2011 Book Expo America is in the Books

Reading is one of life's greatest pleasures.  A good book can transport you to places unknown, inspire you to reach for new heights, challenge you to consider different perspectives, or provide a much needed escape from day-to-day life.    So to spend three days at the convention that's all about books is pretty much nirvana for me.

I was first introduced to Book Expo America (BEA) by my friend Wendi, who's been attending for nearly ten years now.  BEA is primarily an opportunity for publishers to promote their soon-to-be-released books to book sellers.  Other people with a connection to the book industry can attend, though, such as librarians, educators and people who work with non-profits with a focus on literacy.  My first BEA experience was purely a fluke--it was being held in Washington, D.C. when I was visiting friends there, and Wendi had an extra ticket for the final day.  The only hitch was that I was recovering from a severely sprained ankle and I wasn't sure if I was up to the rigors of the experience.  Curiosity won out over sensibility, though, and I hobbled my way through the morning, coming away with an armload of galleys to share with my friends and to read myself. 

This week was my fourth BEA, and it was as crazy as ever.  When the doors open at 9:00, there's a rush of hundreds of people to get into the convention center in search of the free galleys.  It's a bit like the running of the bulls in Pamplona except the "bulls" are other eager readers.  Veteran attendees bring tote bags with them so they can immediately scoop up galleys, dump them in and be on their way.  There's no time to consider "Hmm, does this book sound interesting to me?" or "I wonder if so-and-so would enjoy reading this?"  You make a snap decision and keep moving or run the risk of getting trampled by the masses.  (Who knew that reading could actually be a contact sport???)  You have to have a bit of an eagle eye as you're rushing through the aisles because some of the galleys are piled on the floor, tucked up against makeshift walls or podiums.   When you have weighed yourself down with as many books as you can physically carry (being a lifelong schlepper is a definite attribute), you head down to the shipping area where you can get a box and deposit your finds to be sorted through later.

The rest of the day is dedicated to getting books signed by their authors.  These books cannot be found by roaming through the aisles (at least not until after the signings), so the only way to get them is to stand on line.  There is an autographing area with 25+ lines where authors sign their books for 30 minutes or an hour, depending upon popularity.  Some authors have enormous queues and you can wait over an hour to get that prized book with its signature (and have a couple of words with the author as a bonus).  Tickets are given out for a few of the "hottest" authors starting at 6:45 on the day they are going to sign.  Two years ago I left my house at 5:45 a.m. so that I could get a ticket to have Lee Child sign his latest book.  (I'd do it again in a heart beat--he was charming and despite the long line took the time to ask about Literacy Volunteers and comment on the importance of adult literacy work.  Plus I loved the book!)   This year there weren't any ticketed authors that interested me enough to get there that early, so I picked a few authors from the 775+ in attendance and got their John Hancocks.   It's always interesting to see what books have the longest lines--vampires seem to be hot again this year--and sad to see some authors sit by themselves waiting for a reader to ask for their signature.  (Having said that, I didn't feel bad enough for the author of "The Medium Next Door" to get her book.  My friend Lee's commentary was that it was good that the author can talk to the dead because she certainly didn't have any fans to talk to!)  

Then there are the signings in the publisher's booths.  Again, some authors are quite popular and you can wait for their books in a line that snakes up and down the aisles for an extended period of time.  (Luckily, you always have reading material available!)   I got two of the books I'm most excited about reading this way--Tom Perrotta's The Leftovers (Macmillan) and Lisa See's Dream of Joy (Random House).  Sometimes there are other little give aways as well.  James Patterson was signing yet another book that he penned with a fellow author called "The Christmas Wedding" and you could get a piece of wedding cake with your galley.  After all, you have to keep up your energy after all that running around! 

At the end of the convention, it's decision time--which books to bring home with you and which to leave behind in the shipping area.  Being incredibly cheap, I don't actually ship books--I just use the area as a holding pen for my finds.  This year I was limited by my strategy of bringing books home in one roller bag that I will check on the plane (plus what I can physically carry with my other luggage--again, the schelpper thing!)  My checked bag can only be 50 pounds unless I want to pay $100 for overweight baggage, so I had to be discriminating.   At this point, opening my bag when I get home will be like opening a present on Christmas morning--it's a bit of a blur after three days of frantic acquisition.  One thing I do know, though, is that I have lots to look forward to on the reading front this year.   

Zietoun by Dave Eggers

 As Louisiana and other southern states deal with the aftermath of the flooding of the Mississippi River, it seemed like an apt time to write about Zeitoun by Dave Eggers. Zeitoun is the story of one Muslim family’s experiences in New Orleans before and after Hurricane Katrina, and it is very eye opening.

Abdulrashman Zeitoun grew up in Syria. He made his living working on fishing boats and freighters. In 1988 Zeitoun came to the United States on a tanker carrying oil from Saudi Arabia to Houston.  He eventually ended up in Baton Rouge, where he met and married his wife Kathy, a convert to Islam. When the story opens, Abdulrashman and his wife Kathy are fielding calls for Zeitoun A. Painting Contractor, a family-run house painting business that has expanded into property management. On this August day, some of their more cautious customers are making preparations for Hurricane Katrina. As the day develops and the storm continues to be upgraded, Zeitoun continues to help his customers prepare for the storm while he debates with Kathy whether they should stay or evacuate. Eventually a decision is made that Kathy will take their four children and head to Baton Rouge while Zeitoun will weather out the storm in New Orleans, giving him the opportunity to watch over their own properties and their customers’ homes.

As we all know, Hurricane Katrina turned out to be anything but a benign storm. The book tells the story of homes being destroyed as the levees break and of Zeitoun’s rescue of people in need with a canoe that he purchased on a lark a few years back.  When he saw it, he thought, "It seemed to speak of exploration, of escape."  Little did he know.  This part of Zeitoun's story is interesting, but nothing that we haven't heard about before.  Just when I was thinking, "Why are they writing about this guy's story?", things got very interesting.

On September 6th, a week after the hurricane made landfall, Zeitoun and three friends were in one of Zeitoun's properties when five men and one woman wearing policy and military uniforms with guns came to the door and forcibly put them on their boat.  Zeitoun assumed that they were being moved since they had ignored the mandatory evacuation order. It quickly became apparent that this was not the motivation when they reached their destination and Zietoun was tackled and handcuffed as he stepped off the boat.  Zietoun and the others were being held as suspected looters and terrorists.

The men were held at the New Orleans Union Passenger Terminal, which had been converted from a train and bus depot into a jail.   (They later learned that the jail had been build by prisoners shipped in from Dixon Correctional Institute and Louisiana State Penitentiary and that it was referred to as "Camp Greyhound".)   Zeitoun became increasingly upset as he heard passing soldiers call them "al Qaeda" and "Taliban."  They were processed and strip searched before being moved to the parking lot, which had been transformed into an outdoor prison.  Zeitoun shared a cell approximately 15' x 15' with his friends.  It was empty but for a portable toilet without a door.  The men had to sleep on the ground and eat whatever was given to them.  They were denied their right to make a phone call. Zeitoun and Nasser, another Muslim who was picked up at the same time, continued praying five times a day as required by their faith.  They were looked upon with suspicion for doing so.   The prison was patrolled by soldiers with dogs, and the men were concerned that an Abu Ghraib situation would come to pass. Prisoners who did not do as they were told were pepper sprayed from head to toe as the other prisoners watched.   Zeitoun realized that watching his fellow prisoners being treated this way was a calculated move.  "It diminished the humanity of them all."

Three days later, Zeitoun was moved to the Elayn Hunt Correctional Center, a maximum security prison.  He was processed again and put in a cement cell with a bed with a rubber mattress.   Zeitoun continued to ask for a phone call but was told that this was up to FEMA because FEMA was renting the prison space from the Correctional Center.  (After 9/11 FEMA was folded into the Department of Homeland Security and, as such, had broad powers after a national emergency such as Katrina.)  Zeitoun originally shared the cell with only Nasser, but other men joined them over time.   One man was a sanitation worker from Houston whose company had been contracted to help with the clean-up.  He was walking to his truck one morning when he was picked up by the National Guard for unknown reasons.   They were all doing "Katrina time."

Eventually, though a complicated series of events, Zeitoun was able to get in touch with his wife who found a lawyer to work on his release.   He was charged with petty theft and bail was set at $75,000.  On September 29th, after 23 days of incarceration, Zeitoun was released.  He was never tried for his alleged crime.

I cannot find the words to provide any commentary on the story that is told in this book. It is an indictment of yet another aspect of the way that the post-Katrina situation was handled.  I can only hope that similar situations are not taking place in the states that have been devastated by the flooding of the Mississippi River and ravaged by tornadoes. 

The Zeitouns set up the Zeitoun Foundation in 2009 to aid in the rebuilding of New Orleans.  All proceeds from the sale of this book go to the Foundation.

Gone Fishin' - Mote Aquarium in Sarasota

 One good thing about having my car serviced in Sarasota is that it gives me an opportunity to check out some of the local attractions.  Yesterday my destination was the Mote Aquarium.  Many years ago I went to the Monterey Bay Aquarium in California and was blown away.  I wasn't expecting anything quite so grand from the Mote Aquarium but I was interested to see if it was more than just a fun place to take a kid for an afternoon outing.  The answer is a resounding "yes"!

I started my adventure with the stingray petting pool.   I wasn't sure if I would actually stick my hand into the waters but after taking a look at the stingrays swimming around for a couple of minutes, I couldn't resist.  They're kind of smooth and slimy as you might expect.  The Aquarium has lots of staff and volunteers on hand to ask questions of and I learned that stingrays can crack open mollusks for food with their teeth plates.  (They are located underneath their heads.)  I also learned a bit about how they reproduce but it's way too complicated to explain here (and none too romantic!)

The Aquarium has another pool where you can touch hermit crabs and other types of sea life.  I didn't think I was too interested in this pool until I saw what looked to be a piece of zucchini attached with a clip to a variegated sea urchin.  I had to ask what was up with that.  As it turns out, sea urchins eat zucchini!  Because the seaweed that's in the pool is artificial, their diet has to be supplemented and zucchini is one of their staples.  How they actually ingest it is a bit confusing to me, but the openings underneath the shell are their mouths.  The volunteer also told me that the reason sea urchins decorate themselves with shells is both for purposes of camouflage and for shelter from the sun.  Sounds sensible to me!

My next stop was the mammal building, where I watched two sea turtles being trained to swim onto a platform.  From there, the staff can weigh them, clean them and give them medical treatment in a non-stressful manner. Each turtle has its own target that it has been taught to follow, with the prize being a bite of the pound and a half of shrimp and squid that constitutes its daily diet. The targets (a blue triangle and a green circle) are on paddles that the trainer moves through the water in front of the turtle.  (Sea turtles apparently cannot see reds and oranges very well.)   They also use clickers to guide them by sound.  Fascinating!

Then it was off to see the manatees -- Hugh and Buffett.  There are a lot of manatees in Southwest Florida, but the closest I've ever come to one is a manatee mailbox.  It was feeding time, and they were enjoying a nice taste of romaine lettuce.  Each day the two manatees eat 72-96 heads of romaine and kale, carrots, beets, apples and monkey biscuits with vitamins.  (I was wondering if Worden Farm supplies them with organic produce!)  They apparently have a significant amount of flatulence as a result of their diet.  I really couldn't make this up. 

The rest of my visit was dedicated to enjoying the fish and other aquatic life in the tanks.  The Aquarium has an area where they nurture baby seahorses, which are called fry.  It is the male seahorse that gives birth, usually about 100 babies at a time.  They are so tiny you can hardly see them.  There are of course lots of funky fish, with one of my favorites being the none too happy looking gulf toadfish.  And there are incredible moon jellyfish.  They swirl around in this one tank and you feel like you're looking at a lava lamp.  Groovy, man!


Needless to say, my trip to the Aquarium was a great success.  Like any good educator, they sneak in a lot of learning by engaging all of your senses and making it fun.   Something for me to remember when I'm developing my tutor training program this summer!    

Trivial Pursuits

In this day and age of the iPhone and the iPad, information is always at the ready.   There's no doubt in my mind that this makes us a bit intellectually lazy--why bother to actually learn and retain information when you can just look it up????   This makes the Isles Yacht Club's monthly trivia nights all the more fun. 

When we first moved to Punta Gorda last year, I was amazed at the range of activities that the Yacht Club has to offer.  Boating, biking, kayaking, golf, bridge, billiards, book club--you name it, they've got it.  Over the past year, I've been impressed with the creative ways that they bring people into the Club for an evening of food and fun.  The Club recently had a night of "dining with the dogs" on the patio and 43 dogs were in attendance!  (It sounded to me like a disaster waiting to happen, but it apparently went very well and another evening is in the works.)  Anyway, I've been invited to join a table for a couple of the trivia nights and it is truly a blast.

The evenings are hosted by Trivia Master extraordinaire Rich Tilden.   He does a fantastic job.  The questions are purchased from some website--I don't know all the specifics--and Rich is in charge of posing the questions and corralling a dining room full of eager participants.  His only rule is "The Trivia Master is always right!"  Keeping the evening flowing while keeping the participants entertained is no mean feat.  The fact that Rich knows many of the audience members helps as he teases people in an amusing but never denigrating way.  I learned last night that Rich was a DJ in a former life--that makes his ability to keep up an interesting patter much more understandable!

The format of the evening is pretty simple.  Each table is a team and their first task is to come up with a team name.  Our name last night was the Magnificent Seven.  (We wanted to emphasize the fact that we were a player short so that everyone would be amazed at our strong performance.)  There are six rounds of three questions each.  Rich gives the categories of each question in advance so that you can make a determination as to the points that you want to allocate to your answer.  In the first half, you have to choose between 1, 3 and 5 points per question and in the second half you choose between 2, 4 and 6 points per answer.  So, there is a bit of strategy involved--how confident do you feel in your answer to the first question in the round?  And how confident do you feel that you will be able to answer a question from the second and third categories in the round?

The first question is supposed to be a relatively easy one and all you have to decide is whether it's true or false.  So you have a 50% chance of getting it right.  The statement last night was something like "True or False--Fillies in the Kentucky Derby carry lighter loads than colts."   After much analysis, we decided to answer "false" and cockily allocated five points to the answer.  WRONG!!!!    Oops--not a good start.

Over the course of the evening, we had questions on topics ranging from cars to geography to movies.   Do you remember the "Cash for Clunkers" program?  Which of these four types of car was the most frequently cashed in--Mustang, Explorer, Expedition, Focus.   Within +/- 400 miles, how long is the Mississippi River?   What sharply ironic 1971 Stanley Kubrick film is the only x-rated movie to have been nominated for Best Picture?   Each table puts their answer on a slip of paper and the wait staff comes around to pick them up.  Of course lots of negotiation goes on within each team about the correct response.  As you look around the room, you always see at least one table that's taking it all a bit too seriously and looks as if they might break into a fistfight.  If a table is debating its answer for too long, the room starts singing the theme song for Jeopardy as a signal to wrap it up.

At the end of the evening the Magnificent Seven had made a magnificently poor showing.  Of a possible 75 points (including possible points from the "half time" question), we had only 38.  (Just to put it in perspective, the leading team had 60 points!)  But wait--we had the chance to redeem ourselves with the bonus question, much like in Jeopardy.  The bonus question is always a "ranking" question and last night's was "From highest to lowest, rank the price of gas as of April 10, 2011 in the following four countries:  Germany, United States, Australia and Venezuela."  We could allocate up to 20 points on the answer.  Thanks to my helpful input (not), we ranked Australia ahead of Germany and also got this wrong, leaving us with 18 points at the end of the evening.  Rich said that this was perhaps the poorest showing of all time!  We skulked out of the room in a show of solidarity.  Yes, we did poorly, but it was a hilarious evening spent with good friends.  And we all learned some things and had a nice dinner to boot!   That counts as a win for me regardless of our score.

Postscript:  In case you are interested, the answers to the questions above are the Explorer, 2320 miles and Clockwork Orange.   Did you get them right????

Little Bee by Chris Cleave

Back when I was in school, I was the queen of the highlighter.  I didn't go so far as color coding, but I did have a pretty heavy hand.   When I read books now, I sometimes find myself marking a page that has a passage I'd like to go back to later.  I had to resist the temptation when reading Little Bee to go crazy with my little slips of paper.

I didn't know anything about Little Bee other than that it was on many of those "must read" lists.  Reading the book jacket was not very illuminating but it was intriguing.  "We don't want to tell you what happens in this book.  It is a truly special story and we don't want to spoil it.  Nevertheless, you need to know enough to buy it, so we will just say this:  'This is the story of two women.  Their lives collide one fateful day, and one of them has to make a terrible choice...Two years later, they meet again--the story starts there...  Once you have read it you'll want to tell your friends about it.  When you do, please don't tell them what happens.  The magic is in how the story unfolds."  

I want to honor the author's request and not say too much about the story.   I will say, though, that the book grabbed me at the start and never let go.  I don't think it's disclosing too much to tell you that the protagonists are a Nigerian girl and an English woman.   The chapters alternate between their voices and their perspectives.

The first chapter is narrated by Little Bee, and starts off, "Most days I wish I was a British pound coin instead of an African girl.  Everyone would be pleased to see me coming....It can disguise itself as power, or property, and there is nothing more serious when you are a girl who has neither."   As her story unfolds, she warns that it will be sad, but says that ,"Sad words are just another beauty.  A sad story means, this storyteller is alive."   Little Bee's story is, in fact, heartbreaking, although you don't find out exactly what has happened until much later in the book.

When we are introduced to Sarah, she is about to bury her husband.  Her four year old son, who does not understand that his father is dead, will not be separated from his Batman costume, which he wears at all hours of the day and night.  His job is to fight the "baddies" in the world, and he takes it quite seriously.   Sarah is an editor and her husband was a journalist.  She says of that time, "It was the summer of 2007, and my son was fighting the Penguin and the Puffin, and my country was fighting Iraq and Afghanistan, and my husband was forming public opinion.  It was the kind of summer where no one took their costumes off."

The book is very intense, but it has a lot of humor and compassion.  As I'm paging back through it, I realize how eager I am to read it again.  I don't feel this way often--there are so many good books and so little time--but I do think I'll turn back to it someday soon.  While Little Bee definitively does not qualify as a "beach read," you'd be remiss not to put this book on your summer reading list.

John Wooden's Seven Life Principles

I am at the Florida Literacy Coalition's 27th Annual Conference and it is inspiring on many different levels.  At the opening session, Pat Williams, SVP of the NBA's Orlando Magic, gave a talk to the 300 conference attendees.  I have to admit to being a bit skeptical when I heard that he was going to be the speaker.   Back when I was the General Counsel of Prebon Yamane, an interdealer broker, we had an offsite for our managers and top brokers and former Pittsburgh Steeler Rocky Bleier gave the keynote address (for beaucoup dollars, I might add).  The overwhelmingly male audience was thrilled with Bleier's stories of his days in the NFL and responded well to his motivational message, which was something like "we came together as a team to pummel the opposition."  Having the opportunity to get a picture taken with Bleier and wear one of his multiple Superbowl rings didn't hurt either.  (I have to admit that putting on a Superbowl ring was kind of cool.)   Short story long, this was the association that came to my mind when I learned that another former sports figure was going to be a keynote speaker at the Literacy Coalition's conference.  

When Williams started talking about Coach John Wooden being named the greatest coach of all time by the NBA, I wondered where this speech was going, if he knew who his audience was and how conspicuous it would be if I made my way to the door.  Within moments, though, I was enthralled.  When UCLA's Coach Wooden turned 12, his father gave him a piece of paper with seven principles written on it.  Wooden carried this piece of paper with him in his wallet for his entire life.  Although Wooden's father was a humble Indiana farmer without a formal education, his wisdom shines through the principles that he wanted to instill in his son on the cusp of manhood.  Here they are:

1)  Be true to yourself.
2)  Help others.
3)  Make friendship a fine art.
4)  Drink deeply from good books.
5)  Make each day your masterpiece.
6)  Build a shelter for a rainy day by the way you live your life.
7)  Give thanks for your blessings every day.

Before he began sharing these principles with the audience, Williams asked us each to take out a piece of paper of our own to jot them down.  Being good students, most of us dutifully did so.  As Williams elaborated on some of these principles based on his conversations with Coach Wooden (who died last year at age 97), an adult learner sitting next to me kept peeking over my shoulder to confirm that she had written down the principles correctly.  It was clear that the message resonated with everyone in the room.  Not only are the principles a recipe for life, but--amazingly--they have a literacy component.

Williams, who has written over 60 books and is actively involved with the NBA's Read to Achieve program, exhorted each member of the audience to spend one hour every day reading a book.  He asked us to think about the impact this practice could have not only on our own lives but on the lives of our youth.  Williams shared an amazing statistic published by the Wall Street Journal--59% of the homes in the world do not have a single book in them.   How unbelievable is that? 

At the end of Williams' speech, I think I was the first person in the room to jump up to give him a standing ovation.  In a short 45 minutes, I had gone from skeptic to cheerleader.   It just goes to show the benefits of being open to those around you.   You never know when you're going to hear something that might make a difference in your own life.