Christy
Marshall LeSourd
1967
Submitter: While assisting a rural library with their weeding, we came across Christy. The solo librarian could not believe that it was still on the shelf. She was horrified. It was last checked out in 1995. This little library has done an excellent job of serving its citizens of 353. They use catalog cards and do everything manually, so it is hard to keep up! Someone must have thought that Christy could be brought back to life!
Holly: Poor Christy is being held together with about a pound of tape and a prayer – which is appropriate, since this book is popular with Christian homeschoolers in my community. My library’s copy has circulated 43 times since 2007 when our current copy was added, most recently one year ago today. It would even be worth buying a new copy if ours was in bad shape. Clearly it is not that popular in Submitter’s library, though, if they have a copy in this kind of condition that hasn’t gone out since 1995. I think they’re safe weeding it and letting it go. Different strokes for different folks! I am curious about the tape job, actually. You can no longer see any title from the spine and there’s no call number sticker either. Even the title on the cover is so faint you have to look closely to see what book it is. Maybe it would have circulated if anyone could tell what book it was while browsing.
one of my favorite books! This still checks out in my library. Maybe not as much as it did in 1995, but enough that a new copy would have been warranted had ours been in that kind of shape! It’s still in print. I bet a nice new copy would still go out.
Bless that librarian. She can’t catch them all, particularly when no one’s checked it out since the Clinton Administration. Glad you were able to help her out.
@Holly: Neither the prayers nor the tape can help Christy now!
Woah, the book’s half worn apart there
Woah, readin’ on a prayer
Take this book, the tape’ll hold I swear
Woah, readin’ on a prayer….
Is this Catherine Marshall’s book “Christy” ? I remember it was pretty popular c. 1970 (and not only with Christians), about a schoolteacher in an Appalachian village. There was a Quaker lady who ran a mission, and a Dr. O’Neill (or was it MacNeill ?) who falls in love with Christy, but I don’t remember anyone named Grundtvik (that sounds more Minnesotan than Appalachian)