Just What The World Needs...Another Blog

All right, I admit it. I saw Julie & Julia, and since then, all I've wanted is to start my own blog. Fame, fortune and a book deal will follow forthwith, I'm sure, although if the fact that it took me more than a year after I saw the movie to start a blog is any indication, I'd better not quit my day job.

My day job, of course, is what led me to this blog topic - books. I'm an English teacher, a reading specialist, and I'm in the process of getting a degree to become a librarian. I like books. More than like, really. I love books. I'll read any book, and will frequently read them until they're falling apart, pages fluttering away (I don't imagine that my future will involve employment in any rare books archives, sadly). It makes me sad to think about how many people don't love books, and how many who do like them prioritize things like American Idol over reading (I can be superior about not watching American Idol, since I haven't watched since Bo Bice lost to Carrie Underwood in a teeny-bopper driven miscarriage of justice).

The problem with finding a good book is often that we all judge books by their covers. That's not social commentary, it's just fact. We look at cover art, the title, and maybe the blurb on the back, and we're in or out. Maybe sometimes we listen to Oprah, or actually read one of the thousands of emails Amazon sends out, but mostly, book choice is a browser's paradise. Or not.

So...in true Julie & Julia fashion, I'm issuing myself a challange: I will read and review at least two books a week until the start of the 2011 school year (that's almost 14 months. I'm already more dedicated than Julie). Most of the books will be young adult titles, because my other goal is to try to incorporate more reading into my students' lives (but I won't blog on that one, since I would likely erupt into screaming frustration on a regular basis if I had to chronicle all the reasons teenagers present me regarding why Reading is Dumb). I don't want to repeat authors, but I'm considering that one more a guideline than a rule. I'll probably have to work out a scale eventually, but I'd probably leave out essential elements, so we'll let that develop as it will.

While reading is essentially solitary, there's no cooler community than a community of readers. Toward that end, I'd love recommendations, so long as you promise not to be mad at me if I don't love one of the books you love. Share this blog with whomever you want, and please let me know what you think (nicely - I am fragile).

Bookishly Yours,
Lori

PS I read Julie and Julia: My Year of Cooking Dangerously
also. And My Life in France. They were both awesome, in completely different ways. I have not read Julie Powell's second book, Cleaving: A Story of Marriage, Meat, and Obsession, yet, because it deals with butchering and infidelity and, while I have no objections to reading about either, it seems that if they're put together in one book it ought to be a true crime story. See what I mean about browsing?