Lady Banks' Commonplace Book Newsletter

"What was really lovely about doing the research this time was that it didn’t feel like research. It felt like literally a walk in the woods. I did end up reading copiously. I read more than 120 single-volume books about trees, but unlike many of the other topics I’ve written about in the past, I was able to do a lot of the emotional research for the book just by being in the forest, in the woods."

--Richard Powers

In a recent interview with The Guardian, Mr. Richard Powers admits that in researching his wonderful novel, The Overstory, he went on a lot of walks in the woods, and read 120 books on trees.

120 books on trees. Her ladyship, the editor, was vastly impressed. She is fond of trees, and fond of reading about them, but can scarcely claim to be so well-read. In fact, she does not believe she has in her possession, much less has read, 120 books on any given subject. But just to be sure, she immediately went over to the bookcase she has reserved for science and nature subjects, and started counting.

Her ladyship, the editor, found that she has 18 books in her possession that could be said to be "about trees," including the fields guides and not including Mr. Powers' own worthy novel.

Like most avid readers, her ladyship's library is built of smaller collections of books representing past and current interests and obsessions. She has 32 different books about Shakespeare (not to mention the 4 different collections of his plays.) She has 5 different translations of The Iliad, and about a dozen books about the poem itself. 15 books on baking bread. 10 books on color theory. 8 books about the city of Venice. 14 books on 18th and 19th century naturalist-explorers. Around 20 books that fall under the category of "world mythologies." She even has 16 books on her shelves scrunched up next to the tree books that are about "rivers."

But she doesn't have 120 of anything. More to the point, as enjoyable as it was to walk around her bookshelves counting titles as minor passions became apparent, it quickly became clear to her that in every case, there was a first book -- the one that set her off on that particular obsession until the impulse spent itself. The Iliad collection was the result of reading Caroline Alexander's The War That Killed Achilles. The tree books mostly owe their places to the anniversary edition of Donald Culross Peattie's Natural History of North American Trees (which her ladyship originally purchased for the engravings). Having whetted her taste for its subject, those first books were soon followed by others. By many others in some cases. But still, if she had to save only one from the shelf, it would be that first -- the one that drew her in to the topic. The one that caught her imagination.

Mr. Richard Powers, as is clear to anyone who has read any of his books, is a scholar as well as a story teller. Her ladyship, alas, is an addict, with unfettered access to an unlimited number of gateway drugs and happy to drift from one high to the next.

Read independently, and shop local.

"It's adorable! It's about a mill in Slater, SC that wove material for Neil Armstrong's spacesuit."

Papa Put a Man on the Moon by Kristy Dempsey ($17.99*, Dial Books), recommended by Fiction Addiction, Greenville, SC.

In time for the fiftieth anniversary of the moon landing, this father-daughter story celebrates a small community's big contribution to one of America's greatest accomplishments.

Marthanne and her father sit side by side, looking out over their mill village as the moon glows in the sky. Marthanne hopes that one day, man will walk on the moon, and she knows her father is helping America accomplish this mission: The fabric he weaves forms one layer in the astronauts' spacesuits. Papa insists he's only making a living, but Marthanne knows his work is part of history, and she's proud. She tries to be patient, but she can't stop imagining the moon mission: the astronauts tumbling through space, the fabric her papa made traveling all the way up into the sky. When the astronauts blast off and Neil Armstrong finally takes his first steps on the moon, Marthanne watches in wonder. She knows her papa put a man on the moon.

Papa Put a Man on the Moon by Kristy Dempsey, Sarah Green (illustrator)
May 7, 2019 | Dial Books | 9780735230743

For the week ending May 12. Books on the Southern Indie Bestseller List that are southern in nature or have been recently recommended by southern indie booksellers.