Everything That Makes You by Moriah McStay

June 12, 2015 by Abigail

Post-read, the title now seems so profound, that it could stand alone without the need of a blog post written by myself. My perception of Moria McStay’s debut young adult novel has been greatly transformed since Clara (think the lovely girl who works in Oz) recommended it to me shortly after I started working at Lemuria. I am a relatively new Lemurian, as I started working here a month+ ago. The world of Lemuria has been a wondrous place, where my narrow mindedness has already been exponentially expanded in a relatively short period of time. I have a reputation for being rather persnickety in regards to which books, movies, and music I listen to. Part of my desire in working for the store is to pull my head out of the sand where it’s been buried for so long (as a friend lovingly informed me not too long ago). All that being said, I was prepared to enjoy McStay’s novel, but not to for it to be a tool in a season of self-analysis. It was not the first time I have assumed incorrectly.

McStay engagingly weaves back and forth between two characters, who happen to be the same person. Fiona Doyle suffered a childhood accident that left half of her face horribly scarred, and has greatly impacted who she is. Fi Doyle appears to be everything that Fiona is not, she is a popular high school athlete who seems to have no visible limitations. McStay, with quite simple prose delves into topics that hit on nerves I was unprepared to visit. Both girls struggle with fear to pursue what they love; to be vulnerable enough to pursue their dreams. They share the same dynamics with their mother, neither ever feels like they are enough for her (none of us can relate to that, I’m sure). And of course, there is a little drama to be found in their relationships and interactions with their crushes and boyfriends. They share many commonalities, but they are different people as a result of their different stories. My curiosity was insatiable to the end to see which life decisions they would make, and how similar or dissimilar they would be. You will have to read the book to find out the answer for yourself!

It is only recently that I have had time to self-analyze, and liberally bemoan prior mistakes. There is much that I wish I could go back and change, or dynamics in my past that I wish were, well, different. But do I really want to the past to be different? McStay sums it up aptly, “There’s no way to know what I’m missing, or who I’d be otherwise. Stuff happens every day that sets us in on direction or another.” Do I really want to be different than who I am? I think for the most part we all answer, “No”. Everything that we have gone through has made us into who we are; the more scars we bear, the more diverse and hopefully empathetic we are to the foibles of others.

All in all, whether you are young, or a bit older like myself, you will enjoy this book; maybe a little or a lot more than you expect.

Rooted in Design by Tara Heibei and Tassey de Give

June 11, 2015 by Hillary

I know our blogs are normally written on fiction related books, but I figured (with it being summer and all)….I’d write this blog about gardening!

I’ve grown up with my Dad always planting a garden, every single year. I’ve grown up hoeing, planting, and then picking, shelling, or snapping. Every year. With that being said…you learn a thing or two about how to plant/where to plant certain plants, seeds or bulbs. However, because my husband and I are only renting our current home, I’ve mainly stuck with indoor plants and container gardening (tomatoes WILL grow in a bucket).

With the indoor plants, because they are a form of decoration for me, I became more interested in their looks. I would definitely pop into Lowes, buy a few plants I thought were “pretty” or “neat” and then plant them. I soon realized, I didn’t even know what half of the plants I had were named or even how much sun or watering they needed.

So! Of course I turned to our bookstore and rummaged through the gardening section. I came across Rooted in Design and realized it was the best of both worlds (a book on taking care of indoor plants AND using them for decor in your home). Just looking at the photos in this book made me want to buy all of the plants at Lowes. The authors discuss the importance of balance when using plants as decor in your home, making sure to not overcrowd an area, but to use plants to play with the proportions of a space. There is a section in the back that goes over fertilization, pruning, potting and re-potting as well as a plant directory, with photographs and the scientific names, of every plant shown through-out the book. Which this, of course, helped me to figure out what some of plants I already had were named and what amount of watering they needed.

There are so many projects in this book (building terrariums, growing vines along your wall, moss walls, etc.) that it inspired me to basically re-pot all of the plants in my home. I went out and made sure I purchased the correct potting soil; I even bought rocks to make sure water would drain better in some of my pots (…I paid for rocks, y’all). Here are a few of the plants I re-potted.

And they’re still going strong!

I’ve never owned a gardening book before, but I’m really happy I picked this one up. If you’re into (or just getting into) indoor or container gardening, I would suggest taking a look at this book. It definitely inspires one to be creative in their home and in their gardening.

It’s time to be honest about summer reading.

June 9, 2015 by Daniel

If you have walked outside recently you know that it is definitely summer in Mississippi again- and I couldn’t be happier. I love the way the summer smells, I love the long days, and I might be the only one that loves the heat. Spending an entire day outside getting filthy and sweaty is still a real pleasure to me- one I rarely get to enjoy anymore. But there’s also fresh veggies being pushed by a farmer’s market that has made some real strides in making fresh produce more available to people in this city. Fondren had it’s first all day First Thursday last week, which I hope a lot of people went out to support the small but growing group of artists blooming all over the city. If you work in a bookstore or have children of your own you know what the summer is really all about: SUMMER READING!

excited-baby

I loved reading for school and then getting to have a teacher explain the significance of what I just read. Novels became a true love for me with my summer reading books because I learned all books have secrets in them. A single page could contain the right combination of words that unlocks a secret, but this is not just the author’s secret- it is your secret as well. Hidden in that book the author has spoken right to you, to an experience you never knew anyone else felt; but if the author felt it, then it must follow logically that some other reader- somewhere reading those same words as you- knows it too. If we are to join in this community of thinkers and shared experiences we have to start somewhere. A shared library of classics we have all read could be a beautiful way to create a shared experience and understanding.

e9cf1 If that was the best of times, then what was the worst of times? Dull classics that crushed my imagination and frustrated me. When children are nothing more than hormones and imaginations why would you ask them to read The Scarlet Letter or A Tale of Two Cities? These are dense, complex novels with imagery and alliterations I still cannot completely grasp, but I was forced to memorize the details that would be on the tests. The significance of the French Revolution or Puritan morality both certainly went over my head because they were inappropriate for the age group when we read them. It is a mistake to show children these books as the benchmark that other books are to be measured by. For many students these will be the only books they read that year and if you hated every book you read in a year you would stop reading until you were forced to read again, just like most students.

tumblr_lofromwMdu1qej4mpo1_500 I am very happy to see more contemporary/popular books on summer reading lists these days. I think the only way to get children to become readers is to show them how much fun it is. Reading can be an amazing escape from the stresses of growing up, it can expand your way of thinking, it can nourish you and connect you and make you feel loved. We have to show young readers where to find the books that will do just that for them. Where can we find a middle ground from these two opposing views I put forth? I think it must be in a diversity of books we have all read and are able to relate to. Asking children to read dusty old classics is sure to bore them away from a love of books- but we can nurture that love with a selection of books that are appropriate in content and relatable to the culture they know.

Rearranging

June 8, 2015 by Hannah

I looked at my bookcases. I looked, and I knew it was time.

This is all wrong, I said. Who arranged this? Do they know what the alphabet is? It was time to take matters out of my hands and put them back into my newer, smarter hands.

I rearranged the entire bookcase. My husband came home. Again? Why are you doing this again? Now he knows better than to ask.

I think this new system will last for at least another month before I ultimately decide that it’s wrong- IT’S ALL WRONG WHAT IDIOT THOUGHT THIS WAS A GOOD IDEA?!

Blackberry, Blackberry, Blackberry

June 5, 2015 by Clara

Blackberry, blackberry, blackberry.

Every time I eat a blackberry or see a blackberry, I think about Meditations at Lagunitas by Robert Hass. For somebody who loves words, the way they feel in your mouth and the way they look on the page, Hass’ poem is a gold mine of beautiful language and a love letter to the written word.

In the line, “a word is elegy to what it signifies,” the entire written world is open for interpretation. A blackberry in my mind is different from a blackberry in the mind of somebody else. Because you can read the word blackberry, and it is no longer just a word, but takes shape in your mind, takes on a feeling, evokes memories of summer, the way the juice stains your fingers dark purple. My favorite lines:

…because there is in this world no one thing

to which the bramble of blackberry corresponds,

a word is elegy to what it signifies.

And then at the end:

There are moments when the body is as numinous

as words, days that are the good flesh continuing.

Such tenderness, those afternoons and evenings,

saying blackberry, blackberry, blackberry.

Meditation at Lagunitas

By Robert Hass

All the new thinking is about loss.

In this it resembles all the old thinking.

The idea, for example, that each particular erases

the luminous clarity of a general idea. That the clown-

faced woodpecker probing the dead sculpted trunk

of that black birch is, by his presence,

some tragic falling off from a first world

of undivided light. Or the other notion that,

because there is in this world no one thing

to which the bramble of blackberry corresponds,

a word is elegy to what it signifies.

We talked about it late last night and in the voice

of my friend, there was a thin wire of grief, a tone

almost querulous. After a while I understood that,

talking this way, everything dissolves: justice,

pine, hair, woman, you and I. There was a woman

I made love to and I remembered how, holding

her small shoulders in my hands sometimes,

I felt a violent wonder at her presence

like a thirst for salt, for my childhood river

with its island willows, silly music from the pleasure boat,

muddy places where we caught the little orange-silver fish

called pumpkinseed. It hardly had to do with her.

Longing, we say, because desire is full

of endless distances. I must have been the same to her.

But I remember so much, the way her hands dismantled bread,

the thing her father said that hurt her, what

she dreamed. There are moments when the body is as numinous

as words, days that are the good flesh continuing.

Such tenderness, those afternoons and evenings,

saying blackberry, blackberry, blackberry.