What if everyone read the same book at the same time?
Imagine if everywhere you went, on the train, the bus, in the park, everyone was reading the exact same book. What kind of conversations would you have with one another, how easy would it be to have a conversation with someone you’d never talked to before?
That’s the idea behind the One Maryland One Book program. This year the Maryland Humanities Council has chosen The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie as its book. In this semi-autobiographical book, 14-year-old Arnold Spirit takes his future into his own hands and leaves his troubled school on the Spokane Indian Reservation in Washington State to attend an all-white farming town high school where the only other Indian is the school mascot.
Throughout the coming months there are events all around Maryland involving the issues brought up in this book. Two events worth noting are:
- September 24th @ 2 PM the author will be speaking, answering questions, and signing books at the Baltimore Book Festival
- October 6th @ 12-1 PM the Sheridan Libraries’ Diversity Committee will be holding a brownbag book discussion in the Hamburger Room of the MSE Library