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The Librarian Is In

Lots of Good Fun That Is Funny

The Librarian Is In

The New York Public Library

Arts, Tv & Film, Books

4.7595 Ratings

🗓️ 8 December 2016

⏱️ 55 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Children's librarian Louise Lareau joins Frank and Gwen to talk about NYPL's annual Best Books for Kids list and why you should say "underpants" during first-grade storytime. Plus: Eve Babitz, Joan Didion, Zadie Smith, joy, suffering, existentialism, etc., etc.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0

Welcome to The Librarian is in. The New York Public Library's podcast about books, culture, and what to read next. I am Gwen. And I'm Frank. And this is Frank's microphone.

0:19.9

I'm just adjusting myself, so to speak.

0:23.4

And later we will be joined by Louise Leroux, who is a librarian at the Children's Center at the main library building on 42nd Street.

0:31.6

She was the head of the committee that chose the newly released 100 Best Books for Kids, which is really fun.

0:37.5

And so she's going to talk about the list and the books,

0:39.7

and then I'm going to babble about the teen list and the teen books.

0:44.0

And yeah.

0:45.2

Is that your thing today talking about the lists?

0:47.4

I think so.

0:48.4

Okay.

0:49.2

I also want to talk to her about something else, which will be a surprise.

0:51.9

And, oh, I wanted to tell you a story.

0:54.1

So we did launch parties for the Best Books for Te something else, which will be a surprise. And, oh, I wanted to tell you a story.

0:59.6

So we did launch parties for the best books for teens list, which is 50 books, not 100, like,

1:05.6

the kids. But there was one, we wanted to do one in each borough. And so I went to the one in the Bronx at Bronx Library Center, and I was helping there, and it was awesome. It was such a cool party.

1:09.9

Like, there were 125 kids there, which was crazy. And they was helping there. It was awesome. It was such a cool party. Like, there were 125 kids there,

1:12.5

which was crazy. And they had different stations. Like, the librarian who set it up, Katie Fernandez is

1:17.5

amazing. And she had so many really good ideas. She set up different stations that all related to

1:22.4

the books that made the list. And so there was one where, like, it was for the women in colonial

1:27.2

America. And so if you put butter in a ball, or I'm sorry, I just ruined the punchline, if you put cream in a ball jar and you shake it for like 20 minutes, it turns into butter as they were turning butter. There was like a butter churn. A butter churn. A like handmade butter churn. It was really cool. And there was like Tetris. There is an old school Nintendo there because there's this nonfiction book on the list. It's a graphic novel about Tetris. And there were just all these different stations that were really, really cool. And Zoraida Cordova spoke, who was the author of Labyrinth Floss, which is one of the books. Anyway, the point is not about the party. The point is that I was helping at this party. And so there are these kids who are all at these different

2:05.1

tables. And I was at a station where I was like helping kids sort of take like a personality

2:10.4

quiz and then the butter. And then there was a thing set up where they were supposed to trace

...

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