Post and Courier Talks about Books of 2024
Today, Sunday, August 11, Post and Courier writer Adam Parker wrote a column in which he had book reviewers for the paper name their most outstanding book (so far) of 2024. Several of the books named are familiar ones, such as Salmon Rushdie’s Knife and Percival Everett’s James. Two reviewers, however, talked about ones less familiar, ones that I had not read about or considered for discussion.
Jonathan Haupt, director of the Pat Conroy Literary Center in Beaufort, SC., thinks that Lulu Dean’s Little Library of Banned Books, by Kirsten Miller, is essential reading for the time in which we live. The story is set in a small Southern town where Lulu Dean has launched a campaign to rid the local schools of inappropriate books. To add a positive thread to her mission, she sets up one of those little street libraries outside of her home and stocks it with books she deems to be wholesome. Lulu does not realize that her daughter has gone out and changed the book selections. She put banned books inside the covers of the books her mother had chosen. What happens when the townspeople begin to read the books, which are actually books Lulu thinks should be banned, is very interesting.
Some people have said that the book is a bit too political and the characters are stereotypically either good or bad. Other reviewers, such as Jonathan Haupt, think that Miller handled the controversial aspects evenhandedly and did not seek easy answers one way or the other. Reviews from readers have focused on the author’s small town humor and skillful satire.
The other book that caught my addition is one mentioned by reviewer Bill Thompson. While not published in 2024, he wanted to talk about Paris to the Moon by Adam Gopnik. Thompson picked up the memoir at a used book sale. With all the attention on Paris for the last few weeks, perhaps you will be interested in reading this account of the time that Gopnik and his family spent in the city beginning in 1995. Certainly everyone delighted in the prominence of the Eiffel Tower throughout the news coverage of the 2024 Olympics.
Thompson compared Paris to the Moon to books by Ernest Hemingway, Gertrude Stein and James Baldwin. He goes on to say that even French writers were impressed with Gopnik’s depictions of French culture. Readers appreciate Gopnik’s humor both in the situations he faced as an outsider in an iconic city and also as a father with a toddler and a new baby.
