Great Books

I certainly enjoyed my first Great Books Celebration last week in Baltimore County. It was a well-organized, well-run event that in my mind went off without a hitch. The event was my first Great Books, but from what one of the introductory speakers said, it may be the last Great Books Celebration, at least of this magnitude. I hope not. That would be a real shame. I told another librarian from my system that even if we only have half a dozen people sitting at a picnic table next year, we should still try to have some type of Great Books discussion. We shall see.

Anyway, if you're unfamiliar with it (as I was), Great Books is a two-day event (You only attend one day. The second day is the same as the first, only with different participants.) that allows librarians to discuss the best children's books published during the past year. Three committees read at least 100 books in each of the following categories: Picture Books, J-Books (fiction and NF) and Teen Books (fiction and NF). From that list, they narrow it down to several categories of four books each (five books each in the Picture Book category). You sign up for three groups/categories, which you can mix or match.

I chose all Teen Books, which meant I had to read twelve YA books. So you have two sessions, followed by lunch and a guest speaker (in this case children's author Jacqueline Woodson, who was excellent), followed by the third and final session.

The sessions I signed up for consisted of anywhere from six to eight people with two facilitators who served on the committee for that category. The first group was full of lively discussions of the "Survival" books: The Hunger Games, No Choirboy, Living Dead Girl and The Adoration of Jenna Fox. Some great discussions here, especially with Living Dead Girl, the most controversial book of the lot. The conversations were so interesting, I could easily have stayed in that group for another hour.

The second group - the Dead group (Generation Dead, Newes from the Dead, Me, the Missing and the Dead and Deadville) - was not nearly as lively (maybe because they were dead books? :), but there were still some good discussions. I sat next to a guy from one of the Enoch Pratt branches that had some really great comments, but I think the lady next to me was comatose.

The final group - the Freedom group (Sunrise over Fallujah, Snow Falling in Spring, Little Brother and Bog Child) - must've felt like pulling teeth for the facilitators. I definitely did most of the talking to start things off. Nobody else would say anything! I wonder if many of them either didn't read the books or didn't get much out of them. So I talked. A lot. Hey, I got my money's worth. If you're going to have a book discussion and want people to talk, I'm your man. Otherwise why would you come? (Don't get me started....)

The verdict? A very enjoyable day, well worth the money. Will they have Great Books again in some format? I sure hope so. If not, you're all invited to my house for a discussion of the best books from 2009 next March.