Tiffany

When a high school English teacher introduced Tiffany to The House on Mango Street her life changed dramatically. She developed a deep love and need in her life to hear tragic stories beautifully told. Tiffany loves resilient mischievous outsider characters like Jean Louise "Scout" Finch, and Harriet the Spy. She gravitates toward post-colonial and American ethnic literature, reads nature essays as if they were a form of spiritual worship, and also has read nearly every book by Martin Luther King, Jr.
Tiffany is often found obsessing with her co-worker, Laurie, about color and harmony between adjacent book covers on display. Her dream is to be an artist in addition to all other things, and also to learn Spanish. She cares for the store's Art, Health and Psychology sections.

Home Ground: Language for an American Landscape
by Barry Lopez and Debra Gwartney
Home Ground is an anatomy of the United States written by forty-five authors of various American backgrounds. Each author defines twenty cultural phrases we use to describe the particularities of our geographic landscapes. As you flip through the pages, you will not find a dictionary definition. You will find histories, references to literature, pen sketches, and a symphony of voices that awaken states of amnesia, dispel cynicism, and restore a sense of mature identity to the United States as a place and a people.

The Smell of Apples
by Mark Behr
Behr writes a novel that moves back and forth in time between Marnus's narration as a small boy, growing up as the son of an Afrikaner general in Apartheid South Africa, and letters he writes as a young adult soldier. It is about the silencing of the feminine voice, and the connection between war and the sexual assault of boys. How does a young boy get broken into racism, cruelty and militarism? It is brilliantly crafted with images that will continue to inform the reader for years.

Boundaries
by Maya Lin
I was first awakened to the mystery of art when I saw a documentary of Maya Lin and her initial sketch of the Vietnam War Memorial. It was a simple elongated black "v" shape sketched in a green landscape. The panel stared at it in awe. And I am embarrassed to say I laughed at the spectacle. Every part of this book is specially designed and written by Ms. Lin and is intended as an intimate artwork in itself where the reader experiences the slow process of her creative fruitions.

The Monster at the End of this Book
by Jon Stone
This was probably my favorite book as a child. Only later did I understand the brilliant psychological significance in this story about "lovable, furry old Grover." As a child I was always laughing and rejoicing and somehow comforted by Grover's discovery. But you'll have to read the book to find out.

Emma's Rug
by Allen Say
Emma's Rug is one of the most profound statements about the artistic process available. This is a beautiful book to add to any child's development and consciousness.

The House on Mango Street
by Sandra Cisneros
As a fourteen-year-old I learned from this book how to make meaning of my family, my town, and time. As an adult I learn from Cisneros how to make meaning out of where I am and where I come from. Each vignette is at once a child breaking free and a woman coming home again.

An Interrupted Life
by Etty Hillesum
A Holocaust book like no other. deeply honest, Hillesum's writings show her often quirky transformation from and inner life in shambles to a giving strength for her people. subtle details of the holocaust filter into her diaries and soon her struggles are no longer about herself but about the spiritual resilience of the human experience. for anyone cultivating consciousness of self and society this is a must read.

Beloved
by Toni Morrison
There is no other book that has taught me freedom, love, and relationships more than Beloved. This is a book with a voice that I now feel is part of my body, a book that I have read over and over again. It is also a book that has been banned from a number of schools.
Based on a crime article Toni Morrison found in newspaper archives while researching the lives of ex-slaves, the novel asks the question, why would an escaped slave cut the throat of her own infant who has never known slavery? When the chains are gone, broken people still have an ocean to cross. It's a book about slaves continuing to kill their own soul until loss, rage, and eternal scars are given room to live.