LibraryPoint Blog

"Powered by ideas, ideals, and by idealism." This is one of the first few lines in the mission statement of Project Gutenberg, a Web site stating that it is the first—and largest—single collection of free eBooks. Another tidbit worth mentioning is the fact that it is completely run by volunteers, and there are no dues or membership requirements. While they do gladly accept donations and new volunteers, the site makes its main goal clear: “...provide as many eBooks in as many formats as possible for the entire world to read in as many languages as possible.”

In its first chapters, Sweet Tooth begins like Dickens’ David Copperfield.  Serena Frome (rhymes with Plume) tells of her unremarkable childhood and how she ends up working as a spy for Britain’s MI5. With her blonde and beautiful looks, she is a bit of a Bond Girl and wreaks havoc on the men around her.

A good all-around student, Serena devours novels and wants to do an English degree in a small university, but her housewife mother, in an uncharacteristic fit of feminism, tells her she has a chance of making something of herself by going to Cambridge and doing “maths.” 

Mark your calendars!  You will definitely want to visit the England Run Branch between February 26 and April 24, 2013.  The Central Rappahannock Regional Library system is one of only ten libraries in the country to successfully apply for the grant-funded, museum-quality science exhibit, Discover Earth: A Century of Change!

What's wrong with this story:

A father tells the authorities his daughter can do impossible things AND the authorities believe him. 
A soon-to-be bride promises to give her future baby away to a TROLL. 
Said bride agrees to marry the man who's threatened to kill her if she can't keep doing the impossible. 
What would a troll do with a baby anyhow, and why would he give her all that spun gold for a tiny ring? 
Why doesn't the heroine do ANYTHING to get herself out of this predicament?!

This old fairy tale is such a ridiculous story that the author wanted to fix it. So Vivian Vande Velde set out to do so six different ways in The Rumpelstiltskin Problem. The characters never come out the same in these retellings. The troll in "A Fairy Tale in Bad Taste" has gruesome appetites. "Straw Into Gold" has our beauty and her father resorting to an elaborate con game to keep from starving to death in the days before Social Security or insurance.

We invite you to try out our new Web-based library catalog, powered by Bibliocommons. If you have longed for more robust searching and sharing options than what our current catalog offers, you will love the new features debuted here.

You will be able to do things like...
1. Enter a search term like “kids dvds” and receive an appropriate list of results.
2. See at a glance all of your current, pending (with the next due date), and overdue items out.
3. Rate items, share reviews, and contribute content like video trailers about your favorite books.
4. See new titles added to the catalog each day and what is on order.
5. Create lists of your favorite items in any topic and share it with others.
...and much more!

Tom Bissell's Magic Hours: Essays on Creators and Creations represents the best of what an essay collection can offer: incisive observations about a wide range of intriguing topics, intelligent social commentary that refrains from didacticism, and a good sense of comedic timing. Bissell's essays are characterized by impressive eclecticism. He discusses established cultural figures like Ernest Hemingway, David Foster Wallace, and Werner Herzog, as well as less conventional subjects, such as Tommy Wiseau (the auteur responsible for the cult film The Room), the Underground Literary Alliance, and Jennifer Hale, “the Queen of Video-game Voice-over.” While these topics might seem incurably disparate, Bissell's interest in the process and consequences of creation provides a framework which links them together.

Do you long for a library catalog with more robust searching options, social networking, and reading recommendations? Are you a fan of Amazon or Goodreads? If so, we think you will love the new catalog that we will be unveiling soon. Check back here on Monday for more details and the link to try it out. We can’t wait until you experience the CRRL’s new way to connect with the library.

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.

The Hobbit, or, There and Back Again by J.R.R. Tolkien: Bilbo Baggins, a respectable, well-to-do hobbit, lives comfortably in his hobbit-hole until the day the wandering wizard Gandalf chooses him to take part in an adventure from which he may never return.

If you liked The Hobbit, or, There and Back Again, you may also like these titles (for adults):

The Color of Magic by Terry Pratchett

The Coming of Conan the Cimmerian by Robert E. Howard

Start the New Year by joining the CRRL in giving a wonderful book—or two or twenty—to those who may not be familiar with the joys of reading.  Sign up by January 23, 2013, to receive multiple copies of amazing books.  The only catch: they cannot be resold. Neither are they to keep for yourself or your bibliophile friends.  They are to be given away with joyful hearts, as an invitation to the world of reading.  There’s no charge to be a book giver, but you do need to apply.

Legends of Zita the Spacegirl is Ben Hatke's second comic book about a gutsy gal who just happens to be lost in the universe. Zita has already saved the planet Scriptorus and is now on a publicity tour, hopping from world to world to shake hands and answer questions from all sorts of alien beings.