Library Staff Valentine's Feature Friday

February 14, 2020

In honor of Valentine’s Day, our staff is sharing their first book loves with you for this week’s St. Helens Public Library #FeatureFriday.

Youth Librarian Gretchen: My first book love (as my parents tell it) was “Dr. Seuss's ABC,” which I made my parents read over and over and over and over and over and OVER night after night during our bedtime stories. Even now, more than 30 years since he last read the book, if you give my dad a letter of the alphabet, he can recite the rhyme for that page ("X is very useful if your name is Nixie Knox. It also comes in handy spelling ax and extra fox"). I think it must be burned into his memory forever! I'm so appreciative that my parents spent time reading to me every night when I was little -- and even into elementary school and very early middle school! It was definitely a big part of what made me into a reader.

Library Technician Nicole: The first book I remember loving as a child was an illustrated book of poems by Eugene Fields with Wynken, Blynken and Nod, The Calico Cat and the Gingham Dog, and The Sugar-Plum Tree.  I still remember the words to Wynken, Blynken and Nod. 

Reference Librarian Brenda: Falling in love with books is a powerful idea made more powerful when wedded to the love of one’s land.  As a child, my father, brother, and I would pour over “Oregon for the Curious” by Ralph Friedman deciding where we would go for our weekend drive. From these many excursions, I learned to love Oregon from Shaniko to Quartzville to the Barlow Road and beyond.  Celebrate the 161st year since Oregon’s admission to the United States this February 14th and see something great in Oregon!

Library Director Margaret: As an eleven year old, I fell in love with “A Wrinkle in Time” by Madeleine L’Engle. I marveled at how the concept of time travel could be described as a “wrinkle” or shortening of the distance to go. More importantly, I fell in love with L’Engle’s books – “Meet the Austins,” “The Moon By Night” and “The Arm of the Starfish” were other favorites of my sixth grade year.

Library Assistant Michele: My first book love. Some kids are horse book readers and some kids are dog book readers- at least they were at my school.  I was a dog book reader: “Kavik the Wolf Dog” by Walt Morey and “The Incredible Journey” by Sheila Burnford are a couple that I loved. But when I was in 5th and 6th grades, I read “Where the Red Fern Grows” by Wilson Rawls over and over. I cried every time, and I still fondly remember the story as my favorite from childhood.  

Library Assistant Dan: After surviving all of the regular childhood reading adventures and getting through a number of dry textbooks, I came across an old used copy of “The Medium is the Massage” by Marshall McLuhan.  I was instantly hooked.  The style of McLuhan’s writing is different, mostly a ‘probe’ followed by some wild conjecture that really comes from left field. The kind of writing that makes you stop and think. Years later I found a good quality first edition at Powell’s Books and saved up for the purchase. It is a book that was really ahead of its time. Like many of McLuhan’s books, it leaves an impression that he was forecasting much of what we see today (i.e. Global Village). He remarked on the response to one of his earliest books, “The Mechanical Bride,” that it was a wedding invitation buried in concrete to be discovered a thousand years in the future.  Yeah, just like that.  It was because of his writing that I discovered many of my other favorite authors. Thanks, Marshall.

Library Assistant Cameron: After a tremendous amount of consideration and waffling back and forth between “The Lord of the Rings” and “His Dark Materials” series... I've decided that I'll choose “The Stinky Cheese Man & Other Fairly Stupid Tales” by Jon Scieszka and illustrated by Lane Smith as my early childhood book love instead. My parents loved strange and unusual kids' books, so “The Stinky Cheese Man” was (of course) one of our favorites. I would learn the "real" stories in school, then come home and have way, way more fun reading Scieszka's versions with my parents. The art was bizarre, the stories are hilarious, and it taught me an important life lesson: everything is completely absurd.