Here is a librarian's worst nightmare. A customer comes in looking for book recommendations. He or she is only interested in well-written fiction — they can't stand sappy mid-list stuff and are only interested in top-notch writing. Something modern but something a fan of Chekov would enjoy. So far, so good. Any librarian worth their salt could show them dozens of books, but just as we are about to take our customer by the figurative hand they drop the bombshell; "Oh, and it has to have a happy ending."

Oh.

For some reason, most of the "great works of literature" don't end well for thier characters. Most serious works of literature also focus on the "big issues": death, the human condition (whatever that is), Man's inhumanity to Man, Man's folly in our relationship with nature. Fun stuff like that. Or, as Henry de Montherlant said, "Happiness writes white"; that is white ink on a white page cannot be read.

Then there is Laurie Colwin. As smart as anyone writing in the Twentieth Century, a master of subtle shades and carefuly nuanced sentences, who chose to write about the most over written about topic there is — relationships. Finding love and keeping it; discovering what it means to be happy; domesticity — this is the straw she wove into gold. Laurie Colwin wrote brilliant books with happy endings — a feat almost unheard of outside of comic novels. I confess I have not read all her work, but I feel pretty confident that no one in her books throws themselves under a train. I think it is a sign of a great writer that she can make her readers care about things they otherwise wouldn't give a fig about, and Colwin made me care about dinner parties thrown by upper-middle class WASPs. Obviously the woman was a genius.

Whether or not you go in for happy endings, you should do yourself a favour and checkout Laurie Colwin. Sadly, Laurie left us in 1992 at the far-too-young age of forty eight.

As I was walking through the library I saw a new edition of Colwin's novel Happy all the Time on the shelf — I hope this is a sign that all of her books are going to be reprinted. Happy all the Time is probably the finest of Colwin's many fine books, and well worth a read if you you are looking for something both fun and smart.

Greetings from Sunny Morocco!

My family decided to head to Morocco on an imaginary Around the World in 80 Days trip to evade the Calgary snow. I pulled the patio lounge furniture into the spare room, and plugged in a portable heater to blow warm air. Then I made a cup of mint tea, and settled down in my imaginary riad garden with Lulu in Marrakesh. This is s a novel by Diane Johnson, who wrote the popular book Le Divorce. Lulu is a young American spy sent to Morocco to gather on the ground intelligence. So far, it’s an easy read joining Lulu as she settles into the expat community in Marrakech. 

Tour guides are great for amusing stories, so we borrowed a couple from the library. Ian Wright is the affable host of the Lonely Planet Globe Trekker DVD series. We watched him explore the Atlas mountains on Northern Africa compilation DVD. It was painful to watch him get a contortionist massage in the hamman bath, and it made us very grateful we weren’t experiencing that in person! This is a series everyone in the family enjoys, especially watching Ian with his friendly nature and cockney accent.

A crankier but equally entertaining tour guide is Anthony Bourdain. He’s a New York chef who travels around looking for unusual traditional meals. In Anthony Bourdain: A Cook’s Tour: Morocco and Russia he disdains the hotel couscous and tagine, insisting on finding a whole roasted sheep. The Berber technique of cooking bread in hot sand is hard to try at home. Instead, we’re boiling beets to make the Moroccan salads featured in the second show, Traditional Tastes.

A fictional movie about Morocco you may enjoy is the 1942 classic Casablanca with Ingrid Bergman and Humphrey Bogart.

Play it, for old time's sake.

Around the World in 80 Days. I so very much want to, but have only four vacation days saved up. However I work in a library, where imagination reigns supreme, so I’m moving on to Plan B: Around the World in 80 Days In Your Imagination. I figure that Riley Library has enough DVDs, cookbooks, photography books and stories to keep my travel urges stoked through these lingering cold days of spring. My husband enthusiastically signed on board, pleased with the reduced cost of a virtual trip. My son signed on as long as there were good snacks involved.

Jules Verne wrote the adventure novel in 1873. To prepare for our epic journey, we watched the classic 1956 movie. David Niven plays Phileas Fogg heading out from London with his valet Passepartout on a bet they can’t make travel all the way around the world in 80 days. It’s a classic 1950s lush and slow moving film, with long travelogue sequences, goofy slapstick, and lots of cameos by famous people like Frank Sinatra and Marlene Dietrich.

Next we watched Jackie Chan’s goofy remake Around the World in 80 Days from 2004. This bombed at the box office, but we enjoyed its gleeful idiocy as it veers way off the track of the original story. As in all Jackie Chan’s movies, it’s all about the elaborate choreographed fight scenes in which every possible object is turned into a weapon.

There are other movies and TV shows inspired by the story. Michael Palin from Monty Python made a documentary travel series. There was a TV remake in 1989 with Pierce Brosnan as Phileas. Alberta Theatre Projects have announced they will perform the play in November 2013.

No time for those, however, as we are busy placing our library holds on books about our first destination on the trip. We are heading south from London to Morocco!

Dear Penny Black:

I'm doing spring cleaning. I have a bunch of those red books of Canadian 42 cent stamps and the like around the house. I was planning to use them up when I send mail. What should I do?

-Phil.

Dear Phil:

Save those books as they are, Phil. Some are worth many times more than the face value. I found an ordinary one that was now worth $30, provided it's intact. This is surprising since they seem to be the standard issue stamps that we remember well from the time eg. the 1990s, with flag or Queen on the front. These were are sometimes valuable than some older, more interesting looking items.

If you have any old Christmas seals with no value on the front, don't give them to the kids to play with! First, check out the Unitrade Specialized Catalogue of Canadian Stamps. If you already have, don't despair. Remember that the true value in things is the enjoyment they give you and what they mean to you! You never know, you may want to enter the world of Philately.

-Penny

p.s. Calgary Public Library has a great collection of collectibles books, so have a peek!

(this one of the left is one of Canada Post's newest, but you get the idea)

RILEY LIBRARY TEEN

Book of the Month

Seraphina, by Rachel Hartman

A new vision of knights, dragons, and the fair maiden caught in between . . .

Four decades of peace have done little to ease the mistrust between humans
and dragons in the kingdom of Goredd. Folding themselves into human shape,
dragons attend court as ambassadors, and lend their rational, mathematical minds
to universities as scholars and teachers. As the treaty's anniversary draws
near, however, tensions are high.

Seraphina has reason to fear both sides. An unusually gifted musician, she
joins the court just as a member of the royal family is murdered. While a
sinister plot to destroy the peace is uncovered, Seraphina struggles
to protect the secret behind her musical gift, one so terrible that its discovery
could mean her very life. Seraphina's tortuous journey to self-acceptance
will make a magical, indelible impression on its readers.

RILEY LIBRARY ADULT

Book of the Month

Doc, by Mary Doria Russell

Russell's novel about Doc Holiday and Wyatt Earp is a bold act of historical reclamation
that scrapes off the bull and allows those legends to walk and love and grieve in the
dynamic 19th-century world that existed before Hollywood shellacked it with clichés.

Today Jarome Iginla left the Calgary Flames. I was thinking about Jarome when I suddenly remembered meeting him once when he came into a bookstore I worked in. I remember two things distinctly about that day: 1) Jarome looked like he could bench press a smart car, and 2) he bought a copy of The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas — a rip-roaring adventure story written 169 years ago. Sometime later I remember reading an interview in which Jarome said that The Count of Monte Cristo was his favourite book. I don't know if he had just read the copy I sold him for the first time or if he bought it to reread his favourite book, but I did feel it was exceptionally cool that our biggest sports hero named a 19th Century french novel as his favourite book. 

I wish Iggy the best of luck in Pittsburgh and I'll pay tribute the best way a book snob like me can — by reading the book he loves! So why not check it out yourself?

Besides Louise Riley herself, for whom our library is named, several other notables have graced the hill of Hounsfield Heights since the early days at the turn of the last century.

Charlie Richardson- first principal of Hillhurst School. His daughter Barbara kept her horse Princess tethered where Sears is now.

Harry Pollard- world famous photographer of First Nations people. He was also Chief photographer of Canadian Pacific Railway and his collection is in the Provincial Archives of Alberta in Edmonton. You can view his photographs here https://hermis.alberta.ca/paa/Search.aspx?CollectionID=2&st=harry+pollard. His wife Ella (Eleanor Pollard) was was a beauty queen and rode in the Domion Fair Parade in 1908 as "Miss Canada."

Sam Adams- lawyer, alderman for five years, then mayor for 2 years. Long Lance (Sylvester Clark Long, reporter) threw a fake bomb through his window, which resulted in his being fired as a reporter for the Herald.

Alexander Calhoun- first director of Calgary Public Library lived in a nearby house on the hill and walked to Memorial Park Library every day. Louise Riley worked there also. The branch named after him (built into a hill) is located on 14th Street SW.

Dr. Huxley Johnson- a local doctor who died in the polio epidemic while assisting the communtiy. He was Huxley Jr. Huxley Sr, an early resident , was doctor at the Sunnyside Military Hospital.

Bill W. Saunders- vice principal of SAIT. In 1957, he started the first courses related to the oil industry.

W.R. Castell- also a Calgary Public Library Director

Ralph McCready- instructor at Mount Royal College

Charles Richardson-first principal of Hillhurst Public School for the first 23 years

Gerald Tailfeathers(1925-1975). "One of the first Native Canadians to become a professional artist, he came to prominence in the 1950s. His art had several influences: study in the Summer Art School in Glacier National Park (Montana) with New York portrait painters Winold Reiss and Carl Linck; the cowboy school of painting led by Charles Russell; the Oklahoma school of Indian painting; the Banff Centre School of Fine Arts and the Provincial School of Technology and Art in Calgary. In the main, his work exhibits a romantic and nostalgic vision of his Blood people's life in the late 19th century. Thus, it features warriors in their traditional activities of warfare, hunting and ceremonial life. Tailfeathers later began experimenting with cast-bronze sculpture that depicted themes inspired by cowboy art" -source:The Canadian Encyclopedia, which you can access in our E-library online.

Thank you to Marg McCready for her reseach, and to the Calgary Association of Lifelong Learner's for adding Gerald Tailfeathers.
See our earlier post about the Riley family and their influence on the neighbourhood.

Do you know of another famous Housfield Heights dweller? Please comment if you do!