The award-winning debut novel, “Weyward,” by Emilia Hart will be the subject of the First Thursday Book Discussion on April 4 at the Columbia Public Library.
Filled with vivid descriptions of English landscapes, Hart’s novel follows three women living between the 1600s and the 20th century. The protagonists face challenges that are both oddly conventional to their times and timeless. Likewise, Hart illustrates the resiliency of women and the strength they can draw from the natural world. Continue reading “April First Thursday Book Discussion: Weyward”
March marks the end of the first quarter of the year. How is your yearly resolution going? Did you make one? Does your new year start on January 1st? Or maybe on Lunar New Year (February 10, this year)? Or maybe on your birthday? It could start whenever you are ready to make a change — why wait? There are many examples of writers who have decided to take a year to try something different and record the results. We can live vicariously through their experiences and/or start our own adventures. Here are some books to get you started.
Possibly the queen of the “Year of…” genre is Eve Schaub. She is the author of “Year of No Sugar,” “Year of No Clutter” and, most recently, “Year of No Garbage.” In the latter, Schaub and her family attempt to live for a year without creating any garbage, and she learns a lot in the process. Her telling is, at times, funny, but it is also sobering to read about some of the ways people have spoiled the environment. Here is an excerpt from one of her blog posts:
Since I don’t buy new clothing at all anymore except for underwear (only used, consignment or vintage) I figure buying one bra from Australia is not going to kill any more polar bears than absolutely necessary. Plus, there’s the added benefit that when I am done with it years from now, it won’t contain plastic to poison the environment within some landfill for generations to come… In fact, ‘The Very Good Bra’ has a blog post with pics of their bra in a home worm farm, to demonstrate their ready compostability. You won’t find that at Victoria’s Secret. Continue reading “Literary Links: The Year Is Yours”
Often times, if I’m reading heavily in a particular genre, or on a theme, I’m aware of it and have gone out of my way to do so. Not this time! No, I suddenly realized after finishing the first book on this list that I had been reading a lot of King Arthur and Camelot retellings recently, and what were the chances? I decided I needed to continue the trend and in doing so, take some things off my to be read pile. And maybe I also needed to make a list of other King Arthur and Camelot books and retellings, because if there’s one thing I love, it’s a list. Now, join me around the Table of Some Shape and let’s read!
“Gwen & Art Are Not in Love” by Lex Croucher is a young adult romance novel set hundreds of years after the time of King Arthur and his knights, but is still firmly in what we would consider medieval England. Our two POV characters are Gwendoline, a bit of a shut-in upright young woman, the daughter of the current king, sister of Gabriel the prince, and most unfortunately for her, betrothed to Arthur, our other POV. Arthur (Art to his friends), is a bit of a party animal, enjoys causing chaos for his father, and generally tries not to live up to his namesake. Besides their disparate personalities, why are these two not meant to be? Well, for starters, as the summer tournament begins, Gwen catches Art kissing a boy, and Art in turn finds Gwen’s diaries where she’s written about her feelings for the land’s only lady knight, Bridget Leclair. Slightly awkward. The two decide to keep one another’s secrets, and perhaps even help each other where they can. This book was funny, heartwarming, exciting and sweet. Continue reading “Let’s Not Go to Camelot; ‘Tis a Silly Place”
Danielle Winton is a Columbia, MO memory & learning expert who has co-authored a book with
Tyler Small called “
Highly Promotable: .”
The book walks people through the three critical components of promotability: working well with others
, doing the right work, and doing the work well. Winton is the founder of Memory Strategies, where she teaches effective methods of learning and studying to students and professionals. She was kind enough to take the time to be interviewed via email.
Continue reading “Q&A With Danielle Winton, Co-author of “Highly Promotable””
Below I’m highlighting some nonfiction books coming out in March. All of the mentioned titles are available to put on hold in our catalog and will also be made available via the library’s Overdrive website on the day of publication in eBook and downloadable audiobook format (as available). For a more extensive list of new nonfiction books coming out this month, check our online catalog.
Top Picks
“Double Click: Twin Photographers in the Golden Age of Magazines” by Carol Kino (Mar 5)
The McLaughlin twins were trailblazing female photographers, celebrated in their time as stars in their respective fields, but have largely been forgotten since. Here, in “Double Click,” author Carol Kino provides us with a fascinating window into the golden era of magazine photography and the first young women’s publications, bringing these two brilliant women and their remarkable accomplishments to vivid life. Frances was the only female photographer on staff in Condé Nast’s photo studio, hired just after Irving Penn, and became known for streetwise, cinema verité-style work, which appeared in the pages of Glamour and Vogue. Her sister Kathryn’s surrealistic portraits filled the era’s new “career girl” magazines, including Charm and Mademoiselle. Both twins married Harper’s Bazaar photographers and socialized with a glittering crowd that included the supermodel Lisa Fonssagrives and the photographer Richard Avedon. Kino uses their careers to illuminate the lives of young women during this time, an early twentieth-century moment marked by proto-feminist thinking, excitement about photography’s burgeoning creative potential, and the ferment of wartime New York. Toward the end of the 1940s, and moving into the early 1950s, conventionality took over, women were pushed back into the home, and the window of opportunity began to close. Kino renders this fleeting moment of possibility in gleaming multi-color, so that the reader cherishes its abundance, mourns its passing, and gains new appreciation for the talent that was fostered at its peak. Continue reading “Nonfiction Roundup: March 2024”
2024 marks the 10th year of the Read Harder Challenge put on by the folks over at Book Riot, but this is my first year doing it! I decided there wasn’t enough going on this year, so I’ll read 24 books, and then share my thoughts on them every couple of months! So look forward to that! What is the Read Harder Challenge though? Well, according to the Book Riot website, “the challenge is made up of 24 tasks (an average of two per month) that invite readers to explore formats, genres, and perspectives that might go beyond their reading comfort zones. How you approach Read Harder is up to you: you can read one book per task or count one book for multiple tasks. The point of the challenge isn’t to do the thing one particular way but to push yourself to diversify your TBR.”
This sounds like a lot though, how is anyone meant to find 24 books that meet all these challenges? Luckily your local library is here to help! This is a collection of lists outlining the 2024 challenges along with library books that help meet those challenges! Need support or to check in with others undertaking the same goal? We have monthly check in programs at the library too, just check the events calendar for the next one! For my purposes though, I’ll be reading and discussing four books a month, and my challenges will be all over the place, starting with: Continue reading “Reading Harder in 2024! – Part 1”
There is a phenomenon that is prevalent in a lot of science fiction media: whenever the aliens crash land, visit or invade Earth, they always seem to end up in the United States. From Star Trek’s “First Contact” showing Vulcans landing in Montana to “Independence Day’s” undeniably evocative movie poster of the White House being destroyed by a flying saucer, it seems a disproportionate amount of extra-terrestrial interaction happens Stateside. I’ve seen it called the “White House effect,” “All Aliens Speak English” or just “that’s Hollywood for you.”
The puzzle behind this phenomenon has a simple answer: a majority of the mainstream science fiction that is written, filmed or drawn is done so by American artists for an (ostensibly) American audience. As many of the major producers of film and publishers of books are also American, those are the stories that end up making it big. And, given one of the United States’ biggest exports is our media, it is no surprise that the sci-fi genre is inundated with American cultural touchstones, Stateside scenery, and good ol’ US of A values.
While the oversaturation of American cultural media is a whole conversation for another time, this type of overrepresentation is not limited to just American sci-fi. If you’re a watcher of Doctor Who, you’ll notice the aliens tend to have a preference for landing in London. Jules Verne’s novels, while a bit more international in setting, often feature French scientists, inventors and adventurers as their main cast. Turns out, people will write what (and who) they know!
As with my previous post, I’ve been ever looking to expand my science fiction horizons. This time around, my scope of expansion is an international one. All of the books in this post (and in my most recent booklist) are science fiction originally published in another language. In a similar vein to my previous writing for the blog, here is a short survey of a book I’ve read, a book I’m reading, and an author I’ve yet to read. Continue reading “Ciencia Ficción, Zukunftsfiction & Tieteiskirjallisuus: Science Fiction in Translation”
There are genres of literature, there are genres of music, and today, I will make a case for letting the two play together. What I mean is this: What if we used music genres to describe literature? What might such an experiment reveal about the literature?
Here’s a fun music genre to think about: shoegaze, a dreamy genre from 80s Britain which drew a close following with its hazy, melancholic offerings. “It’s a particularly unusual genre in that its name describes neither a sound nor a connection to music history,” Pitchfork writes. Indeed, “shoegaze” originally described a scene of musicians whose heavy use of effects pedals led them to perform in a still, detached manner, clutching their guitars, eyes fixed to the floor.
The internet has some interesting things to say about shoegaze. Wikipedia notes its “ethereal mixture of obscured vocals, guitar distortion and effects, feedback, and overwhelming volume.” One blogger defines the genre by its “dense, shimmering textures of distorted guitars, thundering drums, and dreamy, reverb-heavy vocals,” adding that the performers lacked “the charisma and machismo of big stadium rock acts.” Continue reading “Shoegaze Literature”
Patti Callahan Henry’s charming book about the power of imagination and story, “The Secret Book of Flora Lea,” will be the subject of the “First Thursday Book Discussion” at the Columbia Public Library on Thursday, March 7 at noon.
I know I took refuge in stories as a child and teenager — actually, I still do! In Callahan Henry’s novel, older sister Hazel invents a secret fantasy world shared only between the sisters as a refuge and distraction from the loss and displacement of WWII. When her little sister, Flora, disappears mysteriously, Hazel is shattered. She abandons their fairytale realm.
Twenty years later, Hazel is working in an antique bookshop when she comes across an illustrated book that echoes their shared stories. Hazel is set upon a mission to find the origin of the stories.
“The Secret Book of Flora Lea,” works on many levels. It is a good story of sisters and also a mystery, but also has many themes to explore about growing up, the symbolism of stories, love and guilt.
Join us in March to explore these themes and share your thoughts with other community members.
Of course, we all know about the birds and the bees! We weren’t born yesterday! The birds and the bees talk of love (and, shhhhh… s.e.x.). But in literary terms, birds and bees tell of so much more.
Humans are funny creatures and we like to assign meanings to so many things. Birds, especially, it seems, get to do a lot of talking symbolically. In general, they are often seen as messengers from the gods or from heaven — especially raptors. Birds also evoke “freedom.” And it seems that each species has its own symbolism. The stork brings babies. Canaries can evoke beauty, song or a warning. As for bees, they have been used to symbolize fertility, industry and community among other things.
I have gathered a few birds and bees books for you to fall in love with. Continue reading “The Birds and the Bees”
