Brief Notes
Georges Perec
Brief Notes Georges Perec
Christina Weisensel
Narnia 6
Harry Potter 8
The Giver 10
A Series of Unfortunate Events 12 A Wrinkle in Time 14 Raven’s Gate 16
6
Alex Rider 18 Maximum Ride 20
The Princess Diaries 22 Heist Society 24 Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children 26
Hunger Games 32
Divergent 30
Splintered 28
The Girl at Midnight 34 The Selection 36
Every library answers a twofold need, which is often also a twofold obsession: that of conserving certain objects (books) and that of organizing them in certain ways. One of my friends had the idea one day of stopping his library at 361 books. The plan was as follows: having attained, by addition or subtraction, and starting from a given number n of books, the number K = 361, deemed as corresponding to a library, if not an ideal then at least a sufficient library, he would undertake to acquire on a permanent basis a new book X only after having eliminated (by giving away, throwing out, selling or any other appropriate means) an old book Z, so that the total number K of works should remain constant and equal to 361: K + X >361> K - Z.
NARNIA C.S. Lewis I first experienced this book series when my dad read it to me when I was six. We were reading The Magician’s Nephew and I was so scared we had to stop. I read them for myself when I was in early high school and was no longer scared, but excited. Of course I loved the movies too and my friends and I would constantly dream about being royalty ourselves.
Age 8 and up Grade 3 and up
7 books Average of 242 pages
Age of the characters
8, 10, 12, 13
“Once a King or Queen in Narnia, always a King or Queen.”
Percy Jackson Harry Potter Lord of the Rings Little House on the Prairie
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As it evolved this seductive scheme came up against predictable obstacles for which the unavoidable solutions were found. First, a volume was to be seen as counting as one (1) book even if it contained three (3) novels (or collections of poems, essays, etc.); from which it was deduced that three (3) or four (4) or n (n) novels by the same author counted (implicitly) as one (1) volume by that author, as fragments not yet brought together but ineluctably bringable together in a Collected Works. Whence it was adjudged that this or that recently acquired novel by this or that English-language novelist of the second half of the nineteenth century could not logically count as a new work X but as a work Z belonging to a series under construction: the set T of all the novels written by the aforesaid novelist (and God knows there are some!). This didn’t alter the original scheme in any way at all: only instead of talking about 361 books, it was decided that the sufficient library was ideally to be made up of 361 authors, whether they had written a slender opuscule or enough to fill a truck.
HARRY POTTER J.K. Rowling I wasn’t allowed to read Harry Potter until I was thirteen. My mom thought that the unicorn being killed in the first one would be too scary for my child mind. I’m glad I had to wait because when I did start all the books were out, so I never had to wait. I read the entire series in a week. I can thank the fact I am an artist to this epic world of adventure.
Age 9 and up Grade 4 and up
7 books Average of 598 pages Age of the character
11-17
“You’re a wizard, Harry.”
Narnia Lord of the Rings
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Australia Czech Republic
Eragon
Poland
Twilight
United Kingdom
#113
BOUGHT TOGETHER
This modification proved effective over several years. But it soon became apparent that certain works romances of chivalry, for example - had no author or else had several authors, and that certain authors - the Dadaists, for example - could not be kept separate from one another without automatically losing 80 to 90per cent of what made them interesting. The idea was thus reached of a library restricted to 361 subjects - the term is vague but the groups it covers are vague also at times - and up until now that limitation has been strictly observed. So then, one of the chief problems encountered by the man who keeps the books he has read or promises himself that he will one day read is that of the increase in his library. Not everyone has the good fortune to be Captain Nemo: ‘...the world ended for me the day my Nautilus dived for the first time beneath the waves. On that day I bought my last volumes, my last pamphlets, my last newspapers, and since that time I would like to believe that mankind has neither thought nor written.’
THE GIVER Lois Lowry I don’t remember the first time I read The Giver, but I think it was late middle school or early high school. I didn’t read it for class, just for fun. To this day it is my favourite book. I keep this book in my bag at all times.
Age 12 and up Grade 7 and up
1 book 240 pages Age of the character
12
“Memories are forever.”
Tuck Everlasting Number the Stars Holes Wrinkle in Time
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United States
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Captain Nemo’s 12,000 volumes, uniformly bound, were thus classified once and for all, and all the more simply because the classification, as is made clear to us, was uncertain, at least from the language point of view (a detail which does not at all concern the art of arranging a library but is meant simply to remind us that Captain Nemo spoke all languages indiscriminately). But for us, who continue to have to do with a human race that insists on thinking, writing and above all publishing, the increasing size of our libraries tends to become the one real problem. For it’s not too difficult, very obviously, to keep ten or twenty or let’s say even a hundred books; but once you start to have 361, or a thousand, or three thousand, and especially when the total starts to increase every day or thereabouts, the problem arises, first of all of arranging all these books somewhere and then of being able to lay your hand on them one day when, for whatever reason, you either want or need to read them at last or even to reread them.
A SERIES OF UNFORTUNATE EVENTS Lemony Snicket I was nine when I found this series. These were my goto books growing up. I remember when the thirteenth one came out on Friday the thirteenth and it blew my mind; I bought the book at midnight.
Age 8 and up Grade 3 and up
13 books Average of 276 pages
Age of the characters
baby, 12, 14
“Reading is one form of escape. Running for your life is another.”
Percy Jackson
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All the Wrong Questions
Canada
The Magicians
New Zealand
Miss Peregrine’s Peculiar Children
United States
#759
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A WRINKLE IN TIME
Thus the problem of a library is shown to be twofold: a problem of space first of all, then a problem of order.
1. Of Space 1.1. Generalities
Books are not dispersed but assembled. Just as we put all the pots of jam into a jam cupboard, so we put all our books into the same place, or into several same places. Even though we want to keep them, we might pile our books away into trunks, put them in the cellar or the attic, or in the bottoms of wardrobes, but we generally prefer them to be visible. In practice, books are most often arranged one beside the other, along a wall or division, on rectilinear supports, parallel with one another, neither too deep nor too far apart. Books are arranged - usually - standing on end and in such a way that the title printed on the sine of the work can be seen (sometimes, as in bookshop windows, the cover of the books is displayed, but it is unusual, proscribed and nearly always considered shocking to have only the edge of the book on show).
I read this book when I was about nine. It was so cool to be able to notice all the biblical references throughout the series. When I found out there was a movie I was so excited, unfortunately it’s not very good. Thankfully a new movie is coming in 2018.
Madeleine L’Engle
Age 10 and up Grade 5 and up
4 books Average of 296 pages Age of the character
14
“Wild nights are my glory!”
Where the Red Fern Grows Island of the Blue Dolphins Bridge to Terabithia Narnia
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#827
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RAVENS GATE
In current room layouts, the library is known as an ‘area’ for books. This, most often, is a module belonging as a whole to the ‘living-room’, which likewise contains a
drop-leaf drinks cabinet drop-leaf writing desk two-door dresser hi-fi unit television console slide projector display cabinet etc.
and is offered in catalogues adorned with a few false bindings. In practice books can be assembled just about anywhere.
Anthony Horowitz The only reason I read these books when I was thirteen was because they were by a familiar author. I felt like a total rebel reading the first one because it was all about demons and the supernatural. When I got to book four I was getting pretty freaked out and ended up stopping.
Age 12 and up Grade 7 and up
5 books Average of 388 pages Age of the character
14
“We live in an age when there is no room for the impossible.” BOUGHT TOGETHER
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Australia Moriarty United States Origin I Am Number Four
United Kingdom
#76,331
Alex Rider
1.2. Rooms where books may be put
in the entrance hall in the sitting room in the bedroom(s) in the bog
Generally speaking, one kind of book is put in the room you cook in, the ones known as ‘cookery books’. It is extremely rare to find books in a bathroom, even though for many people this is a favourite place to read in. The surrounding humidity is unanimously considered a prime enemy of the conservation of printed texts. At the most, you may find in a bathroom a medicine cupboard and in the medicine cupboard a small work entitled What to do before the doctor gets there.
ALEX RIDER Anthony Horowitz A complete obsession of mine for so many years. These books spanned across my life from the age of ten to the age of nineteen. I always bought the new book the day it came out and would finish reading it before bed. An absolutely incredible series.
Age 12 and up Grade 7 and up
10 books Average of 376 pages Age of the character
14
“You’re never too young to die.”
MOST POPULAR REGIONS
Raven’s Gate
Australia
Artemis Fowl
New Zealand
Percy Jackson
United Kingdom
Gallagher Girls
United States
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#19,394
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MAXIMUM RIDE
1.3. Places in a room where books can be arranged
James Patterson
On the shelves of fireplaces or over radiators (it may be thought, even so, that heat may, in the long run, prove somewhat harmful), between two windows, in the embrasure of an unused door, on the steps of a library ladder, making this unusable (very chic), underneath a window, on a piece of furniture set at an angle and dividing the room into two (very chic, creates an even better effect with a few pot-plants).
When I was thirteen I was staying at a friends house for awhile when my parents were away. I was telling her how I wished I had brought a book. She pulled out this weird adult looking book swearing it was really good. I kinda didn’t want to believe her though because she said she had gotten it for free from a bookstore because they were trying to get rid of them. I read it anyway and from that day on I would wait anxiously every year for the new book release. The last one came out when I was twenty-one.
Age 12 and up Grade 7 and up
9 books Average of 386 pages Age of the character
14
“Can you giggle while racing for your life and protecting a six-year-old? I can.”
Witch and Wizard Percy Jackson
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The Ranger’s Apprentice
New Zealand
Divergent
United States
#15,211
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THE PRINCESS DIARIES Meg Cabot
1.4 Things which aren’t books but are often met with in libraries Photographs in gilded brass frames, small engravings, pen and ink drawings, dried flowers in stemmed glasses, matchbox-holders containing, or not, chemical matches (dangerous), lead soldiers, a photograph of Ernest Renan in his study at the Collége de France,* postcards, dolls’ eyes, tins, packets of salt, pepper and mustard from Lufthansa, letter-scales, picture hooks, marbles, pipe-cleaners, scale models of vintage cars, multicoloured pebbles and gravel, ex-votos, springs.
Like most girls, I saw these movies and loved them. Forever wishing I could be whisked away to be a princess instead of having to do math. I was at the library one day and saw that the story didn’t have to end because there was an entire series of books. I first read them when I was around twelve. I never ended up finishing all the books because there were so many and I grew out of them.
Age 12 and up Grade 7 and up
11 books Average of 308 pages Age of the character
15
“C’est la vie”
Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants
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Philippines
Avalon High
Sweden
Ella Enchanted
Vietnam
Gallagher Girls
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United States
#66,212
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HEIST SOCIETY
2. Of Order
A library that is not arranged becomes disarranged: this is the example I was given to try and get me to understand what entropy was and which I have several times verified experimentally. Disorder in a library is not serious in itself; it ranks with ‘Which drawer did I put my socks in?’. We always think we shall know instinctively where we have put such and such a book. And even if we don’t know, it will never be difficult to go rapidly along all the shelves.
Ally Carter One day I was bored and wanted a new book. So I asked the lady in Barnes and Noble if there was anything good out right now. She showed me Heist Society and I was sucked right in. At sixteen I suddenly thought it would be the coolest thing if my job was robbing museums. Thankfully I didn’t follow that career path, but I did continue to read as the characters made a living in the high stakes adventures.
Age 12 and up Grade 7 and up
3 books Average of 314 pages Age of the character
15
“We just figured out a half dozen ways not to rob the Henley.” BOUGHT TOGETHER
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Embassy Row The Naturals Finishing School
United States
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Gallagher Girls
Opposed to this apologia for a sympathetic disorder is the smallminded temptation towards an individual bureaucracy: one thing for each place and each place for its one thing, and vice versa. Between these two tensions, one which sets a premium on letting things be, on a good-natured anarchy, the other that exalts the virtues of the tabula rasa, the cold efficiency of the great arranging, one always ends by trying to set one’s books in order. This is a trying, depressing operation, but one liable to produce pleasant surprises, such as coming upon a book you had forgotten because you could no longer see it and which, putting off until tomorrow what you won’t do today, you finally re-devour lying face down on you bed.
I was late to the Peculiar Children train. I read the first book in the summer of 2016 when I was twenty-two. I was into the book so far that I would feel like a culture shock when I had to put it down. That book took me only two days to read and I immediately bought the second. While I haven’t had time to read it yet due to college, I look forward to picking it up again.
MISS PEREGRINE’S HOME FOR PECULIAR CHILDREN Ransom Riggs Age 13 and up Grade 8 and up
3 books Average of 420 pages Age of the character
16
“Sometimes it’s better not to look back.”
The Book Thief Red Queen
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Chile France
The 5th Wave
Philippines
Thirteen Reasons Why
Singapore
#557
BOUGHT TOGETHER
SPLINTERED
2.1. Ways of arranging books
ordered alphabetically
A.G. Howard
ordered by continent or country ordered by date of acquisition ordered by date of publication ordered by format ordered by genre ordered by major periods of literary history ordered by language ordered by priority for future reading ordered by binding ordered by series None of these classifications is satisfactory by itself. In practice, every library is ordered starting from a combination of these modes of classification, whose relative weighting, resistance to change, obsolescence and persistence give every library a unique personality.
Much like Heist Society, I got this book as a recommendation from a Barnes and Noble employee when I was eighteen. She raved about these books and like an idiot, I bought it. I too ended up falling in love with it. I loved it so much that I wrote to the author thanking her for her contribution to young adult literature, I even compared her to JK Rowling. She wrote back and said that my note made her cry and she was beyond thankful. I ended up being sent a free copy of her second book before it was on the shelves.
Age 14 and up Grade 9 and up
4 books Average of 382 pages Age of the character
16
“Oh no, luv. I bring out the life in you.”
Asylum The Lunar Chronicles The Magicians The Maze Runner
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#37,205
BOUGHT TOGETHER
We should first of all distinguish stable classifications from provisional ones. Stable classifications are those which, in principle, you continue to respect; provisional classifications are those supposed to last only a few days, the time it takes for a book to discover, or rediscover, its definitive place. This may be a book recently acquired and not yet read, or else a book recently read that you don’t quite know where to place and which you have promised yourself you will put away on the occasion of a forth-coming ‘great arranging’, or else a book whose reading has been interrupted and that you don’t want to classify before taking it up again and finishing it, or else a book you have used constantly over a given period, or else a book you have taken down to look up a piece of information or a reference and which you haven’t yet put back in its place, or else a book that you can’t put back in its rightful place because it doesn’t belong to you and you’ve several times promised to give it back, etc.
DIVERGENT Veronica Roth I actually read these books because my hair stylist told me about them when I was nineteen. I’ve been going to the same person for over six years and we always talk about the latest movies we’ve seen and books we’ve read. She has never once steered me wrong. Of course this book was amazing. Unfortunately the movie kind of butchered it. Oh well.
Age 14 and up Grade 9 and up
3 books Average of 586 pages Age of the character
16
“Fear doesn’t shut you down; it wakes you up”
The Hunger Games The Maze Runner The 5th Wave The Mortal Instruments
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Armenia New Zealand Philippines United States
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In my own case, nearly threequarters of my books have never really been classified. Those that are not arranged in a definitively provisional way are arranged in a provisionally definitive way, as at the OuLiPo. Meanwhile, I move them from one room to another, one shelf to another, one pile to another, and may spend three hours looking for a book without finding it but sometimes having the satisfaction of coming upon six or seven others which serve my purpose just as well.
2.2. Books very easy to arrange
The big Jules Vernes in the red binding, very large books, very small ones, Baedekers, rare books or ones presumed to be so, hardbacks, volumes in the PlĂŠiade collection, the PrĂŠsence du Futur series, novels published by the Editions de Minuit, collections, journals of which you possess at least three issues, etc.
HUNGER GAMES Suzanne Collins The Hunger Games train was another one I was late to jump on, no pun intended. I was seventeen when I read this series and I ended up getting all my friends at school hooked on them as well. (We were all always late to the game.) Since then I had read all the books multiple times and saw all the movies at midnight. I actually watched Catching Fire three times in a row when I was working on a Making project as a freshman in college.
Age 12 and up Grade 7 and up
3 books Average of 394 pages Age of the character
16
“May the odds be ever in your favor.”
MOST POPULAR REGIONS
Divergent
Australia
The Maze Runner
Germany
Percy Jackson
New Zealand
Lord of the Rings
United States
# ON BEST SELLER LIST
#1,858
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THE GIRL AT MIDNIGHT Melissa Grey
2.3. Books not too difficult to arrange
Books on the cinema, whether essays on directors, albums of movie stars or shooting scripts, South American novels, ethnology, psychoanalysis, cookery books (see above), directories (next to the phone), German Romantics, books in the Que Sais-je? series (the problem being whether to arrange them all together or with the discipline they deal with), etc. 2.4. Books just about impossible to arrange The rest: for example, journals of which you possess only a single issue, or else La Campagne de 1812 en Russie by Clausewitz, translated from the German by M. Bégouën, Captain-Commandant in the 31st Dragoons, Passed Staff College, with one map, Paris, Librairie Militaire R. Chapelot et Cie, 1900; or else fascicule 6 of Volume 91 (November 1976) of the Proceedings of the Modern Language Association of America (PMLA) giving the programme for the 666 working sessions of the annual congress of the said Association.
I stumbled across these books by chance. I was on a book buying rampage at Barnes and Noble one day not long after my twentyfirst birthday, just grabbing anything that looked good off the shelves, and I found this masterpiece. I went to sit in the cafe to skim all the books I had grabbed and I didn’t even get to the second book because I couldn’t stop reading this one. Of course I bought it. I own the second one as well but have not read it yet.
Age 14 and up Grade 9 and up
3 books Average of 436 pages Age of the character
17
“When in doubt, bravado. Always bravado.”
MOST POPULAR REGIONS
Daughter of Smoke and Bone The Crown’s Game The Wrath and the Dawn
Kingdom on Fire
United States
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#424,961
BOUGHT TOGETHER
Like the librarians of Babel in Borges’s story, who are looking for the book that will provide them with the key to all the others, we oscillate between the illusion of perfection and the vertigo of the unattainable. In the name of completeness, we would like to believe that a unique order exists that would enable us to accede in knowledge all in one go; in the name of the unattainable, we would like to think that order and disorder are in fact the same word, denoting pure chance. It’s possible also that both are decoys, illusions intended to disguise the erosion of both books and systems. It is no bad thing in any case that between the two our bookshelves should serve from time to time as joggers of the memory, as cat-rests and as lumber-rooms.
THE SELECTION Kiera Cass Millions of people love to watch The Bachelor. If you’re one of those people this book is for you. I had seen these books in book stores for years but never bothered to read them because they didn’t seem like something I would enjoy. Obviously I was quite wrong when I was twenty and finally gave in. It’s one story spread throughout three books, so it feels like the adventure never ends. And just like book covers, nothing is completely as it seems. The same is true for this book, and that is why I was hooked.
Age 13 and up Grade 8 and up
5 books Average of 348 pages Age of the character
17
“Great. Now the queen thought I was a misfit, too.”
The Siren Red Queen The Lunar Chronicles Matched
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Brazil Poland Portugal United States
#4,753
BOUGHT TOGETHER