Jane Lynch doesn't mind being upstaged by her latest co-star, Olivia - after all she "has no bad side, she is always ready to pose and she sits perfectly still when you put her in your lap.
Reported by Miami Herald 16 minutes ago.
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'Glee's' Lynch and dog go to bat for shelter mutts
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Glees Lynch and dog go to bat for shelter mutts
LOS ANGELES (AP) - Jane Lynch doesnt mind being upstaged by her latest co-star, Olivia _ after all she "has no bad side, she is always ready to pose and she sits perfectly still when you put her in your lap. "Im much more temperamental," Lynch said. Lynchs dog Olivia is her co-host for "Shelter Me: Lets Go Home," the second installment in the PBS series "Shelter Me." The "Glee" star also has a canine companion on Broadway, where shes filling in as Miss Hannigan in "Annie." Lynch got Olivia, part Lhasa Apso and part other things, from a shelter 13 years ago, the day after filming wrapped on "Best in Show.""She is the love of my life," the 52-year-old actress said. She went on to save dogs Georgie and Frances and cats Frisky and Jiggles.
Reported by MyNorthwest.com 35 minutes ago.
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Judo: Seven youngsters earn promotion at the latest gradings at Bridgeview
Seven youngsters successfully earned promotion at Bridgeview Judo Club’s latest grading. Niah Salmon, Max Timlin and Olivia Akehurst all moved to the top of the red belt section as they converted second mons to third mons.
Reported by Sussex Express 6 minutes ago.
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Playoff Tracker: Fenwick, Trinity Girls Soccer Win Playoff Openers
Patch Oak Park-River Forest, IL --It's playoff season for high school spring sports, and we're tracking all the action at Fenwick, Oak Park-River Forest, Proviso East and Trinity.
With such a rich history of sporting success at our high schools, here's a quick and easy way to track the teams.
You can also help us by sharing photos from games and meet. Follow a certain team? You can also post photos and updates to our Local Voices section here.
***"Next game" indicates the teams' next playoff game, not necessarily their next regular season game.
*Badminton*
State finals are May 10-11.
· *OPRF:* Team placed third at the Willowbrook sectional. State singles qualifier Ana Spinuzza lost in the first round of the state bracket.
*Baseball*
State finals are May 31-June 1.
· *Fenwick:* Next game is 4:30 p.m. May 23 vs. De La Salle in the 4A regional semifinals.
· *OPRF:* Next game is 4:30 p.m. May 22 vs. the Lincoln Park/Steinmetz winner in the 4A regional semifinals.
· *Proviso East:* Next game is 4:30 p.m. May 20 vs. Argo in the 4A regional quarterfinals.
*Soccer (Girls)*
State finals are May 31-June 1.
· *Fenwick:* Last game: Won 10-0 vs. Hyde Park in the Class 2A regional semifinals. Next game is 4:30 p.m. May 17 at De La Salle in the regional championship.
· *OPRF:* Season over. Last game: Lost 1-0 (PK) vs. Wheaton North in the Class 3A regional semifinals.
· *Proviso East: *Season over. Last game: Lost 9-0 vs. Hinsdale Central in the regional semifinals.
· *Trinity: *Last game: Won 8-0 vs. Muchin in the Class 2A regional semifinals. Next game is 1:30 p.m. May 18 vs. Lake View in the Trinity regional championship.
*Softball*
State finals are June 7-8.
· *Fenwick: *Next game is 4:30 p.m. May 22 vs. Noble Street Charter in the 3A regional semifinals.
· *OPRF: *Next game is 4:30 p.m. May 21 vs. Niles West in the 4A regional semifinals.
· *Proviso East: *Next game is 4:30 p.m. May 20 vs. Von Stueben in the 4A regional quarterfinals.
· *Trinity: *Next game is 3:30 p.m. May 21 vs. the Maine East/Foreman winner in the 4A regional semifinals.
*Tennis (Boys)*
State final meet is May 23-25.
· *Fenwick:* Will compete in OPRF sectional May 17-18.
· *OPRF: *Will compete in OPRF sectional May 17-18.
· *Proviso East: *Will compete in OPRF sectional May 17-18.
*Track & Field (Boys)*
State finals meet is May 23-25.
· *Fenwick: *Will compete in Fenwick 2A sectional May 16.
· *OPRF:* Will compete in St. Ignatius 3A sectional May 16.
· *Proviso East: *Will compete in St. Ignatius 3A sectional May 16.
*Track & Field (Girls)*
State finals meet is May 16-18.
· *Fenwick:* Placed 4th in the Glenbard South 2A sectional. State qualifiers include the 4x800m relay; Grace Cronin (300m low hurdles); Olivia Ryan (1600m run); Brianna Daley (1600m run); and 4x400m relay.
· *OPRF: *Team placed 4th in St. Ignatius 3A sectional. Individual qualifiers: McKenzee Kroeschell and Olivia Lenzo (pole vault); Hannah Gorin (3200m run); Amari Wilkerson (100m high hurdles and 300m low hurdles); Chisolm Nwoko (400m dash);
· *Proviso East: *Team placed 8th in St. Ignatius 3A sectional. Individual qualifier: Asia Dickerson (triple jump).
· *Trinity: *Competed in Glenbard South 2A sectional. Individual qualifier: Anna Sloan (100m dash and 200m dash).
*Volleyball (Boys)*
State finals are May 31-June 1.
· *Fenwick: *Next game is 7:30 p.m. May 21 vs. Lindblom in the regional semifinals.
· *OPRF:* Next game is 6:30 p.m. May 21 vs. the Cristo Ray Jesuit/Farragut winner in the regional semifinals.
· *Proviso East: *Next game is 7 p.m. May 20 vs. Wheaton-Warrenville South in the regional quarterfinals.
*Water Polo (Boys)*
State finals are May 16-18.
· *Fenwick: *Last game: Won 11-8 vs. Lyons Township in the sectional championship. Next game is 5:45 p.m. May 17 vs. Homewood-Flossmoor in the state quarterfinals.
· *OPRF: *Season over. Last game: Lost 12-9 to Lyons Township in the sectional semifinals.
*Water Polo (Girls)*
State finals are May 16-18.
· *Fenwick: *Last game: Won 10-2 vs. Lyons Township in the sectional championship. Next game is 8:15 p.m. May 16 vs. Mother McAuley in the state quarterfinals.
· *OPRF:* Season over. Last game: Lost 8-7 to York in the Fenwick sectional quarterfinals. Reported by Patch 16 hours ago.
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Honor Roll: South River High School
Patch Crofton, MD --South River High School has released the names of students who earned honor roll and principal's honor roll for the third marking period of the school year.
*Grade 9 Principal's Honor Roll:* Riyadh Ali, Audrey Blumenfeld, Randall Bowers, Amanda Brownlee, Travis Bucknall, Olivia Bunting, Gabriel Campbell, Erica DeVito, Gregory D'Onofrio, Emma Gregory, Tyger Hanback, Andrew Harvan, Megan Hayden, Eric Hoffmann, Casey Jackson, Eric Janowitz, Kaitlyn Kelly, Grayson Kelmer, Nicholas Koziolek, John Krolak, Alexander Laurel, Julia LeDane, Kathryn LeGrand, Kelly Longo, Victoria Marinzel, Connor McDermott, Hugh McMullen, Christine Miles, Hannah Mulvaney, Clay Newman, Miahnna Nguyen, Maria Osborn, Samantha Park, Ryan Peacock, Nicholas Perkins, Brooke Porter, Emily Proctor, Alyssa Quinn, Allison Raines, Daniel Ricci, George Roberts, Jonghyun Roh, Joseph Rostock, Olivia Sadka, Isabella Schenk, Liam Scott, Patrick Shields, Brianna Simmons, Nicholas Spagnuolo, Jason Spalding, , Mitchell Spalding, Loren Suite, Madeline Szanyi, Emily Thomas, Thomas Trunnell, Francesca Vertucci, Patrick Watson, Eleanor Wood
*Grade: 9 Honor Roll:* Kevin Adair, Alexandra Adams, Sally Albright, George Alexander, Austin Baeza, Mason Baird, Jenna Barber, Madeline Battista, Luke Bausum, Margarette Bechtold, Vincent Bedessem, Ruby Bell, Blake Bender, Joshua Berger, Cullen Bilger, Kirby Bilyeu, Gavin Blair, Caitlin Blanche, Julia Blandford, Robert Blandford, , Philip Blevins, Jackson Blue, Lauren Bounds, Ashlee Brennan, Joseph Brocato, Jonathan Brodt, Jordan Brooks, Benjamin Brown, Alexis Brownlee, Sarah Butters, Madison Callahan, Boomer Callaway, Russell Cameron, Elise Carmichael, Preston Carter, Dominic Cass, Kristen Castle, Hans Cave-Hawkins, Joshua Chase, Arjun Cheema, Margaret Chen, Samuel Clemens, Morgan Clementson, Katherine Collins, Taylor Cooper, Zachary Corley, Bethany Cosgrove, Chloe Courtade, Kayla Creek, Hannah Creighton, Alexander Creswell, Gwenyth Crew, Haley Cromwell, Hannah Cromwell, Lena Cuevas, Breia Cummings, Hannah Cunningham, Emily D'Ambra, Julia Daniel, Caroline Davis, Nicholas Davis, Jonathan DeRycke, Sarah DeVol, Kristina Dick, Karynne Doherty, Jenna Donovan, Mikaela Dooley, Ryan Dorsey, Kelly Dougherty, Robert Dover, Kristina Edwards, Mathew Egley, , Steven Emminizer, Sarah Erteschik, Madelyn Esparza-Ramirez, Alyssa Espeut, Andrea Esquetini, Kelsey Eure, Anthony Facchina, Ethan Falsone, Max Farcot, Matthew Fenton, Kali Ferguson, Molly Finnan, Katherine Fitch, Jake Flaherty, John Flanagan, Gabriella Flores, Casey Flynn, Elizabeth Foster, Trenton Foster, Austin Gaines, Ashton Gardner, Bret Garey, Abigail Geiman, Joseph Gibbs, Sarah Gillogly, Connor Gray, Charles Greenwell, Cheyanne Groves, Fallon Haley, Shannon Harrar, Luke Hartley, Kaleb Hayward, Kyle Heffner, Justin Henderson, Savana Herndon, Jacob Hirschmann, Edmund Horsch, Lilly Huijboom, Henry Hutcheson, Gwendolyn Inman, Jaret Izumi, Brendan Jackson, Amanda Jones, Amber Jordan, Dylan Jordan, Loretta Jorden, Megan Keller, Danicka Kelsey, Kelly Kennedy, Valerie Kilchenstein, Dylan King, Ryan Klaus, , Ryan Kopin, Aleksandra Kos, Nikita Kulick, Nicholas Lambden, Benjamin Lammers, Jessica Langweil, Rhea Lawhorn, Nicholas Leighton, Ayia Lindquist, John Locklair, Hannah Rose Lunsford, Kerry Lynch, Randy Magd, Mark Makris, Henry Maloof, Aleah Mathews, William Mayhew, Ryan McCaffrey, Jesse McElree, Morgan McKean, Katherine McMorrow, Nicole McVay, Nicholas McWhorter, Christopher Miller, Jacob Mondoro, Connor Monroe, Raelyn Moreland, Marissa Morris, Katharine Moser, Annabelle Mundon, Taylor Mungin, Joseph Natoli, Teresa Natoli, Christopher Nolker, Gregory Ogorek, Patrick O'Hara, Samantha Ojeda Urban, Lauren Page, Zachary Palmer, Abigail Parks, Ainsley Parramore, Kishan Patel, Lauren Peffers, Hayden Pellegrino, Rachael Pendleton, Brittany Pennell, Arthur Perez, Kyle Pessagno, Vanessa Pessoa, Lillie Peterson, Zachary Peterson, Marielle Pickering, , Karissa Pierce, Emily Pigott, Madeline Piper, Marissa Poliks, Steven Pollock, Linnette Prewett, Conner Prout, Julianna Raimondo, Jacob Rebstock, Conor Reinold, Kristen Reynolds, Isaac Richard, Lindsay Riley, Cameron Ripple, Dakota Robey, Kevin Rogers, Jacquelyn Rudisill, Natalie Schroeder, Emma Schwartz, Gianna Segnatelli, Philip Seidel, Eric Sieber, Brittany Simmons, Kai Smith, Nicholas Smith, Alexandra Snyder, Alicia Sondberg, John Sood, Anthony Squillari, Christina St Jean, Jacob Stanton, Matthew Steckel, Eric Stevens, Megan Stevens, Daniel Sutton, Christopher Svitak, Keaton Taliaferro, Katarina Tarabella, John Taylor, Lillian Taylor, Morgan Teletchea, Kayla Thomas, Nichole Thompson, Walter Tolliver, Casey Troxler, Alexandra Turano, Kaitlyn Turner, Nicholas Veres, Evan Vetter, Mason Voelbel, Paris Walker, Justin Walsh, , Samantha Warren, Payton Weaver, Alexandra Webber, Eric Weigt, Kathryn Wellington, Celia Whisman, Karley White, Jonathan Williams, Anna Woytko, Alexis Ziehl
*Grade 10 Principal's Honor Roll:* Matthew Anderson, Victoria Bartlett, Ryan Bergamini, Emma Berger, Katherine Berkowitz, Jakob Bevard, Kathryn Biddle, Peyton Brooks, Lea Carter, Devin Comba, Alexandra Conway, Logan Fraser, Matthew Gallatin, Madison Gore, Natalia Gorski, Joy Hoover, Cynthia LaBarge, Marlena Lewis, Grace MacMillan, Sophie Nolan, David Ossman, Caitlin Pierson, Emily Saari, Anna Sappington, Frank Schenk, Sarah Kathryn Seaberg, Maeve Story, Sara Tavakoli, Katrina Vaitkus, Amelia Williams, Elizabeth Wink, Caterina Wu, Madeline Zinkl
*Grade: 10 Honor Roll: *Katherine Adair, Douglas Ahearn, Lindsey Airth, Androniki Anastasis, Samuel Anawalt, Alex Andrade, Eric Andrade, Aaron Anthony, Maria Arellano, Sahar Asi, Shannon Au, Heather Augustine, Thomas Bach, Chase Bailey, Morgan Barkdoll, Francis Barnes, Zaryn Baroudi, Katherine Bauckman, Matthew Bauckman, David Beans, Nathan Beans, Brooke Bell, Taylor Betances, Jenna Blevins, Mackenzie Bodman, Tyler Boudreau, Savannah Boyd, Amanda Brandao, Ethan Brown, Kaitlyn Budney, Nicole Cantrell, Jordan Carter, Kobe Chaney, Ayesha Chaudhry, Nathaniel Chester, Craig Chick, Nicole Clark, Clayton Cobb, Devin Conroy, Griffin Cosgrove, , Shelby Cousin, Ryleigh Cox, Ethin Crews-Hollingsworth, Jack Crino, Stephanie Cupp, Lauren Daly, Matthew D'Amico, Danielle Davis, Kali Dawson, Christopher Day, Christina DePietro, Caroline Dering, Julia Diamond, Zachary Dickson, Annalise Dietz, Rebecca Dom, Madison Donithan, Stephen D'Onofrio, Ryan Drabick, Grant Drohat, Daniel DuBeau, Kelsey Duswalt, Sydney Ead, William Easten, Kaylin Edwards, Bethany Eisenstein, Taylar Elliott, Sarah Engel, David Escalera, Molly Fait, Courtney Fegan, Michael Fohs, Clare Foley, Cian Foran, Patrick Forbus, Alice Ford, Alexandrea France, Elizabeth Frenaye, Braden Froble, Jasmine Fuhrmann, Allison Funk, Savannah Gaines, Cassidie Gammon, Abigail Garland, Matthew Garufi, Sean Gavin, Joseph Geballa, Shawn Gibbs, Caroline Gibson, Alexandra Gilbert, Jalen Gillespie, Morgan Gingerich, , Olivia Gonzalez, Kellie Gough, Joseph Graziano, Felicia Hallworth, Mitchel Hallworth, Hailey Hardesty, David Hare, Connor Haxton, Caitlyn Hayden, Sean Healy, Montana Herndon, Steven Herrera, Alyssa Hill, Courtney Hincks, Charles Holm, Lindsay Hopkins, Joelle Huber, Samantha Hunt, Miles Hunter, Grace Inman, Rocco Jack, Faith Jackson, Christopher Jennings, Hunter Jennings, James Johnson, Alanna Joyce, Cheyenne Joyner, Nicholas Jung, Isaac Kale, Chad Kandare, Kyla Kellogg, Carley Kelly, Madison Kiessling, Kayla Kimble, Cameron King, Chandler Kirk, Bela Klimesova, Brian Kraus, Michelle Kreiner, Haley Kuffler, Stephan Kulick, Rebecca Langham, Kyle Lasher, Olivia Laurenzano, Alyssa Lawson, Valerie Leonberger, Daniel Leyendecker, Anna Lilly, Kyle LoGiudice, Megan Lynch, Tara Mahoney, Grant Maloof, , Dylan Mansur, Madison Margas, Kyle Markovic, Benjamin McClanahan, Madison McCrackin, Maija McFarland, Colin McGee, Shawn McGraw, Clare McGuire, Garrett McLendon, Nicholas Miller, Sophia Miller, Richard Milton, Serena Mohammed, Angela Moore, Evan Morris, John Murray, Maxwell Myers, Christopher Mylod, Kristian Nelson, Vinh Nguyen, Meredith Obear, Seungseo Oh, Anastasia Orlov, Charles Palandati, Rachael Palandati, Kady Palmer, Daniel Palumbo, John Patterson, Christiana Pavlick, Kaitlyn Peacock, Kasey Pearson, Britney Pieraldi, Kirk Pierce, Sandhya Piratla, Charles Place, Alyssa Pleffner, Kevin Pollock, Nicolette Powell, Jack Purcell, Thushiyaanthi Ramakrishnan, Jennifer Randall, Yessica Reyes, Kailen Richmond, Kathryn Robbins, Amanda Rocker, Abigail Rose, Cameron Ross, Zachary Rowe, Alyssa Ruleman, Rachel Sanford, Vanessa Santos, , Brennan Scheidhauer, Lacey Schenck, John Schimoler, Payton Shoemaker, Ropafadzo Shumba, Austin Shuttle, Samantha Sims, Moses Smiroldo, Jabari Smith, Keeley Smith, Nathaniel Smith, Miranda Snyder, Alyssa Solimena, Andrew Sorrells, Amanda Speciale, Sierra Spies, Justin Stacey, Bethany Stanton, Sara Stern, Jessica Streeks, Marina Sullivan, Gabrielle Sutphin, SeDona Sweeny, Brooke Szachnowicz, Emily Szachnowicz, Meghan Taschenberger, Andrew Thomas, Caroline Thompson, Travis Thorne, Alyssa Turner, Stephanie Turner, Gabrielle Ulery, Griffin Vermillion, Martin Vermillion, Reilly Wagner, Matthew Wallace, Daphne Warner, Olivia Wates, Abigail Werre, Lionel Whitcombe, Kayla White, Celine Wiggs, Ryan Williams, Samie Williams, Catherine Wilson, Morgan Wolf, Anna Wolfe, Ian Wolfe, Dylan Wood, Nicholas Woodall, Niya Young, Katherine Zafiriou, , Claire Zellin, Zi Zhou, Noah Zingler
*Grade 11 Principal's Honor Roll:* Gavin Baird, Trevor Baird, Alexander Beal, Zachary Chester, Emma Clement, Riley Figliozzi, Brian Goncalves, , Thomas Gough, Gregory Hare, Amber Hayden, Jadyn Izumi, Megan Jager, Haley Janowitz, Angelica Joya, Gill Eun Kang, Danielle LaDue, Samuel Leitess, Caroline Llareus, Andrew Magd, Kristine Mar, Sean McDonough, Caitlin Moore, Tye Muffley, Brent Musselman, Lydia Navarrete, Brendan Parlett, Joshua Peters, Rachel Pierson, Alexander Pique, Timothy Putnam, Yichen Qian, Eileen Shea, Kaitlyn Simmons, James Sorrells, Emma Stephenson, Kristin Stolzenberg, Zachary Thomas
*Grade 11 Honor Roll: *Benjamin Abbott, Casey Abend, Madison Aho, Andra Anastasi, Connor Anderson, Mason Angleberger, Brian Baldwin, George Baldwin, Katie Barnes, Tyler Barton, Evan Batten, Diamond Battle, Rachel Bergamini, Brittany Bergendahl, Christopher Bernard, Gordon Bickerstaff, Spiro Billos, Michael Biondi, Jared Bishop, Olivia Blandford, Joseph Bolivar, Olivia Borum, Alexander Bourdon, Nicole Bowcutt, Andrew Broda, Adam Bubniak, Graham Buck, Carly Bunting, Malinda Bush, Casey Cain, Connor Callahan, Kyle Canavan, Jason Carmichael, William Cave-Hawkins, Aaron Ceroy, Jeffrey Chandler, Barbara Cheakalos, Hamzah Choudhry, Tyler Coar, Hannah Coffin, Marissa Colea, Alexander Collins, Ryan Collins, Shelby Conner, Amanda Connolly, Brendan Conroy, Alexander Cooper, , Jack Cowan, Liam Cox, Brooke Coyle, Katherine Creveling, Ellana Crew, Robert Crosley, Alec Crowe, Alex Crupi, Jaime Cruz, Cassidy Cutlip, Zoe Cyphers, Sarah Dahms, Stephen D'Ambra, Paige Davis, Joseph DeVito, Carly Dickerson, Justice Dignan, Alysson Dillner, Cierra Dillon, Casey Doerr, Jacob Donaldson, William D'Onofrio, Ciaran Dorland, Madalyn Dredger, Kaileigh Ducharme, Sarah Elert, Tyler Elliott, Maryam Ermin-Sinanovic, Lindsey Eshelman, Amanda Evans, Thomas Falsone, Anthony Fidyk, Marissa Fischer, Shannon Flaherty, Jailen Forrest, Samantha Francis, Anna Fusick, Sarah Galloway, Sheridan Gardner, John Garrison, Abigail Gelinne, John Giel, Maria Gonzalez, Charles Goodman, Natalie Granger, Danielle Greco, Caitlyn Gregorio, Rachel Gregory, Trevor Gromen, Julia Grounds, Ashley Groves, Christopher Gruner, , Lauren Guzman, Kathleen Haggerty, Jasmine Hall, Peter Hanley, Kathryn Hantske, Kelsey Harman, John Haugen, Abigail Havermann, Benjamin Hayden, Lisa Haynes, Graham Hays, Matthew Hayward, Margaret Herberger, Juan Heredia, Ashleigh Hill, Zachary Hubbard, Brooke Hutchison, Claire Igoe, Molly Igoe, Kennedy Irwin, Natasa Ivkovic, Gelsey Jian, Eric Johnson, Jhalyn Johnson, Naomi Johnson, Wyatt Johnson, Andrea Jones, Paige Jones, Allison Jordan, Jessie Karnes, Ali Kay, Jada Kegan, Aubrie Kerner, Madison Koenig, Shane Kramer, Tatyana Kulick, Andrei Kuriatnikov, Michael Labs, Tyler Ladd, Christine Lamborne, Michael Landon, Amanda Latorre, Marlana Lauer, Samantha Lauer, Kimberly Lee, Anne Leishear, Zachary Litten, Connor Livingston, Brooke Long, Matthew Long, Kacie Longo, Haley Lowman, , Colleen Lynch, Salman Mahmood, Heather Manderson, Siena Manoogian, Nicholas Marcinowski, Kristin Marsh, Julia Maugeri, Emily Mayhew, Jillian Mayhew, Zachary Maynard, Samantha Mazzatenta, Theodore McClanahan, Nicole McFee, Michael McGrath, Andrew McKnight, Andrew Mergler, Lucas Michael, Marcus Milbourne, Ashley Miller, Trevor Miller, Patrick Mitchell, Rachel Moning, Ian Monroe, Shaun Moore, Hannah Morales, Victoria Mosley, Tyler Mossburg, Alexander Mueller, Robbie Najjar, Alyssa Nelson, Benjamin Nelson, Candice Nice, Sarah Norris, Noelle Nunes, Abigail Nyman, Hannah O'Brien, William O'Hara, Simone Oliver, Nathan Olson, Shaffer O'Neal, Christopher O'Neill, Emma Osborn, Nikolas Ostis, John Owens, Brooke Palemine, Hailey Palmer, Megan Parlett, Harshil Patel, Jeffrey Patterson, Danielle Peterson, Joseph Pettey, Courtney Pierce, , Nicholas Platek, Noelia Pleitez, Natalie Poknis, Megan Prass, Alexandria Preston, Logan Prevo, Jessica Quinn, Gianella Quintana, Luke Raines, Thulashini Ramakrishnan, Diana Rapine, Alexandra Redman, Kyle Reynolds, Amber Robertson, Sarah Roderick, Rebecca Rothhaas, Chase Rudisill, Patrick Russo, Jennifer Sabol, Chelsea Sabota, Christopher Sadka, Tristan Sahwell, Joseph Salamy, Emiley Sale, David Sanner, Hailey Sauer, Mackale Scheffer, Alexis Scheidhauer, Daniel Schemmel, Kristen Sears, Christopher Seidel, Nicholas Shadrick, Clayton Shamblen, Erin Shanks, Nicholas Simon, Jenna Sminkey, David Smith, James Smith, Kaitlyn Smith, Taylor Smith, Jonathan Snowden, Zoe Sparer, Duncan Squires, Angela St Jean, Despina Stephanos, Mary Katherine Sullivan, James Sumpter, Christopher Sutphin, Kerrie-Anne Sutton, Jessica Talley, Anna Taylor, Erika Taylor, , Reilly Thate, Autumn Thompson, Adam Thorne, James Thornton, Heidi Tolson, Jonathan Trappe, Christy Tull, Madalyn Ulery, Camila Velarde, Douglas Veres, Ashleigh Vining, Matthew Voeltner, Anna Wagner, Vanessa Walsh, Michael Ward, Angela Wayne, Jayson Weber, Heritage Weems, Connor Wellington, Colin White, Kelsey White, Krystal White, Katherine Wilborne, Bailey Wilson, Nicholas Wilson, Alexander Witkowski, Brett Wolf, Christian Wolf, Josette Wood, Travis Wood, Ashley Wray, Katherine Wray, Calli Yancey, Adam Young
*Grade 12 Principal's Honor Roll:* Meghan Ambrogio, Alana Anthony, Stephanie Baker, Alexandra Bartlett, Amanda Beall, Anna Biddle, Ryan Cantrell, Corinna Carter, Jolene Cobleigh, Barrett Cosgrove, Zachary Cote, Brooke Cox, Sienna Creech, Elizabeth Duswalt, Caitlyn Evans, Amelia Hallworth, Sean Heminger, Sabrina Hesse, James Hogevoll, Thomas Hutcheson, Dylan Kelly, Tyler King, Sarah Kraus, Michael Kubista, Thomas Lewis, Michael Lozano, Robert Marston, Marisa Masengale, Victoria McGee, Sarah Melanson, Skyler Nelson, Morgan O'Brien, Shelby Olender, Lauren Phibbons, Emily Roberts, Christina Robey, Michael Ross, Anthony Rossi, Luisa Silva, Lauren Smith, Jacquelyn Spalding, Emma Spicknall, Casey Thate, Elisabeth Trunnell, Valerie Ukpeh, Quentin Wagner, Kerin Webber, Jessica Weller, Christina Willingham, Kelly Yambor
*Grade 12 Honor Roll:* Geoffrey Acton, Maria Ambrogio, Christopher Anastasis, Katherine Arita, Jonathan Ashton, Grant Atchison, Michael Augustine, Justin Aumann, Brittany Bach, Kara Back, Amy Bailes, James Baker, Maison Baker, Victoria Barger, Jeremy Barnes, Monica Batterden, , Daniel Bauckman, Jonathon Bechtold, Nicholas Bedessem, Paige Berkebile, James Bieler, Matthew Blair, Robert Blakey, Breanna Bolden, Kayla Booz, Taylor Bresnahan, Emre Brock, Alicia Brown, Emily Brown, Sarah Bruce, Emily Bucknall, Marisa Bylsma, Ricardo Cabrera, Nicholas Caddenhead, Abigail Cannon, Michael Carrette, Emily Carter, Justine Ceradoy, Erica Chanaud, Amber Cheema, Benjamin Chisolm, Jayne Clark, Ariel Cook, Connor Cox, Jordan Culver, Victoria Daley, Amber Davis, Austin Davis, Darek Davis, Laura Davis, Hillory Dean, Rdrilean Dela Vega, Austin Dembeck, Elizabeth DeRycke, Kyle DeVore, Danielle DiBernardo, Gianni DiBernardo, Jennifer Dick, Karim Dilday, Pamela DiMauro, Julia Donovan, Erin Dorsey, Ronald Drescher, Christianna Ducharme, Mary Duggan, Kimberly Edwards, Alex Eichenmuller, Magdalin Ennis, , Cori Eriksen, Alexandria Ernst, Alireza Esfandiari, Alexandra Ewing, Alexander Fagan, Zoe Falk, Christopher Farrow, Alexis Ferguson, Colin Ferrigno, Gavin Fidanza, Louis Fiechtner, Kurtis Flaherty, Tyler Flemming, Jacquelyn Flippo, Daniel Fohs, Brian Foley, Michelle Forbus, Erin Ford, Shona Forsyth, Zachary Fraber, Colin Gabel, Maria Galvin, Jack Garey, Breanna Garren, Matthew Gaskins, Jake Gavin, Julia Gielen, Kaprice Gillespie, Gabrielle Giovinazzo, Jareth Gish, Rebecca Gould, Haley Gray, Hannah Graziano, Carlos Gross, Justin Halsey, Joseph Hamilton, Britni Hardesty, Zachary Harris, Carter Harrison, Savannah Hatch, Samantha Hayden, Daniel Hebb, Cailey Hegarty, Jenna Higdon, Dana High, Jason Hill, Stephen Hincks, Ryan Hirsch, Margaret Hobbins, William Hogevoll, Olivia Hokanson, Andrew Hopkins, , Amanda Horodyski, Caroline Horsch, Crystal Infante, Teodora Ivkovic, Oijah Iyesi, Jennifer Jankowski, Rebecca Jarboe, Heidi Jensen, Kai Jenstrom, April Johnson, Morgan Johnson, Forrest Joholski, Daniel Jones, Derek Jones, John Joseph, Dana Judy, Ryan Kandare, Catherine Kidney, Kate Kindig, David Kirchner, Nicole Kirkner, Ashley Koepping, Dylan Kolson, Amberly Kovalick, Adrian Kozura, Kevin Kraus, Gillian Krautman, Danielle Kreamer, Amanda Kreiner, Savannah Kutz, Carissa Kwan, Samantha Larson, Abbey Lawrence, Taylor Leavy, Jun Lee, Tyler Lee, Anthony Lenox, Jordan Leonard, Kristina Leone, Anna Levendusky, Joshua Lobo, Daniel Lozano, Jacob Lucente, Niles Magowitz, Hasnain Mahmood, Natalie Manning, Nicholas Marcellino, Carter Martin, George Masgay, Matthew McConnell, John McDonald, Colin McGrath, , David McKeever, Tiffany McKinney, John McMullen, Kyle McNab, Megan Meade, Rachel Meinhold, Andrew Mendez, Kayla Messinese, Daniel Miller, Justin Miller, Adair Minihan, Danielle Minor, Alexander Molster, Rachel Monias, Kailey Morarin, Hunter Mulvaney, Khari Murphy, Margaret Murray, Abigail Myers, Kylie Myles, Nicholas Nadeau, Samantha Nash, Lucas Nelson, Taylor Newsome, Mark Newton, Brandon Nguyen, Loi Nguyen, John Nolting, Kenneth Nosacek, SunKyo Oh, Matthew Outten, Brianna Page, Brenna Palmer, Gregory Palmer, Ann Parangot, John Parks, Emily Partner, Toral Patel, Cody Pearl, Curtis Pendleton, Catherine Perez, Anna Perry, Kaitlyn Pessagno, Jacob Peters, Jack Peterson, Rebekah Petty, Tarah Piccirilli, Austin Piekarski, Robert Pierpont, Jean-Claude Pineau, Kassandra Pleffner Schaefer, Hannah Polster, , Darian Potichny, Bakari Powell, Matthew Prass, Marissa Price, Isabella Pyne, Devin Quick, Justin Quick, Brady Radcliffe, John Randolph, Cody Rawlings, Lucas Razanauskas, Brittany Rees, Thomas Reiber, Kyle Reichard, Maria Ricker, Lindsey Robinson, Nicole Rohrer, Christopher Roman, Brianna Ruleman, Adam Russell, Jason Russell, Brooke Sale, Courtney Schneider, Jaylen Schulte, Michael Seaberg, Ashley Seborowski, Mackenzie Seeger, Gabriel Segnatelli, Lauren Seidleck, Sierra Sellars, Shannon Sendaydiego, Diksha Sharma, Katherine Sherrick, Kelsey Shifflett, Bridget Simmons, Kiana Simons, Charles Smith, Kayla Snyder, Joseph Stanton, Thomas Stefany, Hannah Stevens, Lauren Stevens, Dannie Stith, Zackary Stolzenberg, Davis Strench, Zachary Stubblefield, Eva Sweeney, Khalipha Thomas, Mary Townshend, Jasmine Trumbull, Tremayne Tucker, Rebecca Turetsky, , Pierce Tyrrell, Daniela Valverde, Alexandra Vance, Gabriel Vertucci, Julia Walker, Ryan Walker, Alex Watson, Megan Weaver, Victoria Webber, Emily Weber, Kelsey Weinman, Caitlin Weller, Christine Wertz, Ariel Williams, Aiden Witt, Yong Seong Won, Katherine Woods, Austin Wright, Eric Young, Benjamin Zahorec, Mackenzie Zipfel Reported by Patch 22 hours ago.
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Speedboat 'kill cord' was not being worn
This is Cornwall --
A safety device which would have stopped an out-of-control speedboat running over a family of six, killing two of them, was not being worn at the time of the tragedy, investigators have found.
The Marine Accident Investigation Branch has released its "initial findings" into the incident at Padstow which claimed the lives of Nick Milligan and his eight-year-old daughter Emily.
His wife Victoria, 39, and son Kit, four, were also severely injured after the family were thrown into the River Camel from their boat on the afternoon of May 5. The couple's other children Amber, 12, and Olivia, ten, escaped serious injury.
"They were manoeuvring the boat at speed in the Camel estuary near Padstow, Cornwall," the MAIB said in its safety bulletin.
"Some members of the family were subsequently run over by the rigid hulled inflatable boat [RHIB], leading to the death of the father and the eight-year-old daughter and serious injuries to the mother and the four-year-old son."
The circumstances of how the family ended up in the water were "not clear". But investigators said the kill cord on the boat, a safety device designed to cut the throttle when pulled, "was not attached to the driver at the time of the accident".
The MAIB said: "Consequently, when the driver was ejected from the boat, the kill cord did not operate to stop the engine and the RHIB continued to circle out of control, and at speed.
"As the RHIB circled, it ran over the family in the water a number of times, leading to the deaths and injuries."
Mr Milligan, 51, the managing director of Sky's advertising sales division, Sky Media, was declared dead at the scene in Padstow, along with his daughter.
The family were shielded from the out-of-control boat by kayakers and local boat owners before being airlifted to hospital in Plymouth.
Water skiing instructor Charlie Toogood leapt from his own boat into the craft to turn off its engine and prevent further tragedy.
Mr Toogood, an RNLI crew volunteer at Rock until two years ago, was praised for his "incredible bravery which undoubtedly saved lives" after he jumped into the boat and brought it under control.
But the 32-year-old said: "There were many 'heroes' in this tragic incident, all of whom did a remarkable job in difficult circumstances."
Alongside its early findings, the MAIB also issued a "safety lesson".
It said "to ensure that this tragic accident is not repeated" owners of boats fitted with kill cords needed to test them regularly and ensure the cord is in good condition.
The cords should always be attached "securely to the driver" while engines should be stopped before the cord is transferred to another driver.
The MAIB, which will publish its investigation in due course, is investigating the incident alongside Devon and Cornwall Police.
A spokesman for the Milligan family, who were on holiday at their "dream home" overlooking nearby Daymer Bay, confirmed they had all now left Derriford Hospital.
He said: "Amber and Olivia have been discharged while Victoria and Kit have been transferred to a London hospital.
"Victoria's left leg has been amputated below the knee. Kit is responding well to treatment but both require further surgery.
"We are grateful for the continued support of our family and friends and the good wishes we have received from the public." Reported by This is 13 hours ago.
A safety device which would have stopped an out-of-control speedboat running over a family of six, killing two of them, was not being worn at the time of the tragedy, investigators have found.
The Marine Accident Investigation Branch has released its "initial findings" into the incident at Padstow which claimed the lives of Nick Milligan and his eight-year-old daughter Emily.
His wife Victoria, 39, and son Kit, four, were also severely injured after the family were thrown into the River Camel from their boat on the afternoon of May 5. The couple's other children Amber, 12, and Olivia, ten, escaped serious injury.
"They were manoeuvring the boat at speed in the Camel estuary near Padstow, Cornwall," the MAIB said in its safety bulletin.
"Some members of the family were subsequently run over by the rigid hulled inflatable boat [RHIB], leading to the death of the father and the eight-year-old daughter and serious injuries to the mother and the four-year-old son."
The circumstances of how the family ended up in the water were "not clear". But investigators said the kill cord on the boat, a safety device designed to cut the throttle when pulled, "was not attached to the driver at the time of the accident".
The MAIB said: "Consequently, when the driver was ejected from the boat, the kill cord did not operate to stop the engine and the RHIB continued to circle out of control, and at speed.
"As the RHIB circled, it ran over the family in the water a number of times, leading to the deaths and injuries."
Mr Milligan, 51, the managing director of Sky's advertising sales division, Sky Media, was declared dead at the scene in Padstow, along with his daughter.
The family were shielded from the out-of-control boat by kayakers and local boat owners before being airlifted to hospital in Plymouth.
Water skiing instructor Charlie Toogood leapt from his own boat into the craft to turn off its engine and prevent further tragedy.
Mr Toogood, an RNLI crew volunteer at Rock until two years ago, was praised for his "incredible bravery which undoubtedly saved lives" after he jumped into the boat and brought it under control.
But the 32-year-old said: "There were many 'heroes' in this tragic incident, all of whom did a remarkable job in difficult circumstances."
Alongside its early findings, the MAIB also issued a "safety lesson".
It said "to ensure that this tragic accident is not repeated" owners of boats fitted with kill cords needed to test them regularly and ensure the cord is in good condition.
The cords should always be attached "securely to the driver" while engines should be stopped before the cord is transferred to another driver.
The MAIB, which will publish its investigation in due course, is investigating the incident alongside Devon and Cornwall Police.
A spokesman for the Milligan family, who were on holiday at their "dream home" overlooking nearby Daymer Bay, confirmed they had all now left Derriford Hospital.
He said: "Amber and Olivia have been discharged while Victoria and Kit have been transferred to a London hospital.
"Victoria's left leg has been amputated below the knee. Kit is responding well to treatment but both require further surgery.
"We are grateful for the continued support of our family and friends and the good wishes we have received from the public." Reported by This is 13 hours ago.
↧
'Scandal': Olivia Confronts Shocking Personal Connection
Defiance came to an end on the "Scandal" season finale, but just as things looked like they were settling into a groove, it all got turned upside down again. After finding out that Fitz had killed Verna, Olivia came to a conclusion. Too much had been sacrificed to put him in office. He should run again with Mellie at his side. He could come back from the brink, but she worried it was too late for her and her team.
But then, in the closing moments of the episode, Olivia became the scandal. Heading out for a relaxing jog, Olivia was accosted at the doors of her building by a mob of media folks. They were bombarding her with questions about being the president's mistress.
Suddenly, she was pulled through the fray by too men and put into a limo. There, she confronted Rowan ... and recognized him.
“Dad?” she marveled.
TV Line said that no one could have predicted that closing twist, but Entertainment Weekly gave a shout-out to those who did. “Some of you called this the moment we met Rowan," they wrote. "Before we knew that he was buddies with Cyrus, before we even knew that he had a particular interest in Olivia. And you, smart people, were right. You’re all celebrating right now, I hope.”
The can celebrate until the new season premieres in the fall. E! Online says it's going to be a long summer waiting to see what happens next.
TV Replay scours the vast television landscape to find the most interesting, amusing, and, on a good day, amazing moments, and delivers them right to your browser. Reported by Huffington Post 10 hours ago.
But then, in the closing moments of the episode, Olivia became the scandal. Heading out for a relaxing jog, Olivia was accosted at the doors of her building by a mob of media folks. They were bombarding her with questions about being the president's mistress.
Suddenly, she was pulled through the fray by too men and put into a limo. There, she confronted Rowan ... and recognized him.
“Dad?” she marveled.
TV Line said that no one could have predicted that closing twist, but Entertainment Weekly gave a shout-out to those who did. “Some of you called this the moment we met Rowan," they wrote. "Before we knew that he was buddies with Cyrus, before we even knew that he had a particular interest in Olivia. And you, smart people, were right. You’re all celebrating right now, I hope.”
The can celebrate until the new season premieres in the fall. E! Online says it's going to be a long summer waiting to see what happens next.
TV Replay scours the vast television landscape to find the most interesting, amusing, and, on a good day, amazing moments, and delivers them right to your browser. Reported by Huffington Post 10 hours ago.
↧
LMS Model UN Competes at NYC Conference
Patch Lawrenceville, NJ --Lawrence Middle School (LMS) Model United Nations Club recently competed in the 8th Annual Middle School Model U.N. Conference held at the Grand Hyatt Hotel in New York City.
The club competed with over 80 schools from the United States, Canada, Cayman Islands, Ecuador, Ghana, Italy, Panama, Taiwan, Turkey, South Korea, Sri Lanka, and Taiwan.
Members of the Model UN Club represented countries of Canada and Georgia in several UN committees such as the General Assembly, World Health Organization, and UNICEF and had great success in public speaking, debating, negotiating, and writing resolutions to help tackle many global issues facing our world today.
Club members Mohin Chanpura and Rohan Pahwa took home Honorable Mention for Best Delegation representing Georgia on the Global Arms Treaty agenda in the General Assembly.
Club members include Anjali Agarwal, Eshika Agarwal, Sameer Agrawal, Aanchal Aich, Kiran Aiyar, Madalyn Brummel, Mohin Chanpura, Abby Cohen, Cassandra Coyle, Ritesh Dash, Hayley Davis, Gwyneth Lavery, Thomas Lavery, Sanjay Mahadevan, Olivia Maurer, Aadil Mufti, Rithvik Nair, Rohan Pahwa, Sonny Palmisano, Shreya Patil, Kinsey Ratzman, Casey Ryu, Sophie Slutzky, and Olivia Waaben.
LMS Social Studies teacher Dan Christel is the club advisor. Reported by Patch 7 hours ago.
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Patch Reads: 2013 Summer Reading List For Ages 4 to 12-plus
Patch Andover, MA --* *
[Editor's note: Author James Patterson's ReadKiddoRead Foundation provided this list of great summer books for kids.]
***Great Advanced Reads***
* *
*(For tweens and teens, ages 12 and up)*
*The Diviners*
* *
By Libba Bray
For ages 12 and up
A series of occult-based murders in 1920s New York City put Evie O’Neill and her uncle, curator of what’s known as “The Museum of the Creepy Crawlies,” center stage in investigating the crimes. The tightly woven plot and palpable setting combine with supernatural elements, rich themes, and terrific storytelling to make for a compelling read.
* *
*On the Day I Died*
* *
By Candace Fleming
For ages 11 and up
Scary is always in season, and summer is an especially good time to welcome a shivery chill. On appropriately dark and moonless nights, kids will find themselves scaring friends with the stories in this collection, whether examinations of pure evil, ancient curses, alien encounters, or psychological dramas.
* *
*The Fault in Our Stars*
By John Green
For ages 13 and up
Hazel Lancaster, a teen with cancer, dropped out of school at 13 to concentrate on getting well. Now 16, she meets Augustus Waters, a former basketball player who’s lost a leg to cancer. Their connection is instantaneous. Green skillfully uses their lives to ask the big questions: Why me? Why now? Why risk love? What does being alive mean?
* *
*Scarlet: Lunar Chronicles, Book Two*
By Marissa Meyer
For ages 12 up
Another fresh view of a classic fairytale—with another stop-you-in-your-tracks cover. Scarlet (Little Red Riding Hood) and her street fighter boyfriend, Wolf, are in search of Scarlet’s grandmother. Their quest runs right into Cinder’s story as the three race to keep ahead of the evil Lunar Queen Levana.
Or start with the first book in the series: Cinder: Lunar Chronicles, Book One
*The False Prince *
By Jennifer A. Nielson
For ages 13 and up
Carthya is on the brink of civil war. Conner, one of the noblemen, has a treacherous plan to install an imposter on the throne. But first he must find just the right young man to play the part: Could Sage win the role? As in any high stakes game, all is not as it seems. Amid layers of deception and manipulation, readers are in for surprises as Sage draws closer to the goal.
* *
*Shadow on the Mountain
*
By Margi Preus
For ages 12 up
* *
Espen, a 14-year-old Norwegian boy whose country is occupied by the Nazis, joins the Norwegian resistance with his friends. Margi Preus reveals his story in an engrossing text that combines spy thriller with a teen coming-of-age story, enhanced by photographs, maps and brochures from the time.
* *
*Eleanor & Park*
By Rainbow Rowell
For ages 14 and up
* *
In 1980s Omaha, Eleanor, quirky and new to town, and Park, half-Korean, are outsiders in their high school. It’s worse for Eleanor, who has an abusive stepfather and bullying classmates—so bad that she accepts Park’s father’s invitation for her to stay with their family. In small steps Eleanor and Park’s friendship grows into love. But Park realizes that the solution to Eleanor’s troubles means that she will have to move away.
* *
*After Eli*
By Rebecca Rupp
For ages 12 up
Since his older brother was killed in Iraq, Danny Anderson has been keeping a “Book of the Dead” where he chronicles how people from the past have died. It’s his way of understanding loss. But it is not until three years later that Danny begins to pull away from grief: He falls for a girl, finds a new friendship, and works on a farm. A crisis at the end of that summer pushes Danny and his parents toward healing in this moving and emotionally rich novel.
* *
*Out of the Easy*
By Ruta Sepetys
For ages 14 and up
* *
“The Big Easy” has been anything but easy on Josie. She’s tried distancing herself from her mother—an addict, prostitute and thief. Josie dreams of escaping Easy altogether, but doesn’t believe she can make that happen—until she meets a tourist who offers her the encouragement she needs. Ruta Sepetys vividly describes the sights, sounds, and smells, as well as the shady underbelly of New Orleans in 1950, and breathes life into her cast of characters. Teens will be pulling for Josie as she moves ahead, learning that some decisions are anything but easy.
*The Raven Boys*
* *
By Maggie Stiefvater
For ages 12 and up
* *
For as long as Blue Sargent can remember, she’s been told that if she kisses her true love, he will die. And in her family—one filled with bona fide psychics—predictions are never taken lightly. Now 16, Blue befriends three Raven boys from the posh private school nearby and gets caught up in their quest and adventures. Blue fears that one of them just might be her true love. A compelling story from the outset, Stiefvater’s first installment in a planned four-part cycle will have readers on the edge of their seats.
* *
**The Cay **
By Theodore Taylor
For ages 12 and up
When World War II threatens the Dutch island of Curacao where 11-year-old Philip lives, he and his mother decide to return to the U.S. But on the journey, their boat is torpedoed, and Philip is stranded on a life raft with a cat and Timothy, a black man. Later, when Philip becomes blind, he has no choice but to overcome his prejudices and trust Timothy. Their friendship develops beautifully in this exciting survival story.
* *
*5,000 Awesome Facts (About Everything!)*
National Geographic Kids
For ages 11 and up
From 15 peanut butter facts that stick and 50 furry facts about bears, to 100 facts about oceans that will make your head swim, this big, colorful, packed-to-the-brim compendium is sure to fascinate, entertain, and be a source of great conversations for everyone who takes a look. Photographs illustrate the great variety of information, a playful design makes every page inviting, and a ticker at the bottom of each spread counts the facts kids learn as they go through the book. You’ll find your teen dipping in and out of this book all summer long.
* *
*EXTRA CREDIT:*
* *
Life of Pi by Yann Martel
The Lost City of Z: A Tale of Deadly Obsession in the Amazon by David Grann
** **
**Great Pageturners **
* *
** **
**(For ages 9-12)**
* *
*The Secret of the Fortune Wookiee: An Origami Yoda Book*
By Tom Angleberger
For ages 8 and up
In the third of the Origami Yoda books, Sara brings a paper fortune teller in the form of Star War’s Chewbacca (a Fortune Wookiee) to school to fill in while Dwight and Origami Yoda are suspended.
Or start with the first book in the series: The Strange Case of Origami Yoda
* *
*Never Say Die*
By Will Hobbs
For ages 8 up
Nick Thrasher, a 15-year-old Inuit hunter, and his older half-brother Ryan, a wildlife photographer, are off in search of caribou. Soon into their travels they are thrown into the frozen Firth River. Back on land, their struggle to survive continues as they are pursued by animals, including a half-grizzly, half-polar bear. An exciting wilderness survival tale set in Canada’s arctic is the perfect read to cool down a hot summer day.
* *
*Dog Days (Diary of a Wimpy Kid, Book 4)
*
* *
By Jeff Kinney For ages 8 and up
This is not the newest in the series, but it might be the right book to begin with since it’s all about summer vacation. The weather’s great, and all the kids are having fun outside. But not Greg Heffley! He’s in his house playing video games and enjoying himself, thank you very much. But Greg’s mom has other ideas about outdoor activities and “family togetherness.” Whose vision will win out? Will a new addition to the Heffley family change everything?
*On the Road to Mr. Mineo’s *
By Barbara O’Connor
For ages 8 and up
* *
When we remember summers, there’s often a single event that stands out. For the folks in Meadville, South Carolina, this summer will be recalled as the one when a one-legged pigeon named Sherman flew into town. Where did Sherman come from? Only Mr. Mineo seems to know. For many young readers, this summer may be remembered as the one they met Stella and Amos and Sherman in the pages of this wonderful novel.
* *
*Hades: Lord of the Dead: The Olympians, Book 4*
* *
By George O’Connor
For ages 9 and up
* *
Welcome to the Underworld. A mix of action, comedy, superheroes and Greek mythology, this graphic novel introduces Hades and Persephone.
Or start with the first book in the series: Zues: King of the Gods
* *
*Wonder*
By R.J. Palacio
For ages 9-12
August Pullman, 10, was born with a deformed face. Even though he’s been protected and homeschooled, he’s felt the stares and heard the whispers when the boldest jerks called him Freak or Freddy Krueger. Now his parents have decided that it’s time to enroll Auggie in school. The world he finds doesn’t only test his courage; it also takes the measure of everyone he meets. A rare book that just might open a closed heart.
*Middle School: My Brother is a Big Fat Liar*
* *
and *Middle School: How I Survived Bullies, Broccoli, and Snake Hill*
By James Patterson and Lisa Papademetriou, Illustrated by Neil Swaab
For ages 9-13
Two great new stories in the wildly popular Middle School series. When Georgia Khatchadorian heads off to her first day at Hills Village Middle School, everyone she meets immediately brands Georgia a problem child just like Rafe! When Rafe sneakily signs the band up to play at Georgia's first middle school dance, she's terrified she'll embarrass herself. Will she be able to overcome her fears?
Meanwhile, in How I Survived Bullies, Broccoli, and Snake Hill, Rafe is excited about summer camp—but he’s in for a letdown when he realizes it’s summer school camp. Luckily, Rafe quickly makes friends with members of his “Loserville” cabin. And they need all the help they can get as they battle off against the “Cool” cabin all summer long.
Or start with the first book in the series: Middle School: The Worst Years of My Life
* *
** **
**Where the Red Fern Grows**
By Wilson Rawls
For ages 8 and up
In an informal survey, I asked a bunch of grown-ups which childhood summer read they remembered most. Where the Red Fern Grows was the most frequent answer. Set in the Ozarks, the adventure tale of a boy, Billy, and his two hunting dogs, Little Ann and Old Dan, is recalled not only for the trio’s triumphs, but also for the story’s tenderness. Give your kiddos this classic book this summer.
* *
*The Egypt Game*
By Zilpha Keatley Snyder
For ages 8 and up
Before role-playing computer games became so popular, Zilpha Keatley Snyder took young readers to an antiques store in California where Melanie and April, and later four other friends, create and play “The Egypt Game.” With costumes, secret codes and elaborate stories, the kids become more and more involved—until strange things start happening. It just might be time to stop playing. Readers, too, will find themselves caught up in the game and in this characterful novel.
* *
*Hokey Pokey*
* *
By Jerry Spinelli
For ages 9 and up
This is an allegorical tale where childhood is not just a stage, it is a place called Hokey Pokey. The readers meet Jack, who, like many of them, is starting to “age out” of Hokey Pokey. Spinelli’s novel is sure to help them celebrate and cope with all that is the past and all that is to come.
* *
*Navigating Early*
By Clare Vanderpool
For Ages 9 and up
Jack is adrift after his mother dies, so his dad, just back from WWII, enrolls him in a boarding school in Maine. There he befriends Early Auden, a loner who rarely attends classes and whose brother, a soldier serving in France, is presumed dead. Early believes otherwise and so begins the two boys’ quest along the Appalachian Trail.
* *
*Angry Birds Playground: Animals: An Around-the-World Habitat Adventure*
By Jill Esbaum; Illustrated with photographs
For ages 8-11
Those popular Angry Birds are tour guides on this photo-filled exploration of habitats including rainforests, deserts, oceans, grasslands and polar regions. The birds, who are on a worldwide search for their stolen eggs, introduce readers to five major habitats and the animals that thrive in each. With animal vital statistics in sidebars, descriptions in text, and funny asides from the birds on every page, this is the kind of book that gives nonfiction a good name!
* *
**Great Beginner Reads**
* *
*(For ages 6-9)* **
*Cam Jansen and the Graduation Day Mystery #31*
By David A. Adler; Illustrated by Joy Allen
For ages 7-10
Cam Jansen, elementary school detective, is up to her 31st mystery. She’s got to be doing something right! Children making the transition from picture books to chapter books have found Cam Jansen books a great help and motivator. In her latest case, Cam must use her skills and her photographic memory to catch the thief who stole Eric’s father’s graduation present.
* *
*The One and Only Ivan*
* *
By Katherine Applegate, Illustrated by Patricia Castelao Costa
For ages 8-10
“The Ape at Exit 8” is Ivan, a mighty silverback gorilla who lives in a circus-themed shopping mall. Based on a true story, this novel tells how Ivan uses his talent for drawing to rescue the other animals. Winner, 2013 Newbery Medal.
* *
*Ivy and Bean Make the Rules*
* *
By Annie Barrows; Illustrated by Sophie Blackall
For ages 7-9
Nancy, Bean’s older sister, is going to camp, but Bean can’t go: You have to be eleven to go to camp. Never one to accept defeat, Bean and her best friend Ivy create a camp of their own. A triumph of friendship, ingenuity, and fun!
Or start with the first book in the series: Ivy and Bean
* *
*Hello Nebulon!*
* *
By Ray O’Ryan; Illustrated by Colin Jack
For ages 5-8* *
It’s 2120, and Zack Nelson and his family are leaving Earth to move to the planet Nebulon. Their space-aged house has all kinds of awesome gadgets that Zack will be using every day, but still Zack worries that he and his twin sister won’t have any friends. But then he meets a fellow student and slowly starts to realize that things on Nebulon might just be alright after all. Young readers will zoom through the story to find out what happens to Zack, entertained and delighted along the way!
* *
*Captain Underpants and the Revolting Revenge of the Radioactive Robo-Boxers*
* *
By Dav Pilkey
For ages 7 and up
* *
For once, the critics agree with what children have been saying for years: USA Today tells us: “Call Pilkey…the savior of the ‘reluctant reader.’” Newsweek says Captain Underpants is “a triumph of irreverence." And young readers say: “They are funny and crazy!” Now, in the newest book in the series, everything is threatened. Could it be the end for Captain Underpants?
Or start with the first book in the series: The Adventures of Captain Underpants
*Green Eggs and Ham*
* *
*Horton Hatches the Egg*
* *
*Oh, the Places You’ll Go*
* *
By Dr. Seuss
For ages 3-7, 4-8, 4-9
When it comes to new readers, we’ve got two words for you: Dr. Seuss. His beginner books (like Green Eggs and Ham) are not only comical adventures, but also great confidence-builders as brand new readers master them and can read them on their own. And what proud reader wouldn’t want to know Sam-I-Am (who definitely, absolutely, never wants green eggs and ham)?
As kids improve their reading skills, they’ll find reward in Seuss’s classic picture books. Yes, the language is often complicated, but it is always silly and fun. Horton Hatches the Egg is a great place to start because there are loving lessons in the values of persistence and kindness in this story of the elephant who is faithful, 100 percent.
If you want to give a child a pat on the back—along with a gentle push to move on—try Oh, the Places You’ll Go! It is wise, optimistic, filled with encouragement, and great fun to read.
* *
*Gone Fishing: A Novel in Verse*
By Tamera Will Wissinger; Illustrated by Matthew Cordell
For ages 6-9
Nine-year-old Sam and his dad are going to the lake: “For fishing tomorrow/it’s just us two. Not Mom, not Grandpa/not Lucy…” In a series of engaging poems that narrate the day, they prepare their gear; plans change (Lucy does tag along); fish get caught; siblings get along; and all ends deliciously at dinner. We’re guessing that this delightful excursion will lead lots of kids to try their luck at fishing—and to try their hand at poetry!
* *
*Nic Bishop Snakes*
* *
By Nic Bishop; illustrated with photographs
For ages 5 and up
Super-sharp photographs show a great variety of snakes, sometimes at rest but often in action, while equally clear text presents basic facts about each. The handsome design welcomes curious (and maybe even some fearful) children to get up close and learn more.
* *
**Great Illustrated Books*
***
**(For ages 2-6)**
* *
*Llama Llama Time to Share *
* *
By Anna Dewedney
For ages 2-5
While Mama Llama and Nelly Gnu have tea, their two toddlers are left with a boxful of toys to share. All goes well, until that Gnu girl decides to play with Llama’s treasured Fuzzy Llama doll. Llama’s not ready for that much sharing.
Or start with the first book in this series: Llama Llama Red Pajama
* *
*Olivia and the Fairy Princesses *
By Ian Falconer
For ages 3-6
Olivia is one best-selling pig—and with good reason. Strong-willed, high-spirited and, in this book, in search of her true identity—Olivia’s been keeping young children smiling (and recognizing themselves) for a dozen books now. She’s sure to please.
Or start with the first book in this series: Olivia
* *
*This Moose Belongs to Me*
By Oliver Jeffers
For ages 4-7
For the “Can I keep him?” would-be pet owner, this story of Wilfred and Marcel the Moose is a great fit. Wilfred and Marcel make a happy pair, but it isn’t long before Wilfred notice little things about the very big moose. It seems he has some secrets, like the neighbor who greets Marcel as “Rodrigo,” and the fact that he prefers apples to, well…Wilfred. Still their friendship is real, their story is charming, and every page of this picture book is a visual treat.
* *
** **
**Yes, Let's**
By Galen Goodwin Longstreth; Illustrated by Maris Wicks
For ages 3-5
Preschoolers will happily follow one family’s day in the country, from the dedication page with its maze-like roads leading three cars through the woods to a stream-side destination, right to the evening return trip with the happily exhausted parents and children barely making it up the stairs to their bedrooms. The short rhythmic text is simple, fast, and fun to read aloud, while the detail-filled cartoon-like illustrations invite long looks at every spread.
* *
*Creepy Carrots!*
* *
By Aaron Reynolds; Illustrated by Peter Brown
For ages 4 and up
Jasper Rabbit loves to eat carrots—especially the ones that grow at Crackenhopper Field…until the day the carrots start following him. This slightly spooky book will please youngest fans of scary tales while it delivers a subtle message about being greedy.
* *
*Pete’s a Pizza Board Book*
* *
By William Steig
For ages 4-8
* *
Pete’s dad turns a rainy day into lots of fun when he makes Pete into a pizza: Pete’s kneaded and tossed; covered with tomatoes (checkers) and cheese (bits of paper), put into the oven (the couch) and soon is ready to slice and be nibbled. But the sun comes out and the pizza runs out to play with his friends. Absolutely silly and great fun! Reported by Patch 8 hours ago.
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↧
Patch Reads: 2013 Summer Reading List
Patch Algonquin-Lake in the Hills, IL --* *
From James Patterson's ReadKiddoRead Foundation:
**Great Advanced Reads**
* *
*(For tweens and teens, ages 12 and up)*
*The Diviners*
* *
By Libba Bray
For ages 12 and up
A series of occult-based murders in 1920s New York City put Evie O’Neill and her uncle, curator of what’s known as “The Museum of the Creepy Crawlies,” center stage in investigating the crimes. The tightly woven plot and palpable setting combine with supernatural elements, rich themes, and terrific storytelling to make for a compelling read.
* *
*On the Day I Died*
* *
By Candace Fleming
For ages 11 and up
Scary is always in season, and summer is an especially good time to welcome a shivery chill. On appropriately dark and moonless nights, kids will find themselves scaring friends with the stories in this collection, whether examinations of pure evil, ancient curses, alien encounters, or psychological dramas.
* *
*The Fault in Our Stars*
By John Green
For ages 13 and up
Hazel Lancaster, a teen with cancer, dropped out of school at 13 to concentrate on getting well. Now 16, she meets Augustus Waters, a former basketball player who’s lost a leg to cancer. Their connection is instantaneous. Green skillfully uses their lives to ask the big questions: Why me? Why now? Why risk love? What does being alive mean?
* *
*Scarlet: Lunar Chronicles, Book Two*
By Marissa Meyer
For ages 12 up
Another fresh view of a classic fairytale—with another stop-you-in-your-tracks cover. Scarlet (Little Red Riding Hood) and her street fighter boyfriend, Wolf, are in search of Scarlet’s grandmother. Their quest runs right into Cinder’s story as the three race to keep ahead of the evil Lunar Queen Levana.
Or start with the first book in the series: Cinder: Lunar Chronicles, Book One
*The False Prince *
By Jennifer A. Nielson
For ages 13 and up
Carthya is on the brink of civil war. Conner, one of the noblemen, has a treacherous plan to install an imposter on the throne. But first he must find just the right young man to play the part: Could Sage win the role? As in any high stakes game, all is not as it seems. Amid layers of deception and manipulation, readers are in for surprises as Sage draws closer to the goal.
* *
*Shadow on the Mountain *
By Margi Preus
For ages 12 up
* *
Espen, a 14-year-old Norwegian boy whose country is occupied by the Nazis, joins the Norwegian resistance with his friends. Margi Preus reveals his story in an engrossing text that combines spy thriller with a teen coming-of-age story, enhanced by photographs, maps and brochures from the time.
* *
*Eleanor & Park*
By Rainbow Rowell
For ages 14 and up
* *
In 1980s Omaha, Eleanor, quirky and new to town, and Park, half-Korean, are outsiders in their high school. It’s worse for Eleanor, who has an abusive stepfather and bullying classmates—so bad that she accepts Park’s father’s invitation for her to stay with their family. In small steps, Eleanor and Park’s friendship grows into love. But Park realizes that the solution to Eleanor’s troubles means that she will have to move away.
* *
*After Eli*
By Rebecca Rupp
For ages 12 up
Since his older brother was killed in Iraq, Danny Anderson has been keeping a “Book of the Dead” where he chronicles how people from the past have died. It’s his way of understanding loss. But it is not until three years later that Danny begins to pull away from grief: He falls for a girl, finds a new friendship, and works on a farm. A crisis at the end of that summer pushes Danny and his parents toward healing in this moving and emotionally rich novel.
* *
*Out of the Easy*
By Ruta Sepetys
For ages 14 and up
* *
“The Big Easy” has been anything but easy on Josie. She’s tried distancing herself from her mother—an addict, prostitute and thief. Josie dreams of escaping Easy altogether, but doesn’t believe she can make that happen—until she meets a tourist who offers her the encouragement she needs. Ruta Sepetys vividly describes the sights, sounds, and smells, as well as the shady underbelly of New Orleans in 1950, and breathes life into her cast of characters. Teens will be pulling for Josie as she moves ahead, learning that some decisions are anything but easy.
*The Raven Boys*
* *
By Maggie Stiefvater
For ages 12 and up
* *
For as long as Blue Sargent can remember, she’s been told that if she kisses her true love, he will die. And in her family—one filled with bona fide psychics—predictions are never taken lightly. Now 16, Blue befriends three Raven boys from the posh private school nearby and gets caught up in their quest and adventures. Blue fears that one of them just might be her true love. A compelling story from the outset, Stiefvater’s first installment in a planned four-part cycle will have readers on the edge of their seats.
* *
**The Cay **
By Theodore Taylor
For ages 12 and up
When World War II threatens the Dutch island of Curacao where 11-year-old Philip lives, he and his mother decide to return to the U.S. But on the journey, their boat is torpedoed, and Philip is stranded on a life raft with a cat and Timothy, a black man. Later, when Philip becomes blind, he has no choice but to overcome his prejudices and trust Timothy. Their friendship develops beautifully in this exciting survival story.
* *
*5,000 Awesome Facts (About Everything!)*
National Geographic Kids
For ages 11 and up
From 15 peanut butter facts that stick and 50 furry facts about bears, to 100 facts about oceans that will make your head swim, this big, colorful, packed-to-the-brim compendium is sure to fascinate, entertain, and be a source of great conversations for everyone who takes a look. Photographs illustrate the great variety of information, a playful design makes every page inviting, and a ticker at the bottom of each spread counts the facts kids learn as they go through the book. You’ll find your teen dipping in and out of this book all summer long.
* *
*EXTRA CREDIT:*
* *
Life of Pi by Yann Martel
The Lost City of Z: A Tale of Deadly Obsession in the Amazon by David Grann
* *
*GREAT PAGETURNERS *
* *
** **
**(For ages 9-12)**
* *
*The Secret of the Fortune Wookiee: An Origami Yoda Book*
By Tom Angleberger
For ages 8 and up
In the third of the Origami Yoda books, Sara brings a paper fortune teller in the form of Star War’s Chewbacca (a Fortune Wookiee) to school to fill in while Dwight and Origami Yoda are suspended.
Or start with the first book in the series: The Strange Case of Origami Yoda
* *
*Never Say Die*
By Will Hobbs
For ages 8 up
Nick Thrasher, a 15-year-old Inuit hunter, and his older half-brother Ryan, a wildlife photographer, are off in search of caribou. Soon into their travels they are thrown into the frozen Firth River. Back on land, their struggle to survive continues as they are pursued by animals, including a half-grizzly, half-polar bear. An exciting wilderness survival tale set in Canada’s arctic is the perfect read to cool down a hot summer day.
* *
*Dog Days (Diary of a Wimpy Kid, Book 4) *
* *
By Jeff Kinney For ages 8 and up
This is not the newest in the series, but it might be the right book to begin with since it’s all about summer vacation. The weather’s great, and all the kids are having fun outside. But not Greg Heffley! He’s in his house playing video games and enjoying himself, thank you very much. But Greg’s mom has other ideas about outdoor activities and “family togetherness.” Whose vision will win out? Will a new addition to the Heffley family change everything?* *
*On the Road to Mr. Mineo’s *
By Barbara O’Connor
For ages 8 and up
* *
When we remember summers, there’s often a single event that stands out. For the folks in Meadville, South Carolina, this summer will be recalled as the one when a one-legged pigeon named Sherman flew into town. Where did Sherman come from? Only Mr. Mineo seems to know. For many young readers, this summer may be remembered as the one they met Stella and Amos and Sherman in the pages of this wonderful novel.
* *
*Hades: Lord of the Dead: The Olympians, Book 4*
* *
By George O’Connor
For ages 9 and up
* *
Welcome to the Underworld. A mix of action, comedy, superheroes and Greek mythology, this graphic novel introduces Hades and Persephone.
Or start with the first book in the series: Zues: King of the Gods
* *
*Wonder*
By R.J. Palacio
For ages 9-12
August Pullman, 10, was born with a deformed face. Even though he’s been protected and homeschooled, he’s felt the stares and heard the whispers when the boldest jerks called him Freak or Freddy Krueger. Now his parents have decided that it’s time to enroll Auggie in school. The world he finds doesn’t only test his courage; it also takes the measure of everyone he meets. A rare book that just might open a closed heart.
*Middle School: My Brother is a Big Fat Liar*
* *
and *Middle School: How I Survived Bullies, Broccoli, and Snake Hill*
By James Patterson and Lisa Papademetriou, Illustrated by Neil Swaab
For ages 9-13
Two great new stories in the wildly popular Middle School series. When Georgia Khatchadorian heads off to her first day at Hills Village Middle School, everyone she meets immediately brands Georgia a problem child just like Rafe! When Rafe sneakily signs the band up to play at Georgia's first middle school dance, she's terrified she'll embarrass herself. Will she be able to overcome her fears?
Meanwhile, in How I Survived Bullies, Broccoli, and Snake Hill, Rafe is excited about summer camp—but he’s in for a letdown when he realizes it’s summer school camp. Luckily, Rafe quickly makes friends with members of his “Loserville” cabin. And they need all the help they can get as they battle off against the “Cool” cabin all summer long.
Or start with the first book in the series: Middle School: The Worst Years of My Life
* *
** **
**Where the Red Fern Grows**
By Wilson Rawls
For ages 8 and up
In an informal survey, I asked a bunch of grown-ups which childhood summer read they remembered most. Where the Red Fern Grows was the most frequent answer. Set in the Ozarks, the adventure tale of a boy, Billy, and his two hunting dogs, Little Ann and Old Dan, is recalled not only for the trio’s triumphs, but also for the story’s tenderness. Give your kiddos this classic book this summer.
* *
*The Egypt Game*
By Zilpha Keatley Snyder
For ages 8 and up
Before role-playing computer games became so popular, Zilpha Keatley Snyder took young readers to an antiques store in California where Melanie and April, and later four other friends, create and play “The Egypt Game.” With costumes, secret codes and elaborate stories, the kids become more and more involved—until strange things start happening. It just might be time to stop playing. Readers, too, will find themselves caught up in the game and in this characterful novel.
* *
*Hokey Pokey*
* *
By Jerry Spinelli
For ages 9 and up
This is an allegorical tale where childhood is not just a stage, it is a place called Hokey Pokey. The readers meet Jack, who, like many of them, is starting to “age out” of Hokey Pokey. Spinelli’s novel is sure to help them celebrate and cope with all that is the past and all that is to come.
* *
*Navigating Early*
By Clare Vanderpool
For Ages 9 and up
Jack is adrift after his mother dies, so his dad, just back from WWII, enrolls him in a boarding school in Maine. There he befriends Early Auden, a loner who rarely attends classes and whose brother, a soldier serving in France, is presumed dead. Early believes otherwise and so begins the two boys’ quest along the Appalachian Trail.
* *
*Angry Birds Playground: Animals: An Around-the-World Habitat Adventure*
By Jill Esbaum; Illustrated with photographs
For ages 8-11
Those popular Angry Birds are tour guides on this photo-filled exploration of habitats including rainforests, deserts, oceans, grasslands and polar regions. The birds, who are on a worldwide search for their stolen eggs, introduce readers to five major habitats and the animals that thrive in each. With animal vital statistics in sidebars, descriptions in text, and funny asides from the birds on every page, this is the kind of book that gives nonfiction a good name!
* *
*GREAT BEGINNER READS*
* *
*(For ages 6-9)* **
*Cam Jansen and the Graduation Day Mystery #31*
By David A. Adler; Illustrated by Joy Allen
For ages 7-10
Cam Jansen, elementary school detective, is up to her 31st mystery. She’s got to be doing something right! Children making the transition from picture books to chapter books have found Cam Jansen books a great help and motivator. In her latest case, Cam must use her skills and her photographic memory to catch the thief who stole Eric’s father’s graduation present.
* *
*The One and Only Ivan*
* *
By Katherine Applegate, Illustrated by Patricia Castelao Costa
For ages 8-10
“The Ape at Exit 8” is Ivan, a mighty silverback gorilla who lives in a circus-themed shopping mall. Based on a true story, this novel tells how Ivan uses his talent for drawing to rescue the other animals. Winner, 2013 Newbery Medal.
* *
*Ivy and Bean Make the Rules*
* *
By Annie Barrows; Illustrated by Sophie Blackall
For ages 7-9
Nancy, Bean’s older sister, is going to camp, but Bean can’t go: You have to be eleven to go to camp. Never one to accept defeat, Bean and her best friend Ivy create a camp of their own. A triumph of friendship, ingenuity, and fun!
Or start with the first book in the series: Ivy and Bean
* *
*Hello Nebulon!*
* *
By Ray O’Ryan; Illustrated by Colin Jack
For ages 5-8* *
It’s 2120, and Zack Nelson and his family are leaving Earth to move to the planet Nebulon. Their space-aged house has all kinds of awesome gadgets that Zack will be using every day, but still Zack worries that he and his twin sister won’t have any friends. But then he meets a fellow student and slowly starts to realize that things on Nebulon might just be alright after all. Young readers will zoom through the story to find out what happens to Zack, entertained and delighted along the way!
* *
*Captain Underpants and the Revolting Revenge of the Radioactive Robo-Boxers*
* *
By Dav Pilkey
For ages 7 and up
* *
For once, the critics agree with what children have been saying for years: USA Today tells us: “Call Pilkey…the savior of the ‘reluctant reader.’” Newsweek says Captain Underpants is “a triumph of irreverence." And young readers say: “They are funny and crazy!” Now, in the newest book in the series, everything is threatened. Could it be the end for Captain Underpants?
Or start with the first book in the series: The Adventures of Captain Underpants
* *
*Green Eggs and Ham*
* *
*Horton Hatches the Egg*
* *
*Oh, the Places You’ll Go*
* *
By Dr. Seuss
For ages 3-7, 4-8, 4-9
When it comes to new readers, we’ve got two words for you: Dr. Seuss. His beginner books (like Green Eggs and Ham) are not only comical adventures, but also great confidence-builders as brand new readers master them and can read them on their own. And what proud reader wouldn’t want to know Sam-I-Am (who definitely, absolutely, never wants green eggs and ham)?
As kids improve their reading skills, they’ll find reward in Seuss’s classic picture books. Yes, the language is often complicated, but it is always silly and fun. Horton Hatches the Egg is a great place to start because there are loving lessons in the values of persistence and kindness in this story of the elephant who is faithful, 100 percent.
If you want to give a child a pat on the back—along with a gentle push to move on—try Oh, the Places You’ll Go! It is wise, optimistic, filled with encouragement, and great fun to read.
* *
*Gone Fishing: A Novel in Verse*
By Tamera Will Wissinger; Illustrated by Matthew Cordell
For ages 6-9
Nine-year-old Sam and his dad are going to the lake: “For fishing tomorrow/it’s just us two. Not Mom, not Grandpa/not Lucy…” In a series of engaging poems that narrate the day, they prepare their gear; plans change (Lucy does tag along); fish get caught; siblings get along; and all ends deliciously at dinner. We’re guessing that this delightful excursion will lead lots of kids to try their luck at fishing—and to try their hand at poetry!
* *
*Nic Bishop Snakes*
* *
By Nic Bishop; illustrated with photographs
For ages 5 and up
Super-sharp photographs show a great variety of snakes, sometimes at rest but often in action, while equally clear text presents basic facts about each. The handsome design welcomes curious (and maybe even some fearful) children to get up close and learn more.
* *
*Great Illustrated Books *
** **
**(For ages 2-6)**
* *
*Llama Llama Time to Share *
* *
By Anna Dewedney
For ages 2-5
While Mama Llama and Nelly Gnu have tea, their two toddlers are left with a boxful of toys to share. All goes well, until that Gnu girl decides to play with Llama’s treasured Fuzzy Llama doll. Llama’s not ready for that much sharing.
Or start with the first book in this series: Llama Llama Red Pajama
* *
*Olivia and the Fairy Princesses *
By Ian Falconer
For ages 3-6
Olivia is one best-selling pig—and with good reason. Strong-willed, high-spirited and, in this book, in search of her true identity—Olivia’s been keeping young children smiling (and recognizing themselves) for a dozen books now. She’s sure to please.
Or start with the first book in this series: Olivia
* *
*This Moose Belongs to Me*
By Oliver Jeffers
For ages 4-7
For the “Can I keep him?” would-be pet owner, this story of Wilfred and Marcel the Moose is a great fit. Wilfred and Marcel make a happy pair, but it isn’t long before Wilfred notice little things about the very big moose. It seems he has some secrets, like the neighbor who greets Marcel as “Rodrigo,” and the fact that he prefers apples to, well…Wilfred. Still their friendship is real, their story is charming, and every page of this picture book is a visual treat.
* *
** **
**Yes, Let's**
By Galen Goodwin Longstreth; Illustrated by Maris Wicks
For ages 3-5
* *Preschoolers will happily follow one family’s day in the country, from the dedication page with its maze-like roads leading three cars through the woods to a stream-side destination, right to the evening return trip with the happily exhausted parents and children barely making it up the stairs to their bedrooms. The short rhythmic text is simple, fast, and fun to read aloud, while the detail-filled cartoon-like illustrations invite long looks at every spread.
* *
*Creepy Carrots!*
* *
By Aaron Reynolds; Illustrated by Peter Brown
For ages 4 and up
Jasper Rabbit loves to eat carrots—especially the ones that grow at Crackenhopper Field…until the day the carrots start following him. This slightly spooky book will please youngest fans of scary tales while it delivers a subtle message about being greedy.
* *
*Pete’s a Pizza Board Book*
* *
By William Steig
For ages 4-8
* *
Pete’s dad turns a rainy day into lots of fun when he makes Pete into a pizza: Pete’s kneaded and tossed; covered with tomatoes (checkers) and cheese (bits of paper), put into the oven (the couch) and soon is ready to slice and be nibbled. But the sun comes out and the pizza runs out to play with his friends. Absolutely silly and great fun!
The ReadKiddoRead program features bestselling author James Patterson’s picks for the summer. Find reviews of these books on ReadKiddoRead.com. Reported by Patch 15 minutes ago.
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Scandal's Shonda Rhimes Teases Season 3, Alternate Ending, Tiny Time Jump
Scandal's Shonda Rhimes Teases Season 3, Alternate Ending, Tiny Time Jump
Seattle Post-Intelligencer
Copyright 2013 Seattle Post-Intelligencer. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
Published 8:46 am, Friday, May 17, 2013
The same week another network had a mother of a reveal, ABC's Scandal shocked viewers with a patriarchal reveal no one saw coming. Fine, some fan sites may have suspected, but the final line of the Season 2 finale was such a surprising twist, not even members of the cast knew about it in advance - except one. During Thursday's "An Evening with Scandal" event at The Academy of Television Arts & Sciences, the cast shared that no one knew the truth about Rowan's identity until the actual table read for the finale except for Morton, who was clued in from the beginning - something that became hilarious to Washington after the fact. Having him be the leader of a CIA Black Ops division that tortures and kills people was an entirely different direction Rhimes didn't consider until later. When Scandal was picked up for an additional nine episodes this season, Rhimes thought it was the perfect window of opportunity to finally meet Olivia's father, whose connection to B613 and what that means for how Huck (Guillermo Diaz) was able to defect without retaliation is likely on the table for discussion next year. Viewers won't have to wait long to find out what dear old dad is really like since the writers are discussing not doing a time jump in the Season 3 premiere. Defending her decision to break up Olitz once again, Rhimes reveals that they actually shot an additional scene that was cut from the episode in which Olivia and Fitz ended up in bed together again, showing that they were going to carry on their secret relationship. View original Scandal's Shonda Rhimes Teases Season 3, Alternate Ending, Tiny Time Jump at TVGuide.com Reported by SeattlePI.com 2 hours ago.
Seattle Post-Intelligencer
Copyright 2013 Seattle Post-Intelligencer. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
Published 8:46 am, Friday, May 17, 2013
The same week another network had a mother of a reveal, ABC's Scandal shocked viewers with a patriarchal reveal no one saw coming. Fine, some fan sites may have suspected, but the final line of the Season 2 finale was such a surprising twist, not even members of the cast knew about it in advance - except one. During Thursday's "An Evening with Scandal" event at The Academy of Television Arts & Sciences, the cast shared that no one knew the truth about Rowan's identity until the actual table read for the finale except for Morton, who was clued in from the beginning - something that became hilarious to Washington after the fact. Having him be the leader of a CIA Black Ops division that tortures and kills people was an entirely different direction Rhimes didn't consider until later. When Scandal was picked up for an additional nine episodes this season, Rhimes thought it was the perfect window of opportunity to finally meet Olivia's father, whose connection to B613 and what that means for how Huck (Guillermo Diaz) was able to defect without retaliation is likely on the table for discussion next year. Viewers won't have to wait long to find out what dear old dad is really like since the writers are discussing not doing a time jump in the Season 3 premiere. Defending her decision to break up Olitz once again, Rhimes reveals that they actually shot an additional scene that was cut from the episode in which Olivia and Fitz ended up in bed together again, showing that they were going to carry on their secret relationship. View original Scandal's Shonda Rhimes Teases Season 3, Alternate Ending, Tiny Time Jump at TVGuide.com Reported by SeattlePI.com 2 hours ago.
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‘Scandal’ Season 2 finale: Shocking person revealed from Olivia’s past
SPOILER ALERT! In the explosive last scene of ABC's hit show “Scandal,” Olivia Pope, played by Kerry Washington finds herself face-to-face with her past and well, family in the season 2 finale episode.
Reported by NY Daily News 1 hour ago.
↧
'Scandal' Goes Live!
LOS ANGELES — Forget the DVR.
Not this time. Not after this long of a wait.
Millions of fans actually watched the season-two finale of the ABC drama "Scandal" the old-fashioned way: on a TV screen, as it was fed from the network to their local affiliates.
But a crowd of approximately 700 at the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences in North Hollywood experienced this "Scandal" episode differently Thursday night. The audience, comprised primarily of Emmy voters and their guests, got a live performance by the majority of the show's cast members. Star Kerry Washington and company sat in chairs on the Academy stage facing the audience, and recreated the episode's so-called "table read." They delivered dialogue and stage directions directly from the finale's script.
"Scandal" spins around crisis manager Olivia Pope (played by Washington), a political fixer who could use some fixing herself.
On the arrivals line, Washington said that this reading wasn't all that different from those the "Scandal" cast and crew does for each episode.
"It's such a great opportunity, because we all enjoy working together so much, we're like a theater company," added the actress, who, like many of the "Scandal" principals, has logged considerable time on the stage.
If you have not seen the "Scandal" season-two finale, read on at your own risk. The following details what Washington called the "jaw-dropping" last scene of the episode.
Done, apparently once and for all, with her long on-again off-again affair with U.S. President Fitzgerald "Fitz" Thomas Grant III (Tony Goldwyn), Olivia is ready to start life anew. As she opens the door to begin her morning jog, Olivia is greeted by a swarm of reporters, asking variations of, "Are you the president's mistress?" A dazed Olivia is briskly escorted into a limousine, where she's greeted by the mysterious Rowan (Joe Morton).
"Hello, Olivia," he says.
"Dad?" she responds.
End scene and episode.
Recalled Washington, "When I saw it (the word "Dad"), I didn't even know how to make it come out of my mouth. It was such brand-new information for me," she continued. "We haven't had any knowledge of Olivia's personal life outside of the White House."
"Scandal," last week's highest-rated TV drama in TV marketers' coveted 18-49 demographic, was recently renewed for a third season, and is expected to return with new episodes in September.
In a post-performance conversation with the audience, show creator Shonda Rhimes gave up few answers about the fates of her "Scandal" characters.
"I think there are a lot of questions," Washington said. "What's happening with Jake (Scott Foley)? What's going on with Olivia and her family? What's going on with the first couple in the White House? I mean, there's just tons and tons of questions this year."
It seems only one thing's for sure. For "Scandal" fans, it's going to be a long summer.
___
Online:
http://beta.abc.go.com/shows/scandal
Follow Michael Cidoni Lennox at http://www.twitter.com/MikeCLennox Reported by Huffington Post 24 minutes ago.
Not this time. Not after this long of a wait.
Millions of fans actually watched the season-two finale of the ABC drama "Scandal" the old-fashioned way: on a TV screen, as it was fed from the network to their local affiliates.
But a crowd of approximately 700 at the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences in North Hollywood experienced this "Scandal" episode differently Thursday night. The audience, comprised primarily of Emmy voters and their guests, got a live performance by the majority of the show's cast members. Star Kerry Washington and company sat in chairs on the Academy stage facing the audience, and recreated the episode's so-called "table read." They delivered dialogue and stage directions directly from the finale's script.
"Scandal" spins around crisis manager Olivia Pope (played by Washington), a political fixer who could use some fixing herself.
On the arrivals line, Washington said that this reading wasn't all that different from those the "Scandal" cast and crew does for each episode.
"It's such a great opportunity, because we all enjoy working together so much, we're like a theater company," added the actress, who, like many of the "Scandal" principals, has logged considerable time on the stage.
If you have not seen the "Scandal" season-two finale, read on at your own risk. The following details what Washington called the "jaw-dropping" last scene of the episode.
Done, apparently once and for all, with her long on-again off-again affair with U.S. President Fitzgerald "Fitz" Thomas Grant III (Tony Goldwyn), Olivia is ready to start life anew. As she opens the door to begin her morning jog, Olivia is greeted by a swarm of reporters, asking variations of, "Are you the president's mistress?" A dazed Olivia is briskly escorted into a limousine, where she's greeted by the mysterious Rowan (Joe Morton).
"Hello, Olivia," he says.
"Dad?" she responds.
End scene and episode.
Recalled Washington, "When I saw it (the word "Dad"), I didn't even know how to make it come out of my mouth. It was such brand-new information for me," she continued. "We haven't had any knowledge of Olivia's personal life outside of the White House."
"Scandal," last week's highest-rated TV drama in TV marketers' coveted 18-49 demographic, was recently renewed for a third season, and is expected to return with new episodes in September.
In a post-performance conversation with the audience, show creator Shonda Rhimes gave up few answers about the fates of her "Scandal" characters.
"I think there are a lot of questions," Washington said. "What's happening with Jake (Scott Foley)? What's going on with Olivia and her family? What's going on with the first couple in the White House? I mean, there's just tons and tons of questions this year."
It seems only one thing's for sure. For "Scandal" fans, it's going to be a long summer.
___
Online:
http://beta.abc.go.com/shows/scandal
Follow Michael Cidoni Lennox at http://www.twitter.com/MikeCLennox Reported by Huffington Post 24 minutes ago.
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2013 Notre Dame Academy Graduates By Town
Patch Plymouth, MA --Abigail Jackman Abington
Jacquelyn Polito Abington
Violet Landry Braintree
Julia Metri Braintree
Sarah Ona Braintree
Kathleen Cahill Canton
Erin Comeau Canton
Samantha Fabien Canton
Olivia Perry Canton
Olivia Rozanski Canton
Julianna Marrone Carver
Abigail Carrier Cohasset
Jenna Conte Cohasset
Marissa Gildea Cohasset
Caroline Lengyel Cohasset
Mary McKelvey Cohasset
Catherine Pitts Cohasset
Grace Pozniak Cohasset
Kiana Shipp Cohasset
Daryl Denelle Duxbury
Grace Petro Duxbury
Amie Varano Duxbury
Courtney Whitmore East Bridgewater
Catherine Parkinson Falmouth
Laura Blanchette Hanover
Cassidy Cataldo Hanover
Victoria Cullinane Hanover
Alexandra Drury Hanover
Christina Dunn Hanover
Jillian Dziegielewski Hanover
Sydney Hajjar Hanover
Emily Hayes Hanover
Michaela Healy Hanover
Casey Hult Hanover
Abigayle Lee Hanover
Bailey Lyons Hanover
Carolina Manser Hanover
Samantha Mastrogiacomo Hanover
Kayla Valente Hanover
Katherine Walsh Hanover
Jillian Aruda Hanson
Taylor Ellis Hanson
Emily Fredrickson Hanson
Alexandra Bridgeman Hingham
Amelia Brown Hingham
Colleen Cahill Hingham
Abigail Concannon Hingham
McKenna Cudgma Hingham
Megan Daley Hingham
Riley Esco Hingham
Caroline Kenneally Hingham
Natalia Maccarrone Hingham
Amanda Miller Hingham
Elizabeth Morgan Hingham
Brooke Morley Hingham
Rebecca Mullaley Hingham
Morgan Murphy Hingham
Erin Murray Hingham
Rosemary Sorgi Hingham
Meghan Steeves Hingham
Nicole Strauss Hingham
Katherine Sypek Hingham
Sarah Varney Hingham
Clara King Hull
Colby Knobloch Hull
Suzanne Reichardt Hull
Caroline Sullivan Hull
Julie Coen Kingston
Anna Duffy Kingston
Ashley Johnson Kingston
Julie Salters Kingston
Margaret Connor Marshfield
Francesca Corsaro Marshfield
Samantha Foley Marshfield
Julianne McShane Marshfield
Emma Pirri Marshfield
Amanda Stickney Marshfield
Canyon Volpe Marshfield
Amanda Zoebisch Marshfield
Kelly Kiceluk Marston Mills
Abigail Chave Milton
Olivia Love Milton
Audrey Madigan Milton
Bryanna Maher Milton
Thaisha Milord Milton
Jessica Peterson Milton
Anya Petit Milton
Olivia Scannell Milton
Julia Simmons Milton
Sheila Trifone Milton
Alexandra Dalton Needham
Alanna Kelley North Easton
Katie McNamara Norwell
Avery Robertson Norwell
Gretchen Barrett Pembroke
Olivia Bolger Pembroke
Emily Bruce Pembroke
Catherine Flynn Pembroke
Kasey McNamara Pembroke
Maddison Norton Pembroke
Shauna Owen Pembroke
Mackenzie Wilson Plymouth
Kiera Bruce Quincy
Jamie Figueiredo Quincy
Meredith Flaherty Quincy
Devin O'Brien Quincy
Samantha Woodbury Quincy
Sarah Curtis Randolph
Morgan Sullivan Randolph
Shannon Usher Rockland
Margaret Ayers Scituate
Kayla Bray Scituate
Nicole DiPietrantonio Scituate
Julia Ferreri Scituate
Elizabeth MacIsaac Scituate
Colleen McClelland Scituate
Samantha Miner Scituate
Hannah Paradise Scituate
Hannah Pasqualucci Scituate
Anna Ratto Scituate
Erika Schwartz Scituate
Emily Smith Scituate
Mariel Teague Scituate
Madeline Vazza Scituate
Alexandra Clancy Weymouth
Emma Corcoran Weymouth
Gabrielle Corner Weymouth
Emma Dunbar Weymouth
Colleen Garvey Weymouth
Amanda Hajjar Weymouth
Geena Henthorn Weymouth
Sarah Jaklitsch Weymouth
Julianne Kelly Weymouth
Gabrielle Lueck Weymouth
Anna Lydon Weymouth
Julia MacDougall Weymouth
Victoria Neenan Weymouth
Kathryn O'Leary Weymouth
Mollie O'Leary Weymouth
Paige Stokinger Weymouth
Randi Whitham Weymouth
Julie Sophis Whitman
*Share your good news! Announce your student's success on Patch. * Reported by Patch 2 days ago.
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The Future Of Olivia And Fitz, And More Season 3 Scoop
ABC's "Scandal" finale closed the climactic second season with the show's biggest bombshell yet: the mysterious Rowan (Joe Morton), the B613 boss who has been threatening Cyrus (Jeff Perry) and giving Jake (Scott Foley) his orders, is also Olivia Pope's (Kerry Washington) father. Move over, Darth Vader.
"When we read it, we were just really blown away," Washington told The Huffington Post on the red carpet for the Television Academy's "Scandal" live table read on May 16. "What's funny is that the writers do that to us every week and then we pay it forward [to the audience]."
"I knew all along," Morton smugly revealed to a packed house during the cast Q&A that followed the table read.
"When Joe Morton walked in the room for the very first episode that he appeared in, I almost had a heart attack, because I grew up in a household where Joe Morton is a great American hero," Washington said. "He is the first guest star that we've had that I literally called home about." (Foley feigned indignation at this point, to which Washington responded that her family members were bigger fans of "Brother from Another Planet" than "Felicity.")
"Every week I would say to Joe, 'Oh, I really hope we have some scenes together,' and he would smile and go, 'Do we? Do you think we do?'" Washington laughed.
According to The Hollywood Reporter, creator Shonda Rhimes conceived the character as a means of giving the audience some insight into who Olivia is outside of work. "I've been toying with [Rowan being Olivia's father] a lot since the beginning of the second season. A lot of it was about revealing some of Olivia's past and about revealing who Olivia's father was in general, what that meant and who her mother was."
“There’s a lot of talk in the room about why Olivia has such man issues. She makes very, very, very bad choices,” Rhimes told EW. “Part of bringing [Rowan] on was to open up her world a little bit, but it also revealed another piece of Olivia’s past.”
But since Rowan has been playing puppet-master for half the season, that means he's responsible for orchestrating a lot of questionable -- if not downright life-threatening -- situations for his daughter. "B613 did seem to be trying to kill her, kind of," Rhimes conceded to THR. "At the very least, Rowan was trying to get Jake to have sex with her and then make a tape of it, which seems creepy on many levels, right? At the very least that's a little disturbing on many, many levels. I don't know if they were trying to kill her, that's up to interpretation."
Rhimes confirmed that there wouldn't be much of a time-jump between the end of Season 2 and the beginning of Season 3, telling THR, "I was really adamant about the fact that if we were going to end the season with the idea that Liv has been somehow outed by some unknown force and we meet her dad, we couldn't then just say we're going to jump ahead and cheat the audience of what all that meant."
The executive producer also teased that there was originally a scene towards the end of the episode that would've shown Olivia and Fitz rekindling their forbidden romance after Olivia insisted that she couldn't leave her team at Olivia Pope and Associates, "but the problem with it was that Olivia put the white hat back on and emotionally you had felt like she had found her inner core after losing it so badly. It felt like a cheat; that we were cheating her out of trying to do something good," Rhimes told TV Guide.
Still, as Rhimes pointed out to THR, "There's no forever in Shondaland," and while Fitz and Olivia might be separated for now, that might not always be the case. As Tony Goldwyn told us on the red carpet, "He loves Olivia more than he loves being president, he believes that his destiny is to be with Olivia. But he loves being president and he does feel that that's part of his destiny as well. He wants to find a way to have his cake and eat it too, and is very determined to do that. But he chose, and he chose her, and that's real."
Speaking to TV Guide, Rhimes observed that "[Mellie] took him back in the end, but that was a little bit like a boy coming home to his mama, wasn't it? It wasn't a romantic coming home. That's going to be a very interesting dynamic when we come back next season."
"Fitz has this weird relationship with Mellie, because I appreciate her, I have deep respect for her intellect and her potential, and yet I have contempt for her blind ambition," Goldwyn told HuffPost TV before the table read. "I love her and I hate her and I admire her, I have very complicated feelings about her, and yet … she's the mother of my children so I honor her as such. I feel like Fitz is determined, if he can set Mellie on a path towards the truth, then this will all get sorted out, because he feels like their relationship was corrupt from its beginning. He's committed to reality, he's willing to face that. He's committed to Olivia, he's committed to forcing Mellie to deal in reality, and ultimately I think he would want Mellie to be happy. He doesn't hate Mellie."
Bellamy Young admitted that Mellie is still holding out hope that Fitz will love her the way she loves him, telling us on the red carpet, "What we do in long relationships is assume that the other person doesn't change; we still operate from a place that when we fell in love with them, they thought and acted like this. And I think Mellie's guilty of that in so many ways, and Fitz has been transformed by this love with Olivia. So he really is a different person now and Mellie can't accept it. Mellie is still in the ring, still punching away, trying to get her love back. She doesn't quite accept that you cannot force someone to love you."
Fitz has said and done some pretty terrible things this season, and yet Mellie has continued to pine for him, so we asked Young whether there's anything Fitz could do that would change her feelings towards him. "Like life, we never know what's around the bend in these scripts, and I don't know," she admitted. "I will never say never. I know her love for him is so deep and so true, but I think Mellie's open to evolution. I hope that she finds peace in her heart one way or the other. I know that love can transform, so maybe she can love him in different ways and accept that he doesn't want to be her partner in this life. What I know for sure is that Shonda will think of something so much smarter than I would ever think of."
After half a season of lies and manipulation, the finale saw Jake reveal himself to be a hero at heart, saving Olivia's life once more before surrendering to Rowan and allowing himself to be thrown into the hole that caused Huck (Guillermo Diaz) to lose his sanity, as we saw in "Seven-Fifty-Two."
Before the episode aired, Foley admitted, "Everybody who we know who's been in B613, from Huck to Charlie [George Newbern], they all seem to want out, they all seem to be in a position where they don't like their job. And maybe Jake's in the same position -- if they want out, why wouldn't he? They seem like they loved their jobs at one point. I think Jake has, to a degree, taken matters into his own hands in regards to what both Fitz and Rowan have asked him to do, and I think we'll see the consequences for that, and that may or may not end Jake as we know him."
He wasn't lying -- and while Rhimes wouldn't reveal anything about Jake's ultimate fate at the Q&A, Foley's character seems far too compelling to be relegated to the hole forever, especially since it seemed like Olivia was finally starting to come to terms with her own feelings for him in the finale. "It's complicated -- it's a complicated relationship, for sure," Washington laughed on the red carpet.
For his part, Foley is hoping Jake will get the chance for a proper interaction with Huck, as they're both B613 rebels who care for our head Gladiator. "I think that'd be interesting, to have the two of them sit down and hash it out. Who loves Olivia more, Huck or Jake? Fitz needs to go back to his wife and calm down," he teased before the panel.
For more on the "Scandal" finale, head over to THR, EW and TV Guide.
*What did you think of the "Scandal" season finale? Do you want to see more of Jake? Do you think Rowan was really trying to kill Olivia? Are you still rooting for Olivia and Fitz? Weigh in below!* Reported by Huffington Post 1 day ago.
"When we read it, we were just really blown away," Washington told The Huffington Post on the red carpet for the Television Academy's "Scandal" live table read on May 16. "What's funny is that the writers do that to us every week and then we pay it forward [to the audience]."
"I knew all along," Morton smugly revealed to a packed house during the cast Q&A that followed the table read.
"When Joe Morton walked in the room for the very first episode that he appeared in, I almost had a heart attack, because I grew up in a household where Joe Morton is a great American hero," Washington said. "He is the first guest star that we've had that I literally called home about." (Foley feigned indignation at this point, to which Washington responded that her family members were bigger fans of "Brother from Another Planet" than "Felicity.")
"Every week I would say to Joe, 'Oh, I really hope we have some scenes together,' and he would smile and go, 'Do we? Do you think we do?'" Washington laughed.
According to The Hollywood Reporter, creator Shonda Rhimes conceived the character as a means of giving the audience some insight into who Olivia is outside of work. "I've been toying with [Rowan being Olivia's father] a lot since the beginning of the second season. A lot of it was about revealing some of Olivia's past and about revealing who Olivia's father was in general, what that meant and who her mother was."
“There’s a lot of talk in the room about why Olivia has such man issues. She makes very, very, very bad choices,” Rhimes told EW. “Part of bringing [Rowan] on was to open up her world a little bit, but it also revealed another piece of Olivia’s past.”
But since Rowan has been playing puppet-master for half the season, that means he's responsible for orchestrating a lot of questionable -- if not downright life-threatening -- situations for his daughter. "B613 did seem to be trying to kill her, kind of," Rhimes conceded to THR. "At the very least, Rowan was trying to get Jake to have sex with her and then make a tape of it, which seems creepy on many levels, right? At the very least that's a little disturbing on many, many levels. I don't know if they were trying to kill her, that's up to interpretation."
Rhimes confirmed that there wouldn't be much of a time-jump between the end of Season 2 and the beginning of Season 3, telling THR, "I was really adamant about the fact that if we were going to end the season with the idea that Liv has been somehow outed by some unknown force and we meet her dad, we couldn't then just say we're going to jump ahead and cheat the audience of what all that meant."
The executive producer also teased that there was originally a scene towards the end of the episode that would've shown Olivia and Fitz rekindling their forbidden romance after Olivia insisted that she couldn't leave her team at Olivia Pope and Associates, "but the problem with it was that Olivia put the white hat back on and emotionally you had felt like she had found her inner core after losing it so badly. It felt like a cheat; that we were cheating her out of trying to do something good," Rhimes told TV Guide.
Still, as Rhimes pointed out to THR, "There's no forever in Shondaland," and while Fitz and Olivia might be separated for now, that might not always be the case. As Tony Goldwyn told us on the red carpet, "He loves Olivia more than he loves being president, he believes that his destiny is to be with Olivia. But he loves being president and he does feel that that's part of his destiny as well. He wants to find a way to have his cake and eat it too, and is very determined to do that. But he chose, and he chose her, and that's real."
Speaking to TV Guide, Rhimes observed that "[Mellie] took him back in the end, but that was a little bit like a boy coming home to his mama, wasn't it? It wasn't a romantic coming home. That's going to be a very interesting dynamic when we come back next season."
"Fitz has this weird relationship with Mellie, because I appreciate her, I have deep respect for her intellect and her potential, and yet I have contempt for her blind ambition," Goldwyn told HuffPost TV before the table read. "I love her and I hate her and I admire her, I have very complicated feelings about her, and yet … she's the mother of my children so I honor her as such. I feel like Fitz is determined, if he can set Mellie on a path towards the truth, then this will all get sorted out, because he feels like their relationship was corrupt from its beginning. He's committed to reality, he's willing to face that. He's committed to Olivia, he's committed to forcing Mellie to deal in reality, and ultimately I think he would want Mellie to be happy. He doesn't hate Mellie."
Bellamy Young admitted that Mellie is still holding out hope that Fitz will love her the way she loves him, telling us on the red carpet, "What we do in long relationships is assume that the other person doesn't change; we still operate from a place that when we fell in love with them, they thought and acted like this. And I think Mellie's guilty of that in so many ways, and Fitz has been transformed by this love with Olivia. So he really is a different person now and Mellie can't accept it. Mellie is still in the ring, still punching away, trying to get her love back. She doesn't quite accept that you cannot force someone to love you."
Fitz has said and done some pretty terrible things this season, and yet Mellie has continued to pine for him, so we asked Young whether there's anything Fitz could do that would change her feelings towards him. "Like life, we never know what's around the bend in these scripts, and I don't know," she admitted. "I will never say never. I know her love for him is so deep and so true, but I think Mellie's open to evolution. I hope that she finds peace in her heart one way or the other. I know that love can transform, so maybe she can love him in different ways and accept that he doesn't want to be her partner in this life. What I know for sure is that Shonda will think of something so much smarter than I would ever think of."
After half a season of lies and manipulation, the finale saw Jake reveal himself to be a hero at heart, saving Olivia's life once more before surrendering to Rowan and allowing himself to be thrown into the hole that caused Huck (Guillermo Diaz) to lose his sanity, as we saw in "Seven-Fifty-Two."
Before the episode aired, Foley admitted, "Everybody who we know who's been in B613, from Huck to Charlie [George Newbern], they all seem to want out, they all seem to be in a position where they don't like their job. And maybe Jake's in the same position -- if they want out, why wouldn't he? They seem like they loved their jobs at one point. I think Jake has, to a degree, taken matters into his own hands in regards to what both Fitz and Rowan have asked him to do, and I think we'll see the consequences for that, and that may or may not end Jake as we know him."
He wasn't lying -- and while Rhimes wouldn't reveal anything about Jake's ultimate fate at the Q&A, Foley's character seems far too compelling to be relegated to the hole forever, especially since it seemed like Olivia was finally starting to come to terms with her own feelings for him in the finale. "It's complicated -- it's a complicated relationship, for sure," Washington laughed on the red carpet.
For his part, Foley is hoping Jake will get the chance for a proper interaction with Huck, as they're both B613 rebels who care for our head Gladiator. "I think that'd be interesting, to have the two of them sit down and hash it out. Who loves Olivia more, Huck or Jake? Fitz needs to go back to his wife and calm down," he teased before the panel.
For more on the "Scandal" finale, head over to THR, EW and TV Guide.
*What did you think of the "Scandal" season finale? Do you want to see more of Jake? Do you think Rowan was really trying to kill Olivia? Are you still rooting for Olivia and Fitz? Weigh in below!* Reported by Huffington Post 1 day ago.
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Anne-Marie Duff: 'I wondered if I should lie about my background'
On the day the actor bids farewell to her character in the last episode of Shameless, she will open in a very different role in Eugene O'Neill's marathon, Strange Interlude, at the National
Anne-Marie Duff holds out her hand – a shy shake. She is wearing what looks like a child's white vest, jeans and no jewellery. There is nothing to give her away, apart from her face. Even her feet are bare – maroon nail varnish excepted. It is a sunny day – warm upstairs at the Jerwood rehearsal space in south London – and we have two reasons to meet. She is about to star in Strange Interlude at the National, a Eugene O'Neill marathon. And the final episode of Channel 4's Shameless (now in its 11th series) is about to be aired, featuring Fiona – peroxide hair and tarty Gypsy earrings to the fore – taking a last stand. Anne-Marie's range is incredible: Elizabeth I, Margot Fonteyn, Saint Joan, Berenice, John Lennon's mum… and now Nina, complicated, ardent, neurotic war widow. "Interlude", incidentally, misleads. Uncut, the drama is four hours long. Anne-Marie tells me it is one of the plays that made Nicholas Hytner want to be a director. Michael Grandage is another of its champions. I run into Simon Godwin, director of this trimmed version for the Lyttelton and wish him good luck and he laughs, as if acknowledging he may need it.
Anne-Marie is one of those actors who is a chameleon and yet, unmistakably, herself. Her face is uncommonly expressive. It has a wicked gaiety but sorrow comes easily, too. "I am not precious about the way I look. Never having been defined as a great beauty makes that easier." How does she control the detail of what is going on in her face? Here is a test – O'Neill's confounding stage direction to Nina from scene two:
"She appears older than in the previous scene, her face is paler and much thinner… In her fight to regain control over her nerves, she has overstriven after the cool and efficient poise, but she is really in a more highly strung, disorganised state than ever, although she is now more capable of suppressing and concealing it. She remains strikingly handsome and her physical appeal is enhanced by her pallor and the mysterious suggestion about her of hidden experience."
Duff erupts into peels of laughter. "He is like a novelist, O'Neill, isn't he? Our characters are all described forensically at the beginning of these huge scenes. With screenplays, you are advised to ignore stage directions." But she is not about to ignore O'Neill. The trick, she explains, is to rise above literalness and "get the smell of it, breathe it in, see if you can exhale it – that is all you can do". Lashings of white makeup may also be needed to acquire Nina's pallor (Anne-Marie looks as though she spent the Bank holiday weekend in the sun). But the real challenge is to become "more yourself as an actor, visiting every corner". At first she felt unequal to the role, almost turned it down, asked herself: "How can I create this panorama of character? It is not just about charting the years. These people have extraordinary colours that you are trying to find every day in rehearsal. The fluidity of O'Neill's writing is like the ocean – he is obsessed with the sea – it seems to swell in his characters."
Duff almost turned down Shameless, too. This seems to be typical of her. She is careful and carefree – such a mixture. It was her mother who swung it, in the end, saying Paul Abbott's script rang true because "it is about what people have when they don't have anything except laughter, sex and the stars". Or, as Shameless's Frank rephrases it, addressing us from jail: "It is the boredom that gets you. You miss the simple things – drugs and alcohol…"
Duff grew up in Hayes, west London. Her parents are from rural Donegal. Her father was a painter and decorator, her mother worked in a shoe shop. "They taught me many things. Most of all that it is vital in life just to turn up." How does she mean? "To turn up for people, to be present, to have the conversation. This has emboldened me, given me greater empathy." As she says this, her arms are folded and she has a resigned look – sad but in a funny way. She hopes, in time, to pass this "great lesson" on to her three-year-old son. His name is Brendan – after her father.
It is a subject that tends to be treated as if it were a non-issue but I want to know whether it has been difficult to move from one class to another? "My parents were of a generation of Irish people who came here because there was nothing there – out of necessity they came to England. They weren't able to fulfil their dreams." She describes growing up with no sense of "entitlement"– in one sense an advantage. "I knew if I wanted to do this for a living, I really had to pursue it. When I was auditioning for drama schools, the girls around me were from very different backgrounds. I remember thinking, 'Should I lie about my family?'"
She is 42 now, and looking back sees "a tomboy – androgynous until I was 19. Desperately shy. The only confidence I had was in drama." She had been at a comprehensive school in the 80s, "deeply affected by the state of the country: kids weren't interested in politics or the arts". And she adds: "If you had questioned me about anything to do with boys… I was a virgin when I went to drama school [the Drama Centre in north London]. I was naive with the self-righteousness of youth." What about? "It's biological, isn't it? You think you know everything."
The Drama Centre was run by Christopher Fettes and Yat Malmgren – "brilliant but terrifying men". It was a "masochistic" but "exciting" time. "It put me through my paces. I toughened up. I was by no means the star of the year. It taught me to be resourceful, to go away and do the work myself. Invaluable." She points out that it is easier to become an actor from a working-class background than, say, a barrister because "acting is a sublimely egalitarian world". What's more: "I don't feel I've left my parents behind because of the sort of family I come from."
It helps to be married to James McAvoy. They met on Shameless's council estate 10 years ago (he played Steve – he and Fiona had to make passionate love against a Formica worktop). But he comes from a similar family: "Very encouraging and working class." As a result, neither of them has had to suffer "anger or confusion". But it is not a non-issue for her and sometimes it is a joke. She recalls a funny conversation with actor Robert Carlyle, also from a working-class background: "We were laughing, the two of us, saying, 'Just think: our children know what Parma ham is.'"
Anne-Marie Duff has a keen critical intelligence – plenty of sense and sensibility. But she has learned to be careful what she says – and reads – about herself. She avoids reviews: "It is better not to look at them; it is like reading someone's diary. What you think about me is none of my business. It's important to keep faith in the project you are working on." And then there is the question of what she says in public about herself. "My husband has an extraordinary ability to receive a lot of exposure and still maintain a sense of self without giving anything away. I think it's very powerful."
She talks eloquently about how "judgmental" our culture is, deploring its casual cruelty – especially online. She wonders: "How on earth do you teach your child not to be spiteful in the playground when online you can say whatever you like?" She is "no fan" of celebrity culture. She talks, too, about autograph hunters, commenting that it is a racket. (I check later: a photo signed by Duff – as Fiona – can be bought for £24 on eBay).
We talk about the insecurity of her profession. "It comes in waves. I bumped into Olivia Colman recently. She's riding high – she's a brilliant actor and one of the nicest people I have ever worked with [on Jimmy McGovern's Accused]. She said, 'I'm worried I will never work again', which I thought was hysterical." It is important to "be grateful and keep going". She adds: "Nothing is more diminishing than trying to control success or hold on to things."
How does she let go – relax? What would be an ideal holiday? "Right now, as a working mum: Four Seasons, Bali! No, actually, my favourite would always be a muddy tent holiday. Don't get me wrong: there is nothing more delightful than a dirty martini by the pool but I like being in nature." She would pick New Zealand because "there are no natural predators there". She goes off into another of her peals of laughter.
She believes she has changed now she is in her 40s: "I didn't really inhabit myself until I was in my 30s. And motherhood is an epic event. You can't help but be altered by it – and it is important to be." She understands better with age that "just because you feel something, that feeling isn't always the priority. I guess that is being an adult, isn't it?" The ways she lives have changed, too. "Pre-baby, I was a real yoga bunny." Can she still bend in every direction? "I'm pretty loose…" More laughter. But she doesn't officially exercise now. No time – acting is sport enough, alongside running after Brendan. "But I'm always dancing in my kitchen. And I love to sing. I've always sung. My father was a lovely singer. Always sang Jim Reeves at parties. I sing to my boy and he sings too."
Spark – spirit – is the key to Duff. She illuminates even the darkest roles. (She giggles about being cast as demented women like Edith Duchemin in BBC2's Parade's End – and hushes me before we can joke about whether this is typecasting. "She was bonkers, wasn't she? Like a mad racehorse.") As to spirit, she comments: "I am a sanguine individual. Most people are having a difficult time at the moment but still get up in the morning… As a species, we thrive. And I am interested in that ability to thrive. Things have to be about hope. On stage you need to convey hope or you'll lose an audience.
It is too soon to say how this will apply to Nina, but already the role is taking possession of her "as if drawing the calcium out of my bones". It is what director Howard Davies described as Duff's way of "throwing herself on parts as if bruising herself on them". She suggests she is "still that 19-year-old masochist that goes, 'F-ing great.'" And meanwhile, offstage, how much acting is involved just in being herself? "You know what? I can only be who I am."
Strange Interlude is at the Lyttelton, London SE1 from 28 May. The final episode of Shameless is on C4 on 28 May Reported by guardian.co.uk 5 hours ago.
Anne-Marie Duff holds out her hand – a shy shake. She is wearing what looks like a child's white vest, jeans and no jewellery. There is nothing to give her away, apart from her face. Even her feet are bare – maroon nail varnish excepted. It is a sunny day – warm upstairs at the Jerwood rehearsal space in south London – and we have two reasons to meet. She is about to star in Strange Interlude at the National, a Eugene O'Neill marathon. And the final episode of Channel 4's Shameless (now in its 11th series) is about to be aired, featuring Fiona – peroxide hair and tarty Gypsy earrings to the fore – taking a last stand. Anne-Marie's range is incredible: Elizabeth I, Margot Fonteyn, Saint Joan, Berenice, John Lennon's mum… and now Nina, complicated, ardent, neurotic war widow. "Interlude", incidentally, misleads. Uncut, the drama is four hours long. Anne-Marie tells me it is one of the plays that made Nicholas Hytner want to be a director. Michael Grandage is another of its champions. I run into Simon Godwin, director of this trimmed version for the Lyttelton and wish him good luck and he laughs, as if acknowledging he may need it.
Anne-Marie is one of those actors who is a chameleon and yet, unmistakably, herself. Her face is uncommonly expressive. It has a wicked gaiety but sorrow comes easily, too. "I am not precious about the way I look. Never having been defined as a great beauty makes that easier." How does she control the detail of what is going on in her face? Here is a test – O'Neill's confounding stage direction to Nina from scene two:
"She appears older than in the previous scene, her face is paler and much thinner… In her fight to regain control over her nerves, she has overstriven after the cool and efficient poise, but she is really in a more highly strung, disorganised state than ever, although she is now more capable of suppressing and concealing it. She remains strikingly handsome and her physical appeal is enhanced by her pallor and the mysterious suggestion about her of hidden experience."
Duff erupts into peels of laughter. "He is like a novelist, O'Neill, isn't he? Our characters are all described forensically at the beginning of these huge scenes. With screenplays, you are advised to ignore stage directions." But she is not about to ignore O'Neill. The trick, she explains, is to rise above literalness and "get the smell of it, breathe it in, see if you can exhale it – that is all you can do". Lashings of white makeup may also be needed to acquire Nina's pallor (Anne-Marie looks as though she spent the Bank holiday weekend in the sun). But the real challenge is to become "more yourself as an actor, visiting every corner". At first she felt unequal to the role, almost turned it down, asked herself: "How can I create this panorama of character? It is not just about charting the years. These people have extraordinary colours that you are trying to find every day in rehearsal. The fluidity of O'Neill's writing is like the ocean – he is obsessed with the sea – it seems to swell in his characters."
Duff almost turned down Shameless, too. This seems to be typical of her. She is careful and carefree – such a mixture. It was her mother who swung it, in the end, saying Paul Abbott's script rang true because "it is about what people have when they don't have anything except laughter, sex and the stars". Or, as Shameless's Frank rephrases it, addressing us from jail: "It is the boredom that gets you. You miss the simple things – drugs and alcohol…"
Duff grew up in Hayes, west London. Her parents are from rural Donegal. Her father was a painter and decorator, her mother worked in a shoe shop. "They taught me many things. Most of all that it is vital in life just to turn up." How does she mean? "To turn up for people, to be present, to have the conversation. This has emboldened me, given me greater empathy." As she says this, her arms are folded and she has a resigned look – sad but in a funny way. She hopes, in time, to pass this "great lesson" on to her three-year-old son. His name is Brendan – after her father.
It is a subject that tends to be treated as if it were a non-issue but I want to know whether it has been difficult to move from one class to another? "My parents were of a generation of Irish people who came here because there was nothing there – out of necessity they came to England. They weren't able to fulfil their dreams." She describes growing up with no sense of "entitlement"– in one sense an advantage. "I knew if I wanted to do this for a living, I really had to pursue it. When I was auditioning for drama schools, the girls around me were from very different backgrounds. I remember thinking, 'Should I lie about my family?'"
She is 42 now, and looking back sees "a tomboy – androgynous until I was 19. Desperately shy. The only confidence I had was in drama." She had been at a comprehensive school in the 80s, "deeply affected by the state of the country: kids weren't interested in politics or the arts". And she adds: "If you had questioned me about anything to do with boys… I was a virgin when I went to drama school [the Drama Centre in north London]. I was naive with the self-righteousness of youth." What about? "It's biological, isn't it? You think you know everything."
The Drama Centre was run by Christopher Fettes and Yat Malmgren – "brilliant but terrifying men". It was a "masochistic" but "exciting" time. "It put me through my paces. I toughened up. I was by no means the star of the year. It taught me to be resourceful, to go away and do the work myself. Invaluable." She points out that it is easier to become an actor from a working-class background than, say, a barrister because "acting is a sublimely egalitarian world". What's more: "I don't feel I've left my parents behind because of the sort of family I come from."
It helps to be married to James McAvoy. They met on Shameless's council estate 10 years ago (he played Steve – he and Fiona had to make passionate love against a Formica worktop). But he comes from a similar family: "Very encouraging and working class." As a result, neither of them has had to suffer "anger or confusion". But it is not a non-issue for her and sometimes it is a joke. She recalls a funny conversation with actor Robert Carlyle, also from a working-class background: "We were laughing, the two of us, saying, 'Just think: our children know what Parma ham is.'"
Anne-Marie Duff has a keen critical intelligence – plenty of sense and sensibility. But she has learned to be careful what she says – and reads – about herself. She avoids reviews: "It is better not to look at them; it is like reading someone's diary. What you think about me is none of my business. It's important to keep faith in the project you are working on." And then there is the question of what she says in public about herself. "My husband has an extraordinary ability to receive a lot of exposure and still maintain a sense of self without giving anything away. I think it's very powerful."
She talks eloquently about how "judgmental" our culture is, deploring its casual cruelty – especially online. She wonders: "How on earth do you teach your child not to be spiteful in the playground when online you can say whatever you like?" She is "no fan" of celebrity culture. She talks, too, about autograph hunters, commenting that it is a racket. (I check later: a photo signed by Duff – as Fiona – can be bought for £24 on eBay).
We talk about the insecurity of her profession. "It comes in waves. I bumped into Olivia Colman recently. She's riding high – she's a brilliant actor and one of the nicest people I have ever worked with [on Jimmy McGovern's Accused]. She said, 'I'm worried I will never work again', which I thought was hysterical." It is important to "be grateful and keep going". She adds: "Nothing is more diminishing than trying to control success or hold on to things."
How does she let go – relax? What would be an ideal holiday? "Right now, as a working mum: Four Seasons, Bali! No, actually, my favourite would always be a muddy tent holiday. Don't get me wrong: there is nothing more delightful than a dirty martini by the pool but I like being in nature." She would pick New Zealand because "there are no natural predators there". She goes off into another of her peals of laughter.
She believes she has changed now she is in her 40s: "I didn't really inhabit myself until I was in my 30s. And motherhood is an epic event. You can't help but be altered by it – and it is important to be." She understands better with age that "just because you feel something, that feeling isn't always the priority. I guess that is being an adult, isn't it?" The ways she lives have changed, too. "Pre-baby, I was a real yoga bunny." Can she still bend in every direction? "I'm pretty loose…" More laughter. But she doesn't officially exercise now. No time – acting is sport enough, alongside running after Brendan. "But I'm always dancing in my kitchen. And I love to sing. I've always sung. My father was a lovely singer. Always sang Jim Reeves at parties. I sing to my boy and he sings too."
Spark – spirit – is the key to Duff. She illuminates even the darkest roles. (She giggles about being cast as demented women like Edith Duchemin in BBC2's Parade's End – and hushes me before we can joke about whether this is typecasting. "She was bonkers, wasn't she? Like a mad racehorse.") As to spirit, she comments: "I am a sanguine individual. Most people are having a difficult time at the moment but still get up in the morning… As a species, we thrive. And I am interested in that ability to thrive. Things have to be about hope. On stage you need to convey hope or you'll lose an audience.
It is too soon to say how this will apply to Nina, but already the role is taking possession of her "as if drawing the calcium out of my bones". It is what director Howard Davies described as Duff's way of "throwing herself on parts as if bruising herself on them". She suggests she is "still that 19-year-old masochist that goes, 'F-ing great.'" And meanwhile, offstage, how much acting is involved just in being herself? "You know what? I can only be who I am."
Strange Interlude is at the Lyttelton, London SE1 from 28 May. The final episode of Shameless is on C4 on 28 May Reported by guardian.co.uk 5 hours ago.
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Does Prozac help artists be creative?
More than 40 million people globally take an SSRI antidepressant, among them many writers and musicians. But do they hamper the creative process, extinguishing the spark that produces great art, or do they enhance artistic endeavour?
Twenty-five years after pharmaceutical giant Eli Lilly unleashed Prozac on the red-braced 80s, SSRIs are still the world's most popular antidepressants. They are swallowed by more than 40 million people, from Beijing to Beirut, knitting a web of happiness from New York to New Caledonia. Selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors, of which Prozac is the best known, are the defining drug of the modern age, the crutch of choice for the worried well. In the US, where one in 10 takes antidepressants, you can buy beef-flavoured Prozac for your dog, trademarked Reconcile. The Prozac revolution has not only changed the way we think about depression (aided by Eli Lilly's mammoth advertising campaign); it has also changed the way we think, full stop.
In his 1993 book Listening to Prozac, the psychiatrist Peter D Kramer explored the ethical issues around the rise of what he termed "cosmetic pharmacology". With a daily pill people could now banish social awkwardness or the unhappiness of relationship break-ups, forge brassily assertive personae from their once shy selves. Like the Soma of Aldous Huxley's Brave New World, Prozac was making people "better than well". Kramer wrote of the "personality transformations" that occurred in a substantial minority of those taking the drug, briefly pausing to speculate as to what impact this might have had on their creativity. While we know, thanks to Kay Redfield Jamison's Touched with Fire, that poets are up to 30 times more likely to suffer from bipolar disorder than the national average, we have no idea how or if the pills they take to treat the disease affect their creative output.
The French writer Henry de Montherlant said that happiness writes white. For me that whiteness was the colour of a 20mg Cipralex pill – a close cousin of Prozac – taken at the breakfast table. With the depthless chemical happiness of the drug, a thin layer of snow seemed to fall over my mind, blocking access to strong feeling, cutting me off from the hidden impulses that drove me to write. Sometimes I did feel "better than well", but more often I was haunted by the uncanny feeling that I was skimming over the surface of my life. Looking back, those Prozac years have a curious, occluded feel, as if viewed through a gauze.
To celebrate the drug's quarter-century, I spoke to other writers, artists and musicians who have taken SSRIs, trying to establish whether they have been a bane or a boon for our collective creativity. I've deliberately concentrated on the arts, rather than the sciences. This is partly because, while we've all seen Carrie Mathison in Homeland and John Nash in A Beautiful Mind, there is significantly more literature on artists and writers taking antidepressants than on chemists and economists. It's partly because the arts are my bailiwick: I'm not on "are you on drugs?" terms with that many scientists.
*We expect our * artists to be, in Baudelaire's words, touched by "a breath of wind from the wings of madness". In his book Poets on Prozac, Richard Berlin speaks of "an entire generation of writers who became famed for the dramatic excesses of their psychiatric disorders". Sylvia Plath sits at the head of a pantheon of artists who took their own lives – Virginia Woolf, Alexander McQueen, Ernest Hemingway, David Foster Wallace – and who battered their bodies into submission with drugs and booze (see also Roberto Bolaño, Amy Winehouse, F Scott Fitzgerald, Billie Holiday). It's easy to agree with Dryden when he says, "Great wits are sure to madness near allied, / And thin partitions do their bounds divide."
From Heinrich Heine to Edvard Munch, many resisted treatment for their depression, fearing a loss of creative urges. When offered psychotherapy, the poet Edward Thomas replied: "I wonder whether for a person like myself whose most intense moments were those of depression, a cure that destroys the depression may not destroy the intensity – a desperate remedy?" Sigmund Freud – who also killed himself – argued that artistic creativity is a product of neurosis. We deal with the conflicts in our subconscious by making objects out of them. If this, grossly simplified, is the theory behind the link between mental illness and creativity, then the worry for artists is that in banishing their black dogs they are also dousing the flames of inspiration, blunting the edge of their genius.
Creativity and pharmacology have a troubled past. Chloral hydrate, used as a sedative for the first half of the 20th century, left patients feeling sapped and sluggish. The playwright Antonin Artaud accused it of lowering his "mental water level", causing a "diminution of my morality and my intellect". He finally died of an overdose of the drug. In an unpublished letter discovered in 2001, Ted Hughes revealed that Sylvia Plath was taking a monoamine oxidase inhibitor (MAOI) in the days leading up to her suicide. She'd had a negative reaction to a similar drug as a teenager and in the letter, Hughes blames the MAOI and the doctor who prescribed it for her death.
Plath's antidepressant was remarkably similar to Nardil, the drug with which David Foster Wallace struggled for many years. Making little headway with the novel that would be published, incomplete, after his death as The Pale King, Wallace began to wean himself off Nardil. His biographer, DT Max, said "he thought that removing the scrim of Nardil might help him see a way out of his creative impasse". Instead, he remained blocked and, as his friend Jonathan Franzen put it, "when his hope for fiction died, after years of struggle with the new novel, there was no other way out but death".
This is not the essay in which to debate in depth the efficacy of SSRIs. Irving Kirsch claims – to my mind convincingly – in The Emperor's New Drugs that their benefits have been substantially overstated. What is clear is that their side-effects have not. Apart from stifling the libido, SSRI use has consequences that are particularly significant for artists. A 2009 study by Oxford University, published in the British Journal of Psychiatry, found that those taking SSRIs reported "a general reduction in the intensity of the emotions that they experienced". They described themselves as feeling "dulled", "numbed", "flattened", or "blocked". If poetry is (as Wordsworth claimed) "the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings… emotion recollected in tranquillity", then could Prozac bring artists too little feeling, too much tranquillity?
I spent most of my 20s on SSRIs of one sort or another. I was a difficult teenager, expelled from school and lurching from one illegal chemical high to the next. I was prescribed Prozac in the wake of one particularly manic episode and continued to take it on and off for eight years. My GP at university persuaded me to quit for a while, but when I moved to London I found a pharmacy that would sell me my SSRI of choice over the counter, no questions asked. What should have been a temporary buttress ended up forming part of the architecture of my young life.
Writing on SSRIs was like swimming in mud. Words came slowly or not at all; emotions were perceived as if at a great distance, alien and remote. Even at a sentence-by-sentence level, I was aware of a certain lag in my writing, a syntactic sluggishness – the imprint of a brain that was failing to catch up with itself. I missed the hectic moods of my teens where I'd write great (I mean clearly terrible, but great in my mind) stories on my father's ancient Amstrad, caught up in the flow of words. Fuddled and frustrated, I quit writing altogether and didn't start again until I'd given up the pills.
In a recent Radio 4 documentary, Will Self considered the legacy of Prozac's first 25 years on the planet. What he didn't say on air, but admitted to me in a subsequent email, was that he'd had his own run-in with SSRIs. I'd mentioned "Inclusion", a surreal story in his book Grey Area that satirises the psychopharmacological brouhaha surrounding Prozac. "I was prescribed Seroxat (I believe wrongly)," he wrote in reply, "to help me with withdrawals from a bad crack habit (what's a good crack habit?). After being on it a couple of weeks, I borderline intentionally took a heroin overdose and nearly died... so, I have a negative view of the drugs." Self, however, didn't blame the SSRIs for obstructing his artistic flow: "Heroin, cocaine, marijuana and alcohol were really the drugs that ended up fucking my creativity; the Seroxat was just a way station on the escape ramp to abstinence."
Other writers identified with the creative hamstringing I'd experienced on SSRIs. The novelist Amanda Craig was an early adopter of Prozac in Britain. Suffering from profound depression, she found SSRIs unhelpful, even damaging, despite the brief lift they gave to her mood. "Prozac enabled me to function, but dulled everything," she told me, "including the shafts of joy that gradually pierce depression. It changed who I was and that included who I was as a writer." She finally stopped taking the pills and turned her experience of depression into a bestselling novel, In a Dark Wood.
Children's author Lucy Coats is another who found herself blocked by SSRIs. "I've been depressed all my life," she told me, "but it came to a head with postnatal depression after my second child. I was badly depressed and my doctor put me on Seroxat." Although the drugs offered some relief from her symptoms, it was at a heavy price – her creativity. "I took it for six months and I felt as if I was walking through this grey world, with all the joy totally stripped out of it. I could feel neither happy nor sad. It was absolutely vile. As a writer, I need to feel emotion of some kind. The creative spark was completely extinguished for me. I had a deadline and I had to ask the publisher to give me more time because I could not write. Everything I wrote was kind of lumpy, disgusting clay and I couldn't shape it into anything."
It's not just authors who have suffered creatively from the effects of SSRIs. I spoke to my brother, Sam, better known as Preston from the Ordinary Boys. Or, if we're honest, better known for going on Celebrity Big Brother and marrying Chantelle Houghton, one of his fellow housemates. He's since forged a successful songwriting career. I knew he'd been on Prozac throughout his time in the Celebrity Big Brother house and asked him how it affected him – creatively and otherwise.
"More than anything," he told me, "it made me really sweaty. And it seems a banal thing, but it was debilitating, particularly as it was a time I was in the public eye. As for creativity, Prozac just makes you a bit 'Yeah, OK, fine, whatever' about stuff. You lose the inner critic. And that goes for life as well as art. I got married to someone I'd met on a TV show and didn't really know. I think if it hadn't been for the haze of the drug, I might have made better decisions."
I can relate to this (and not just because he's my kid brother). With my creative blockage came what I later identified as a kind of moral blockage. Because actions didn't feel like they had consequences – in that nothing seemed able to shock me from the pallid world the drugs had wrapped about me – I pushed myself into more and more extreme situations, desperate for a spark of authentic feeling. I was haunted by the sense that I was living in the third person. This inability to feel implicated in my actions had its own creative repercussions – the characters in my novels seem to lack agency, are buffeted by forces beyond their control (as several reviewers have pointed out). I gave Charlie Wales in This Bleeding City a Valium addiction, but actually what I was describing was life on SSRIs: "With dead eyes and dead hands, I navigated the world. On the way to work in the mornings I pressed a pill into the furry lining of my cheek and felt it melt, bitter and comforting as I sat on the fusty orange seats of the tube and watched flares of electricity light up the darkness of tunnels. I had stopped reading. Instead, I just watched."
*For other artists*, Prozac has been a life belt thrown as they drowned in a sea of depression. In an exchange of letters with the historian Roy Porter, Zoë Heller speaks of how, after taking Prozac, "I stopped lying in bed in the middle of the day. I stopped crying all the time. I began to entertain visions of my future that were, if not entirely rosy, then at least not entirely gloom-laden." The original Prozac pin-up, Elizabeth Wurtzel, is another who claims to have been rescued by the drug (although a careful reading of her memoir Prozac Nation might give the credit to the rather less zeitgeisty lithium).
Wurtzel's book has not aged well – it is stuck in the 90s, po-faced and narcissistic. It lacks the note of authenticity that characterises the best books about mental illness. Wurtzel is also unsure exactly how she feels about the drug. At one point she gushes, "Prozac was the miracle that saved my life." Several pages later, though, she admits that "the secret I sometimes think that only I know is that Prozac really isn't that great". Writing about depression is difficult precisely because it is a disease that strips us of words, of narrative. One of the most impressive works on the subject is by the Welsh poet Gwyneth Lewis. Her memoir, Sunbathing in the Rain, joins Lewis Wolpert's Malignant Sadness and William Styron's Darkness Visible, three books sent back by emissaries from deep within the abyss of depression. Gwyneth Lewis is another who benefited greatly from Prozac.
When we first met a couple of years ago at a writing retreat in Norfolk, Lewis was literally wearing rose-tinted spectacles, but the world didn't always have such an optimistic hue. After a serious bout of depression, she found herself incapacitated, a ghost in her own life. Sunbathing in the Rain is her description of journeying into and, eventually, out of her despair, during which time SSRIs offered "some psychic space, a small but crucial distance between me and the horrors". I asked her about her experience of writing on the drugs.
"When I get ill, I get so ill I can't write at all," she told me. "I don't work when I'm wretched, I work when I'm happy. The antidepressants offered a pathway to effective working." But there were drawbacks. She stopped taking the pills during a sailing trip with her husband, finding that they rendered her spaced-out and unreactive (and a poor sailor to boot). "I was distanced and dissociated… I'd see a rock coming towards us and I just wouldn't move." She was also aware that the loss of sex drive so common to SSRI users had creative repercussions. "Part of what you feel as a poet is libido towards language. Being on these drugs will change your language use because they change who you are."
For Lewis it was a decision between writing on Prozac or not writing at all. For Keeril Makan, the choice was rather different. One of America's most celebrated young composers, he struggled for years with a depression that would often find vivid reflection in his work. He describes his music as "informed, almost viscerally, by my depression", and spiky, atonal pieces such as The Noise Between Thoughts attack the listener with a bleak physical force. Finally, though, he reached a point at which he had to step away from the darkness. "Although I was still composing," he told me, "it was such an excruciating process and was putting me in contact with these really difficult emotional places. I couldn't go on with my daily life. I was creating music I was happy with and people were interested in, but I had to live as well."
He started taking antidepressants and meditating and found that his music gained a new depth as he dragged himself out of his depression. "Being on the antidepressants does change the type of emotions I'm experiencing," he said, "but I think they can be just as interesting. If anything, this helps the composing. I was working on an opera recently and I don't think I could have written it before. I was too one-dimensional, emotionally. Things were just dark but now there's both – dark and light." I confessed to admiring the raw power of his early work and he chuckled. "It's true that I'm not as fully immersed in darkness as previously, but I guess I don't care, because I couldn't keep doing that. It was a question of living, or creating this music that was negative and violent. I made my choice."
*It shows how * little we understand of the functioning of the brain's neurochemistry and SSRIs' effect upon it that a pill that may cause blockages (as it did in my own case) has also been prescribed as a cure for writer's block. In a Late Show documentary aired in 1995, the psychiatrist and author Oliver James gave five artists Prozac to see what effect it would have on their creative output. Two of them – the New Order frontman Bernard Sumner and the poet Alan Jenkins – were blocked when filming began. Sumner, who was working on his Electronic side project with Johnny Marr at the time, was afflicted by a hyper-critical internal voice, and said that the process of writing lyrics was "like breaking a horse". As he wrote, he'd hear repeated in his head: "You can't do this, you can't do this."
I spoke to James about the effect of SSRIs on writer's block. "What the film showed," he told me, "was that once you removed the depression – and Prozac did seem to do that, whether by placebo or not – people could write. When I first met Bernard Sumner he was clearly blocked and by the end of it he'd written some lyrics." There was a hitch, though. "What I couldn't say on the documentary was that he may have done some work, but I'm not sure that it was any good." This seems to be one of the problems with the use of SSRIs to free up the creative impulse. While, as Gwyneth Lewis said, it's very difficult to write during periods of intense depression, it may be that we need to be a bit down on ourselves in order to produce good work.
James agrees. "On Prozac you become more confident, you're less aware of other people's feelings, less worried about what other people might think about you, you're more able to act as opposed to [being] self-absorbed and stuck. You may be talking crap, producing crap, but you don't care and just press on. And that's a real change of personality for some creative types – to stop caring what other people think. It's a dangerous game."
We begin to recognise the precarious high-wire act that most creative depressives undertake, trapped between the unbearable pain of their illness and the equally unbearable blockages brought about by their medication – walking Dryden's "thin partitions". We need the critical voices in our heads (mine is that of a reviewer who gave my second novel a mauling on Radio 4), but they mustn't swamp us with their carping and condemnation. In Touched with Fire, Kay Redfield Jamison looked at manic depressive artists who took lithium, a drug which "inhibits creativity so that the individual is unable to express himself". She found that, overwhelmingly, the artists either gave up the drug or reduced their dosage "in hope of achieving a kind of controlled cyclothymia [mood swings], willing to take the undulations of power and imbecility in exchange for periods of high enthusiasm and flowing thoughts".
In this essay, I've deliberately only quoted artists who would let me use their names in print. This is partly because, post-Leveson, we know that "a close friend" means the journalist made it up, but also because I think it's important that the subject be addressed in the open. One thing that has struck me while researching this piece, though, is the sheer number of artistic friends and acquaintances who have taken Prozac – some of whom agreed to be quoted, some who preferred to remain incognito. I mentioned that I was writing this article on Twitter and was contacted by a host of creative types keen to share their experiences – positive or (more usually) negative – of working on SSRIs. This is far from a clinical survey, but it does feel like our creative industries are smoothing the jagged surfaces of their lives with SSRIs in astonishing – even epidemic – numbers.
My conversation with my brother confirms this impression. "Everyone in music is on Prozac," he says. "It's like it's part of the job description." We know from toxicology reports that Michael Jackson, Michael Hutchence, Heath Ledger and Brittany Murphy were taking Prozac (although for them it was but one of a heady concoction of drugs), while stars such as Sheryl Crow, Robbie Williams and Olivia Newton-John have spoken about their reliance on SSRIs.
"It's partly to do with the stress of the business," my brother tells me. "If you're really successful you have little time to yourself, you're having to sleep when and if you can, you don't have much control of your life. And if you're playing a gig in Tokyo on Friday, you can't commit to therapy, to sitting down once a week and talking through your problems. You never know where you'll be one week to the next, so you just take a pill and get on with it."
There's another factor in the celebrity antidepressant narrative – doctors. "There's a kind of understanding you come to," my brother tells me. "Because most people in the music industry use private doctors and it was certainly the case with me that I went to this one doctor because I knew I'd get the drugs I wanted. I was paying and she knew that if she didn't write the prescription I'd just go elsewhere." Certain doctors would gain a reputation for being particularly laissez-faire with their prescriptions. "I don't think it was necessarily that they were corrupt or anything," my brother says. "It was more that the only people they saw were these neurotic actors and musicians. Now I see an NHS doctor and she's having all sorts in her surgery so when I come in moaning she's just like, 'Come on now, pull yourself together, you'll be fine.'"
*One of the * effects of the Prozac revolution has been an increasing acceptance that mental illness is caused by chemical imbalances in the brain, a simplified standpoint that has been reinforced by the press and celebrity commentators. In a 2011 Larry King Live interview, Jim Carrey came out with some exemplary bio-babble, both meaningless and pernicious: "Certain elements of the brain like tyrosine and hydroxytryptophan… instead of being a serotonin inhibitor, which just uses the serotonin you have and Prozac and things like that. It just uses the serotonin you have and it doesn't allow it go back into the receptor. But it metabolises your serotonin after a while and you have to keep taking more and more to feel good. This actually creates dopamine and creates serotonin."
Bolstered by heavy drug company spending, the message has been put out there: the brain is an organ like any other; treat depression as you would a stomach upset or broken ankle. This narrative misses the extraordinary complexity of the brain and the very limited understanding we have of its operations. The neurotransmitters which are influenced by SSRIs are intricate and multivalent – indeed the role of these neurotransmitters in the control of mood was only discovered by accident when examining the effect of the anti-psychotic thorazine on the brain's chemistry. In her Prozac Diary (1998), Lauren Slater referred to Prozac as a "revolution in psychopharmacology because of its selectivity on the serotonin system; it was a drug with the precision of a Scud missile, launched miles away from its target only to land, with a proud flare, right on the enemy's roof." Such grandiose claims have faded with time as we come to understand how little we really know about how – and if – Prozac works.
In Daniel Nettle's book Strong Imagination: Madness, Creativity and Human Nature, he turns a scientific eye upon the creative process, looking in depth at the types of mental illness associated with creativity. Of particular interest is his work on serotonin – the neurotransmitter influenced by Prozac. He shows how serotonin systems function to help us to adapt to psychological challenges, reducing anxiety and providing "a carapace against a fickle and confusing world". When I questioned him about the specific impact of Prozac on creativity, he described serotonin-related drugs stimulating "energy, concentration and an expanded mental horizon", although he added that, in the decade since writing the book, he had become convinced that Prozac and related SSRIs were much less effective than once thought.
It is comforting to believe that, to quote Robert Lowell, the lack of a little salt in the brain is all that stands between us and sanity. Irving Kirsch's research for The Emperor's New Drugs suggests, however, that SSRIs are barely more effective than placebos. While the drugs have clearly delivered dramatic benefits to some like Gwyneth Lewis (and, indeed, Oliver James himself, who when he briefly took Prozac in the 90s said he felt "miraculous" on it), it seems to hamper as many creative types as it helps. We need to be sane to work – being an author requires discipline, doggedness, a rhino-hide for criticism – but we must also be open to the insanity of creativity. The state of manic flow when we write, paint, compose or merely play is a kind of cogent madness and antithetical to my experience of the drab fog of SSRI "happiness".
Within three weeks of my own Prozac fog lifting, I was writing again. Yes, I still felt down, so down some days that I couldn't work and buried my head under the duvet, but the trade-off was days when my fingers couldn't move fast enough over the keyboard, my pen struck sparks from the page. In Deborah Levy's Swimming Home, the heroine, Kitty Finch, has just quit Seroxat. "It's quite a relief to feel miserable again," she says. "I don't feel anything when I take my pills." It's been five years since I took my last SSRI. The happiness I get from my writing is deeper seated and more authentic than anything that could be confected in the laboratories of Big Pharma. The drugs didn't work for me and, more importantly, I couldn't work when I was on them.
Alex Preston's novels This Bleeding City and The Revelations are published by Faber & Faber (£7.99)
*Prozac world: the rise and rise of antidepressants*
*1988 *The first SSRI (selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor), Prozac, is made by Eli Lilly and launched in the US.
*1989* The drug reaches the UK. It hit the covers of Newsweek and New York magazine, which described it as the "new wonder drug for depression".
*1991-2001* Annual UK antidepressant prescriptions rise from 9m to 24m.
*1994* Elizabeth Wurtzel's memoir Prozac Nation is published, establishing the drug's position in popular culture.
*1994* The first of many lawsuits concerning side-effects of the drug goes to trial. Joseph Wesbeckerwent on a killing spree in 1989, killing eight before shooting himself. His violence was claimed to be a side-effect of taking Prozac.
*1994 *Psychiatrist Peter Breggin's Talking Back to Prozac, critical of the drug, is published.
*1995* Prozac is referenced in the Blur song Country House: "He's reading Balzac and knocking back Prozac… It's the helping hand that makes you feel wonderfully bland."
*1998* Prozac Diary, the candid memoir by Lauren Slater, is published.
*2000* Zoloft overtakes Prozac as the most popular SSRI in the US.
*2001* Prozac (fluoxetine) loses its patent. Eli Lilly loses $35m of its market value in one day and 90% of its prescriptions in a single year.
*2004 *Prozac is in our drinking water. The Environment Agency says the drug is building up in British rivers and ground-water supplies, probably via the sewage system, but in quantities so dilute they could have no effect.
*2008* Antidepressants are now the third most common prescription drugs in the US.
*2009* The Lancet ranks the top 12 antidepressants from 117 studies. Zoloft and Lexapro come in first for their combination of effectiveness and fewest side-effects.
*2010* One in 10 people in Europe has now taken an antidepressant Reported by guardian.co.uk 4 hours ago.
Twenty-five years after pharmaceutical giant Eli Lilly unleashed Prozac on the red-braced 80s, SSRIs are still the world's most popular antidepressants. They are swallowed by more than 40 million people, from Beijing to Beirut, knitting a web of happiness from New York to New Caledonia. Selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors, of which Prozac is the best known, are the defining drug of the modern age, the crutch of choice for the worried well. In the US, where one in 10 takes antidepressants, you can buy beef-flavoured Prozac for your dog, trademarked Reconcile. The Prozac revolution has not only changed the way we think about depression (aided by Eli Lilly's mammoth advertising campaign); it has also changed the way we think, full stop.
In his 1993 book Listening to Prozac, the psychiatrist Peter D Kramer explored the ethical issues around the rise of what he termed "cosmetic pharmacology". With a daily pill people could now banish social awkwardness or the unhappiness of relationship break-ups, forge brassily assertive personae from their once shy selves. Like the Soma of Aldous Huxley's Brave New World, Prozac was making people "better than well". Kramer wrote of the "personality transformations" that occurred in a substantial minority of those taking the drug, briefly pausing to speculate as to what impact this might have had on their creativity. While we know, thanks to Kay Redfield Jamison's Touched with Fire, that poets are up to 30 times more likely to suffer from bipolar disorder than the national average, we have no idea how or if the pills they take to treat the disease affect their creative output.
The French writer Henry de Montherlant said that happiness writes white. For me that whiteness was the colour of a 20mg Cipralex pill – a close cousin of Prozac – taken at the breakfast table. With the depthless chemical happiness of the drug, a thin layer of snow seemed to fall over my mind, blocking access to strong feeling, cutting me off from the hidden impulses that drove me to write. Sometimes I did feel "better than well", but more often I was haunted by the uncanny feeling that I was skimming over the surface of my life. Looking back, those Prozac years have a curious, occluded feel, as if viewed through a gauze.
To celebrate the drug's quarter-century, I spoke to other writers, artists and musicians who have taken SSRIs, trying to establish whether they have been a bane or a boon for our collective creativity. I've deliberately concentrated on the arts, rather than the sciences. This is partly because, while we've all seen Carrie Mathison in Homeland and John Nash in A Beautiful Mind, there is significantly more literature on artists and writers taking antidepressants than on chemists and economists. It's partly because the arts are my bailiwick: I'm not on "are you on drugs?" terms with that many scientists.
*We expect our * artists to be, in Baudelaire's words, touched by "a breath of wind from the wings of madness". In his book Poets on Prozac, Richard Berlin speaks of "an entire generation of writers who became famed for the dramatic excesses of their psychiatric disorders". Sylvia Plath sits at the head of a pantheon of artists who took their own lives – Virginia Woolf, Alexander McQueen, Ernest Hemingway, David Foster Wallace – and who battered their bodies into submission with drugs and booze (see also Roberto Bolaño, Amy Winehouse, F Scott Fitzgerald, Billie Holiday). It's easy to agree with Dryden when he says, "Great wits are sure to madness near allied, / And thin partitions do their bounds divide."
From Heinrich Heine to Edvard Munch, many resisted treatment for their depression, fearing a loss of creative urges. When offered psychotherapy, the poet Edward Thomas replied: "I wonder whether for a person like myself whose most intense moments were those of depression, a cure that destroys the depression may not destroy the intensity – a desperate remedy?" Sigmund Freud – who also killed himself – argued that artistic creativity is a product of neurosis. We deal with the conflicts in our subconscious by making objects out of them. If this, grossly simplified, is the theory behind the link between mental illness and creativity, then the worry for artists is that in banishing their black dogs they are also dousing the flames of inspiration, blunting the edge of their genius.
Creativity and pharmacology have a troubled past. Chloral hydrate, used as a sedative for the first half of the 20th century, left patients feeling sapped and sluggish. The playwright Antonin Artaud accused it of lowering his "mental water level", causing a "diminution of my morality and my intellect". He finally died of an overdose of the drug. In an unpublished letter discovered in 2001, Ted Hughes revealed that Sylvia Plath was taking a monoamine oxidase inhibitor (MAOI) in the days leading up to her suicide. She'd had a negative reaction to a similar drug as a teenager and in the letter, Hughes blames the MAOI and the doctor who prescribed it for her death.
Plath's antidepressant was remarkably similar to Nardil, the drug with which David Foster Wallace struggled for many years. Making little headway with the novel that would be published, incomplete, after his death as The Pale King, Wallace began to wean himself off Nardil. His biographer, DT Max, said "he thought that removing the scrim of Nardil might help him see a way out of his creative impasse". Instead, he remained blocked and, as his friend Jonathan Franzen put it, "when his hope for fiction died, after years of struggle with the new novel, there was no other way out but death".
This is not the essay in which to debate in depth the efficacy of SSRIs. Irving Kirsch claims – to my mind convincingly – in The Emperor's New Drugs that their benefits have been substantially overstated. What is clear is that their side-effects have not. Apart from stifling the libido, SSRI use has consequences that are particularly significant for artists. A 2009 study by Oxford University, published in the British Journal of Psychiatry, found that those taking SSRIs reported "a general reduction in the intensity of the emotions that they experienced". They described themselves as feeling "dulled", "numbed", "flattened", or "blocked". If poetry is (as Wordsworth claimed) "the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings… emotion recollected in tranquillity", then could Prozac bring artists too little feeling, too much tranquillity?
I spent most of my 20s on SSRIs of one sort or another. I was a difficult teenager, expelled from school and lurching from one illegal chemical high to the next. I was prescribed Prozac in the wake of one particularly manic episode and continued to take it on and off for eight years. My GP at university persuaded me to quit for a while, but when I moved to London I found a pharmacy that would sell me my SSRI of choice over the counter, no questions asked. What should have been a temporary buttress ended up forming part of the architecture of my young life.
Writing on SSRIs was like swimming in mud. Words came slowly or not at all; emotions were perceived as if at a great distance, alien and remote. Even at a sentence-by-sentence level, I was aware of a certain lag in my writing, a syntactic sluggishness – the imprint of a brain that was failing to catch up with itself. I missed the hectic moods of my teens where I'd write great (I mean clearly terrible, but great in my mind) stories on my father's ancient Amstrad, caught up in the flow of words. Fuddled and frustrated, I quit writing altogether and didn't start again until I'd given up the pills.
In a recent Radio 4 documentary, Will Self considered the legacy of Prozac's first 25 years on the planet. What he didn't say on air, but admitted to me in a subsequent email, was that he'd had his own run-in with SSRIs. I'd mentioned "Inclusion", a surreal story in his book Grey Area that satirises the psychopharmacological brouhaha surrounding Prozac. "I was prescribed Seroxat (I believe wrongly)," he wrote in reply, "to help me with withdrawals from a bad crack habit (what's a good crack habit?). After being on it a couple of weeks, I borderline intentionally took a heroin overdose and nearly died... so, I have a negative view of the drugs." Self, however, didn't blame the SSRIs for obstructing his artistic flow: "Heroin, cocaine, marijuana and alcohol were really the drugs that ended up fucking my creativity; the Seroxat was just a way station on the escape ramp to abstinence."
Other writers identified with the creative hamstringing I'd experienced on SSRIs. The novelist Amanda Craig was an early adopter of Prozac in Britain. Suffering from profound depression, she found SSRIs unhelpful, even damaging, despite the brief lift they gave to her mood. "Prozac enabled me to function, but dulled everything," she told me, "including the shafts of joy that gradually pierce depression. It changed who I was and that included who I was as a writer." She finally stopped taking the pills and turned her experience of depression into a bestselling novel, In a Dark Wood.
Children's author Lucy Coats is another who found herself blocked by SSRIs. "I've been depressed all my life," she told me, "but it came to a head with postnatal depression after my second child. I was badly depressed and my doctor put me on Seroxat." Although the drugs offered some relief from her symptoms, it was at a heavy price – her creativity. "I took it for six months and I felt as if I was walking through this grey world, with all the joy totally stripped out of it. I could feel neither happy nor sad. It was absolutely vile. As a writer, I need to feel emotion of some kind. The creative spark was completely extinguished for me. I had a deadline and I had to ask the publisher to give me more time because I could not write. Everything I wrote was kind of lumpy, disgusting clay and I couldn't shape it into anything."
It's not just authors who have suffered creatively from the effects of SSRIs. I spoke to my brother, Sam, better known as Preston from the Ordinary Boys. Or, if we're honest, better known for going on Celebrity Big Brother and marrying Chantelle Houghton, one of his fellow housemates. He's since forged a successful songwriting career. I knew he'd been on Prozac throughout his time in the Celebrity Big Brother house and asked him how it affected him – creatively and otherwise.
"More than anything," he told me, "it made me really sweaty. And it seems a banal thing, but it was debilitating, particularly as it was a time I was in the public eye. As for creativity, Prozac just makes you a bit 'Yeah, OK, fine, whatever' about stuff. You lose the inner critic. And that goes for life as well as art. I got married to someone I'd met on a TV show and didn't really know. I think if it hadn't been for the haze of the drug, I might have made better decisions."
I can relate to this (and not just because he's my kid brother). With my creative blockage came what I later identified as a kind of moral blockage. Because actions didn't feel like they had consequences – in that nothing seemed able to shock me from the pallid world the drugs had wrapped about me – I pushed myself into more and more extreme situations, desperate for a spark of authentic feeling. I was haunted by the sense that I was living in the third person. This inability to feel implicated in my actions had its own creative repercussions – the characters in my novels seem to lack agency, are buffeted by forces beyond their control (as several reviewers have pointed out). I gave Charlie Wales in This Bleeding City a Valium addiction, but actually what I was describing was life on SSRIs: "With dead eyes and dead hands, I navigated the world. On the way to work in the mornings I pressed a pill into the furry lining of my cheek and felt it melt, bitter and comforting as I sat on the fusty orange seats of the tube and watched flares of electricity light up the darkness of tunnels. I had stopped reading. Instead, I just watched."
*For other artists*, Prozac has been a life belt thrown as they drowned in a sea of depression. In an exchange of letters with the historian Roy Porter, Zoë Heller speaks of how, after taking Prozac, "I stopped lying in bed in the middle of the day. I stopped crying all the time. I began to entertain visions of my future that were, if not entirely rosy, then at least not entirely gloom-laden." The original Prozac pin-up, Elizabeth Wurtzel, is another who claims to have been rescued by the drug (although a careful reading of her memoir Prozac Nation might give the credit to the rather less zeitgeisty lithium).
Wurtzel's book has not aged well – it is stuck in the 90s, po-faced and narcissistic. It lacks the note of authenticity that characterises the best books about mental illness. Wurtzel is also unsure exactly how she feels about the drug. At one point she gushes, "Prozac was the miracle that saved my life." Several pages later, though, she admits that "the secret I sometimes think that only I know is that Prozac really isn't that great". Writing about depression is difficult precisely because it is a disease that strips us of words, of narrative. One of the most impressive works on the subject is by the Welsh poet Gwyneth Lewis. Her memoir, Sunbathing in the Rain, joins Lewis Wolpert's Malignant Sadness and William Styron's Darkness Visible, three books sent back by emissaries from deep within the abyss of depression. Gwyneth Lewis is another who benefited greatly from Prozac.
When we first met a couple of years ago at a writing retreat in Norfolk, Lewis was literally wearing rose-tinted spectacles, but the world didn't always have such an optimistic hue. After a serious bout of depression, she found herself incapacitated, a ghost in her own life. Sunbathing in the Rain is her description of journeying into and, eventually, out of her despair, during which time SSRIs offered "some psychic space, a small but crucial distance between me and the horrors". I asked her about her experience of writing on the drugs.
"When I get ill, I get so ill I can't write at all," she told me. "I don't work when I'm wretched, I work when I'm happy. The antidepressants offered a pathway to effective working." But there were drawbacks. She stopped taking the pills during a sailing trip with her husband, finding that they rendered her spaced-out and unreactive (and a poor sailor to boot). "I was distanced and dissociated… I'd see a rock coming towards us and I just wouldn't move." She was also aware that the loss of sex drive so common to SSRI users had creative repercussions. "Part of what you feel as a poet is libido towards language. Being on these drugs will change your language use because they change who you are."
For Lewis it was a decision between writing on Prozac or not writing at all. For Keeril Makan, the choice was rather different. One of America's most celebrated young composers, he struggled for years with a depression that would often find vivid reflection in his work. He describes his music as "informed, almost viscerally, by my depression", and spiky, atonal pieces such as The Noise Between Thoughts attack the listener with a bleak physical force. Finally, though, he reached a point at which he had to step away from the darkness. "Although I was still composing," he told me, "it was such an excruciating process and was putting me in contact with these really difficult emotional places. I couldn't go on with my daily life. I was creating music I was happy with and people were interested in, but I had to live as well."
He started taking antidepressants and meditating and found that his music gained a new depth as he dragged himself out of his depression. "Being on the antidepressants does change the type of emotions I'm experiencing," he said, "but I think they can be just as interesting. If anything, this helps the composing. I was working on an opera recently and I don't think I could have written it before. I was too one-dimensional, emotionally. Things were just dark but now there's both – dark and light." I confessed to admiring the raw power of his early work and he chuckled. "It's true that I'm not as fully immersed in darkness as previously, but I guess I don't care, because I couldn't keep doing that. It was a question of living, or creating this music that was negative and violent. I made my choice."
*It shows how * little we understand of the functioning of the brain's neurochemistry and SSRIs' effect upon it that a pill that may cause blockages (as it did in my own case) has also been prescribed as a cure for writer's block. In a Late Show documentary aired in 1995, the psychiatrist and author Oliver James gave five artists Prozac to see what effect it would have on their creative output. Two of them – the New Order frontman Bernard Sumner and the poet Alan Jenkins – were blocked when filming began. Sumner, who was working on his Electronic side project with Johnny Marr at the time, was afflicted by a hyper-critical internal voice, and said that the process of writing lyrics was "like breaking a horse". As he wrote, he'd hear repeated in his head: "You can't do this, you can't do this."
I spoke to James about the effect of SSRIs on writer's block. "What the film showed," he told me, "was that once you removed the depression – and Prozac did seem to do that, whether by placebo or not – people could write. When I first met Bernard Sumner he was clearly blocked and by the end of it he'd written some lyrics." There was a hitch, though. "What I couldn't say on the documentary was that he may have done some work, but I'm not sure that it was any good." This seems to be one of the problems with the use of SSRIs to free up the creative impulse. While, as Gwyneth Lewis said, it's very difficult to write during periods of intense depression, it may be that we need to be a bit down on ourselves in order to produce good work.
James agrees. "On Prozac you become more confident, you're less aware of other people's feelings, less worried about what other people might think about you, you're more able to act as opposed to [being] self-absorbed and stuck. You may be talking crap, producing crap, but you don't care and just press on. And that's a real change of personality for some creative types – to stop caring what other people think. It's a dangerous game."
We begin to recognise the precarious high-wire act that most creative depressives undertake, trapped between the unbearable pain of their illness and the equally unbearable blockages brought about by their medication – walking Dryden's "thin partitions". We need the critical voices in our heads (mine is that of a reviewer who gave my second novel a mauling on Radio 4), but they mustn't swamp us with their carping and condemnation. In Touched with Fire, Kay Redfield Jamison looked at manic depressive artists who took lithium, a drug which "inhibits creativity so that the individual is unable to express himself". She found that, overwhelmingly, the artists either gave up the drug or reduced their dosage "in hope of achieving a kind of controlled cyclothymia [mood swings], willing to take the undulations of power and imbecility in exchange for periods of high enthusiasm and flowing thoughts".
In this essay, I've deliberately only quoted artists who would let me use their names in print. This is partly because, post-Leveson, we know that "a close friend" means the journalist made it up, but also because I think it's important that the subject be addressed in the open. One thing that has struck me while researching this piece, though, is the sheer number of artistic friends and acquaintances who have taken Prozac – some of whom agreed to be quoted, some who preferred to remain incognito. I mentioned that I was writing this article on Twitter and was contacted by a host of creative types keen to share their experiences – positive or (more usually) negative – of working on SSRIs. This is far from a clinical survey, but it does feel like our creative industries are smoothing the jagged surfaces of their lives with SSRIs in astonishing – even epidemic – numbers.
My conversation with my brother confirms this impression. "Everyone in music is on Prozac," he says. "It's like it's part of the job description." We know from toxicology reports that Michael Jackson, Michael Hutchence, Heath Ledger and Brittany Murphy were taking Prozac (although for them it was but one of a heady concoction of drugs), while stars such as Sheryl Crow, Robbie Williams and Olivia Newton-John have spoken about their reliance on SSRIs.
"It's partly to do with the stress of the business," my brother tells me. "If you're really successful you have little time to yourself, you're having to sleep when and if you can, you don't have much control of your life. And if you're playing a gig in Tokyo on Friday, you can't commit to therapy, to sitting down once a week and talking through your problems. You never know where you'll be one week to the next, so you just take a pill and get on with it."
There's another factor in the celebrity antidepressant narrative – doctors. "There's a kind of understanding you come to," my brother tells me. "Because most people in the music industry use private doctors and it was certainly the case with me that I went to this one doctor because I knew I'd get the drugs I wanted. I was paying and she knew that if she didn't write the prescription I'd just go elsewhere." Certain doctors would gain a reputation for being particularly laissez-faire with their prescriptions. "I don't think it was necessarily that they were corrupt or anything," my brother says. "It was more that the only people they saw were these neurotic actors and musicians. Now I see an NHS doctor and she's having all sorts in her surgery so when I come in moaning she's just like, 'Come on now, pull yourself together, you'll be fine.'"
*One of the * effects of the Prozac revolution has been an increasing acceptance that mental illness is caused by chemical imbalances in the brain, a simplified standpoint that has been reinforced by the press and celebrity commentators. In a 2011 Larry King Live interview, Jim Carrey came out with some exemplary bio-babble, both meaningless and pernicious: "Certain elements of the brain like tyrosine and hydroxytryptophan… instead of being a serotonin inhibitor, which just uses the serotonin you have and Prozac and things like that. It just uses the serotonin you have and it doesn't allow it go back into the receptor. But it metabolises your serotonin after a while and you have to keep taking more and more to feel good. This actually creates dopamine and creates serotonin."
Bolstered by heavy drug company spending, the message has been put out there: the brain is an organ like any other; treat depression as you would a stomach upset or broken ankle. This narrative misses the extraordinary complexity of the brain and the very limited understanding we have of its operations. The neurotransmitters which are influenced by SSRIs are intricate and multivalent – indeed the role of these neurotransmitters in the control of mood was only discovered by accident when examining the effect of the anti-psychotic thorazine on the brain's chemistry. In her Prozac Diary (1998), Lauren Slater referred to Prozac as a "revolution in psychopharmacology because of its selectivity on the serotonin system; it was a drug with the precision of a Scud missile, launched miles away from its target only to land, with a proud flare, right on the enemy's roof." Such grandiose claims have faded with time as we come to understand how little we really know about how – and if – Prozac works.
In Daniel Nettle's book Strong Imagination: Madness, Creativity and Human Nature, he turns a scientific eye upon the creative process, looking in depth at the types of mental illness associated with creativity. Of particular interest is his work on serotonin – the neurotransmitter influenced by Prozac. He shows how serotonin systems function to help us to adapt to psychological challenges, reducing anxiety and providing "a carapace against a fickle and confusing world". When I questioned him about the specific impact of Prozac on creativity, he described serotonin-related drugs stimulating "energy, concentration and an expanded mental horizon", although he added that, in the decade since writing the book, he had become convinced that Prozac and related SSRIs were much less effective than once thought.
It is comforting to believe that, to quote Robert Lowell, the lack of a little salt in the brain is all that stands between us and sanity. Irving Kirsch's research for The Emperor's New Drugs suggests, however, that SSRIs are barely more effective than placebos. While the drugs have clearly delivered dramatic benefits to some like Gwyneth Lewis (and, indeed, Oliver James himself, who when he briefly took Prozac in the 90s said he felt "miraculous" on it), it seems to hamper as many creative types as it helps. We need to be sane to work – being an author requires discipline, doggedness, a rhino-hide for criticism – but we must also be open to the insanity of creativity. The state of manic flow when we write, paint, compose or merely play is a kind of cogent madness and antithetical to my experience of the drab fog of SSRI "happiness".
Within three weeks of my own Prozac fog lifting, I was writing again. Yes, I still felt down, so down some days that I couldn't work and buried my head under the duvet, but the trade-off was days when my fingers couldn't move fast enough over the keyboard, my pen struck sparks from the page. In Deborah Levy's Swimming Home, the heroine, Kitty Finch, has just quit Seroxat. "It's quite a relief to feel miserable again," she says. "I don't feel anything when I take my pills." It's been five years since I took my last SSRI. The happiness I get from my writing is deeper seated and more authentic than anything that could be confected in the laboratories of Big Pharma. The drugs didn't work for me and, more importantly, I couldn't work when I was on them.
Alex Preston's novels This Bleeding City and The Revelations are published by Faber & Faber (£7.99)
*Prozac world: the rise and rise of antidepressants*
*1988 *The first SSRI (selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor), Prozac, is made by Eli Lilly and launched in the US.
*1989* The drug reaches the UK. It hit the covers of Newsweek and New York magazine, which described it as the "new wonder drug for depression".
*1991-2001* Annual UK antidepressant prescriptions rise from 9m to 24m.
*1994* Elizabeth Wurtzel's memoir Prozac Nation is published, establishing the drug's position in popular culture.
*1994* The first of many lawsuits concerning side-effects of the drug goes to trial. Joseph Wesbeckerwent on a killing spree in 1989, killing eight before shooting himself. His violence was claimed to be a side-effect of taking Prozac.
*1994 *Psychiatrist Peter Breggin's Talking Back to Prozac, critical of the drug, is published.
*1995* Prozac is referenced in the Blur song Country House: "He's reading Balzac and knocking back Prozac… It's the helping hand that makes you feel wonderfully bland."
*1998* Prozac Diary, the candid memoir by Lauren Slater, is published.
*2000* Zoloft overtakes Prozac as the most popular SSRI in the US.
*2001* Prozac (fluoxetine) loses its patent. Eli Lilly loses $35m of its market value in one day and 90% of its prescriptions in a single year.
*2004 *Prozac is in our drinking water. The Environment Agency says the drug is building up in British rivers and ground-water supplies, probably via the sewage system, but in quantities so dilute they could have no effect.
*2008* Antidepressants are now the third most common prescription drugs in the US.
*2009* The Lancet ranks the top 12 antidepressants from 117 studies. Zoloft and Lexapro come in first for their combination of effectiveness and fewest side-effects.
*2010* One in 10 people in Europe has now taken an antidepressant Reported by guardian.co.uk 4 hours ago.
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Sports Shorts
SOFTBALL: Hofstra advances to title round Senior Olivia Galati threw her second complete game of the day and third of the NCAA Columbia (Mo.) Regional while also hitting her first home run of the season as Hofstra hit three homers in the 10th inning in an 8-4 victory over Oregon...
Reported by NY Post 3 hours ago.
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Missouri softball beats Hofstra and reaches final of NCAA regional
Tigers' Chelsea Thomas settles down, beats Hofstra's ace Olivia Galati 1-0.
Reported by KansasCity.com 2 hours ago.
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LMS Model UN Competes at NYC Conference
Patch Lawrenceville, NJ --Lawrence Middle School (LMS) Model United Nations Club recently competed in the 8th Annual Middle School Model U.N. Conference held at the Grand Hyatt Hotel in New York City.
The club competed with over 80 schools from the United States, Canada, Cayman Islands, Ecuador, Ghana, Italy, Panama, Taiwan, Turkey, South Korea, Sri Lanka, and Taiwan.
Members of the Model UN Club represented countries of Canada and Georgia in several UN committees such as the General Assembly, World Health Organization, and UNICEF and had great success in public speaking, debating, negotiating, and writing resolutions to help tackle many global issues facing our world today.
Club members Mohin Chanpura and Rohan Pahwa took home Honorable Mention for Best Delegation representing Georgia on the Global Arms Treaty agenda in the General Assembly.
Club members include Anjali Agarwal, Eshika Agarwal, Sameer Agrawal, Aanchal Aich, Kiran Aiyar, Madalyn Brummel, Mohin Chanpura, Abby Cohen, Cassandra Coyle, Ritesh Dash, Hayley Davis, Gwyneth Lavery, Thomas Lavery, Sanjay Mahadevan, Olivia Maurer, Aadil Mufti, Rithvik Nair, Rohan Pahwa, Sonny Palmisano, Shreya Patil, Kinsey Ratzman, Casey Ryu, Sophie Slutzky, and Olivia Waaben.
LMS Social Studies teacher Dan Christel is the club advisor. Reported by Patch 4 days ago.
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