While I yet live, give me books ...

Originally published in the Ketchikan Daily News, July 2021; written by Michelle Lampton.

To a close reader of this column, “The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet” is familiar; I wrote two years ago that this charming novel about a misfit spaceship crew was profound in subtly inviting readers to assess differing viewpoints— sometimes radically different— with a willingness to understand each other even where we don’t, or can’t, agree.

But recently, I’ve realized it had a larger impact on me. Certainly, the book itself didn’t change any of my personal views. It was too fun, too much a space opera, to be capable of that. But its effect on how I thought, rather than what I thought, is undeniable in hindsight. More than helping relax my instinctive, often reactive internal alarm when talking with people who disagreed with me on the ‘hot topics of the day,’ the book had planted a seed, which, once sprouted, did something deeper: It drove me to assess whether facts and arguments I’d collected to support many life-long views were, unknowingly, tainted by my own confirmation bias. As it turns out-- I’m calm and humble enough to admit now-- that had been the case.

Good books are like that. Just like people, they can change you in the most vital, often unexpected, ways. It made me wonder: How many other books affected my life without me aware at the time?

I’m on autism spectrum, and I know it now because of “The Hunger Games” trilogy. The books touch on heavy topics (“Just War Theory,” PTSD, etc.), but fan discussion also circled whether main character Katniss Everdeen was Autistic-coded. I’d recognized a lot of myself in how Katniss thought, and after a few years of being exposed to this meta-analysis, I started doing more reading. (“The Reason I Jump: The Inner Voice of a Thirteen-Year-Old Boy with Autism,” is available from the Campus Library). I grew brave enough to see a psychologist, and now I’m diagnosed.

Did it really take a YA book series to bring me, an adult, to that point? Apparently, yes, it did. And now I actually understand why I’ve thrived in some environments over the course of my life, while struggling in others.

Truthfully, no genre is unimportant, no book too small, no format too unsophisticated. When I was seven, at the Tucson Public Library, I read a picture book about a young Latinx working neighborhood odd-jobs to save for a new recliner, a surprise gift for the child’s single mother who worked two or three jobs to support them. I couldn’t tell you the title if my life depended on it, but that picture book, and its culturally vibrant, watercolor images, stayed with me. It taught me that not everyone’s lives are the same, and sometimes you can’t see the struggles of other people or communities unless you are looking.

Sometimes, the most important book might even seem the most unattractive. Two years ago, I processed a book into the Public Library collection. Because of the cover, I read the inside flap. It was a hard pass: I don’t read books about necromancers, and certainly not horror. Nope, “Gideon the Ninth,” by Tamsyn Muir, was not for me! But cue the 2020 lockdown, and I read it because I was bored.

That book, about a goth bone magician and her jock body guard with a comedic case of really-needs-a-girlfriend, ultimately, saved my life. I won’t go into how, because that’s personal. But it’s enough to say I found the writing clever and at times hilarious (I’m now a huge fan), and because of it, I made two friends to whom I owe a tremendous debt.

Some might think I’m being self-indulgent; I’m not trying to be. Books really matter to me. I hope to drive deep the message that they-- and consequently libraries-- are not simply important, but vital. To encourage you to be more open to those experiences. To encourage you to be a more frequent patron of Ketchikan’s libraries, and to actively assist your kids and grandkids to be as well. I hope it helps you see there is value in books of all genres, and all types, not simply the ones that get called the “important” kind.

Books can change lives. They can challenge opinions, or inform where there is ignorance. The right book can lift a person up when they’re down, or help someone find community. They can be windows into others, or mirrors to the self. If you’re lucky, you’ve encountered a book or two like this. I wish you many more.

The Public Library is open seven days a week, and the UAS Ketchikan Campus Library five days a week. Why not swing by and see if you can’t find one today?