Blog Post
If you haven't read them.....
by Maxine
...then these two classics should be on your summer reading list. On this day, July 11, Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird was published. Lee grew up in Monroevile, Alabama which became a model for the town of Maycomb. The character, Dill, was loosely based on her next door neighbor, a boy named Truman Capote. After writing seven drafts, Lee became so frustrated that she threw the manuscript out the window of her apartment into the snow but her editor demanded that she pick up the pages. And thankfully, she did. The book is a moving testament to the power of love and forgiveness in a town consumed by racial bigotry. It became a best seller, won the Pulitzer Prize and sold more than 30 million copies. Watch Gregory Peck give an outstanding performance as Atticus Finch in the movie.
Today is also the birthday of author E.B. White who was born in Mt. Vernon, New York. A writer at the New Yorker Magazine, White decided to leave the madness of New York City and move to a farmhouse in rural Maine. He loved telling stories about the animals on his farm to his many nieces and nephews. When a young pig he was raising died, he was inspired to write Charlotte's Web in which a runt pig named Wilbur has his life saved twice, once by a little girl and then by a spider. It went on to become one of the best selling children's books of all time.
Blog Post
Teen Stuff: Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins
by Caser
The U.S. as we know it has fallen. Now, 12 North American districts exist in its place, each serving only to support the oppressive Capitol district, which every year requires 2 tributes (aged 12-18) from each district to participate in a televised battle royale called the Hunger Games, a fight to the death that will leave only one teen alive.
Enter Katniss Everdeen, a 16 year old girl from the poorest district, who makes the ultimate sacrifice in choosing to participate in the Games in place of her younger sister. A sharpshooter bow hunter and expert tree climber, Katniss must rely on her hunting skills in order to survive the lethal attacks from the other tributes. Violently bloody from the start, Hunger Games pulls no punches, yet it speaks to the plight of children suffering during wartime, a timely if not innocuous theme. The sequel, Catching Fire, will be released on September 1, 2009.
Blog Post
New Fantasy Novels for Youth
by elijah
Do your children devour books of magic and fantasy? Never fear--the library has plenty more for their consumption! Check out some of our new novels:
Lost, the sequel to the Magic Thief by Sarah Prineas. Conn is a wizard's apprentice. The only problem is he cannot perform magic anymore because his magic locus was destroyed. While Conn desperately searches for another way to perform magic, he uncovers a terrible plot by an evil sorceror-king, and he is the only one who can stop it!
Or:
Also try Stargazer by Patrick Carman. In this, the fourth book in the Land of Elyon series, young adventurer Alexa Daley sails with her companions to the Five Pillars, a strange land far from the dangers she had defeated in her homeland. Or so she thinks--a dangerous evil follows her from Elyon. Can Alexa and her companions save this innocent land from evil that followed them?
Or even:
Tom Trueheart is from the famous adventuring family of Truehearts. In Tom Trueheart and the Land of Dark Stories, sequel to The Secret History of Tom Trueheart by Ian Beck, Tom's six brothers are marrying princesses-but their nuptials are interrupted when the brothers and the princesses are kidnapped and taken to the Land of Dark Stories! Now Tom must venture into that terrible land to rescue them all and save the day.
Blog Post
Hidden Gems: Books Unjustly Dusty #1
by cecile
Four books with a nautical theme in the AADL Catalog are calling out for attention.
Stargazing: Memoirs of a Young Lighthouse Keeper by Peter Hill is a well-written account of his time in the 1970s as a lightkeeper on the west coast of Scotland. Spending time alone to contemplate life and in close quarters with an older generation of lightkeepers that can only be described as "salty" makes for some memorable stories. Strange, but everyone was obsessed with the Watergate Hearings and migrating birds.
Cherish the Sea: A History of Sail by Jean de la Varende, a history of sailing beginning with the Egyptians up to the clipper ships, is beautifully illustrated by the author. Translated from the French by Mervyn Savill, it is obviously a work of love that took many years to complete.
She Captains: Heroines & Hellions of the Sea by Joan Druett is a fun read about Grace O'Malley, the Irish pirate queen of the 16th century, Caribbean buccaneers Anne Bonny and Mary Read, and Cheng I Sao, a woman who organized a confederacy of pirates that controlled the China Sea in the 19th century.
Before the Wind: The Memoir of an American Sea Captain 1808-1833 by Charles Tyng is a journal discovered by one of his descendants that chronicles pirates, storms, shipwrecks, mutinies, and other near-death adventures at sea.
Blog Post
Take Me Back to the Moors
by Caser
Although it's unreasonable to judge every book-to-film adaptation against the first iteration of a title, when it comes to Wuthering Heights it's nearly impossible to cast out of mind William Wyler's 1939 version, especially Laurence Olivier's stormy yet affable portrayal of Heathcliff, and the Hollywood-ization of the novel's morose ending. In these two regards does PBS' 2009 rendition of Wuthering Heights most severely contrast Wyler's version.
Tom Hardy's Heathcliff is one of the darkest and most menacing screen incarnations of the character, with outstanding scenes when he's intimidating young Catherine in front of the hapless Hareton and exacting his revenge against Cathy, Edgar, and Hindley in the latter half of the film.
Running nearly 2.5 hours in length, few scenes from the novel are entirely absent, though the plot sequence has been changed, and Lockwood's character has been cut.
Thankfully, the harrowing ending of the novel is kept intact, catharsis and all. Decidedly a PBS Masterpiece presentation in its staginess, the acting is nevertheless sharp, carrying the story and its characters gracefully over the moors once again.
Blog Post
A stunning debut
by Maxine
C.E. Morgan's first novel, All the Living, told in luminous prose, is the story of Aloma, a mission school girl, who falls for Orren, a tobacco farmer who is still grieving the loss of his family in a car crash. They live a hard scrabble life with Orren retreating further into himself through work and Aloma regretting her decision to desert her dreams of becoming a pianist. When Aloma gets a job playing piano at a nearby church, she develops a deep friendship with the preacher which confuses her intentions even more. Morgan grapples with some elemental questions: the power of work to instill love and the meaning of the "real world" Aloma longs for in what looks like isolation.
Blog Post
My Summer Overcoat
by DavidQ
At dinner recently, my housemates and I talked about the books we had to read in high school, including all of the great Russians... those writers who somehow captured so much of the core pieces of what it means to be human. I was reminded of my desire to read some of Nikolai Gogol's short stories, especially The Overcoat.
Having now read this simple story about a civil servant and his quest to obtain a decent overcoat for the Winter, I understand why Gogol is so well regarded. It is full of compassion and distills the loneliness of urban life quite poignantly. But I am left with another question: why did Jhumpa Lahiri feature this strange writer in her novel The Namesake? Why does Ashoke Ganguli say that we all come out of Gogol's overcoat?
I am curious to know what others think.
Blog Post
Following the crowds to Nora Roberts
by annevm
Just for fun, I typed Nora Roberts into our catalog--245 hits. More than Stephen King! Wow, I thought, maybe I will read one of these in our Summer Reading Game. Then, for more fun, I searched J.D. Robb, the name under which Roberts writes police procedurals. Whoa, another 72 hits! Clearly Roberts is beyond prolific, and you can learn (lots) more about this bestselling phenom in Lauren Collins’ wonderful profile in the June 22 New Yorker. As many as 27 Nora Roberts books are sold every minute, the article suggests.
Blog Post
Gone but not to be forgotten
by andersone
At the Ann Arbor District Library there are many great books, and many terrific authors. With the advent of summer, many of us find that we have more time to read and are looking for current, popular books to captivate us. However, sometimes, during that quest for the novel, we may overlook some gems that are not so new, not in the media spotlight, not on our lists. This is particularly the case if the author has been deceased for a number of years.
One such author, Graham Greene (1904-1991), offers a variety of different works for different tastes. Greene wrote both what could be considered literary works, such as The Heart of the Matter, which focus more on the prose, character, and theme, and others he termed 'Entertainments' which read more like genre fiction, particularly mystery or suspense.
Greene worked surreptitiously as a spy for the British Government for a majority of his active writing career (being a writer was considered quite a good cover, by his government). Greene often remarked that the spy novels of Ian Fleming and the like poorly reflected the real nature of secret service. His experience often bleeds onto the page in works such as The Quiet American, The Confidential Agent, or Our Man in Havana.
Blog Post
Rockin' and Readin' with LaRon Williams
by annevm
What a learning fest, when Storyteller LaRon Williams talked about Juneteenth and racial history at our Traverwood branch last night! I knew his reputation--but had not actually watched him spin history and tales. Lucky me, and lucky all of us, because not only did Williams give a great show, he also shared a reading list on racial hierarchy and transcending prejudice. Prominent is Why are all the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria?, the 2004 Ann Arbor-Ypsilanti Reads book. Other titles include “Every Day Anti-Racism,” by Mica Pollock and The Color of Wealth.