Marietta, You Must Read ...

Ok, so the National Education Association has not really made up its mind about Read Across America; that is, do they label the event as a "day," which happens to land on March 2 and the birthday of Theodor Geisel, otherwise known as Dr. Seuss? Or do they label it a "week?" A "month?" Or all three?

If everyone in America read that day or this week or this month, then it probably doesn't matter.

If we go for the "week," then not by happenstance, the caps off the week by hosting its semi-annual book sale from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Friday and Saturday and from 1 to 5 p.m. on Sunday at Jim Miller Park, 2245 Callaway Road.

Donated items for the book sale include soft- and hard-cover books, magazines, textbooks, DVD and VHS movies and children's books. Prices range from 10 cents to $2. Sales last year generated more than $50,000, which enabled the library staff to purchase new books, CDs and DVDs.

For information about the sale or to volunteer for this event, call 770-528-2342.

And now it would be pointless to make this a Patch Picks column, if we didn't offer some picks. Since it is Read Across America (insert time frame here), here are two lists of must-read books for the Marietta-based reader (compiled with the great help of Jonathan McKeown and the staff at the Cobb Public Library System).

Books from Marietta authors:

1. Trouble No More by Anthony Grooms, who teaches creative writing at Kennesaw State University. Grooms' works made the Books All Georgians Should Read in 2005 and earned the Lillian Smith Book Award in 1996 and 2002.

2. Confederate General Rides North by Amanda Gable. This book was a finalist for the 2010 Townsend Prize for Fiction and a 2010 selection for Books all Georgians Should Read. 

3. This Is the Dream by Diane Z. Shore. This book earned a starred review from Booklist and was named a 2007 Once Upon a Child Honor book. Shore's Bus-A-Saurus Bop was a winner of the 2004 Childrens Choice Award, and Look Both Ways was a winner of the 2007 Kansas Reads to Preschoolers Award.

4. Stealing the General by Russell S. Bonds was a featured selection of the Book of the Month Club, History Book Club, Military Book Club and the 2007 Richard Barksdale Harwell Book Award for the best Civil War book of the year.

5. Good Eats 2 by Alton Brown, a Marietta resident and Food Network star.

Cobb Library staff also recommends a few local history titles including Then & Now: Marietta Revisited by Joe Kirby; Cobb County, Georgia, and the Origins of the Suburban South: A Twentieth-Century History by Tom Scott; and Marietta, the Gem City of Georgia: A Celebration of Its Homes – A Portrait of Its People by Douglas Frey, which is scheduled for release in June 2011 by Cobb Landmarks and Historical Society.   

Finally, a quick Top 5 list of some of the top requested books recently at the Cobb Library:

1.  Cleopatra: A Life by Stacy Schiff.

2. Cutting for Stone by Abraham Verghese.

3. Decision Points by George W. Bush.

4. Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience and Redemption by Laura Hillenbrand.

5. The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot.