LSJ staffers pick favorite books

Journalists are adept at handling breaking news, asking difficult questions and (usually) meeting daily deadlines. But if you want to freeze a newsroom of journalists in its tracks, ask this seemingly simple question: What is your favorite book?

Yes, I dared to ask that question and got this universal response:

"You want me to pick ONE?"

Yes, one. Your favorite book.

"Children's book, adult book, fiction, non-fiction?"

It doesn't matter. Your favorite book.

"You really want me to pick just ONE?"

Yes, just one.

And then, I sat down to complete the assignment myself. Let's just say it was easier assigned than completed.

My list of potential favorites is long, like many of my colleagues. And tomorrow I could quite possibly give you a different answer.

But today, I declare my favorite book to be "Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone."

(I know some of you are rolling your eyes, so let me explain.)

Our two children were just the right ages when the "Harry Potter" series came out. If memory serves, I read some of the first one aloud to them, and then they were off and running. It helped cement their love of reading, which I rank as one of the most joyful luxuries in life.

"Harry Potter" also cemented for me where my love of reading originated.

My parents were avid readers, so much so that I thought everyone's home was filled with shelves of books and two daily newspapers. I pored over the Chicago Tribune sports pages and also devoured "Nancy Drew," "The Hardy Boys," and Judy Blume. My parents passed down their love of the written word to me, and I wanted to do the same thing for our children.

Enter "Harry Potter," the bridge that spanned the years between my parents and my children. Imagine my delight watching my 62-year-old father and 8-year-old son in animated discussion about the adventures of Harry, Ron and Hermione.

That is the joy of reading.

Stephanie Angel, Executive Editor

• Favorite book: The Harry Potter series, by J.K. Rowling

• Why I love it: These books are special to me because they allowed my 8-year-old son and 62-year-old dad to have a shared experience. Harry Potter was also my children's first experience with reading a book and then seeing the movie. For them it cemented the reason why reading is better than watching.

Dawn Parker, Life on the Eastside reporter

• Favorite book: "Lord of the Rings," by J.R.R. Tolkien

• Why I love it: Immerses me in a magical world of good and evil, with characters who make you care about them from beginning to end.

Tom Thelen, Reporter

• Favorite book: Fiction: "Hunt For Red October," by Tom Clancy. Non-fiction: "Failure Is Not An Option," by Gene Kranz

• Why I love it: "Hunt for Red October" has a lot of suspense and got me hooked on Clancy's works. Gene Kranz worked with the space program from its beginning through the Apollo program and provides a great behind-the-scenes look at the space program's triumphs and tragedies.

D. Jayne Higo, News Assistant

• Favorite book: " The Once and Future King," by T.H. White

• Why I love it: Fantasy, chivalry, Camelot, might v. right all in one wonderful book! What's not to like?

Barb Modrack, News Producer

• Favorite book: "American Salvage," by Bonnie Jo Campbell

• Why I like it: Bonnie Jo Campbell is a Michigan author and this collection of short stories was nominated for a National Book Award. That in itself intrigued me. But the stories provide a magnificent experience of rural realism where you can't look away from the train wreck you are passing. Bonnie Jo is a genius and a state treasure.

Kate DuHadway, Active Lifestyle Reporter

• Favorite book: The Discworld series by Terry Pratchett

• Why I love it: I love reading books from a variety of genres. Terry Pratchett satirizes all of them. Based on a world shaped like a disc, balanced on the backs of four giant elephants, carried by a galactic sea turtle swimming through the cosmos, any one of the books in this series will have you in stitches by the end of the first chapter. If you read them, be prepared to get strange looks from those around you when you laugh out loud.

Kenneth Palmer, Reporter

• Favorite book: "Stone Spring," by Stephen Baxter

• Why I love it: This novel, part of a trilogy by British science fiction writer Stephen Baxter, is less an alternate history — as some critics have described it — than a speculative imagining of life during the Stone Age. It's a fascinating story based on hard science, and nobody is doing hard science fiction better right now than Baxter.

Matthew Miller, Storytelling Coach

• Favorite book: "At Swim-Two-Birds," by Flan O'Brien

• Why I love it: Because it's sympathetic toward hack writers and drunkards, immensely funny and usually telling at least two stories, often three.

Elaine Kulhanek, Content Strategist

• Favorite book: "All the President's Men," by Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein

• Why I love it: I grew up during Watergate and this book helped inspire my career choice. It always reminds me that the best journalism is built on difficult, sometimes tedious, work. And that done well, journalism makes a difference.

Kelsey Pence, Digital Producer

• Favorite book: I love all of Emily Giffin's books!

• Why I love them: Her storylines are smart, witty, suspenseful and incredibly relatable.

Vickki Dozier, Love Lansing reporter

• Favorite book: "Manchild in the Promised Land," by Claude Brown

• Why I love it: My first encounter with this autobiography was in my parent's bookcase. I was told it was off limits, so I read it. Claude "Sonny" Brown's raw narrative of a boyhood spent among killers, drug addicts and prostitutes in the tough streets of Harlem in the 40s and 50s fascinated and shocked me. It was hard for me to comprehend that some kids lived like this, but it made me appreciate my own childhood. It's a story of survival against the odds. Couldn't put it down then, and still can't.

Brian Calloway, Lead Prep Sports Reporter

• Favorite book: " Tuesdays with Morrie," by Mitch Albom

• Why I love it: The book was given to me by one of my best friends and reminds me of experiences I had with a man that became my mentor while in college. He has still helped me to this day in my journalism career.

Graham Couch, Sports Columnist

• Favorite book: "Paddy on the Hardwood," by Rus Bradburd

• Why I love it: Bradburd's real-life journey from Division I assistant college basketball coach to amateur Irish fiddler and coach of the Irish Super League's Tralee Tigers is the sort of mid-life detour I can imagine for myself. It's a story of basketball and music and finding peace.

Will Kangas, Education Reporter

• Favorite book: "The Hobbit," by J.R.R. Tolkien

• Why I Love It: I was too young to read it (I remember having to use a dictionary for some of the big words) but older kids in the neighborhood had read it and I wanted to know what they were talking about. I was hooked from the first page and couldn't put it down — even for dinner.

Dave Wasinger, Videographer/Photographer

• Favorite book: A.A. Milne's "When we Were Very Young," Rudyard Kipling's "Just So Stories," and Shel Silverstein's "Where the Sidewalk Ends."

• Why I love it : As a family we read these books many nights before bed, choosing a handful of poems or a story as one last piece of mental candy — sweets that push the imagination, often to absurd, nonsensical, hilarious ends. Our three children love the stories and have been known to quote particular pieces, things like, in the summer saying, "I'm so hot I just want to take my skin off and sit in my bones!" (Quote from "It's Hot" by Shel Silverstein.) Haven't we all been that hot before?

Lindsay VanHulle, Business Transformation Reporter

• Favorite book: "To Kill a Mockingbird," by Harper Lee

• Why I love it: First read in a high school English class, I've read my copy so many times the cover is worn. Lee's use of narration and point of view to comment on issues of race and class, written at a time of enormous social change in this country, creates a nuanced and satisfying read. Atticus Finch is still one of my literary heroes.

Laura Trabka, Producer

• Favorite book: "All the Light We Cannot See," by Anthony Doerr

• Why I like it: This is a newer book, but one I want to already pick up and read again. I love reading historical fiction and nonfiction, and this one is set during World War II. The book centers on two characters and weaves their lives together. The author does a great job of keeping you interested and caring about what happens next.

Chris Solari, Sports Reporter

• Favorite book: "Hammer of the Gods," by Stephen Davis

• Why I love it: Is it a true portrait of Led Zeppelin? Is it embellished and mostly fictional? No one will fess up, but it's a fun read that takes you inside the salacious 1970s rock scene more so than any other biography of its kind.

Holly Deal, Producer

• Favorite book: "Monstrous Regimen," by Terry Pratchett

• Why I love it: This novel is about a girl who dresses as a man to join the military to help fight a neighboring country in a religious conflict. The novel touches on women's rights and the unnecessary conflicts that arise due to religious beliefs and includes many plot twists.

James Edwards III, High School Sports Reporter

• Favorite book: "The Book of Basketball: The NBA According to the Sports Guy," by Bill Simmons

• Why I love it: One of the most historical, detailed pieces of literature about any sport that I have ever read. Also, who doesn't love the NBA? Wait, don't answer that. This book gives me great insight on how the NBA, and it's most polarizing team/athletes, came about. An amazing book for basketball fans.

Tovah Olson, Consumer Experience Director/Audience Analyst

• Favorite book: "Ubik," by Philip K. Dick

• Why I love it: Unsettling existential science fiction that's a fun and frightening read.

Barry Kiel, Planning Editor

• Favorite book: "Hatchet," by Gary Paulsen

• Why I love it: I have great memories of reading this book to my kids at night when they were in elementary school. It's a classic novel that made all of us think and anticipate what was coming next. There's nothing like a good book to make kids actually look forward to bedtime.

Steve Reed, Watchdog Reporter

• Favorite book: " Steve Jobs"

• Why I love it: We all know his name, which is synonymous with the world's most valuable company, but it's easy to overlook the sum of Steve Jobs' accomplishments. Walter Isaacson's biography reminds us of Jobs' visionary record in creating Apple's Macintosh computers, iPhones, iPods, iPads, iTunes along with the iTunes store, which saved the music recording industry. Published in 2011, this is a big, fat book but it's also a spellbinding page-turner. The hero dies in the end. His legacy survives.

Al Wilson, Audience Coach

• Favorite book: " Conagher," by Louis L'Amour

• Why I love it: It's a classic Western and a love story all in one, which was not always the case with Louis L'Amour. One of his best characters aside from the Sacketts. I always expected Conagher to ride into another L'Amour story, even if just in passing, as some of his favorite characters do from time to time. Yes, I own the movie, and no, it's not as good as the book.

Kevin Grasha, Justice Reporter

• Favorite book: "Catch-22," by Joseph Heller

• Why I love it: Not a single wasted sentence.

JoAnn Klein, Editorial Assistant

• Favorite book: "All the President's Men," by Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein

• Why I love it: As someone who became intrigued with the journalism profession in the ninth grade, I was mesmerized by the ruthless reporting efforts of Woodward and Bernstein. But more than that, I was captivated (and still am) by the real life story of Watergate, and to learn from these pages what those summer-long televised hearings were all about that pre-empted my mother's soap operas at a time when I was too young to understand what the drama was all about.

Anne Erickson, Things To Do Reporter/Music Columnist

• Favorite book: "Experiencing Nirvana: Grunge in Europe, 1989" by Bruce Pavitt

• Why I love it: "Experiencing Nirvana: Grunge in Europe, 1989" is a reminder of the beauty of the indie music culture. Penned by Sub Pop Records co-founder Bruce Pavitt, the book digs into those early days of Nirvana, right when Nirvana's debut studio album, "Bleach," was setting the stage for the group's explosive success with "Nevermind" two years later. It follows the band's 1989 European tour with Mudhoney and Tad— a fascinating journey.

Robert Killips, Photographer/Videographer

• Favorite book: "The Moment It Clicks," by photographer, Joe McNally

• Why I love it: It's so much more than a technical book on how he made some of his stunning images. Mostly I enjoy the insights and back stories told by this sometimes irreverent, and often self-deprecating photographer, teacher and author.

Kurt Madden, Community Content Editor

• Favorite book: "Beloved," Toni Morrison

• Why I love it: Incredibly powerful expression and rich imagery employed to tell the story of a Black woman and her children trying to escape slavery in the Civil War era. Mother tried to kill her children rather than let them be taken from her and returned slave owners. Richly deserved Pulitzer Prize for literature.

Christopher Behnan, Reporter

• Favorite book: "Life," by Keith Richards

• Why I love it: Keith Richards, lead guitarist for the Rolling Stones, recalls his childhood in post-World War II England through more than 50 years in the world's most iconic rock and roll band. Richards' blow-by-blow memories of five tumultuous decades with the Rolling Stones makes this book a must have for fans and anyone who loves autobiographies.

Rod Sanford, Visual Journalist

• Favorite book: "Midnight's Children" (Salman Rushdie)

• Why I love it: Midnight's Children is a fantastical book that deals with the transition of India from British colonial rule to independence and eventual partition. It is based in history, but the stories are told through the mystical and magical tales of people born on or near the stroke of midnight on the day of independence---the Midnight's Children. They all possess special powers and the closer they were born to midnight, the more powerful they are. Incredible and informative writing. I've never read anything quite like it.

Rachel Greco, Life in Eaton County Reporter

• Favorite book: " The Hobbit," by J.R.R. Tolkien

• Why I love it: I read it for the first time at age 10 and identified with the principal character Bilbo Baggins in so many different ways — outwardly afraid of adventure but secretly longing for it. I've come back to this book again and again over the years. It's a story I can simply fall into. I love the rich story line.

Kathleen Lavey, Michigander Reporter

• Favorite book: "One Hundred Years of Solitude" by Gabriel Garcia Marquez

• Why I love it: I was introduced to the work of Garcia Marquez when I was studying Latin American politics at U-M. I like that this Nobel Prize-winner got his start in writing as a journalist. I love this book because it is a rich, multi-generational tale where the fantastic is normal. At the same time, it's a biting commentary on the legacy of colonialism. Its images have stuck with me for decades and I re-read it from time to time.

Justin Hinkley, Reporter

• Favorite book: "Islands in the Stream," by Ernest Hemingway

• Why I love it: It's Hemingway's best, most mature and strongest book and it says so much about what it means to be a father and a son.

Dan Kilbridge, Producer

Favorite book: "Trinity," by Leon Uris

• Why I like it: I've enjoyed several of Leon Uris' epic, historical fiction novels. "Trinity" follows one Irish Catholic family in its struggle under British Protestant rule, spanning several decades and locations throughout Ireland and England. I enjoyed it so much partly due to my Irish heritage, but it's a great read for anyone interested in rebellion, strong characters and great storytelling.

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