Memories

Snagged a book from the staff room the other day. The title which caught my eye was "Shelf Discovery: the Teen Classics We Never Stopped Reading, A Reading Memoir" by Lizzie Skurnick. I was game for a walk down memory lane. What did Lizzie consider teen classics and how old was this Lizzie and did this effect her choices? If I recall, the library I grew up with had a miniscule young adult section of two bookcases. It wasn't a big market in the late 70's and 80's and consisted of a lot of titles like "Nurse Nancy Meets Doctor Dan" which were from the 50's and the 60's. After that, you were either so depressed that you returned to the delights of the children's section or jumped off the deep end into the doom and gloom of the adult world. Lizzie's choices are a mixed bag and I wouldn't consider them all classics. I remember reading Judy Blume's , "Are You There God , It's Me Margaret?", the Madelaine L'Engle books, "Summer of My German Soldier" etc. But then she segues into a lot of books by Lois Duncan, which I don't remember seeing back then (or maybe I was too chicken to read) and a lot authors I don't recall. The funniest chapter is called "Panty Lines: I Can't Believe They Let us Read This" which she quotes the "good parts" of Auel's, "The Clan of the Cave Bear", and V.C.Andrews, "Flowers in the Attic". No need to rush to the shelves and relive it-it's all right there. Ahhh.. memories.
--by Miss Anne