NEW ALISON BECHDEL!!!!

New Books

Just Kids................................Patti Smith*

Graphic Women...................Hillary L. Chute

Stone Butch Blues................Leslie Feinberg*

My Red Blood.......................Alix Dobkin

To Teach................................William Ayers*

JDS

JD Salinger died today, he's one of my favorite authors. Except only his short stories, absolutely NOT "Catcher in the Rye." I read that in high school and loved it but then when I reread it in college it was just not that great.

However, I absolutely LOVE "Nine Stories", "Franny and Zooey", and "Raise High the Roof beam Carpenter and Seymour: An Introduction" (in that order). Mainly because I love how Salinger wrote about the Glass family throughout his stories and it was great how you could piece together the family's history through different books. Also many people believe the character Buddy was based on Salinger, which makes sense since both were writers and ended up living in the woods out of touch with reality.

While so many people talk about how they would love to see a film of "Catcher" (which will never happen because Salinger and his family won't allow it), I would much rather see a film about the Glass family based on all the short stories about them. It would be very "Royal Tenenbaum"-esque (Wes Anderson did base some of that movie on the Glass family). It would be so dysfunctionally and darkly fantastic. Someone get on that.

Girls Like Us

I just started reading the book "Girls Like Us" by Sheila Weller about Carole King, Joni Mitchell, and Carly Simon. These three women are amazing!!!! I already loved Joni Mitchell before this; Blue is an amazing album.

The book is a biography of all three and they are so fascinating and so talented. I wish I was alive in the 60s and 70s and was a folk singer. I'm only halfway through it, but I already can't wait for all of the interactions each woman had with each other and with other amazing artists.

I had no idea Joni's song "Little Green" was about giving up her daughter for adoption when she was really young. I also had no idea that Carly Simon's dad is the Simon of Simon and Schuster. Definitely a must read.

Female Force

Apparently there is this comic book series called Female Force and each issue focuses on the life of an important woman. So far Oprah, Princess Diana, Hillary Clinton, Michelle Obama, and others have been the topic. And the newest one is going to be on Ellen Degeneres! I kind of want to go out and get it, for the stories and to see the graphics. I wonder if they sell these at bookstores or if they are only available online.

Quimby's

I have discovered my newest obsession in Wicker Park/Bucktown: Quimby's Bookstore. This store has so many graphic novels and authors that I love. I went there today for the first time just to check it out and found great stuff. I had been looking for this series written by Ariel Schrag for such a long time and they had it! This is the one I got today, the first in the series:

The second book in the series is being turned into a film. And I think that last one recently came out. I'm really excited to start reading this and the spend more time in Quimby's!

Current Obsessions: Ariel Schrag, Craig Thompson, Marjane Satrapi, Alison Bechdel

West Rogers Park

For one class I am doing field research in the neighborhood West Rogers Park. This neighborhood has a large Orthodox Jewish community, as well as Russians, Arabs, Indians, and a lot more ethnic groups.

Today I walked into a Jewish bookstore and of course I pick up probably the most controversial book in the store called, "Black, White, and Jewish" by Rebecca Walker. It looks really interesting and is about a girl whose dad is a Jew and whose mom is the African American writer Alice Walker.

I couldn't help but notice the look I got from the woman who checked me out at the store, but whatever, I'm really excited to start this book!