Intro, Part Two

Here’s what the media will tell you about Harriet Klausner – retired librarian, romance novels, Western Pennsylvania, free books. But in my obsession with Harriet, I like to think I know a bit more about her. After all, if you know about someone’s reading habits, then you know quite a bit about them, right? Haven’t we all done that, browsed our bosses bookshelves in his living room at the end of the year shindig, where we were surprised to find out that he was a Wiccan, a homosexual, someone who really liked Lord of the Rings? Of course we have.
And so, based on that premise, here’s what we REALLY know about Harriet:
She thinks of books as a product, as a type of industrial good. She doesn’t think they’re magic. You probably remember at least one childhood librarian who introduced you to the Chronicles of Narnia or the fairy stories of Edward Eager and who spread her arms wide, telling you about how a book can magically transport you places. Well, that wasn’t Harriet. She of the firmly planted orthopedic shoes, standing steadily on the ground, isn’t about to soar anywhere with a book. Yes, I know that. Yes, I can tell all of that from the workmanlike way she produces her four paragraph book reviews and dutifully types them in every night. One paragraph which gives an overview of the book, one which tells what she liked about the book, one in which she compares it to other books and one in which she allows herself to be a bit critical, but not too much so.
She’s consumed with efficiency, oh she of the book a day reading and review habit, and therefore, she tends to sprinkle her reviews with advice about whether or not you want to “waste your time” with this little gem of a book, or whether “your time might be better spent” reading another book. She is not, I repeat, NOT transported anywhere through her reading of the books.
She also doesn’t expect a book to rescue her. She doesn’t read self-help books. She doesn’t read books about how to improve your diet, how to lose weight, how to dress more attractively or how to improve your marriage (or your sex life). She doesn’t need Stacey or Clint to tell her what to wear. Nor does she need Suzie Orman to tell her how to manage her money, or Martha Stewart to tell her what color to paint her walls. She clearly doesn’t need Dr. Phil. Maybe she’s just extremely secure – Maybe her husband really loves her and they have a great marriage, as she sits in her big, comfy chair next to the window reading romance novels, and he putters around the house fixing things and tightening things. Or maybe she’s just not a talker, but more of a reader. Busy reading, she seldom has time to follow him around the house or to stand in the kitchen giving him the third degree about the girl in the yellow tank top that he glanced at just a little too long the last time they were in the supermarket. Whatever the case, harriet doesn’t seek and she doesn’t find. She doesn’t seem to think that books are a key to anything – and is not engaged in that eternal scavenger hunt for enlightenment that I, for one, thought all readers were prisoner to.
Harriet plays her cards close to the chest. I’ve noticed, as a connoisseur of Amazon.com reviews, that many people feel compelled to personalize their reviews, telling you things about themselves in the course of reviewing the book. There’s Bob, who bought a guidebook to Florida, but feels honor bound to tell you that he’s “only going there on business for three days so I didn’t expect to use all the sections of the book.” However, later in the review, Bob tells us how he was pleasantly surprised that Orlando was both less dirty and less expensive than he expected and that as a result he may just give in to his wife (Joanna)’s pleading and take her and the two children to Disney for spring break, despite it being “a little pricey” for their budget.
And if you really want self-revelation in your book reviews, check out those reviews for books that will save your marriage, or books on dealing with various illnesses. It’s all there – the woman who was manic depressive for twenty years, but tahnks to a new “raw diet” and lots of nutritional supplements, she’s no longer so crazy that her kids won’t come see her. “Your book saved my life,” she writes. “Your book saved my marriage,” writes a housewife from Akron, Ohio. And if you’re feeling brave enough, you might want to visit the reviews for personal care items, since there’s one where a guy goes on in excruciating detail about the effectiveness of a certain razor for grooming his, er, private parts. “My girlfriend really likes this,” he tells us. That we did not need to know.
I picture Harriet recoiling in shock. Harriet would never tell you WHY she bought a guidebook, nor how she used it. She’s too reserved for that. Furthermore, in addition to having neither marital nor financial angst, Harriet also appears not to travel much. Sometimes I think that my obsession with harriet has to do with the fact that she’s so damned content! She’s not looking for anything in her books, other than a good read. She’s all mind, that girl, cerebral Harriet. She doesn’t have a problem with her own mind-body duality. She knows exactly who she is.
And she’s incredibly secure. She doesn’t want to fix herself, and she apparently doesn’t want to expand her horizons too much. She knows what she likes to read and seldom challenges herself with something obscure, like a novel by someone from Pakistan, for example. I assume she’s a solitary reader, and not a book clubber. Book clubbers tend to find themselves reading (and frequently reviewing) books that take them way outside their comfort zones. “I never expected to like clan of the Cave Bear,” they write, eschewing all things Neanderthal as they do, “but yet I did. It reminded me of Judith Kranz.” You won’t ever find old Harriet writing a sentence like that.
Harriet also doesn’t feel compelled to enhance her credentials and work them into her reviews, like some reviewers do. (“I’ve been a certified public accountant for twenty years and this is the best tax preparation guide on the market.”) No, Harriet may tell you that she’s an avid reader, but other than that she reveals little of herself, despite the fact that she has published several thousand reviews.
In the words of my husband, Harriet stays in her lane. And he’d describe this as a good thing. She knows who she is and what she wants and doesn’t apologize for it. She doesn’t seek to broaden her horizons or expand her thinking. She doesn’t read to challenge herself, because she already knows that she’s right. She reminds me of that odd roommate I once had in graduate school who said to me one day out of the blue, “I don’t understand why anyone feels the need to go abroad. We have everything we need right here – in Michigan.” I’m afraid I laughed, before I realized she was serious.