Breaking My Own Column Rule

July 7, 2022 by Woody

My great friend Dan had a basement that was a boyhood wonderland with a pinball machine, Ping-Pong table, slot-car racetrack, dartboard, Rock ’Em Sock ’Em Robots, board games and more.

Dan not only knew how to expertly shake the pinball machine without a “tilt” registering, he also had a habit of tilting other games in his direction. That is to say he playfully cheated.

“My house, my rules,” Dan would announce and claim a do-over when his HO-scale Corvette went around a curve too speedily and flew off the track; when his dart wildly missed its mark and ricocheted off the cinder-block wall; when he jiggled the pinball machine a little too vigorously and the flippers did freeze.

Similarly, a high-stakes roll in Monopoly sometimes required having both dice coming to rest on the game board, not the table; but other times vice-versa. “Doesn’t count. Roll again,” he would cackle if he didn’t like the outcome. “My house, my rules.”

Naturally, the rules tilted in my favor when we played H-O-R-S-E or checkers at my house.

I bring this up today because I have long had an unwritten rule of not writing about local authors and their books in this space. It seems more prudent to say “no” to all requests, being as numerous as they are, than risk this becoming a weekly book review column.

Alas, loyal readers of this space with good memories will instantly recognize my hypocrisy because back in February I wrote about the novel “Thanks, Carissa, For Ruining My Life” (Immortal Works Publishing). The setting features a fictional beach town named Buena Vista that is clearly – from Main Street to the foothills to a familiar taco shack – Buenaventura.

That author, a former prestigious John Steinbeck Fellow in Creative Writing, has a new book that just came out last week: a collection of short stories titled, “How to Make Paper When the World is Ending” (Koehler Books). It is terrific. Indeed, no less than ten of the 15 offerings have previously appeared in literary magazines and journals.

Just as Mr. Steinbeck time and again wrote about the Salinas Valley in his fiction, Dallas Woodburn over and again writes about her hometown – including the pier, beach, and promenade – in the pages of “Paper.” One of my favorite stories here is titled “How My Parents Fell In Love” which begins:

“My mother walked out of the grocery store. She wore a red dress, her hair was permed the way it looks in photo albums. My father drove up in a car, a fast car, silver, a car that goes vroom vroom. He did not know her yet. She looked pretty in that red dress with the ruffles at the hem. He rolled down the window, leaned out, and smiled, and said, ‘Hubba, hubba!’ They fell in love and lived happily ever after.”

Four similar vignettes follow, each growing longer and written more maturely than the previous, each storyline slightly changed yet each ending exactly the same: “They fell in love and lived happily every after.”

The sixth and final version, however, rings most true and scraps the fairy-tale ending: “Later that night they kissed under the mistletoe. The fell in love. And they lived, happily. Also angrily, naughtily, hopelessly, hungrily. Messily. Ever after. Like saints and martyrs and lovers and children. They lived, and they live. Together still.”

Am I guilty of hypocrisy and nepotism with today’s subject? Yes, most assuredly. Also unashamedly, happily, unapologetically, proudly with my buttons popping off.

“My column, my rules.” I hope you understand and will forgive me.

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Essay copyrights Woody Woodburn

Woody writes a weekly column for The Ventura County Star and can be contacted at WoodyWriter@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter and Instagram at @woodywoodburn. His SIGNED books are available at www.WoodyWoodburn.com.

Personalized Signed copies of WOODEN & ME: Life Lessons from My Two-Decade Friendship with the Legendary Coach and Humanitarian to Help “Make Each Day Your Masterpiece” and “Strawberries in Wintertime: Essays on Life, Love, and Laughter” are available at WoodyWoodburn.com

Thanks, ‘Carissa’, for the Ventura Shout-out

February 25, 2022 by Woody

I remember watching “Little Miss Sunshine” in a downtown Ventura movie theater a number of years ago and the audience erupted with applause and cheers at the dramatic pageant arrival scene when Steve Carell’s dad character, driving the family in a bright yellow VW Microbus, misses the freeway exit and has to take an overpass to turn around…

…and the brief on-screen “star” is our 101 California Street exit – only four blocks away from the movie theater we were watching in – with the high-rise Crowne Plaza beach hotel in the background.

If you are at all like me you feel a similar thrill whenever you see Ventura in a Hollywood role. For example, our downtown in “Swordfish” or several local spots in “Two Jakes” or our beloved pier in “God Bless America” to name three more.

I imagine it’s how Monterey’s “Cannery Row” neighborhood must have felt to be immortalized in John Steinbeck’s novel of the same name. Less famously, the fictional coastal town of Cabrillo hints strongly of Ventura – and the old Star-Free Press – in my predecessor Chuck Thomas’ novel “Getting Off The Map.”

Well, a new book has me smiling and cheering for featuring Ventura in its pages. Actually, the fictional beach town is named Buena Vista, but make no mistake it is Buenaventura. From the beach and pier to Main Street and the foothills, its author – Dallas Woodburn – pays homage to her dear hometown through and through.

My daughter’s second novel, “Thanks, Carissa, For Ruining My Life” from Immortal Works, has just been published and – Boasting Dad Warning – instantly soared to No. 1 on Amazon’s list of Young Adult New Releases.

The story centers around two teenagers, Rose and Brad, who travel parallel journeys of self-discovery, empowerment, and acceptance after popular “queen bee” Carissa tears apart their lives. In Hollywood parlance, it’s “Brittany Runs a Marathon” meets “Some Kind of Wonderful.”

A wonderful kind of thing some writers like to do is scatter “Easter eggs” that only certain readers will find and recognize. “Carissa” has a basketful of such hidden treasures. For example, Tony’s Taco Shop is obviously Snapper Jack’s; Nature’s Grill makes a cameo as Nature’s Café; and in a role encompassing its own storyline is the Buena Vista radio station WAVE-104.3 that is, clear as a Santa Ana wind-blown summer day, Ventura’s KVTA-1590 where Dallas has been a guest on esteemed radio personality Tom Spence’s morning show. The observant reader will find more brightly dyed local gems.

Books are time machines and while “Carissa” will surely transport most readers back to high school, it carries me to when Dallas was only 6 or 7 and already dreaming of becoming an author. In my mind’s eye I can still see her, sitting tall on her knees, in a chair at the kitchen table and typing on her great-grandfather’s restored Underwood No. 5 typewriter. Punching the QWERTY keys, firmly with only her right index finger, she let her imagination soar.

There was modern magic in that 1911 heirloom: in second grade, Dallas had a poem – “Peanut Butter Surprise” about a PB&J sandwich made with a jellyfish because the grape jelly ran out – published in The Star’s “Kids Corner” feature and in fifth grade self-published a book of short stories and poems that sold 2,000 copies.

The little girl’s big dreams kept coming true with a play produced off-Broadway, a John Steinbeck Creative Writing Fellowship, and a handful of awards for her debut novel “The Best Week That Never Happened” two years ago.

Thanks to “Carissa” her writing life remains charmed, not ruined.

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Essay copyrights Woody Woodburn

A Stack of Books to ‘Yes, Read!’

December 18, 2021 by Woody

While I sometimes fall short in my quest to read a book a week for the calendar year, in 2021 I reached the goal with two weeks to spare.

This year’s 52-and-counting tally doesn’t include the approximately 502 books I read to my 3-year-old granddaughter, including these recommendations from Maya: “Change Sings: A Children’s Anthem” by Amanda Gorman; “The Boy Who Spoke to the Earth” by Chris Burkard; “Grumpy Monkey” by Suzanne Lang; and “No, David!” by David Shannon.

As for my favorites, here is a tall stack of “Yes, Read!”

“One Long River Of Song,” a posthumous collection of short essays by Brian Doyle, is a gem that next had me picking up one of his novels. “The Plover” is such a spellbinding seafaring tale that I will soon be visiting his backlist further.

Colson Whitehead, a two-time Pulitzer Prize winner, once again displays his storytelling mastery in his new 1960’s era “Harlem Shuffle” about thievery, and humanity, while Bryce Courtenay’s “The Potato Factory” is a terrific tale about a likeable London con artist in the 19th Century.

I dare say one need but be a runner to be captivated by “The Slummer: Quarters Till Death” by Geoffrey Simpson. Taking place in 2083, athletics – and society – has been divided into genetically designed “elites” and “slummers” who were born the old-fashioned way.

“The Storied Life of A.J. Fikry” by Gabrielle Zevin is a charming story that takes place in a bookstore. Meanwhile, I owe my thanks to Ventura’s charming “Timbre Books” for tipping me off to the engaging, funny and sometimes heartbreaking “The Last Taxi Driver” by Lee Durkee.

“A Tree Grows in Brooklyn” by Betty Smith is a young girl’s coming-of-age story that is slow-paced in the very best of ways. Also taking place in Brooklyn is “Snow In August,” a touching tale about an unlikely friendship by Pete Hamill.

Fans of “chick lit” will surely love “Writers & Lovers” by Lily King because even though the genre isn’t my cup of tea I greatly enjoyed this novel.

Even at nearly 600 pages, Amor Towles’ “The Lincoln Highway” will have you wishing this 1954 road trip of memorable characters would travel along a little further.

Meanwhile, “The Busker” by Brooks Rexroat is thin at 153 pages, but thick on entertainment. This Grand Prize Winner of “The Great Novella Contest” (whatever that is) is an underdog, hard-luck tale about a guitar-playing teen.

Stephen King’s “Billy Summers” is a flat-out, fast-paced, page-turner, road-trip story about a hitman you’ll find yourself rooting for and “The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry” by Rachel Joyce is about another road trip, albeit taken by foot, that you will want to tag along on.

Speaking – rather, reading – of road trips, somehow I had never before buckled in with Jack Kerouac’s classic “On The Road” but I am glad I finally did.

“One More For The Road” by the late, great Ray Bradbury is a marvelous collection of short fiction while “The Sun is a Compass: A 4,000 Mile Journey into the Alaskan Wilds” by Caroline Van Hemert chronicles a remarkable nonfiction off-the-road trip.

If you twisted my arm to name my favorite book I read this year, I would cry “uncle” and give you a toss up between these three novels: “The Midnight Library” by Matt Haig; “The Four Winds” by Kirstin Hannah; and “City of Thieves” by David Benioff.

In closing, a thought from Groucho Marx: “Outside of a dog, a book is man’s best friend. Inside of a dog it’s too dark to read.”

For that, I recommend a backlit e-reader.

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Woody Woodburn writes a weekly column for The Ventura County Star and can be contacted at WoodyWriter@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter and Instagram at @woodywoodburn. His SIGNED books are available at www.WoodyWoodburn.com.

A Book A Tree, A Tree And A Book

January 23, 2021January 23, 2021 by Woody

FOLLOW ME ON INSTAGRAM: @woodywoodburn

A Book And A Tree,

A Tree And A Book

“When we try to pick out anything by itself,” John Muir wrote, “we find it hitched to everything else in the Universe.”

So it is that a book in New York City is hitched to a tree in Central California; and that tree is hitched to a tree in Camarillo; which in turn is hitched to a book in Ventura. This circle of life, so to speak – trees becoming books and books leading to trees – includes a death, but begins with a birthday.

As birthday gift a couple years past, my son gave me a book. Rather, knowing my passion for books and literacy and libraries, he donated a new volume in my honor to the New York Public Library.

A commemorative nameplate on the first page inside its front cover reads: “In honor of my Dad – Thank you for teaching me to make each day a masterpiece, drink deeply from good books, and make friendship a fine art.”

Those are my top three of John Wooden’s “Seven-Point Creed.” To be told that these lessons from my beloved mentor have successfully been passed down like a priceless heirloom to my son put birdsong in my heart.

You may be curious as to the title of the gifted pages. I certainly was and specifically wondered which of my all-time favorites my son chose: “The Old Man and the Sea”? Perhaps “The Grapes of Wrath” or “Adventures of Huckleberry Finn”? Or maybe my childhood treasure “Where The Wild Things Are”?

Alas, my son had no say in the selection and was not informed which book was purchased. When I contacted the NYPL and asked I was told no specific records are kept.

“You’ll have to find it yourself,” the employee joked.

Here’s the punch line: If placed end to end, there are 63.3 miles of shelves in the NYPL’s main branch at Fifth Avenue and 42nd Street in Manhattan. Indeed, one would need endless “Patience” and unlimited “Fortitude” – the names of the two iconic marble lions proudly standing guard at the front entrance – to find my honorary nameplate in one of the 3 million volumes within. Finding a needle in a vast hayfield would be less impossible.

In truth, not knowing which title bears my nameplate in no way diminishes the specialness of the gift because now I can imagine it to be any book at all. With this insight, I gave a dear friend of mine a similar gift she will never find – a memorial tree planted in Sierra National Forest after her sister passed away.

Upon the death of another of her loved ones, my friend thought of the faraway tree she has seen only in her imagination.

“Your gift deeply moved my soul,” she told me kindly, “and inspired me to purchase a Chinese Elm – ‘Tree of Harmony’ – for my family to put in the Friendship Garden at our church in honor of my sister and brother-in-law.”

Together, she and her husband and their three children personally planted the skinny eight-foot-tall elm and surrounded it with a circular perimeter of large stones. She expressed comfort in knowing their Tree of Harmony will always be there to visit.

Inspiration seeds inspiration. To be able to see a specific tree through the forest, as it were, inspired me to donate a book – of my choosing, this time – to a local library. I won’t give away its title, but I will tell you the handwritten inscription inside reads:

“Make each day a masterpiece, drink deeply from good books like this one, and make friendship a fine art.”

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A Flood of Book Recommendations

December 19, 2020 by Woody

FOLLOW ME ON INSTAGRAM: @woodywoodburn

Book Recommendations for

Celebrating Jaolabokaflod

As a Southern Californian through and through, I love sunshine on my face and a sea breeze in my lungs and sand between my toes, yet on Christmas Eve I will be an honorary Icelander celebrating Jolabokaflod.

Pronounced yo-la-bok-a-flot, Jolabokaflod translates to “Yule Book Flood” and is the tradition where books are exchanged as gifts on Dec. 24. Everyone spends the rest of the night curled up by fireplaces, drinking hot chocolate and reading.

It’s no small wonder 93 percent of Icelanders annually read at least one book (only 70 percent of Americans do) and 50 percent read eight or more.

Perhaps I have ancestral roots deep in the tundra because I try to read 52 books each year. Thanks to stay-and-sheltering, I have surpassed this book-per-week goal with 57 titles to date. Below is my small flood of Jolabokaflod recommendations for 2020.

“The Boy, the Mole, the Fox and the Horse” by Charlie Mackesy is short at 218 illustrated pages, but long on Winnie-the-Pooh-like wisdom for kids and adults alike.

Speaking of kids, while my tally does not include children’s books I read to my 2-year-old granddaughter, Maya, I’d still like to single out a special one: “Finding Aloha” written and wonderfully illustrated by professional artist Daniela Arriaga, a Ventura native who now resides in Hawaii.

“Gilead” by Marilynne Robinson wowed me and I enjoyed her debut novel “Housekeeping” next, but was honestly disappointed by her recently published “Jack.”

Written in non-rhyming poetry “brown girl dreaming” by Jacqueline Woodson is a memoir about growing up during the civil rights and her newest novel “Red at the Bone” is even better.

“The problem with new books,” John Wooden said, “is they keep us from reading good old ones.” Two old good ones by Ray Bradbury that I enjoyed this year were “The Golden Apples of the Sun” and “Dandelion Wine.”

I had not read any of Pete Hamill’s work until he passed away this summer and a friend insisted I make up for this shortcoming. It was kind advice. “Forever” where Cormac O’Connor is granted immortality so long as he never leaves the island of Manhattan is terrific and “North River” about a neighborhood doctor in New York City during The Great Depression is even better.

I also came late to Toni Morrison this year and couldn’t put her down once I started. “Beloved” is amazing; “Bluest Eye” even better; and “Song of Solomon” as powerful and relevant during today’s Black Lives matter movement as when it was published nearly two decades ago.

“Homegoing: A Novel” by Yaa Gyasi is a heartbreaking story about two half sisters, one free and one not, and the lasting impact slavery has on both branches of their descendants through the ensuing eight generations.

“The Book Thief” by Markus Zusak is 608 pages of unforgettable storytelling.

My November featured this Fab Four: “Last Bus to Wisdom” by Ivan Doig; “The Light Between Oceans” by M. L. Stedman; “The Power of One” by Bryce Courtenay; and “Anxious People” by Fredrik Backman.

Impossibly, “American Dirt” by Jeanine Cummins almost lives up to the acclaim calling it a modern day “The Grapes of Wrath.” Speaking of which, biographies do not get any better than “Mad at the World: A Life of John Steinbeck” by William Souder.

My favorite book, naturally, was “The Best Week That Never Happened” by Dallas Woodburn. I honestly would be touting this award-winning, page-turning debut novel even if I did not know the author.

Will you join me by your own fireplace this evening? Don’t forget the hot chocolate!

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Woody Woodburn writes a weekly column for The Ventura County Star and can be contacted at WoodyWriter@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter and Instagram at @woodywoodburn. His books are available at www.WoodyWoodburn.com.

Check out my memoir WOODEN & ME: Life Lessons from My Two-Decade Friendship with the Legendary Coach and Humanitarian to Help “Make Each Day Your Masterpiece” and my essay collection “Strawberries in Wintertime: Essays on Life, Love, and Laughter” …

Personalized signed copies are at WoodyWoodburn.com

Mrs. Figs’ “Storytime” is Magical

April 18, 2020 by Woody

FOLLOW ME ON INSTAGRAM: @woodywoodburn

“Storytime With Mrs. Figs”

Offers Magical Healing

It is said that reading aloud to young children fosters a love for books and literature that lasts a lifetime. Connie Halpern, however, pays lip service to this noble notion.

Literally.

Four weeks past, in an effort to make these shelter-in-place days and nights a little less confining for children, Connie started a not-for-profit channel on YouTube.com entitled “Storytime with Mrs. Figs.” She believes even coronavirus cannot quarantine a child’s imagination.

You may well recognize Connie’s pseudonym because for the past decade, before recently selling her independent bookstore, Connie was the effervescent shopkeeper of “Mrs. Figs Bookworm” in Camarillo.

“I believe strongly in the healing qualities of stories,” Connie says in explanation of why she created “Storytime.”

Down the road, again literally, Connie plans to travel by motor home and read to children all across America. For now, she is spreading the healing qualities of stories online.

Connie Halpern, aka the marvelous “Mrs. Figs.”

To date, Mrs. Figs has posted eight fireside Storytimes, including: “The Day the Crayons Quit” by Drew Daywalt and its bestselling sequel, “The Day the Crayons Came Home”; “Wild About Books” by Judy Sierra; “After the Fall” by Dan Santat; and “All in a Day” by Cynthia Rylant. More stories promise to be added as she receives copyright permission from publishers and authors.

Previously, the favorite fireplace I had ever seen was in Mark Twain’s home in Hartford, Conn., in his library to be specific.

Making it special is the elaborately carved oak mantelpiece that came from Ayton Castle in Scotland. Displayed upon it, from left to right, are a painted round vase; large seashell; marble figure of a woman; tall blue vase; silver serving platter; framed painting of a woman wearing a red winter coat and black hat; bronze tile of Twain’s profile; matching tall blue vase; white pottery water jar; small blue vase; a typing paper-sized painting of a cat’s face surround by ruffles; and a tiny bronze harp figurine.

I detail the items because each evening the master storywriter became an oral storyteller by making up a new tale for his young daughters in which he incorporated the entire ensemble, always beginning with the “Cat in a Ruff” painting. To imagine Twain performing one of his off-the-cuff stories is to imagine magic.

Connie’s “Storytime” is surely similar magic brought to life. She even reads while sitting beside an elegant fireplace, flames flickering as warmly as her voice, the handsome wooden mantle filled fully from left to right with books. It is my new favorite fireplace.

To say Mrs. Figs reads aloud is not quite accurate. Rather, she performs, the words seemingly memorized as she displays the illustrations to the listener/viewer. Additionally, she offers introductory thoughts about each book and other wisdoms.

“The only thing that you absolutely have to know,” Albert Einstein said, “is the location of the library.” During stay-and-shelter with children, knowing the location of “Storytime With Mrs. Figs” on YouTube is an absolute must.

Reading a book has been called a time machine. Mrs. Figs further proves that for adults, listening to a children’s book can magically transport us back to kindergarten naptime or even younger while being tucked into bed as our mother read us to sleep.

“Now you get to close your eyes,” Connie even coos after finishing one performance.

“It is my prayer that stories will be one small way that we can ‘stay-connected-while-sheltered’ during ‘stay-and-shelter,’ ” Connie allows, her words echoing the spiritual origins of Mrs. FIGs: Faith In God.

“Until next time, much love to you,” Connie signs off each episode. All that is missing is a kiss on the forehead.

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Personalized signed copies are available at WoodyWoodburn.com

“Good-Sized” Reading List 2019

December 28, 2019 by Woody

FOLLOW ME ON INSTAGRAM: @woodywoodburn

A “Good-Sized”

Reading List From 2019

Jack London, as young as age 10, maintained a goal of reading “two good-sized books a week” even when achieving the mark required staying up until 2 o’clock in the morning. Moreover, he had to rise early to deliver newspapers before school.

Later in life, the great novelist read even more voraciously, noting: “There is so much good stuff to read and so little time to do it in.”

More modestly than London, I annually try to find time to read one “good-sized” book a week. Often I fall shy of 52, but this has been a bumper-crop year with my tally at 59 books and 18,035 pages. Below is the best of my “good stuff to read” from 2019.

As usual, historian David McCullough did not disappoint with his latest offering, “The Pioneers: The Heroic Story of the Settlers Who Brought the American Ideal West.”

As a space/moon/Apollo junkie, I thoroughly enjoyed “The Man Who Knew The Way To The Moon” by Todd Zwillch.

“Behold the Dreamers: A Novel” by Imbolo Mbue is a fresh coming-to-America saga touching on race and immigration, rich vs. poor. Meanwhile, “I Will Always Write Back: How One Letter Changed Two Lives” by Martin Ganda and Caitlin Alifirenka is an inspiring true story about a boy from Zimbabwe and an All-American girl.

I always enjoy Fredrik Backman’s storytelling and “Beartown” and its sequel “Us Against You” are no exceptions. Both novels are about a hockey town filled with dirty politics and violence, but also loyalty and love.

These two Pulitzer Prize-winners captivated me: “The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay” by Michael Chabon mixes superheroes and Nazis, the War and NYC, friendship and mystery; while Donna Tartt’s “The Goldfinch” dives into the art world’s dark underbelly.

My brother is a fly-fisherman who ties his own flies, but such interests are not at all necessary to be enthralled by the true story “The Feather Thief: Beauty, Obsession, and the Natural History Heist of the Century” by Kirk Wallace Johnson.

“Mr. Penumbra’s 24-Hour Bookstore” by Robin Sloan is a fun page-turner filled with mystery and delightful characters.

“The Murmur of Bees” by Sofia Segovia is masterfully told by two narrators from different perspectives.

“The World’s Fastest Man: The Extraordinary Life of Cyclist Major Taylor, America’s First Black Sports Hero” by Michael Kranish is reminiscent of “The Boys In The Boat” except on two wheels with one hero.

“Bridge of Clay” by Markus Zusak merits a five-star review – one for each young brother, including Clay, who live on their own in this tale filled with heart and heartbreak.

Recommended to me by author Judy Blume in her “Books & Books” shop in Key West, “Red at the Bone” by Jacqueline Woodson weaves together the story of one family through the narration of different generations. I am eager to read more of Woodson’s award-winning writing.

Delia Owens’ writing sings, usually sorrowfully, in “Where The Crawdads Sing” with a mystery that holds until the final pages.

“The Nickel Boys: A Novel” by Colson Whitehead is very nearly as remarkable as his Pulitzer-winning “The Underground Railroad: A Novel.”

“The Water Dancer: A Novel” by Ta-Nehisi Coates is another mesmerizing Underground Railroad tale with magical realism added that makes one’s heart weep.

Lastly, perhaps my favorite read all year was “This Tender Land” by William Kent Krueger. A revision of “The Adventures Huckleberry Finn” taking place during the Great Depression, it features three boys who escape a brutal orphan school and go on an odyssey to find “home.” Jack London would surely have enjoyed spending time with these pages.

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Personalized signed copies are available at WoodyWoodburn.com

On Page, In Person, In Full Blume

December 21, 2019December 21, 2019 by Woody

FOLLOW ME ON INSTAGRAM: @woodywoodburn

On Page, In person,

She’s In Full Blume

Books are a time machine, it is rightly said, but so too are bookstores.

Indeed, the double-glass doors of “Books & Books” in Key West’s Old Town recently served as a magical portal that transformed my middle-aged wife into a young schoolgirl. Having taken no more than three steps inside the charming shop, my much-better-half stopped in her tracks and, her voice rising in pitch, declared: “I know you! You’re Judy Blume!”

No schoolboy was ever more excited to come face-to-face with LeBron James or Roger Federer.

“Yes, I’m Judy,” the Books & Books’ co-founder replied warmly.

Lisa and Judy Blume … and me.

“I read all your books growing up,” my wife-turned-child gushed as my mind’s eye flashed back to our daughter, as a teen, meeting author Ray Bradbury in Santa Barbara. “I loved them! Your writing was like a friend.”

Blume, whose Young Adult novels include “Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret” and “Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing,” smiled. It was not merely a polite grin, but rather broad and sincere for she surely could feel that my wife’s sentiments were heartfelt.

“I’m sorry,” my wife-turned-child said in her next breath, returning into a more-reserved adult. “You must have people tell you all the time how much your books meant to them.”

Blume, whose works have sold more than 80 million copies in 32 languages since arriving on the literary scene in 1969, relaxed in posture as if now chatting with an old friend. With the radiance of the Key West sun she replied, “I always enjoy hearing such kind compliments. Thank you.”

Meeting a hero – or, in this case, shero – from childhood can be dicey. The risk is that in real life the person will topple off her pedestal. Blume, however, proved to be a rarity by figuratively standing even taller. For the ensuing ten minutes she visited with my wife, answered questions and even asked some of her own.

During their conversation, Blume learned that our daughter actually spent an afternoon at her nearby home while attended the Key West Writing Workshop six years ago. Asking for an update and learning that Dallas’ debut YA novel – “The Best Week That Never Happened” – will be published this coming spring, Blume on her own accord wrote down the title and publisher so as to carry it in Books & Books. No small kindness, that.

Googling Blume afterwards, I discovered that my wife – and daughter, too, for she likewise once devoured Blume’s books – chose a gifted writer to admire. As evidence, among Blume’s numerous honors is being recognized as a Living Legend by the Library of Congress.

Equally estimable, if not more so, Blume has been a courageous writer. Indeed, she was a groundbreaker who broached controversial – and important – topics that previously had been largely sidestepped in YA literature. These included teen sex, birth control, menstruation, racism, divorce and death.

Never in my wildest dreams did I think I would ever find myself in a bookstore half as magical, with a proprietor a fraction as affable, as Connie Halpern and “Mrs. Fig’s Bookworm” in Camarillo, but Blume and Books & Books is very nearly a matching East Coast bookend.

Whenever I visit an independent bookstore I make a point to leave with a book as a show of support. This time, my wife and I left with an armful. Two of them – one recommended to me by Blume – makes my annual list of best books I’ve read in 2019, which I’ll reveal in this space next week.

In the meantime, I think it’s time I finally read a Judy Blume YA novel.

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Personalized signed copies are available at WoodyWoodburn.com

Mom’s Day Gift is Free Library

September 9, 2017 by Woody

For a Personalized Autographed copy of “STRAWBERRIES IN WINTERTIME” or “WOODEN & ME” mail a check for $25 to:

Woody Woodburn

400 Roosevelt Court

Ventura, CA 93003

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This Mother’s Day Gift is for Kids

“Though she be but little, she is fierce!” Shakespeare wrote in “A Midsummer Night’s Dream,” and these words seem apropos when describing the curbside street library on the 2700 block of Preble Avenue in midtown Ventura.

Though it is but little, it is fiercely wonderful!

Indeed, “The Little Free Library” (charter #35222) lives up to its name: it is a mere 21 inches wide by 24 inches tall, with only two shelves. Also, its books are free.

That’s right, people are can take – and keep – a book. No library card is required. Patrons can also return a borrowed book or leave a donated book. 1TimCindy

The library belongs to Tim and Cindy Hansen. More accurately, it is Cindy’s – she requested it for Mother’s Day two years past.

Tim and the couple’s adult sons Bernie and Franklin, made Cindy’s wish a reality. Perched atop a waist-high post, the “Prairie Two-Story” model they selected from littlefreelibrary.org looks like an elegant birdhouse with a picture window as a front door.

Little Free Library is a nonprofit organization aimed at increasing access to books for readers of all ages. Annually, Little Free Libraries foster the sharing of millions of books worldwide. In the Hansen’s neighborhood alone, there are two more free street libraries within walking distance.

The bottom shelf of the Hansen’s library is devoted to children’s books, and for good reason: “It’s lower and easier for the kids to reach,” Cindy notes.

Adding to the kid-friendliness are two curbside reading chairs.

Meanwhile, Tim enjoys his own nearby watching chair.

“It is a joy to sit on my porch and watch the birds all flutter away as a child comes running up to look for a new book,” Tim says, his voice filled with flight.

Wearing a navy-blue knit watchman’s cap, even on a warm afternoon, combined with his shrub-thick and long gray beard, Tim comes into focus like a Hemingway character of the sea. Cindy, meanwhile, constantly wears a smile that shines like a lighthouse.

Both have an oceanic-deep love for books.

As a child, Cindy says, the “Little House” series by Laura Ingalls Wilder “opened the world of reading for me.” She has spent her adult life opening up this same world for youth as an educational therapist and school librarian.

“I love to find that one book that lights a kid’s world on fire,” Cindy shares. This included her two sons who, she notes with a laugh, “grew up hearing me tell them to go read a book, not watch TV.”

Visiting Cindy and Tim, it quickly becomes clear that even though their street library has a top shelf of titles for adults among its roughly 50 books, their real focus is young readers. For example, Cindy routinely buys children’s books to ensure the lower shelf remains full.

“During summer, when school was out, the kids’ books really disappeared,” Cindy says, happily.

She adds, also happily: “When I’m gardening here out front, I love to see kids walk by or hop out of a car and get a book. It’s become part of the neighborhood.”

What difference can a mere few dozen books make? I am reminded of the beachcomber tossing a starfish back into the ocean, while hundreds more remained stranded on the sand after a storm, and telling a naysayer: “To this one, I’m making all the difference in the world.”

So it is with this little library, as a journal kept alongside reveals.

“I took a book, I drop a book in the night. Be back, Conrad” reads one entry.

Another: “Thankful to have such thoughtful neighbors. Reading opens our hearts and minds to a world of imagination. I’ll be back. (drawn heart)”

One more: “Thank you for having books. I enjoy it & really appreciate it.”

And, lastly, my favorite, printed in the hand of a young child: “thank you fore this little free labrary this will rilly help : ) Adeline”

I imagine this may be the first library little Adeline has ever visited. I also imagine it will forever remain her favorite.

* * *

Woody Woodburn writes a weekly column for The Ventura County Star and can be contacted at WoodyWriter@gmail.com.

Wooden & Me Kickstarter Front Photo Check out my memoir WOODEN & ME: Life Lessons from My Two-Decade Friendship with the Legendary Coach and Humanitarian to Help “Make Each Day Your Masterpiece” and my essay collection “Strawberries in Wintertime: Essays on Life, Love, and Laughter” …

Personalized signed copies are available at WoodyWoodburn.com
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Act I: Literary Walk Turns Serendipitous

February 25, 2017March 4, 2017 by Woody

Woody’s highly anticipated new book “STRAWBERRIES IN WINTERTIME: Essays on Life, Love, and Laughter” is NOW available! Order your signed copy HERE!

* * *

Literary Walk Takes Serendipitous Turn

“I have always depended on the kindness of strangers,” said the great playwright Tennessee Williams, who died 34 years ago today – Feb. 25, 1983 – one month and a day shy of turning 72.

The kindness of a stranger, with serendipity at play as well, made Williams leap off the printed page to life for me a short while ago. It was an encounter worth sharing.

Act One:

While in New Orleans on vacation, my wife, son, daughter, son-in-law, and I visited William Faulkner’s house in the French Quarter. In the upstairs study, in 1925, the future Nobel Laureate wrote his first novel, “Soldiers’ Pay.”

Inside William Faulker’s house turned bookstore.

Tucked away in an alley off famous Jackson Square, the home is now called “Faulkner House Books” and is a combination of charming bookstore and museum – with the emphasis on the former. While browsing books and memorabilia, we learned that another important 20th literary figure had once lived nearby: Tennessee Williams.

People collect many things, from postage stamps and baseball cards to fine wines and first-edition books. The later interest me, and greatly, but rare books are also generally beyond my bank account, and greatly.

As remedy, I have begun collecting visits to the homes of famous writers. My compilation includes John Steinbeck, Edgar Allen Poe, Thornton Burgess, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau and my top-shelf hero, Jim Murray, to name a handful.

The opportunity to add two more icons to my archives in a single afternoon was not to be passed up.

A Google search for directions revealed there was no reason to desire a streetcar – or Uber ride – to get to Williams’ home from Faulkner’s house. Less than a mile away, we decided to walk.

“We” now consisted of my son, daughter, son-in-law and me, for my wife begged out to go shopping. It wasn’t long before she seemed to have made the wiser choice.

Hoping for some literary osmosis from Tennessee Williams’ house in the French Quarter.

A right turn when we should have gone left turned us into lost wayfarers. Tempted to quit our quest, we decided “in for a dime, in for a dollar” and pressed on.

At long last we arrived at 1014 Dumaine Street. With green shutters and matching ornate ironwork railings on an iconic French Quarter-style balcony, the two-story yellow house is attractive.

It was also, to be honest, a little disappointing. The only thing marking it as special is a small bronze plaque out front proclaiming:

“Tennessee Williams owned this 19th-century townhouse from 1962 until his death in 1983. Here he worked on his autobiography, Memoirs, in which he wrote, ‘I hope to die in my sleep . . . in this beautiful big brass bed in my New Orleans apartment, the bed that is associated with so much love . . .’ He always considered New Orleans his spiritual home. This home is dedicated a Literary Landmark by Friends of Libraries U.S.A.”

Even the plaque is less than remarkable with its raised words weatherworn and hard to make out.

Unassuming as it all is, with no tours either, we reverently stood in the quiet street and studied the house as one might the Mona Lisa. Suddenly, a voice broke our reverie.

“Do you know what that is?” a man asked, his friendly tone made even more so by a Southern drawl. He was dressed business casual; tucked under one arm was a stack of papers, folders and an iPad; round-rimmed glasses and thinning gray hair added to his professorial look.

“Yes, it’s the Tennessee Williams’ house,” my son easily answered.

“Do you know who he is?” came a follow-up question that was little more difficult.

“Of course,” my daughter replied. “He was an author and playwright – a great one. He wrote, ‘A Streetcar Named Desire’ and ‘The Glass Menagerie.’ ”

The gentleman smiled, pleased.

“Not many people seem to know who he is anymore,” he said.

Tennessee Williams talked about “the kindness of strangers.” We were about to experience the kindness of one stranger. A stranger who, serendipitously for us, personally knew Tennessee Williams.

Intermission. Act Two next Saturday.

* * *

Woody Woodburn writes a weekly column for The Ventura County Star and can be contacted at WoodyWriter@gmail.com.

Check out my new memoir WOODEN & ME: Life Lessons from My Two-Decade Friendship with the Legendary Coach and Humanitarian to Help “Make Each Day Your Masterpiece”

Personalized signed copies are available at WoodyWoodburn.com
Unsigned paperbacks or Kindle ebook can be purchased here at Amazon

Save

WOODY WOODBURN

Writer, "Streaker" & Speaker

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Act I: Literary Walk Turns Serendipitous