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Monday, January 20, 2014
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MONDAY, DECEMBER 16, 2013
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
FINALS GUIDE
THE CAFFEINATED COUNTDOWN
Next year's Common Book will hit close to home — literally.
"The Center of Everything," by University professor Laura Moriarty, set in the fictional town of Kerrville, Kan., during the 1980s, has been selected as the 2014-2015 Common Book.
"It's the first time that we've chosen a book that was written by a professor here at KU," said Howard Graham from the Office of First-Year Experience. "That lends itself to the community aspect of the goal in a really unique way."
Incoming first-year and
"It's not exactly a highconcept plot," Laura Moriarty said. "The readers who like it tend to like it for the narrator's voice and the characters and the ideas."
Moriarty is an English
receive a copy, Graham said this builds a community and creates a shared academic experience that helps students transition into college.
The novel, the first fictional Common Book, is a coming-of-age story. It deals with poverty, religion, evolution, role models, family and Reagan-era politics, following the fictional character Evelyn Bucknow from 10 years old until going off to college.
The University Daily Kansan:
What should KU students who read "The Center of Everything" take away from it?
Laura Moriarty: I would never want to tell a reader what he or she should take away from my book. But for me, the novel is very much about a girl who, at least when she's young, clings to black-and-white thinking as a survival skill. That kind of thinking does serve her for a while, when her circumstances are pretty desperate. But as she gets older, new experiences encourage her to consider a
degrees at the University.
SEE BOOK PAGE 9A
Laura Moriarty, a University english professor, shares her book, "The Center of Everything," which has been selected as next year's Common Book. The book is set in the fictional small Kansas town during the 1980s.
GEORGE MULLINIX/KANSAN
Index
CLASSIFIEDS 2B
CROSSWORD 5A
CRYPTOQUIPS 5A
OPINION 4A
Don't Forget
All contents, unless stated otherwise, © 2014 The University Daily Kansan
SPORTS 1B
SUDOKU 5A
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