More Summer Reading — Seaside Observations
July 2, 2008 | 8:55 am
I can’t help but talk about it, as it’s on my mind. Two reasons (ha! as though I ever needed a reason to think about, talk about, or read books!) come currently to mind: I live in a resort area so am constantly seeing people who are on vacation; and my writing group is looking for new members, and one of the questions we’re asking applicants is what they like to read.
From what I can see, nonfiction is trumping fiction at the beach. Note that this is a small and casual survey, what I’m observing rather than what I’m asking about. But in this election year in the United States, it’s interesting to see some early involvement, with political titles all over the place.
Writing group applicants, on the other hand, are reading fiction; but it’s a skewed sample since they’re interviewing to be part of a group that does fiction and poetry.
I’ve seen a few Kindles, Amazon’s ebook reader, and people seem to be managing with them even outdoors, so the screen resolution and lighting must be superb. Sony Reader, an earlier model, is absent; but there are still few enough ebook readers around to make that observation somewhat moot. I like seeing the ebook readers: unlike many of my colleagues, I don’t think that the sky is falling on the book publishing industry, and I believe that the future is filled with opportunities for people to continue reading: and that’s what matters. How they’ll do it is a matter for the technocrats; all I care about is that we all continue to read, that authors continue to write, and that the world may always, to borrow a phrase from my own book, fly away on its bountiful imagination.
РJeannette C̩zanne
Open Your Heart with Reading
Posted by: reading, reading books, Words, Opening the heart — jcezanne
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Changing the World One Book at a Time: Conference Information
June 18, 2008 | 11:00 am
This notice comes to me from my colleague Charles Patterson, author of a startling and well-worth-reading book called Eternal Treblinka: Our Treatment of Animals and the Holocaust:
Want to Change the World? The San Francisco Writing for Change Conference Can Help!
Gay Hendricks, coauthor of You’ve Got to Read this Book!, will be a keynoter at the Second San Francisco Writing for Change Conference, Saturday and Sunday, August l6 & l7 at the Hotel Kabuki.
The SFW4CC is the first conference devoted to nonfiction writing about any kind of change, from the personal to the planetary, including the environment, politics, health, culture, and spirituality.
The theme of the conference this year is “Changing the World One Book at a Time.”
New and published writers will be able to learn from bestselling authors, editors, and agents, and get feedback on their work.
Registration is a mere $395, including meals.
For information and registration, visit www.SFWritingforChange.org.
Quite up the Open Your Heart alley, I’d say, and you may see some of our west-coast DreamTime authors there. In any case, consider going — because who can afford to not think about changing the world?
Jeannette Cézanne
Open Your Heart with Reading
Posted by: reading, reading books, Something completely different, Opening the heart, Being Peace — jcezanne
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Summer Reading List
June 10, 2008 | 8:02 pm
It’s officially summer. No, we haven’t yet passed the solstice, but we’ve broken 90 degrees even here on “cool” Cape Cod, so that makes it summer in my book.
And, speaking of books, summer brings … summer reading!
What are you reading this summer? Something light and filled with fluff? Or are you buckling down to that “important” book you’ve had on your TBR (to be read) pile for months and months? I’d love to hear your recommendations for a great read, be it to take to the beach or just to relax with at the end of a hot day!
In the meantime, here are mine:
- Strapless by Deborah Davis: the subtitle is “John Singer Sargent and the Fall of Madame X.” The author explores the scandal that surrounded the artist and Virginie Amelie Gautreau, the “it” girl of the early 1880s Belle Epoque Paris, through the portrait that he did of her — and explores, also, the concepts of beauty, infatuation, and conformity. This is a nonfiction account that reads like a novel and manages to be both fun and profound.
- Creating a Life Worth Living by Carol Lloyd. Those of us who live for our art, whatever that may be, often chafe at the need to “make a living” in a way that pulls us away from that art — and may well pull us apart in the process. Lloyd gives us a crash course in career survival by encouraging us to articulate our dreams and then invent the means to support them.
- Travel That Can Change Your Life by Jeffrey Kottler. It’s not about the destination in this book, but rather about how you can make every trip the best trip of your life. The author, a psychologist, urges the reader to “discover how you can make the most of your vacation, business trip, or getaway by seizing the moment to create a profound personal transformation.”
- The Remains of an Altar by Phil Rickman. Anyone who has read by book knows how much I adore and admire this author, and this latest paperback addition to his Merrily Watkins series does not disappoint. Rickman’s ability to give the place in which his novels are situated equal billing as characters in the stories is legend, and here the Melverns play a prominent role. If you haven’t read any of his books, you may want to start with earlier ones, though that’s not necessary: one of the finest novels you’ll read this summer!
- All Things Bright and Beautiful by James Herriot. I recently revisited this old series of books about a Yorkshire country vet and found it as wonderful as it was when I first read it years ago. Amusing, hilarious, tragic, and filled with anecdotes that stay with the reader long after the book is closed: check out your local used-book shop for this one and rejoice that you don’t need to put your arm into a cow to make a living!
So there it is: my summer list. What’s on yours?
Jeannette Cézanne
Open Your Heart with Reading
Posted by: reading, reading books, Reading toolkit, Words, Opening the heart — jcezanne
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What Is Wrong With This Country?
May 28, 2008 | 8:02 am
No, this isn’t going to be a political diatribe. Not really. Well, almost not.
But I’m struck as I’m out promoting Open Your Heart with Reading by the inability of many well-meaning people to understand how destructive it is to live in a country with 90 million functionally illiterate adults. That’s the kind of statistic one expects to see in third-world countries. That’s the kind of statistic one never expects to see at “home.”
And yet it’s true.
Emma Goldman, one of my favorite rabble-rousers, said, “The most violent element in society is ignorance.” It makes for a clever bumper sticker, but it also reflects a clarity of thought we’d do well to consider and even emulate.
No, I can’t be light-hearted about this. Because it’s my fault. It’s my fault, and it’s your fault: it’s the fault of anyone who can read these words that we’ve allowed this kind of situation to develop. Why aren’t we clamoring for better education? Why aren’t we out on the streets, claiming that a basic education — the minimum amount of eduction required to navigate through life in a first-world country — is not accessible to all and required of all? Why aren’t we more appalled? 90 million people in this country cannot read what I am writing here. More importantly, 90 million people can’t read voter registration cards or warning labels or lease agreements. They can’t supervise their children’s schoolwork. They can’t function in an environment that many of us take completely for granted.
And the fact that we’re not appalled is itself appalling.
Other countries take it more seriously. Today’s Shelf Awareness carried this tidbit of information: “I think that each book has its own soul; they know how much I love them,” bookseller Phan Trac Canh told Viet Nam News, adding that during his student years, his book obsession was a challenge. “I skipped breakfast so I could use the money to buy books. I sometimes even rummaged through rubbish bins looking for books.”
If many people in this country did that, they wouldn’t be able to read what they found there.
So I’m not going to be bright and chipper in today’s blog. I’m not going to say that all we have to do is open our hearts and everything will be wonderful. Part of opening our hearts is opening them to others, to take responsibility for ourselves and our communities, and to make sure that everyone has the opportunity to open their hearts as well.
No one can do it for you. Consider contributing to or volunteering with a literacy group today: 90 million people are waiting for you.
-Jeannette Cézanne
Open Your Heart with Reading
Posted by: reading, reading books, Words, Opening the heart, Difficulty, Overcoming difficulty, Overcoming obstacles, growth — jcezanne
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Challenge Yourself — And Help Others Read!
May 14, 2008 | 7:05 am
I was excited to hear that First Book has teamed up with actor John Lithgow to present this year’s Cheerios Book Donation Challenge, which gives you the chance to determine where Cheerios will donate 100,000 new books to children across the country.
For every question you answer correctly, you can vote for the state you’d like to see receive the new books for children in need. The top five vote-getting states will each receive 20,000 new books for local children. Visit the Cheerios Book Donation Challenge to cast your vote. Don’t delay: the challenge closes on June 15th.
And let’s hear three cheers for Cheerios for the company’s generosity in spearheading this literacy effort!
Jeannette Cézanne
www.JeannetteCezanne.com
Open Your Heart with Reading
Posted by: reading, reading books, Reading toolkit, Words, Opening the heart, Overcoming difficulty — jcezanne
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Read to Feed
May 7, 2008 | 7:42 am
Another DreamTime author, Kelly Smith (Open Your Heart with Quilting) turned me on to this extraordinary event that happened in her community and that I’d love to see spread to others.
A teacher at a local elementary school organized a “Read to Feed” program with his third-grade class. The goal was for the kids to read a combined 9,000 minutes at home; if they did, then a local grocery store would organize a $500 shopping spree to benefit a food pantry.
The students took the mission seriously and read for a combined 16,900 minutes; the store director was so overwhelmed that he doubled the donation. The children did the shopping themselves, armed with calculators and carts and with the help of mentors, after which they formed a fireman’s line outside the rescue mission to pass the 15 carts’ worth of food––3,459 pounds in all––in to food pantry staff. “We’re definitely feeding more families now,” said the mission director. “The numbers are way up compared to last year.”
Want your kids to read more? Want to support the hungry in your community? Read to Feed could be the answer for you, too!
–– Jeannette Cézanne
www.JeannetteCezanne.com
Open Your Heart with Reading
Posted by: reading, reading books, Opening the heart — jcezanne
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Magazines, Anyone?
May 1, 2008 | 12:22 pm
I’ve seen so many statistics on the demise of the printed (as opposed to electronic) word, that I sometimes think that newspapers and magazines are quickly becoming a Thing Of The Past. Not, however, if my family has anything to say about it!
Having moved recently, I’ve had to perform an inventory of our magazine subscriptions — not what we read online, but what actually comes to us as dead trees through the USPS. And I found (somewhat to my surprise) that it’s a hefty list:
- Smithsonian
- Wired
- Ms
- Sojourners
- Car and Driver
- Equus
- Poets and Writers
- Seed
- Technology Review
- Glimmer Train
Don’t get me wrong: I do read a lot of material online, and I do want to save as many trees as possible. But I am one of those who still loves the physicality of reading: touching the pages, turning the pages, underlining a passage, putting an asterisk next to a concept or news item to which I want to return.
What about you? What’s your subscription list look like? Do you read more online or off?
Inquiring minds want to know!
РJeannette C̩zanne
www.JeannetteCezanne.com
Open Your Heart with Reading
Posted by: reading, Opening the heart — jcezanne
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Favorite Authors
February 27, 2008 | 6:10 pm
Open Your Heart with Reading is filled with the words of some of my favorite authors. Just looking at contemporary ones, I’d list Anita Shreve, Jodi Picoult, Phil Rickman, and Pauline Gedge. Only names, no doubt, to many of you; but their words have stirred me, made me think, made me laugh, made me cry. Their words have opened my heart.
What is is about an author that affects you that way? Who are your current favorites?
Let’s talk about the people in our (reading) lives …
– Jeannette Cézanne
www.JeannetteCezanne.com
Posted by: reading, reading books, Opening the heart — jcezanne
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Library of America
February 20, 2008 | 11:50 am
I really have to put a plug in here. Anyone who is interested in reading should be bookmarking the Library of America site (http://www.loa.org) whether it’s for yourself or for gift-giving. As a passionate reader myself, I’ve been finding myself spending more and more of my allowance at the Library of America.
Why? Because in a world where cheapness seems to reign supreme, the Library of America continues to offer beautiful books at reasonable prices, books that you will love to read, books that you will love to own, books that you will love to give as gifts.
The Library of America is a nonprofit organization with a mission:
The Library of America, a nonprofit publisher, is dedicated to publishing, and keeping in print, authoritative editions of America’s best and most significant writing.
Hailed by The New York Times Book Review as the “quasi-official national canon” of American literature, The Library of America each year adds new volumes collecting essential novels, stories, poetry, plays, essays, journalism, historical writing, speeches, and more.
You can subscribe to the Library of America mailing list and learn about new books as they become available. Take a look and see if you don’t agree! Opening yur heart through reading has never been so easy — or so beautiful!
– Jeannette Cézanne
http://www.JeannetteCezanne.com
Posted by: reading, reading books, Reading toolkit, Opening the heart — jcezanne
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Opening Your Heart
December 12, 2007 | 12:44 pm
It’s something that I keep coming back to … as I promote my own books and the series as a whole, I’m always talking about opening the heart; but I really wonder what that means to different people.
I think about it every time I do manuscript consultation on an Open Your Heart book, finding that even within our series, authors have very different concepts of what opening one’s heart means, both in terms of how much they’re willing to open up … and in terms of what they feel is appropriate to share with readers. And I think about it every time I’m on a radio show or doing a print interview, as the interviewer reflects back to me her or his conceptualization of what I’m expressing.
It makes me wonder what a reader is thinking — is expecting — when she picks up one of the series books and opens it to the first page … to a random page … and reads some of the words there. What is he looking for? Does the book he picked up respond to that need?
What is opening the heart? What does it mean to others? What does it mean to you?
– Jeannette Cézanne
htp://www.JeannetteCezanne.com
Posted by: reading, Opening the heart, Learning something new — jcezanne
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