PORT ANGELES – As the long, dark time settles over us, we Northwesterners tend to seek comfort between the covers.
Book covers: They hold us close, and spirit us away for an evening or – if the story’s good enough – a whole sleepless night.
If Paula Barnes has her way, people from Neah Bay to Sequim will get between the same covers of the same book, to learn something about the outside – and inner – worlds.
Clallam County Reads is an idea based on the one-community-one-book project that has brought people together in places such as Palo Alto, Calif., Bozeman, Mont., and Port Townsend.
And it’s an idea whose time has come, said Barnes, director of the North Olympic Library System that serves Clallam County with branches in Sequim, Port Angeles, Forks and Clallam Bay.
Jefferson County has trod this path and is poised to go into its third Community Read, said Port Townsend Public Library youth services specialist Jody Glaubman.
She and library director Theresa Percy aren’t quite ready to let the book title out of the bag.
But come March, they promise, people will be wearing “I’m reading the book” buttons to stimulate impromptu conversation, gathering at pubs for discussions and meeting the chosen author.
