"It is always the simple that produces the marvelous." -- Amelia Barr --

"Each day provides its own gifts." -- Marcus Aurelius --

The Yearling

 

Title: The Yearling

Author: Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings

Rating: ★★★★★

Ages: 10 - 18+

    Back Cover Synopsis:

    In this classic story of the Baxter family of inland Florida and their wild, hard, satisfying life, Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings has written one of the great novels of our times. 

    A rich and varied story - tender in its understanding of boyhood, crowded with the excitement of the backwoods hunt, with vivid descriptions of the primitive, beautiful hammock country with humor and earthy philosophy - The Yearling is a novel for readers of all tastes and ages. Its glowing picture of life that is far and refreshingly removed from modern patterns of living becomes universal in its revelation of simple courageous people and the abiding beliefs they live by. 

 "The whole world opened to me when I learned to read." -- Mary McLeod Bethune

 "To acquire the habit of reading is to construct for yourself a refuge from almost all the miseries of life." -- W. Somerset Maugham --

 "Literature is the most agreeable way of ignoring life." -- Fernando Pessoa --

 "If you would tell me the heart of a man, tell me not what he reads, but what he rereads." -- Francois Mauriac --

 "Reading furnishes the mind only with materials of knowledge; it is thinking that makes what we read ours." -- John Locke --

Jabberwocky by Lewis Carroll

Jabberwocky

by Lewis Carroll

’Twas brillig, and the slithy toves

      Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:

All mimsy were the borogoves,

      And the mome raths outgrabe.

“Beware the Jabberwock, my son!

      The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!

Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun

      The frumious Bandersnatch!”

He took his vorpal sword in hand;

      Long time the manxome foe he sought—

So rested he by the Tumtum tree

      And stood awhile in thought.

And, as in uffish thought he stood,

      The Jabberwock, with eyes of flame,

Came whiffling through the tulgey wood,

      And burbled as it came!

One, two! One, two! And through and through

      The vorpal blade went snicker-snack!

He left it dead, and with its head

      He went galumphing back.

“And hast thou slain the Jabberwock?

      Come to my arms, my beamish boy!

O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!”

      He chortled in his joy.

’Twas brillig, and the slithy toves

      Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:

All mimsy were the borogoves,

      And the mome raths outgrabe.

The Curve of Time

 

Title: The Curve of Time

Author: M. Wylie Blanchet

Rating: ★★★☆☆

Ages: 12 - 18+

   Back Cover Synopsis:

     This is a biography and an astonishing adventure story of a woman who, left a widow in 1927, packed her five children onto a 25-foot boat and cruised the coastal waters of British Columbia, summer after summer. 

    Muriel Wylie Blanchet acted singled-handedly as skipper, navigator, engineer and, of course, mum, as she saw her crew through encounters with tides, fog, storms, rapids, cougars and bears. She sharpened in her children a special interest in the ancient Haida culture and in nature itself. In this book, she left us with a sensitive and compelling account of their journeys. 

 "Autumn is the mellower season, and what we lose in flowers we more than gain in fruits." -- Samuel Butler --

 "You expected to be sad in the fall. Part of you died each year when the leaves fell from the trees and their branches were bare against the wind and the cold, wintery light. But you knew there would always be the spring, as you knew the river would flow again after it was frozen. When the cold rains kept on and killed the spring, it was as though a young person died for no reason." -- Ernest Hemingway, A Moveable Feast --

 "I loved autumn, the one season of the year that God seemed to have put there just for the beauty of it." -- Lee Maynard --

 "The white towers and golden domes of the church gleamed in the sapphire sky. The luxurian autumn asleep till morning. The silence of the earth seemed to merge with the silence of the heavens and the mystery of the earth touched the mystery of the stars." -- Fyodor Dostoyevsky --

 "Humanity's true moral test, its fundamental test . . . consists of its attitude towards those who are at its mercy: animals." -- Milan Kundera --

 "The great revolution in the history of man, past, present, and future, is the revolution of those determined to be free." -- John F. Kennedy --

The Invention of Hugo Cabret

Title: The Invention of Hugo Cabret

Author: Brian Selznick

Rating: ★★★★★

Ages: 10 - 18+

   Back Cover Synopsis:

     Orphan, clock keeper, and thief, Hugo lives in the walls of a busy Paris train station, where his survival depends on secrets and anonymity. But when his world suddenly interlocks - like the gears of the clocks he keeps - with an eccentric, bookish girl and a bitter old man who runs a toy booth in the train station, Hugo's undercover life and his most precious secret are put in jeopardy. A cryptic drawing, a treasured notebook, a stolen key, a mechanical man, and a hidden message from Hugo's dead father form the backbone of this intricate, tender, and spellbinding mystery. 

    With 284 pages of original drawings, and combining elements of picture book, graphic novel, and film, Brian Selznick breaks open the novel form to create an entirely new reading experience. Here is a stunning, cinematic tour de force from a boldly innovative storyteller, artist, and bookmaker. 

 "Freedom is the will to be responsible for ourselves." -- Friedrich Nietzsche --

 "They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety." -- Benjamin Franklin --

 "True freedom is impossible without a mind made free by discipline." -- Mortimer J. Adler --

 "I prefer liberty with danger to peace with slavery." -- Jean-Jaques Rosseau --

 "Music in the soul can be heard by the universe." -- Lao Tzu --

 "Music is the language of the spirit. It opens the secret of life bringing peace, abolishing strife." -- Kahil Gibran --

Esio Trot

Title: Esio Trot

Author: Roald Dahl

Rating: ★★★☆☆

Ages: 6 - 14

    Back Cover Synopsis:

    Mr Hoppy loves Mrs Silver. Mrs Silver loves Alfie the tortoise. Sometimes Mr Hoppy wishes he could become a tortoise. Until one day he finds a way to win Mrs Silver's heart, with the help of a little magic and some cabbage . . .

 "Music is the wine that fills the cup of silence." -- Robert Fripp --

 "Music is the strongest form of magic." -- Marilyn Manson --

 "If you cannot teach me to fly, teach me to sing." -- J. M. Barrie, Peter Pan --

 "It is what you read when you don't have to that determines what you will be when you can't help it." Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray --

 "You know you've read a good book when you turn the last page and feel a little as if you have lost a friend." -- Paul Sweeney --

 "You can never get a cup of tea large enough or a book long enough to suit me." -- C. S. Lewis --