Program Sponsored by the Children's Department

Homeschool Open House
January 12, 2007
at
10:00 AM
Stanly County Public Library
Meeting Room

Resources for Book Groups

The library has a Book Group Network to offer support and assistance to Stanly County book clubs. Advantages of being a Book Group Network member are: help with program ideas, including author information, discussion questions, book sets, and program speakers. There is also a monthly newsletter with notices of local literary and library events and reminders of Friends of the Library book sales that gets e-mailed to the group secretary. All network members also have the opportunity to recommend books for the library to purchase.

I have two special DVD's for book clubs to use. The first is Barbara Delinsky Talks About Writing & Books, and I also have At Home With Adriana Trigiani. Both authors have created these DVD's to help book groups discuss their books. These DVD's are available only to Book Group Network Members.

If your group would like to use one or both of these DVD's, or if you would like to register your book club with the Network, please give me a call at 704-986-3761.

Books to Warm Your Heart

The weather is finally feeling winter like. Are you looking for a good book to curl up under the covers with? Try one of these:

The Cross Country Quilters by Jennifer Chiaverine
The Persian Pickle Club by Sandra Dallas
Walking Across Egypt by Clyde Edgerton
Fried Green Tomatoes by Fannie Flagg
A Painted House by John Grisham
Home to Harmony by Philip Gulley
Friendship Cake by Lynne Hinton
A Common Life by Jan Karon
Patty Jane's house of Curl by Lorna Landvik
Where the Heart is by Billie Letts
The Ladies of Covington Send Thier Love by Joan Medlicott
Suzanne's Diary for Nicholas by James Patterson
Julie and Romeo by Jeanne Ray
Miss Julia Speaks Her Mind by Ann B. Ross
Big Stone Gap by Adriana Trigiani

We really do want your opinions!

As Miss Melanie wrote the other day, the library is in the process of working with an outside consultant to determine the directions in which our programming and services should move... and the opinions of the community we serve are an important component -- if not the most important -- in making those decisions.

If you would like to help us out in plotting the direction of library services here in Stanly County, please click on this link to go directly to the 2006 Citizens Survey. Thanks!

Oakboro Tourism Marketing Plan

Now available for public viewing at the Oakboro Branch Library is a copy of the Oakboro Tourism Marketing Plan 2007. This plan was presented by Greta Lint to the Oakboro Board of Commissioners on November 6. She has been promoting the town is working to expand the infrastructure of tourism marketing.

We want your opinion!

We want your opinion. Stanly County Public Library will post a survey on library use on the blog from Monday, November 27 through Wednesday, November 29. The link will direct you to a Citizens Survey that the library Strategic Issues Committee will use to determine the future direction of the library. This committee is working with planning consultant Bill Millett to create a new five-year plan for the library. We'll post the results here after they have been tabulated.

Celebrating Veterans

As we celebrate our veterans this weekend, check out some of these award winning novels about the military.

Gods and Generals by Jeff Shaara

Jacob's Ladder: A Story of Virginia During the War by Donald McCaig

Dog Company Six by Edwin Howard Simmons

Warning of War: The Marines of North China by James Brady

To the Last Man: A Novel of the First World War by Jeff Shaara

Articles of War by Nick Arvin

Check the library's online catalog by following the link on the right side of this page.

New Book Club Looking for Members

The Norwood Branch Library is starting a new book club, and is looking for new members. The book club will hold their organizational meeting on Monday, November 6th from 7:00-8:00 PM. Please come prepared to discuss and share your favorite books. Call the Norwood Branch Library at 704-474-3625 if you have any questions.

For the Holiday Season

The Oakboro Branch Library is having a holiday Gift Wrapping and Bow Making class. The class will be held on Tuesday, November 14th at 6:00 pm. Participants must call the Oakboro Branch Library at 704-495-4310 to pre-register and get a list of supplies they will need to bring. Because space is limited this class is for adults only.

Books for Book Clubs

This weekend I read a wonderful book about a book club - Dinner With Anna Karenina by Gloria Goldreich. I really enjoyed this novel about a group of women, Cynthia, Jen, Elizabeth, Rina, Donna, and Trish, and their book club. They read and discussed some great books. And yes, it did have a happy ending - but all the characters had to work to make it happen.

Books the group discussed:

• Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy
• Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert
• The Letter of Edith Wharton and The Reef by Edith Wharton
• The Lottery by Shirley Jackson
• Reading Lolita in Tehran by Azar Nafisi and Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov
• The Bell Jar and Ariel by Sylvia Plath
• Little Women by Louisa May Alcott

Other fiction titles about books groups:

• Reading Group by Elizabeth Noble
• Jane Austen Book Club by Karen Joy Fowler
• Reading Lolita in Tehran by Azar Nafisi
• Angry Housewives Eating Bon Bons by Lorna Landvik

Any of these books would be great to read on your own or with your book club.

No due date, No fine!

The Badin Branch Library offers a unique paperback book exchange where patrons may swap paperback books. These items do not need to be checked out or returned, although we do ask that patrons replace what they take with paperbacks of their own.

Please-

• paperbacks only
• even trade: one for one, etc.
• books you bring must be in good condition

NYT Best Sellers - Week of 10.01.06

Red Titles = We Own

FICTION:

1. The Thirteenth Tale - Setterfield, Diane (On order)
2. The Book Of Fate - Meltzer, Brad
3. The Mephisto Club - Gerritsen, Tess
4. Rise and Shine - Quindlen, Anna
5. Judge and Jury - Patterson, James & Gross, Andrew
6. Dark Celebration - Feehan, Christine
7. Ricochet - Brown, Sandra
8. The Guy Not Taken - Weiner, Jennifer (on order)
9. The Emperor's Children - Messud, Claire (on order)
10. The Afghan - Forsyth, Frederick

NONFICTION:

1. Marley & Me - Grogan, John
2. I Feel Bad About My Neck - Ephron, Nora
3. The Looming Tower - Wright, Lawrence
4. The World is Flat - Friedman, Thomas L.
5. State of Emergency - Buchanan, Patrick J.
6. Freakonomics - Levitt, Steven D. & Dubner, Stephen J.
7. Fiasco - Ricks, Thomas E.
8. Hubris - Isikoff, Michael & Corn, David
9. The Way We Were - Burrell, Paul
10. Blink - Gladwell, Malcolm

Friends of the Library Book Sale

It's almost time for the semi-annual friends of the Library Book Sale! For book lovers, this is a wonderful opportunity to get new and used books CHEAP.

Preview Night (for Friends members)

Thursday, October 12 from 5:00 - 8:00 PM

Memberships will be available that evening.

Open to the Public

Friday, October 13 from 9:00 AM - 6:00 PM

and

Saturday, October 14 from 9:00 AM - 2:00 PM

Come early for the best selection.

Enfranchise at SCPL!

September is National Library Card Sign-Up Month

Come celebrate at your local Stanly County Public Library

Get it.

• Get your first library card and receive a logo book bag full of logo goodies.

Use it.

• Use your card anytime during the month, and be automatically entered in a drawing for a prize pack of a bestseller, a limited edition library t-shirt and a limited edition library coffee mug.

New in Youth & Children's Services

The Children's Department now has audio-books on CD available for checkout. The titles include:

• The Tale of Despereaux - DiCamillo
• The Silent Boy - Lowry
• Lunch Money - Clements
• Stink & the Incredible Super-Galactic Jawbreaker- Mcdonald
• Gregor and the Curse of the Warmbloods - Collins
• Chicken Boy - Dowell
• Fairy Duet & the Quest for the Egg - Levine
• Becoming Naomi Leon - Ryan
• The Misadventures of Maude March - Couloumbis
• Gossamer - Lowery
• Small Steps - Sachar
• Dealing With Dragons - Wrede
• Stormchaser - Stewart
• Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane - DiCamillo
• Party Princess - Cabot
• Wrong Hands - Richardson
• Everything on a Waffle - Horvath
• Charlie Bone & the Castle of Mirrors - Nimmo
• Flush - Hiassen

New Books - Audult Fiction - August 2006

New Books – Adult Fiction
August 2006
Stanly County Public Library – Learning for a Lifetime @ Your Library

Alentejo Blue by Monica Ali
Yacoubian Building by Ala Aswani
Farewell Summer by Ray Bradbury
Wives Behaving Badly by Elizabeth Buchan
One Mississippi by Mark Childress
Sins and Needles by Monica Ferris
Prisoner of Gauntanamo by Dan Fesperman
Plum Wine by Angela Davis-Gardner
Dollar Daze by Karin Gillespie
Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen
Druid’s Sword by Sara Douglass
Baby Proof by Emily Griffin
Lilah by Marek Halter
Love in the Present Tense by Catherine Ryan Hyde
Between Georgia by Joshilyn Jackson
Shiver by Lisa Jackson
Winter’s Heart by Robert Jordan
No Good Deeds by Laura Lipman
Owl & Moon Café by Jo-Ann Mapson
Nancy Culpepper by Bobbie Ann Mason
Vanishing Point by Marcia Muller
Dressmaker by Elizabeth Oberbeck
Cross My Heart by Carly Phillips
Lover’s Knot by Emilie Richards
In the Dark of the Night by John Saul
Ruins by Scott Smith
Summer at Willow Lake by Susan Wiggs

For more new titles, please check the library’s online card catalog, or www.stanlylib.org

Vive la France

'Suite Francaise' - Irene Nemirovsky

France has fallen and the Wehrmacht will soon enter the City of Light - So begins Nemirovsky's wartime novel. The stage thus set, she assembles a cast- patrician, bourgeois, plebeian - whose members adapt (or not) to both occupation and occupier.

Originally intended as a novel in five parts, Nemirovsky completed only two parts prior to her arrest and deportation to Auschwitz where she died in 1942. Art does indeed imitate life.

Introducing The Class of 2009

BELOIT COLLEGE RELEASES THE BELOIT COLLEGE MINDSET LIST FOR THE CLASS OF 2009

Beloit, Wis.—In the coming weeks, millions of students will be entering college for the first time. On average, these members of the Class of 2009 will be 18 years old, which means they were born in 1987. Starbucks, souped-up car stereos, telephone voicemail systems, and Bill Gates have always been a part of their lives.

Each August, as students start to arrive, Beloit College releases the Beloit College Mindset List, which offers a world view of today's entering college students. It is the creation of Beloit’s Keefer Professor of the Humanities Tom McBride and Director of Public Affairs Ron Nief.

The list is distributed to faculty on campus during the New Students Days orientation. According to McBride, “It is an important reminder, as faculty start to show signs of ‘hardening of the references,’ that we think about the touchstones and benchmarks of a generation that has grown up with CNN, home computers, AIDS awareness, digital cameras and the Bush political dynasty. We should also keep in mind that these students missed out on the pleasures of being tossed in the back of a station wagon with a bunch of friends and told to keep the noise down, walking in the woods without fearing Lyme Disease, or setting out to try all of the 28 ice cream flavors at Howard Johnson’s.”

According to Nief, “This is not serious in-depth research. It is meant to be thought-provoking and fun, yet accurate. It is as relevant as possible, given the broad social and geographic diversity of our students, who are drawn from every state and 50 countries. It is always open to challenge, which has an additional benefit in that it reminds us of students’ varied backgrounds. It is still a good reflection of the attitudes and experiences of the young people that we must be aware of from the first day of their college experience.”

BELOIT COLLEGE MINDSET LIST® FOR THE CLASS OF 2009

Most students entering college this fall were born in 1987....

1. Andy Warhol, Liberace, Jackie Gleason, and Lee Marvin have always been dead.
2. They don't remember when "cut and paste" involved scissors.
3. Heart-lung transplants have always been possible.
4. Wayne Gretzky never played for Edmonton.
5. Boston has been working on "The Big Dig" all their lives.
6. With little need to practice, most of them do not know how to tie a tie.
7. Pay-Per-View television has always been an option.
8. They never had the fun of being thrown into the back of a station wagon with six others.
9. Iran and Iraq have never been at war with each other.
10. They are more familiar with Greg Gumbel than with Bryant Gumbel.
11. Philip Morris has always owned Kraft Foods.
12. Al-Qaida has always existed with Osama bin Laden at its head.
13. They learned to count with Lotus 1-2-3.
14. Car stereos have always rivaled home component systems.
15. Jimmy Swaggart and Jim Bakker have never preached on television.
16. Voice mail has always been available.
17. "Whatever" is not part of a question but an expression of sullen rebuke.
18. The federal budget has always been more than a trillion dollars.
19. Condoms have always been advertised on television.
20. They may have fallen asleep playing with their Gameboys in the crib.
21. They have always had the right to burn the flag.
22. For daily caffeine emergencies, Starbucks has always been around the corner.
23. Ferdinand Marcos has never been in charge of the Philippines.
24. Money put in their savings account the year they were born earned almost 7% interest.
25. Bill Gates has always been worth at least a billion dollars.
26. Dirty dancing has always been acceptable.
27. Southern fried chicken, prepared with a blend of 11 herbs and spices, has always been available in China.
28. Michael Jackson has always been bad, and greed has always been good.
29. The Starship Enterprise has always looked dated.
30. Pixar has always existed.
31. There has never been a "fairness doctrine" at the FCC.
32. Judicial appointments routinely have been "Borked."
33. Aretha Franklin has always been in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
34. There have always been zebra mussels in the Great Lakes.
35. Police have always been able to search garbage without a search warrant.It has always been possible to walk from England to mainland Europe on dry land.
36. They have grown up in a single superpower world.
37. They missed the oat bran diet craze.
38. American Motors has never existed.
39. Scientists have always been able to see supernovas.
40. Les Miserables has always been on stage.
41. Halogen lights have always been available at home, with a warning.
42. "Baby M" may be a classmate, and contracts with surrogate mothers have always been legal.
43. RU486 has always been on the market.
44. There has always been a pyramid in front of the Louvre in Paris.
45. British Airways has always been privately owned.
46. Irradiated food has always been available but controversial.
47. Snowboarding has always been a popular winter pastime.
48. Libraries have always been the best centers for computer technology and access to good software.
49. Biosphere 2 has always been trying to create a revolution in the life sciences.
50. The Hubble Telescope has always been focused on new frontiers.
51. Researchers have always been looking for stem cells.
52. They do not remember "a kinder and gentler nation."
53. They never saw the shuttle Challenger fly.
54. The TV networks have always had cable partners.
55. Airports have always had upscale shops and restaurants.
56. Black Americans have always been known as African-Americans.
57. They never saw Pat Sajak or Arsenio Hall host a late night television show.
58. Matt Groening has always had a Life in Hell.
59. Salman Rushdie has always been watching over his shoulder.
60. Digital cameras have always existed.
61. Tom Landry never coached the Cowboys.
62. Time Life and Warner Communications have always been joined.
63. CNBC has always been on the air.
64. The Field of Dreams has always been drawing people to Iowa.
65. They never saw a Howard Johnson's with 28 ice cream flavors.
66. Reindeer at Christmas have always distinguished between secular and religious decorations.
67. Entertainment Weekly has always been on the newsstand.
68. Lyme Disease has always been a ticking concern in the woods.
69. Jimmy Carter has always been an elder statesman.
70. Miss Piggy and Kermit have always dwelt in Disneyland.
71. America's Funniest Home Videos has always been on television.
72. Their nervous new parents heard C. Everett Koop proclaim nicotine as addictive as heroin.
73. Lever has always been looking for 2000 parts to clean.
74. They have always been challenged to distinguish between news and entertainment on cable TV.

A recommendation for Fiction Readers

I just finished a wonderful new novel that I want to recommend.

Greensboro, NC resident Angela Davis-Gardner has just published her third novel, Plum Wine. A beautiful story of a young American woman, Barbara Jefferson, teaching in Tokyo in the late 1960's. Barbara inherits a chest full of bottles of plum wine from her Japanese mentor. Around each bottle of wine are pages of writing - all in Japanese calligraphy, which Barbara can't read. With the help of a local potter, Seiji, Barbara gets all the papers translated.

I had to keep reading to find how each paper was translated. They covered the years from 1930-1965 with only one gap from 1943-1948. Each translation was rich with Japanese culture and history.

If you like to read novels with a little mystery to them or set in a foreign country, then give Plum Wine by Angela Davis-Gardner a try.

Please leave a comment and let me know if you liked the book or not.