CLOSE UP by Brian Rudnick

Readers are leaders: Chestnut Hill Book Festival 2011

Somewhere I saw, a long time ago, a button or bumper sticker that said "Readers are Leaders" And I think that's really true- that people who read find out details about the world and have things to talk about. And it's much more effective to be in the world with other humans when you have things to talk about.

We have a rule in our household that if there's a book that's been turned into a movie, you have to read the book first- the Harry Potter movies... there's been a lot of kids books that they've taken and changed around and made them into movies and it's been pretty funny. Because they change them! But I always insist that my kids read the books first. Of course we have to do that ourselves, mind our own rules. So my husband and I had to read "The Lord of the Rings" when that coming out as a movie a while back. We had to read them again. I had read them in high school It was actually work!

Being at this book festival, people are walking by and they're talking about books which is so much fun. And there were some women here earlier at my table and they were talking about kids books that were turned into movies, "The Hunger Games" and how excited they are about that. And we started talking about the books that we love, as adults but they also might be kids books. And then we started talking about the books that are narrated, that are read on tape or CD. And one of the leader-readers, it's so obvious, is Barack Obama, You know he got a grammy award for reading his own book aloud?.. That poor guy has such a job!

Laura Richlin, Chestnut Hill Book Festival 

Watch video interview here.

Spider bit her on the cheek and...

As she slept, a young woman was bitten on the cheek by a spider. But it wasn't a spider and if it was, it wasn't any ordinary bite. It became inflamed and, alarmed, she went to the emergency room. The doctor, too, was alarmed. An x-ray revealed that whatever bit her had laid eggs and they were beginning to hatch and work their way out through her skin. Or so it was according to a story retold with convincing feigned veracity by Linda Lee, a folkore PhD student at the University of Pennsylvania who was giving a talk on urban legends at the Chestnut Hill library. Watch video here.

Student cuts school to hear author

Tim Wood and Kate Stover picked up their daughter Lydia during school to come and see a talk by author Sherman Alexie, whose works Lydia has been reading in school.Lydia likes how Alexie makes the narrator sound like a teenage boy in the "Absolutely True Diary of a Part-time Indian." Mom likes how Alexie gives a window onto the experience of Indians on a reservation. Dad was entertained by hearing Alexie on the radio and thought it would be fun to see him.Chestnut Hill Library, Philadelphia, PA.

Video interview here