Interfaith Understanding Group’s favorite books

One night recently, folks attending the Interfaith Understanding Group went around the table and offered their favorite book. Here are some of those books which might suggest some good holiday reading, too.

Jill Zelinski: Harry Potter series

Colleen McBride: The Rainbow Fish by Marcus Pfister and God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater by Kurt Vonnegut

Pastor Richard Priggie: The Power and the Glory by Graham Greene

Zak Rajput: Mountains Beyond Mountains by Tracy Kidder

Margi Rogal (Library): Lark Rise to Candleford by Flora Thompson

Samantha Haake: Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen

Virginia Johnson (Reading/Writing Center): Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte

Professor Sarah Skrainka (French): Mary Oliver, New and Selected Poems, E.B. White, Charlotte’s Web, Clement Marot, “L’Enfer” and his epistles

Pastor Julio Cruz-Natal: The Fifth Mountain by Paulo Coelho.

A Holiday Dessert

We like to eat in the library, and at this time of year we often have a great variety of treats. In that spirit, I offer a recipe for chocolate-pumpkin layer cake, taken from the New York Times. It’s the perfect blend of holiday flavors.

Adapted from John Down, Christopher Norman Chocolates

Time: 1 1/2 hours plus cooling

20 tablespoons (2 1/2 sticks) soft unsalted butter, more for greasing
2 cups flour, more for dusting
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon allspice
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 cups granulated sugar
3 eggs
1 1/2 cup plain pumpkin purée, canned, frozen or fresh
1 cup semisweet chocolate chips
1 cup chopped pecans
2 1/2 cups confectioners’ sugar
10 ounces unsweetened chocolate, preferably 99 or 100 percent, melted and cooled to room temperature
1 teaspoon vanilla extract.

1. Heat oven to 350 degrees. Use a little butter to grease two 9-inch round cake pans. Line bottoms with parchment paper. Butter and flour the paper. In a large bowl, whisk flour, cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, allspice, baking soda, baking powder and salt together.

2. Using an electric mixer, cream 8 tablespoons butter and the granulated sugar together until light and fluffy, about 3 minutes. Beat in eggs one at a time. Stir in pumpkin purée. Mixture may look slightly curdled. Stir in flour mixture about half a cup at a time until smooth. Fold in chocolate chips and pecans.

3. Divide batter into pans and bake in middle of oven until springy to the touch and a tester inserted in center comes out clean, about 35 minutes. Cool cakes in pans for 10 minutes, run a knife around edges, invert onto racks and peel off paper. Let cakes cool completely.

4. In a large bowl, blend remaining 12 tablespoons butter and confectioners’ sugar together. Blend in chocolate and vanilla extract and beat until smooth.

5. Place one cake layer, smooth side up, on a platter. Ice top. Place second layer, smooth side down, on top; ice top and sides of cake.

Yield: 8 to 12 servings.

Reading and Listening

Here are two books I’ve enjoyed recently–one by turning pages and the other by inserting CDs!

The Exception by Christian Jungersen

Much more than just a mystery novel, this work focuses on four women employed at the Danish Center for Information on Genocide. Woven throughout the compelling story are considerations of the meaning of evil, the human tendency to victimize others and the opposing human ability to be selfless—to be “the exception.” As the point-of-view shifts amongst the women, the reader comes to understand them all, knowing that one may well be an unreliable narrator.

Case Histories by Kate Atkinson

I love books that take a genre form—okay, for me, that’s usually the mystery—and change the angle on it just enough to surprise, delight and breathe new life into that satisfyingly predictable format. What I love even more is listening to a skillful reader, preferably with an accent that is anything other than American Midwestern, reading that book to me as I drive to library consortium meetings throughout Illinois! That’s what I experienced when I listened to the CDs of Case Histories, read by Susan Jameson. The standard mystery is all about the plot and whodunit. Judged that way, Atkinson’s book is not remarkable. But as critic Jeff Turrentine states, if you read (preferably listen to, in my opinion) this novel as a “character study grafted onto the detective-thriller format, it’s a rousing triumph, thanks in whole to Atkinson’s boundless sympathy for her funny, pathetic, three-dimensional and fully human creations.”

Carla

Skinny Dip by Carl Hiaasen

Since some others posting here have written about genres they don’t usually read, I thought I’d give it a go as well. I have really eclectic reading tastes, which is reflected by the titles in the precariously leaning towers of books distributed throughout my home. But one thing that doesn’t crop up so very often in my rotation is the Mystery/Thriller.

There is nothing very intellectual or really that unpredictable about Carl Hiaasen’s Skinny Dip, but that’s what makes it a great choice for vacation reading – this book is a vacation in and of itself. Like most of Hiaasen’s books, it’s set in Florida, it stars attractive, slightly unstable people, and there’s an ecological tie-in to the crime. Hiaasen’s signature biting wit appears in page after page, the story is frantic and funny, and the ending is suitably satisfying. Enjoy!

~Meredith Lowe

Possibly Poetry

For lovely nighttime reading, park a copy of The Best American Poetry 2008 on your bedside table. I love perusing this annual anthology of the newest and best poetry because it exposes me to lots of poets and poems I’ve missed and it provides such a wide variety of kinds of poetry. In the 2008 version, you will find old standbys like Marvin Bell (who will be visiting Augustana in May as a Woodrow Wilson Fellow and as a guest in The River Readings series) and newer poets like Tom Andrews who died at the age of 40 in 2001. Here are three lines from Andrews’ poem “Evening Song”:

Robins gossiped in the poplars,

moths spiraled across the uncut grass.

Moonlight wormed through the neigboring lawns.

–Margi Rogal

Ho Ho Holiday Hours

 

Augustana will be going on holiday break, and so the library must operate with reduced hours as well.

Friday, Dec. 19th 7:30 am – 5:00 pm

Dec. 20-21: Closed

Monday, Dec. 22 8:00 am – 5:00 pm

Tuesday, Dec. 23 8:00 am – 3:00 pm

Wednesday, Dec. 24 – Jan. 4, 2009: Closed

Jan. 5 – 9, 2009 8:00 am – 5 pm

Jan. 10, 2009 Closed

Jan. 11, 2009: 4 – 10 p.m.

Jan. 12, 2009: Regular hours resume at 7:30 am

Happy Holidays!