Part 1-Book Talk
Dancers Among Us: A Celebration of Joy in the Everyday
by Jordan Matter
Pub Date: October 2012
Have ever you felt a moment in life where you just had to get up and dance? You get a new job ( or promotion)? You find Mr. ( or Miss) Right ( and he or she just said "yes")? Or you just felt like dancing for no reason, no music at all?
In Dancers Among Us: A Celebration of Joy in Everyday, photographer Jordan Matter captures moments of life using professional dancers posing in everyday, ordinary places. Matter got the idea while watching his son frantically play with his toys and wondered " How would I catch this moment?" The pictures Matter presents are a mixture of awesomeness and beauty to odd and extreme. ( Some which need to come with a " Do Not Try This at Home, Reader.") In a photo titled " The Thinker" a dancer strikes the pose of the fame Thinker statue.. at a train station. Another photo, " Surrender" has a dancer lying on a cannon at a very scary height. One of my favorite pictures ( besides the cover picture, "Raindancer") is a very sweet and playful picture of two dancers by a heart statue, titled " I Left My Heart in San Francisco" ( I also favor " Fetching" which features a lady, jumping in midair, getting ready to throw a stick to a yellow Lab because it me of my dog.)
I also love that in each chapter or theme of pictures, Matter ( who by the way, did a picture of himself at the end called " The Artist) offers personal stories from his life. In the chapter called "Loving" he talks about meeting the girl would become his wife, in " Exploring" he talks about helping his son prepare for his new baby sister. I also love the stories behind the pictures, provided toward the end of the book.
So celebrate the dancer in you and check out Dancer Among Us: A Celebration of Joy in the Everyday. By the way, Matter still continues the "dance" online at www.dancersamongus.com
Part 2-About the Baker statement
I agree with Baker's statement on choosing only what we've read (and actually love) for booktalks (and I'm going to use a bit of what I know from working as a children's librarian to support my agreement.)When we are planning programs or school visits, we choose books that we know the kids will like, but we really try to choose books that we might have like if we were still kids. Obviously, the goal of a booktalk to "encourage" reading a book (and that reading is fun), so we want to make the time we spend with the kids fun (also, kids can know right away if you don't love the book, there are going to hate the book, thus making it a bad story hour.) For example, one of the books I really looking forward to using while promoting our library fundraiser in January (if we didn't have the blizzard) was What does the Fox Say?, the book version of the Youtube sensation ( and yes, I watched the video 4-5 times to get every word right, even the nonsense sounds.)
Is it possible to do a negative booktalk? I'm not completely sure. Obviously we're not going to love everything we read, but we don't want to upset or displease a public audience. So it might be possible to two ways: during a meeting with other librarians ( I do recall once someone doing a booktalk on Golden Compass and they clearly hated it) or in one on one RA interviews with the patrons ( because they are going to ask " But what did you think about the book?" and it's okay to discourage one reader from a book than a large group).
Well, hope that answers the prompt. I've got a lovely weekend of trying to read a science fiction novel ( I've tried two so far, and no luck. I'm trying three more books, including something suspense but sci fi by acting great Sidney Poiter. Wish me luck.)
Even though this book (Matter's) sounds fascinating you might have given TOO much of it away ... I'm sure there are several more photos to enjoy ... but, I hope you didn't tell about the best ones - that might disappoint a viewer. When you started the one sentence with Matter I was so confused ... then I looked back to the author's name again & it made sense - ha ha!
ReplyDeleteI love your description of the photos-I enjoy good photography and I'm definitely interested in this book. I usually stick to fiction, but your booktalk did a good job of convincing me that I should check this out-I think any audience would feel the same!
ReplyDeleteYour booktalk totally has me convinced - in fact, I just spent about twenty minutes looking up the book, browsing through the "Look Inside" feature on Amazon, and then placing the book on hold at my local library. I'm a ballet dancer myself, so perhaps I'm predisposed to love this, but I can't wait to get it from the library!
ReplyDeleteIn regards to your comments about the Baker article, I feel like your response helped me articulate what had bothered me about her statement. You mention that the goal of your booktalk is to find books that your audience (kids) will like. That's how we should approach booktalking; the focus should be on what our audience will respond to. I feel like the reason Baker's statement rubbed me the wrong way was because it wasn't audience-focused; the emphasis was on our personal preferences. After spending so much time suggesting books that I may not enjoy, but know will appeal to the customer, it's hard to convert to the idea that my preferences are the most important. Perhaps I read something into the statement that wasn't there, but that's why I found myself disagreeing!
Have you read any of the following: Shards of Honor by Lois McMasters Bujold, A Civil Campaign by Lois McMasters Bujold, Hunting Party by Elizabeth Moon, Trading in Danger by Elizabeth Moon or The City Who Fought by Anne McCaffrey? These are sort of all over the map on tone, but all have strong women as major characters and are written by women. The way they deal with relationships (and several do) varies as well.
ReplyDeleteOh, I thought of another sci-fi possibility to consider. If you're in the mood for something completely different, you could try Phule's Company by Robert Asprin. It's sci-fi comedy.
ReplyDelete