin, takes in the Oktoberfest spirit of Munich, encounters swamped sidewalks in Venice, and wall-to-wall tourists in Rome, not to mention making the obligatory visit to Mannekin-Pis (the fountain in Brussels with the little boy pee'ing—and, oh yeah, there's a little girl counterpart, too!). It's also the history of the Arthur Frommer books, from their genesis as a soldier's guide to returning to a peacetime Europe after World War II to the present.

I enjoyed reading this travelogue, although Mack's search for a romance and his dissatisfaction with not finding things as they were got a bit tiresome after a while. However, it was still worth reading for me, especially the glimpses of his mother's own trip in the 1960s.

 Told Under the Stars and Stripes, Association for Childhood Education International
These "Under the Umbrella" children's short story collections were published by the Association for Childhood Education, and this particular volume printed in 1945; I picked it up at the spring library book sale. I was reading it at the mechanic's, waiting for a tire change. The stories are all about immigrant children, or children moving from one region of the country from another, and the challenges they face. What is absolutely astounding about all of them is that although this was written in 1945, there are no prejudices shown in these stories as were still in other children's books of the time. Yes, immigrant parents speak in broken English, but it's not patronizing, and, most impressive, is that the two stories about African-American children do not include, from children and adults alike, the stereotypical "Amos and Andy" type malaprop language that was common in kids' books in those days involving "Negros." No one says "what dat?" or talks about "ghosties" or makes watermelon jokes as were still in the Bobbsey Twin books in the 1940s. Even the story that takes place in Harlem contains no shuffling Stepin Fetchits. Impressed. Really, really impressed.

 Seeds of Hope: The Gold Rush Diary of Susanna Fairchild, Kristiana Gregory
The Fairchild family sets out by ship to Oregon, but halfway there disaster strikes: Mrs. Fairchild is swept overboard during a storm, leaving a grieving Doctor Fairchild and the two teenage daughters, Clara and Susannah, alone. It is also enroute that news of the gold strike in California comes, and Susannah is baffled and horrified when her father quits the Oregon plan to become a gold miner.

Soon the Fairchilds find out the truth about the work needed to find gold. They encounter treachery and theft and betrayal, but make fast new new friends and conquer the hostile environment around them. A similar element of romance as in The Great Railroad Race creeps into this story, and it's pretty obvious when it happens. A workmanlike book that imparts all the requisite historical information.

 Trixie Belden and the Mystery at Mead's Mountain, Kathryn Kenny
When a friend of Mr. Wheeler buys a ski lodge, the Bob-Whites are thrilled to get an invitation to check out the slopes in Vermont. There's a rumor that there is a ghost at the lodge on Mead's Mountain, which piques the interest (naturally) of Trixie and Honey. They soon find that the lodge is beautiful and that the caretakers, Pat and Katie O'Brien, are model hosts. But things start to go wrong: they receive threatening notes from the "ghost," items are stolen out of the Bob-Whites rooms, and Trixie becomes suspicious of the new ski instructor.

Thankfully, there's no one pointing guns or knives at Bobby Belden in this outing. It's pretty much straight mystery, with many red herrings and still a bit of danger in the end. Would that they were all like this!

 The Lexicon, Steve Vander Ark
One of the most popular web outgrowths of the Harry Potter books was the extensive, exhaustive "Harry Potter Lexicon," an encyclopedia of the Potterverse. Drawings, photos, cross-reference, even conjecture found its way on the site. JK Rowling enthusiastically supported it.

However when a publisher came a'calling, Rowling objected to a book being published, as she was considering her own Harry Potter encyclopedia. So The Lexicon published is a much abridged item. It's still a fun read, but, sadly, not as complete as the original. I'd save it for a bargain purchase.

 The Great Railroad Race: The Diary of Libby West, Kristiana Gregory
This is the third "Dear America" book by Kristiana Gregory that I've read and I have come to the conclusion that I don't like her stories very much. She's not a dreadful writer or anything like that, but her books don't seem to have the luster others do.

Libby West's newspaperman father is determined to go west to cover the completion of the transcontinental railroad, and, since her mother will not let him go alone, the entire family, parents, Libby, and her precocious younger brother Joe travel to Utah. On the way they encounter both good people and bad (including a frightening outing to a "hell town" by Libby and a friend), are curious about the Mormons, and puzzle over why Mr. West is so patient with his grubby, smelly assistant Pete, an old friend from his Army days.

Gregory does a nice job describing the activity around the construction of the railroad and the conflicts and dangers of the day, but I just don't find her prose all that inspiring. YMMV.

 Serving Victoria, Kate Hubbard
Say "lady in waiting" or "queen's equerry," and what would  you imagine? I'm sure more than a few folks would envision a glamorous position doing a few light chores while enjoying the pleasures of a magnificent palace, dressing up in lovely clothing, and meeting with all sorts of interesting political and national figures.

Being one of the royal attendants to Queen Victoria, alas, was nothing like that. Her ladies-in-waiting endured freezing environments indoors (Victoria didn't allow her homes to be any warmer than 60 degrees) and out (long open carriage rides, even in winter), close supervision of their personal lives down to the books they could read, separation from their children, and dull evenings making small talk over meals or embroidery. Her male secretaries and assistants rarely saw their wives, were driven to ulcers, and had to endure the impertinence of more favored servants (like the Highlanders from Balmoral, who were pretty much constantly drunk). Everyone was expected to wear some sort of mourning clothes for many years following the death of Prince Albert, and as the queen grew older and lost more members of her family and household, there were memorial services almost every month at which black must be worn. Yet most of Victoria's entourage were devoted to her.

Hubbard weaves an absorbing narrative of the women and men who kept Victoria happy and the monarchy running smoothly, using material taken from personal diaries and letters. Considering the queen's whims and the strain under which the servants were required to perform, I'm surprised more of them didn't go to an early grave, as many of them suffered nervous breakdowns, and, at the very least, loneliness with regards to their family and lack of sleep. There were many details of the Queen's life that I had not read in other volumes (the Princess Royal's tantrums, for example, or about her Highland and Indian servants being favored over the rest—previously I thought only John Brown alone received such exalted status) and Hubbard writes in a brisk style that imparts many details without being dull. If you are curious about "backstairs at the palace," you should enjoy this volume.

 A Time for Courage: The Suffragette Diary of Kathleen Bowen, Kathryn Lasky
Girls today may not be able to grasp the idea of how few rights women had in the so-called "modern world" not so long ago. Those who react indignantly to the mistreatment of women by certain religious groups today would be shocked to realize that, before 1920, women in the United States not only could not vote, but in many states were unable to own property, and that in a divorce a husband almost always received custody of the children and it was the woman who was "ruined" by the act, even if the husband was abusive. Indeed, police often did not respond to domestic violence calls because the opinion was "she had it coming."

It is this world Kathleen Bowen is growing up in. Her mother, sister, and aunt are staunch suffragettes, used to being called "unnatural" by both men and women alike, peacefully marching with protest signs (no, that wasn't just in the 1960s) and being attacked and arrested. Her aunt's husband is against women's suffrage and her aunt and cousin lead a miserable life under his thumb. Meanwhile, World War I is raging in Europe and some women are longing to help in the war effort in more ways than knitting and rolling bandages.

Lasky lends a nice flavor to this 1917-set novel, although I didn't like it as much as Christmas After All. Her chapters about the force-feeding of women prisoners are pretty chilling. I did notice one basic historical error: she talks about children trick-or-treating. This custom did not start until the 1930s and was not really popular until after World War II. Before that, children and adults had Hallowe'en parties where they played games and told fortunes.

 His Majesty's Hope, Susan Elia MacNeal
MacNeal gets to a little more "meat" in this third installment of the story of Margaret "Maggie" Hope, a British-born but American-raised young woman with a talent for mathematics who is back in wartime Britain and will be going on her first undercover mission for the Allies. She is given two relatively "easy" tasks (if she can avoid being caught by the Nazis, of course) and has then been instructed to come home. But as always with Maggie, things are never easy. She discovers there is more important information she can glean by staying in Germany, even if it costs her her life—not to mention a face-to-face meeting with someone she had always been told was dead.

Those readers charmed but occasionally frustrated by Maggie's "Nancy Drew for adults" adventures will find this volume a bit more disturbing, as MacNeal addresses Hitler's original "final solution" of "humanely euthanizing the sick, the mentally ill (including homosexuals) and "deficient," and other undesirables through the eyes of a young German nurse who discovers the truth while caring for a little girl with Downs Syndrome. (Hitler's jeer that the Americans' concern about this policy makes them hypocrites due to the US theories of eugenics and treatment of people of color will truly make you wince.) If you are sensitive to this type of story, I would beware reading this book. Otherwise, Maggie's career continues apace as she discovers more family secrets and becomes toughened to the realities of war (especially to the results that her actions have to those connected with her). In addition, her homosexual friend is "outed," which bringing pain to him and his lover, and Maggie's own lover Hugh becomes embroiled in sensitive issues at Bletchley Park. MacNeal's modern references are getting fewer, but boy, do they toss you out of the story. When Maggie admires a friend's "baby bump" ("baby bump"? in 1940s Britain? seriously?), my jaw dropped. But I still raced through the pages to get to this installment's conclusion. Take that as you will.

The Spring Library Book Sale

This morning I got there late enough not to have to stand in line, but early enough. Didn't spend much time in the alphabetized fiction, but I never do as the volumes are heavily bestsellers. Heck, "P" should just be labeled "James Patterson" and "Jodi Picault." I'm always looking for Barbara Paul's Marian Larch mysteries (they have a character based on Paul Darrow's Avon character from Blake's 7), since I never saw them in bookstores. Miracles still do not occur. You also find fewer and fewer really old children's books anymore. And I did not luck out and find the companion book for my hardback of The Good Master (The Singing Tree).

I did hit the usuals: Literature, History, Biography, the Nature and Animals section, Science, Travel, even took a peek in Sociology, and then braved the Stroller Crowd at the children's books. But first I found the Christmas books on a cart right in front. They did have more of the "World Book" Christmas In... books, and, since I had wisely taken inventory of the ones I already had, I only picked up four: Spain, Brazil, Holy Land, and Russia. I also found something called The Christmas Almanack, which is a cheap paper but fat book with customs, countries, and stories and song references.

The rest of the tally:

• Letter from New York by Helene Hanff, based on broadcasts she did for the BBC
• Through the Children's Gate by Adam Gopnik
• A Year in the Maine Woods (which I thought I might already have and I did; ah, well, it was only $1.50)
• Usage and Abusage, an English usage manual by Eric Partridge
• Blue Latitudes by Tony Horowitz (following Captain Cook's voyage; I loved his A Voyage Long and Strange)
• Three "Dear America" books (the Gold Rush, transcontinental railroad, and the diary of a Jewish immigrant)
• A Dictionary of First Names
• Told Under the Stars and Stripes, tales of international children now living in the United States
• Sherlock Holmes of Baker Street by William S. Baring-Gould, which is supposed to be a classic

And a brand-new book I can't mention because it's intended as a gift.

James got home early and had happened to read my Facebook post about having passed up two books of literary criticism of Robert Heinlein. (Also passed up a book of short stories by Alexander Wolcott, one of the Algonquin Round Table writers.) He said he would have been interested in them. I said, "Well, we could always go back."

And so we did. The place was nearly empty, and the earlier crowds had scarfed up a ton of books; books that were in boxes on the floor this morning were on the tables now. (Yes, I do notice what's on the floor.) The Heinlein books were still there, though, and he found some other cool stuff, too, including a 1945 book of classic science fiction short stories.

The second tally (yeah, second, even with the books picked over):

• Christmas in Poland
• An Oxford Book of Christmas Stories (lovely illos here)
• Street Gang [the story of Sesame Street]
• An Italian Education by Tim Parks, sequel to his Italian Neighbors, which I already have
• A Year in Provence, because it's mentioned in every travel narrative I read
• The Mystery of the Black Diamonds by Phyllis A. Whitney, one of her teen mysteries
• Holiday Symbols, from all countries and religions (heck, and events; they even have the Stupid Bowl and the Indy 500)
• And finally 1950's The Little Princesses, a memoir by Marion Crawford, the beloved governess "Crawfie" of Lilibet and Margaret, otherwise known as Queen Elizabeth II and Princess Margaret

I was reading Told Under the Stars and Stripes at the mechanic's, waiting for my tire change. These children's short story collections were published by the Association for Childhood Education, and this particular volume printed in 1945. What is absolutely astounding about all of them is that although this was written in 1945, there are no prejudices shown in these stories as were still in other children's books of the time. Yes, immigrant parents speak in broken English, but it's not patronizing, and, most impressive, is that the two stories about African-American children do not include, from children and adults alike, the stereotypical "Amos and Andy" type malaprop language that was common in kids' books in those days involving "Negros." No one says "what dat?" or talks about "ghostes" or makes watermelon jokes as were still in the Bobbsey Twin books in the 1940s. Even the story that takes place in Harlem contains no shuffling Stepin Fetchits. Impressed. Really, really impressed.

Oh, Look: Upcoming!

Little Women: An Annotated Edition

I have the annotated Anne of Green Gables and love it! This one is already on order.

[April 16: This came today! It's lovely!]

Books Finished Since February 1

 Call the Midwife, Jennifer Worth
In 1950, young, middle-class Jennifer Lee graduated as a midwife and was assigned to what she thought was a hospital in the East End of London, then a slum area crowded with hundreds of tenement buildings filled with the poor families of dockworkers. The "hospital" turned out to be a convent of Anglican nuns who practiced midwifery. For Jenny, the squalid surroundings were a shock, but in her practice she learned that, like anywhere else, good and bad existed no matter what the economic state.

This is the original memoir from which the hit British television series was taken (along with its sequel, Shadow of the Workhouse) and provides a wonderful window into a different time. The appalling conditions of the East End are not glossed over, and several sequences, like the story of Mrs. Jenkins and Mary's tale, will probably make you cry. The nuns and Jenny's fellow midwives, especially tall, clumsy "Chummy," the poor little rich girl determined to help others, and Sister Monica Joan, elderly and suffering from bouts of dementia, are unique and memorable figures.

Worth's writing is crisp and brisk, whether writing about a particularly difficult birth or about the humorous exploits of the convent's man-of-all-work, and this is a terrific memoir of a lost time. Please be warned, though, that the elements surrounding the workhouse patients (especially in the sequel) are often very painful. If situations like that bother you, you might want to give this a miss, or at least be prepared to skip certain chapters.

 The Blythes are Quoted, L. M. Montgomery
This is a very unusual book, the actual final book in the Anne of Green Gables series. It was delivered to Montgomery's publisher just before her death and, at that time, was not published in its complete form because it was submitted during World War II and the publisher felt people might not like its anti-war sentiments.

As originally written, Montgomery intersperses short stories in which Anne and Gilbert Blythe are mentioned (or in which their children are mentioned or play very small roles), among poetry of her own that she attributes to Anne or her son Walter, who died in World War I, and bits of dialog between Anne, Gilbert, their housekeeper Susan Baker, and, later in the book, their older children. In this way you find out the fates of the Blythe children (pretty much paired up as you might have expected after the ending of Rilla of Ingleside) and learn that now their children are set to participate in yet another world war. Eventually the poetry and dialog was removed, a story excised, and the book published as The Road to Yesterday. This Penguin version is the first time the original book has been seen by the public.

The stories are a mixed bag, and of subjects that Anne fans only might think inappropriate (divorce, revenge, deserted children, etc.). Several of them, like "Penelope Struts Her Theories" and "Brother Beware," are quite humorous, but most are darker, especially the opening story, "Some Fools and a Saint," and also "Retribution." The continual mentioning of the Blythes in several of the stories seems forced. The poetry ranges from lyrical nature to musings over death and the nature of loss.

I enjoyed this book, but I can't say it's always easy to read. Once lively Anne remains grief-stricken at her son's death and for those of us who grew up with her, it's difficult to see her so sad.

And, okay, I have to say it; I feel the same way about this as I do about the rest of the later books: Susan Baker drives me crazy. I wish she would shut up and let Anne and Gilbert have more "airtime." YMMV.

 Farmer Boy Goes West, Heather Williams
Having tackled all manner of Laura Ingalls sequels, this newest "Little House" title is a sequel to Wilder's Farmer Boy, following the later adventures of Almanzo Wilder. Now thirteen, Almanzo is facing boarding school until his father decides to accept an invitation from his Uncle George, now living in Spring Valley, Minnesota, with his wife, to visit their farm and perhaps buy land. Almanzo chooses to accompany his parents, sister Alice, and baby brother Perley to Minnesota, only to find Uncle George ill, his aunt Martha unfriendly, and the farm not doing as well as George has always stated. But there's also a new friend, new challenges, a new horse (of course!), and even a rather attractive young classmate!

Given that the "Little House" books are really novels based on biography, Williams does a good job of portraying Almanzo's later adolescence. Father Wilder seems a bit milder than he was in the original book, but otherwise the narrative seems to capture the characters and the time pretty well (except for a rather strained "kiss with history" that author Williams tells us really happened in an informative afterword). I enjoyed this...YMMV.

 The Letters of Dorothy L. Sayers Volume 1, chosen and edited by Barbara Reynolds
Let's say that you may have to be interested in the life of Ms. Sayers to enjoy this book. Reynolds has collected her correspondence from her first girlish letters from school all the way through the publication of the final Lord Peter Wimsey books, chronicling her years at Oxford, her struggle to find a career, and her relationships with friends and with the man who formed the basis for the character of Philip Boyes in Strong Poison. It was due to her breakup with John Cournos that Sayers had a rebound romance with a motor mechanic and conceived a son, John Anthony, whom she entrusted to the care of a close cousin for his upbringing. For years her son thought Sayers' cousin was his mother and Sayers his cousin until the truth was finally revealed to him.

No insights are really given into her books via the correspondence, which is a pity (although there are a couple of times where you say "Oh, that's where that came from!"), but it's a vibrant portrait of Sayers, who went boldly to university in a era when women were still viewed by many as "unnatural" for doing so (see Gaudy Night) and made her own way in the world (well, with some monetary gifts from her parents), not conforming to stereotypes. I'm a Sayers fan, so I found the collection enjoyable. If you've never read a Sayers' mystery or one of her religious translations, the letters will probably not hold your interest.

 Elemental Magic, edited by Mercedes Lackey
I've rarely been this disappointed by a Lackey short story selection.

Instead of the usual collection of Valdemar-set short stories, these revolve around Lackey's Elemental Masters universe, which postulates practitioners of magic aided by Air, Water, Fire or Earth disciplines. While Lackey's universe covers the late Victorian through World War I era, the stories cover Elemental Masters through all phases of history, and perhaps that was a bit of the problem for me, as I like the Victorian/Edwardian settings. But the first two stories, which take place in Ancient Greece, I thought were rather dull. Another two of the tales were just vignettes rather than full-fledged stories, with characters introduced and interacting, but nothing really resolved, as if waiting for a second volume and a sequel. Another is a rather dull version of "Rapuzel."

Saying that, there were some very enjoyable stories, including the Hawaiian-themed "Makana" and "Queen of the Mountain"; "Air of Mystery," which involves a parfumiere, and even a companion story to The Wizard of London. Unfortunately the blah stories overwhelmed the better ones, and the book even has a a recycled cover with illustrations pinched from previous novels. Shrug.

 Bless the Bride, Rhys Bowen
Well, that's more like it!

I found Molly Murphy's last outing, helping escape artist Harry Houdini and his wife Bess, a bit of a slog, but this next entry in the Murphy mysteries had me from beginning to end. It's almost time for Molly and Daniel's wedding, but the bride, staying at the Sullivan family home, is chafing under the criticism of her future mother-in-law and longing for a little more action than gossip and sewing. While visiting her friends in the city, she decides to take one more case, what looks like a relatively simple effort of finding a Chinese man's missing jade pendant. But, as she soon learns, what is really missing is the man's illegal bride.

But after finding out what kind of a man her employer is, if she finds the bride, does she want to tell her client? Worse, how will she keep Daniel from finding out that she has broken her promise to take no more detective cases when the police become involved in a crime in Chinatown?

This great combination of New York City history and mystery also includes lots of scenes involving Molly's flamboyant friends Sid and Gus, which are always fun. Note: If you read historical mysteries, you may notice that part of this story touches on the same territory as the Sarah Brandt mystery Murder in Chinatown, about Chinese men marrying Irish women since Chinese women were forbidden entry into the United States. However, the plots do not overlap. A treat.

 Lost in the City, Kathleen O'Dell
In this newest Julie mystery, the 1970s San Francisco girl is helping her best friend by caring for a pet parrot while the family is away. When the bird vanishes, Julie has a flock of suspects, including a cranky elderly man and a former classmate.

I'm really not the right person to review the Julie mysteries; I was a teen myself during the 70s and all the hippie stuff being "history" gives me the giggles, and, frankly, is as much of a bore as it was back then. A minor mystery involving Julie's aunt becoming a vegetarian is also a snooze, and anyone owned by a bird will be able to figure out the identity of the bird thief.

I noticed they only gave Marie-Grace a mystery this time and not Cécile, to give Caroline a book. I wish they'd left out Julie instead.

 Traitor in the Shipyard, Kathleen Ernst
The first Caroline mystery involves a dramatic situation going on at the Abbott shipyard: sabotage of a the construction of a new warship. Caroline is afraid that a friend of her father, a man who was held prisoner by the British at the same time as Mr. Abbott, now working at the shipyard, is the culprit. With help from her friend Rhonda, Caroline tries to ferret out the spy.

There are several good red herrings in this story, even if I suspected the person doing the spying after a while. As in one of the Felicity mysteries, the author tries not to make value judgments about people's loyalties, which certainly represents the population of the United States at the time of the War of 1812 better than a strictly jingoistic POV. The end is quite exciting; all in all a dandy mystery.

 Trixie Belden and the Mystery of the Castaway Children, Kathryn Kenney
On a hot August night as a thunderstorm threatens, young Bobby Belden hears an odd noise in the yard and notices that the family dog is uneasy. The Beldens soon discover why: there's a baby hidden in the doghouse, and to Trixie and Honey's great dismay, it looks as if the child may have been abused. The teens soon discover the identity of the child, but it only deepens the mystery: where is the baby's older brother? Has he truly been kidnapped, as a ransom note suggests?

There's a good mystery in this one, with some baffling situations and clues, but everyone mooning over the baby gets a bit tiresome. I was also a little upset to discover that Bobby had once again been placed in rather menacing circumstances. You would think by now the Belden adults would have put their foot down about the girls solving mysteries if this sort of thing was going to keep happening.

 The Haunting of Maddy Clare. Simone St. James
Call it a ghost story with romantic interruptions.

In post-World War I England, Sarah Piper's employment opportunities are few and she is living hand-to-mouth on temporary jobs. One day her agency sends her to see Andrew Gellis, who needs her to substitute for his partner for a few days. Her task: attempt to communicate with a ghost! A terrified housemaid, once rescued from abuse, committed suicide in a barn and her spirit has haunted the structure ever since, growing more destructive and malevolent by the day. Andrew is desperate to capture some concrete sign of spirit activity to prove that his theories about ghosts are true. And so begins Sarah's ordeal as she helps Gellis and his partner Matthew Ryder not only prove the existence of the ghost, but to try to discover why the young woman hung herself. They soon discover that several townspeople know more than they are telling, including a former innamorata of Andrew's.

I'm not much for scary stories, so I was relieved that this had just the right amount of "creep" to it without being too gory. The 1920s atmosphere is very light; with only a few words one might change the time period and not change the story much, although the repercussions of the Great War do play a role in the story. The story does not presume that 1920s people were innocent of sexuality or profanity, so do be warned that both exist in the story. A few bits of non-period vocabulary did toss me out of the story occasionally, but I thought it built to a satisfactory climax with characters I liked, if one of the male characters was a bit Mills and Boon/Silhouette.

 Fire Works in the Hamptons, Celia Jerome
Ah, I think I get the drift finally: Willow is going to end up with a different hot guy in every book (although this time there's little action, just a lot of wanting).

In this outing, the strange man Willow hopes may be a date prospect (if he's not one of her cousin Susan's "strays") must take a back seat when the local fireworks turn out to contain odd "lightning bugs" that set things on fire, and Willow sees beautiful shapes within the fireworks that no one else sees. When a baby swallows one of the bugs, she begins breathing fire, and the townspeople assume this is again Willow's doing; that she has created some type of character for her comic book that has come alive. To help Willow cope with the "fire"flies and the fire-breathing baby, the Department of Unexplained Events sends Piet, a man whose presence keeps fires from starting. As the blazes increase and Willow's precognitive dad sends her garbled danger signals, our heroine must sort out what's going on, and her growing attraction to Piet.

Another fun entry in the Willow Tate, Visualizer, series, although I was annoyed and confused why the town got so furious at Willow when the fireflies appeared. It's not like she created them; they were only attracted to her because she was working on a fire creature for her comic book. And it's not like she did it deliberately! So much for support from her neighbors in Paumanok Harbor, who all have odd little talents. Piet is charming, especially with baby Elladaire, Dad Tate's strange messages are as funny as usual, and her tart grandmother just gets better. If you're looking for a fantasy series with a big of humor and a bit of romance, Willow Tate's adventures may be for you.

 Show Dog, Josh Dean
If you wait for Westminster each year with bated breath, this one is for you. Dean follows a year in the life of Jack, an Australian Shepherd who, although bought as a pet, becomes involved in the show circuit. Owner Kimberly Smith falls in love with a photo of Jack on his breeder's website, but the breeder knows Jack has show-ring potential, so she offers to sell Jack to Kimberly and offer financial assistance for handler fees and show fees if and only if Kimberly will allow Jack to be shown at bench shows. Kimberly agrees and so begins Jack's odyssey on the dog show circuit.

Dean's prose is light and understandable but instructive as he leads us behind the scenes at dog shows, threading in the history of breed shows as Jack progresses from puppy classes up the ladder quickly—too quickly, his breeder is afraid—to championship status, with a coveted appearance at the Westminster Kennel Club Dog show included. He lets us know what the judges are looking for when they physically examine the dog, how handlers juggle multiple dogs in the ring, the routine of the show circuit, about the friction between the American Kennel Club and the Australian Shepherd breeders due to a schism in the latter group, and all manner of other gossipy dog-show insider moments.

While Kimberly's wavering ambivalent attitude to Jack's career occasionally annoyed me (she knew the job was dangerous when she took it!), the rest of the book is a delight. Definitely for dog lovers!

 The Haunted Opera, Sarah Masters Buckey
Marie-Grace Gardner is excited to learn that a famous opera, The Crown Diamonds (reputed to be bad luck!), will be performed in New Orleans, and that her Aunt Océane will play an important role. Better yet, she finds out she and her good friend Cécile Ray will be able to help backstage. But the moment the English opera company arrives to start rehearsals, things start to go wrong. Costumes are sabotaged, and then Aunt Océane is accused of deliberately losing a critical prop. Is it one of the company? A friend of the girls' in the costume department? Or someone else?

I was right when I said they should have skipped the Julie mystery and given us someone else, like another Cécile story. This was a great behind-the-scenes look at an opera production, a popular entertainment in the 1854 setting of the story, and there were some good red herrings that pointed in the direction of several suspects (although one suspect was so obvious you were pretty sure it wasn't that person). In addition, another aspect of history is touched upon in the story that lends additional interest to a supporting character. If you can only afford two of the three new mysteries in this set, get Caroline and Marie-Grace.

Long Forgotten

Even if you're a book lover, there are books you are glad there are no need for any longer.

For instance, a very popular booklet was printed from the 1930s through the early 1960s that is, thankfully, only a curiosity now. It was published for African-American families who liked to go traveling, but who faced the continual problem of hotels, restaurants, and other businesses for "whites only."

Equally as sad is the fact that the publisher based this booklet on a similar publication that was available for Jewish travelers.

The Negro Motorist Green Book, 1949 edition, is available here in full text in PDF format.

Chasing the Elusive Verney

Every once in a while I still go looking for John Verney. Strange how a writer I loved so well and who was so popular just disappeared.

His obituary.

His photograph from the National Portrait Gallery.

A Telegraph article about Friday's Tunnel. (Ah, I'm not the only one who thinks his illos look like Edward Ardizzone's.)

A Christmas Card drawn by Verney.

A piece of art by Verney, "Toyland."

Books Finished Since January 1

 Eighty Days, Matthew Goodman
If this doesn't end up on my "Dozen Favorite Books Read in 2013" list at the end of the year, it will mean I have had some excellent reading in 2013!

Almost everyone has heard of Nellie Bly (Elizabeth Cochrane), the spunky, intrepid New York World reporter, who, after writing several startling exposé pieces, including one about the asylum for "insane" women on Blackwell's Island, is sent on a whirlwind trip to best the fictional Phileas Fogg of Jules Verne's Around the World in 80 Days. Bly didn't have time to post many reports, but the World promoted the story as today's "reality shows" are publicized, and even held a contest, promising a world tour to whomever came the closest to guessing the official time of her journey.

Not as well known was the around-the-world journey taken at the same time by Elizabeth Bisland, a quiet Southerner displaced after the Civil War. Bisland, who left just hours after Bly departed, but heading west instead of east, was sponsored by "Cosmopolitan" (yes, that one, a very different magazine in the 19th century).

I was captivated from the first paragraph to the last, in chapters that chronicle Bly's and Bisland's adventures by turns, using the women's diaries, their books published after the voyage, and other news stories, or stories about the same destinations, people, and institutions written by people who had visited them. I especially enjoyed the details about the cities they visited, the society they lived in, the publications and people they worked for, and all the myriad little facts that made 19th century society come alive. I could see the quiet streets of Japan so loved by Bisland, hear the uproar of the marketplaces as visited by both women, envision the meeting between Bly and Jules Verne (and got a good laugh out of Verne's real opinion of Bly, the one that didn't make publication!). I could almost walk into the 19th century world described, especially then-exotic ports of call in India, Japan, and China, not to mention pre-earthquake San Francisco and the blizzard-shrouded Western frontier. Bly and Bisland are vividly portrayed with all their strengths and weaknesses, and the epilogue briefly addresses what happened after their voyages. I would recommend this book to anyone who loves history!    

 Speaking from Among the Bones, Alan Bradley
It's the 500th anniversary of the death of St. Tancred, the patron saint of the church at Bishop's Lacey, and in honor of the occasion, archaeologists are opening the crypt where the saint is interred. Headed to the church organ loft to gather a specimen of bat's blood (don't ask!), budding young chemist Flavia DeLuce of course must check out the proceedings. To the vicar's horror, Flavia is there when the stone is shifted and a body is exposed.

Except that it is not the bones of St. Tancred that appear, but the fresher body of Mr. Collicutt, the church organist who so abruptly disappeared. Not only that, but he's wearing a gas mask. In short order Flavia's discovered a secret tunnel leading from a open grave, yet the book has barely gotten started!

This is a great entry in the Flavia series, mixing old favorite characters with new, including a charming young man named Adam who helps Flavia with her sleuthing. In addition, there's some family surprises—Flavia actually getting along with her sisters? can it be true?—including a whopper at the end that will leave you open-mouthed.

 Charles Dickens and the Great Theatre of the World, Simon Callow
A biography of Dickens with a different slant. Actor Callow, who has not only played Dickensian roles over the years, but who has played the writer himself in a stage show as well as in an episode of Doctor Who, looks at Dickens from the POV of his great joy in performing, whether it be doing parlour magic tricks for his children or readings in great halls for the hundreds of people who flocked to see him perform or even acting out scenes from his books in the privacy of his home before committing them to paper. Dickens' exuberance for the acting profession, an early ambition, shines clearly in Callow's peppy text.

This is not an exhaustive biography of Charles Dickens by any means, but is not meant to be. For those with only a casual knowledge of the writer, or who remember him only as "that boring guy from required reading," this is a good introduction to a man who was as wildly popular in his day as a big-name actor or sports figure is today. (Dickens' behavior to his wife can certainly be parallelled to today's celebrities; eventually the poor woman is banished to a different house while her husband cavorts with young actress Ellen Ternan.) Callow's style is breezy and enjoyable.

 Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm, Book 3, Eric Wiggin
I became friends with Rebecca Rowena Randall at an early age, admiring her grit, her creativity, and her blossoming from feckless young girl to poised young woman, rejoicing in her successes and commiserating in her defeats. I was delighted later to find another book of her adventures that added more childhood events and even stories about her friends.

Eric Wiggin isn't related to Kate Douglas Wiggin, although some of his biographies have stated so. He took two classics, Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm and New Chronicles of Rebecca, simplified all of Kate Wiggin's lovely poetic Edwardian language, and blended them into one narrative spanning two books, then produced this novel, a sequel to both, layering on a thick smear of overt Christianity to what was already a Christian-themed book. Not only does this heavy-handed moralizing reduce poor Rebecca to boring adulthood, but he basically goes through and gives anyone from the country (like Rebecca's mother) cheap rural accents. Kate Wiggin says John Randall went to medical school; in this John stays around to do farm chores. Where Eric Wiggin might have brought to life Rebecca's siblings Mark, Fanny, and Jenny, they are reduced to the background, while we listen to Adam Ladd repeat what improvements the railroad will make to Sunnybrook and the surrounding countryside ad infinitum. (Just how many times can you comment at the difference a standard-gauge railway instead of a narrow-gauge one will make?) (I also noticed Mr. Wiggin lowers "Mr. Aladdin's" age so hopefully people will forget Rebecca's being courted by a man twenty years older than she is.) Oh, and Harriet Beecher Stowe makes an appearance, despite the fact that Rebecca was written in 1904 and in this book everyone is getting a telephone, and Stowe died in 1896.

Another major change I noticed was the way Rebecca's father was portrayed. As a child she always loved him because he sang songs, played the violin, and danced, and her mother did all the boring things like housework and sewing and was never any "fun." She realizes only after she is older that it was her mother who kept them all from starving, sacrificing her looks and her strength so that her husband's clothes were always sharp-looking. Aurelia would do chores so Lorenzo's hands might not be hurt and he could still play instruments. And then he has the nerve to criticize her appearance! Mr. Wiggin turns the feckless Lorenzo into a father who makes wooden toys for his children and works hard, completely contrary to Mrs. Wiggins' original text!

Add to the fact that Mr. Wiggin kills off a regular character and then spends his time indiscriminately matching up adult characters in holy wedlock...well, the book ends up being a disservice to Kate Wiggin, but most of all to the wonderful spirit of Rebecca Randall. Phooey.

 Leaving Everything Most Loved, Jacqueline Winspear
This tenth novel involving Maisie Dobbs, psychologist and private investigator, finds her at a cusp in her life. She's in love with James Compton and wishes to marry him, yet she feels that she has not yet achieved all she wants for her own life. She feels the urge to travel and learn something of other societies before committing herself to the responsibility of marriage. So she goes into her newest case conflicted and discovers her own situation mirrored in the murder victim, a young Indian woman who has been boarding with former missionaries, hoarding enough money to go home and start a school for girls. For reasons known only to the murderer, this seemingly lovely and inoffensive woman was shot.

Maisie's personal dilemma provides counterpoint to the story of the murder victim, who Maisie discovers, was not a traditionalist, something which may have angered her fellow Indian compatriots. Winspear also uses the story to portray the prejudiced way these members of the Empire were treated (even their officers who helped fight in the Great War and who received medals are not considered on the same level as their British counterparts). Then, too, changes are overtaking Maisie's co-workers,  Billy Beale and Sandra Tapley, and even her father.

Winspear could have left Maisie a static character who forever solved World War I-related cases (and I'm certain those stories would have been interesting), but instead she stays true to Maisie's continual thirst for knowledge and enlightenment. This reads almost like a final book, with everything tucked away, but enough hope is given in the concluding chapter that the old days of Maisie's investigations are not yet finished. I, for one, hope not!

 Heidi's Alp, Christina Hardyment
One of the most delightful books about children's books ever. Hardyment and her four daughters, first accompanied by a friend and her baby, and then by her husband, set off from their home in England in an aging camper van nicknamed "Bertha" to discover the Europe of children's books: from Denmark and the sites of Hans Christian Andersen (and Lego bricks), through Switzerland (where they discover their very own Alm Uncle in "Heidi country"), Germany, Italy, and France. It's part travelogue, part family story, and always referencing children's books, starting with the world of Hans Brinker and the Silver Skates as the family crosses the English Channel into the Netherlands. Along the way they try to discover the real history behind the legend of the little Dutch boy with his finger in the dike, the disappearance of the children of Hamelin (was it really due to the Children's Crusade as so often theorized?), and the truth behind William Tell.

As far as I'm concerned this was a dream of a trip and a wonderful tale told in appealing, descriptive narrative. I envy the Hardyment girls their adventure and wish I'd been along for the ride.

[I didn't realize until after I'd finished the book that I'd read another of Hardyment's books many years ago, Dream Babies, about how babies were portrayed in child-rearing manuals through the years. Another cool book.]

 Trixie Belden and the Mystery Off Old Telegraph Road, Kathryn Kenney
This next Trixie Belden mystery has a slight plot that only begins halfway through the book: the kids have decided to arrange a bikeathon to raise money for the Sleepyside Junior/Senior High School art department, and once the reader gets two vital clues (an item Trixie finds and an occupation revealed), the crime du jour should be pretty obvious. Instead, the amazing highlight of this story is that Trixie and Honey have a fight! and that Mart is the one who counsels Trixie about it! Wonders will never cease. Not to mention a re-use of an old plotline appears: this time it's Honey's cousin Ben who's been sent to Sleepyside to keep him out of gangs. Favorite learning moment: silk-screening is completely explained, and we get a lecture about how expensive art supplies are. My question: a brand new character, a classmate, is referred to occasionally by his whole name, but more often by his first name. Why is Honey's cousin Ben, whom we've met in a previous book, always referred to as "Ben Riker"? Almost every single time. Can't they remember who he is?

 Ghost Story, Jim Butcher
(spoilers ahoy!)
When we last left Harry Dresden, he was dead and plunging into cold water.

Since this series of books is about Harry, you might surmise Changes was the final novel in the saga of Harry Dresden, Chicago's only practicing wizard. But readers of the series who know Harry also know it's hard to keep a good wizard down. And sure enough, Harry is enlisted, in ghostly form, to find his own murderer. Trouble is, he's not corporeal any longer, so how does he do what used to be simple things, like really simple things, as in communicate with people so he can get the information he needs?

In the six-month interval since his death, Chicago has come under attack by otherworldly beings (yeah, I know; this is a Dresden book: so what else is new?) released by Harry's actions in the previous novel, Harry's friends are holding them at bay, and his apprentice has been so emotionally scarred by her role in helping rescue Harry's daughter that she has become unstable. But the greatest change is with Harry himself, who must face the consequences of his actions in the previous book and also learn to resolve the conflict without his powerful magic, trusting old friends and new allies to help him.

Again, another nonstop narrative, with some old friends turning up, including Harry's former detective agency partner Nick Christian (from Butcher's very first Dresden story). I basically sat down and inhaled the book in a couple of sittings.

 The Case of the Murdered Muckraker, Carola Dunn
The Daisy Dalrymple books are so good-natured  that I didn't think I'd ever dislike one of them, but I really didn't enjoy this Daisy adventure. Really, I read these books for their English setting, and the last thing I want to read is Daisy in the States. But here, in her tenth escapade, she is.

Even in the United States, Daisy can't seem to escape murder cases. While she stays at a hotel in New York City while her new husband Alec Fletcher works in Washington, DC, a muckraking journalist is killed. To find out "whodunnit" Daisy must navigate witnesses and lawmen with absurd American accents (apparently no one speaks correct English in the US in the Daisy universe except for woman journalists and their spinster sisters). Later in the book Daisy has an extended "kiss with history," as Quantum Leap once referred to it, with African-American aviatrix Bessie Coleman in a drawn-out chase scene that turns into a real snoozer.

Daisy and Alec deserved better. Certainly Coleman did!

 Oz Reimagined, edited by John Joseph Adams and Douglas Cohen
A caveat about this one: don't just recall the Technicolor confection of The Wizard of Oz and the simple childishness of the books. These are stories written for adults and several of them touch on adult themes. In general these are not short stories for children.

Disposing with that warning, I can't say I am an Oz fanatic. I've read the classic novel and at least one of the sequels, watched the MGM film and Disney's darker sequel, seen an Oz cartoon or two, peeked into Oz via Heinlein, but never have been tempted to dip into the rest of the novels or  the Macguire books. But I quite enjoyed this collection, which ranged from stories in the Oz tradition ("The Great Zeppelin Heist of Oz" and, what was my favorite story, "The Cobbler of Oz" about a gentle Winged Monkey child and the cobbler who hopes to make her dreams come true) to a hardboiled version as portrayed in "Emeralds to Emeralds, Dust to Dust." There is also Oz as a video game simulation, or as a tilted world as seen by psychiatric inmates, or as a setup for a reality series; as a training ground for early-20th century suffragettes and even a story of a Chinese Dorothy whose adventures parallel an actual historical event, and another in which the inspiration for Baum's first novel come from the adventures of his eldest son and his slightly eccentric classmate. Not all the tales revolve around Dorothy, either, as evidenced by a bitter story about the lives and fate of "little people" who keep the Emerald City so gleamingly clean.

If you are open-minded enough to approach Oz in tales that are skewed differently from Baum's imaginings, you will find much to enjoy in this collection.

 A Nation Rising, Kenneth C. Davis
I picked this up after reading Davis' Hidden History and enjoying it. Again, he addresses historical facts that are little-taught today in schools. You might call this volume "white Anglo-Saxon Americans hate everyone"; unfortunately this statement is well-supported by Davis' historical chapters about Andrew Jackson's war against the native American tribes, even the "five civilized tribes" who had settled down into farming like their white neighbors; the Protestant populations who at the least bad-mouthed and who, in more extreme cases, burned out Catholic neighborhoods; and above all the prejudice held against both slaves and free persons of color (and against the native tribes that supported them), with terrible revenge taken against slave rebellions. Even the chapter about Jessie Frémont reveals abuses against the natives of California by the Spanish soldiers and religious figures.

This is an easy read for folks who are interested in the history of the United States between the Revolutionary War and the Civil War, an era, except for "high points" like the War of 1812, the Mexican War, and the Gold Rush, that history teachers seem to gloss over. It should be used as a springboard to read more about each era and issue.

(One also may wish Davis would keep modern politics out of his historical discussions. Equating "tea baggers" with bigots who attack Catholics seems a bit much.)

Bryant and May Christmas Short Story

Can be read here.

Better reading if you're familiar with the series. :-)

My Dozen Favorite Books of 2012

Wow. All nonfiction this year. What does that mean?

• Letter Perfect, David Sacks (the story of the alphabet; Hamilton Books)
• Maphead, Ken Jennings (the world of geography fans; gift from James)
• Superman: The High-Flying History of America's Most Enduring Hero, Larry Tye (self-explanatory; Amazon Vine choice)
• Chicks Dig Time Lords, edited by Lynne M. Thomas and Tara O'Shea (essays about Doctor Who by women; Amazon purchase—and won a Hugo award!)
• The Helene Hanff Omnibus: Underfoot in Show Business, 84 Charing Cross Road, The Duchess of Bloomsbury Street, Apple of My Eye, Q's Legacy, Helene Hanff (Hanff's "greatest hits"; Amazon Marketplace purchase)
• The Poisoner's Handbook, Deborah Blum (story of the development of forensic science in New York City; Borders ::sob:: remainder tables)
• Star Trek FAQ, Mark Clark (surprisingly, found something new to say about Star Trek!; Books-a-Million)
• The Story of Charlotte's Web, Michael Sims (a gentle bedtime book about the genesis and writing of the children's classic; Barnes & Noble)
• The Great Silence, Juliet Nicolson (post WWI England societal changes; Amazon purchase)
• Red, White, and Blue Letter Days, Matthew Dennis (book about the changing face of American holidays; Colonial Williamsburg gift shop)
• Quirky QWERTY: The Story of the Keyboard @ Your Fingertips, Torbjörn Lundmark (history of the typewriter keyboard; McKay's Used Books)
• A Kosher Christmas: Tis the Season to Be Jewish, Joshua Eli Plaut (how Jews cope with the tumult of Christmas; Barnes & Noble)

Honorable mentions:

• Santa Claus: Last of the Wild Men, Phyllis Siefker (could our Santa Claus character come from older source than a Turkish bishop?; Borders ::sob:: liquidation sale)
• A Pocketful of History, Jim Noles (examining the stories behind the images on the State Quarter dollar coins; Hamilton Books)
• Names on the Land, George R. Stewart (the story of place names in the United States; Barnes & Noble)

Books Finished Since November 1

 Red, White, and Blue Letter Days, Matthew Dennis
I saw this book on a discount table at the wonderful bookstore at the Colonial Williamsburg welcome center and initially passed it by. I'm glad we went back to the bookstore because I was able to pick it up and really enjoyed it.

This is nonfiction about strictly American holidays, beginning, of course, with Independence Day and Thanksgiving, but also Columbus Day, the "Saint Mondays" (Monday holidays), and Labor and Memorial Days. While each chapter contains a history, the book is more an examination of how the perception of each holiday has changed over the years, and, indeed, how different ethnic groups have viewed the holidays, as for a long period, African-Americans had little reason to celebrate Independence Day, and neither did the Native Americans. I was quite amused, in fact, to read of the subversive use the "Indians" made of Independence Day, hiding the celebration of their own traditions under the guise of "Fourth of July." Good for them! Anti-Thanksgiving protests are also discussed, as are the shift from days which memorialize sober events, such as Memorial Day and Veterans Day, to days for recreation and special sales in department stores, and the conversion of Washington's Birthday in combination with Lincoln's Birthday into a generic "Presidents Day" which exists now mainly for a day off work and a "white sale."

This is a fascinating holidays book which also contains vintage posters, photographs, and newspaper illustrations. Unique!

 Williamsburg: Before and After,
This is a neat hardback mostly picture book of the restoration work done on the different homes in Colonial Williamsburg since the creation of the area in the 1930s. You get a quick overview of the history of the city and its gradual slip into obscurity and a summary of the efforts to turn it into a living history museum by day, but the majority of the book are before-and-after stories about each of the restored homes, who lived in them, and what was removed to restore them to their colonial appearance (in some cases, after more research was done, the homes were restored again). If you are a Colonial Williamsburg fan, this one is a winner, although you may want to find a store or site where you can purchase with a coupon, as it's pretty pricy.

 Williamsburg in Vintage Postcards
An Arcadia Publishing ("Images of America") of the historic homes in Williamsburg, most of them before the purchase of the area that became Colonial Williamsburg. Well, I was interested!

 The Mystery of the Phantom Grasshopper, Kathryn Kenny
Compared to the previous book, #17 of the newer Trixie Belden mysteries, this one is almost written for third graders. The print is large and there's not much to the story. Trixie and Honey are after whomever stole "Hoppy," the colonial-era grasshopper weathervane (supposedly made by the same artist who provided the grasshopper weathervane on Boston's Fanuiel Hall) on the Sleepyside Town Hall. They're crushed when their favorite teacher seems to be involved in the robbery.

We're luckier than Trixie and Honey in that, via print, we are given a clue that the girls don't have. So the culprit is obvious to the reader and makes the girls look pedestrian. A plus to this book is that Bobby is actually given a chance to shine while training a pony for Regan. Nothing special. Frankly, I didn't care whether "Hoppy" got returned or not.

(Okay, perhaps you can comment that it's my adult POV that has gotten in the way of giving these books a better rating, but I can still read young adult and children's books and enjoy them as much as if I were reading them back when they would have been for my age group. I still read the original sixteen Trixie books with great delight. These later ones, so far, just appear substandard.)

 Grace Interrupted, Julie Hyzy
In the second of the Grace Wheaton "Manor House" mysteries, a Civil War re-creation group is holding a gathering at a remote part of the manor grounds so that modern-day influences do not interfere with their efforts to stick to period food and dress. One of the re-creationists is a particularly obnoxious man who has left his girlfriend at the altar; two of her friends appear at the Manor House hoping to even the score. But when Mr. Obnoxious is later murdered, everyone's a suspect, including Grace's new boyfriend Jack and his younger, emotionally unstable younger brother Davey, since Jack was accused of killing the dead man's brother many years earlier.

Once again Grace is involved in a mystery (or the story ends here). :-) The tale dips into a behind-the-scenes look at historical re-creationists (some who strictly keep to the time period, others who are "farby" and include coolers and fans into their historical settings to stay comfortable) and the feuds between them. Grace's romance inches on, and a long-standing mystery is solved. Plus Grace has a new roommate: a cute tuxedo kitten and we learn more about her prickly assistant Frances (some of which definitely surprises Grace!). A nice ambling cozy with likeable characters (I love Bruce and Scott!), even if Grace is a commonplace character. You might want to read the first book, Grace Under Pressure, to get the background on all these characters.

 A Journey to the New World, Kathryn Lasky
This is one of the original stories in the "Dear America" series, and has none of the compelling touches of Lasky's Christmas After All. Indeed, it seems to hit all the Pilgrim clichès: seasickness, conflicts between the "Saints" and the "Strangers," stepping off onto a big rock to get to the mainland, meeting the Indians, etc. Perhaps, being one of the first books, Lasky was forced to stick to a strict outline of what could and couldn't happen. Sadly, it doesn't breathe a whole lot of life into the historical characters except in a few entries where "Mem" (short for Remember) has an emotional revelation about her new stepmother.

These early books did not list the author's name on the cover, and indeed the afterward tries to give the impression that this was an actual diary found in an attic. I notice Scholastic quit doing that after bitter complaints of readers who were taken in by these fake "diaries." These are all fiction, some better than others; this one falls somewhere into "middling" territory. Much better that Winter of the Red Snow, however.

 The Secret of the Unseen Treasure, Kathryn Kenny
#18, and the third of the newer set of Trixie Belden books. A note right off: the cover illustration of the "oval edition" throws you right off; the mystery has nothing to do with skin diving or a mystery on a lake. Instead, it takes place right in the girls' own neighborhood, on Glen Road, which has certainly gotten more populated from the days when Crabapple Farm, Ten Acres, and the Manor House were the only residences for miles around! The gang finds a bag of stolen social security checks in the lake and tries to figure out why they were stolen, only to have them tossed away, while helping Mrs. Elliot make ends meet selling flowers to the local florist. Is her stepson Max trying to drive her off her farm behind the scenes?

This is also "Trixie meets modern times" as drug use is hinted at in the plot (good heavens, no! not by the Bob-Whites!). And Bobby is back to falling down and getting dirty. At least he's not yelling "Holp!" anymore. Better than Phantom Grasshopper, but the density of the old books and #17 is definitely missing. Is "dumbing down" a kids' book series really necessary?

 The Tale of Castle Cottage, Susan Wittig Albert
In this tale, Albert's "Cottage Tales of Beatrix Potter" come to an end, as Beatrix considers breaking off her engagement to William Heelis, fearing the reaction of her possessive parents. And then when she discovers her brother Bertram is finally going to reveal his secret marriage after all these years, she believes there is no hope at all.

Of course there's a mystery involved in the story as always—the death of a carpenter who's working on Beatrix's newly purchased Castle Farm, where she and William have planned to live—but it all takes a back seat to the troubles between Beatrix and her parents and the usual animal subplot, which involves the local domesticated crowd and the regulars at the Brockery [badger den] against very sinister rats (who smoke and swear and gamble) hiding out under the Castle Farm barn (an ominous precursor to World War I, which is hinted at with one line of dialog late in the book). Indeed, the animals take up a good part of the story, but the charm of Beatrix's (faltering) romance is the pivot in this one. If you have invested in the series, you'll want to finish the set and "see how the story comes out." A teatime book for sure!

 Quirky QWERTY: The Story of the Keyboard @ Your Fingertips, Torbjörn Lundmark
This is a darling little book printed in Australia that I picked up in a used bookstore that basically tells the story of all the symbols on the modern keyboard, starting with why the QWERTY arrangement was chosen in the first place by main typewriter creator Christopher Sholes (so the typebars didn't stick together when common letter combinations were used) to the history behind the letters (in QWERTY order, of course) and behind the symbols (which I found the most fascinating because while I've read letter histories since I received my first World Book Encyclopedia at age seven—each volume starts with a history of the letter—there aren't that many references to punctuation and diacritical marks around. Ever call something whose name you couldn't remember a "dingus"? Well, that's really three asterisks in a row: ***. The Irish were the ones responsible for putting spaces between the words. And more neat stuff like that.

The only thing Lundmark didn't address was how the arrangement of the keyboard has changed from the 1970s. I was reminded of this during a conversation about typewriters as Christmas gifts on one of my Christmas gifts, where I posted a picture of the typewriter I received under the tree in 1970. The location of symbols on the keyboard changed from when I learned to type in 1970, with the result that I had to teach myself to type again when I went back to school for a year in 1981.

The " used to be over the 2.
The ' used to be over the 8.
On the key where the " and ' are now, there were the @ and the ¢ (which is no longer on the modern keyboard; you hold down the ALT key and type 0162 on the numeric keyboard instead)
The _ was over the 6 and there was no ^
The * was over the -
Plus, on the older typewriters pre-1970, there was no 1 / ! key. You made the number one using the lowercase l. In those typewriter days, the ! was made by typing a . then backspacing and typing a '.
There also were no ~ and ` on the typewriter keyboard.

And now it's time for me to start my Christmas reading glut—I've already begun on the magazines. Those Christmas book reviews will be posted in Holiday Harbour.

Thinking of Donna Parker on Election Day

It may be, you would think, a strange direction.

For those of you unacquainted with Donna, she was the heroine of a series of seven books published by Whitman Books in the late 1950s/early 1960s. She solved minor mysteries, like "who is the elderly man living in the woods?" or "who is using the school home ec rooms at night?" but mostly the Donna Parker series was about growing up. She had a dad, a stay-at-home mom, and a pesty younger brother, a best friend named "Ricky" (short for Fredericka), and a gaggle of school friends (including one poor girl named Karen who never got a last name). She was an ordinary kid, no budding sleuth like Nancy Drew or Trixie Belden. Her mom nagged her to eat a good breakfast every morning, her dad called her "Cookie," and her younger brother lived to annoy her. She existed in one of those series book whitebread small towns (about a two-hour train ride to New York City); if Donna ever encountered "Negroes," Jews and Catholics, it was probably in books—even the housekeeper was white.

In Donna Parker: Special Agent, Donna and Ricky are entering ninth grade. Since childhood they have always done things together. Now, when they have a chance to join after-school clubs, they come to their first parting of the ways: Ricky wants to take drama, Donna wants to join the school paper. And both follow their dreams.

Donna finds the school paper a mixed bag: the other kids she works with, save one, are great and the advisor, Miss Fischer, is a dream teacher. To her surprise, she finds herself elected assistant editor, but everyone knows she won't do much, since snooty Joyce Davenport, the daughter of the town newspaper editor, is in charge. And then, when she least expects it, Joyce breaks her leg and Donna is in charge.

The Summerfield Junior High School kids are looking for an interesting angle for their paper. They decide on covering the school election, with the school having a goal of 100 percent participation. When Donna talks about this while visiting Joyce, the girl convinces Donna how important participation in the voting process is, and her parents agree. So the kids expand their project: helping with the campaigning for city mayor. Not for specific candidates, but helping people vote. The students who could drive would drive people to the polls. Girls would babysit children so mothers could vote. And the kids would encourage everyone to vote: canvassing voters over the phone, tacking up posters, talking to people. Goal: 100 percent participation, just like at school.

Remember, this was the late 1950s: the Cold War, fear of spies, slapping "under God" in the Pledge of Allegiance because of "those Godless commies." Children's series books like Donna Parker and Ginny Gordon and even Trixie Belden often emphasized public service: the Bob-Whites raise money for charity, the  "less fortunate" are helped via Christmas baskets and fundraisers, the kids support the Community Chest. But this was the one specific instance of elections and the right to vote and the need to vote were pointed out, and in words and ideas even a nine-year-old (me) would understand.

The town of Summerfield doesn't quite make the school record. Only 90 percent of the town votes, and Donna is so disappointed, so down, until everyone tells her what a terrific job she has done heading this project. Can you imagine if that happened today? 90 percent! What a feat accomplished that would be!

Go on. Go out there and vote. Do it for your town, your county, your state, and your country. Your vote matters. Everyone's vote matters.

If nothing else, do it for Donna.

Books Finished Since October 1

 Meet Caroline, Caroline's Secret Message, A Surprise for Caroline, Caroline Takes a Chance, Caroline's Battle and Changes for Caroline, Kathleen Ernst
Appropriately, on the 200th anniversary of the start of the War of 1812, American Girl has issued these books, which take place on Lake Erie during the war. The series begins on an exciting but sober note as Caroline Abbott's father, a shipbuilder, and her cousin are arrested by the British and their ship is commandeered. The British return Caroline to her home, Sackett's Harbor, New York, and it is then the family's long ordeal begins, hoping the British will either free Mr. Abbott or he can escape.

This is a much more lively set of adventures than in some of the other American Girl series, although it is probably unrealistic that Caroline gets to experience so many of the ordeals that girls in 1812 were likely to endure: having a father kidnapped, helping supply him clues to escape, etc., in addition to her mother taking over the running of the shipyard. Hardships are touched upon, especially for Mr. Abbott, but of course there is nothing truly frightening that lone women in that era might have had to face. And even in the midst of the conflict, "growing up" problems like jealousy are addressed, although the situation is rather dull when compared to Caroline's other adventures.

Major points to this set for addressing what is sometimes called "the forgotten war." One wonders if future sets will continue to address less well-known periods of history, as this and the previous Marie-Grace/Cecile series did. In addition, the artwork is lovely!

 Growing Up Laughing, Marlo Thomas
This is Thomas' take on her childhood "growing up laughing" with Dad Danny Thomas, her first career steps, marriage to Phil Donohue, and involvement with her father's charity, St. Jude's Hospital. As interstices to the chapters, she interviews other comedians about their childhood and comic heritage. Most of these are okay, but I wish Marlo had skipped most of them and given us more time with her family and her dad, as well as the famous comedians who were her father's friends (Jan Murray, George Burns, etc.). Her stories about her musical grandmother, about her father's tales, and her brothers and sisters are the real meat of this book. There's even a nice tribute to Ted Bessell and another to her TV dad, Lew Parker, but not a lot about the show that made her a star, That Girl. If you're interested in those "meaty" parts, I'd borrow the book or get an inexpensive copy.

 To a Distant Day, Chris Gainor
This is the story of the rocket pioneers in the days before the Mercury program and the Soviet space program. The book opens with fictional dreams of traveling in space, including Jules Verne's From the Earth to the Moon, and the work of the early astronomers, leading into modern discussions about early Soviet efforts and the experiments of Robert Goddard. Some of the most fascinating chapters are devoted to Sergei Korolev, so long the un-named genius behind the Soviet space flights. Korolev's early life was tragic, as he was fingered in one of Stalin's early purges and spent so much time in the gulag that his health was permanently compromised.

Also touched on several times is Werhner Von Braun and his companions' culpability in the Holocaust, as one of the most notorious "work camps," Dora, provided the slave labor for the rockets built in Peenemunde. So thoroughly were these German scientists covered up for by the researchers who wanted their information that many older Americans still remember Von Braun as "that nice German scientist who worked with Walt Disney." The author mentions the work camps several times, but makes no judgment calls. You can tell it's an uncomfortable subject for him, as it for the reader, knowing that space progress came from such horrific sources. Of note, too, for animal lovers: some of the creatures shot into space met a gruesome end.

This is not a book for a casual reader who just wants simple facts about man's progress in space; however, should you be interested in the subject, Gainor is a clear, concise writer who explains difficult subjects simply without being simplistic. There are many details about animal test flights and the life of Korolev that I had not heard before.

 To Davy Jones Below, Carola Dunn
Daisy Dalrymple and her beau DI Alec Fletcher have finally been married (to the dismay of her mother and of his). With Alec's schoolgirl daughter in the care of her grandmother, the happy couple are about to go a-honeymooning when they find they have been booked on the ocean liner Talavera at the instigation of their American friend Caleb Arbuckle, who is traveling along with his daughter Gloria, now married to Daisy's friend Phil, as well as Arbuckle's partner and his flashy new wife, whom Arbuckle suspects is a golddigger. They are barely out to sea when a man is pushed overboard.

In this ninth Daisy adventure, she's pulled into a mystery through no fault of her own, especially after Alec develops seasickness. I did find myself a  bit resentful of Arbuckle's role in their ending up aboard ship in the first place—yeah, I know; story ends here if he hadn't, but really... Their shipboard company varies from commonplace (a country farm couple on their first vacation) to offbeat (a spinster herbalist who is constantly described as "a witch"), not to mention the ostentatious and manipulative new bride of Arbuckle's partner, Jethro Gotobed. 1920s shipboard life is portrayed vividly, and of course Daisy does what she does best: sleuth and exasperate Alec. Missed in this adventure is Alec's solid partner, Sgt. Tring, but there's enough shipboard intrigue to keep all busy. Still spiffing!

 The Know-It-All, A.J. Jacobs
Have I mentioned before that A.J.'s wife Julie has to be one of the most patient women on earth?

This is magazine writer Jacobs' breakout book, a chronicle of his mission to read the entire Encyclopædia Brittanica (no, not the classic 1911 version, but a newer version with the "macropedia" and the "micropedia," which, IMHO, was a waste of good paper), a project his father started but never finished. (BTW, did you know you can read the classic 1911 version online?) Since I've "done" The World Book at least twice, this was a natural for me.

Of course in classic A.J. Jacobs style, he goes overboard, flaunting his new knowledge at every opportunity, realizing he won't retain what he reads (which leads to some amusing encounters with speed-reading classes), and including choice little tidbits of the text. It also chronicles A.J. and Julie's odyssey of trying to get pregnant (yeah, a little TMI sometimes) and Julie's patient but occasionally exasperated coping with her husband's new madness.

Jacobs is best taken in small doses; this book is recommended for bedtime reading. :-)

 Bryant and May Off the Rails, Christopher Fowler
The Peculiar Crimes Unit is in peculiar circumstances once again: they can only survive if the killer known as "Mr. Fox," who escaped custody after killing one of their own, is brought to justice immediately. Still smarting from the death of Liberty DuCaine, the team knows they have only a week to make things right, and when a single mother is pushed down an escalator in the King's Cross Station, they fear "Mr. Fox" has begun a new killing spree. But what is the mysterious sticker put on the victim's clothing all about? And what does it have to do with a student who disappears after boarding a subway car?

As in every PCU mystery, Fowler explores some aspect of London life. This time it's the London Tube, which is the stage set for all that happens next, whether from the bright corners of the monitored stations to the hidden inner workings.

I find it hard to describe these books because they're so offbeat, definitely not your usual police procedural. They are always puzzling, certainly often whimsical, especially with someone of Arthur Bryant's personality, with the added fillip of learning neat little facts about London pubs, rivers, mythology, etc. as with the tube system and its modern surveillance in this story (technology definitely plays a factor in this one, despite Bryant's continual misuse of his cell phone). I enjoy the heck out of them. If you like your mysteries straight, perhaps not for you, but for me, just my cup of hot cocoa!

 Little Vampire Women, Louisa May Alcott and Lynn Messina
If I'd known this book was this funny, I would have read it long ago.

Part of the movement that paired classic books with monsters, starting way back with Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, this is the supposed "true" telling of Alcott's classic work. The March family, vampires all, are humanitarians who eschew human blood for more humane animal blood, but otherwise the narrative is the same as Alcott's with otherworldly interruptions or changes (for instance, Jo isn't a writer in this one; she's in training to defeat vampire slayers by means of modern methods, until Professor Bhaer encourages her to rely on good old-fashioned vampire instinct). Messina's sense of the absurd comes to the fore in many chapters (the reference to Beth and the kittens convulsed me), such as the commentary about the etiquette of attending a mixed vampire/human gathering (it's considered bad form to bite someone's neck...or stake someone). Jo's search for the perpetrator of the disease that strikes Beth also adds a novel twist to the familiar tale.

A bit gory, but with vampires you must know it would be, but amusing. A good Hallowe'en read!

 Trixie Belden and the Mystery of the Uninvited Guest, Kathryn Kenny
Okay, a little backstory here: girls who grew up in the 1950s-1970s will remember Trixie Belden as the anti-Nancy Drew; instead of a lawyer dad, a roadster, and everything at her fingertips, she had two older brothers (one who teased), a pesty younger brother, a stay-at-home Mom, and a Dad who worked in a bank. They all lived at Crabapple Farm, near the village of Sleepyside-on-Hudson in New York. The farm was off the beaten path, so Trixie didn't have any friends nearby until Madeleine "Honey" Wheeler and her family moved into the big Manor House up on the hill. A "poor little rich girl," Honey was a sheltered, sickly child—until she meets Trixie. The two thirteen-year-olds become fast friends and almost immediately start solving mysteries together, starting with the appearance of a redheaded teenage boy named Jim at the abandoned Ten Acres estate in The Secret of the Mansion.

Sixteen books were written about Trixie, Honey, their family and friends, and the activities of the kids' club, the Bob-Whites, between 1948 and 1970, when Whitman books dropped the series. I collected these sixteen books, in which the characters aged, moved up a grade, and began the long process of growing up, but I skipped the newer set that began in 1977 because of the capricious decision to freeze all the kids' ages (of course! the publisher didn't want them growing up!). However, when a stack of books #17-#31 hove into view at the library book sale for only fifty cents each, how could I resist?

Boy, was I surprised, too! Now, granted, one of the appeals of Trixie was that she was often impetuous. Too many times she acted before she thought. But she's a good kid at heart, which is why I was flabbergasted at the way this book opened, with Trixie practically foaming at the mouth over the visit of her cousin Hallie from the West Coast. Apparently Trixie and Hallie have "issues" going back to childhood, but we really don't know what the rivalry is all about, besides the fact Trixie seems to be resentful because Hallie is pretty. In short order suddenly Trixie thinks she's fat. (She's "sturdy"—that's not fat.) And apparently is having a cow just because Jim might think Hallie was pretty. Seriously? Plus six-year-old Bobby ends up being threatened with bodily harm, which I found disconcerting. The older kids have been threatened with guns and knives before, but on Bobby it seems a bit much.

The rest of the mystery isn't so bad, with former bad boy Dan accused of theft before he vanishes and a wheelchair-bound woman trying to horn her way into Jim's cousin Juliana's wedding. But wow, the Trixie-angst in the first half of the book is shocking. I hope that doesn't continue in the rest of the later books.

 The Doomsday Vault, Steven Harper
Alice is a lass in a steampunk Victorian London, doomed to spinsterhood by the mysterious deaths of her family in the clockwork plague and her peculiar interest in automatons; Gavin is a music-loving cabin boy on a dirigible overtaken by pirates who is frantically trying to escape the unsavory attentions of one of his captors. Naturally, these two must meet!

In the meantime it's a glorious, grand adventure filled with secret societies, women operating "out of their place," steampunk puzzles and automated cats, airships and steam horses, and hulks of stalking zombies in a London still fraught with late Dickensian overtones: coal smoke, gaslit alleys, and the requisite "mad scientists," who here are victims of the clockwork plague. Despite the fact that modern man's fascination with conspiracy theories also rears its ugly head, this is a nonstop action piece from beginning to end, with a feisty female lead and surprises around every corner. I galloped through it in a couple of days.

 December 1941, Craig Shirley
I really, really wanted this book when it was released; I loved the idea of a day-by-day chronicle of December 1941, not just straight on war-news, but something that would give you an idea of how people lived back then, what they read in books and newspapers, what was popular culture suddenly interrupted by violence. And on that note, the book does succeed. While each chapter begins with war-related headlines, the writer endeavors to give you a seat in the kitchen or parlor in 1941 America, reading the newspapers and magazines of the day. War news from Europe mixes freely with hit movies, discoveries in science, world news, the inequalities of the races, behind the scenes at the White House and in Congress, sports, advertisements for Christmas gifts, and more. Once Pearl Harbor is attacked, we also have more personal war-related glimpses: the arrivals in homes of telegrams announcing the death of a son or father or the relentless efforts of the military to hold sites in the Pacific like the Philippines, Singapore, Hong Kong. Winston Churchill arrives in Washington, DC.

Unfortunately, the effect of all this information is rather overwhelming; I would say this is not a book you would read in one sitting. Chapter by chapter is a more fitting way to address it. Sadly, reading it chapter by chapter to get a feel for the time and place is about all you can do with this book, since it is filled with factual errors, typos, and repetitions, not to mention pedestrian writing. It looks like it was rushed to print at the last minute with no proofreading or fact checking at all. (Heck at one point, the printed book actually has blank spaces in it where it was supposed to calculate the days, hours, and minutes since the war started, but no one bothered to fill it in before the book was published.) If these were obscure facts it would be one thing, but items like who was Secretary of the Navy at the time, or what day December 1, 1941, fell on, or the number of pilots in the RAF, are pretty much basic. To get that 1941 feeling, borrow from the library or buy it for a dollar from a library book sale, and for God's sake, take the facts with whopping big grains of sea salt.

 Will Sparrow's Road, Karen Cushman
Cushman's newest book comes with a twist: while her previous protagonists have all been girls, the hero of this Elizabethan tale about a traveling circus is a young boy whose abusive father sold him to a tavern keeper in exchange for beer. When Will finds he will again be sold, perhaps for the terrifying job of being a chimney sweep, he flees, meeting what he thinks are helpful folk on the road who only steal from him. So Will swears to not trust anyone again and soon finds himself as errand boy and hawker for a traveling "freak show," whose company includes an inebriated dwarf and a girl with the furry face of a cat, plus a blind juggler and a man with an "educated" pig.

Prickly Will, for obvious reasons, is not the most likable character at first, and it takes him a long time to learn a lesson akin to The Frog Prince and the story of "The Golden Man" on Lost in Space, but it paints a fascinating picture of life in 1599 and the means of entertainment back then, and how those who were unusual faced prejudice and banded together to survive. Cushman's portrayal of Elizabethan life is so vivid: the colors and the smells of the marketplace and the midden, the piercing cold of the rain and swimming heat of the sun, the noise of the crowds and the mouthwatering descriptions of food—young Will is always hungry, as most boys are—that this book is a delight to read if only for those, but the story of Will and his traveling companions is just as compelling. A great way to introduce an older child to everyday life in a different era.

HIR (Highly Incorrigible Reader) Postscript

On the way to do a distasteful task (buy clothing), I made one more stop at the book sale. Arrived when they opened at one to find only a dozen people there. I had only fourteen dollars, so I had to be good even if I found a lot of things.

Only six books this time:

All Around the Year: Holidays and Celebrations in American Life by Jack Santino, which I can now take off my Amazon wish list.

The Letters of Dorothy L. Sayers, Volume II (no Volume I, sadly).

World Book's Christmas in the Netherlands (a bit in bad shape, but how could I abandon Sinter Klaas and Black Peter?).

The #20 Trixie Belden I missed on Friday, Mystery Off Old Telegraph Road.

Beany Malone, the second book in a long-running series.

and Susannah of the Yukon, the sequel to Susannah, A Little Girl of the Mounties (you may have seen the Shirley Temple version, Susannah of the Mounties).

HIR (Highly Incorrigible Reader)

So, I told myself sternly. NO books you don't need this year! Don't buy anything at the library book sale that you don't need.

But I needed these books. Honest.

Yes, totally incorrigible when left in the company of books. Especially inexpensive books. I only spent $32 on two reusable grocery bags of books I almost couldn't carry to the car.

This year I was determined to get there when the doors opened and I made it. (Never mind the guys had shown up to cut the grass when I told them to come next Thursday. Whatever.) To discover a line! Really, there were folks lined up to get into the doors, most of them senior citizens to whom dollars are precious. I do understand.

(We were all keeping a weather eye—pun intended—on the sky. The prediction was for only 20 percent chance of rain, but as I parked the car near the equestrian arena (these events are held in Jim Miller Park, where they have the county fair every year and rodeos several times a year), there was an ominous grey-shading-to-black cloud on the horizon, and by the time the line started to move the dark cloud was covering one third of the sky, with two funny ripples in it, like it was folded. I should have taken a photo. I fully expected it to rain while I was inside, but there was no precipitation.)

I usually make a beeline for the Christmas books first. After two times of having them down near the computer books, this year they were back up front. And I found more of those "Christmas in [name of country]" World Book-published volumes. Having not looked at the ones I bought in the spring—well, since spring, since I'm waiting until closer till the holidays to read them—I may have bought some duplicates, but if I did, each duplicate has a good home elsewhere. (I just checked—I bought two duplicates, but one was intentional. Volumes are Christmas in New England, ...Australia, ...Ukraine, ...France, ...Ireland, ...Denmark) Plus another for someone who'll like it, and a book of Christmas plays. Also looked through humor, travel, nature, with no results except for Mouse Tales (a behind-the-scenes look at the Disney parks) and then realized I couldn't put off going through the offensive stroller crowd longer and went into the next building where the children's books were.

I didn't find any miracles, like any Lois Lenski regionals or history books, or a hardback copy of The Singing Tree, or any more "All-of-a-Kind Family" books. Did find three "Dear America" books that looked promising (Alamo, suffragettes, Native American captive), a Christmas book I believe I have but someone else should enjoy, a copy of the first Happy Hollisters with no dustjacket, an ARC of a mystery book that takes place in Boston (I saw several ARCs there; you're not supposed to give away or sell advance reader's copies, at least according to Amazon Vine, but are supposed to destroy them after six months if you don't want them), and an old Scholastic copy of El Blanco: Legend of the White Stallion, which was one of my favorite Disney shorts in the 1960s.

I also found a real curiosity: Yourself and Your House Wonderful, which has a copyright date of 1940, but two earlier ones of 1902 and 1932, and is a health book for grade-school kids (definitely older kids because it talks about not believing in Santa Claus at one point). I opened it up to a page where it urges you not to bite your fingernails because the bits going into your stomach can possibly kill you! Will be interested in the other old-fashioned advice it imparts!

I also came home with a stack of Trixie Beldens. If you don't know anything about the series—girl sleuth living with two older brothers and one younger one who befriends wealthy girl who moves in next door and they have adventures—it was a series of sixteen books written from the 1940s to the 1960s. There was a gap of seven years, then 22 more were written between 1977 and 1986. In the first sixteen books, the juvenile characters were allowed to grow older and have birthdays; after that the series basically froze them in time. Trixie and best friend Honey were eternally fourteen, Trixie's big brothers stuck at fifteen and seventeen, and little Bobby forever five. I lost interest when this happened and didn't buy any more, but there they were, just ripe for the buying... I found 17-31, missing #20, a goodly amount.

I actually never did get a good look at the history or biography sections, as when I got back there my arms were about to fall off [grin]. After wandering about a little, however, I did get a copy of an illustrated volume about Edith Holden, who wrote Country Diary of an Edwardian Lady, which became phenomenally popular in the 1970s when they were showing Upstairs, Downstairs. It's mostly her artwork, which is why I bought it.

I also bought a real find: Margery Fisher's Who's Who in Children's Books, which is a list of famous characters from juvenile fiction, mostly American and British—the Pevensie children, Charlotte the spider, Winnie-the-Pooh, the Moffats, the Swallows and Amazons, the March sisters, the "Railway children, Danny Dunn, Christina Parsons can all be found here—but Strewweltpeter and Pippi Longstocking and the Moomins also appear. I saw this in some bookstore back in the 70s, couldn't afford it (originally $22 back then), and have coveted it ever since. Not only is it a neat reference book, but it is full of lovely illustrations from most of the books mentioned, so you have artwork by Ardizzone, Verney, Pyle, Shepard, Sendak, Ransome, Potter, Baynes, etc. Really chuffed about that one!

[Later: Looks like the last two and a half chapters are missing from the House Wonderful book, including the rest of the chapter about reproduction. This came from a religious publishing house, however, so I'm sure most of the mechanics have been left out.]

For L'Engle Lovers

The Madeleine L'Engle reread