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... with all gratitude to my generous father, who shared his Hilton Head Island home with me for a few brief glittering days.

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Woodson, Jacqueline. 2014. Brown Girl Dreaming. New York: Penguin.

Despite the title, Brown Girl Dreaming is most certainly not just a book for brown girls or girls.  Jacqueline Woodson's memoir-in-verse relates her journey to discover her passion for writing. Her story is framed by her large, loving family within the confines of the turbulent Civil Rights Era.

Sometimes a book is so well-received, so popular, that it seems that enough has been said (and said well); anything else would just be noise. Rather than add another Brown Girl Dreaming review to the hundreds of glowing ones already in print and cyberspace, I offer you links to other sites, interviews and reviews related to Brown Girl Dreaming.  And, I'll pose a question on memoirs in children's literature.

First, the links:

• Brown Girl Dreaming is a National Book Award Finalist in the Young People's Literature category. 
• Jacqueline Woodson was interviewed on NPR regarding Brown Girl Dreaming.
• Read an excerpt from Brown Girl Dreaming here.
• Even the prestigious Christian Science Monitor carried a review of Brown Girl Dreaming - the review written by award-winning author, Augusta Scattergood.
• Elizabeth Bird's "Fuse 8" review of Brown Girl Dreaming - thoughtful and insightful, as always
• AudioFile Magazine's review of Brown Girl Dreaming and an excerpt - read by Jacqueline Woodson herself
• New York Times Sunday Book Review of Brown Girl Dreaming

And now something to ponder:

As a librarian who often helps students in choosing books for school assignments, I have written many times about the dreaded biography assignment - excessive page requirements,  narrow specifications, etc.

Obviously, a best choice for a children's book is one written by a noted children's author. Sadly, many (by no means all!) biographies are formula-driven, series-type books that are not nearly as engaging as ones written by the best authors.  Rare is the author of young people's literature who writes an autobiography for children as Ms. Woodson has done.  When such books exist, they are usually memoirs focusing only on the author's childhood years.  This is perfectly appropriate because the reader can relate to that specified period of a person's lifetime.  Jon Sciezska wrote one of my favorite memoirs for children, Knucklehead, and Gary Paulsen's, How Angel Peterson Got his Name also comes to mind as a stellar example.  These books, however, don't often fit the formula required to answer common student assignment questions, i.e., birth, schooling, employment, marriages, accomplishments, children, death. Students are reluctant to choose a book that will leave them with a blank space(s) on an assignment.

I wonder what teachers, other librarians and parents think about this. Must the biography assignment be a traditional biography, or can a memoir (be it in verse, prose, or graphic format) be just as acceptable?  I hate to see students turn away from a great book because it doesn't fit the mold.  If we want students to be critical thinkers, it's time to think outside the box and make room for a more varied, more diverse selection of books.

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I was lucky enough to hear Jacqueline Woodson speak about and read from Brown Girl Dreaming during the School Library Journal Day of Dialog last spring.  If any of you have seen Woodson before, you know she is charming, and dynamic and funny.  She read a few poems from the book and spoke of her family and writing life.  Like the rest of the librarians, I waited in line to speak with Ms. Woodson and have an arc signed, but 10 minutes or so into the wait I knew this arc wasn't going to be for me to keep.  Instead, I had it signed for a student and gave it to her when I saw her next.   So like so many others, I waited for the book birthday to get my hands on the hard cover copy on the day of its' release.

I'm not sure I can add much to the conversation around this book, as I agree with the buzz.  Brown Girl Dreaming is more than a book or a memoir....it is a gift.  We follow Jacqueline and her changing family from Ohio to South Carolina and up to NYC and each poem is a revelation of sorts that brings the reader through the timeline of Woodson's life.  From the "how to listen" haikus to poems like "sometimes, no words are needed", "stevie", and "as a child, i smelled the air" I found myself closing the book to pause again and again.

I had posted a photo of "stevie" on Instagram and commented that I was swooning over this book, and a friend commented that her copy is so dog-eared that she isn't going to share it with her students.  It made me comment back that this is the kind of book you carry around with you.  I will take the dust jacket off, and place it in my school bag.  And when the world gets to be a little too much, I will open the pages and gift myself with a little bit of magic.

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COLUMBIA, South Carolina – Longtime Realtor Rusty Shealy knows the value of a good piece of property. So after months of searching, he jumped at the opportunity to purchase a home with 4.5 wooded acres, the perfect place to build … Continue reading →

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I picked up a book recently because it’s set in New Orleans. The plot sounded okay, but really, New Orleans. As someone who used to live in the American Lowcountry, I miss the South. As an Anne Rice fan, I feel I’ve visited New Orleans many times, even though I haven’t.

I was excited to start this book, escape the desert for a while, and be lulled into a sensuous stupor by the sights, sounds, and smells of what many consider the most beautiful city in the world.

To say I’ve been disappointed is an understatement. Here’s what I’ve gotten so far: “There was something about New Orleans—something about the air itself—a certain sultriness found nowhere else, that silky touch of humidity on skin like fingertips dragged slowly over your flesh.”

Great! And that was the first line. Since that first line, nothing, nadda. The author could be writing about Wall, South Dakota, and I wouldn’t know. Where is my French Quarter? Where is the overwhelming, sweet scent of magnolia? Where are the horse-drawn buggies for tourists?

I’ll tell you where: in New Orleans. But not in this author’s book.

As a writer, setting is important. In my novels (even in my short stories), the city becomes a character. When I wrote Life without Harry, my readers rejoiced over places they recognized and couldn’t wait to visit places they did not. Same goes for Something about a Ghost, set in Phoenix. You know damn well you’re in Phoenix. You feel the dry heat and smell the spring-blooming orange blossoms. You see the purple-red sunsets, because Phoenix has a persona. Setting should have a persona.

As I mentioned, I was once lucky enough to live in the American Lowcountry. I lived in Charleston, South Carolina (aka “Heaven on Earth”), and the novel I’m writing at present takes place there. An excerpt:

“The air felt crisp, clean, light, and although most of the flowers were long dead, the air still smelled like some sweet bloomer over the usual scent of saltwater and wet sand. He clunked down the metal stairs that led to the ground floor and paused as his boat shoes met grass.

“He walked through the yard and its overabundance of dormant gardenia plants, their waxy leaves still green and lush despite the chill. The Crepe Myrtles at the end of his sidewalk were almost bare, beyond a few dark orange leaves that clung. He pulled a leaf free and held it between his fingers as he took a left and walked down Church Street toward Battery Park.

“He passed the houses where rich people lived, passed their well-kept gardens, their BMWs. He passed over brick roads, beneath the sprawling, wicked arms of Angel Oaks. He paused at Stoll’s Alley, a tiny walkway of brick, overwrought with climbing ivy—one of his usual short cuts—and kept moving until he entered Battery Park, the very tip of the Charleston peninsula.

“He stayed on the edge of the Battery. He stood on the walkway overlooking the harbor with his elbows leaned against the cold metal rail. The sky was cloudy, so the water looked dark green, tumultuous as though a storm would soon arrive. In the distance, he could see Fort Sumter and an American flag that flapped in the wind. There was a wind, a slight one that brushed softly over his face and brought with it the smell of dead fish.”

Do you smell the smells? See the sights? Feel the air? I hope so. I worked hard to take you to Charleston, even if you’ve never been there. This is setting, and for some reason, we’ve forgotten it. We’ve gotten so caught up in plot, character, conflict—but what is a story without a world, a sense of place?

This is a reminder to writers and readers alike: don’t let books get away with weak settings. Don’t be lulled by pretty people. People are but a thin pie slice of what is really happening in a story. Don’t disappoint me. I’ll find you and write about you on my blog.

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What a glorious part of the country Greenville and Spartanburg, South Carolina, proved to be. And what enormously generous hosts I had in my friends Susan Tekulve and Rick Mulkey. We walked, we talked, we taught, we ate, we found flowers, fresh and unsnowy. In the process, I met incredible students and community members, read from Going Over, Flow, and Nest. Flight. Sky., and shared some thoughts about the writing life.

And then there was this: I saw old friends. The glorious Carolyn Wilson Baughman, of whom you last heard when I was in Asheville, NC, for her sister, Katherine's, wedding. The incredible Lois Carlisle, of whom I spoke after returning from the National YoungArts program in Miami. And Lisa Hammond (and her friend Joyce)—Lisa being the mom of another terrific National YoungArts scholar, Laura Rashley, and a poet herself.

So much good feeling. So many indelible memories. An early spring.

Thank you, Susan, Rick, Converse College, friends and community.

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COLUMBIA, South Carolina — Rusty Shealy Pole Vault Club has pledged five 3-Day Summer Vault Camp slots, valued at $425, for vault fans who contribute $375 to Maggie’s Audiobook Campaign! Coach Rusty Shealy is eager to help narrator Tavia Gilbert … Continue reading →

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COLUMBIA, South Carolina — Rusty Shealy Pole Vault Club has pledged five 3-Day Summer Vault Camp slots, valued at $425, as a reward for vault fans who contribute $375 to Maggie’s Audiobook Campaign! The camps includes meals and lodging and … Continue reading →

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Students at McDonald Green Elementary School in Lancaster, South Carolina, are participating in a competition called the Living Literature Project.

 

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We (unintentionally) started a debate about the origin of the word “buckaroo” with our quiz Can you speak American? last week. In an excerpt from Richard Bailey’s Speaking American, he argues that it comes from the West African language Efik (pages 52-54). A response from OED editor Dr. Katrin Thier will follow.

Not all Barbadians were brutish planters tyrannizing over those unfortunate enough to be in their power. In 1684, Thomas Tryon published some Friendly Advice in support of the conversion of slaves to Christianity. (The practical problem was that Christians might seek emancipation, and it was thus in the planters’ interest to keep these evangelizing efforts from being successful.) Tryon presented his argument in the form of a dialogue between a slave and his master, though without doing much to give an air of authenticity to the conversation:

SLAVE: I desire first you would lay that frightful Cudgel a little further off, and then begging Pardon for the Presumption, since this is the Day you observe to serve God in, I would crave leave to be a little instructed touching that Service, and wherein it consists.

MASTER: Why? It consists in being Christians, as we are — But what should I talk to such a dark ignorant Heathen, scarce capable of common Sense, much less able to understand things of such an high and mysterious Nature.

SL. I confess we are poor silly dark ignorant Creatures, and for ought I find, so many of the Bacchararo’s too, as well as we; but that you may not grudge your Time or Pains, I will assure you, that I will attend very seriously to what you say, and possibly may prove somewhat more docile than some of our Complexion; For I was the Son of a Phitisheer, that is, a kind of Priest in our Country and Way; he was also a Sophy, and had studied the Nature of things, and was well skill’d in Physick and natural Magick …. (Tryon 1684 , 150–51)

Tryon inserted a note to explain Bacchararo’s: “So the Negro’s in their Language call the Whites.” This publication (and the note) provide the first evidence of the word that in its modern spelling is rendered backra or buckra (Craigie and Hulbert 1938-44; Cassidy and LePage 1980; Allsopp 1996; Collymore 1957).

Buckra is very much an indicator word revealing the Barbadian connection to South Carolina. Today, according to The Dictionary of American Regional English, the word is found “chiefly” in coastal South Carolina and Georgia, though it is well known in many regions of the United States (Cassidy and Hall 1985). In the Caribbean, it has been employed in various compounds, though early evidence is lacking for many of them: backra fire ‘electricity,’ backra-johnny ‘poor white,’ backra missy ‘daughter of a planter,’ backra nigger ‘light-skinned person of mixed black and white ancestry,’ backra pickney ‘white child.’

Buckaroo persisted in the Sea Islands of South Carolina. In the 1970s, two investigators examined nicknames of people in the region and noted that the given names were often of English origin and the nicknames of African. The person bearing the nickname buckaroo was, they reported, especially skilled in the management of farm animals, and they asserted that the name was derived from vaquero ‘cow hand’ (< Spanish vaca ‘cow’). More likely, however, is the explanation that it was the special skill rather than the animals that accounted for the nickname (Baird and Twining 1991).

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by Elvin Lim

Newt Gingrich has won the biggest primary prize up for grabs so far. Romney’s win in New Hampshire has been discounted because he’s from neighboring Massachusetts, while poor Rick Santorum’s newly declared victory in Iowa was quickly eclipsed by the news about Rick Perry dropping put of the race, ABC’s interview with Gingrich’s ex-wife, and the scuffle over Romney’s tax returns. This is a huge victory for Gingrich because every winner in South Carolina since 1980 has gone on to win the nomination. So Gingrich is now the conservative alternative to Romney.

Volatility, though, has been the hallmark of the nomination race this year, and there is no reason to think this will change. The higher quantity of debates has helped Gingrich build a momentum in the last week — as has his superPAC — and both are new developments from the last cycle. For the first time in modern history, the Republicans have picked a different winner for each of the first three states. For the first time ever, the Republicans are going to nominate either a Mormon (Romney) or a Catholic (Gingrich). This denominational diversity reveals a conservative electorate much more concerned about the economy than about social values, which was the major issue just eight years ago. Finally, the loyal supporters of Ron Paul are a wild card, because no one knows to whom they will turn when Paul finally bows out — and he intends to to hang around. All told, there are 1150 delegates to get to earn the nomination, so this race pushes on at least until the Spring.

Gingrich did not win in South Carolina because of “electability” as the SC exit polls misleadingly say; he won because of the rage that South Carolinians believe is necessary to take on Obama. Gingrich received the first standing ovation in the debates so far when he observed that more people had been put on food stamps under Obama than under any other president – a line he has been repeating in the last week. Obama will not and cannot receive credit for whatever he has done because his very presence in the White House is perceived by some conservatives as a criminalization of the the state in the service of socialism. This newly rediscovered “southern strategy” worked in South Carolina and it may well work beyond.

Gingrich is in a good position but not a front-leading one, however. He will not enjoy the native-son-of-the-South advantage in Florida as he did in South Carolina, so the next contest is going to be important for him to prove his viability. He would need a huge infusion of cash to be able to afford the television ads he or his superPAC will need to run in Florida. Gingrich won’t be able to sustain his momentum with just the free media, though the two debates last week will help. For now, Romney still enjoys a lead because Florida’s electorate is older and less evangelical than in South Carolina. Early voting has already started in Florida, and will continue until the 28th, so Romney’s initial lead there would help him.

It is also worth noting that Romney is the only candidate who has done well in all three states. He is still, therefore, the frontrunner. But he cannot afford any more mis-steps. The tax returns questions from the media was just poorly handled, and Romney has stuttered repeatedly on a question for which he should have been more than prepared (as Gin

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