The White Devil by Justin Evans

AND thou art dead, as young and fair

As aught of mortal birth;

And form so soft, and charms so rare,

Too soon return'd to Earth!

~by: George Gordon (Lord) Byron (1788-1824)

To continue with my creepy ghost-story theme, (see Don’t Breathe a Word and The Raising), I read a gothic thriller, The White Devil, by Justin Evans.

Andrew is a seventeen year old American who’s seemingly worn out his father’s patience. After a brief but disastrous flirtation with heroin, he’s been placed in a school of last resort, a British boarding school where his father’s money outweighs Andrew’s poor record. Within a day of arrival, Andrew witnesses what seems to be a murder, when a gaunt wild figure with bulging eyes strangles a fellow student in the historic graveyard. The problem: the figure completely and utterly disappears, and autopsy finds the student has died of a pulmonary sarcoidosis, a rare lung disease, not strangulation.

Andrew’s visions of this pale-haired figure don’t stop; dreams and peripheral sightings haunt him until he wonders if he’s going insane. Despite that, he’s drawn into the life of the school. The headmaster’s daughter, Persephone, who is the one and only female student, takes a liking to him based on his striking resemblance to Lord Byron, the Romantic poet. She arranges for him to be cast in a play about Lord Byron’s early years which has been commissioned by the school because Byron was an actual student there, 200 years before.

Soon, Andrew realizes his strange visions tie into Lord Byron’s history-- and so does the deadly outbreak of tuberculosis in the school. When Persephone contracts the disease, Andrew must solve a 200 year old murder and put a ghost to rest.

The White Devil is a stay-up-too-late kind of book, suspenseful and creepy. The setting is perfectly gothic and evocative, and the plot is enriched with some (rather embroidered) history of Lord Byron. I didn’t realize until after I read it, but the school in the novel, The Harrow School, is real, and Lord Byron did in fact attend it from 1801-1805.

Mehndi for Teens

Thursday, August 4 was the Newport Library's Teen Henna Night, hosted by special guest Lyn Getner, a henna body art specialist.

Early in the evening Lyn gave us a bit of background about the history and significance of henna. Did you know that use of henna dates back 9,000 years? Eastern Indians traditionally only use henna for ceremonial purposes, such as wedding ceremonies.

After that, each teen received a “cone” of henna, which Lyn had prepared ahead of time. Each cone is filled with 1-2 ounces of henna paste. Then, armed and dangerous, and mostly self-directed, we launched into our artistry.

30 teens took part, including a few out-of-town visitors. By the end of the night we were hands, arms, ankles, shoulders, feet and leg deep in henna designs. Perhaps you’ve seen some of us around town sporting our new body décor.

What’s next?

August 19th will be the final drawing and announcement of Grand Prize winners for the Teen Summer Reading Contest.

A new Teen Advisory Board will be forming to help direct and design upcoming programs for 2011-2012. If you’re interested in serving on the Teen Advisory Board, give Linda a call at 541-265-5465. You could have a voice in the decision-making process. (And we usually have food!)

--Linda

Every creeping thing that creepeth

The plight of spotted owls has resurfaced in the news recently in the same breath with barred owls. Barred owls, which can live in more diverse habitats than their spotted cousins, are thriving and crowding spotted owls out of what remains of old growth forests. In an attempt to keep spotted owls from becoming extinct, the U.S. Forest service is proposing killing thousands of barred owls.

T.C. Boyle’s latest novel, When the Killing’s Done, presents a similar dilemma set in the Channel Islands, located off shore of Santa Barbara, California. The islands are a unique habitat, supporting over 2,000 plant and animal species, many of which are found nowhere else. Introduced species, namely rats and feral pigs, have been fruitful and multiplied, at the expense of native plants, bald eagles, sea otters, sea birds, and island foxes.

The story is told from the point of view of several people, all with ties to the Channel Islands. Alma Takesue is a calm, cool National Park Service biologist who is leading the efforts to save the islands’ endangered species. As she presents a lecture at the Natural History Museum about the need to eliminate the rat population on Anacapa Island, she is interrupted by Dave LaJoy, a dreadlocked, wealthy, animal rights activist with a hair-trigger temper. Throughout the book, LaJoy tries to undermine the Park Service’s plans, with increasingly reckless tactics. He forms a group called For the Protection of Animals (FPA), which pickets and chants relentlessly outside Takesue’s office. When a raccoon family digs holes in his newly laid lawn, LaJoy captures them and decides to rehome them humanely: on Santa Clara Island. Their survival on the island, where feral pigs are being hunted and slaughtered, is one of the ironies of the story.

Takesue shows a calm demeanor in public, but the continuous protesting wears on her nerves, and causes her to have doubts.  She didn't join the Park Service to kill animals, but how else will she save the murrelets and island foxes?



Boyle does not take sides on the issues, but gives us plenty to consider. To what degree should we interfere with nature to bring an ecosystem to balance? How do we decide which animals are acceptable in an ecosystem and which aren’t? And to what extremes will people go to support or subvert a mission? When the Killing’s Done tells one such story. The final chapter of the spotted owls’ fate remains to be written.

Welcome back to Bordertown

I remember how refreshing and different Bordertown was, when I was a teenager.

Back then - this was in the early 1980s - I read a lot of fantasy novels. They tended to be deeply influenced by Tolkien's Lord of the Rings trilogy. Stephen R. Donaldson, Patricia McKillip, Terry Brooks, Katherine Kurtz - they all depicted magical worlds modeled on medieval Europe. There were kings and queens, knights and ladies, not to mention wizards and elves, going on quests and facing down magical threats in imaginary landscapes. I read them all.

The first Bordertown anthology, Borderland, was edited by Terri Windling and came out in 1986, and how unusual it was. Here was fantasy that took place in a modern city, amid the highways and bars and bands and apartment buildings and factories. Urban fantasy isn't that unusual now, but at the time it was strange and delightful.

Bordertown is a city in the NeverNever, the fey area where the World meets the Elven Realm, where neither magic nor human technology seem to work properly. To this city come the riffraff of both worlds - runaways, rejects, halflings, and seekers of all kinds. They figure out who they are, build new communities in exile, and try to steer clear of the gangs and addicts.

There were several Bordertown anthologies, featuring stories by well-known fantasy authors of the day. The format of the books is just as interesting as the setting - lots of authors wrote their own stories, sharing the setting. The books are mostly out of print now, and very hard to find (though the Tillamook County Library has this one).

After a long hiatus, a new Bordertown anthology has come out. Welcome to Bordertown features stories by some of my favorite authors from the old anthologies - Ellen Kushner, Emma Bull, Will Shetterly, and Charles de Lint. It's also picked up stories by some other authors who, like me, enjoyed the series back in the day - Neil Gaiman, Cory Doctorow, Holly Black, and Catherynne Valente.

My favorite story is "Incunabulum" by the always-excellent Emma Bull, in which an elf in a bloodstained shirt finds himself in Bordertown, furious, frightened, and unable to remember his name or how he came to be there. His attempt to steal a clean shirt starts him on the road to self-discovery.

If you're an old fan of Bordertown - or if you've never heard of it, but are intrigued by the idea - check out Welcome to Bordertown. It's lots of fun.

Still Time for T-shirts

Newport Library's summer reading shows in Literacy Park are over for another year, but young readers still have time to finish their reading goals and collect a yellow "One World, Many Stories" t-shirt.

If you have young readers at your house who're working on their reading goals, please remind them that they have until August 31st to finish and collect their reward.

Amusant à la bibliothèque

Although only fourteen teens signed up ahead of time for the Newport Library Teen Summer Reading Club's French Culture Night on Thursday, July 26, more kept walking through the door. The final count was 25 teens. Three of those were French students, here in Oregon for a 3 week homestay with local families through the American Discovery Program based in Eugene.

We started with a challenge. Using only craft sticks, skewers, pipe cleaners, toothpicks and hot glue, the kids were challenged to create a scale model of the Eiffel Tower. The teams broke up into four groups and got started. One team essentially used the entire night to design and produce their version of the famed tower. Each final product was completely different from the next.

We also had our own mini Tour de France. Teams of kids rode preschool-sized trikes across a maze-like path in our parking lot created by some of the attendees. “Do we have to pedal?” asked one teen. When I said “no,” I expected her to simply keep her feet on the ground and propel herself along. Wrong. She lifted the tricycle and started running down the path. Of course this was met with laughter and applause.

Next, the French Waiter Relay. Teens were challenged to don an apron, pick up a tray, and cross the room without losing any of the very lightweight Styrofoam and paper items on the tray. Basic, yes. Silly, yes. Fun? I sure thought so.

And so it went. Teens made new friends and visited with old ones, snacked, rubbed elbows with French contemporaries, and had a good time.

I hope to see you at our Teen Henna Night this Thursday, August 4th from 7 - 9pm. Remember to sign up at the circulation desk beforehand.

--Linda
Newport Library Youth Services Assistant

Puppet Show in Literacy Park This Wednesday

Magic, music, dancing, laughter and stories have filled Literacy Park this summer. This week is the last show for our "One World, Many Stories" summer reading program and we're going to finish with puppets, just like we have for the past four years. Jason Ropp and his cast of characters from Dragon Theater Puppets will bring their show to Newport, Wednesday at 1:00.

This year’s show, "Rapunzel Redeems Rumpelstiltskin," is Dragon Theater Puppets original production written specifically for the library theme of “One World, Many Stories.”

Wednesday, August 3, Dragon Puppet Theater will be at Waldport Public Library (10 a.m.), Newport Public Library (1 p.m.), and Driftwood Public Library in Lincoln City (6:30 p.m.). On Thursday, August 4, they will be at Toledo Public Library (11 a.m.) and Siletz Public Library (1 p.m.).

The puppet shows are funded by Ready to Read grants from the Oregon State Library as well as support from Ross and Janis Neigebauer and Jeanette Hofer. Lodging is provided by La Quinta Inn and Suites of Newport and D’Sands Motel in Lincoln City.

Children attending the puppet show are urged to wear their yellow summer reading shirts for a photo session. I'll certainly be wearing mine!