Wonderland Creek

Finished June 16

Wonderland Creek by Lynn Austin

This historical novel is set in 1936. Alice Ripley lives with her parents in a suburb of Chicago. Her father is a pastor and while Alice trained as a teacher, she wasn't good at classroom discipline and went into work at her local public library instead. 

As the book begins, Alice's fiancé breaks up with her, which she has a hard time accepting although she honestly doesn't have strong feelings for him. She also loses her job due to funding. When her aunt and uncle take a road trip to a resort, she gets them to drop her and hundreds of books that she collected for a rural library in Kentucky off at that library, arranging for them to pick her up again a week later. But she finds a situation quite different than she expected. The librarian is a man, which she didn't expect since she'd been corresponding with him and assumed the name Leslie was a female one. There isn't room for her to stay anywhere in the small village without putting someone else out of a bed, and Leslie (known as Mack to his friends) is also looking after the dying black woman who raised him.

When Leslie gets shot and badly wounded, Alice finds herself stepping into his shoes as she manages the household, the library, and even takes on duties as one of the Packhorse Librarians working out of the small library. 

I liked how Alice grew from her experiences, but also had an influence on the community through her love of reading and her dedication to literacy. She overcame many of her prejudices and fears and found real relationships among the hill people as she learned about their struggles, include the union movement, the local feud, and secrets kept close. 

The Library Bus

Finished November 30
The Library Bus by Bahram Rahman, illustrated by Gabrielle Grimard

This picture book was written by a Canadian who immigrated here from Afghanistan and was inspired to document the struggle for education faced by not only the women in his family, but for thousands of others. 

The main character here is a young girl, Pari, who helps her mother run a library bus that operates in and near the city of Kabul in Afghanistan, and focuses on the literacy of young girls. We see Pari going with her mother on one day. Their first stop is a small village where the girls are eager to learn and exchange their books. Pari's mother does a storytime during the stop as well. They then move on to a refugee camp where Pari is delegated to hand out notebooks and pencils to those that need them while her mother helps them with books before a storytime. Pari notices the outward difference in the girls clothing and surroundings, but finds them all eager to learn. She is glad she is able to help her mother in this task and looks forward to being able to attend school herself and expand her learning. Her mother explains that the girls they served don't have access to schools, so this library bus is one of the only educational resources available to them. 

The book ends with a note from the author and a brief side note on refugee camps.

The illustrations were lovely, with the girls seen as individuals and the eagerness clearly portrayed. I loved the colours used here as well. And, of course, how could I not love a book about libraries and their importance.