“Of emotions, of love, of breakup, of love and hate and death and dying, mama, apple pie, and the whole thing. It covers a lot of territory, country music does.” -Johnny Cash
Ken Burns new series “Country Music” premiers this Sunday, September 15 on PBS. It is being promoted as “A sweeping series on the history and impact of country music.” This subject is ripe for the Ken Burns treatment. The genre is an integral part of America, in both obvious and subtle ways, but it is often narrowly defined and confined to a corner of our culture. Here’s a sampling of books that represent the variety and history encompassed by this true American art form. Continue reading “Country Music”
C.S. Lewis once said, “Eating and reading are two pleasures that combine admirably.” My book club takes this concept very seriously. We call it a book club, but really it is a food and book discussion extravaganza. With a cast of bakers extraordinaire, queens of paleo and global food warriors, we celebrate food, reading and companionship every month. Many of our chosen books have been the foundation for the dishes we bring. “A Man Called Ove” by Fredrik Backman inspired dishes common to the Nordic region, including pickled eggs, a smoked salmon appetizer and lingonberries. People often visit the library in search of suggestions for their next book club read. Why not try a book and food pairing theme? Continue reading “Literary Links: Upping Your Book Club Game”
Behind every thriving library is a hearty group of volunteers aptly named the Friends. Here at DBRL, the Friends of the Library collect and resell books and media, donating over $85,000 annually for library materials and programs like One Read. Some donations even make their way to our shelves, including “Becoming,” “Where’d You Go, Bernadette” and DVDs in high demand like “Avengers” and “Outlander.” Continue reading “We Love Our Friends of the Library!”
Publishing is picking up for the fall season so here are several exciting new nonfiction releases coming out in September 2019! Visit our catalog for a more extensive list.
“How To: Absurd Scientific Advice for Common Real-World Problems” by Randal Munroe
“How To” is an instruction manual for taking everyday problems and using science and creative thinking to turn them into much bigger and more exciting problems. It teaches you how to cross a river by boiling it, outlines some of the many uses for lava around the home, and walks you through how to use experimental military research to ensure that your friends will never again ask you to help them move. From changing a lightbulb to throwing a pool party, it describes unusual ways to accomplish common tasks, and analyzes what would happen to you if you tried them. In addition to being a profoundly unhelpful self-help book, it’s an exercise in applying math, science, and research to ordinary problems, and a tour through some of the strange and fun science underlying the world around us. Continue reading “Nonfiction Roundup: September 2019”
The narrator of “Splinterlands,” by John Feffer, is Julian West, an academic whose best selling book titled, “Splinterlands” predicted many crises and collapses that have come to fruition in 2050. The world has been ravaged by climate change and various geopolitical collapses. Now, very ill and facing his final days, Julian uses an offer to write about the current state of global affairs as a way to reach out to his estranged children and ex-wife, who are scattered across the globe. With each visit we get a clearer picture of Julian’s past, what led to the dissolution of his family and the state of the world. Continue reading “Know Your Dystopias: Splinterlands”
I struggled to pick a book for this prompt because there are just so many options. There are mythologies and folklore from every part of the world, and there are fun contemporary twists on familiar works.
Continue reading “Read Harder 2019: A Book of Mythology or Folklore”
Here’s a look at some of the most exciting books being published by first-time authors this August. For a longer list, visit our catalog.
“The Ventriloquists” by E. R. Ramzipoor
The Nazis stole their voices. But they would not be silenced.
Brussels, 1943. Twelve-year-old street orphan Helene survives by living as a boy and selling copies of the country’s most popular newspaper, Le Soir, now turned into Nazi propaganda. Helene’s world changes when she befriends a rogue journalist, Marc Aubrion, who draws her into a secret network that publishes dissident underground newspapers.
The Nazis track down Aubrion’s team and give them an impossible choice: turn the resistance newspapers into a Nazi propaganda bomb that will sway public opinion against the Allies, or be killed. Faced with no decision at all, Aubrion has a brilliant idea. While pretending to do the Nazis’ bidding, they will instead publish a fake edition of Le Soir that pokes fun at Hitler and Stalin — daring to laugh in the face of their oppressors.
The ventriloquists have agreed to die for a joke, and they have only eighteen days to tell it. Continue reading “Debut Author Spotlight: August 2019”
Graphic novels and comics are a great medium because they combine strong storytelling with visually appealing art. Plus, reading stories in this format can help you play catch-up on your reading goals, because they typically take less time to read than a standard novel! As a long-time student who never thought I’d have time to read anything non-academic while in school, I’m grateful that graphic novels helped me rediscover pleasure reading. Despite reading tons of other comics and graphic novels, I never delved much into manga until recently, but there are tons of great titles. Manga is a Japanese form of comics, including comics written in Japanese or made in Japan that adhere to certain stylistic elements. Manga is read from right to left, and may take some time to adjust to if you are used to reading from left to right. Continue reading “Manga: Read Harder 2019”
Here is a quick highlight of some of the noteworthy nonfiction titles being released the August. Visit our catalog for a more extensive list.
Interesting Picks
“The Ghosts of Eden Park: The Bootleg King, the Women Who Pursued Him, and the Murder That Shocked Jazz-Age America” by Karen Abbott
In the early days of Prohibition, long before Al Capone became a household name, a German immigrant named George Remus quits practicing law and starts trafficking whiskey. Within two years he’s a multimillionaire. The press call him “King of the Bootleggers,” writing breathless stories about the Gatsby-esque events he and his glamorous second wife, Imogene, host at their Cincinnati mansion, with party favors ranging from diamond jewelry for the men to brand new Pontiacs for the women. By the summer of 1921, Remus own 35 percent of all the liquor in the United States. Pioneering prosecutor Mabel Walker Willebrandt is determined to bring him down. Willebrandt’s bosses at the U.S. Attorney’s office hired her right out of law school, assuming she’d pose no real threat to the cozy relationship they maintained with Remus. Eager to prove them wrong, she dispatches her best investigator, Franklin Dodge, to look into his empire. It’s a decision with deadly consequences: with Remus behind bars, Dodge and Imogene begin an affair and plot to ruin him, sparking a bitter feud that soon reaches the highest levels of government — and that can only end in murder. Continue reading “Nonfiction Roundup: August 2019”
