‘100 Books’ Serves As Guide

Target marketing is one good way, maybe the best way, to make sure that someone actually might want to buy what you sell.

In recent years, publishers have aimed books at every reader group imaginable, from the most obscure ethnic groups to the largest number of average citizens - namely, those of us who are “Complete Idiots” (you know, those of us who need help with our computers, with our taxes, with classical mythology, etc.).

Since the feminist movement of the early 1960s, more and more books have been aimed at women. Just the latest to cross my desk is “100 Books for Girls to Grow On” (HarperPerennial, 334 pages, $14).

The book came out of personal experience. Author Shireen Dodson, trying to avoid the seemingly inevitable split that comes between parents and their adolescent children, formed a mother-daughter book club. She and her 9-year-old daughter invited other mother-daughter duos to meet monthly and discuss what they had read.

“I felt a need to strengthen our connection before it had to weather those turbulent waters,” Dodson wrote. “That simple idea brought Morgan and me closer together than I could have imagined.”

Dodson has already written about her book-club venture, in “The Mother-Daughter Book Club.” This new book is more of a reference guide, introducing each of the 100 books (culled from over 400 that Dodson had read), providing a brief biography of the author and study questions to prompt discussion.

“Although I applied certain rules and guidelines in my search, it mostly came down to selecting books that I thought were well written, held my interest and would make for great discussion,” Dodson wrote.

Among her personal favorites: “A Wrinkle in Time” by Madeleine L’Engle, “The Golden Compass” by Philip Pullman, “The Eye, the Ear, and the Arm” by Nancy Farmer, “Habibi” by Naomi Shihab Nye, “Walk Two Moons” by Sharon Creech, “Another Way to Dance” by Margaret Southgate” and “The Dark Side of Nowhere” by Neal Shusterman.

Some of the books that Dodson includes feature difficult material. One, “Something Terrible Happened,” even focuses on AIDS and interracial marriage. But that’s to be expected and, in the right atmosphere, even embraced.

“I’m sure there are those who’d say that AIDS and interracial marriages are inappropriate subjects to discuss,” Dodson wrote, “but I think we underestimate girls at this age. I think they can handle almost anything in a safe environment, which is what a book club or a parent can provide.”

Raising the roof

Many years ago, when I worked in sports, the biggest controversy involving the University of Idaho’s domed stadium was whether to use a preceding definite article.

As in, “The Vandals play football in Kibbie Dome,” or “The Vandals play football in the Kibbie Dome.”

I’m not sure that “Raising the Roof: Creating the Kibbie Dome at the University of Idaho” (University of Idaho Press, 60 pages, $24.95) provides the final word on that question. But it pretty much tells you everything else you might want to know about the building of what author Peter T. Johnson calls “the largest indoor college facility in the nation.”

Except, maybe, how the Vandals will do this coming season.

Story of the moral

Remember that kid in Yankee Stadium who interfered with a ball hit to right field in the playoffs a couple of years ago? The one who was hailed as a hero when the Yankees went on to beat the Baltimore Orioles?

Over and above your feelings about the teams involved, how do you come down on the question of what the kid did? Was he right, wrong, misguided, street-smart, what?

Sandpoint author Don Otis takes a hard look at this kind of question, and a lot more, in his book “Trickle-Down Morality: Returning to Truth in a World of Compromise” (Chosen Books, 255 pages, $12.95 paper, ISBN 0-8007-9257-2).

“The primary ingredient in living moral lives is to embrace the biblical concept of truth,” Otis wrote. “Not just anyone’s interpretation of the truth, but one based on biblical realities that supersede our own.”

Otis and his wife Susan founded Creative Resources Inc. a Christian consulting and public relations firm.

The reader board

Jon Turk, author of “Cold Oceans,” will read from his new book at 7:30 p.m. Thursday at Auntie’s Bookstore, Main and Washington.