Dear Mom, Love Cher (2013)

Georgina Holt (86 year-old mother of Cher):

"We got down to twenty cents, I remember that, and I said, 'Johnny, this will buy the baby two bottles of milk.  What are we going to do?'"

"We had gone to Scranton, Pennsylvania.  He said, 'Well, I'm Catholic.  We can put her in the Catholic home and we can border there, and you can go to work, and I'll go back to New York and try to get money.'"

"And so I went to work in a diner for a dollar a night, from seven at night to seven in the morning (pictured as White Tower Hamburger, but the it must have been a stock video because no restaurant by that name existed in Scranton, according to the 1946 City Directory) in a strange town where I knew nobody.  After two weeks, I went to go pay the money, then take her out.  The Mother Superior wouldn't let me take her out and said that I should let her be adopted.  Johnny was at his sister's in New York, and I had no way of contacting him."

"There was this man on the City Council I became friends with, and I told him my situation.  He was just terrific.  He said, 'Look, Kid.  I can't buck the Catholic Church right now.'  But he said, 'I will help you.'  He did finally help me get her out, but I was just terrified." 

This incident, told by Cher's mother Georgina Holt in the Lifetime TV documentary Dear Mom, Love Cher (premiere date May 6, 2013) inspired Cher to write the song Sisters of Mercy.

UPDATE 7/12/14 The library now has two copies of Dear Mom, Love Cher available to borrow on DVD.  Click here to place a hold.

Night Film by Marisha Pessl (2013)

Since late Spring, Entertainment Weekly has been generating a lot of buzz about Marisha Pessl's second novel titled Night Film.  Through text, images from websites and newspaper/magazine clippings, Night Film involves a disgraced investigative reporter researching the suicide of the daughter of a mysterious film director, which may or may not be cult-related. The reclusive director, Stanislas Cordova, makes controversial horror films on his massive estate (named The Peak), and the films are often banned and only screened in underground locations.

Pages 153-154 of Night Film consists of an article reproduction of an interview conducted by the reporter.  The interview's subject is Nelson Garcia, a neighbor of the filmmaker:

"According to Garcia, in early December 2004, he received a series of UPS deliveries that were intended for The Peak but, by mistake, was delivered to him.  The first was a massive box stamped with a label reading Century Scientific. 

 

Century Scientific, Inc., based in Scranton, Pennsylvania, is a company that specializes in medical equipment.  They vend beds, wheelchairs, stretchers, and other therapeutic devices to private hospitals." 

 

Night Film is available to borrow from the Lackawanna County Library System; click here to place a hold.