Dave Knows: Portland

Can I be the only one not obsessed with all things Harry Potter? For those of you who got your fill of children’s books when you were children, here are a couple Portland-related books I recommend you read while all your friends enjoy making J. K. Rowling even richer.

(If you *must* read fantasy, at least read something good like anything by local legend Ursula K. Le Guin. Her books: Library | Powell’s)

City of Readers: a Book Lover’s Guide to Portland by Gabriel Boehmer

This little book is brimming with information for Rose City readers; best places to read, local authors, bookstores, libraries, volunteering, and even “Twenty-five ways to sustain and improve Portland’s literary quality of life”.

The book has a website: www.cityofreaders.com

Where to find it: Library | Powell’s

Red Hot and Rollin’: A Retrospection of the Portland Trail Blazers’ 1976-77 Championship Season Edited by Matt Love

Listening to late-70s Blazer games with my dad is one of my fondest kindergarten-aged memories. Bill Shonely’s bouyant and booming voice marvelously survived the tinny radio on the window sill above the kitchen sink. Anyone who similarly reminisces about the Blazers of that era will adore this book. It consists of photographs and accounts, by various writers and hangers on, of the epic season. Those who weren’t here in 1977 should read this book to get an inkling of how “Rip City made us lose our minds,” if only to prepare for a repeat in the next few years (I’m an eternal optimist).

Where to find it: Library | Powell’s