World War II, Sign Language, Graphic Novels to Keep Family Entertained

Today’s excursion to the Ector County Library yielded 14 lbs of books and videos. That’s 4 lbs more than the doctor has cleared me to carry with my hurt back. It’s a good thing most of those pounds were selected by the Boy.

This week’s interest centers around World War II (a subject I like myself). He picked up two Weapons of War titles — one on WWI and one on WWII – from Lucent Books, Yankee Doodle Gals: Women Pilots of World War II by Amy Nathan, Navajo Code Talkers by Nathan Aaseng, and Jaruzelski (about a Communist leader in Poland).

He couldn’t resist The Real Vikings by Melvin Berger. It was sitting near the military history books. From the fiction shelf, he pulled Coming On Home Soon by Jacqueline Woodson about a girl whose mother must go to work while the men are fighting in World War II.

I grabbed a couple of titles from the Caldecott winners shelf –  Madeline’s Rescue by Ludwig Bemelmans (1954) and A Tree is Nice by Janice May Udry (1957). I’ve been reading Caldecotts to the kids in more or less chronological order.

The Girl checked out Signing is Fun and Sigining for Kids by Mickey Flodin and The Joy of Sigining by Lottie L Riekehof. That’s her interest this week.

The video department lent us Flushed Away and The Pirates Who Don’t do Anything. Flushed Away is absolutely hilarious. Little details like the cockroach who is reading Kafka’s La Metamorfosis make this film great.

My search in the adult department gave me Batman: The Black Glove by Grant Morrison (I don’t recall hearing about this one before) and Dark Horse Books’ Indiana Jones Omnibus Volume 1. Volume 2 was also available, but I’ll get it next time.

The graphic novels are fairly recent and will probably lead to reviews for Suite101.com. But first I have to finish my reviews of DC’s new mini-series El Diablo.