Avoid Brain Strain With These New Fiction Titles From JCPL!

Recently, while working with my 5 year old grandson by holding up flash cards with common, everyday words assigned by the teacher, I discovered something. The English language is not very consistent. Surprised? Really, if you don't just "know" some of the words, phonetics won't get you too far. Take the word "was." Not recognizing it on sight, I tried to help. "Sound it out. What sound comes first?" We got through the "w," but then came the "a," which, in theory, should be the short "a" sound, as in cat. Not so. And if it's confusing to us, imagine the dilemma that comes up for other countries trying to communicate in English.

Some examples of sentences gone wrong include this one outside of a Hong Kong tailor shop as they invite, "Ladies may have a fit upstairs." In Japan, a detour sign read, "Stop: Drive sideways." The awkward English is not limited to other countries, however. In the U.S., a general store window advertises, "Why go elsewhere and be cheated when you can come right here?" This Tennessee highway sign warns drivers, "Take notice. When this sign is under water, this road is impassable." Huh?

Don't let these convoluted sentences strain your brain! Read on for some new fiction titles from the Jasper County Public Library that will cure that "brain strain."

As a crowd gathers outside of the Panama Hotel, boarded up for decades and under new ownership, the belongings of Japanese families who were sent to internmnet camps during World War II surface, and among these items is a Japanese parasol. Henry Lee watches as someone opens the parasol, and this small act takes him back to his school days, snubbed by his American classmates, but befriended by Keiko, a young Japanese-American girl with whom Henry forms a fast bond of friendship. "Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet" by Jamie Ford is a story of hope, love, and the extraordinary committment of an unforgettable duo who have learned to forge ahead because they possess the power of forgiveness.

Milena Shabnov flees the home she loves to come to America, finding that the mining town she is living in is barbaric and the working conditions inhumane. Greed, brutal treatment of women, and a company with little regard for the safety and wellbeing of its workers is a way of life, but Jack Buchanan, a worker at the mine, knows no other life. When miners begin to disappear, Milena, gifted with "the sight," feels the despair and restless spirits all around her, trusting no one, especially Jack Buchanan, a man haunted by his own past in "Jasper Mountain" by Kathy Steffen.

The magic of food comes alive for eight students who gather weekly in Lillian's restaurant to learn a new recipe, but as the group begins to connect on a different level, their secrets are revealed. One by one, each student is transformed by what they learn in the class, not only of what they create in the kitchen, but the companionship that they find in one another in "The School of Essential Ingredients" by Erica Bauermeister.

It is 1962 Mississippi and twenty two year old Skeeter has just graduated from Ole Miss. When she meets up with Aibileen, a black maid, and her best friend, short and stocky Minny, the three women form a bond as a clandestine project brings them together in "The Help" by Kathryn Stockett, a story full of hope, humor, and the bonds of mothers, daughters, caregivers, and women everywhere who want to make a difference.

More thoughts to ponder: If a vegetarian eats vegetables, what does a humanitarian eat? In what other language can you recite at a play, but play at a recital; and who can figure out how noses can run, but feet can smell?
For more "awkward English," check out "The Play of Words: Fun and Games for Language Lovers" and "The Revenge of Anguished English: More Accidental Assaults on Our Language," by by Richard Lederer, both available at JCPL. Still confused? Me too; coz it's all Greek to me!