Renaissance Woman
Jeanne is a graduate of the University of New Hampshire (BA German, Speech and Drama) and Simmons College (MS Library Science).
Jeanne would admit that her knowledge is an inch deep and a mile wide, for which she compensates by knowing where to find out just about everything. She likes knitting, swimming, crossword puzzles and puttering around the house or garden (where she has discovered the joys of raised bed and container plants for their salutary effect on her knees). She loves the Red Sox (even in the bad years) and enjoys an occasional visit to venerable Fenway “Pahk,” as the local say.
An avid traveler, she has visited 45 states (although she admits to only changing planes in two of them) and hopes to get to the Pacific Northwest to check out the rest of the country. She was an exchange student in Germany and traveled around western Europe, although that was quite a few years ago and things have changed (starting with the Berlin Wall…)
She reads voraciously: mysteries, biographies, humor, armchair travel, medical stories, history (fiction and nonfiction), children’s books for all ages, travel guides, contemporary romance, cereal boxes, and pretty much everything with print. She at one time could read and speak German fluently (Hessian accent), and has a smattering of Spanish and French.
Librarian
Jeanne has enjoyed a varied career as a reference librarian in almost every type of library. She worked at the UNH library in the circulation department, the Boston University School of Medicine library as circulation librarian, and as reference librarian at the consultant Arthur D. Little, Inc., the Acton Memorial Library and the Lincoln Public Library, all in Massachusetts.
Along the way she developed a reputation as a librarian who could really, really find things and who handled various (occasionally very odd) questions with aplomb. She has also helped many patrons with local history queries, developing along the way a fascination for Colonial and Revolutionary America.
Eagle-eyed and savvy readers might note that she has never been employed in a school library, a lapse for which she atoned as a volunteer when her younger daughter entered the new Francis W. Parker Essential Charter School on opening day.
For reasons that escape her, she is listed in Who’s Who of American Women, Who’s Who in America, and Who’s Who in the World.
Awards
- Best Editorial, Massachusetts Press Association
- Best Feature article (2d and 3d prizes: New England Press Association)
- Best column (2d and 3d prizes: New England Press Association)
- Best column (1st prize): National Press Association
- Excellence in Cancer Communications (American Cancer Society, Mass.Division)
- Local prizes for poetry and short fictionand
- the Biggie: A New York Times Librarian of the Year
Books Books Books
Which came first, the reader or the writer? Books have always been my pleasure and my refuge, and that continues today. “So many books, so little time” was surely coined with me in mind. I read voraciously, often much later into the night than is good for me, and to insure that I have reading material at hand (or ear) all the time, I have audio books for accompaniment when I drive or sit in the car waiting. With selections from biography to medical nonfiction, from mysteries to romances, from children’s books to massive novels, from humor to history, I am the literary equivalent of the omnivore. (Bibliovore? Apparently that is a real term. God Bless Google.)
I’ve kept a book log for nearly 20 years, making notes on books I’ve read. This year I decided to share my book thoughts with the world. (You’re welcome.) Follow me on Good Reads to see what I’ve been reading and what I thought about it. As the [retired] Mystery Maven of the Minuteman Library Network and member of Sisters in Crime, I have attended many regional and national mystery lovers’ conferences, so I feel qualified to note that my favorite mystery authors are Katherine Hall Page, Hank Phillippi Ryan, Margaret Maron, Dana Stabenow and others too numerous to mention here. Check out Good Reads. Really.
