Meditations. Books for My Children

Burning Book, Brian Kershisnik

I never feel more alone than when I finish a book I loved. I prowl, I chew on my fingers, I pick things up and toss them about. Sometimes I cry a little. Or a lot. I don't want to even see people who haven't read that book. I feel like I'll never want to eat ever again but sometimes I just do, anyway, to distract myself and to dull a longing that is sort of like, and not at all like, hunger.
So alone because I want to have shared it, worked through the book with another human, though that's not possible or practical considering how much and at what speeds I read. I want to talk, argue and remember, prognosticate and review and sigh and I'm nearly lonely enough to bleed from it for a while. Till I get myself into another book. That deadens the disconnect and I forget.

I could avoid most all of this by immediately placing the book in someone's hands and making them go off and read it so they could talk to me. And I used to do that.
I used to recommend books to people.

I used to read a book and, if it had been a good book or if I felt it was asking for a specific person and I thought I knew that person, I would take the book to them and admonish, nay, command them to read, my assumption being that if it was good for me, it would be good for you.
To my astonishment and dismay, this caused trouble, over time. Not everyone agrees with my choices, which really is fine by me. I don't actually care, though I may choose to mourn, a little, for their loss. On my planet if you don't like a book I like, after a minute and rousing examination of our separate opinions, we go our several ways like gentlemen and forget about it. But on this planet people sometimes get annoyed if they don't like the book they think I think they should read; they sometimes get angry and they sometimes get offended. Sometimes they tell you their estimation of you is forever altered and they never want to play with you again.
I finally, protectively, made a rule to never recommend books, ever. And except under very special, occasional and unusual circumstances I cling, limpet-like to that rule,
And yet, as now, I am finishing an exceptional book, racing the downward arc of narrative and at the same time braking, leaning back, knowing that you can only read a book for the first time one time and after this is over, it is over forever, trying simultaneously to sprint and to savor, I find I instinctively begin scanning my interior landscape for someone, a friend, a reader, a beloved human who will not, I think, yet know this book. I cannot feel a book that has cleaved (and cleaved to) my soul is finished with me till I have hastened at its behest, clasping it against my heart, to press the book against another beating heart and say, read this, stop what you are doing and read this, drop all the lesser things and read this book this book this book and then talk to me, talk to me. But I don't do that anymore. I say, "yeah. I think I read that. I'm not sure," carefully scanning the other face for hints, clues and signs before I give any more answer. Almost no other time do I feel so keenly the sharp hard pain of living a careful life. The dreadful losses suffered where Caution rules as regent in Honesty's kingdom, Honesty being held captive by Fear, Failure and Fatigue.

Webster's tells us recommend, from the Latin re-, and com-, from cum intensive, and mandare, to order, literally means to order back or commend strongly, and the example given, no kidding, is as to recommend a book. Therefore, if I recommend a book, I am not merely marking its existence, observing that, here is a book, persons may or may not enjoy this book but this is not for me to say. No. If I recommend a book I am so much more than offering it as a possible good time. (for a good read call...) I am advising, enjoining, exhorting. That mandare in recommend is to entrust to, to commend; to put in one's hands, commit to one's charge, as in Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit.
Into your hands, this book...no.

However.
For reasons I determined to hammer out a list, a list I will amend and alter as I grow up and continue reading. This is not a list of books to placate the people who ask me (as if someone who reads a lot would know just what you were in the mood for next. pfft.). I drawing up this list for my children, a sort of last will and testament of my book legacy, should that inheritance ever interest them. Anyone can see it but is is for my kids. These are books to which I have returned repeatedly for study, for refreshment, for delight, for wisdom and for sorrow. It will not be exhaustive because I forget. It will be eclectic because. You will not understand all of it and will disagree but comfort yourself with the knowledge that it wasn't made for you. I wish to point out here that I cannot receive less than full marks for stating my own opinions. These are all, every single one, books I went back to and back to, to read again. Scriptures are a given.
Study
These books are tools. Tools should be both useful and beautiful. They should work well in more than one capacity.
*A Good Dictionary, and a Good Thesaurus
Vital. I recommend you invest in good ones, I have several including the OED in one volume. That's a bit excessive, but for me it is not unlike a big game trophy in the library. And it comes with the coolest mystical magical magnifying dodad! (Now, let me say here, at the very beginning, that all the resource information is available on line. Of course it is. But this is my list and I am talking about books. With pages. I like pages. Enough said.)
*A Good Atlas
For years we have used and loved The Great World Atlas from the American Map Corp. I taught my children geography and earth science from it. And I don't know where on the world anything is.
*Strong's Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible
I use it all the time.
*Timetables of History, Bernard Grun, based upon Werner Stein's Kulturfahrplan
History works best for me when I can spread it out like a map.
*Compact Atlas of World History, Random House
This is a tiny volume. Most often, it's all I need to know.
*Understanding Paul, Richard L. Anderson
This would be the Apostle Paul. What can I say? It helps me.
*Making Sense of the Doctrine & Covenants, Steven C. Harper
I actually had a sort of unusual experience with this one, something a friend once called "shopping with Jesus." I had a very specific need and went, blindly, straight to this book. It is a new best friend.
*The Language of Flowers, Kate Greenaway
I was so fascinated by this as a child, the idea of communicating desperate vows, taunts or even threats with boutonnieres and bouquets. I longed to have a lover who would send me flowers and know what they meant--even, perhaps, engage in a conversation!! I got over it. I still think about it though when I see certain floral combinations. Hmm.
*On Food and Cooking: the Science and Lore of the Kitchen, Harold McGee
This is a wonderful and very serious book. If you want to know how bread stales, the timeline of fruit importation in western Europe, the comparative water, protein, fat and carbohydrate content of, say, acorns, coconut and pistachios, or why on a molecular level we have ice cream in the first place, McGee's tome is for you.
*The Postage Stamp Garden, Duane Newcomb and the Sunset Western Garden Book
This is where I start.
A Dictionary of Costume and Fashion: Historic and Modern, Mary Brooks Picken
Do you know what a pelisse is? A parure? A peruke? Do you want to? I do.
*What People Wore, Douglas Gorsline
This is not an in depth text but is quick and easy to use. I always go here first.
*The Stitch Directory
is missing. This has been a terrible problem for a while. I'll update later, when I find it.
*The Betty Crocker Cookbook and The Martha Stewart Cookbook (with the blue spine)
Whenever I need a recipe I go to these first and compare everyone and everything to them. If I could only have two cookbooks (horror!) I would choose these ladies.

Nonfiction
*All Creatures Great and Small, James Herriot
*Tisha, as told to Robert Specht
Just read this to my youngest, 11, she loved it. I softened but did not skip the swears as I read.
*The Beak of the Finch: a Story of Evolution in Our Time, Jonathan Weiner
This book about on-going evolution in the Galapagos Islands is gorgeously written. Also, the greatest testimony I have ever read of the reality of a loving, observant Heavenly Father, constantly involved, constantly aware, constantly adjusting out of care and concern.
*The Outermost House, Henry Beston
And here it is folks, the book that, more than any other, caused me so much trouble I stopped recommending books. It is a classic, beautifully, wondrously written. It is a record of observations made in a year the author lived alone in a tiny house on Cape Cod. Here is a sample conversation between myself and someone who tried to read this book because I told them it was my favorite book ever. Ever.
Them."Do you know this is a book about nothing?"
Me. "What? What do you mean? It's not about nothing, it's about--"
Them. "It is too. It is about nothing."
Me. "No it's not!! It's about everythi--"
Them. "No. Nothing happens in this book."
Me. "Wh--!!"
Them. "Suzanne. Nothing happens. There's a chapter about SAND."
Whatever.
It is possibly my favorite chapter and I couldn't care less if you never read it. Your loss. Your eternal loss.
*Tao Te Ching, attributed to Lao -tzu
Dazed and urgent, trailing this book, Noah came and found me to talk about a bowl defined not by what it holds but by its emptiness. Formative moment for a boy who Does Too Much, and his mother who is Trying To Hold Emptiness. Hmm. Time to read this book again.

The Hero with a Thousand Faces, Joseph Conrad
Stories. Think about stories.
*Generations: the History of America's Future, 1584-2069, William Strauss & Neil Howe
Utterly changed the way I see stuff. Really.
*The Battle for Christmas: a Social and Cultural History of Christmas, Stephen Nissenbaum
A little word of warning to the faint of Christmas spirit. I read this book, read or told most of it to the painter, read it with Noah, read it again. I think it's important. I'm one of those people who want to know where traditions come from, what they really mean. At the end of the first read, I didn't believe in Christmas anymore. I didn't believe in ANYTHING anymore. Christmas, you see, really does come from a store. By the end of the third read I decided that everyone had always just been making Christmas up as they went along and I could certainly do that, too. Remaking this holiday is our only real Christmas tradition, so I got to have any sort of holiday I wanted. And I'm much happier now in my celebrating than I've ever been. But proceed with caution because maybe you don't actually want to know. Don't say I didn't warn you.
*Wide as the Waters: the Story of the English Bible and the Revolution It Inspired, Benson Bobrick
I loved this much, much more than Wide as the Waters, but that is a good companion piece.
*A History of the American People, Paul Johnson
Everyone needs a good American history, this is the one I like.
*Catching Fire: How Cooking Made Us Human, Richard Wrangham
This is such a, well, cool book. Very lucid and compelling. Not a quick read. You may want to skim the fossil record bits. Big bits, those. But such a worthwhile read. One of those books that makes you strike up conversations with people you don't even like just so you can inform them humans can have larger brains than monkeys can because we cook our food. Incredible, huh? (cooked food=softer food=smaller jaws)
*The Book of William: How Shakespeare's First Folio Conquered the World, Paul Collins
I confess it. I cried. At the first story of two friends, old men, the only people still living who worked with Shakespeare, going about to gather up copies of their friend William's plays for publication in a single volume that would come to be known as the First Folio. Collins gives a list of plays not much regarded at the time and out of circulation which these two carefully tracked down, plays which would probably otherwise have disappeared forever. I read the names of the first two plays to myself, paused, thought how interesting and instructed the painter to listen as I read the list to him aloud. I began again and got only as far as the third play. A Midsummer Night's Dream. The Taming of the Shrew. The Tempest. My world trembled and shimmered. What if...what if..? I had found myself sobbing suddenly and unexpectedly the summer before, standing in Shakespeare's birthplace, looking at a copy of the First Folio in its little upstairs niche. My family sweetly wandered away and let me cry alone. In heaven I'm finding those two men who toiled through the bookstalls of London, lovingly seeing to the plays their friend had never seen to himself. What if...what if..?
*The Thirteenth Element: The Sordid Tale of Murder, Fire and Phosphorus, John Emsley
Not everyone is blown to bits at the elegance, the usefulness, the prophetic wholeness and utter rightness of the periodic table. I am. If you are, or if you think you ought to be, this book is not to be missed. It's not to be missed anyway, but that is, of course, up to you. Also, if you've ever wondered why you were taught never to play with matches. It may not be for the reasons you think.
*Gift from the Sea, Anne Morrow Lindberg
*Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, Robert M. Pirsig
Just write about one brick...still changes my life. Still.
*How Reading Changed My Life, Anna Quindlen
*A Grief Observed, C. S. Lewis

Stories
You may see here books you think of as being for children. I think an amazing story is for people. Some of these books are called Fantasy. I will not label those as such in case you have an unreasonable allergy and, if you knew, would avoid them solely on that ground. This list is arranged in what to me is an order: if you know and like one book, I think the chances are reasonable you will like the ones listed near it.

*Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrel, Susanna Clarke
Currently sitting at the top of the list, and there for a reason, but also sitting alone.
*Watership Down, Richard Adams
This one also sits alone; I've never read anything quite like it. If you've read this and liked it, The Private Life of the Rabbit, one of Adams' sources, is very well written and interesting and nearly made it on my nonfiction list on its own merit.
*The Forgotten Beasts of Eld, Patricia A. McKillip
*The Chronicles of Narnia, C. S. Lewis
Especially The Voyage of the Dawn Treader.
*Lord of the Rings, J. R. R. Tolkien
The Two Towers is my favorite.
*The Earthsea Trilogy, Ursula K. LeGuin
I love The Tombs of Atuan best and recommend (and this is a recommendation) that no one read beyond the original trilogy. Life is short.
*Dragonsong/Dragonsinger, Anne McCaffrey
Personally unmoved and finally annoyed by the rest of the series.
*Abhorsen (series), Garth Nix
*The Dark is Rising series, Susan Cooper
Though I don't love the last book and skip it when I read these to my kids. Nobody notices.
*James and the Giant Peach, Roald Dahl

The Glassblower's Children, Maria Gripe
Oh, I love this fairy tale and oh, it's out of print and oh, I wish you luck should you desire to find it.
*The Pink Fairy Book, ed. by Langston Hughes
These are all good, Pink is the one I owned as a child.
*Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH, Robert C. O'Brien
*The Tough Winter, Robert Lawson
This is the second book, after Rabbit Hill. My mom never bought the first one. Go figure. So I read the first book as an adult and like it but don't love it, though it is just as good. I like difficult tales about winter and hardship. Let's pretend like this is our winter cave and our parents are dead...
*Puck of Pook's Hill/Rewards and Fairies, Rudyard Kipling
Wonderful children's books that children may have a bit of trouble wading through. I would suggest these as read-together books. Very worth it.
*The Children of Greene Knowe/The Treasure of Greene Knowe, L. M. Boston
I don't love the rest of the series.
*Alice in Wonderland/Through the Looking Glass, Lewis Carroll
I have recently been informed these are not books for children. Hmm. They were when I was rereading them. If you know and love Alice already, you might like to dip into the facsimile edition or The Annotated Alice put together by Martin Gardener. I like to dip into them.
*The Penderwicks/The Penderwicks on Gardam Street, Jeanne Birdsall
*All of a Kind Family, Sydney Taylor
*Little Women, Louisa May Alcott
This is the only one of Alcott's books I like. There, I've said it. I didn't know growing up I was reading an edited version. It worked really well for me.
*Caddie Woodlawn,
*Anne of Green Gables series, L. M. Montgomery
In all honesty, I lost interest after Anne and Gilbert ironed out their misunderstandings in a matrimonial way.
*The Secret Garden/ A Little Princess, Frances Hudgson Burnett
*The Wolves of Willoughby Chase, Joan Aiken
This is a long series. Noah got further than I did.
*Journey to the River Sea, Eva Ibbotson
*Mandy, Julie Andrews
*Adopted Jane, Helen Fern Daringer
*Up a Road Slowly, Irene Hunt
*Strawberry Girl, Lois Lenski
*To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee
*The White Witch of Kynance, Mary Calhoun
*Quest for a Maid, Frances Mary Hendry
*The Island of the Blue Dolphins
*The Witch of Blackbird Pond, Elizabeth George Speare
*Calico Bush, Rachel Field
*Three Men in a Boat, Jerome K. Jerome
*Cold Comfort Farm, Stella Gibbons
*I Capture the Castle, Dodi Smith
*A Room with a View
*North and South, Elizabeth Gaskell
*Rebecca, Daphne du Maurier
*The Sound and the Fury, William Faulkner
*Gilead, Marilyn Robison
*The Madonnas of Leningrad
*The Song of Hiawatha, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
*A Child's Garden of Verses

*Fun and Nonsense

Authors
This list caused me the most grief. In order to be here I have to have enjoyed everything I have read by these people. I will say candidly that not all their works are of equal strength, but if I see one of their books in a library I check it out; if I find one in a used bookstore I buy it. For some of them I have listed an obvious favorite. Or two.
*Hans Christian Anderson
*Laura Ingalls Wilder, The Long Winter, These Happy Golden Years
*Rosemary Sutcliff, The Shining Company
*Geraldine McCaughrean, The White Darkness, The Kite Rider, Pirate's Son
*Claire B. Dunkle, By These Ten Bones, Hollow Kingdom Trilogy
*Terry Pratchett, Winter Smith
*Diana Wynne Jones, Homeward Bounders
*Agatha Christie
*Meindert De Jong, House of Sixty Fathers, Journey from Peppermint Street, The Wheel on the School
*Jane Austen
*Robert Frost
*William Butler Yeats
*Emily Dickinson
*William Shakespeare
*Charles Dickens, A Christmas Carol
*Henry James
*Edith Wharton
*H.E. Bates
*P. G. Wodehouse
*M. R. James
*Gene Stratton Porter

So, there is a list of my tried and true, sturdy, trusty bookfriends. It will change.
I'd love to see your lists.

I recommend we all read.
What you choose is your own terrible responsibility.

Man With a Very Small Book, Brian Kershisnik