Banned Book Week: September 29 - October 6

Across the nation, "Banned Book Week" is being promoted starting today. The Waterloo Public Library has a lot of books that have been challenged or banned in different parts of the country. Some of the titles will be very familiar to many of you. Here are just a few of titles you may, or may not know:


Hollywood vs. America by Michael Medved (302.23 MED) - Film critic Michael Medved writes a scathing report on Hollywood, portraying religion unfavorably, glamorizing violence, and celebrating immorality. It was withdrawn from the Greencastle, IN, High School because of graphic language.

Reviving Ophelia by Mary Pipher, Ph.D. (305.235 PIP) - Psychiatrist Mary Pipher has worked with teenagers for more than a decade before writing this book about the violence and sexism toward female teenagers. This book was challenged in Richland, WA, high school English classes because it talked about "suicide, illicit sex, violence, and hopelessness."


Children in the Holocaust and World War II: Their Secret Diaries by Laurel Holliday (+940.5318) - This is anthology of diaries written by children all across Nazi-occupied Europe. This book was only allowed in seventh grade or higher in Columbus, OH, because of reference to sex, abortion, and drug use.


Source for this information: Banned Books by Robert P. Doyle (025.213 DOY)



























c Waterloo Public Library 2007

He hears dead people

After all these years, psychic and author Sylvia Browne seems to be as popular as ever. In fact, I think we have some books by her that just arrived over the last year.

Sylvia's son, Chris Dufrestne has written My Life with Sylvia Browne (133.092 DUF in the Biography section). It's quite obvious that Sylvia is the major influence in Chris's life. His father left the family when he was very young, and Chris feels that it's no major loss. Chris is also psychic, so some of the book talks about his abilities and his appearances with his mother on various television programs.

All of his life he was used to strangers hanging around the house - in the porch, kitchen, wherever - waiting for there turn for a reading by his mother.

If you're looking for a tell-all book, airing the dirty laundry, you won't find it here. His writing style is very calm, matter-of-fact, and caring style. It's a loving tribute to his mother who raised a well-grounded son.

c Waterloo Public Library 2007

Mauricio Lasansky: one of the premier Iowa printmakers

Mauricio Lasansky. Many may not know the name, but you have probably seen his work around Iowa. UNI has several of his pieces. The Cedar Rapids Art Center has done at least one solo exhibition of his work, as well as the Des Moines Art Center. University of Iowa also has quite a collection of his work.

Lasansky was born in Argentina, and later moved to New York City. For over 30 years, his home was in Iowa City where he taught at the university.

He's internationally know for his large (some as large as 6 feet) portraits that are done in a variety of printmaking techniques: engraving, etching, soft ground, and scraping. Many of his later works incorporated several plates for just a single print, allowing him to change the look of one image.

Lasansky: Printmaker (769.924 LAS) is a catalog of his prints from 1933-1973.

c Waterloo Public Library 2007

The battle over chocolate

Author Joel Glenn Brenner is quite a reporter. In The Emperors of Chocolate (338.766 BRE), he reveals the dedication it took on his part to get the scoop on the two US chocolate giants: Hershey and Mars. In the introduction, this reporter said that he never had this much trouble getting information from any company before doing research for this.

Even though Hershey is a publicly traded company, his phone call requests would be blocked. Because Mars is still a privately owned business, he understood their hesitation to answer his questions.

All this secrecy made him more determined to get answers. What he discovered is that the rivalry between these two is actually greater than the one that exists between Coke and Pepsi (competition that has been consistently written about and even promoted in their ads).

I think you'll find their histories quite intriguing. So grab your favorite candy bar - whether it's a Milky Way or Reeses Pieces - and get ready to read about the battle over chocolate.

c Waterloo Public Library 2007

Prisoner of the Vatican

Prisoner of the Vatican by David I. Ketzer ( 945.63 KER) is a fascinating look at a part of European history that is not discussed in general world history or humanities courses.


The country of Italy as we now know it, was not formed until the late 19th century. Before this time, Italy was a series independent Italian states. After uniting the states King Victor Emmanuel, he began taking away the vast land held by the Vatican. Pope Pius IX, denounced this and began plotting a way of getting back his power and land. Over the next twenty years the pope tried to enlist the help of other European countries.

c Waterloo Public Library 2007

A child called Noah

A Child Called Noah (362.7 GR) is a diary written by Josh Greenfeld. Josh's writes his first entry on July 1, 1966, the day his second son, Noah, is born. In addition to Noah, the household includes his Asian wife, Foumiko, and his firstborn, Karl, who is roughly a year older than Noah.

At the age of one, Noah begins to talk, however his motor skills aren't progressing as well, but he still seems to be a normal child to Josh. Noah seems to have a charming disposition, but he's very slow with rolling over, sitting up, and attempting to stand. Before Noah's third birthday, he stops talking. On a regular schedule, Josh and Foumiko have been taking him to the doctors. Different doctors diagnosed Noah differently - creating a lot of stress for Josh. Noah was finally diagnosed as autistic after a series of tests.

Josh's heartfelt entries will resonate with any parent.

c Waterloo Public Library 2007

The Business of Blood

I'm one of those squeamish people who practically faint at the sight of blood. But I was still fascinated by Blood: An Epic History of Medicine and Commerce by Douglas Starr (call # NAMES 362.1784 STA).

Starting with the 17th century, this book discusses the concept of bloodletting to remove the poisons in the body to the AIDS crisis in the 1980s. He talks about the experimental blood transfusions between animals and humans. During WWII, the Germans were racing to improve the quality of transfusions on the battlefield.

Some of the information is very disturbing, but worthwhile to fully appreciate what the medical profession offers to patients today.

c Waterloo Public Library 2007

Billy Bean's secret is out

If you've ever seen the newer TV game show "I've Got a Secret," you probably recognize the guy on the cover of this book, Going the Other Way (796.357 BEA in the biography section). In case your not familiar with the show, it's a remake of the old classic where four panelists try to guess the secret talent. Billy Bean plays it "straight" compared to the other panelists.



In Billy Bean's autobiography, Going the Other Way, he writes about his personal field of dreams. He was able to spend many years earning a living in baseball. He earned the nickname "Roy Hobbs" by his teammates. There was one secret that he had which could ruin his career. He was a gay man working in a brutally anti-gay world. He kept his life hidden for many years, "dating" women to keep his cover. He even married, thinking this would solve his problems. Of course, anyone who has known






c Waterloo Public Library 2007

To catch a crook

While reading this book, I had to stop to get a map of New York City. I've only been there once and that was a few years ago. TriBeCa is one of the locations discussed a lot, and, if memory serves me correctly, I spent time there going to different art galleries. I also wanted to find out where 507 E. 11th Street was, since that address played a prominent role in this book.

These two locations are discussed over and over in Frank Bose and Bob Barchiesi's book Rock Solid ( 364.177 BOS). They are cops who were playing cat and mouse with a powerful drug lord named Alejandro "the Man" Lopez in 1985. The apartment building on 11th Street was one of his main locals for moving as much as an estimated $50,000 in solid cocaine every day. His operation was so sophisticated and well-known that "the Man" called his brand of cocaine "Rock Solid." This guy was clever, setting up his business in buildings with trap doors, underground corridors, and secret hideaways.

"The Man" was one of those ruthless guys who thought nothing of killing associates who squealed on him. Ralph Rodriguez was one of the unlucky ones who ended up with six slugs after he talked to the police about the cocaine ring. Others who did spill there guts to save themselves from jail time were lucky enough to have the police provide alibis for talking to them - alibis that were realistic enough to save their lives.

Anyone who's interested in a true story about the techniques used by policemen to catch criminals and get them to talk should read this book. It's fascinating and troubling to read that this happened in an area I casually walked through 20-some years after these events took place.

c Waterloo Public Library 2007

A trip to the see the Amish

I had mentioned last week, that my father enjoys visiting the Amish community. Visiting them was something he has done for many years. I still remember all the road trips we took on Sundays. We would finish milking and feeding the animals early. My mom would pack a picnic lunch, and off we'd go to some place like LaCrosse, Wisconsin. It didn't matter where we went; Dad always took the country roads, and we always seem to end up going through a section of the country where houses would periodically have many buggies in front. We knew we were in the Amish country.

Some of the Amish traditions are quite different from other religious groups. They don't have churches. A group would meet at one of the parishioners' homes.

The Amish Wedding and Other Special Occasions of the Older Order Communities (289.73 SCO) talks about various holidays and important events, including Sunday worship.

For anyone not familiar with their culture, this book is a good, easy-to-read beginning book about the Amish way of life.

c Waterloo Public Library 2007

A true story of a troubled girl

Torey Hayden accepted a job as a grade school teacher for special needs students in a very small town. Unfortunately, she was hired in the middle of the school year. For many weeks before Hayden came, her students were taught by several substitute teachers - one of them didn't even last a day.

Her class consists of only four students, but even they were a handful. Jeremiah is the nightmare student, full of energy and a vile mouth. Philip is a cowering, whimpering child. Reuben is constantly on the go. Jadie is a selective mute, meaning that she can talk when she wants to but just refuses to talk in school. From the very first day, Hayden had a lot of work to do with these youngsters, and the fact that they did not have a regular routine did not help any.

The title of Hayden's true story is Ghost Girl, referring to Jadie. Jadie has her share of problems. She's hunched over, almost doubled over with her arms folded against her stomach. It's very difficult for Hayden to see her eyes, because of her posture. Although she is well behaved and does her school work, she refuses to talk in class.

As time goes on, Jadie trusts Hayden more and more. The author's background is doing research on selective mute children, so she's successful at getting Jadie more involved in class. Jadie does begin to talk a little in private, but what she says seems to make no sense - it's very confusing and cryptic. Hayden begins to have strong suspicions that something is really wrong in the family.

If you enjoy a book with an ending where everything is explained, Ghost Girl is not for you. There are a lot of questions raised by the author, but that doesn't mean that the book isn't worthwhile. By the end of the story, your heart goes out to Jadie with all of her troubles. I think it will change your perspective on how you behave around someone who is as unresponsive as this young girl.

This book can be found on the second floor under the Dewey # 362.1989 HAY.

c Waterloo Public Library 2007

The Good Ol' Days

One of my 93-year-old father's favorite activities is traveling with my sister and brother-in-law through the Amish territory by Fairbank. It's all he'll talk about for several days afterwards. And he's ready and willing to go back again every two weeks.

A little background on my father: He's been a farmer all of his life. Even after retirement, he still kept informed about the changes occurring in farming. He was a farmer's son. He worked as a farm hand after he left home. When he married, he and my mother (a Waterloo city girl) moved to the farm that he still owns. He's lived through a lot, including the Great Depression and World War II. Because they had land for crops and animals and little money, they weren't affected by the Depression and the war as much as others.

Bob Artley's Seasons on the Farm ( 741.597 ART) is the perfect book to show Dad. The whimsical, sentimental cartoons will bring back a lot of memories for him. Artley writes about all of the activities farm kids used to do years ago: thrashing the oats, going to the one-room school house, plowing with horses, milking by hand, gathering chicken eggs, cleaning out the hog house, etc.

I'm sure that once I show this book to Dad, he'll remember a lot more stories to tell me about his own childhood and farming.

c Waterloo Public Library 2007

I heard "Tie a Yellow Ribbon..." and now I can't get it out of my head.

Remember "Tie a Yellow Ribbon 'Round the Ole Oak Tree" sung by Tony Orlando and Dawn? I just heard that lately. I'm old enough to remember when the song came out. I think that it was around 1973 when people started putting yellow ribbons on trees to show there support for the military in Vietnam. Rows of trees could be seen with yellow ribbons. It was quite a sight. Of course this was decades before the yellow ribbon car magnets that you see all over the place became popular.

Tony Orlando has written an autobiography called Halfway to Paradise (biography section, #781.64 ORL). I didn't even know that the book title is the title of his first hit in 1961. I only remember him from the 1970s, beginning with his song, "Candida." In fact, he was popular enough to travel the concert circuits with Gene Pitney, Brian Hyland, Ray Stevens, and Bobby Vinton back in the '60s.

After touring, he settled in to work as an executive at Columbia working under Clive Davis. Even though he was not recording at Columbia, it did not stop him; he secretly recorded music for another company (Bell). After "Knock Three Times" became a big hit, even reaching #1 in England, he decided he should leave Columbia and concentrate on his singing career. Several bands claimed to be the original Tony Orlando and Dawn. He wanted to make sure that he did not lose control of his music career by having someone else gain legal access to the name.

As with many famous people, he's had his share of drug addictions. At times they were bad enough, that he ended up in a facility. Lindsay Lohan had it easy compared to what Orlando describes in his book.

This book is an easy read and will delight anyone who wants to reminisce about the good old days of music during the '60s and '70s.

c Waterloo Public Library 2007

Three generations of women in China

Some of you may already be familiar with a new novel written by Lisa See called Peony in Love. I have wanted to read this novel, since it discusses women's role in ancient China. The story revolves around a 15-year-old girl whose parents arrange a marriage for her. Unfortunately, I have not read it yet, since it's always checked out.

That book description piqued my interest in what it would be like for a woman growing up in China. Most of my education in world history concentrated on Europe. Very little was on Asia.
When I saw Wild Swans by Jung Chang (951.05 CHA), I had to read it.

The book tells the story of three Chinese woman: Jung Chang, her mother, and her grandmother.

The story begins in the early 1900s with her grandmother. As a young child, Chang's great-grandparents bound her feet, causing her a tremendous amount of pain. Her feet were broken on purpose and bound to make them more dainty, lady like. That was a common practice at the time, resulting in woman taking very small steps and walking every so carefully. Regular sized feet were considered an embarrassment. At the age of fifteen, her grandmother was given to a warlord general as a concubine. (It was not unusual for rich people to have a wife and several concubines.) This gave Chang's great-grandparents more prestige and wealth. Her life was extremely lonely during that time, and she was despised by the wife of the general. Fortunately she was able to escape the cruelty of that household. While she was in her twenties (considered old for marriage), an elderly doctor fell in love with her and married her, providing some years of happiness.

Chang's mother was more of a free spirit, only wanting to get married when she was in love. During her childhood, the Japanese ruled Manchuria, where she lived. When the Japanese were defeated during WWII, political and economic unrest occurred. There were two opposing sides vying for power, practically destroying the town she lived in. As an adult, she joined the Communist party.

Jung Chang does a great job of incorporating a tremendous amount of personal material about her family history and at the same time writing about the dramatic changes in women's rights that have occurred during the last three generations.

c Waterloo Public Library 2007

He has rocks in his head

Now, I've heard of people spending their entire vacation looking at stones in Egypt, going from one incredible monument to another. I've heard of people going to Great Britain to visit the extremely popular site known as Stonehenge, but I've never heard of anyone spending an entire long vacation looking at stones across the island.

Before reading this, I had three reasons for wanting to look at this book. I have a fascination with prehistoric structures (I studied them in art history). My brother Michael publishes a magazine (KMT) that features all types of man-made stone structures. Several years ago, there was an exhibit at the Waterloo Center for the Arts. A series of beautiful, richly colored large paintings of megaliths were on display. Ever since I saw the first photograph of a pyramid, I was hooked.

M. Scott Peck and his wife did just that, and it's chronicled in his book, In Search of Stones (#150.92 PEC). Supplied with a guide book and a map, go on an expedition looking for stones. These aren't ordinary stones, though. These are stones that for some unknown reason have been moved and placed in particular patterns or locations. Some are carved onto specific shapes, some are decorated with fanciful animals and abstract shapes.

Although he does talk about the excitement of finding another site, it's more than just a journal of his travels. On this trip, he does a lot of thinking. This is one of those books that takes a while to get through. I have to read this in segments, not because I'm bored, but because he gives me something to reflect on. He's able to find all sorts of relationships between disparate ideas. He openly reveals several aspects of his life: religious beliefs, addictions, marriage, and infidelity are just a few. Even though he is the first to admit that he's far from perfect, he's a person I would really like to know.

Who knew a book about stones could be so fascinating?

c Waterloo Public Library 2007