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Big Library Read: The Four Corners of the Sky by Michael Malone eBook
Susanna Kearsley coming June 5!
Summer Reading Clubs Coming June 1!
OverDrive Next Generation site now live!
New eBook Collection from Freading
CRRL Mobile App: Self Check-out
Big Library Read: The Four Corners of the Sky by Michael Malone eBook
Susanna Kearsley coming June 5!
Summer Reading Clubs Coming June 1!
OverDrive Next Generation site now live!
New eBook Collection from Freading
CRRL Mobile App: Self Check-out

LibraryPoint Blog

Bold Sons of Erin by Owen Parry
Abraham Lincoln -- fiction, Battle of Fredericksburg -- fiction, Beth Solka, Civil War - U.S. -- fiction, espionage, Historical mysteries, LibraryPoint Blog, Shelf Life Blog, Historical Fiction
08/30/2011 - 3:30am
Bold Sons of Erin cover

You have to love living in Fredericksburg! I enjoy walking my dogs through the forest paths of the Fredericksburg Battlefields, but you have to be out of the park by sundown because the park police lock the gate.  One evening I was hurrying down the darkening path before sunset when I heard footsteps behind me.  When I turned around to see who was walking behind me, I saw a Confederate soldier coming out of the shadows of the path.  I was being followed by a ghost and I don’t even believe in ghosts!  I made a mental note to talk to my Supervisor at the library about getting some time off for my mental health.  As I came to the edge of the woods and climbed up the hill into the clearing with a little extra daylight I could see that there were Confederate soldiers milling around everywhere.  I had to be smack dab in the middle of a re-enactment.  Whew! That was relief - scratch the request for a mental health day!

If you love mysteries and the Civil War, then you might enjoy Owen Parry books.  The main character is Major Abel Jones, who is an unassuming tiny man who walks with a limp and uses a cane.  He is a Welsh immigrant to America who serves in the United States army, but previously served in the British army in India, Pakistan, and Afghanistan. Now he is a secret investigator for President Lincoln.  In Bold Sons of Erin, Major Abel is sent by Lincoln to investigate the sudden death of General Stone.  The book begins with Abel arranging to dig up the grave of General Stone.  When it is opened, he finds the body of a young girl who has been stabbed to death buried in the grave of the General. 

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Mable Riley: A Reliable Record of Humdrum, Peril and Romance by Marthe Jocelyn
1900-1909 -- fiction, Canada -- fiction, Farm Life -- fiction, LibraryPoint Blog, organized labor -- fiction, teaching -- fiction, Virginia Johnson, Women's Rights, Shelf Life Blog, unRequired Reading Blog, Gutsy Girl Reads, Into the Past
08/29/2011 - 3:30am
Mable Riley

1901, Ontario, Canada

Riding the train to a small farming community, young Mable and her older—and rather bossily annoying—sister Viola are about to embark on an autumn of possibilities, although certainly everything seems dull as dishwater on the surface. Goodhand Farm, where they will be rooming, seems the same as countless other family dairy farms, and the one-room school where 19-year-old Viola will be teaching seems much like countless others across territory.  But there are some very important details in Marthe Jocelyn’s book, Mabel Riley, that change the dull into the brilliant to illuminate the friction of a swiftly changing world.

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If You Like Cat's Cradle by Kurt Vonnegut
Book Match, LibraryPoint Blog, Mary Buck, Shelf Life Blog, Literary Fiction
08/26/2011 - 8:20am
Cat's Cradle by Kurt Vonnegut

This readalike is in response to a patron's book-match request. If you would like personalized reading recommendations, fill out the book-match form and a librarian will email suggested titles to you. Available for adults, teens, and kids.  You can browse the book matches here.

Cat's Cradle by Kurt Vonnegut: "Cat’s Cradle is Kurt Vonnegut’s satirical commentary on modern man and his madness. An apocalyptic tale of this planet’s ultimate fate, it features a midget as the protagonist, a complete, original theology created by a calypso singer, and a vision of the future that is at once blackly fatalistic and hilariously funny." (Book summary)

If you liked "Cat's Cradle" by Kurt Vonnegut, you might enjoy these other titles for their mix of science fiction, satire and social commentary:

American Gods by Neil Gaiman

"A master of inventive fiction pens the story of an ex-con who is offered a job as a bodyguard for Mr. Wednesday, a trickster and a rogue. Shadow soon learns that his role in the man's schemes are far more dangerous and dark than he could have ever imagined." - catalog summary


 

Catch 22 by Heller

"At the heart of Catch-22 resides the incomparable, malingering bombardier, Yossarian, a hero endlessly inventive in his schemes to save his skin from the horrible chances of war. His efforts are perfectly understandable because as he furiously scrambles, thousands of people he hasn't even met are trying to kill him. His problem is Colonel Cathcart, who keeps raising the number of missions the men must fly to complete their service. Yet if Yossarian makes any attempts to excuse himself from the perilous missions that he is committed to flying, he is trapped by the Great Loyalty Oath Crusade, the hilariously sinister bureaucratic rule from which the book takes its title: a man is considered insane if he willingly continues to fly dangerous combat missions, but if he makes the necessary formal request to be relieved of such missions, the very act of making the request proves that he is sane and therefore ineligible to be relieved."-catalog summary

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