It was heart-warming to read that an abandoned Wal-Mart in Texas has been turned into an award-winning library. The McAllen Public Library is located in a small city on the border of Texas. Apparently, McAllen is not a cosy intellectual town – it's a centre of drug smuggling and related violence. In the Los Angeles Times, writer Adriana Ramirez commented: «It's not really easy to find a place to hang out when you're 14 that's not the mall, the movies, or Mexico. And a giant library – a cool-looking open space devoted to entertaining the imagination? Well, I think that's the best counter-move against violence imaginable.»
So the book has a future after all. In fact, the library seems to blend traditional reading and computer screens seamlessly. Which brings me to the big dilemma of my summer beach reading: books or Ipad? As it looks as though I'll be taking at least three books with me, a tablet might have been a lighter option. But it would probably get drowned, gritty or stolen. Books are tough, practical packets of entertainment. Plus, I like the way the beach transforms a book. The pages get wet and dry in sculptural ripples; they absorb the fragrance of suntan lotion. When you get them home and open them again – perhaps years later – a few grains of sand spill out, like memories of summer. Have a good one.
