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Community Corner

Patch Picks Celebrates National Reading Day

Reading specialists in Ladue and Frontenac give us their picks for best reads.

In honor of the National Education Association’s Read Across America annual celebration, we surveyed our area book specialists for their recommendations for children and adult books.

Adult literature.

Recommended by Jennifer Alexander, a collection development specialist at the St. Louis County Library:

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The Surrendered by Chang-rae Lee
The Illumination by Kevin Brockmeier
Let the Great World Spin by Colum McCann

Why she’s recommending these books:

“Both The Surrendered and Let the Great World Spin are beautifully written and illustrate different types of human suffering without an overwhelming mood of despair. So the books are very sad but still a little hopeful at the same time. And The Illumination is just interesting and fun because of the unusual premise: at some point in time people’s physical injuries begin to give off light. The connected stories all work on the question of how people might react to such a change.”

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Recommended by Terry DeForest, community relations manager at Barnes & Noble in Ladue:

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot
Three Seconds by Anders Roslund and Borge Hellstrom

Why she’s recommending these books:

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks  is a non-fiction work about a woman whose cells were taken from her without her knowledge. It launched a revolution in medical research. And even though she’s been dead for 60 years, her cells are still alive today. This book is a hot seller with lots of customers requesting it.

Three Seconds is benefiting from the popularity of the Stieg Larsson novels which have become the hot new genre in fiction: Swedish crime novels.  Three Seconds won the Swedish Academy of Crime Writers’ 2009 award for the best Swedish crime novel.  It was translated into and published in English in February 2011.”

 Recommended by Siri Hudson, bookseller at Barnes & Noble in Ladue:

Left Neglected by Lisa Genova
Wench by Dolen Perkins-Valdez
The Passage by Jonathan Cronin

Why she’s recommending these books:

“In Left Neglected , which is written by the author of Still Alice, an accident leaves a woman unable to see anything on the left side.  She only eats half of her food, only shaves half of her head and only sees half of her life.  She used to be a go-getter and now with her limited sight she finally sees her whole life.  We always worry about having the latest stuff or the best vacation and we end up neglecting family and friends. This book demonstrates how we need to pay attention to the people in our lives, not the things.

“If people liked The Help or The Known World, they will love Wench.  The Known World, which won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, is about African-Americans who owned slaves. Wench, which is about a black woman who is a mistress, is selling really well.

“I love The Passage.  It’s like a post-apocalyptic book. The government has made these zombie-like creatures and the book is about what happens to a society when there is no society. It’s well-written and a great story. Even though it’s a large book it goes fast.”

CHILDREN'S LITERATURE

Recommended by Terry DeForest, community relations manager at Barnes & Noble in Ladue:

You Can Count on Monsters: The First 100 Numbers and Their Characters, by Richard Evan Schwartz, is selling so well that we have to keep re-ordering it. In the book, which is located in our math section, kids have fun with the monsters and learn about multiplication. The pages are black with vibrant colors and great graphic illustrations. Recommend for ages 4—8 years, we have teachers and parents coming in asking for this.

“There is a series of books by Amy Krouse Rosenthal and illustrated by Jen Corace that are charming little hardcover picture books that have great little stories and illustrations:  Little Pea, Little Oink, and Little Hoot. The books are smaller than average hardcover books, so they’re easier to handle. Little Oink is my favorite. It’s about a pig who is very neat and loves to clean. His momma and poppa tell him he can’t come out of his room until it is a pig sty. It’s just adorable. The books are fun and the illustrations are cool. They catch your eye when they’re on the shelf. I just love them."

Recommended by Desiree Schumann, a youth specialist at the St. Louis County Library:

For preschoolers

Dooby Dooby Moo by Doreen Cronin is great book to read aloud, especially when the kids help sing. Duck’s rendition of “Born to be Wild,” complete with air guitar, is always a crowd pleaser. And it’s a good example of early literacy skills like phonological awareness and reading motivation.
 
Truckery Rhymes by Jon Scieszka is an awesome book for preschoolers. It puts a new spin on the nursery rhymes we all grew up with. All the characters are trucks so how can you go wrong? I was hooked from the very first rhyme: Jack be nimble. Jack be quick. Jack smash through the wall of brick! We recite the original rhymes before reading Scieszka’s. It’s also great because you can jump around reading your favorites.”

For elementary school-aged children

N.E.R.D.S. by Michael Buckley is a James Bond-type intrigue series for elementary kids which is funny too. Who can resist a book about a group of misfit fifth-graders running a spy network under their school, ridiculously diabolical villains and cool gadgets?”

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