Before there was Bridget Jones, decades before Chicklit entered our lexicon, Rona Jaffe blazed the litery way to modern urban females mixing professional ambitions with romantic shenanigans.

Ms. Jaffe, who died December 30, 2005, while on vacation in London, wrote of what she knew. A Radcliffe graduate at 19, she was approached six years later by Hollywood to write a movie tie-in reverse. Her instructions: write a "guilty plesaure" book to rival Kitty Foyle: The Natural History of a Woman, a Ginger Rogers blockbuster for which Rogers won an Oscar in 1941. Jaffe promptly penned The Best of Everything (1958 -- will be ordered January 15, 2006) and, within six months, she was at the top of the New Times Bestseller, list. The movie came out in 1959, starring Hope Lange, Joan Crawford, and Diane Baker.

Najma has lost her mother and infant brother in a bombing raid over her small village during the Afghan war in 2001. After fleeing a refugee camp, Najma makes her way disguised as a boy to Peshawar, hoping to find her father and older brother who were taken by the Taliban. Under the Persimmon Tree by Suzanne Fisher Staples is the story of her journey and in alternating chapters, follows a young American woman, Nusrat, who has married a doctor from Afghanistan and converted to Islam. Her husband is away, treating the war wounded and she fears for his life.

Confession: When I was about sixteen, I was talking on the phone with someone who was older, "wiser", and definitely more hip than myself. When he asked me if I had a "The Source." I naively responded, quite enthusiastically, that I did. Too bad I thought he said thesaurus and that I had no idea that he was, in fact, talking about a hip hop magazine.

Had Hip Hop Matters been around then and had I browsed it, I would have saved myself the humiliation.

Hip Hop Matters seeks to answer the question of why hip hop matters. The author, S. Craig Watkins is not afraid to delve into the many issues that surround this art form. He explores and complicates the notions of profit versus politics, responsibility, authenticity, identity, economics, bombast, style, credibility, ownership, misogyny, fidelity and much more. This is a far-reaching study about the implications of hip hop with respect to popular culture, politics and beyond.

It’s always fun to discover a new series, or an old one, and settle down to hours of good reading. Here are a few of my favorites, with a slight prejudice for fantasy. The Bagthorpe Saga by Helen Cresswell is a very funny series about a very eccentric British family, sort of an Arrested Development for kids. Jack is the hero who has to put up with the outrageous antics of a demented aunt, a contentious grandmother and a totally self-centered father. Sound familiar? Tales of Gom in the Legends of Ulm by Grace Chetwin is full of mountain lore, wizardry and adventure. After his mother disappears, Gom must solve the mystery of a strange rune that she has left him. Subsequent adventures lead Gom to his mother and to the discovery of his power. The DarkAngel Trilogy by Meredith Ann Pierce begins when Aeriel sets out to destroy the vampire Irrylath, but chooses to love him instead. Her quest is to break the spell of the witch who has enchanted him. My all-time favorite is The Dark is Rising series by Susan Cooper. When Will Stanton, age 11, discovers he is the last of the Old Ones, he and his siblings must uncover the items necessary to vanquish the rising forces of the Dark. This series is a wonderful read-aloud. Two of the five of this series are Newbery winners.

“Tff.Tff. Single drops of rain raised little divots of dust, as though invisible feet were running over the dirt…..it had begun.”

Everyone knows the story. How it rained for forty days and forty nights. How Noah collected two of each animal and forbade anyone but his family on the Ark.

But Geraldine McCaughrean’s book, Not the End of the World, tells another story. It’s the story of Shem who cares only for the glory of his lineage and of Japheth whose only concern is the animals. At the center of the story is Timna, Noah’s daughter, who tells us how she rescues a boy and his baby sister from the flood and hides them from her father. The animals, too, have a voice. The terrified rabbit, the defiant raven, and the predatory lion all have their say. Frightened, hungry and desperate human and animal struggle to survive. But in the end it is Noah’s wife who questions her husband’s reasoning, defies him and saves her daughter. Not the End of the World won the British Whitbread Children’s Award for 2004. Well deserved, I’d say.

Luke wants to play stickball with his older brother Nicky. He gets his chance and fails. After he is taken to a Dogders game to see his favorite player, Jackie Robinson, he learns the lesson of hard work and determination. Set in Brooklyn, New York, in the 1950's, Rachel Isadora offers a touching tribute to one of America's best baseball players.

Pattiann Rogers, one of America's best modern poets, was awarded the prestigious Lannan Literary Award for Poetry for 2005. The Lannan Literary Awards and Fellowships were established in 1989 "to honor both established and emerging writers whose work is of exceptional quality."

In awarding Rogers the $125,00 purse, the Lannan Foundation said of her writing: "Roger's wise and complex poems read like a series of witty but deeply felt explorations of the phusical world and the presence of the divine." Among her twelve volumes of poetry are: Generations (2004), Song of the World Becoming: New and Collected Poems, 1981-2001 (c2001), and The Expectations of Light (c1981).

Margaret Hodges, author of dozens of books for children, died December 20, at the age of 94. In addition to her popular retelling of well-loved legends, Hodges also wrote many biographies for children.

Ms. Hodges, a former children's librarian, received numerous prestigious literary awards, including the Caldecott Medal for Saint George and the Dragon: A Golden Legend (adapted from Edmund Spenser's Faerie Queene), illustrated by Trina Schart Hyman, (1984).

Canadian Patricia Van Tighem, whose harrowing account of her savage mauling by a grizzly in 1983 is recounted in her memoir The Bear's Embrace: A Story of Survival, has died.

Van Tighem and her husband Trevor Janz were hiking near Montana in the Canadian Rockies when a brown grizzly appeared out of nowhere and attacked her husband. In horror, Van Tighem sought refuge in a nearby tree but the bear climbed after her and destroyed her face.

Van Tighem's life since then had been a nightmare of endless surgeries, relentless pain, and severe bouts of post-traumatic stress syndrome. When she wrote The Bear's Embrace in 2001, her family hoped it would trigger a full emotional recovery.

You know that feeling --- you found that perfect pair of pink-satin kitten heels on the sale rack and it is YOUR size. Oh that thrill of discovery, you just have to call your girlfriends. It is that way for me when I come across a first novel or a new author that is a cut above. In the next months, I will be sharing some of my finds with you.

Koula by the three-time Greek national book award winner Menes Koumantareas is the first of his works to be translated (nicely done by Kay Cicellis) into English.

Originally published in 1978, this timeless novella is set in Athens. The plot is fairly clichéd – an affair between young handsome Dimitri and the middle-aged Koula. What distinguishes this 88-page little gem is the “spare, immaculate prose… and the ending that is logical, appropriate, and poignant without being cheaply bittersweet”. A perfect short read. Starred review in Booklist.