Richmond Public Library Staff Picks

News!

noreply@blogger.com (Natalie D Librarian) — Thu, 06 Apr 2017 19:42:00 +0000

After many years of "bloggering", the RPL Staff Picks Blog will be moving to the RVAlibrary.org website during #NationalLibraryWeek (April 9th-15th). We'll be on break this week while we make the switch so go ask Mayor Stoney what he recommends you read next when he visits Broad Rock this Sunday to kick off our week-long celebration!

And then the murders began.

noreply@blogger.com (Natalie D Librarian) — Thu, 30 Mar 2017 14:59:00 +0000

Game time! The internet is always up to no good and we are not above jumping into the fray when it comes to literary nonsense. Lately there have been a lot of posts swirling about online with folks adding "And then the murders began." as the second line to famous books. In some cases, this is an improvement to the original texts. We couldn't resist, and thought we'd share a few of our favorites here.

"It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen. And then the murders began." —George Orwell, 1984

"It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair. And then the murders began." —Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities

"The Miss Lonelyhearts of the New York Post-Dispatch (Are you in trouble?—Do-you-need-advice?—Write-to-Miss-Lonelyhearts-and-she-will-help-you) sat at his desk and stared at a piece of white cardboard. And then the murders began." —Nathanael West, Miss Lonelyhearts

"Someone must have slandered Josef K., for one morning, without having done anything truly wrong, he was arrested. And then the murders began." —Franz Kafka, The Trial

"Once upon a time and a very good time it was there was a moocow coming down along the road and this moocow that was coming down along the road met a nicens little boy named baby tuckoo. And then the murders began."—James Joyce, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man

"Mother died today. And then the murders began." —Albert Camus, The Stranger

"Mrs. Dalloway said she would buy the flowers herself. And then the murders began."—Virginia Woolf, Mrs. Dalloway

"For a long time, I went to bed early. And then the murders began."—Marcel Proust, Swann's Way

"He was an old man who fished alone in a skiff in the Gulf Stream and he had gone eighty-four days now without taking a fish. And then the murders began."—Ernest Hemingway, The Old Man and the Sea

Children's lit works too!

"Where's Papa going with that axe?" said Fern to her mother as they were setting the table for breakfast. And then the murders began" --E.B. White, Charlotte's Web

"The sun did not shine, it was too wet to play, so we sat in the house all that cold, cold wet day. And then the murders began." -- Dr. Seuss, The Cat in the Hat

"In an old house in Paris that was covered with vines lived twelve little girls in two straight lines. And then the murders began." --Ludwig Bemelmans, Madeline

"The Mole had been working very hard all the morning, spring-cleaning his little home.And then the murders began."-- Kenneth Grahame, The Wind in the Willows

"When Mary Lennox was sent to Misselthwaite Manor to live with her uncle everybody said she was the most disagreeable-looking child ever seen. And then the murders began."-- Frances Hodgson Burnett, The Secret Garden

"'Christmas won't be Christmas without any presents,' grumbled Jo, lying on the rug. And then the murders began."-- Louisa May Alcott, Little Women

"The night Max wore his wolf suit and made mischief of one kind and another his mother called him 'WILD THING!' and Max said 'I'LL EAT YOU UP!' so he was sent to bed without eating anything.And then the murders began."-- Maurice Sendak, Where The Wild Things Are

We made it!

noreply@blogger.com (Natalie D Librarian) — Thu, 23 Mar 2017 15:42:00 +0000

The 25^th Annual Richmond French Film Festival, co-sponsored by VCU and UR, is upon us and promises to be the best yet! Not only is the festival occurring over a full week at both the Byrd Theatre and the University of Richmond but there are also special events scattered throughout, such as a live concert by Henry Padovani, one of the founding members of The Police (following a documentary about him) and a special poetry recitation by one of France’s preeminent actors, Philippe Torreton, which closes the festival.

Padovani pictured center

Jacques Perrin

Other special guests include composer Bruno Coulais and director-producer-actor Jacques Perrin. They will be presenting symposium lectures as well as introducing and moderating q-and-a sessions for both films they have worked on together and separately. One of these, the Coulais-scored Coraline, was a popular American release in 2010.

Winged Migration, a joint hit for both, was widely shown in the United States (I saw it at the much-missed Westhampton Theatre) but on Friday afternoon it will be shown in its original French release, Le Peuple Migrateur. As the Festival poster proudly proclaims, 700 films have been screened and 850 members of the French film industry have come to share their experiences with us since the first festival in 1993. This year’s program includes 8 features, 6 documentaries (3 by Perrin) and 11 short films, plus the first North American showing of the Magic Lantern show from the Cinematheque Francaise.

There are several past Festival selections currently available in our DVD collection, including last year’s The Clearstream Affair. My favorite drama of all those I have seen is Claude Miller’s (the Honorary Godfather of the Festival who passed away in 2012) Un Secret/A Secret (2008) and my favorite comedy is Le Prenom/What’s in a Name? (2013). Other notable selections include the children’s film Belle and Sebastian, Gemma Bovery, The Hedgehog (adapted from the Muriel Barbery novel The Elegance of the Hedgehog), Pour une Femme (For a Woman), Renoir, Le nom des gens (The Names of Love), Hors la loi (Outside the Law) and the extraordinary documentary Oceans, yet another outstanding cinematic work by Jacques Perrin!

(Many thanks to Robert Hickman of Westover Hills, our resident French film expert, for this annual update!)

Dublin International Literary Award 2018

noreply@blogger.com (Natalie D Librarian) — Fri, 17 Mar 2017 17:02:00 +0000

...yet so little time.

I couldn't pass on the opportunity to blog about our Dublin picks on St. Patrick's Day, could I?
Every year, the RPL Dubliners read literally hundreds of new books and keep notes on our favorites to nominate for the Dublin Literary Award, then get together in the dead of winter and fight to the death over who has the best list.

Just kidding! We are usually pretty civilized about it. This year we are thrilled to have voted on our obsessive lists of fantastic fiction (published in English for the first time in 2016) and proudly endorse these three picks for the 2018 prize!

Drumroll please:

Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi

A must-read for absolutely everyone, Homegoing is compulsively readable, a finely crafted story of two families separated by oceans, centuries, and slavery. It is an American epic with roots in 18th century Ghana, a sweeping multi-generational family saga that will get into your soul and stay with you forever.

The Nix by Nathan Hill

The Nix presents a political history of Chicago politics from the 1940s to current day with both humor and appropriate darkness. A loaded novel in terms of both plots and characters, The Nix follows Samuel Anderson, an English professor who prefers playing a specific video game, from a time when he is told his mother, Faye, who deserted him as a child,has been arrested for throwing rocks at an extremely conservative presidential candidate. Faye's life, and eventually Samuel's, become intertwined in flashbacks, before the reader views certain parallel circumstances between mother and son, reality and fantasy, and politics and daily life.

Nathan Hill manages to weave historical and cultural details together in The Nix to present an accurate portrait of not only U.S. politics, but a global study of what makes politicians and their non- followers tick and compete.

Behold the Dreamers by Imbolo Mbue

Set in New York City in 2007 on the eve of the global financial crisis, a young family from Cameroon find their immigration status tenuous after Lehman Brothers collapses and Jende loses his job. His heart pulled in two directions, back to his home in Limbe or to stay in New York with his wife and children, Jende and Neni must decide where they belong. Behold the Dreamers is a poignant love letter to home.

Now on to those 2017 books...

Thanks, Dubliners, for your contributions to this wonderfully never-ending process. Keep reading!

High five, Dublin Award committee

DIY 4 LIFE

noreply@blogger.com (Natalie D Librarian) — Thu, 09 Mar 2017 19:30:00 +0000

It's not all fantastic fiction here in blogland, sometimes we like to get a little dirty out in the garden (and listen to an audiobook!), make our own clothes (while listening to an audiobook!), do some repairs around the house (while listening to an...you get the idea), and even make our own darn shoes (audiobooooook!).

BOOOOOOOOOK

Well, have I got some DIY handbooks for YOU! Now, I know what you're thinking, internet friends, "isn't it easier to just YouTube that?" Sure, there's an instructional video online for just about anything--from A-Z (surviving an atomic apocalypse to surving a zombie apocalypse)! It's OK, I feel you. I successfully changed my own headlights last year in the Auto Zone parking lot with just my phone and a YouTube video.

#hero

But there's just something about having a handy how-to guide in your hot little hands to get you motivated to take on a project, or inspire you to create and do cool things with your wits and bare hands.You know what won't happen while you spend hours sitting on the couch, scrolling through smoothie recipes on Pinterest? You won't bump into a neighbor doing the same thing. A neighbor, IRL, you can look at and talk to about your mutual affection for smoothie making! It's a wonderful feeling. So, crawl out of your bunker and browse the many DIY offerings on hand at your neighborly neighborhood library.

/PSA

Week-by-Week Vegetable Gardener's Notebook

I have never gardened before this year, and now I want to plant all of the things. The potential for failure is high! But this book is giving me life.
The organization of the book is fantastic, and while I don't love spiral bindings on the shelf, it makes it easy to lay the book flat near your pots and dirt for hands-free planning. Frankly, the cover has so much information on it, you hardly even need to open it.

Salad Days: Recipes for delicious organic salads and dressings for every season

Now that I have my garden all planned out, I need to have a plan for all those little leafy greens I'll be harvesting. This book is basically all about tasty dressings because "salad recipe" is usually "take pile of leafy things, add dressing". But where does dressing come from if not a bottle? Fear not, this book solves that age-old mystery. These are some crazy, year-round, all season salads too. I mean, "Sauteed Fiddlehead Fern and mâche salad"? STOP. Eating ferns? I thought ferns were just for looking!

Finally, an end to the tyranny of dressing in bottles!

Custom-Make Your Own Shoes and Handbags

This book is BANANAS, you guys. It shows you how to use an old pair of shoes to create a plaster last (shoemaker term for foot shaped plaster thing), and shows how cast a last from your foot. Those shoes will be custom fitted to your exact foot. Imagine! I almost can't. Then as if that isn't enough information, this book shows you how to make handbags. Of course you could do what the author does and make shoes and a bag to match every dress, or not, because that's a little insane.

MIND-BLOWINGLY BANANAS

Brew better beer : learn (and break) the rules for making IPAs, sours, pilsners, stouts, and more

If you want to brew your own beer, but you want to break all the rules in doing so, this is your guide. Beer brewing is serious business. When those things explode you'll know what I'm talking about. Your viral GIF recipes aren't going to tell you what to do if your pilsner's popping in the wrong way.

You can't spell PAIN without I.P.A

And finally, Roughing it Easy

With quite possibly the greatest title ever it isn't hard to imagine why this classic remains on the shelf. It's chock-full of the most useful tips (with illustrations!) one could ever need should they find themselves in the unfortunate situation of having to scramble eggs on a rock. You should really, really check this book out.

Everybody loves a flowchart!

noreply@blogger.com (Natalie D Librarian) — Thu, 02 Mar 2017 20:00:00 +0000

Sometimes you just don't know what you want to read so we came up with a flowchart to help.

Or do you prefer GIF-advisory?

I want a book that makes me...

Check out Moranifesto by Caitlin Moran to feel like laughing with your bestie, until something embarrassing happens.

I want a book that makes me...

Check out Little Heaven by Nick Cutter (the new king of horror, IMHO). Also, The Natural Way of Things by Charlotte Wood to feel all the mortal terror.

I want a book that makes me...

Check out Fever Dream by Samanta Schweblin, Suite for Barbara Loden by Nathalie Leger, and Normal by Warren Ellis to think all the thinks.

Art in the Richmond Planet

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Fri, 24 Feb 2017 15:32:00 +0000

This image appeared at the top of the Richmond Planet, the country’s longest-running weekly black newspaper, beginning in 1895. Its artist, John Mitchell, Jr., was the paper’s editor and first editorial cartoonist, as well as being, over the course of a life that began in slavery in 1863, a teacher, an alderman, an activist, and a bank president.

Writing about Mitchell’s reputation in the years after his death in 1929, his biographer, Ann Field Alexander, noted, “His story was too complex to lend itself well to presentations during Negro History Week, and even his most solid achievements—his editing of the Planet, his crusade against lynching, his work on the city council, his fight for black officers during the Spanish-American War, his leadership of the streetcar boycott—did not fit in well with a celebratory view of Virginia’s past.”

Now 87 years after his death and 21 years after the newspaper he devoted his life to ceased publication in Black History Month, 1996, Mitchell’s achievements occupy a much firmer place in the celebration of Virginia’s past, thanks in part to Alexander’s biography, Race Man: the Rise and Fall of the “Fighting Editor” John Mitchell Jr., and efforts to digitize and preserve copies of the Richmond Planet at the Library of Virginia and the Library of Congress.

Issues from 1889 to 1922 are online, and what can’t be seen online may be available in microfilm at the Main branch downtown. Reading the Planet in any format is an excellent way to learn about black businesses in Richmond, the history of the black community and the police, even the art of editorial cartooning.

A few scrolls through the microfilm or the website, for instance, reveal Mitchell’s clenched-fist symbol used in advertisements as early as four years before it appeared on the cover. The flexed arm amid bolts of lightning retakes strength and power from the oppressors of black Americans, the same way the "We Can Do It!" poster came to retake strength and power from the oppressors of women. When Mitchell moved the Planet out of the Swan Tavern on East Broad in 1897, his new offices bore a large sign presenting the Planet’s arm and fist to Jackson Ward.

Beneath the paper’s logo, the Planet regularly included Mitchell’s simple but effective cartoons, the first known cartoons published in a black, Southern paper. In 1918, however, Mitchell stepped down as editorial cartoonist and hired George H. Ben Johnson in his place. Despite Johnson’s talent and the fierceness of his approach, he remains a mysterious figure in Richmond history and the history of black art. In their exhibit on the Richmond Planet the Library of Virginia noted that “almost nothing is known about Johnson aside from his name and the legacy of his cartoons.”

Born in Richmond in 1888, Mitchell studied at Hampton Normal and Agricultural Institute, the Landon School of Illustration and Cartooning, and Columbia University. In 1917 Mitchell published a small book of Johnson’s work, Souvenir Cartoons. The typically one-panel cartoons featured realistically rendered black men and women against starkly blank backgrounds, as well as African imagery—the pyramids and the Sphinx—used to remind the Planet’s readers that black history is ancient. In a cartoon titled "American Ideals," the Statue of Liberty holds a sign reading, "Liberty, protection, opportunity, happiness for all white men. Humiliation, segregation, lynching, etc. for all black men. All are welcome."

After working at the Planet Johnson continued to draw and paint. In 1926 he wrote a letter to W.E.B. Du Bois while in New York asking if Du Bois would like to view his cartoons for possible publication in Du Bois’s magazine The Crisis. The next year he exhibited at the Richmond Public Library, and in 1945, he won a prize from the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts. His painting Idyll of Virginia Mountains remains in the VMFA’s collection.

For now, Johnson's name appears in only a few encyclopedias and collections. As Mitchell makes his way further into our view of Virginia’s past, hopefully Johnson will follow and more of his life and work will be known and shared.

Gettin' nostalgic for...

noreply@blogger.com (Natalie D Librarian) — Thu, 16 Feb 2017 15:00:00 +0000

The 2008 financial crisis?
The Futures by Anna Pitoniak is the ticket back to the financial crisis of '08 that nobody asked for. If you get misty for the days of fallen hedge fund heroes this should satisfy your inexplicable craving for that dismal period of recent memory. Meet Julia and Evan (*eyeroll*), young Yale graduates on the edge of the future. Scrappy small town Canadian Evan gets the privileged and perfect girl of his dreams / Julia is living a privileged and perfect life with her hedge fund manager boyfriend but she just can't figure herself out and *tiny violins* for real. It's a he said, she said-style narrative so of course there's gonna be cheating, which always makes for a good read, and I for one can't resist a good ol' marriage in crisis story. Read it if you're in the mood for a crumbling relationship with a side of crumbling economy!

BTW, Behold the Dreamers by Imbolo Mbue was the NYC-set book to read about this particular period, also with a marriage at the center, should you feel the sudden need to reminisce about that time when everybody lost their pensions.

Geeking out in the 80s?
Let's hear it for the nerds, am I right? The Impossible Fortress features kids that remind one of the beloved pack of misfits from Stranger Things. What's better than coming of age stories featuring great friendships? And set in the 80s too? The 80s had the best friends.
This book has it all: a geeky trio of misfit guy pals; an impossible quest for a much coveted issue of Playboy; lots of nerding out over programming video games on a Commodore 64; young love. It's funny, and clever, and lovable, and I want to read it again.

Speaking of great 80s kids and formative friendships, half of Swing Time by Zadie Smith is spot on! The other half a little less so--[spoiler alert] when the narrator grows up and goes to work for someone who seems an awful lot like Madonna, but after several eye-rolling chapters of asking yourself "and why do I care?" you'll be nostalgic for the beginning of the book when it was a pitch perfect tale of awesome 80s girlhood and best friends, and when you finish it you'll be nostalgic for On Beauty.

Read Harder 2017: One book to rule them all?

noreply@blogger.com (Natalie D Librarian) — Fri, 10 Feb 2017 15:00:00 +0000

How's your challenge going? Struggling to find the time to read? (ME TOO.) So, looking to check off a few list items with just one book? We've got you covered!

Check out Lucky Boy by Shanthi Sekaran for four challenges in one book!
Those challenges are:
#2: Read a debut novel. (Sekaran's first!)
#4: Read a book set in Central or South America, written by a Central or South American author. (This is a bit of a stretch but a good portion of the narrative takes place in Oaxaca.)
#5: Read a book by an immigrant or with a central immigration narrative.
#24: Read a book wherein all point-of-view characters are people of color.

While admittedly it gets a teensy bit too sentimental for my liking (heart of stone over here), I think readers will totally fall in love with Sekaran's wonderfully real, flawed, and relatable characters, and the compelling narrative that springs from their (sometimes dubious) life choices.

Solimar, barely 18 and pregnant, has journeyed from rural Oaxaca to California to work for her aunt as a housekeeper. Her situation is tenuous and after a snowballing series of small disasters, seriously in peril. Meanwhile Kavya, a chef in Berkeley, is in her 30s and unable to get pregnant but desperately wants a child. Can you kind of guess where this is going? Their lives and families intersect after a surprising turn of events.

New's Year resolutions are tough. Here's what I'm reading right now:

The Gustav Sonata by Rose Tremain
Selection Day by Aravind Adiga
Guapa by Saleem Haddad
...Because I have to read multiple books at once.

What are YOU reading?

Check out our "best sellers" from 2016!

noreply@blogger.com (Natalie D Librarian) — Thu, 02 Feb 2017 17:49:00 +0000

Every year we like to share our "best sellers" list from the year before-- the top ten most checked out books in the city of Richmond from 2016. Last year's numbers were interesting for a variety of reasons, especially for the fact that two locations were closed for half the year.

If we look at check-outs at all the branches together, our top ten looks like this:

The girl on the train : a novel / Paula Hawkins
All the light we cannot see / Anthony Doerr
The nightingale / Kristin Hannah
No more Mr. Nice Guy : a family business novel / Carl Weber
The nest / Cynthia D'Aprix
The life-changing magic of tidying up / Marie Kondo
Carl Weber's Kingpins. Cleveland / Brandi Johnson
The last mile / David Baldacci
Go set a watchman / Harper Lee
Carl Weber's Kingpins. Philadelphia / Brittani Williams

However, each of our branches serves a community with their own distinct reading preferences. Click a pin on the map below to see how your neighborhood read last year:

Richmond is for readers!

In which we react to every book President Obama has recommended while in office

noreply@blogger.com (Natalie D Librarian) — Fri, 20 Jan 2017 14:00:00 +0000

...with reaction GIFs, duh!

JUST KIDDING. That is a LOT of great books (86! 5 more GIFs than the law allows).
However you vote, you have to admit that the man is incredibly well read. We'll be reacting to some of the books he recommends, linking to past reviews of some as well. Enjoy this reading list to end all reading lists as we bid farewell to our Bookworm-In-Chief:

*List adapted from a post by Entertainment Weekly. (yeah, we read that too.)

The Naked and the Dead, Norman Mailer
One Hundred Years of Solitude, Gabriel García Márquez
The Golden Notebook, Doris Lessing
The Woman Warrior, Maxine Hong Kingston
Brown Girl Dreaming, Jacqueline Woodson
Heart of Darkness, Joseph Conrad
Nora Webster, Colm Toibin

The Laughing Monsters, Denis Johnson
Age of Ambition: Chasing Fortune, Truth and Faith in the New China, Evan Osnos
Being Mortal: Medicine and What Matters in the End, Dr. Atul Gawande
Cartwheeling in Thunderstorms, Katherine Rundell
The Narrow Road to the Deep North, Richard Flanagan
Redwall series, Brian Jacques
Junie B. Jones series, Barbara Park
Nuts To You, Lynn Rae Perkins
Barbarian Days: A Surfing Life, William Finnegan
H Is for Hawk, Helen Macdonald
The Girl on the Train, Paula Hawkins
Seveneves, Neal Stephenson
The Underground Railroad, Colson Whitehead
All That Is, James Salter

The Sixth Extinction, Elizabeth Kolbert
The Lowland, Jhumpa Lahiri
Between the World and Me, Ta-Nehisi Coates
Washington: A Life, Ron Chernow
All the Light We Cannot See, Anthony Doerr
Treasure Island, Robert Louis Stevenson
Of Mice and Men, John Steinbeck
The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald
Where the Wild Things Are, Maurice Sendak
Moby Dick, Herman Melville
Self-Reliance, Ralph Waldo Emerson
Song Of Solomon, Toni Morrison
Parting The Waters, Taylor Branch

Gilead, Marylinne Robinson
Best and the Brightest, David Halberstam
The Federalist, Alexander Hamilton
Souls of Black Folk, W.E.B. Du Bois
The Power and the Glory, Graham Greene
The Quiet American, Graham Greene

YES! THE CANCER WARD IS AMAZING!

Cancer Ward, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
Gandhi’s autobiography
Working, Studs Terkel
Wealth of Nations, Adam Smith
Theory of Moral Sentiments, Adam Smith
All the King’s Men, Robert Penn Warren
Cutting for Stone, Abraham Verghese
To the End of the Land, David Grossman
Purity, Jonathan Franzen
A Bend in the River, V. S. Naipaul
Fates and Furies, Lauren Groff
Lush Life, Richard Price
Netherland, Joseph O’Neill
Two Years Eight Months and Twenty-Eight Nights, Salman Rushdie
Redeployment, Phil Klay
Invisible Man, Ralph Ellison
Plainsong, Kent Haruf
The Way Home, George Pelecanos

What Is the What, Dave Eggers
Philosophy & Literature, Peter S Thompson
Collected Poems, Derek Walcott
In Dubious Battle, John Steinbeck
Gone Girl, Gillian Flynn
The Three-Body Problem, Liu Cixin
Harry Potter series, J.K. Rowling

The Rise of Theodore Roosevelt, Edmund Morris
John Adams, David McCullough
Lincoln: The Biography of a Writer, Fred Kaplan
Defining Moment: FDR’s Hundred Days and the Triumph of Hope, Jonathan Alte
FDR, Jean Edward Smith

Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln, Doris Kearns Goodwin
The Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln
Hot, Flat, and Crowded: Why We Need a Green Revolution and How It Can Renew America, Thomas L Friedman
Ghost Wars: The Secret History of the CIA, Afghanistan, and Bin Laden, from the Soviet Invasion to September 10, 2001, Steve Coll

Unequal Democracy: The Political Economy of the New Gilded Age, Larry Bartels
The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the Fall of New York, Robert A. Caro
Age of Ambition: Chasing Fortune, Evan Osnos
Thinking, Fast and Slow, Daniel Kahneman
Moral Man And Immoral Society, Reinhold Niebuhr
A Kind And Just Parent, William Ayers

The Post-American World, Fareed Zakaria
Lessons in Disaster, Gordon Goldstein
Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind, Yuval Noah Harari
The Fire Next Time, James Baldwin
Andy Grove: The Life and Times of an American, Richard S Tedlow
Behind the Beautiful Forevers: Life, Death, and Hope in a Mumbai Undercity, Katherine Boo

Phew! That's a tough act to follow, sir. Enjoy your time off to read!

Read it right now: Truevine, and other new nonfiction

noreply@blogger.com (Natalie D Librarian) — Fri, 13 Jan 2017 14:00:00 +0000

This week is all about the brand new stuff that readers and critics are loving.

Truevine
by Beth Macy

In 1899, young albino African American brothers, George and Willie Muse, were taken from the tobacco fields near Roanoke where they worked and made to join the circus as freaks. Convinced their mother was dead they spent decades traveling the world as a popular sideshow attraction: Eko and Iko, the sheep-headed cannibals or Ambassadors from Mars. That, and their mother's fierce fight to get them back, make for an incredible story. Keen and well-researched, Truevine is a fascinating and compelling read.

It looks like Paramount and Leonardo DiCaprio might be trying to acquire the rights to put this story to film. Hmm, I wonder how it will translate to the screen without sensationalizing the Muse brothers' story.

At The Existentialist Cafe
Freedom, Being, and Apricot Cocktails
By Sarah Bakewell

Did your New Year's resolution have anything to do with reading more about philosophy? Really? Well, good! You'll love this book then. It's the lively life story of existentialism, starring Simone de Beauvoir and Jean-Paul Sartre, who was (sort of) inspired by apricot cocktails. Just give it a chance? It's getting rave reviews!

You Can't Touch My Hair
And other things I still have to explain
by Phoebe Robinson

Phoebe Robinson, super funny stand-up comedian, host of the Sooo Many White Guys podcast and co-host of 2 Dope Queens, has written this fantastic collection of essays on race, gender and culture in America.

Did I mention she's super funny?

Me, always.

Born a Crime
by Trevor Noah

Trevor Noah, South African comedian and host of The Daily Show, is seriously insightful and funny. This is one of those laugh and cry, cry and laugh kinds of books. Born to a white Swiss father and black Xhosa mother in apartheid South Africa, he spent much of his childhood hidden away indoors as living proof of their crime. Born a Crime is deeply moving and the audiobook happens to be narrated by none other than Trevor Noah himself--well worth a listen.

...And top it off with a slice of Damn Fine Cherry Pie!

The final episode of Twin Peaks aired 26 years ago but it refuses to go away--and that's just fine by me.

(Ok, I don't know if anyone is raving about this but I'm always looking for any chance to throw in a Log Lady gif.) This unauthorized cookbook has all you need to prepare damn fine pie, damn fine coffee (and FYI, David Lynch has his own line of coffee and it is legit), and host your own (damn) Log Lady tea party. #goals

Resolve to "Read Harder" in 2017

noreply@blogger.com (Natalie D Librarian) — Thu, 29 Dec 2016 21:13:00 +0000

Did you accept Book Riot's challenge to Read harder (with a vengeance, hopefully) in 2017? We're here to help you get to your goal. We have some hand-picked, librarian-endorsed, recommendations to help you achieve your New Year's Resolution. Many of these books satisfy multiple tasks in the challenge--bonus points for figuring out which ones!

All 24 tasks of the challenge posed by the fine folks at Book Riot are listed in bold below. The recommendations are ours. Happy New Year, and happy reading!

1. Read a book about sports.

Gah! The challenge leads with sports? Dang. Well, even if sports aren't your thing, check out Major Taylor : the inspiring story of a black cyclist and the men who helped him achieve worldwide fame by Conrad Kerber, Barracuda by Christos Tsiolkas, You Will Know Me by Megan Abbott. We just got a copy of Black Gods of the Asphalt by Onaje X.O. Woodbine so I'll add that one to my "read harder" pile.

2. Read a debut novel.
The Nix by Nathan Hill has all the acclaim you're looking for, also check out The Sleepwalker's Guide to Dancing by Mira Jacob, The Bees by Laline Paull, The Turner House by Angela Flournoy, We Love You, Charlie Freeman by Kaitlyn Greenidge, and Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi. I am looking forward to the Charlotte Holmes series, the first of which is A Study in Charlotte, Brittany Cavallaro's debut novel.

3. Read a book about books.
Did somebody say "BOOKS"?
Check out Mr. Penumbra's 24 Hour Bookstore by Robin Sloan, 84 Charing Cross Road by Helene Hanff, The Book of Speculation by Erika Swyler, Disclaimer by Renée Knight, If on a Winter's Night a Traveler by Italo Calvino, The Novel: A biography by Michael Schmidt, and, if you just saw Nocturnal Animals and also want to read the novel behind the (OMG gorgeous and intense) movie about a novel, check out Tony & Susan by Austin Wright--I know I will be.

4. Read a book set in Central or South America, written by a Central or South American author.
Reputations by Juan Gabriel Vásquez, Talking to Ourselves by Andrés Neuman, and Ways of Going Home and My Documents, both by Alejandro Zambra. The House of the Spirits by Isabel Allende has been on my "to read" list for a long time--maybe this is the year.

5. Read a book by an immigrant or with a central immigration narrative.
Check out Behold the Dreamers by Imbolo Mbue, Lowland by Jhumpa Lahiri, All Our Names by Dinaw Mengestu, Americanah by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, The Barbarian Nurseries by Hector Tobar. To my great shame I never finished reading The Russian Debutante's Handbook by Gary Shteyngart, but I promise I will.

6. Read an all-ages comic.
First I would kindly ask the list-makers here to define "all ages" as I don't see comics serving alcohol but OK, challenges are meant to be...challenging? The March series by John Lewis, Sisters and Smile by Raina Telgemeier, El Deafo by Cece Bell, Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi and American Born Chinese by Gene Luen Yang are a few I would recommend to pretty much everyone regardless of age. I also don't differentiate between "graphic novel" and "comic" but perhaps the challenge authors do? IDK, but I'm looking forward to reading March #3 soon.

7. Read a book published between 1900 and 1950.
Just read all of the Evelyn Waugh (Scoop, Vile Bodies, etc.) and be amazed by how well the humor holds up. I like to read all the new books so my "old books to read still" list grows longer every year. This year I check off the Raymond Chandler box with The Big Sleep (1939).

8. Read a travel memoir.
Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil by John Berendt, The Ministry of Guidance Invites You to Not Stay: An American Family in Iran by Hooman Majd, and check out the audio book version of The Sick Bag Song by Nick Cave. He reads it and it's marrrvelous. I'll be reading Butter Chicken In Ludhiana: Travels In Small Town India by Pankaj Mishra this year.

9. Read a book you’ve read before.
This one depends on what you've read before, but if I were to recommend "read it twice" books, hmmm. The Women's Room by Marilyn French and The Book of Strange New Things by Michel Faber are some of the very few books I've read twice. With so much to read I typically don't revisit books no matter how beloved. I do want to re-read The Museum of Innocence by Orhan Pamuk because I love it so much, and A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L'Engle to see if it is still the book I remember reading as a child.

10. Read a book that is set within 100 miles of your location.
Some places are very author-dense and Richmond is fortunate to be one of those. As a result, loads of books feature Richmond and the surrounding area. Readers will find Richmond in a lot of popular urban fiction like Carl Weber's and Nikki Turner's books, in the books of Patricia Cornwell, and in a whole bunch of Civil War stuff. If you're from around these parts, check out The Shore by Sara Taylor. It's a chilling multi-generational tale set on the islands of the Eastern Shore (sure, sure, I think it's a little more than 100 miles to the eastern shore from Richmond but I want you to read this book so, shhh.) The Supernatural Enhancements by Edgar Cantero is set in a fictional Virginia town supposedly near Richmond, and Mislaid by Nell Zink is set in or near Richmond.

11. Read a book that is set more than 5000 miles from your location.
Behind the Beautiful Forevers: Life, Death, and Hope in a Mumbai Undercity by Katherine Boo, (Booker Prize-winning) The Luminaries by Eleanor Catton, Hotel Iris and all of the other books byYoko Ogawa, Beauty is a Wound by Eka Kurniawan. Do Not Say We Have Nothing by Madeleine Thien and The Natural Way of Things by Charlotte Wood are on my to-read pile.

12. Read a fantasy novel.
The Library at Mount Char by Scott Hawkins, Alif the Unseen by G. Willow Wilson, The Gracekeepers by Kirsty Logan. Everfair, a steampunk strory set in the Belgian Congo written by Nisi Shawl, is on my list.

13. Read a nonfiction book about technology.
Dataclysm by Christian Rudder, So You've Been Publicly Shamed by Jon Ronson. A free copy of Whiplash: How to survive our faster future by Joi Ito and Jeff Howe just landed on my desk. I hope I can read it in time!

14. Read a book about war.
Add The Sympathizer by Viet Thanh Nguyen, Girl at War by Sara Novic, War and Turpentine by Stefan Hertmans, The Narrow Road to the Deep North by Richard Flanagan, and Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut to your list. I'll finally be reading The Yellow Birds by Kevin Powers this year.

15. Read a YA or middle grade novel by an author who identifies as LGBTQ+.
Check out 'Beyond Magenta: Transgender Teens Speak Out' by Susan Kuklin, and Two Boys Kissing by David Levithan, and For Today I Am a Boy by Kim Fu. I'm checking out The Summer Prince by Nebula award winner Alaya Dawn Johnson, and We Are the Ants by Shaun David Hutchinson. Check out this handy list on the BN Teen Blog for more.

16. Read a book that has been banned or frequently challenged in your country.
So, so many books to choose from on this list. Read To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee, Beloved by Toni Morrison, and I know why the caged bird sings by Maya Angelou for starters. I think I'll check out Kaffir Boy: The True Story of a Black Youth's Coming of Age in Apartheid South Africa by Mark Mathabane.

17. Read a classic by an author of color.
Check out Go Tell it on the Mountain by James Baldwin, Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston, The Sport of the Gods by Paul Laurence Dunbar, and Ceremony by Leslie Marmon Silko to name just a few. I'll be reading Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison this year.

18. Read a superhero comic with a female lead.
Bitch Planet, Ms. Marvel, Wonder Woman, Princeless, and Nimona to name a few, I'm going to read Rat Queens this year.

19. Read a book in which a character of color goes on a spiritual journey.
The Mortifications by Derek Palacio, Before We Visit the Goddess by Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni, Saving Fish From Drowning by Amy Tan, The Seventh Day by Yu Hua and Siddhartha by Hermann Hesse. I think I will finally get around to reading Life of Pi by Yann Martel.

20. Read an LGBTQ+ romance novel.
Ugh, romance? My least favorite genre and my readers advisory kryptonite. These might not be strictly romance novels as much as they are novels containing romance but even this cold-hearted, Nicholas Sparks eschewing reader can recommend books with some touchy-feelies: Try Tipping the Velvet by Sarah Waters, The Danish Girl by David Ebershoff, Brideshead Revisited by Evelyn Waugh, The Price of Salt by Patricia Highsmith, and Brokeback Mountain by Annie Proulx (a cinematic list for sure). I'll be reading Guapa by Saleem Hadad this year.

21. Read a book published by a micropress.
How small is micro? I will be reading Suite for Barbara Loden by Nathalie Leger and The Ugly by Alexander Boldizar, and Grief is the thing with feathers by Max Porter, a tiny novel written in short essays, has popped up on all kinds of lists, including my "to read" list.

22. Read a collection of stories by a woman.
Check out Intimations: Stories by Alexandra Kleeman, Get in Trouble by Kelly Link, and Gutshot by Amelia Gray for the best creepy little stories, and of course, Shirley Jackson's short stories are unrivaled. I'm looking forward to reading Exposure by Richmond author Katy Resch George.

23. Read a collection of poetry in translation on a theme other than love.
Tough one...I don't read a lot of poetry. Challenge, accepted! Check out The Collected Poems, 1952-1990 by Yevgeny Yevtushenko and Stolen Air: Selected Poems of Osip Mandelstam. I am adding Extracting the Stone of Madness: Poems, 1962 - 1972 by Alejandra Pizarnik to my read harder list.

24. Read a book wherein all point-of-view characters are people of color.
Here Comes the Sun by Nicole Dennis-Benn, The Mothers by Brit Bennett, The Fishermen by Chigozie Obioma, and The Association of Small Bombs by Karan Mahajan, Everything I Never Told You by Celeste Ng. I've got a copy of Wife of the Gods by Kwei Quartey here on my desk that I'm pretty excited about reviewing for book club.

Welcome to the Season of Light!

noreply@blogger.com (RVAKids) — Thu, 15 Dec 2016 22:55:00 +0000

As the coldest winds begin to blow and the days become shorter, the celebration of light begins with the Winter Solstice on December 21. Cultures worldwide have recognized this day for centuries as it receives the least sun and is the beginning of longer days to come.

Many winter holidays celebrate with candles and light, beginning with Hanukkah this year starting on December 24, Christmas on December 25, and Kwanzaa beginning on December 26 and lasting until New Year's Day.
Light celebrations continue in many Asian communities around the world with Chinese New Year beginning on the second new moon of the new year. This year the celebration begins on January 28 and traditionally lasts for two weeks until the full moon. This welcome to spring comes with longer days and dreams of warmer temperatures.

Pick up some books to pass the short, cold days and long nights of winter.

The Latke Who Couldn't Stop Screaming by Lemony Snicket
This "Christmas tale" by the author of the Series of Unfortunate Events combines humor and facts about Hanukkah to tell the story of the latke who ran away from hot oil only to find out "there's no place like home." Unfortunately, at home there will be someone who wants to eat him!

Lively illustrations and simple haiku fill Hanukkah Haiku by Harriet Ziefert with celebration and color. After reading this try writing holiday haiku of your own.

Do you have a tablet? Download a copy of The Miracle Jar by Audrey Penn and discover the Hanukkah miracle. You will need to install Overdrive to explore the many eBooks that Richmond Public Library has to offer.

Read together Merry Christmas, Mr. Mouse by Caralyn Buehner. The mouse family learns about the meaning of Christmas while staying cozy under the stove. Find the hidden pictures on each page.

The Gift of the Magi by O. Henry has been adapted as a picture book in Boris and Stella and the Perfect Gift by Dara Goldman, who adds a touch of Hanukkah to this story.

Patricia Polacco is a master of autobiographical storytelling in pictures. Her holiday book The Trees of the Dancing Goats remembers a Hanukkah in Michigan with her grandparents where many of their rural neighbors have scarlet fever and are unable to prepare for and celebrate Christmas. Discover how her Jewish grandparents develop a generous solution and bring healing and joy to their neighbors.

For older readers the new, graphic novel Snow White by Matt Phelan is a noir gem. Set in the late 20s and early 30s in New York City this adaptation includes all of the classic characters with a dark twist. In Phelan's characteristic muted tones the images, full of just enough detail, pull the reader into the world of Samantha White, her Wall Street father, her stepmother "the Queen of the Follies" and the seven street urchins who protect her.
Christmas? Look for the classic, holiday department store windows.

Popular illustrator Shane Evans partnered with author Donna Washington on Li'l Rabbit's Kwanzaa. Gramma is sick and Li'l Rabbit surprises her with the best gift of all. Includes the The Nguzo Saba - The Seven Principles of Kwanzaa.

My First Kwanzaa by Karen Katz introduces younger children to the celebration of this contemporary holiday.

However you celebrate, make sure to include some time for reading during the holidays ahead.

Richmond's a Real Person

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Fri, 09 Dec 2016 22:57:00 +0000

This fall the Main Library hosted the Richmond Zine Fest, an exciting frenzy of do-it-yourself printed matter. Richmond in fact has a long history of forward-thinking publishing, stretching as far back as the Southern Literary Messenger, edited by Edgar Allan Poe, and, in the 1920s, the ambitious “little magazine,” The Reviewer.

Between the Messenger and The Reviewer the South went through a period that caused H.L. Mencken to refer to it as something of a cultural desert. In 1921 the book section of the Richmond Evening-Journal closed, and its editors decided at a party in the Fan to continue reviewing books and publishing fiction and to prove Mencken wrong. Emily Tapscott Clark, The Reviewer’s first editor (pictured below), remembers someone simply stating: “Let’s start a little magazine.”

That magazine, The Reviewer, sought to be both regional and experimental, to see past the mists of the Old South towards new literary forms. In its first issue Mary Johnson recalled a man who, after visiting Richmond for the first time, said, “‘I shan’t let it be the last time. Richmond’s a Real Person!” Johnson agreed, and extended the sentiment: “A real person always has literary value.” Publishing from and about this real entity meant exploring new approaches to literature, dispelling old myths and finding new ones.

Credited with prompting the Southern Literary Renaissance, The Reviewer published work by Ellen Glasgow (who lived not far from the Main Library), Gertrude Stein, and English stylist Ronald Firbank, whose eight short novels remain as challenging as they are hilarious. Reviewer editor Hunter Stagg (seen above as painted by Richmond-native Berkeley Williams) went on to spend time with Firbank in Europe, furthering a bridge between The Reviewer and the international avant-garde.

After 35 issues and the departure of editors Clark and Stagg, The Reviewer moved to Chapel Hill in 1925 and from there to Dallas, where it merged with The Southwest Review and continues to publish. The Main Library holds all original issues of the Richmond-based Reviewer as well as Clark’s memoir of her time at The Reviewer, Innocence Abroad.

Pioneering publishing lives on in Richmond ninety years after The Reviewer changed headquarters. Considering the daring nature of their magazine, Clark and Stagg would have been perfectly at home setting up a table at October’s Zine Fest, perhaps talking up the Gertrude Stein piece in the latest issue or handing out button badges that say: “Richmond’s a Real Person.”

New York Times' Notable Books of 2016

noreply@blogger.com (Natalie D Librarian) — Thu, 01 Dec 2016 16:05:00 +0000

In which I personally review as many of the Notables as possible*, in Gif form.

*There are still a handful of neglected notables on my to read pile (it's a big pile) so any books missing from this list do not represent a non-endorsement--there are far too many "NOPE" gifs out there for me to resist including books I didn't like.

With the exception of a couple, themes of home and family really seem to dominate my list. Did any of the books on the list surprise you? Any grabbed your attention?

Without further ado:

Zero K. by Don DeLillo

This one completely lost my interest but I feel like giving it another chance.

War and Turpentine by Stefan Hertmans

Captivating multi-generational tale of fathers and sons, art and war.

The Vegetarian by Han Kang

Wonderfully, deeply, unsettling.

The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead

A little light on the promised steam punk but overall a powerful narrative.

Today Will be Different by Maria Semple

Quirky!

Reputations by Juan Gabriel Vásquez

Really good, really short. Kudos!

The Nix by Nathan Hill

This book is so right on it's a little scary.

The Mortifications by Derek Palacio

That ending, though. :(

Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi

It's that good.

Here I Am by Jonathan Safran Foer

Seriously, the audiobook version is EVERYthing

Here Comes the Sun by Nicole Dennis-Benn

The use of patois achieves stunning results.

Don't Let My Baby Do Rodeo by Boris Fishman

Unexpected, enigmatic, and engrossing.

Behold the Dreamers by Imbolo Mbue

Love letter to home.

Before The Fall by Noah Hawley

Kind of surprised this made the notable list over some other books but it was a solidly enjoyable read.

The Association of Small Bombs by Karan Mahajan

Haunting.

When Breath Becomes Air by Paul Kalanithi

Featured in our "Books for an Ugly Cry" post earlier this year.
Hug all your loved ones!

Looking to leave town for a while? Why not take a trip to one of these fictional dystopias!

noreply@blogger.com (Natalie D Librarian) — Thu, 17 Nov 2016 15:00:00 +0000

Visit One World!

Take a trip to sunny One World! Surrounded by a Big Green Wall and encased in glass, you won't have to worry about privacy, dreams, agency, or individuality in this beautiful panopticon. Leave your troubles at the door and conform because the state decides, and the state is watching!
Check out We by Yevgeny Zamyatin, a classic of early Soviet Science Fiction published in 1921.

Visit London in the 1990s!

Escape the fallout of global nuclear war in an exciting, post-apocalyptic London under the control of fascist government, Norsefire. Frequent attacks by anarchist revolutionaries keep things interesting!
Check out V for Vendetta by Alan Moore and David Lloyd, first published in Warrior, in 1982.

Visit Airstrip One!

This province of Oceania is in a state of perpetual war, careful censorship, and government surveillance. And that's just great! Because "War is peace. Freedom is slavery. Ignorance is strength". Your strictly circumscribed existence will be hassle-free as long as you play by the rules. Enjoy!

Check out 1984 by George Orwell, written in 1949.

Visit the Republic of Gilead!

Relax within the closed borders of this near-future totalitarian theocracy. Women, take it easy. You will be sorted into one of 6 clearly defined roles making this vacation truly worry-free. The mandatory color-coded robes are on the house! And leave your books at home, ladies. You're not allowed to read.

Check out A Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood, written in 1985.

Visit The World State!

Accept your station in life under this benevolent dictatorship. Throw off the shackles of critical thinking and reproduction. It's all taken care of--and try the Soma! According to one Yelp reviewer:"All the advantages of Christianity and alcohol; none of their defects."

Check out Brave New World by Aldous Huxley, written in 1931.

Visit Panem!

Grab the kids and get right into the action of reality television. You can even win fabulous prizes! Survivors eat free in the Capitol.

Check out The Hunger Games trilogy by Suzanne Collins

Or...

Happy Trails!

"This book is a gift from the Small Press Expo"

noreply@blogger.com (Natalie D Librarian) — Fri, 04 Nov 2016 17:11:00 +0000

You may have noticed these popping up on Richmond Public Library shelves--bookplates bearing the title of this post appearing inside some of the cleverest and most exciting new graphic novels you've ever seen.

We are thrilled to be recipients of the Small Press Expo's Graphic Novel Gift Program, which aims to:

"Expand the reach of graphic novels to readers of all ages utilizing public and school libraries. Promote learning and literacy through the availability of graphic novels at local libraries. Provide library systems with additional resources by which they can purchase graphic novels and comics."

Children's graphic novels:

Cave In by Brian Ralph, Korgi by Christian Slade, The Kurdles by Robert Goodin, Maddy Kettle by Eric Orchard, Astrid Lindgren's Pippi: the Strongest in the World! by Astrid Lindgren and Ingrid Vang Nyman, S.F. by Ryan Cecil Smith, Yam: Bite-Size Chunks by Corey Barba

Young Adult:

Aya: Life in Yop City by Marguerite Abouet and Clément Oubrerie, Beautiful Darkness by Fabien Vehlman, The Heart of Thomas by Moto Hagio, Incredible Changebots by Jeffrey Brown, Infinite Kung-Fu by Kagan McLeod, The Story of Roberto Clemente by Wilfred Santiago

Adult:

Underwater Welder by Jeff Lemire, Moving Pictures by Kathryn and Stuart Immonen, 5,000 km per second by Manuele Fior, Earthling by Aisha Franz

This is only a sample of what's available--check out the collection at every branch!

Horror Stories You Can Read and Watch This Season

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Fri, 28 Oct 2016 14:35:00 +0000

Tis the season for frights, freaks and ghouls. Tantalizing tales of terror. Frightening fables of misfortune. Electrifying legends of horror. ...Well, not for everyone exactly. There are many that don't take part in the traditions of Halloween, but for the lot that do, I've compiled a list of books made into movies or T.V. series - some older, some newer - that are sure to make you double check your locks at night (and if that's a little too dramatic, at least entertain you for a bit). So whether you are a searching for a terrifying book or movie (or both!), check these out.

*though some contain graphic content and parental guidance is suggested when permitting minors to read or watch (especially the DVDs that have a R rating)*

1. The Shining - Stephen King
Availability: Library - BOOK | DVD

Sorry to be so predictable. But let's be honest with each other. Stephen King is the most prolific horror/suspense author out there, so it's a genuine no-brainer that this would be here. It's the unforgettable tale of the Torrence family alone in a secluded resort and all the supernatural happenings that take place there as the father Jack Torrence's mind starts to unfold. If you can't get enough, RPL also has the sequel that was released in 2013: Doctor Sleep.

2. Rosemary's Baby - Ira Levin

Availability: Library - BOOK & DVD

Rosemary's Baby was inducted into the National Film Registry in 2014 thanks to some coercion from the Library of Congress. They found it to be historically and culturally significant. Sweet! Its conception would then spawn several woman-gives-birth-to-son-of-devil type movies that seemed 'o so popular in the 70s. It could even be said that along with The Exorcist, this movie helped propel the fad of demonic possession movies that flooded the big screen at the time (one of the most obvious movie series being The Omen (some horror buffs theorize that those two stories are interwoven)). All in all its a creepy tale. One that must be seen and read about.

3. The Exorcist - William Blatty

Availability: Library - BOOK & DVD

Blatty's book never had quite the success that his screenplay did. Though one considerably exciting thing about the adaptation is that it was written and directed by the author himself, which isn't always the case for successful adaptations. But it's left a lasting legacy on what scary / gross / horrifying really is. Despised and loved by many. It was the first horror film nominated for Best Picture despite its content. During its release, some theaters offered barf-bags (though some parts are admittedly cheesy). And it was even responsible for eliciting a message from the Zodiac Killer in 1974. The killer had been silent for many years, but this movie prompted his last letter sent to The San Francisco Chronicle, praising the movie. He called it, "...the best satirical comedy" he had ever seen.

4. Invasion of the Body Snatchers - Jack Finney

Availability: Library - BOOK & DVD

Originally published as a serialized story for Collier's Magazine, it's the tale of an alien seed race coming to earth. These aren't your typical alien race, more microbial and deadly. They make carbon copies (which only have a life span of 5 years) of human hosts while destroying the originals. Not exactly sure why these seeds do this. But they travel through space wreaking this havoc from planet to planet. This sinister story has been adapted four times in the last 60 years. And if you read the book and watch the movies, you'll notice some clear discrepancies. It has to do with the endings, which you'll just have to read to find out, or google it.

5. I am Legend - Richard Matheson

Availability: Library - BOOK & DVD

Matheson's book release in 1954 was important landmark for the horror community. It was the first book that set up the zombie genre. Even though the antagonists are called vampires and garlic is a repellent, the disease they carry is transmitted through blood. But in their relation to the tried and true vampire motif that everyone had come to love, it didn't have much in common. George A. Romero (who you should know as one of the masters of horror ((responsible for giving us Night of the Living Dead)) credited this book as one of the main pools of inspiration for his brain-hungry monsters. It was the earliest zombie-apocalypse book to ever happen. If you want to read or see where all the sensation began, look no further than this cult masterpiece.

6. American Psycho - Brett Easton Ellis

Availability: Library - BOOK

I remember this book coming up in my post-modern literature classes, which was surprising to me at the time. Having little experience with Brett Ellis, I only knew about the movie, which was a classic dark-comedy about a Manhattan businessman. Upon the release of this film, some countries found the content so inappropriate that it was sold encased in shrink-wrap. We could dive into the awesome literary theory around this transgressive novel and talk about postmodernism in some attempt to look at the details of the book in a more theoretical way, but we'll save that for another day. Instead here's a little background on this book. The book was originally dropped by Simon and Schuster for aesthetic differences. Ellis received death threats for this book and mountains of hate mail. Germany deemed it "harmful to minors." Australian legislation put a rating of R18 on it and most libraries require an age of 18 or more to check it out. Bookstores there still sell it shrink-wrapped. As you can tell, not everyone appreciates the content, but it certainly has a created a frightening legacy that makes it one of the important works of horror. Brett Ellis has commented on the serious amount of censorship his book has / continues to receive: he says, "I think it's cute...".

7. The Walking Dead - Robert Kirkman / Tony Moore
Availability: Library - BOOK & DVD

Once you know about Richard Matheson's I Am Legend, it's awesome to see how he created a theme that is still being explored to this day. It originally started out as a graphic novel series that has been adapted to a public television series. Not exactly the most frightful of stories out there, but it does keep close to the ideas like I Am Legend and Body Snatchers, human isolation and the looming end of humankind. What's not scary about that? This series has enthralled fans of the graphic novel and the show (which has engaged million of viewers continuously over the past several years). It even won the heart of another horror novelist dabbling in the zombie world. Which brings me to the next item on the list...

8. World War Z - Max Brooks

Availability: Library - BOOK AND DVD

Last on the list is Max Brook's most recent release. It manages to pull from the greats while doing something totally unique. That something is its international focus. The story is told through the accounts of people all across the globe. Unlike most zombie-apocalypse stories that have a feeling of human isolation, this one feels much bigger and more connected, exploring the whole global catastrophe by asking real survival questions. The story has been known for its political undertones and its focus on various governments and their response to the outbreak. Its got enough of a new twist on the genre to keep you hooked while having enough of the old tricks to keep it in company with Matheson and the others. All in all, a great story to sink your teeth into this Halloween season.

So there you have it folks. Eight seriously great books and movies that will chill you to the core this season - and even beyond, because it doesn't always need to be Halloween to get your scare on. Just remember that they're all available in RPL system. So come in and check out (or get a card first if you don't have one already). It doesn't cost a dime to get scared this October when you have a RPL card.

Brand new books we would binge-watch if they were streaming shows

noreply@blogger.com (Natalie D Librarian) — Fri, 21 Oct 2016 13:00:00 +0000

How about this one: Readalikes for TV watchers?

Why not?

Maria Semple's laugh-out-loud Seattle stories, the 2012 epistolary Where'd You Go, Bernadette and her latest (also sort of an epistolary), Today Will Be Different, could easily translate into a series full of quirky, likable but totally unrelatable characters delivering droll zinger after droll zinger. I could see fans of the Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt diving into a weekend of uninterrupted viewing, with candy (and snark) for dinner. Until it gets optioned for two seasons on Netflix, check it out at the library! I did read it mostly in one sitting--so technically I binge-read it.

Jonathan Safran Foer's latest novel, naughty parts and all, would translate PERFECTLY to the small screen. For readers I highly recommend the audiobook version over the text--the text is great but the audiobook narrator totally nails Foer's jokes with serious comedic skill. I could not stop listening to this while completing a seemingly never-ending bookshelf building project on my porch even though, out of context, the aforementioned naughty bits would be pretty blush-inducing if overheard by my neighbors. This is a story of a family in crisis and everything that came before and will be after, paralleled by a disaster in the middle east after a massive earthquake hits Israel. Not convinced? Give it 100 pages. Fans of Arrested Development will want lock the doors and turn off their phones until this is over.

The last man on earth heard a knock at the door.

noreply@blogger.com (Natalie D Librarian) — Fri, 07 Oct 2016 14:01:00 +0000

(Don't you just love the shortest scary story/scariest short story in the title?)

This time of year, when the night is getting longer and the days shorter, pumpkins are proliferating and leaves are turning, I pull out all my sweaters and scary stories, and start planning my Halloween costume. Don't you? Anyway...hello, horror fans!

Chills! Thrills! Bills? All the scariest things you could possibly need are on the new books shelf right now:

Invasive
by Chuck Wendig

"Earth is home to more than twelve thousand species of ants." If that fact isn't enough to give you the creeps, get on Invasive, equal parts high-tech espionage thriller and creepy crawly horror story. Seems made for fans of Before the Fall, The Ruins, and the Area X trilogy.

Wolf Road
by Beth Lewis

Shaping up to be one of my favorites books of the year, this post-apocalyptic, western-style stalker thriller has something for fans of The Road, The Revenant, and True Grit.

The Binding
by Nicholas Wolff

Fans of Peter Straub and The Fog will enjoy this horror story about a small town seemingly ravaged by a rare mental disorder, and something in the town's dark past may be the answer.

Disappearance at Devil's Rock
by Paul Tremblay

From the author of A Head Full of Ghosts comes another terrifying tale, this time a mystery involving a missing teenager and the strange series of events that follow, haunting the search for the truth.

Speaking of scary things, have you guys been following this clown-sighting business on the news lately?

Nightmares!

[Censored]

noreply@blogger.com (Natalie D Librarian) — Fri, 30 Sep 2016 13:00:00 +0000

I'm a big fan of Banned Books displays in libraries and bookshops around this time of year (Banned Books Week is coming to a close on Saturday). They are by nature provocative, another thing I enjoy--especially in books. When we put together these displays we are provoking a conversation about censorship and intellectual freedom (a big deal to librarians) that we need to keep having, year after year. Book challenges in the United States continue, with the same books popping up on the lists over and over. They are removed or attempted to be removed from public and school library shelves and from course curricula. A number of book challenges have made the news this year, including a proposed (and vetoed) bill right here in Virginia, and while we see a lack of diversity in the publishing industry, the list of book challenges year to year are rather diverse.

How many of your youthful favorites on this table?

"Criminalizes the Foresting industry"?!

This year the official Banned Books Week Facebook page posted a poll asking people to vote on which character from a banned book they would most like to have lunch with.

Willy Wonka won by a substantial margin. I personally find him to be too unsettling to dine with.

2015 saw a lot of challenges to books with LGBT themes. From the American Library Association's Office for Intellectual Freedom, the top ten most frequently challenged books of 2015 are:

Looking for Alaska, by John Green

Reasons: Offensive language, sexually explicit, and unsuited for age group.

Fifty Shades of Grey, by E. L. James

Reasons: Sexually explicit, unsuited to age group, and other (“poorly written,” “concerns that a group of teenagers will want to try it”).

I Am Jazz, by Jessica Herthel and Jazz Jennings

Reasons: Inaccurate, homosexuality, sex education, religious viewpoint, and unsuited for age group.

Beyond Magenta: Transgender Teens Speak Out, by Susan Kuklin

Reasons: Anti-family, offensive language, homosexuality, sex education, political viewpoint, religious viewpoint, unsuited for age group, and other (“wants to remove from collection to ward off complaints”).

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, by Mark Haddon

Reasons: Offensive language, religious viewpoint, unsuited for age group, and other (“profanity and atheism”).

The Holy Bible

Reasons: Religious viewpoint.

Fun Home, by Alison Bechdel

Reasons: Violence and other (“graphic images”).

Habibi, by Craig Thompson

Reasons: Nudity, sexually explicit, and unsuited for age group.

Nasreen’s Secret School: A True Story from Afghanistan, by Jeanette Winter

Reasons: Religious viewpoint, unsuited to age group, and violence.

Two Boys Kissing, by David Levithan

Reasons: Homosexuality and other (“condones public displays of affection”).

*Note the burning books

A little history*: The Decameron, a 14th century Italian collection of short stories, was one of many books (see also Candide by Voltaire, and The Canterbury Tales by Chaucer) banned from US mail under the Federal Anti-Obscenity Act (Comstock Law) of 1873, which banned the sending or receiving of works containing "obscene," "filthy," or "inappropriate" material.

*Thanks, Wikipedia.

I thought I'd share with you my top ELEVEN (I will not be oppressed by this global obsession with round numbers) favorite challenged books. These come from the ALA OIF list of the top 100 challenges of the past 25 years (as long as they've been keeping track).

Scary Stories (series), by Alvin Schwartz
*I was devastated when the new edition of this series came out a few years ago without Stephen Gammel's haunting, disturbing, creepy as anything illustrations.
The Witches, by Roald Dahl
A Wrinkle in Time, by Madeleine L’Engle
Go Ask Alice, by Anonymous
Julie of the Wolves, by Jean Craighead George
The Handmaid’s Tale, by Margaret Atwood
The Outsiders, by S.E. Hinton
Flowers for Algernon, by Daniel Keyes
Slaughterhouse-Five, by Kurt Vonnegut
Lord of the Flies, by William Golding
I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, by Maya Angelou

Many more of my favorites are on these lists, most of them childhood favorites from the hours and hours spent hiding in a corner of my neighborhood branch captivated by a stack of picture books. I can't imagine my life without them.

Mind: Blown. (Or, The top ten GIF reasons you need to check out Dark Matter immediately)

noreply@blogger.com (Natalie D Librarian) — Fri, 16 Sep 2016 12:30:00 +0000

I can't actually tell you anything about this book except to call it a "literally mind-blowing physics-based romance that sci-fi fans and EVERYONE else in the world will love" without giving away a bunch of spoilers because pretty much everything after the first 20 pages is a mind-blowing thrill ride. I mean it--it could do permanent damage. Consider wearing a helmet because this book is a wild trip through space, time, and love.

1. The best use of Schrodinger's Cat in a book ever?

2. EVER

3.Daniela!

4. The string!

5. Jason(s)!

6. That feeling when your ebook expires with, like, 50 pages left and IT IS GETTING REALLY REAL

7. #TFW your reading twin texts to tell you her mind was so LITERALLY BLOWN by this book that she can't even use words anymore and just sends you a bunch of emoji only your hold hasn't come in yet so you still haven't finished it

8. That feeling when you're not at work the day she sneaks you her copy through interdepartmental mail and all you can think about all day is that book sitting in an envelope on your desk but you just moved and have so many boxes left to unpack and then you finally get to read it and can't put it down and then THAT SCENE IN WISCONSIN OMG (you'll see)

9. Best use of Reddit in a book ever?

10. THAT ENDING THOUGH

*Thanks TT

Weekend Rx:Take two and call us in the morning...

noreply@blogger.com (Natalie D Librarian) — Sat, 10 Sep 2016 17:06:00 +0000

...because you're going to need more.

The critically acclaimed debut novel, Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi is completely, totally, indisputably perfect--a must-read for absolutely EVERYONE. This is a compulsively readable, gorgeously crafted story of two families separated by centuries, oceans, and slavery. It's an epic American story with roots in 18th century Ghana, a sweeping multi-generational family saga that will get into your soul and stay with you forever.

Behold the Dreamers by Imbolo Mbue

Set in 2007, this must-read is the tale of a young family from Cameroon who find their immigration status tenuous after Lehman Brothers collapses and Jende loses his job. His heart pulled in two directions, back to his home in Limbe or to stay in New York with his wife and children, Jende and Neni must decide where they belong.

When I say prescription, I say it as a professional book-prescriber. Trust me, your heart needs these books.

Long weekend forecast? Rain and lots of reading.

noreply@blogger.com (Natalie D Librarian) — Fri, 02 Sep 2016 16:14:00 +0000

While I grumble and pace, waiting for my copy of Underground Railroad to come in, I decided to give Underground Airlines a go because, themes? Holy moly you guys, this is one intensely thrilling read. I walked past it a few times at first, intrigued by the cover and the premise but doubtful the author would pull it off. Maybe I found it too disturbing? I know what you're thinking--too disturbing... for me? I finally picked it up to read the first chapter and could barely put it down. Winters takes us into a sort of uncanny valley with his disturbingly plausible landscape of an alternate present day in which the Civil War never happened, and slavery was never abolished.

Slavery still exists in "the hard four"--four southern states with heavily guarded borders and economies supported by slave labor. A government agency now hunts and captures slaves who escape. "Victor", the mysterious and haunted former slave at the center of the novel, is a skilled hunter. This engrossing narrative of a secretive, lonesome man with a despicable job--ostensibly free but still enslaved--will keep readers up late, frantically turning the page to find out what happens.
Fans of science fiction will especially appreciate Winters' skillful world building in this grim alternate history.

Don't be jealous but I got my hands on Nathan Hill's debut novel, The Nix, just in time for the long weekend. If anyone needs me I'll be enjoying the cooler weather and this allegedly wickedly funny political satire the New York Times declared "The love child of Thomas Pynchon and David Foster Wallace".

Have a safe and book-filled Labor Day weekend!