Adult Selection

 
Angle of Repose, by Wallace Stegner

Wallace Stegner has said of his epic novel, "It's perfectly clear that if every writer is born to write one story, that's my story." It is a testament to the power of his prose and vision that Angle of Repose, winner of the 1972 Pulitzer Prize for fiction, can be appreciated as America's story as well.

Based on the correspondence of the little-known 19th century writer, Mary Hallock Foote, the novel's heroes represent opposing but equally strong strains of the American ideal. Susan Burling Ward is refined, educated, and strong-willed. Her husband, Oliver, is a handsome adventurer of cruder habits, who brings a pistol when he comes courting, yet who is humbled in the presence of Susan's sophistication.

As we follow Susan on her first journey across the young country, we experience the West through the eyes of a true easterner, horrified at the lack of culture, the quickly fabricated cities, the dust, dirt and heat. Susan is eventually able to appreciate the raw beauty of her new surroundings. Yet throughout her married life she defines herself through her east coast roots, debating Oliver's worthiness as a husband and provider, and assessing what she has given up in exchange for a life of adventure and uncertainty.

In Susan and Oliver's numerous disappointments and incidents of misfortune, we find Stegner exposing the myth of America's west as a land of golden opportunity and fearless cowboys. It is a theme we find in many of his novels, along with a passionate appreciation of the western landscape.

Indeed, Stegner's most magnificent writing can be found in his descriptions of the mountain peaks, deep canyons, winding ravines, and vast stretches of plain and prairie. The terrain becomes a character in its own right, deserving of fear and respect, forcing its will on the people who carve their homes out of its resistant rock and soil.

Stegner’s technical brilliance shines through in this novel in his choice of narrator: retired historian Lyman Ward, whose degenerative bone disease has confined him to a wheelchair and left him unable to move his head from side to side. Lyman's literal tunnel vision elucidates the figurative—as an historian he looks to the past, and as a disillusioned husband and father, he finds solace in it. But, even he cannot escape the present and some measure of self-examination.

Angle of Repose was written during a time of tremendous political and social upheaval in America, and Lyman's frequent reflections on the era create much of the tension in the novel. Yet some twenty years after its publication the characters’ personal histories continue to be relevant and edifying. They are America's stories, part of her past and present—undoubtedly part of her future.

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Discussion topic: Stegner's novel helps us recognize America as a nation in constant flux, engaged in incessant struggle between east and west, between young and old, between myth and reality, between reaching for one's dreams, and settling for less. Each of these dichotomies should provoke interesting discussion.

Selection for Young Readers

The Three Questions
Adaptation by Jon Muth. Based on a story by Leo Tolstoy.

What is the best time to do things?
Who is the most important one?
What is the right thing to do?

Nikolai knows that he wants to be the best person he can be, but he is often unsure if he is doing the right thing. So he goes to ask Leo, the wise turtle. When he arrives, the turtle is struggling to dig in his garden, and Nikolai rushes to help him.

As he finishes work, a violent storm rolls in. Nikolai runs for Leo's cottage, but on his way, he hears cries for help from an injured panda. Nikolai brings her in from the cold, and then rushes back outside to rescue her baby, too.

Muth’s book about compassion, living in the moment and finding happiness in good deeds is based on a short story of the same title by Leo Tolstoy. Children and parents alike will enjoy the award-winning illustrator’s beautiful, playful watercolor depictions of the animal characters and background landscapes.

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Discussion topic: This book is about being the best person one can be. Children may enjoy discussing what that means to them, as well as how they would answer Nikolai’s three questions.

Selection for Middle Readers

 
Because of Winn-Dixie, by Kate DiCamillo

Author Kate DiCamillo describes Because of Winn-Dixie as “a hymn of praise to dogs, friendship, and the South."

The summer Opal and her father, a preacher, move to Naomi, Florida, Opal goes into the Winn-Dixie supermarket and comes out with a dog. A dog she dubs Winn-Dixie. Because of Winn-Dixie, the preacher tells Opal ten things about her mother, one for each year Opal has been alive.

Winn-Dixie is better at making friends than anyone, and because of Winn-Dixie, Opal meets Miss Franny Block, who once fought off a bear with a copy of War and Peace. She meets Gloria Dump, who is nearly blind but sees with her heart, and Otis, an ex-con who sets the animals in his pet shop loose after hours, then lulls them with his guitar.

Opal spends all that summer collecting stories about her new friends and thinking about her mother. But because of Winn-Dixie, or perhaps because she has grown, Opal learns that friendship--and forgiveness--can sneak up on you like a sudden summer storm.

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Discussion topic: This coming-of-age story deals with change, friendship, forgiveness, and learning to love what you have. Readers might consider how each of these topics are important in their own lives.

Selection for Young Adults

How to Disappear Completely and Never Be Found, by Sara Nickerson

An offbeat mystery about coincidence, fate, and the many different ways to tell the same story, How to Disappear Completely and Never Be Found is the unforgettable tale of a twelve-year-old girl who discovers just how terribly beautiful and wonderfully bizarre the world and the people around her can be.

Margaret always knew that her family was a little strange. Not that she was exactly normal herself. After all, she did do her sixth-grade science report on a pack of killer Chihuahuas.
Then Margaret's mother takes her and her little sister, Sophie, to an old abandoned mansion and places a FOR SALE BY OWNER sign in the front yard. But who could have lived there? And why was her mother keeping it all such a secret?

Convinced that her father's death, her mother's silence, and the mansion are somehow related, Margaret returns to the spooky old house alone, determined to make sense of three clues: a swimming medal, a key, and a strange, handwritten comic book about a boy who turned into a rat.

With the help of Boyd, the lonely, comic-book-obsessed boy next door, she discovers that truth can be stranger than fiction -- depending upon who's telling the story.
 

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Discussion topic: Readers might discuss the roles coincidence, fate and individual points of view play in this story, and in real life.

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Last Updated: 07/27/2006