Posted: Wed 07/27/2011 11:34 AM | By: Leigh Newman
It's Summer Reading Week at Oprah.com! This week we're profiling the writers and books that you love, as well as some unexpected tidbits about all things literary. Today's homage: Ann Patchett's new bookstore.
Photo: Melissa Ann Pinney
All of us have wondered, at one time or another, what it would be like to try a different profession—maybe without giving up the one we've already got. This week the Los Angeles Times reported that writer Ann Patchett—the genius behind this summer's beloved and bestselling novel State of Wonder—has just announced she's opening up her own bookstore in her hometown of Nashville. "I see this as a gift to the city," Patchett said. "Not as an investment, not as a smart business move, but really as somebody who loves Nashville..."
We chatted with Patchett about the nitty gritty of owning a store—from managing two careers to interviewing in-store pets.
Oprah.com:What kind of books do you want to feature: the classics? Modern fiction? Do you
have something unexpected or quirky that you'd love to put on that front table or in its own section? Ann Patchett: I'm an equal opportunity bookseller, though I will admit I despise furious
political nonfiction built on rumors and mean-spiritedness. I'd like to
not sell any of those. I certainly will want a little table of books I
love and love to recommend, like Edith Pearlman's short stories, and
Jeanette Haien's tiny and utterly perfect novel, The All of It, and, of course Moss Hart's autobiography, Act One. I'm just broken-hearted that I've already read Act One. It makes me feel better to think that other people are reading it.
Every week, we'll be letting you know about new releases the editors at O and Oprah.com couldn't stop reading. On sale today, a paperback that's required reading for anybody whose battled tragedy—without surrendering to the emotional monsters and muck. If you missed it in hardcover, please, please don't let it slip you by at the bookstore.
The genius plot: A 13-year-old girl tries to save her family's Florida alligator park while her sister communes with swamp ghosts and her brother works at the competing mega-attraction the World of Darkness.
The twist: Expect the heartbreaking and true, not just the wacky and possibly paranormal.
The riveting opening scene: "Mom swam...the entire length of the lake. People screamed and pointed whenever an alligator swam into the spotlight with her, a plump and switching tail cutting suddenly into its margarine wavelength, the spade of the monster's face jawing up at her side."
The moment that changes everything: "Hilola Jane Bigtree, world-class alligator wrestler, terrible cook, mother of three died in dryland hospital bed in West Davey on an overcast Wednesday March 10, at 3:12 p.m."
The bit of reptilian trivia we'll always remember: Alligators can run faster than Arabian horses on land.
Posted: Tue 07/26/2011 09:30 AM | By: Leigh Newman
Monday is too stressful. Wednesday is already hump day. But Tuesday is "you" day: a day when you have the energy to do—or plan—something fresh and unexpected that might just turn your whole week around.
So many of adults agonize over birthdays--what to give, how much to spend, what to ask for (and is it impolite to make a list when you're long, long past the age of childhood?). But nine-year old Rachel Beckwith knew exactly what to do about hers. She asked her family and friends to raise $300 for a charity that helps provide
clean water in developing countries.
This past Saturday, as CNN reported, Rachel passed away after a horrific 14-car accident near Bellevue Washington.
Out of respect, her community rallied around her birthday wish, sending out appeals on Facebook and Twitter, and this Monday, more than 2,366 donors had visited her
website, raising $126,509.
"On June 12th
2011, I'm turning 9," Rachel's website says. "I found out that millions of people don't live to see their 5th birthday. And why? Because they didn't have access to clean, safe water so I'm celebrating my birthday like never before. I'm asking from everyone I know to donate to my campaign."
Note her logic. In Rachel's mind, to celebrate meant to give. And that lives on.
Everybody has a dream. I would like to be a jazz singer or just finish a book (I am on year 11, regarding the latter). Diana Nyad wants to
swim from Key West, Florida, to Cuba—a trip that will take 60 hours in the open ocean. Along
the way, The New York Times reported, she will "most likely hallucinate and
endure the stings of countless jellyfish," and "sea salt will swell her tongue to cartoonish proportions and rub her skin raw."
But what we love is
that Nyad has tried this trip before—and failed at age 28. Back in 1978, due
to stormy weather, she had to give up the dream after 50 miles. She also
used a shark cage for protection. Thirty-three years
later, she's not only upping the ante by losing the cage, she also told The Times, "Physically, I am much stronger than I was before. I feel strong,
powerful, and endurance-wise, I'm fit."
Then there are the
money issues. She has $350,000. She needs a half million. She says, "If I wind up $150,000 in debt, I won't lose sleep over it."
Add to these issues the mental challenges. Swimming for long times, totally alone, in the sea, can
get, well, depressing, boring, painful and exhausting. Nyad's response? She sings a song with a beat that matches her stroke. Her favorite is "Ticket to Ride."
If you, like me, are
wondering at this point what makes this woman so unwavering, driven and
optimistic, if you are thinking, "Hey, why am I not like this? Do you have to
be born like this?" do not fear or beat yourself up. There's a more nuanced
reason for Nyad's belief in her dream. She took on this swim of a lifetime
because she was upset about turning 60—and she needed to turn those feelings around.
"This
is what I need to remedy my malaise," Nyad says. "There is no thinking about
regrets or what will I do with the rest of my life. I'm immersed in the
everyday, full tilt. It's so energizing."
Just a quick reminder to ourselves: Real triumph doesn't come from victory or defeat. It comes from what you do after you've experienced both.
It's Summer Reading Week at Oprah.com! This week we're profiling the writers and books that you love, as well as some unexpected tidbits about all things literary. Today's homage: Laura Ingalls Wilder (plus a few thoughts on Edgar Allan Poe and Flannery O'Connor)
As a girl, I was so in love with Laura Ingalls Wilder that I read all 10 of her Little House books. Then reread them. Then reread them again. Then, I bought her cookbook and diaries and letters and read those too, not just because I wanted to learn more about her via primary materials, but also because I just couldn't bear for our whole intimate relationship to end. (Apparently, I'm not alone—a new book called The Wilder Life explores just this syndrome.)
Should you find yourself in the same spot—yearning for more of an author, while running out of books to read—there is now a website that can help. Writers' Houses pays tribute to various author abodes all over the world. There is even a house finder that lets you search by author name or geographic location, which lead to me to this pastoral pic of Wilder's home in Mansfield, Missouri.
Photo: www.joleenenaylor.com
"We feature over 100 homes," says A.N. Devers, founder of the site. Her obsession with literary real estate began while studying at the University of Virginia, where the dorm room of Edgar Allan Poe is kept open to the students 24 hours a day, visible through a door covered in Plexiglas.
Posted: Thu 07/21/2011 10:04 AM | By: Leigh Newman
With the space shuttle's return to earth today, just about everybody in the nation has got a wacky case of landing mania. But let's roll back the clock 13 days, to July 8th, when Atlantis launched--and we noticed a story by CBS about a small town flag-loving librarian named Annie Platoff.
Platoff has undertaken the task of researching and locating the position of the six American flags planted on the moon during the Apollo missions. The simple act of raising a flag, it turns out, required intense preparations. Listen below as she describes how the thick astronaut gloves impeded gripping the slippery nylon, how a third horizontal bar had to be mounted to keep the flags from flopping down due to a lack of a breeze, and how micro-meteriods now threaten to puncture little holes in the still-waving stripes and stars.
What we loved most about all the flag-loving was Platoff herself. How in the world, we wondered, did this woman figure out her passion, which, by the way, comes with a delectable official name—vexillology.
"Well," she says. "It's funny, but I first fell in love as a kid. They had these flags of the world patches that you got in the mail if you sent in 3 Campbell's soup labels and one proof of purchase from a Premier saltine box."
Posted: Wed 07/20/2011 10:37 AM | By: Leigh Newman
On Sunday, I had a bathing suit moment. I went into a sporting goods store and tried on a bikini. It was a cute, unique bikini. It had mushrooms all over it and came from France. I jimmied my body into the thing. I looked at my back, then my front. I thought, "I don't look so awful. Except for the side flab, bottom-area situation."
A big gong went off. (Apparently dressing room attendants keep gongs around for Ah-a! moments.) What, I wondered, would it be like to think, "Hey! I look good! I look strong and ready to swim the English channel!" I hustled away from the mirror, back into the store. Suddenly tennis rackets and water shoes and kayaks were pointing accusingly at me from all corners of the room. "I don't work out," I wanted to confess to them. "I want to! But I'm busy and tired and my back hurts and I haven't worked out for (gulp) 5 years. I have flab. This is bad for my health and strength and mind--forget the bikini!"
On Monday, I decided to try to find a gym or some kind of class: pilates, yoga, whatever came along. I walked the streets around my office; I saw healthy, strong people sweating on machines through windows. I thought the exact thoughts that Jennifer Hudson described in her video, reflecting on how she used to feel before getting in shape: "A lot of the time you see all the fit people, and you think 'I shouldn't be here with them. I'll never get there.'"
Discouraged, I went back to work, and, by some quirky miracle, I saw this video. I laughed until I re-found my inspiration--because I am not being asked to overcome a genetic fear of water or to wear a proud, patient, thoughtful expression while crooning, quasi-disco music plays as soundtrack to my experience. All I have to do is get on the treadmill and put on foot in front of the other. All I have to do is think of my inner big kitty--and commit.
Posted: Wed 07/20/2011 07:53 AM | By: Leigh Newman
Photo: ThinkStock
Is there love after
love?After a painful breakup, it
can feel like you'll never want to see a certain someone again. You might even
want to, say, dump all his (or her) overpriced, pretentious, toasted-gold-and-ego
flavored coffee into the cat litter box, stir it up, and the scoop it all
back into the coffee bag--so that he (or she) will have a delightful early morning
drink the first morning in his (or her) new, much larger (!) apartment.
Which is why the world works
in more mysterious, wiser ways.
The story behind the memoir: A boy's joyous and politically uncertain childhood in Kenya, his travels around the globe as a full-grown man—and then all the way back to Kenya to learn about the meaning of home.
The person we loved:
Mum, whose "voice is soft, and tingly" so that "people get tingly
with her and do what she says."
The Swahili word we
learned:nyatiti (a traditional instrument)
The scene made for
falling in love with Africa: "The
wind swoops down, God breathes, and across the lake a million flamingos rise,
the edges of Lake Nakuru lift, like pink skirts swollen by petticoats..."
The scene made for considering the complexities of Africa: The Swedish men who come to Wainaina's elementary
school to teach the young but English-speaking children about cow manure, which the Swedes mistakenly call "fecal martyr." "With this new fuel," the Swedes kindly explain, "you can light your bulbs and
cook your food. You will become balance dieted; if you are industrious perhaps
you can run a small ... food mill and engage in income-generating activities. ... This is called development and we are here to raise your awareness."
The Oprah blog is a place where you can find engaging news coverage, fresh inspiration, and the straight talk you've come to count on. A place that
provides the tools you need to make a change—if not in the world—then at
least in your little corner of it. It's a place that will raise your energy, lower your blood pressure and
occasionally make you laugh—in short, a place of possibility.
