One Book 2010

In the crush of the Tree Lighting ceremony the day after Thanksgiving and the electrical glitches, you may have missed the Mayor's announcement of the "One Book One Middletown" selection for the new year.

The committee decided upon "The Soloist", the 2008 book by Los Angeles Times columnist Steve Lopez. Described by the publisher thusly:

"When Steve Lopez saw Nathaniel Ayers playing his heart out on a two-string violin on Los Angeles’ skid row, he found it impossible to walk away. More than thirty years earlier, Ayers had been a promising classical bass student at Juilliard—ambitious, charming, and also one of the few African-Americans—until he gradually lost his ability to function, overcome by schizophrenia. When Lopez finds him, Ayers is homeless, paranoid, and deeply troubled, but glimmers of that brilliance are still there.

Over time, Steve Lopez and Nathaniel Ayers form a bond, and Lopez imagines that he might be able to change Ayers’s life. Lopez collects donated violins, a cello, even a stand-up bass and a piano; he takes Ayers to Walt Disney Concert Hall and helps him move indoors. For each triumph, there is a crashing disappointment, yet neither man gives up. In the process of trying to save Ayers, Lopez finds that his own life is changing, and his sense of what one man can accomplish in the lives of others begins to expand in new ways."

I read the book a few months after its publication and could not put it down. It's not an easy read in that Nathaniel Ayers is such a complicated person and his schizophrenia can be scary. Despite the occasional setbacks and the roadblocks Ayers throws up, Steve Lopez never gives up.

"The Soloist" allows the "One Book" committee to create programs that revolve around mental health, homelessness in Middlesex County and beyond, the string program in the local schools, classical music presentations and more, including a screening of the movie version of the book released earlier this year and starring Jamie Foxx and Robert Downey Jr. The Russell Library will have multiple copies of the book available for loan and the schedule of events will be published early in 2010.

To find out more about the author and his fine book, go to www.stevelopezonline.com/.