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Find out what’s new in audiobooks, fiction, business, romance, mysteries, science fiction and more. Books on the Air is sent every Friday to give you updates on hot new releases and recent appearances of authors on TV and radio. Book Club Choices to gives you ideas for titles that will promote lively discussions. Check out our Book Club in a Bag and our new reference books too. There's even one for Teens!

Cheerleading in Michigan

Competitive Cheer is the fastest growing Girls sport in the Michigan High School Athletic Association (MHSAA). The sport is growing in popularity with high school students and with fans, drawing a large enough crowd to fill the DeltaPlex in Grand Rapids for State Finals. All cheer eyes will be on the Regional Competitions happening this Saturday. Region 6 will host many local powerhouse teams from the Kalamazoo area, and will be a tight race to state! My eyes will be on the Wyoming Park regional since that is where I have been selected to officiate. Have you ever considered becoming a part of high school athletics? If so, there are many opportunities for you! Registered officials and coaches have the opportunity to promote educational athletics and be part of a team. The library has many resources for sports, including wonderful new additions to the Cheerleading section. My favorites include American Cheerleader magazine in the Central Teen Collection and Complete Cheerleading by Justin Carrier and Donna Mckay. If you are a coach, official, parent, athlete or fan, you will find the materials you need to help you succeed in high school athletics at KPL! To find out more about officiating high school sports, please click on the MHSAA website link! To see some amazing stunts by Michigan Competitive Cheer Team Rochester High School, watch below.




http://www.mhsaa.com/

The Good Husband of Zebra Drive

For my mother-in-law’s birthday, we gave her the five most recent books of the No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency Series by Alexander McCall Smith, including The Good Husband of Zebra Drive. She called the other night to thank us, saying how much she likes the books “because nothing really bad ever happens.”

She’s right. That the crimes and mysteries solved by the “traditionally built” Mma Precious Ramotswe are relatively mild does not mean the stories are dull. We’re called to visit the hearts and circumstances of people in these stories. Forgiveness and reconciliation are dispensed instead of punishment. Characters treat each other with gentle consideration — a polite formality, even — that is comforting. And then there is Botswana itself. The rich descriptions of this country and Mma Ramotswe’s deep love for the land and its people make me want to go there, find her, and settle down with a cup of bush tea.

Edna Lewis

It seems like Edna Lewis was waiting for me in every corner last month! Reading Judith Jones' book THE TENTH MUSE, she talked about editing a cookbook that Southern cook Edna Lewis wrote. Then in "Gourmet" magazine, there was an editorial and article about Edna. The only sensible thing to do was to track down Edna Lewis' own cookbooks: THE GIFT OF SOUTHERN COOKING and IN PURSUIT OF FLAVOR. Anyone with an interest in cooking or eating needs to be familiar with Edna Lewis and her kitchen!

From the streets of NYC

New York Look Book: A Gallery of Street Fashion by Amy Larocca and Jake Chessum collects over 200 of the human subjects from New York Magazine’s “The Look Book”, a monthly feature in the magazine which celebrates the style of New York City and its inhabitants. The subjects of each photograph are captured on the street, against a stark white background, in the midst of their mad New York day. The photos are posed, but not contrived, and most are accompanied by a brief yet intriguing interview with the subject, inquiring about their personal style. The short interviews are smart, funny, weird, often perplexing, and leave you wanting more. To me they are like short stories waiting to be written and flipping through this book is fun and voyeuristic and makes me want to get in the car and leave for New York tonight!

*An added bonus is The Listings section which gives an overview of the various neighborhoods where the photo sessions took place and includes chic shopping and restaurant suggestions for each; a helpful tool for planning that impromptus trip to New York…someday.

Three Cups of Tea

Ever heard of Korphe, Parkistan? How about the Karakorham Highway or the valleys of the Hindu Kush? These and even more remote locations are just the places that American Greg Mortenson chose to build schools for children who had never had any formal education, nor even seen a real school.

"Three Cups of Tea" is a journey into the promise one man made to a small group of children after their village community saved his life following a disastrous attempt to climb K2.

The author never imagined that his one small promise would eventually lead to a lifetime of building community-based education, but it did, and in this book we learn about how it happened - in fifty-five villages - in Afghanistan and Pakistan, one school at a time.

I love books that inspire, and this one did. I think you will enjoy it as well!

A Life In Six Words

The rhythm to dying is breathing

Coming to KPL soon!

Kalamazoo Lost and Found

We are so lucky in Kalamazoo to have an active community of folks interested in researching and preserving our historic structures. We are also fortunate that these people are willing to share their knowledge with us. Local historians Pam O’Connor and Lynn Houghton authored the book Kalamazoo Lost and Found and it is a wonderful place to look when you are curious about a local building, trying to picture what used to be on a certain spot, or just want to remember the good old days. Not only does it contain fantastic then and now photos, but you can read all about the history of many Kalamazoo businesses, organizations, and people. In the next month both Pam and Lynn will be sharing some of their vast knowledge of Kalamazoo buildings in “This Old Building” programs at the library. On February 28, Pam will present a history and insider’s view of the Marlborough building on South Street and on March 27, Lynn will enlighten her audience about Kalamazoo’s “educational heart” at the corner of Vine and Westnedge. Both programs will be held at 7:00 pm in the VanDeusen Room.

Best Music Movie of 2007!

Once is a movie about a busker and an immigrant creating music, falling in love and fixing vacuums in Dublin, Ireland. Playing the role of "The Guy" is Glen Hansard, the lead singer of the popular Irish band The Frames, and playing opposite of him is young actress Markéta Irglová, or "The Girl." In addition to having one of the best soundtracks of 2007, Once is also a most realistic love story. Over one week of time you will witness two individuals falling in love as they consider how their lives would change if they allowed their relationship to move to the next level. The movie was written and directed by John Carney and all the songs were written and composed by Hansard and Irglová. The budget for the movie was around $160,000 with many of the extras being friends of the band! Once is a movie you will definitely want to see more than twice!

NOTE: Both the DVD and Soundtrack for Once are available as AV Hot Picks! A new service that immediately provides many popular CDs and DVDs for a short three day check out.

Another NOTE: I just watched Hansard and Irglová sing the Oscar nominated sing "Falling Slowly" on the Academy Awards show. If they do not win, there is no justice in the world. Great performance!

One More NOTE: THEY WON!!

Have questions about foreclosure or debt?

What can you do if you are in danger of having your home foreclosed on? Are you renting a home that is being foreclosed on? Who can help? Unfortunately, these are questions many people are faced with today. KPL has many resources to assist those who need information about foreclosure, including a brief nutshell produced by the law library. We also have many titles available, including The 250 Questions You Should Ask to Avoid Foreclosure. Stop in to the law library for more information, or join us in the Van Deusen Room on Monday February 25th at 7:00pm for a FREE foreclosure/debt clinic sponsored by the Kalamazoo County Treasurer’s Department and Legal Aid of Western Michigan.

Marley & Me

I can’t wait to finish reading Marley & Me: Life and Love with the World's Worst Dog. Why would I tell you about it, when I haven’t finished the book? I’m trying to entice you to get your own copy, so you can join staff in discussing it at Reality Check Tuesday, April 1, 7:00 pm, at the Central library.

John Grogan has a charming style that will keep you turning the pages, as he fills you in on Marley’s sweet, adorable, neurotic life, from start to finish. Marley’s a loveable Labrador retriever, who just is too hard to train, but he comes to be a valuable member of the entire family.

HAPPY PRESIDENTS' DAY?

For many Americans, I suspect, the observance of Presidents’ Day means a Monday with no mail and no trip to the bank. But I thought I would put the holiday to use by highlighting the volumes of the AMERICAN PRESIDENTS SERIES that the library is acquiring as they are being published by Times Books. Written by noted authors such as Elizabeth Drew (Richard Nixon), Kevin Phillips (William McKinley), H.W. Brands (Woodrow Wilson), James MacGregor Burns (George Washington), Garry Wills (James Madison), and Tom Wicker (Dwight D. Eisenhower), these books are about 180 pages each. As such, they present a concise, readable account of each president’s life and administration. Since they are not being published in chronological order, the SERIES feature of our web catalog comes in handy when trying to find those purchased by the library so far. This series began in 2003; approximately half of the scheduled volumes have now been published. Many of them have been featured on one of my favorite TV programs, Book-TV, which airs weekends on C-SPAN.

Why Do Southerners Eat Grits?

Albion’s Seed: Four British Folkways in America

by David Hackett Fisher

In 900-some fascinating pages, with loads of footnotes and charts, David Hackett Fischer details four waves of British immigrants — where they came from and where they settled. Each wave of newcomers brought along its own distinct ideas about architecture, cooking, gender relationships, rank, recreation, religion and work. Fischer argues that these differences contributed to our country’s strong notions of a free society. (And yes, he also explains why Southerners eat grits.)

Defiantly Optimistic

Terry Ryan has entertainingly chronicled her mother's trials and triumphs in The Prize Winner of Defiance, Ohio: How My Mother Raised 10 Kids on 25 Words or Less. Struggling to support her growing family in the 40s and 50s with a husband who spends much of his salary on alcohol, Evelyn manages to make magic with her jingles and poems and wins contests by the dozens. She earns toasters and trips, shopping sprees and cars...just when her family needs them most.
The biography was made into a delightful movie starring Julianne Moore and Woody Harrelson by DreamWorks in 2006. It closely follows the book's narrative and spirit (and shows the ten grown children as they are today).

The Comebacks (DVD)

Talk about stupid.

I thought, I've done enough thinking and dealing with serious stuff: it was time to turn off my mind and entertain myself with some mindless comedy, well I got mindless for sure.

“Comebacks” is a comedy heavily laden with spoofs of other movies. The "Comebacks" is a football team that gets a new coach with a history of losing. I like spoof and football movies so I had high hopes I would like this one. I think they tried too hard and thus were too many jokes that bombed.

One of the spoofs was of the movie Radio. Instead of calling him Radio, they've updated it and call him iPod. I did find it humorous when iPod called a play. The team lines up to hike the ball, then shifts to the left, and then they shift again. Someone says what kind of a play is that and the coach responds, drumroll.. that’s the iPod shuffle.

If I had spent money to see this movie I may have felt ripped off. As this was a Library DVD, it was free and all I wasted was my time. We have this movie and many other (better) movies. Here's a link to the NEW DVDs.

Tales of a Female Nomad

This time of the year, many people are beginning to make travel plans for the spring and summer. I read travel guides written about specific countries, but I also like to read travel writing to discover not only where people have gone but what they did once they got there.

Children’s author, Rita Golden Gelman, decided over twenty years ago to travel to across the world like a nomad, living with the people she meets in the various countries she visits, which only enhances her knowledge of the area. She discusses her travels in the book Tales of a Female Nomad: Living at Large in the World.

You may not want to travel like Rita has done but it is an interesting book. She also has a website http://www.ritagoldengelman.com/ which gives more information not only about Rita, her activities and her current travels but also links to others who have done the same.

lynnh

Economic Stimulus Payments

Interested in whether you are eligible for one of the 2008 Economic Stimulus Payments recently in the news? The Internal Revenue Service just announced the final eligibility requirements and limitations in their newsroom articles today. Low-income workers and recipients of Social Security may also be eligible. Forms, instructions and additional information are all available on the IRS web site.

Best of American Travel Writing

Do you love to travel to exotic places or just down the road to your children's home? Would you like to see the wilds of Alaska or the warm balmy waters of the Gulf of Mexico? Each year the library receives a copy of the series The Best American Travel Writing. Each volume showcases the best of short fiction that transports the reader from New York City to Patagonia. Without leaving home, you can experience all types of adventues from riding the rapids of a river to downhill skiing on a mountain slope to sharing a dinner in Paris. Get a unique perspective on historic areas and places that you might never dream of visiting written by widely recognized writers.

Mystery series for Regency romance readers

Lovers of Regency romances who want a little extra "umph" in their stories should check out a mystery series featuring Sebastian St. Cyr, by C.S. Harris. St. Cyr is a veteran of the Napoleonic Wars, ex-spy and nobleman (Viscount Devlin), an unusual sleuth who originally enters the detection world as a suspect in the murder of a famous actress. Donning various disguises, he is able to move from the drawing rooms of high society to the dreadful slums of London in his quest to clear his name. He relies on help from his war-time friend, Irish doctor Paul Gibson, who provides CSI-type evidence, 19th-century style. Additional returning characters include his lover, actress Kat Boleyn; Tom, a young boy St. Cyr rescues from the harsh life of the streets, and various family members. The books should be read in order, as the characters are introduced in book 1 and appear in subsequent volumes: What Angels Fear (2005) - When Gods Die (2006) - Why Mermaids Sing (2007).

I just finished reading Identical Strangers : a Memoir of Twins Separated and Reunited, jointly written by identical twins Elyse Schein and Paula Bernstein, two women who were reunited in their mid-30s after being split up as infants and adopted to different families that were unaware that their adoptive daughters were part of a set. The memoir is told from both women’s points of view: Elyse, who was ecstatic at finding her twin, having always felt something was missing from her life, and Paula, who had finally found happiness and wasn't looking for any changes to disrupt it. As the sisters become acquainted and begin to research their pasts, they discover they were part of a secret study conducted by a New York adoption agency that chronicled the development of twins that were adopted separately. Elyse and Paula suddenly find themselves challenged with uncovering the secrets of the study and the secrets of their own pasts. KPL has this book in both hardcover and audiobook formats, located at 306.8754 B5317 and COMPACT DISC 306.8754 B5317.

The Summer of the Swans

"The Summer of the swans" by Betsy Byars won the John Newbery Medal for the most distinguished contribution to American Literature for Children in 1970. Sara Godfrey, 14 years old, has a younger brother named Charlie who is mentally impaired from a childhood illness. Wanda, her older sister, is 19 years old. Their mother died and their Aunt Wanda is their caretaker. Their father is alive, but working away from home in Ohio, distant both physically and emotionally. The story takes places in the summer in West Virginia.



Sara struggles with self-image and selfishness, but that preoccupation is quickly forgotten when the focus sharply turns onto Charlie who becomes lost after deciding to leave home in the middle of the night to look for the "swan" lake where Sara and he had visitited earlier in the day. Sara is consumed with finding Charlie along with the townsfolk! Sara is befriended by Joe, a former enemy, who is as intent as she is. The author draws the reader into the search for Charlie and takes us to the mountain top where a discovery is made. Discover the result for yourself. I recommend this book.

Staff Picks Unplugged

If you are a frequent visitor to the Central Library, you may have noticed the recently constructed physical counterpart to this virtual space. Old favorites, new and notables, or just weird stuff we’ve read the new Staff Picks display, located in the first floor Rotunda area of the Central Library, will feature an ever changing collection of eclectic titles hand-picked by KPL’s eclectic staff. Come in and check it out!

The title I chose for the display? The Road by Cormac McCarthy. Chosen because it effected me more than anything that I read in the past year.

Still My Grandma

Since I serve on the library’s diversity committee, I thought I’d consider this year’s Reading Together selection, Animal Dreams, by Barbara Kingsolver, from a diversity perspective. There are several possibilities in this many layered novel, but I settled on the subject of Alzheimers disease.

If this subject is of interest to you, check out the 239 listings under Alzheimers in our catalog: 69 non-fiction and many fiction titles, as well as 7 DVD’s that include the excellent, Oscar nominated Away from Her, and one specifically designed to stimulate sufferers of this devastating disease. (Investigate a little, you'll find it!)

There are helpful children’s titles, including Still My Grandma, for parents and caregivers who are trying to help youngsters understand someone they love who is no longer the same person they have grown up with, titles for teens to help them cope, and even mysteries and science fiction novels that include Alzheimers as a theme.

Although I have worked here many years and shouldn’t be, nevertheless I am often amazed at the tremendous amount of resources we have available on a single topic – just take a look…And if you don’t find what you need, don’t forget to ask one of our fabulous librarians for help!

PET SMILE!

February is Pet Dental Health Month.Clean teeth and healthy gums are very important to the general health and happiness of both felines and canines. Without regular care, cats and dogs can lose teeth at an early age and may experience problems with other organs, especially the kidneys and heart. I started brushing my cats teeth years ago and now my 2 adult 11 yr.old cats, Cosmo and Julius, tolerate daily or every other day brushings using a finger toothbrush and malt or fish flavored toothpaste. As a reward ,for good behavior, they receive some hairball remedy gel( which they love and lick off my finger) or some impromptu playtime.

Cat and Dog Fancy magazines emphasize good dental health and many books that KPL owns also include a chapter or several pages on this procedure.

Remember starting a regular dental care routine for your pet is one of the most important things you can do to ensure their optimum overall health.
Resolve to take the steps this month for a dental care regimen that will ensure your pet's good health for life!

Check out this website for more valuable information on this topic:www.placervillevet.com/cat%20toothbrushing.htm.

Sincerely, Teresa M-R






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If I were an 11-year-old boy . . .

Recently I read The Rise of the Black Wolf by Derek Benz and J.S. Lewis, the second in their "Grey Griffins" series. The series focuses on four children who are surprised to discover that the creatures from their favorite fantasy role playing game are alive and well in their Minnesota town--and that the four of them have a key role in stopping evil from taking over the world. These books are chock-full of adventure, danger, Knights Templar, ancient prophecies, and anything you else you could wish for. It was interesting to me that my one complaint with the book--that evil creatures relentlessly pop up without any introduction or explanation--is the one thing that young readers will probably like best. These books are a thrill-a-minute and will definitely leave you wanting more.

What's your dream?

For the past several years, I have made it a point to read the Reading Together selection so that, even if the particular title may not otherwise interest me, I can speak knowledgably about it to library patrons and others I encounter in our community.

However, because this year's selection, Animal Dreams by Barbara Kingsolver, spoke to me on so many personal levels, I was more compelled than I have ever been before to send an email to several friends in my personal address book, encouraging them to read it. While many of them had already done so and therefore already shared my excitement for it, others were inspired to check it out and have since told me how much they liked it.

The point I'm trying to make is that there are so many different themes beautifully woven into this one story, I think you'll have a hard time not finding a common thread to talk about with your friends, neighbors, or even with the stranger at the grocery store wearing the "What's Your Dream?" button on his/her coat. After all, that's one of the goals of Reading Together...bringing us together with other members of our community we might not otherwise have the occasion to meet.

In addition to the paperback edition, Animal Dreams is available at KPL in large print, audio cassette, and in a Spanish language version.