Ages 18+.
Blog Post
New Fiction on the New York Times Best Sellers List (5/6/07)
by Mazie
Years after he died in 1973, J.R.R. Tolkien is on top of the List with The Children of Hurin. His legions of fans celebrated the return of the Elves in this prequel (thousands of years before Frodo) to Middle Earth. Tolkien's elderly son Christopher has worked on this labor of love for the last thirty years, cobbling together subplots and notes that his father left behind. For some critics this new tragic epic is a well-crafted and coherent addition to the canon and for others it is an impenetrable and boring volume.
The other new titles are: The Woods by Harlan Coben, The Good Husband of Zebra Drive by Alexander McCall Smith, and The Blue Zone by Andrew Gross.
Blog Post
Gary Snyder
by Maxine
Today, May 8 is the birthday of poet, Gary Snyder who was born in San Francisco in 1930. When he was a student, he worked as a logger, a forest ranger and a seaman. All of these experiences informed his life as a poet, drawing on his closeness to nature, concern for the environment and a respect for the primal forces that affect humanity. He first started writing while working on a trail crew in Yosemite National Park. Snyder also spent eight years in a Zen Buddhist monastery in Japan where he developed his love for solitude and all it could teach him. His poetry is characterized by its spareness and contemplative quality and use of work, family and nature as metaphors for more universal themes. Here is one that examines the origins of poetry:
How Poetry Comes to Me
It comes blundering over the
Boulders at night, it stays
Frightened outside the
Range of my campfire
I go to meet it at the
Edge of the light
Blog Post
Gardening with Native Plants
by iottJen
Are you a gardener—or do you dream of being one? Get some inspiring ideas when you learn about Michigan’s native plants on Thurs., May 10 at 7 pm at the downtown Library. Greg Vaclavek of Native Plant Nursery will tell us about native Michigan plant species and the benefits of growing them. The folks from Native Plant Nursery can be found at the Ann Arbor Farmer’s Market every Saturday from mid-April through September. The graceful plant in the photo is Nodding Wild Onion or Allium cerium.
Blog Post
In The Beginning
by RiponGood
Sharpe's Tiger is historically the first novel in the Richard Sharpe series, written by Bernard Cornwell. In 1799, as a private, Sharpe enters Seringapatam in India, trying to rescue a captured colonel from the Tipu. Sharpe leaves the city a sergeant and a very wealthy man.
Blog Post
Short Stories to Films
by muffy
Away from Her, a film by twenty-something, first-time director Sarah Polley is based on the story The Bear Came Over the Mountain in Alice Munro’s Carried Away : A Selection of Stories. Starring Julie Christie as Fiona, a woman whose Alzheimer’s disease devastates a long-standing marriage, it is a film not to be missed.
Jindabyne, starring Laura Linney and Gabriel Byrne as a married couple, is based on Raymond Carver’s short story So Much Water So Close to Home, found in his Short Cuts: Selected Stories. This Carver classic opens with the discovery of a dead body on the river by a group of sport fishermen and the effects of one questionable decision made on their families and the Jindabyne community. This Australian import was filmed around New South Wales.
Both films open nationally early May. Check your local listings.
Blog Post
New Lodi Township Historical Group Forming
by annevm
A new group is working to preserve the history of Lodi Township. An offshoot of the Saline Area Historical Society, the group has two current projects: Preserving the Old Lodi Township Hall and cleaning up the Lodi Township Cemetery. The old hall, located on Pleasant Lake Road, dates back to 1867 and has been closed for 30 years, according to the spring/summer Lodi Connection newsletter. The cemetery, located at Textile and Ann Arbor-Saline roads, dates back to the late 1820s. A spring clean-up of the cemetery is planned for Saturday May 19 with a rain date of Sunday May 20. Anyone interested in helping with this clean-up should meet at the cemetery at 9 a.m. May 19 with rakes and yard clippers. For more information call Margaret O’Connor, 663-1327, or Peg Canham, 944-2922.
Blog Post
Comics With Curtis
by Bertha
Curtis Sullivan, owner of the Vault of Midnight will talk about what's new in the world of comics and graphic novels--and rave about his favorites!
It's happening Sunday, May 6"> 4:00-5:30 PM Downtown Library Board Room.
Actually Free Comic Book Day is set to be celebrated around the world on May 5, Saturday, so make your total week-end a comic one.
Blog Post
New Fiction on the New York Times Best Sellers List (4/29/07)
by Mazie
Dorothea Benton Frank continues her string of hits featuring the South Carolina Low Country. Her fans expect a certain dynamic involving family crises and romance laced with humor. In The Land of Mango Sunsets her heroine Mellie has a mid-life meltdown when her husband leaves her and everything else seems out-of-whack, too. A trip to Sullivans Island resolves all issues and results in a very happy ending. Just what Frank promises.
Fans will want to note that Frank is coming to the Ann Arbor Book Festival on Saturday May 19.
The other new books are: Fresh Disasters by Stuart Woods, Sleeping with Strangers by Eric Jerome Dickey and Obsession by Karen Robards. None of these authors are strangers to the List.
Blog Post
He was an advocate for babies and peace
by Maxine
Today, May 2 is the birthday of Dr. Benjamin Spock, pediatrician and crusader in the field of child care, later active in the peace movement during the Vietnam War. Spock was born in 1906, the eldest of six children and so from an early age had taken care of young children. After the publication of the first edition of what was to become Dr. Spock's Baby and Child Care, Spock was surprised at its success, being the second largest selling book in the world after the Bible. His philosophy of child care revolutionized the way parents thought about their children, giving them permission to use their instincts, not always adhere to a strict feeding schedule, to comfort crying babies and to actually enjoy parenting. His love and concern for children was also manifested in his work in the peace movement as he watched young men risking their lives in what he considered an unnecessary war. Spock died in 1998 at the age of 94.
Blog Post
Fabulous Fiction Firsts #62
by muffy
In Summer People, Nathan, a midwestern college dropout/aspiring graphic novelist, is hired as a "caretaker" for Ellen Broderick who summers at Brightonfield Cove, an exclusive coastal community in Maine.
Not everyone in town is civil, let alone welcoming to Nathan except for Edwin Lowell, an Episcopalian pastor and his feisty, dark-eyed beauty of a nanny, Leah, who quickly peeks Nathan’s interest.
Apart from the rounds of evening cocktails, tennis matches at the Golf and Tennis Club, and midnight picnics with Leah, Nathan finds his caretaker’s responsibilities increasingly demanding and Ellen’s behavior unnerving. Ellen's colorful past, and the secrets of this insular town might just be more than Nathan could do to keep them both safe.
A promising debut for Brian Groh and a solid good read.