The Longest Book You've Ever Seen

By Jan Pease

Have you ever read fairy tales as the Brothers Grimm wrote them?    Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm published the first volume of Children’s and Household Tales 200 years ago.  Over the two hundred years, these fairy tales have been sanitized and Disneyized  into versions we love, but the brothers would hardly recognize.

  Philip Pullman retold them four years ago, in time for the 200^th anniversary of Children’s and Household Tales   in the book, Fairy Tales from the Brothers Grimm.  I missed this book when it was first published, but am happy to say that it is in the collection at Litchfield now.  Pullman’s introduction to the book provides a short lesson on the fairy tale.  These fifty stories are, as Mr. Pullman says, “the cream of the Kinder- und Hausmärchen.”

 

In 1964, I was eleven years old, with my nose in a book most of the time.  Iowa wasn’t a hot bed of civil rights strife, but I was aware that in the South brave college students had actually been killed because they tried to help black people vote.  In Melody: 1964,  Denise Lewis Patrick tackles the difficult problem of Civil Rights. These books are in the “Beforever” series published by American Girl.  Each book in the series is about 220 pages and takes the place of the six titles that were released at once in the old American Girl books.  The first book, Music in My Heart, is subtitled “My Journey with Melody.” It is an interactive book in which your decisions   determine the path of the story.  These “choose-your-own” books are really fun in a simple, low-tech way.  The second book, Never Stop Singing, also by Denise Lewis Patrick, tells Melody’s story in a more linear way.   She loves to sing, and puts life into her music 

Avi tackles the supernatural in School of the Dead.  I was curious about this one, but didn’t have time to read it.  So I jumped over to amazon.com and read reviews.  One reviewer said that Tony was too self-aware for a 12 year old boy.  Another reviewer said that “Our hero, Tony Gilbert, is not the most self-aware person on the planet. It takes him quite awhile to notice things are not what they seem and yet more time to puzzle out motives and loyalties, so the pacing of the book is quite slow.”  I say, “Well, which is it?”     I need to find a kid who will read this and report back to me.  Meanwhile, if you like ghost stories, try this one.

Dan Gutman, who writes the series, “My Weird School,” has published two weird nonfiction books.  They are titled, My Weird School: Fast Facts Geography and My Weird School: Fast Facts Sports.  These books are shelved in nonfiction in the sports area, but I predict they will never stay long on the shelf. Fictional characters explain interesting facts about real things.  It’s a bit confusing, but very entertaining.   

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One of the most unusual picture books I’ve ever seen has arrived. The title is Megalopolis: and the Visitor from Outer Space.    Cléa Dieudonné has designed a vertical book.  Just sit down on the floor with a child and start unfolding.  When expanded to its full height, it is 10 feet tall.  Really.  I know it’s kind of a fad book, and won’t last long on the shelves, but sometimes you just have to give in to the slightly crazy. 

Keep cool with some great books from Litchfield Library!

What will you read this summer?

What are you going to read this summer?  Summertime always brings lists of books recommended for bringing along on vacation or to the beach.  I’ve been looking through the lists that are out so far, looking for the ones the book reviewers agree on.  Following are several of the books we have at the Litchfield Library that are getting a lot of press.

Annie Proulx has a new novel out titled Barkskins.  Proulx is famous for writing The Shipping News, which won both a Pulitzer and a National Book Award, and Brokeback Mountain.  Barkskins is an epic story of a family working in the lumber business.  It begins in the 1600s with a Frenchman enduring great hardship as he takes down trees in the vast North American forests.  The story continues through the generations and across continents through more than 300 years of history as humanity levels forest after forest.  A wide range of reviewers are praising the fascinating characters and the beautiful and compelling writing in this one.

Emma Straub’s The Vacationers was one of the beach reads of 2014.  This year her novel Modern Lovers is getting a lot of attention.  It asks: what happens when you age out of being cool?  A group of college friends who used to have a band have hung onto being hip, but now their children are going off to college themselves.  Living now as neighbors, with the trappings of adulthood, these friends grapple with what being an adult truly means.  Despite the depth, this book is described by many reviewers as entertaining.

I was at a meeting of librarians recently and the book I heard about over lunch was The Nest by Cynthia D’Aprix Sweeney.  It’s been showing up on many published summer book lists, too.  This novel is about four adult siblings who are waiting for their inheritance to be distributed once the youngest turns forty.  They have all made life decisions in anticipation of this windfall, but one brother causes an accident and ends up endangering that money for all of them.  The writing is described as warm and funny even though the family is highly dysfunctional. 

Eligible by Curtis Sittenfeld is a modern retelling of Pride & Prejudice, the classic by Jane Austen.  Liz is a magazine writer and Jane is a yoga instructor, both living in New York City.  They return to their parents’ home when their father has a health scare, and they rejoin life with their directionless younger sisters and their mother who wants them all to get married before they get too old.  Of course, Dr. Bingley and his friend Dr. Darcy are new in town.  Reviewers say it’s clever and charming.

And finally, Stephen King has come out with the final book in his Bill Hodges trilogy, End of Watch.  The first two books are Mr. Mercedes and Finders Keepers.  Library Journal says that one would expect the prolific King to run out of ideas by now, but this is one of the most original crime thrillers to come out in years.  If you like Stephen King, you won’t be able to put this one down.

Whether you’d like to read some fluffy romance or some dense historical nonfiction this summer, we can set you up with what you need.  If you want the most popular book in our library system right now, A Man Called Ove, you may have a bit of a wait.  Leave it to a Swedish book about a curmudgeon and his neighbors to appeal to Minnesotans.  Take a look at our shelf of new books to pick up some of the newest fiction and nonfiction that’s available right now, or place an order for something popular or obscure.  Enjoy the summer days as you relax with a good book!

Books for a Hot Summer Day

By Jan Pease

These long days of June are my favorite part of summer.   The library feels like a busy, vibrant place.   More than 260 young people ages 2 through 16 are participating in summer reading, but there is still plenty of time to sign up and start playing the summer reading game. 

Several well-known authors have released new books in recent weeks.

Erin Hunter wrote the six books in Survivors, a series about dogs surviving the end of human civilization .  Hunter’s new series is called “Survivors: The Gathering Darkness.”  The first book is titled A Pack Divided and the title of the second book is Dead of Night.  Expect more tension and a lot of action in this one.   I don’t think my dogs would last long if we disappeared, but it’s nice to think they could join a pack and survive.   The back cover of Dead of Night states, “In a pack, loyalty is everything – but some dogs should never be trusted.”

Another book cover asks, “In a game of lies, who can you trust?”  The title of the book is The Long Game, by Jennifer  Lynn Barnes.   This is the second novel in the “Fixer” series.    The fixers are a family named Kendricks who help make the problems of the Washington elite disappear.  This thriller is written by a very qualified author.  Jennifer Lynn Barnes has advanced degrees in psychology, psychiatry, and cognitive science and writes a believable political thriller.

The Notorious Pagan Jones is a work of fiction that reads like headlines about some of the young self-destructing actresses in Hollywood. 

Nina Berry set her story in the 1960’s, with a young actress killing her entire family in a car accident.  She is released from jail and sent to Berlin to make a movie which is only a cover for herinvolvement with the CIA.  Interesting twists and turns make this a political thriller set in a turbulent time in Germany. 

Karen Cushman was a Newbery Medalist for The Midwife’s Apprentice and knows how to tell a good story.  In Grayling’s Song our heroine must free all of the magic makers in the kingdom from a powerful curse.  Ms. Cushman stated that while she enjoys writing historical fiction, she wanted to set a book in a place like medieval England, but with magic.

Finally, a noted nonfiction author, Sy Montgomery, brings us The Great White Shark Scientist.  The scientist profiled in this book is Greg Skomal, and he does what I could never do.  He is an expert on shark biology.  This book is filled with wonderful photographs both above and under the water.  Many children tell me that they want to be marine biologists, an odd vocation for someone from the Midwest.  This lovely book might just inspire some more would-be young scientists.

These books, and more, are waiting for you at Litchfield Public Library.

Read for The Win!

By Jan Pease

This year marks my 25^th summer reading program.   I remember some of the themes, but I would find it difficult to remember each one.  One of my favorites was “Library Kids Lead the Way,” during the time we were planning the new building.  We drew gigantic characters on huge pieces of paper that were hung up high on the north wall.  I used to spend hours and hours enlarging pictures for decorations and cutting things out.  Now I tend to find an easier way: precut paper products and bulletin board kits. 

Something that hasn’t changed is our commitment as a library to encourage young people to become lifetime learners.  The program we’re using this year, “Read for the Win,” is provided by iREAD, which stands for Illinois Reading Enrichment and Development.  Thanks to the Illinois Library Association, for the following information.

   

”iREAD  stands for Illinois Reading Enrichment and Development and is an annual project of the Illinois Library Association. The Illinois Library Association provides leadership for the development, promotion, and improvement of library services in Illinois and for the library community in order to enhance learning and ensure access to information for all. The goal of this reading program is to instill the enjoyment of reading and to promote reading as a lifelong pastime.   The benefits of summer reading are clear. National research from Dominican University finds that students who participate in public library summer reading programs scored higher on reading achievement tests at the beginning of the next school year than those who did not participate.

Young people experience learning losses when they don’t engage in educational

activities during the summer. Research spanning 100 years shows that students typically score lower on standardized tests at the end of summer vacation than they do on the same tests at the beginning of the summer.   Libraries are part of the solution.  To succeed in school and life, children and young adults need ongoing opportunities to learn and practice essential skills. Summer reading programs remind kids that reading is for fun—as well as for learning.”

Please consider stopping by the library a regular part of your summer routine.  Encourage your children and grandchildren to participate in Summer Reading.  Read to your children and have your children read to you. Sing, laugh, play, and talk.   Enjoy these fleeting days of summer!

Kids and teens, read down your fines in June!

by Beth Cronk, Litchfield head librarian

Kids will have an opportunity again this summer to read down their late fees.  We tried this program last June and people have been requesting it ever since.  The Friends of the Litchfield Public Library are on board to help sponsor the program again. This year we will offer it from June 1 through June 15.

Here’s how it works: Children and teens under age 18 can sign in at the desk, read in the children’s department, and come back to the desk to record the time they finish.  For every fifteen minutes spent reading in the library, $1 will be taken off of the fines on that child’s card. 

There’s no limit on the dollar amount of late fees that can be cleared this way, but it can’t be applied to lost or damaged items or lost library cards.  Another limitation is that kids can’t read down their parents’ fines this way, only their own.  And the program isn’t open to adults.  Sorry, grownups.

Can’t read yet?  No problem.  Young kids can read down their fines by being read to by a parent, babysitter, or older sibling, as long as they’re in the library. 

So what do you do if you have a book or movie at home that you know is long overdue?  Bring it back to the library between now and June 15, and then spend 45 minutes doing the fines read-down.  Even if you’ve gotten a big bill to replace a book or movie, the fine will drop to $3 once it’s returned.  Of course, you have the option to pay the fine, too, rather than spending that time in the library, but for this short time a child would have a way to take care of it without having to come up with any money.

The Friends of the Library do all kinds of great things for the library.  If you drive by while the monthly book sale is on, you’ll now see a sign out by the street that says “book sale,” which the Friends just bought.  We hope this new acquisition will help you remember that the sale is happening.  I can’t tell you how many people come in to the library during a book sale and say, “Oh, I didn’t know this was happening!”  The sale happens on the third Saturday of every month from 10-2 in the meeting room.  The exception is in July, when the sale is moved to the Saturday of Watercade.

The Friends run the book sale, with cashiering assistance from the Litchfield Women’s Study Club.  Members of the Friends sort the donations, set up the carts in a well-organized way, and take it all down when it’s done.  They also put things out on the cart of free books near the magazine exchange, and they send some things to Better World Books that can make the group some money, which they use to benefit the library. 

One of the things they spend their funds on is “Book Page,” the monthly book review magazine you see at the library’s front desk.  It’s very popular, because it’s an appealing magazine full of suggestions of books to read.  Every avid reader needs ideas!  We get a box of copies of this publication every month, so you can take one home with you. 

The Friends have also paid for some great new books that we’ll be giving away as prizes for summer reading, and they help to fund things like storytime and summer reading crafts, books for Beginners’ Book Club, and prizes for the adult winter reading program.  And, like I mentioned at the beginning, they are helping to fund the Fines Read-down in June. 

Good libraries need good Friends, and we have a wonderful group.  If you’re interested in joining them, pick up a brochure at the library’s front desk for more information.  Thank you to the Friends for all of their work and support!

On Your Mark! Get Set! Go!

By Jan Pease

Mark your calendars!  Get ready for an incredible summer at Litchfield Public Library!  The summer reading program, “Read for the Win @ Your Library” officially begins June 1^st.  Patrons ages 2-18 can sign up to participate.  Each of these activities count toward completing the reading game:  read for 15 minutes (up to one hour per day), attend a library program, check out a book about your favorite sport or physical activity, do an activity sheet at the library,  read to a buddy or a pet, play a sport or do a physical activity for at least 20 minutes (one sport or physical activity per day), check out a Library Laptop or iPad with your library card to use while at the library, or ask a Librarian for a book recommendation.  You will receive a (small) prize for every 10 items completed.  Each completed game sheet handed in to the librarian will get your name entered in for a larger prize drawing at the end of the summer!  The library game ends August 31^st.

Friday, June 3 at 10:00 our very favorite magician, Professor Marvel, will present his show “The Magic of the Olympics: A Summer Reading Celebration.”  If you remember, about 250 people came to his performance last year, which overwhelmed the library building.  Litchfield Christian Church, at 312 North Marshall, has agreed to let us use their great room for this exciting event.  There will be plenty of room, so come and bring friends and family. 

The Watercade Princesses will visit the library on June 10^th, and on June 11^th we will have a special Second Saturday Story Time about the Summer Olympics.  On Saturday, July 9^th there will be no story time due to the Kiddie Parade.

On Friday, July 15 at 10:00 St. John’s Outdoor University will present their “Nature Olympics” program.  They always present an educational and fun experience with lots of hands on activities.  According to their website, St. John’s Outdoor University offers “preK-12th grade environmental education programs that strive to improve environmental literacy and emotional connectedness to the natural world through hands-on and age-appropriate field trips.”  I love their message of land stewardship and conservation, and deeply appreciate their outreach programs. 

On Saturday, August 13, at 10:00 Paul Spring will present a free concert.  He has spent late spring canoeing down the Mississippi River stopping at river towns along the way.  I think we will enjoy his music, and it’s a nice way to end our summer second Saturday story hour series.

Monday, June 9^th marks the beginning of a great new program presented by Mariah Ralston, Art Journaling.  If you’re in grades 4-8, you’re invited to participate in this project. All supplies are provided free of charge.  If I were in 4^th grade, I’d like to come and hang out, listen to music, and do a little art. 

 Regular children’s programs begin the week of June 6 with Toddler Time on Wednesdays at 10:15,  and Preschool Story Time on Fridays at 10:00.  So much fun, and we love books!

On 3^rd Thursdays, the Beginner Book Club will meet from 3-4 p.m.   The book for June is Clueless McGee, by Jeff Mack.  This book was suggested by a member of the book club.

If you are age 4 and older and like to build with Legos, come to Brickheads on Thursday nights this summer  at 6:30 p.m.  We’re building every week, so it’s easy to remember when to come. 

Teenaged patrons, ages  11-18  are invited to participate in activities on the 2^nd and 5^th Saturdays at 1:30 p.m.  They do so many interesting things like geocaching, robotics, ginormous gaming, and coding.  No sign up or fee involved, and refreshments are always served.   There is something for everyone at Litchfield Library!

  

 

Job opening at Litchfield Library: Shelver

Job opening: Library Assistant I at Litchfield Public Library

Job description: Shelves materials in their proper locations, sets up carts in preparation for shelving, performs shelf-reading and straightens shelves, shifts materials as needed, assists patrons in locating materials, and performs related work as apparent or assigned. 

Qualifications: Requires some high school and an understanding of library organization and services, or a combination of education, training and experience necessary to perform the requirements of the job.  Must have attention to detail and be able to use alphabetical and numerical classification systems when instructed.  Must be able to interact with a wide range of customers in a courteous and effective manner.  Must be able to follow instructions and work independently.

Physical requirements: Requires seeing, walking, bending, kneeling, crouching, reaching, grasping, lifting up to 25 pounds, and pushing carts filled with books. 

Hours: 4-7 hours per week plus additional subbing on occasion: Mondays, Wednesdays, and some Saturdays preferred but flexible.  Time of day is flexible within library hours.

Applicants should submit a completed Pioneerland application form to the Litchfield Library by May 26, 2016.  For more information, contact Beth Cronk at (320)693-2483.