Library Notes week of April 27

Congratulations to the winners in the annual Tulip Poster raffle. The Friends of the Library had another successful raffle to raise funds for the library. There were lots of prizes besides the beautiful framed poster, I hope you were lucky enough to win one.

We are getting in lots of new books. Maybe one of these will interest you.

Death of a Witch by M.C. Beaton. The Scottish Highlands most stubborn bachelor returns to his home village of Lochdubh from a disappointing vacation to discover a witch stirring up trouble. To Macbeth's annoyance, the sex-starved local men have fallen under the spell of Catriona Beldame, who turns out to be a runaway bride with a shady past. Macbeth longs to prove she's selling illegal remedies for sexual dysfunction, and warns her to stop if she is. Macbeth gets a shock when someone murders Beldame and sets her house on fire—soon after Macbeth is overheard to say he'd like to kill her.

The Little Giant of Aberdeen County by Tiffany Baker. In an upstate New York backwater, Truly has a bleak existence with her depressed father and her china-doll–like sister, Serena Jane. Truly grows at an astonishing rate—her girth the result of a pituitary gland problem—and after her father dies when Truly is 12, Truly is sloughed off to the Dyersons, a hapless farming family. She befriends the Dyersons' outcast daughter, Amelia, and later leaves her beloved Dyerson farm to take care of Serena Jane's husband and son after Serena Jane leaves them. Haunting the margins of Truly's story is that of Tabitha Dyerson, a rumored witch whose secrets afford a breathtaking role reversal for Truly.

Cape Disappointment by Earl Emerson. A man and a woman, their coastal getaway interrupted, say goodbye on an isolated landing strip in Washington State. She then calls from the air. And he watches from the base of a lighthouse as the plane, with eleven people on board, plummets into the steely gray sea. The man remembering this tragic event is in a hospital room, the victim of a bombing weeks after the crash. In this extraordinary thriller by award-winning author Earl Emerson, Seattle private eye Thomas Black returns after more than a decade–and he must put together the shattered fragments of his life. His life and his country depend on it.

Library Notes Week of April 13

This is National Library Week. First celebrated in 1958, it is an annual celebration of the contributions of our nation’s libraries and librarians.

Secretary of State Sam Reed encourages Washington citizens to help celebrate National Library Week by visiting and using their local library. “Now more than ever, libraries play a crucial role throughout Washington and America,” Reed said. “They not only provide many useful resources and services, they open up new worlds and help make lifelong learning possible. What better way for people to celebrate National Library Week than by visiting a local library and taking advantage of the many services offered?”

Washington State Librarian Jan Walsh agrees, pointing out that libraries have tremendous civic, cultural and economic value. “Everyone benefits by using libraries, especially during these tough economic times,” Walsh said. “A library can save people a lot of money. Buying books, CDs and DVDs can be expensive. But these same books, CDs and DVDs are free if you have a library card.”

Walsh pointed out that libraries are much more than books. “They give people access to newspapers and periodicals, CDs and DVDs, computers and the Internet, historical documents and so much more.”

If you haven’t visited our library lately you are missing out!! Why not stop in today.

Ghost at Work by Carolyn Hart. When Bailey Ruth Raeburn and her husband die on their cabin cruiser during a storm, Bailey joins the heavenly host. Later, she returns to earth via the Rescue Express to help the rector's wife, Kathleen Abbott. After finding the body of a dead man on her back porch, Kathleen fears either she or her husband might be accused of the crime. Bailey Ruth helps her to move the body, inaugurating a search for the killer that proves difficult as the victim was despised by many. As Bailey Ruth uncovers more than one crime, she must contend with her own violations of the Precepts for Earthly Visitation and adjust to her powers on earth.

Fire and Ice by Julie Garwood. Sophie Rose, a tough and determined newspaper reporter, is the daughter of Bobby Rose, who happens to be a notorious big-time thief sought by every law-enforcement agency in the country. When the major Chicago daily where she works insists she write an exposé about her roguish father, Sophie refuses, quits her job, and goes to work at a small newspaper. Far from her onetime high-powered crime beat, she now covers local personalities such as the quirky winner of several area 5K runs whose trademark is goofy red socks.

Oolong Dead by Laura Childs. Indigo Tea Shop proprietor Theodosia Browning and her horse, Captain Harley, encounter murder most unsavory during the annual Charleston Point-to-Point Race. Shortly after clearing a jump, they're spooked by encountering the corpse of Abby Davis, an evening TV news anchor, who's been shot through the forehead.

Library Notes week of March 30

Are you curious about the President’s stimulus package? We had the document – all 1434 pages—donated to us. Stop in if you want to wade through it. Also, April is National Poetry Month. If you go to http://www.poets.org/ you can get a poem a day sent to your e-mail. What a great way to celebrate!

We have lots of poetry titles. Below are just a few of the most recent we have in our collection.

Ballistics by Bill Collins. Two-term U.S. Poet Laureate touches on love, death, solitude, youth and aging in this collection of poetry. His tongue-in-cheek assault on the gloom and doubt in our poetry is his remedy for the loneliness that (even for him) shadows all poems: this is a poem, not a novel, he laments, and the only characters here are you and I,/ alone in an imaginary room/ which will disappear after a few more lines.

The Blue Hour of the Day by Lorna Crozier. Lorna Crozier has become one of Canada’s most beloved poets, receiving high acclaim and numerous awards. In this definitive selection of poems, Crozier’s trademark investigations of family, spirituality, love’s fierce attachments, and bereavement and loss have been given a new framework.

The Way It Is by William Stafford. His widely anthologized "Ceremony," "Thinking for Berky," and "Traveling through the Dark" are here, along with others, including "Adults Only," which begins, "Animals own a fur world; / people own worlds that are variously, pleasingly bare." A writer of silence, loss, memory, and conviction, Stafford wrote a poem almost every morning, rising at four to eat toast and compose. This is a part of his myth that the Stafford industry--other poets, workshop leaders, old friends--agrees is admirable, the hard-working farmhand who beats the cows to the dairy barn.