Reading in the Garden

Candy for the Mind  O. Henry is pen name of William Sydney Porter, who wrote over 600 short stories in his lifetime. Often funny, sometimes touching, always witty and imaginative, each story ended with a surprising twist. One of his most famous stories is the The Gift of the Magi   where a young, penniless couple sacrifices something dear to their hearts in order to buy the perfect Christmas present for each other. The ending has a sweet twist to it, kind of like an Oh, Henry! candy bar, which supposedly pays tribute to the beloved author. (Read it here:  https://americanenglish.state.gov/files/ae/resource_files/1-the_gift_of_the_magi_0.pdf ) There is almost an endless selection of books containing his short stories. While there are too many stories to list, below are some of my favorites.  Lost on Dress Parade   is  about a young man who saves his money for ten weeks so he can go out and pretend to be a rich man for one evening....

Happy Birthday, Frank McCourt Frank McCourt is the author of Angela's Ashes , which won a Pulitzer Prize for Biography/Autobiography in 1997. McCourt was born August 19, 1930 in Brooklyn, NY. He moved to Ireland with his family during the Great Depression. In his 1996 memoir, Angela's Ashes , he recounts his miserable childhood spent in poverty with an alcoholic father and a struggling mother.  At the age of nineteen, he returned back to the United States and became a teacher before writing his book for which he won immediate praise and a Pulitzer Prize, National Book Critic's Circle Award, and Boeke Prize.  He passed away on July 19, 2009 from cancer, at the age of 78. According to a 2000  Washington Post article  Angela's Ashes had already sold 4 million copies, was on the Best Seller list for 117 weeks, and was translated into twenty languages.  His memoir is still one of my favorite books and tops my list of recom...

Mighty Librarians Every once in awhile I pick up a juvenile book, not to read to my grandkids, but just for me because they’re so interesting.   This is one of those books.   This 55-page book is about the Pack Horse Program that was started under the Works Progress/Projects Administration during the Great Depression in 1935.   The program was an extention under the New Deal Initiative designed to restore prosperity in America during that devastating time period. In this program, librarians were paid $28 a month to deliver books to people in isolated areas of the Cumberland Mountains.   The librarians provided their own horses using saddlebags, sacks, and pillowcases to carry books to people who had no way to get to libraries. Through rugged terrain and in all kinds of weather, these hardy librarians delivered books that were donated from womens’ clubs, PTAs, schools, churches and univer...