Man Book Prize Shortlist Announced

The Man Book Prize is for novels written in English by writers from Britain, Ireland or the Commonwealth of former British colonies.

From India are Aravind Adiga and his novel The White Tiger and Amitav Ghosh with the novel Sea of Poppies.

From Australia is author Steve Toltz with his first novel A Fraction of the Whole. The Albemarle library has a copy of this book available for checkout.

Ireland's Sebastian Barry recieved his second nomination for his novel The Secret Scripture. This title is on order and will be available soon.

Two novelists from England are on the list. Linda Grant for her novel The Clothes on Their Backs, which is on order and will be available soon. And Philip Hensher for his novel The Northern Clemency. His newest novel is not available for order yet, but the Albemarle library does have a copy of his previous book Mulberry Empire available for checkout.

The Man Booker winner will be announced on October 14.

It's Football Time

It's football time again. Friday night local games, Sunday afternoons in front of the TV and Monday Night Football. The Stanly County Public Library has lots of great football books for fans and football widows alike. We have everything from biographies of football players and coaches to warm love stories with handsome football heroes. Try one of these titles:

Just Too Good to be True by E. Lynn Harris

Boots on the Ground by Dusk: My Tribute to pat Tillman by Mary Tillman

Between Sundays by Karen Kingsbury

Don't Bet Against me!: Beating the Odds Against Breast Cancer and in Life by Deanna Favre

Playing for Pizza by John Grisham

Quiet Strength: the Principles, Practices & Priorities of a Winning Life by Tony Dungy

Natural Born Charmer by Susan Elizabeth Phillips

Deal Breaker by Harlan Coben

September is Library Card Sign-Up Time

Get it.

• Bring a friend who doesn't have a library card in to get one and both of you will be eligible to win a $25.00 gift card.


• The adult and child at each location who bring in the most friends will will a gift card tot eh Friends of the Library Fall Book Sale.

Use it.

• use your library card anytime during the month and be automatically entered in a drawing for one of 19 Memory Band USB devices.

@ your Library.

• Check out the library's new web site at http://www.stanlycountylibrary.org/.


• Get a new library card with key tag.


• Get a free card holder key chain to put your new library card in.

Summer Vacation

What does a librarian take on vacation? This has taken a lot of thought - I want to have enough to read, but I don't want to add too much weight to my bags.

The Bridge of Sighs by Richard Russo. My husband and I started listening to this on audio and both enjoyed it. We weren't able to finish listening to the entire thing (it's about 21 CD's long) so I am taking the book so we can finish.

Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers by JRR Tolkien. This is a book that my husband loves to read. I have never read it, but I love the movie, so I'm going to give it a try.

That makes two books we'll both be able to read. I also plan on downloading The Tortilla Curtain by TC Boyle onto my MP3 player. The library offers free downloadable audio books through Net Library on NC Live. My book club will be discussing it this at our September 16th meeting so I need to get it read.

And, of course, we have a Vancouver/British Columbia guide book.

And that's what a librarian takes on vacation.

I'd love to hear what you took on vacation. Leave me a comment, and I'll put every one's name into a drawing for some free summer reading.

Movies at the Library

The library is showing movies this summer for kids and adults. A great way to save gas money and see a movie locally for FREE and be indoors out of the heat.

Friday, July 25th at 10:00 am Charlotte's Web (PG) 96 min.

Friday, August 1st at 2:00 pm Under the Tuscan Sun (PG-13) 113 min.

Friday, August 8th at 10:00 am Bee Movie (PG) 100 min.

Friday, August 15th at 2:00 pm Casino Royale (PG-13) 144 min.

Teens' Top 10

Teens' Top Ten is a "teen choice" list, where teens nominate and choose their favorite books of the previous year! Nominators are members of teen book groups in fifteen school and public libraries around the country. If you read nominated books throughout the year, you’ll be ready to vote for your favorites during Teen Read Week, October 12 - 18, 2008. Readers aged twelve to eighteen can vote online anytime that week.

Before I Die. Jenny Downham.
Betrayed. P.C. Cast and Kristin Cast.
City of Bones. Cassandra Clare.
Diary of a Wimpy Kid. Jeff Kinney.
Eclipse. Stephenie Meyer.
Extras. Scott Westerfeld.
Evil Genius. Catherine Jinks.
Glass. Ellen Hopkins.
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. J.K. Rowling.
Ironside: A Modern Faery’s Tale. Holly Black.
Jango. William Nicholson.
Jinx. Meg Cabot.
The Luxe. Anna Godberson.
Maximum Ride: Saving the World and Other Extreme Sports. James Patterson.
Saving Zoë. Alyson Noël.
Sun and Moon, Ice and Snow. Jessica Day George.
The Sweet Far Thing. Libba Bray
Tamar. Mal Peet.
Twisted. Laurie Halse Anderson.
Unwind. Neal Shusterman.
Vampire Academy. Richelle Mead.
Wicked Lovely. Melissa Marr.
Wildwood Dancing. Juliet Marillier.

Read as many titles as you can so you can make informed decisions about your favorite books when you vote. Encourage your friends to join you in TTT reading and voting—tell your book group, youth organization and any other groups you belong to to vote between October 12-18! The more teens who participate, the more accurately the winning list will reflect the reading tastes of teens all over the country!

June Book A Month Challenge

Knowledge
The quest for knowledge has driven generation upon generation upon generation of humans. Whether it was forbidden knowledge, secret knowledge, or higher knowledge having knowledge has always meant having power. The world’s oldest sin in the Judeo-Christian tradition is Eve stealing the apple from the Tree of Knowledge, forever linking apples with knowledge. Isaac Newton’s nap under the apple tree, getting bopped on the head and coming up with the Law of Gravity cemented the relationship. Secrets and the spies in search of them are always lively reads. If nothing else, read a book on a topic you have always been interested in learning more about. Feel free to write a review here on the library’s blog (but it’s not necessary).

Food for Fines Successful

Thank you to all of our library patrons who came into our libraries during National Library week and paid their fines with non-perishable food items. We were able to donate 254 pounds of food to the Stanly County Christian Ministries.

2008 Edgar Awards

At the 62nd Annual Edgar Awards ceremony, the Mystery Writers of America announced their 2008 winners. John Hart took home the Edgar for Best Novel for his sophomore effort, Down River. The Edgar for Best First Novel By An American went to Tana French for In the Woods.

2007 Nebula Award Winners

The Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America have presented the Nebula Awards for 2007. Michael Chabon won the best novel award forThe Yiddish Policeman's Union. And J.K. Rowling won the Andre Norton Award for Young Adult Science Fiction and Fantasy for Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.

Memory Keepers Daughter

The novel, The Memory Keepers Daughter by Kim Edwards has been adapted for television. Lifetime will air the movie on Saturday April 12, 2008 at 9:00 pm (check your local listing). Dermot Mulroney, Gretchen Mol and Emily Watson star.

March BAM Challenge Book Review

I finally finished the book I was reading for the March Book A Month Challenge which had to do with craft. I read Sisters, Ink by Rebeca Seitz because the 4 women in the book were scrapbookers and I am too. It was a good little book about Tandy and her 3 adopted sisters and scrapbooking, family, coming home and love. This is Rebeca's second book, Prints Charming was her first title, and this one will be the first in a series - can't wait to read the next one.

Now I have to find a book to read for the April Book A Month Challenge - something to do with "beauty". I hope you're finding some great books to read for these fun challenges.

2008 Pulitzer Prizes Announced

ARTS:

Fiction: "The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao," by Junot Diaz (Riverhead Books)
Drama: "August: Osage County," by Tracy Letts
History: "What Hath God Wrought: the Transformation of America, 1815-1848," by Daniel Walker Howe (Oxford University Press)
Biography: "Eden's Outcasts: The Story of Louisa May Alcott and Her Father," by John Matteson (W.W. Norton)
Poetry: "Time and Materials," by Robert Hass (Ecco/HarperCollins) and "Failure," by Philip Schultz (Harcourt)
General Nonfiction: "The Years of Extermination: Nazi Germany and the Jews, 1939-1945," by Saul Friedlander (HarperCollins)

National Poetry Month

maggie and milly and molly and may

by E. E. Cummings

10

maggie and milly and molly and may
went down to the beach(to play one day)

and maggie discovered a shell that sang
so sweetly she couldn't remember her troubles,and

milly befriended a stranded star
whose rays five languid fingers were;

and molly was chased by a horrible thing
which raced sideways while blowing bubbles:and

may came home with a smooth round stone
as small as a world and as large as alone.

For whatever we lose(like a you or a me)
it's always ourselves we find in the sea

Copyright © 1956, 1984, 1991 by the Trustees for the E. E. Cummings Trust from The Complete Poems: 1904-1962 by E. E. Cummings, Edited by George J. Firmage. Reprinted by permission of Liveright Publishing Corporation. All rights reserved.

BAM Challenge - "Beauty"

This month’s challenge is to read about “beauty”. Maybe you read a book of poetry you find evokes beauty. What about reimaginations of the tale of Sleeping Beauty or Beauty and the Beast? Music and art are routinely noted as beautiful expressions of the soul. Do you find a certain public person beautiful in face and form or soul? Maybe the beauty industry and what constitutes beauty fascinates you. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder and so is the meaning of the books you read. Feel free to write a review here on the blog.

Watch PBS Online for Free

Stanly County Public Library is one of North Carolina's libraries with access to NCLive's newest online offering - nearly 25o PBS programs, including the Emmy award winning series "American Experience" and "Frontline", as well as groundbreaking programs such as Ken Burns' "The Civil War", "Baseball", and "Jazz". Go to: http://www.stanlylib.org/ and click on NCLive to get started. If you don't have an NCLive password, stop by any of the library locations - Albemarle, Badin, Norwood, Oakboro, or Locust - to get a free password.

Author Nora Roberts in the News

Author Nora Roberts/J.D. Robb was converting an old hotel into an inn with reading themed rooms. Read more about it:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080222/ap_on_re_us/fire_roberts;_ylt=AubYSzkoti5PdYUhxbzDpPhvzwcF

News from Author Cathy Pickens

Southern author Cathy Pickens has lots of interesting news in her latest newsletter. Be sure to watch for her newest title, Hush My Mouth which will be available in February.

If you want the chance to see Cathy, she will be at the South Carolina Book Festival in Columbia, SC February 22-23. She will be closer to Stanly County on April 1 when she will lead the Let's Talk About It discussion of Paretsky's Burn Marks at the Cabarrus County Library. She will also be the Friends of the Library speaker for the Kannapolis Public Library's luncheon and discussion on April 22.

There is a new Southern Writers Blog that Cathy is participating in. "A Good Blog is Hard to Find" is available at http://southernauthors.blogspot.com/ and you will find a large group of Southern writers - names you may be familiar with and new ones.

Visit Cathy's website at www.cathypickens.com for links to interview podcasts and youtube book trailers along with her appearance schedule.

February BAM Challenge

The theme for the February Book A Month Challenge is “Heart”.

For the month of love, you can read a romance, or go with any genre that has a subplot of romance. Try a book about legendary lovers or even something in medicine about the heart. And then there is always a book with “heart” in the title. I’ve got a great list of choices to get you started – or you can come up with your own title that somehow relates to the theme of “Heart”. Leave a comment and let me know what title you pick and leave a short review if you feel like it. My choice is going to be easy this month – a romance novel.

Romance
Agnes and the Hitman by Jennifer Cruise and Bob Mayer
Heart of Honor by Kat Martin
Be Still my Vampire Heart by Kerrelyn Sparks
What a Lady Wants by Victoria Alexander
Mad Dash by Patricia Gaffney
Alphabet Weekends: Love on the Road fro A to Z by Elizabeth Nobel
Natural Born Charmer by Susan Elizabeth Phillips
Love Letters From a Duke by Elizabeth Boyle

Other Genres
Blood Lie by Daniel Kalla
Heart of the World by Linda Barnes
Lover’s Knot by Emilie Richards
Dark Dreamers by Christine Feehan
The Wedding Officer by Anthony Capella
The Guy Not Taken: Stories by Jennifer Weiner

Legendary Lovers
Casanova in Love by Andrew Miller
The Tragedy of Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare
The Memoirs of Cleopatra: a Novel by Margaret George
Love and Hate in Jamestown: John Smith, Pocahontas, and the Heart of a New Nation by David Price

Medicine
Every Second Counts: The Race to Transplant the first Human Heart by Donald McRae
The Alarming History of Medicine: Amusing Anecdotes from Hippocrates to Heart Transplants by Richard Gordon
Walk on Water: a Pediatric Surgeon’s Journey by Michael Ruhlman
Chicken Soup for the Soul Healthy Living: Heart Disease

Books with “Heart” in the Title
The Heart-Shaped Box by Joe Hill
The Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad
Heart Full of Soul: and Inspirational Memoir About Finding Your Voice and Finding Your Way by Taylor Hicks
Where my Heart Belongs by Tracie Peterson
Socrates in Love: Philosophy for a Passionate Heart by Christopher Phillips

Thursday Next: First Among Sequels by Jasper Fforde

I read Thursday Next: First Among Sequels by Jasper Fforde for the Janaury Book A Month Challange. Our challenge was to read a book with the theme of "Time". The book I read is the latest in the Thursday Next series of books. This is a humerous series full of puns and literary allusions. Thursday, the heroine, is able to jump between the real world, Outland, and the book world where she has many adventures. Her son, Friday, is able to jump through time as a future member of the Chrono Guard. Together they have to work together in the present, past and future and in the real world and the book work to save time. The book was a little slow to get started but was worth sticking with. Great characters and a setting the is contemporary Britian but yet it's not the Britain we know. I hope you try this or one of the other titles in the series: The Eyre Affair, Lost in Good Book, The Well of Lost Plots, and Something Rotten.

If you read a book for this challenge, please let us know, by leaving a comment, what book you read and if you liked it.

I'll be sharing the February Read A Month Challenge soon.