Elaine Corum Strawn is a Columbia, MO author whose latest fiction book is “Kiddie & the Major.” The book is romantic historical fiction inspired by her real life grandparents, journalist and sports announcer Bill Corum and model socialite Kiddie Kolle. Readers can follow their ups and downs of dating, falling in love, getting married and growing together…
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“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…
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“Celebrating Women Who Tell Our Stories,” is the theme for Women’s History Month this year, and I don’t think they could have picked a better theme. At our core, humans are creatures of stories. Long before the written word, we used oral storytelling to convey important information and ideas and most importantly, meaning. Whether you…
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“Command and Control” tells the true story of a 1980 nuclear weapons incident in Damascus, Arkansas – during routine maintenance at a Titan II missile silo in Damascus, a technician dropped a socket wrench which led to a fire in the silo, and eventually an explosion. The book also splices in parts of nuclear history…
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My Mom bought us a beautiful globe and world atlas when we were kids. The ocean floors were depicted in blues ranging from a very light, almost white blue to a deep navy. The rifts running through the oceans looked like seams knitting our planet together. We owe this image and theories of plate tectonics…
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I like to think of Maya Angelou as a Missourian, although she spent only a small part of her life in the state. She was born in St. Louis in 1928 with the name Marguerite Anne Johnson. Upon the break-up of her parents’ marriage when she was three years old, she and her older brother…
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What book combines the obscure art of horse diving, otherworldly hauntings, unusual animals, World War I veterans and Wild West shows, all taking place under the long shadow of Manifest Destiny and racial segregation in America? Look no further than this year’s One Read book, “When Two Feathers Fell From the Sky” by Margaret Verble…
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Did you know that Thanksgiving was not an official holiday until 1863? In fact, the so-called “first Thanksgiving” wasn’t even the first Thanksgiving feast; both the English and the native Wampanoag had celebrated similar harvest feasts for centuries. Furthermore, the first Thanksgiving table probably did not feature turkey, and they certainly didn’t serve pumpkin pie…
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“A truly great library contains something in it to offend everyone.” ~Mary Jo Godwin, Librarian It’s fall again and another Banned Books Week is here, September 26 to October 2. This year’s theme is Books Unite Us: Censorship Divides Us. I have written several posts about banned books in the past detailing why various books…
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Here is a quick look at the most noteworthy nonfiction titles being released this July. Visit our catalog for a more extensive list. Top Picks “Crisis in the Red Zone: The Story of the Deadliest Ebola Outbreak in History, and the Outbreaks to Come” by Richard Preston This time, Ebola started with a two-year-old child…
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