LibraryPoint Blog

You’ve probably encountered them - big flashing warning boxes on websites that inform you that your computer is infected with hundreds of viruses or malware or some such.  Scary, right?  You don’t want your computer to be infected with anything!  And these nice people are offering to scan your computer to clean it with their free download - how thoughtful!  So you click yes, please clean my computer, and it all goes downhill from there.

No one really liked Duny in A Wizard of Earthsea by Ursula K. Le Guin. The boy was wild, proud, and full of temper-- well-suited to the company of the goats he herded. Then came the day when he overheard his aunt chanting a spell to call her goat down from the roof of her house. He remembered the rhyme and later spoke it to his own herd:

"Noth hierth malk man hiolk han merth han!"

The first time he said it, they came to him all together, staring with their yellow eyes. Duny laughed and shouted the rhyme again. They pushed towards him with their thick, ridged horns. Duny ran all the way to town with the goats close beside. The villagers laughed at him and cursed the animals.

Which is cooler: Finding the answer to life’s most important question using brain power or Google? Mr. Penumbra’s 24-Hour Bookstore is optimistic about the future of technology and people working together as it looks at the question of immortality. In the novel, friends care about each other. A multi-generational fellowship forms. Two young couples get together. Read deeply and follow the clues to solve the mystery of the Unbroken Spine left by the fifteenth-century printer Griffo Gerritszoon. This novel is a mystery, but it is also about the love of books, whether you find them in the Central Rappahannock Regional Library; a big-box store like Barnes & Noble; a local, independent bookstore like The Griffin; or the quiet little stores built into our Kindles and Nooks.

The Ojibwa trappers had come to trade with the villagers on Spirit Island, but what they saw caused them to turn their boats around and head for home as quickly as they could.  The entire island seemed empty of life. Smallpox, the terrible illness for which the Native Americans had little immunity, had wiped out everyone. Well, almost everyone. Still alive and crawling through the ruins was a baby girl, all alone.

Omakayas, or Little Frog, was soon adopted into another Ojibwa family on Lake Superior’s Madeline Island.  Her life is as rich and full as that of another beloved book character, Laura Ingalls, and there are many similarities between the stories, including the children’s delight in nature and wild creatures.. Omakayas’ family’s everyday activities and celebrations and tragedies are carefully set down, from season to season.  The Birchbark House is foremost a very well-written story with believable, lovable and intriguing characters, including Omakayas’ annoyingly greedy little brother and beautiful but sometimes cold-hearted big sister.  Older generations are also well-represented.  The grandmother, a gifted healer, shares stories of long-ago, and her dreams are filled with omens of things to come and solutions to real-life problems given by the spirit world.

One of my favorite customers called me to tell me that he loved the book Until Tuesday.  I am sure that this story about a veteran spoke to him since he is also a veteran who happens to love dogs. 

Until Tuesday is the true story of a highly-decorated Iraqi war veteran who returns home as a war hero.  However, Luis Carlos Montalvan has such incredible injuries to his body and his psyche that he cannot cope with everyday life. He hovers on the brink of suicide until he meets Tuesday, a golden retriever who also had an emotionally difficult journey to get to Luis.

History and gardening fans get together April 20 through 27, 2013, throughout the Commonwealth to tour gardens of houses great and small from the Tidewater area to the Highlands. The Rappahannock Valley portion of the tour will be held Tuesday, April 23, in the Fredericksburg area, including Stafford County:

"To celebrate the anniversary – this tour will feature homes that were opened 80 years ago! Featured locations include Belmont in Falmouth, Virginia, The Snowden House, Chatham, Brompton and Fall Hill. All of these properties enjoy spectacular views of the area and the Rappahannock."

Tours will be offered in different venues throughout the state through Saturday, April 27. Check out the Garden Club of Virginia's Web site for information on all the tours and check out books from the library featuring homes and gardens in the Old Dominion.

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.

World War Z by Max Brooks: "Brooks tells the story of the world's desperate battle against the zombie threat with a series of first-person accounts "as told to the author" by various characters around the world. A Chinese doctor encounters one of the earliest zombie cases at a time when the Chinese government is ruthlessly suppressing any information about the outbreak that will soon spread across the globe. The tale then follows the outbreak via testimony of smugglers, intelligence officials, military personnel and many others who struggle to defeat the zombie menace." (Publisher's Weekly)

If you enjoyed World War Z and other books dealing with pandemics and global menaces, here are some other novels you may enjoy:

Death Troopers by Joe Schreiber
When the Imperial prison barge Purge breaks down in a distant, uninhabited part of space, its only hope appears to lie with a Star Destroyer found drifting, derelict, and seemingly abandoned. But soon after a boarding party returns from a scavenging expedition, a horrific disease breaks out and takes the lives of all but a half-dozen survivors whose only option forces them to return to the Star Destroyer--and the soulless, unstoppable dead waiting aboard its vast emptiness. (worldcat.org)

Feed by Mira Grant
The year was 2014. We had cured cancer. We had beat the common cold. But in doing so we created something new, something terrible that no one could stop. The infection spread, virus blocks taking over bodies and minds with one, unstoppable command: FEED. NOW, twenty years after the Rising, Georgia and Shaun Mason are on the trail of the biggest story of their lives-the dark conspiracy behind the infected. The truth will out, even if it kills them. (catalog description)

One of the most popular humanitarian nonfiction books of the 2000s was Greg Mortenson’s best seller Three Cups of Tea.  Three Cups of Tea was marketed as a call for humanitarian aid to impoverished Central Asian nations such as Pakistan and Afghanistan, but Mortenson’s life story of dedicating himself to providing education to the people of Central Asia was the emotional connection that sold many readers on the book.  Mortenson traveled across the U.S., giving lectures, setting up charities to provide money for his Central Asia Institute (CAI), and appearing on numerous talk shows to promote his book.  As beautiful as his humanitarian mission seemed, it was ultimately revealed as too good to be true by writer Jon Krakauer, whose expose Three Cups of Deceit explored the lies in Mortenson’s story and the lack of effectiveness in the CAI’s schools program.  Although Three Cups of Deceit can be a depressing read at times, it also makes for a fascinating study in media awareness and image manipulation.

In celebration of National Library Week, April 14-20, we're offering a week free of fines!

There will be no late charges for overdue materials returned April 14-20.

Don't know what to do with your newfound fortune? You can spend all the money you saved at our HUGE spring book sale, beginning Saturday, April 20 (Friends preview Friday, April 19)!