The Phantom Tollbooth by Norton Juster

OH, this book. If you know me in person, I’ve probably told you you must read it. If you’ve read here for any length of time, you’ve come across a post or two singing its praises. This is hands down my favorite middle-grade novel of all time (and that’s saying something!). My book club, The Dead Authors Society, read it earlier this year. It was (roughly) my thirtieth time through. (You’ve read that correctly. I first read about Milo’s adventures as a sixth grader, then during my student teaching days, then with scores of kids in various classrooms, then with my own children. It’s been ten years since I’ve visited The Lands Beyond, and everything I’ve ever said or thought about this book holds true. It’s witty, clever, insightful, timely [fifty-plus years after it first published], and pretty much perfect.)

When Milo, a boy who “doesn’t know what to do with himself — not just sometimes but always” receives a strange package (“for Milo, who has plenty of time”), he assembles it to find a tollbooth that ushers him into The Lands Beyond, where the Kingdom of Wisdom is falling apart. Feuding brothers King Azaz, the Unabridged (ruler of Dictionopolis), and the Mathemagician (ruler of Digitopolis), have banished princesses Rhyme and Reason. It’s Milo’s job to bring them back, restoring order to Wisdom. Every page is magic! If you haven’t yet, please, please read this book. Here’s a picture of my beloved copy.

Kristin Lavransdatter by Sigrid Undset

I’ve been meaning to read this trilogy for the last twenty years (that’s no exaggeration). When a book club friend suggested it for our list this year, I was all in. The trilogy is the key reason why Undset won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1928, which was given for her “powerful descriptions of Northern life during the Middle Ages.”

Set in fourteenth century Norway, the books (The Wreath, The Wife, and the Cross) tell the story of Kristin’s girlhood, her marriage to the dashing-but-not-so-decent Erlend, their tumultuous relationship, and the eight sons they share. There are all sorts of interesting medieval daily life details, like wearing eating utensils on a belt at your waist or putting a knife or axe under a baby’s crib to keep it healthy. The characters are fabulous and complex and wonderfully human. A complicated storyline involves Simon, the man Kristin was betrothed to when she met Erlend, who eventually marries her younger sister (though he still carries a torch for Kristin). Truly, an epic saga spanning generations and covering treasonous plots, love, loyalty, faith, and fate. Since reading, I’ve heard all sorts of people say this series is on their best of the best list. I absolutely understand why.

Kristin Lavransdatter reminded me of one of my all-time favorites, Katherine by Anya Seton.

The Dead Romantics by Ashley Poston

This book is so charming and clever and fun! Florence Day, a failed romance novelist, finally finds success ghostwriting for a bestselling romance author. The only problem is she can’t finish the last book in her contract. She’s stuck because after a disappointing breakup she no longer believes in love.

Florence meets her new handsome editor, Ben, but he is unsympathetic about extending her deadline again. Then Florence gets a call. Her dad, a mortician, has died unexpectedly. She needs to go home, a place she hasn’t been for years because she’s been avoiding a few things, and well, she sees ghosts. And the next ghost she happens to see is none other than Ben.

This was a great read that was light in tone but had some powerful things to say about love and loss. I loved the writing and publishing bits and pieces peppered in. Also, a ghostwriter who sees ghosts? Too fun.

What have you been reading lately?

I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately. For years, actually. I guess the key word here is good and how a reader chooses to define it.

Back in my younger days, before I started writing or was just starting out, I had very particular opinions about what made a book good, snooty opinions that meant my views trumped others’ tastes and preferences. It was only when I got serious about writing that I realized just how difficult it is to tell any sort of story with any measure of success. I noticed the books I had formerly considered “beneath” me had readers who loved them. Who was I to decide those books weren’t good? It was around this time I shifted from categorizing books as “good” or “bad” to determining if a book was a good fit for me.

In college, my favorite class (by far!) was adolescent literature, taught by Albuquerque author Jeanne Whitehouse Peterson. I loved my class and my professor so much I cried when it was over.* Jeanne taught my class of future teachers so much about children’s literature. She was adamant that we use the word “enjoy” instead of “like or dislike” when discussing the books we’d read. Pushing us to find something to appreciate about a text (whether we liked a book or not) was what made a discussion rich and made reading a more interactive experience. I carried this concept into my teaching days, challenging my students to find what they enjoyed about a story even if they didn’t particularly like it.

Lately I’ve been thinking about preferences and how much they shape what we bring to a book. You might read a book’s jacket copy and have particular expectations going in that you feel aren’t met once you begin reading. You might not be the type of person who likes XYZ when it comes to storytelling. This happens sometimes to me when I read. It happens in my critique group, too, when someone points out something (or I point out something) that doesn’t feel like it’s working when really, in that particular situation, it’s not working for that specific reader. It’s a preference thing, in other words. Sometimes it happens when people come to my books and don’t get what they were looking for or find something that’s not to their taste (“I don’t like multiple point of view books” or “I wish there had been some reference material included” or you get the idea). I’m trying to be aware of my preferences and expectations when I come to a piece of writing. I’m trying to remember this when others read my books, too. I often think of something my critique partner, Uma Krishnaswami once said:

Few books are perfect. If you read like a writer you must read to gain what you can from each book, so reading then becomes a generous act. I tell my students they must learn to be generous readers and judge each book not by whether it’s the book they would have written but by whether it fulfilled the writer’s apparent intention for it.

That’s where I land nowadays as a reader. What can I appreciate about the book I’m reading, even if it’s not my preference? (I’m so glad for a book club that sometimes pushes me beyond my preferences, by the way! It is good to grow and good to be challenged.) Has the author fulfilled her purpose in writing it, as far as I can tell? This is a generous way to read. Whether a book is to my taste or not (and my taste has really broadened over the years).

You might notice I never publicly speak poorly of another author’s work (though I still have opinions! Listen in on a book club discussion sometime!). This was a personal decision I made once my own books were published.

I’m curious: How do you determine if a book is good? How much do preference and expectation play into the way you experience a book? How do you choose to talk about the books that aren’t for you? Comment below or hit reply if you’re reading this over email. And if you know anyone who might find this conversation interesting, I encourage you to pass it along!

*Imagine my surprise when, years later and living in Albuquerque again, I discovered she had once been a member of my beloved critique group! I get to see Jeanne when my group meets annually for our Christmas dinner. It has been such a pleasure to know this former teacher I admired so much now as a peer and friend.

Listening to lots of readers talk about their reading lives, it’s clear that sometimes readers don’t read. Give yourself some grace. Every reading experience influences our reading lives, including time periods when we choose not to read. …Our reading lives ebb and flow. We just finished a book we loved and want to pause. We’ve abandoned our last three books and need a break. We have to read something for work or class and we don’t have time to read something else. Reading is easy to back burner. It’s a forgiving pastime. When you don’t make time to read, your book will wait. And wait. And wait.
— Donalyn Miller

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Mark your calendars! A MIRACULOUS reading Saturday, April 29 at 11:00am, at Albuquerque’s newest bookstore, Books on the Bosque.