Banned Books Week

Gulliver's Travels by Jonathon Swift
Originally uploaded by hatcher.library

The week of September 29 through October 6 is Banned Books Week. This is a week when those of us who read should remember those books that folks, for a wide variety of reasons, have tried to take out of our hands.

The list is long and diverse. Would-be censors right, left and center have all challenged books. The urge to stifle thought that we don't agree with is universal; we all have a duty to combat that urge within ourselves.

It is interesting to note that more than "banned" books, we now speak of "challenged" books. These are books that someone is trying to keep us from reading, either by banning or by raising an un-holy stink about them.

The American Library Association's Office for Intellectual Freedom points to this quote from Ray Bradbury (author of Fahrenheit 451):

You don't have to burn books to destroy a culture. Just get people to stop reading them.

Thus we see campaigns that complain loudly about certain books. They may or may not call for book-banning, but they all can lead librarians, teachers, parents and readers to shy away from certain books. And that is not good.

Half-Year Books-Read Update

I'm using a site called GoodReads to track my reading this year. At the halfway point of the year, I can report that I have read thirty books so far this year. I'm about half-way through number thirty-one. Twenty-seven of the thirty-one books have been library books. I have purchased four.

Looking back at last year at this time, I see that my pace of reading is almost the same. On June 30 last year I had finished thirty-one books and the ration of library books to purchased books was exactly the same.

I guess I'm predictable.

Books in 2009

I've chosen a tool to try out as my books and reading tracker for 2009. I was looking for a way to track my reading for the year; different from the WordPress blog I tried in 2008.

I did some poking around and looked into several different book-lover sites. I also considered creating a Google Docs spreadsheet to track my books. But when I took a look at goodreads, set up to "improve the process of reading and learning throughout the world," I decided to give it a shot.

It looks like it will allow me to maintain a list of books organized into "shelves." I'm starting with to-read, currently-reading, read, library-book, and owned. I may add more later. It comes with lots of metadata about books built-in and is set up as a social site, encouraging reviews and recommendations among users.

I've added a goodreads widget to the left-hand side-bar. It tracks books as I finish them. We'll see how it works out.

2010 Metrics: Reading

I read 60 books in 2010, down a bit from my reading totals in 2008 and 2009.

All but two of the books I read were fiction, the exceptions being The Blind Side, by Michael Lewis, and Craig Ferguson's outstanding memoir American on Purpose. I like fiction. I read for entertainment and escape and I usually choose fiction.

As my word cloud of authors shows, I read a few folks more than once last year. I read three by Chris Knopf, who writes anti-hero mysteries set in Southampton. I like the off-beat nature of his characters and the fact that he sets his stories in a beach resort, often off-season. It rings bells for me. I also read three of Neil Gaiman's books. All of these I had read before. Mr. Gaiman is a personal favorite.

Among those I read twice was Jack Kerouac, who appealed to me this past fall for some reason. I really enjoyed travelling back to his time.

As usual, most of the books I read in 2010 came from the Lewes Public Library. Forty-seven -- 78% -- were library books and thirteen -- 22% -- I either bought or borrowed from family members.

2009 Metrics: Reading

I read 63 books during 2009. That's almost exactly the same as my total for 2008 (which I find a little freaky).

I find that, of the books I read, 51 were checked-out from the Lewes Public Library, 11 were books I own (either gifts or books I bought), and 1 was borrowed (The first in a series by Owen Parry, handed off to me by my brother Matt, who often finds great novels for us to read.

2009 Book Montage

Mike's favorite books »

For 2009, I used a web site called GoodReads to track my reading. Ill be looking around this weekend for where to track reading in 2010. I'm leaning towards designing my own Google Docs spreadsheet.