Ever wake up and feel... different?

Myfanwy (pronounced like "Tiffany" with an "M") Thomas knows the feeling.  Waking in the rain with black eyes and bruises, she has no memory. Is this the plot of the best Lifetime movie you've never seen starring former Saved by the Bell starlet, Lark Voorhies?  Sadly, no. However, thanks to a recommendation via twitter during a reading rut it’s the main character in Daniel O'Malley's The Rook , one of the most fun and engaging books I’ve read in the past six months.

Armed with an envelope of instructions, Myfanwy learns three things about her former self:

1. Someone is trying to kill her.   

2. Things are not always what they seem

3. She works for a secret organization dealing with the supernatural

Part thriller, mystery, and Ghostbusters, The Rook is an addictive adventure.  The more Myfawny delves into her former self, the more complicated life becomes as she exposes corruption and herself to the person who’d love to see her dead. Myfany's fate is in her hands.  If she wants to live, she better make some quick decisions .

Floods, earthquakes, snow, volcanoes, and landslides! Trying to think of and prepare for every possible catastrophe that might occur in the Pacific Northwest can be daunting!

Thankfully there are many resources available from your Multnomah County Library and other government agencies to help you plan for any situation. Karen T. and Catherine M., both parents and library staff put some of these resources to the test, using them to prepare themselves and their families for some of the most likely disasters.

Karen’s family makes a plan and adjusts to the realities of getting everyone on board

Karen, using online federal resources from FEMA.gov and Ready.gov,  introduces the project of making a family disaster plan and the need of assembling an emergency supplies kit to her family. She finds that it is a challenge to get the entire family to buy into the importance of being prepared. They have other priorities.

She doesn’t let that stop her, after letting her family stew on the project for a bit she breaks it down into manageable parts and recruits family members to take ownership of some of these tasks. She uses a new ploy, Mother’s Day, to get action. Whatever it takes to get everyone involved, reason or guilt, at least the family now has a plan!

With the new plan in hand Karen gathers everyone to look at it and make minor changes (one of the emergency meeting spots was to be on top of a huge in-ground water storage tank...which seemed a bit too precarious in the event of an earthquake).

A real-life mini-emergency takes place, Portland issues a boil water notice and the grocery stores quickly run low on bottled water. This underscores the need to plan ahead and store enough clean water for the whole family (don’t forget pets!). Karen learns how to properly disinfect drinking water from the EPA emergency disinfection instructions. Do you know how much water you really need to get through a short term emergency?

For her own assignment, Karen makes a  home emergency kit and a few mini-survival-kits to keep in easily accessible spots like backpacks, gloveboxes, and winter jacket pockets.  As the final part of her work Karen spreads the word so that co-workers, extended family, friends and neighbors are equally prepared, thus maximizing the potential for positive outcomes no matter what happens. Karen lives the motto, “Be prepared, stay informed, make a kit, and get involved.”

Catherine’s Three Levels of Preparation at Work

Catherine’s family has emergency supplies both at home and in the car.  However she usually takes public transportation to work.  In the event of a major natural disaster and transportation disruption she could easily find herself stranded away from home.  She needs to plan for a safe hike home or to shelter in place at work if necessary.  To do this she has three levels of preparation: everyday carry, get home bag, and overnight necessities.

The Everyday Carry

The everyday carry is just what it sounds like, basic items to have on your person at all times. Catherine travels light but packs a bottle of water, a snack, a small first aid kit, a dust mask, a small flashlight, cell phone, an emergency information/contact list, and a book to pass the time.  She, like most librarians, also wears sensible shoes (ones she could easily hike home in).  Her son also has a few items in the bottom of his school bag to make up a basic everyday carry for children. What does your everyday carry look like?

The Get Home Bag and Overnight Necessities

The next level of preparedness is the get home bag, a small backpack of necessary supplies to keep at work for an unanticipated hike home.  Multnomah County has a helpful Get a Kit page that has some ideas. Since Catherine takes the bus her get home bag includes a second bottle of water, a poncho, some pocket change, an extra pair of socks, and a second set of keys.  She keeps her get home bag in a secure place at work where she can easily grab it and “get home.” She also has a predetermined meeting place if crossing the Willamette River is impossible due to seismic bridge damage or severe traffic issues.  This pre-planning will get the family back in contact with each other ASAP after an emergency.  You can also look at ideas for a get home bag or workplace plans from Ready.gov. How would you get home to your family?

There may be a situation where it is unsafe or impossible to hike home so Catherine has a few overnight necessities at work.  In addition to the everyday carry and the get home bag she also has enough bottled water for 48 hours, nonperishable snacks, a few toiletries, a small blanket, a change of clothes, and an extra phone charger stored in a work locker. She shares with her coworkers so they can also make a plan.  What would you need if you were stuck at work overnight?

Each family’s disaster readiness plan is going to be different based on what events you prepare for, the everyday situations you and your family find yourselves in and the special needs and makeup of your family.  Karen and Catherine teamed up to encourage each other to meet their family goals.

These online government resources were most helpful: Ready.gov, Multnomah County Office of Emergency Management, and the Portland Bureau of Emergency Management. You can access all of the online resources in this list: Multcolib Research Picks: Disaster Preparedness Online Resources.  Additionally, there are some great preparedness books geared especially toward parents: Multcolib Research Picks: Disaster Preparedness Books for the Whole Family.

Stay Informed

Most librarians would agree that, “knowledge is power.” This holds true in times of disaster. Be aware of what the most likely events may be, know ahead of time where your family will meet up, and sign up to be notified through the CENS Public Alerts Emergency System by voice or text in the case of a local emergency.

If you would like more information about preparedness resources do not hesitate to contact a librarian. You are also welcome to share your own disaster preparedness planning adventures in the comments below. Can you answer the question, Are you prepared?

 

'Just when you're beginning to think pretty well of people, you run across somebody who puts sugar on sliced tomatoes.' Will Cuppy is a master of the written word. Now, maybe your family doesn't put sugar on their sliced tomatoes. But if they do, like mine, then you understand the genius of this quote. 

Never heard of Will Cuppy? Allow me to introduce you. An American humorist and journalist, Cuppy was best-known for his mock-scientific observations of nature. Born in 1884 in Indiana, Cuppy lived and wrote for many years in New York, before taking his own life in 1949. Writing funny but factual magazine articles was Cuppy's real talent. Many of Cuppy's articles for The New Yorker and other magazines were later collected as books, including How to Attract the Wombat, one of my personal favorites. I mean, who doesn't want to know how to swat a fly? This book will tell you just that, in an article in which Cuppy codifies the essentials of this simple activity in ten hilarious principles. These articles are not necessarily factual though they are equally not untrue. Cuppy writes short, darkly humorous articles, perfect for when one only has a few minutes to read, and needs a laugh. We also read them out loud in our house, and that is real hoot!

Cuppy was reclusive and cultivated the image of a curmudgeon, but he had many friends in New York's literary circles. If you are a fan of writings from the golden age of humor (late 1920's-early 1950's), writers such as Robert Benchley, James Thurber, and S.J. Perelman, then I urge you to seek out Will Cuppy's works. Multnomah County Library owns several, and our friendly staff is always available to help you locate more Will Cuppy via Interlibrary Loan. Happy reading!

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A while back I told all ya’ll about The Disappearing Spoon by Sam Keane. Loved it. It inspired me to order up a poster of the periodic table and stick it on my living room wall, thinking that if it was in front of my eyeballs, there may be some passive absorption. It kinda worked--I learned the noble gases, but really it was just the pressure of a pub trivia team that inspired that. Still I want to understand this stuff at a level higher than my C in high school chemistry.

In an effort to up my game I watched Hunting the Elements by PBS/NOVA. I’ll be honest, based on the boring cover, my hopes were not terribly high. It was ~amazing~. One dude actually made a wooden periodic table, the size of a real dining room table, and gave each element its own little compartment.  If I had that in my house I could pick up and hold a sample of molybdenum. Super cool and very practical. There are enough violent explosions and deadly gases throughout to keep things lively, plus who wouldn’t love to see how gold bricks are made?

The book, The Periodic Table: A Visual Guide to the Elements,  is essentially a field guide, just two pages per element--one a color picture of the element and the other its most interesting info. Platinum, for example, is a precious metal used all the time in jewelry, as we know, but it’s also essential in your car’s catalytic converter.

So, in my expert opinion as an armchair science girl, I think anyone with an interest would love the dvd. Have a kid who loves kitchen-science experiments? Watch it with them. But also, anyone who may struggle with a chemistry class in the near future might like both in combination. Perhaps even as a preemptive strike at understanding before the struggle begins. Seeing and hearing info in a different way can make a huge, helpful difference . It certainly did for me.

What do writers need? Virginia Woolf famously said that “a woman must have money and a room of her own if she is to write fiction” (in the essay A Room of One’s Own), but of course that’s not all, and not for everyone (men, poets, playwrights…). Writers need time, and space to pursue their craft. Writers need support, which can take the form of opportunities to read aloud, or to hear other writers talking about writing, or a community of supportive critical readers.

There are lots of organizations in the Portland area that offer resources for writers! Some are free, others are cheap (though not all). They involve various commitments of time. Here are some local organizations, roughly grouped  - but you’ll see that they are hard to categorize… 

Writing groups, workshops, and classes

The Attic Institute presents workshops, classes, and individual consultation about writing projects.

Lewis and Clark Northwest Writing Institute offers classes for community members.

The Mountain Writers Series presents monthly readings and writing workshops. The links section of their webpage connects to a huge number of other local organizations!

The Multnomah Arts Center offers some wonderful literary arts classes.

PDX Writers facilitates workshops and retreats.

Portland State University has a few different graduate programs in writing.

VoiceCatcher is a nonprofit connecting and empowering women writers in Portland.

Write Around Portland offers free creative writing workshops in social service settings, and creates publication and reading opportunities for workshop participants.

Membership organizations

The Independent Publishing Resource Center (IPRC) offers resources and workshops related to printing and book-making. They also have certificate programs in creative nonfiction/fiction, poetry, and comics/graphic novels.

Oregon Poetry Association, Oregon’s oldest and largest literary organization, offers community, contests, and conferences.

Oregon Writers Colony offers community, conferences and workshops, and the use of a beach house writing retreat!

Rose City Romance Writers, the Portland, Oregon chapter of Romance Writers of America, educates, supports, and mentors published and unpublished romance writers.

Willamette Writers hosts regular meetings for the exchange of ideas related to writing and craft.

Reading series

Literary Arts’ programs include Portland Arts and Lectures, Writers in the Schools, the Oregon Book Awards and Fellowships, and Delve Readers Seminars.

LitHop PDX is an annual literary pub crawl featuring many readings at different venues.

There are many different reading series in Portland! You could head out to hear writers read their work at the Mountain Writers series, the Spare Room series, the Loggernaut reading series, the Bad Blood poetry reading series, Burnt Tongue, If Not for Kidnap, Unchaste Readers, Soft Show, or The Switch... you could catch a reading when the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (FWWA) Pacific Northwest Reading Series has a Portland event...  or you could see one of the many readings at Powell's Books! KBOO also maintains a list of regular readings in the Portland area.

Conferences/Festivals/Big events

Ooligan Press’s Write to Publish Conference aims to demystify the publishing industry for emerging writers.

At the Portland Zine Symposium, zine and minicomic creators sell and trade their self-published creations.

Wordstock is Portland’s biggest annual literary festival, featuring author readings, writing contests, workshops, exhibits and a book fair.

Other stuff

Oregon Authors is a great general resource for information about authors in Oregon! The site is a collaboration between Oregon Library Association and Oregon Center for the Book. It includes a great list of readers and writers groups in Oregon.

Last but certainly not least, Multnomah County’s Central Library offers the Sterling Room for Writers, where writers can find a quiet work space in close proximity to all the resources the library has to offer. Interested writers must submit an application and be approved to gain access to the room.

Sometimes children do horrible things. Sometimes children are horrible things. Well, in fiction, at any rate.

In Mike Carey’s new book, The Girl with All the Gifts, the titular girl is one of those horrible ones. But she doesn’t know it, at least not at the beginning of the novel.

Melanie spends most of her life alone in a cell. Every weekday morning she is bound by soldiers that handle her with prods and cuffs, then take her to a schoolroom full of similarly restrained children. There Melanie, with her voracious and brilliant mind, learns a great deal about the world that used to be. Her favorite lessons are from her beloved teacher Miss Justineau, who teaches her about the Greek myths.

Slowly Melanie learns that her life is the way it is for a good reason. At first she cannot believe she is so dangerous, but she bravely, impressively, does accept it. In fact, she practically embraces it, using her power to protect the one person she loves.

Carey has created an ultra-compelling story of a lovable fiend. For other stories with really, really bad children check out the list My beloved monster.

June is weddings and honeymoons, summer camps and vacations; time to get ready for life in the future or step back from the life you are living.

Journeys are begun that can lead to escape from the mundane. Dorothy Gilman of Mrs. Pollifax fame offers three works that could be travelogues due to the exquisite descriptions of culture and country off the tourist path. Yet they are also explorations of the inner terrain, the place where we really are when we know who we are.

Incident at Badamya is set in war-torn Burma in the 1950’s. Europeans traveling the river Irrawaddy are kidnapped and held for ransom by freedom fighters/terrorists. Enter sixteen-year-old Gen Ferris. Born and reared in Burma, she is newly orphaned and on her way to an America which she knows only from movie magazines. Dangerously innocent, relentlessly honest she is a catalyst for change. Masks are ripped off, dark secrets come to light as the detainees plot and plan their escape. The reader learns anew that ‘to thine own self be true’ is the magic in the real world.

Uncertain Voyage and Caravan complete the trio. Find yourself in 1960’s Europe, newly divorced and diagnosed with mental disease. Or take a journey across the Sahara sands as a slave in the early days of WWI. Both are worthy companions for long, lazy days full of lemonade or margaritas, whichever is your preference.

I was practically sobbing last summer as I scrubbed away eleven years worth of smudges and fingerprints on the walls of a hallway leading down to my basement. Not because I don’t especially enjoy housework, or because it's hard getting a house ready to sell when you've lived in it for a long time with a rather slovenly family, or because the prospect of finding a new house to buy was stressful, although all those things are true. My face was wet with tears because a character I’d come to love in my audio book had met a terribly sad end. When my husband, who was doing some other chore, passed by on his way to the basement and gave me a quizzical look, I flopped back my hair to show him my headphones, and he nodded. 

I'm too busy-- just like everyone else in the 21st Century, right?--but I have to have books in my life, not only because they matter to me, but because staying on top of what’s happening in the world of books is part of my job. Audio books have been my secret weapon. I can read on the way to Trader Joe's, while I make fish tacos for dinner, while I get the exercise that is so important to my mood, while I clean up the clutter in my house. 

I resisted audio books for awhile. The experience is, admittedly, different from reading a “real” book. And I tend to try to save things that are deeper or more complex for reading on an actual printed page. But some books are actually better in audio. I always feel a little sad for people who are checking out David Sedaris' printed books at the library, because I love them so much in Sedaris’s very unique voice. And listening to Caitlin Moran’s How to Be a Woman is an absolutely lovely experience. Her current English accent is very pleasant to listen to, but sometimes in the course of the story, she uses the accent she had in her working class, Northern English childhood, which is hilarious. Libba Bray’s The Diviners is set in 1920s New York City, and the voice actor does an astonishing job with a wide variety of characters. There's a showgirl who sounds a lot like Mae West, and the main character sounds a little like Gracie Allen. The reader's narration brings an already wonderful book to life and makes it even better. And did you know that there’s an audio book of Graham Greene’s romantic, moody novel, The End of the Affair that is read by Colin Firth? Come on. Colin Firth speaking right into your ears. This could make even cleaning out the cat box a transcendent experience. If you enjoy audio books and want ideas for a new one to listen to, take a look at some lists I made. There's one for young adult fiction, one for adult fiction, and one list of great audio books that are read by the author. And please-- let me know if there are more good books in our collection that you think are better in the audio version.

Summer is here! Maybe you’ve got some plans to pile the kids in the car and set out on a family road trip. Just a half hour down the road, your teenager is ear-budded-up staring glumly out the window, your tween is playing some game on a handheld and driving everyone crazy with the grunts and sighs of competition, and your youngest is starting to get a little restless (“Are we there yet?”).  Is someone feeling a little carsick? Could it be time for an audiobook?

The books on the lists below have a little something for everyone, and won’t make Mom or Dad fall asleep from boredom.  Nothing too violent, scary, sexy or literary for this road trip, yet the adventures will make the miles roll by.  

If you’ve listened to a great book on a family road trip, let us know in the comments.