Slate article

The online magazine Slate has become even more click-bait focused, and today's eye-roller is about adults reading YA books. I've read the article and I disagree with the author, especially since her entire argument seems to boil down to "things should stay in their own boxes."

So, I'd like to tell a story based on my own experience about why we shouldn't give a damn about adults reading YA.

I was on the T late one night. I'd waved goodbye to my friends at Porter Square and settled in to reread Emma while the red line chauffered me home to Quincy. It was fairly deserted and around Park Street, a guy probably a decade older than I was got on. He seemed a little drunk, but wasn't belligerent, so I kept reading. Two stops later, he asked me if I liked reading. I gave a tight nod and kept reading. He asked me another question, which I ignored, and then he asked, "Have you tried those Harry Potter books?"

I had. I had indeed. I think the book of Goblet of Fire had just come out. He said that he hadn't read a book since he got out of high school. He was divorced. He only saw his son on weekends and it had completely flummoxed him when his son brought a book with him to read, not because it had been assigned, but because he enjoyed it. When his son started on the second book, he asked to borrow the first. He was hooked. He rearranged his custody weekend to take the kid to the midnight sale for Goblet and proudly bought two copies so they could read it together.

It started him back on the path to reading. He'd found Ken Follet's books and didn't like Dan Brown much and wanted to know if I thought he'd like Emma. (I said I wasn't certain and gave him a synopsis. He thought no. But he asked if I had any action adventure recommendations, and I suggested The Thirty-Nine Steps by John Buchan, one of the early LeCarre books, and the Sherlock Holmes stories.)

My first thought on reading the Slate article was that she would rather this man, whose name I never learned, continue to be excluded from the world of books. His "in" for reading was Harry Potter. And really, are the mystery stories my mother reads any more sophisticated than a YA novel? They're set in the adult realm, but they're formulaic (as is some of my favorite science fiction).

I don't know why this got under my skin, but it really, really did.

On another note, does anyone want to help me set up my World War I blog?

Meme From Serafina

First twenty pieces that came up on my shuffle (Amazon Cloud, not iTunes). I didn't cheat at all.

1) Uma Historia De Ifa by Virginia Rodrigues
2) This Plum is Too Ripe from The Fantasticks (nb: I listened to the original cast; this is from a 2006 revival)
3) Pavanas by Simeon Simov
4) Shelter by The Beach Boys
5) Bluesology by Modern Jazz Quartet
6) Straight no Chaser by Thelonius Monk
7) Wasted Time by My Life with the Thrill Kill Kult
8) Concierto de Aranjuez III: Allegro gentile performed by Zoltan Tokos, Budapest Strings (wish the Paco de Lucia version had come up)
9) Come Heavy Sleep by Sting
10) Petite Suite (1889): Menuet (Debussy) by Dag Achatz and Yukie Nagai
11) Prayer in Passing by Anoushka Shankar
12) Twelve Etudes for Piano L136: Pour les Octaves (Debussy) by Noriko Ogawa
13) An American in Paris (Gershwin) by Oscar Levant
14) The Woman I Love by Jason Mraz
15) Symphony 104 in D Major (London) III: Menuetto Allegretto (Haydn) by Vienna State Opera Orchestra
16) Power of Two by Indigo Girls
17) Thanks/Prayer by En Vogue
18) We're Okay from Rent
19) Movie Magg by Paul McCartney (Rockabilly)
20) Quartet No. 59 (Rider) in G minor (Haydn) by The Griller String Quartet

I'm more than a little surprised that I got so much classical without any Mahler. I would have expected at least one Glee song or one acapella, but none came up. Also, I have more Spanish and Portuguese music than French. It's nice that the two major Jazz pieces are such classics, but I would have expected more Jazz than Classical to come up.

Also, I want to remember I have Indigo Girls and Anoushka Shankar because they're awesome and deserve to be listened to more.

ETA: Links were added where I could find them easily.