My neighbors just put up a Little Library out front. Example: A nice concept, and someone already put Hatchet in there so hell yeah I'm reading it again, but it seems like just the thing for people to fuck with too. Focus: For better or worse, what books would you donate to the library? Alt-focus: What is the one book you'd want to share with people the most?
I kid, I kid. In all honesty probably this one. I feel like if anything, it would be right up CJs alley.
Hey, Juicy. Found one for you. It's OK, little guy. We'll get through this. Focus: Modern classics. Fahrenheit 451, Lord of The Flies, Fight Club, East of Eden, Blood Meridian, Movable Feast. Stuff like that is always good for the kids in the neighborhood. Especially the parents' reactions. "He tried to warp my child's mind WITH BOOKS!" It would please me to no end if they started their own schoolyard project mayhem or took up drinking gin. "Fuck you, mom. I'm just a man trying to learn his numbers. If I can do well and good, and the math is good, then I can be proud and move on to second grade. Now let me tell you about the war in the playground where we lost so many men." Alt. Focus: Will Chris Baer's Phineas Poe trilogy. Kiss Me, Judas in particular. Possibly my favorite book. Not many people have heard of this guy. He's teaching creative writing at some community college in butt fuck California after his publisher went belly up. It is a shame. He could have an audience as big as some of the mystery writers. It's hard to explain his style. Imagine Cormac McCarthy and Raymond Chandler wrote a book about a half nuts, druggie ex-cop and the black market organ trade. He's got a really unique voice, possibly some of the best prose ever. It is entrancing. And the stories and characters are just cool as fuck. Slick. Is he important? No, he will never be the voice of a generation, or go down like Steinbeck as having aided in the progression of humankind. But his writing would absolutely grab a kid and inject him with a passion for language, reading, and stories. Oh, and hope none of you try to do this in Kansas. You will get SHUT. THE. FUCK. DOWN. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/06/2 ... 27282.html
So hang it from a tree, and it's no longer freestanding. I fucking hate the soccer-mom mentality that is entering into local politics... this is a good thing for the betterment of society, and people are complaining about it. Fuck them. As to the books I'd recommend, I wouldn't go with the classics, mostly, because I think they are fucking boring for the most part, and any avid reader will already have read them, or have them on their bucket list. I'd rather include fun stuff to get people reading. Right now, I'd throw in the Hyperion Series by Dan Simmons.
We have one of these in Scranton. It's a British phone box outside this guy's house. It's a registered free library and has been up for over a year now. As far as books I would recommend, anything by Wally Lamb. He write stories that follow the same characters for nearly their entire lifespan. His four best are "She's Come Undone", "The Hour I First Believed", "I Know This Much Is True", and "We Are Water". He also wrote a Christmas book about his childhood and two different collections of essays from the creative writing class he teaches in a women's prison. If I had to make a comparison to someone well-known, he does for adult contemporary literature what John Green does for YA lit. His books are unbelievably tragic, but you are rooting for the main characters the entire time.
So I found this: http://www.kansascity.com/news/governme ... 87562.html So at least they got their shit together so that the little libraries could continue in this community