Have a New Kid by Friday

Have a New Kid by Friday

By Dr. Kevin Leman
Parenting Shelves - Lower Level - 649.64 L

Dealing with a strong willed child?  This book is a treasure trove of information, methods and reassurance.  An index of problem behaviors and discipline methods to correct these problems makes up the bulk of the book.  
This is a pretty solid parenting book.  Dr. Leman asks parents to look at their own behavior before attempting to change the behavior of their children with tips like "Say it once and walk away." Some of the advice is repetitive and I can't say that I am a huge fan of the author's sense of humor (I wouldn't call my children ankle biters.) but the techniques worked at my house and for that I am grateful! 

 

Matterhorn

By Karl Marlantes

Adult Fiction Shelves-Main Level – MARLANTES

Having never been in combat, nor even visited Vietnam as a tourist, it will always be trite to claim that I feel as though I understand what it was like to be in the jungles of South Vietnam with the men of Bravo Company and second lieutenant Mellas – but that is precisely how good Karl Marlantes’s novel, Matterhorn truly is.  The poignancy and gripping realism of Marlantes’s first novel is informed and enlightened by his background as a combat-decorated veteran of the Marine Corps (awarded the Navy Cross for his heroism in Vietnam) as well as a Rhodes Scholar and Yale graduate.  “Pager-turner” clichés are much too worn for a novel as well-executed and absorbing as Matterhorn.  Every Vietnam War archetype is present here without ever feeling tired or forced.  Politics, class, and race all play a vital role in the novel, just as they did during the war and still do to this day.  If you haven’t yet, please do yourself the favor of reading what has quickly become the novel of the Vietnam War.  It is enriching, engrossing, and utterly moving – you will be well-rewarded for your efforts here.



Listening for Madeleine

Listening for Madeleine is a pointillist portrait of the Newbury Award-winning author, whose work for both children and adults is among my very favorite. It starts off with a short biography by the editor, but is mostly composed of lots and lots of thoughts by individuals who knew her, gained from letters and interviews. They are divided up by how people knew her: from childhood, as a writer, matriarch, mentor, friend or icon. They include friends from childhood, editors and publishers, writers like T.A. Barron and Mary Pope Osborne, her daughter, granddaughters, and former son-in-law, and lots of people whom she was friends with or mentored over the years. Many people referred to an unflattering profile of L’Engle that was published in the New Yorker in 2004, which I hadn’t read, but which I was able to pull up on Gale’s Biography in Context without any difficulty. (“The Storyteller”, by Cynthia Zarin.) Family members acknowledged the frustration of living with a writer whose published version of their life together – the writer’s perspective, warts airbrushed out – became the version that readers everywhere believed was true; the fictional works inspired by family life felt more true to reality than those published as nonfiction. Outside the family, people were generally horrified that family members were willing to air as much dirty laundry as they did while L’Engle was still alive. But the fact that these discussions are in the book give me the comforting feeling that this isn’t a hagiography, even though most of the people contributing to the anthology cared about her. For all the painful things voiced by her relatives, they were still there caring for her in her increasingly dependent old age. Balancing that were the many, many tales of her writing from the publisher’s side and of her support for young and aspiring writers especially.

The most negative profiles came in the Icons section. These, dealing with L’Engle’s writing, were perhaps ironically tougher for me to read, as a devoted fan of her writing who never met her in person. Jane Yolen, a writer whose work I also love, wrote about her horror at L’Engle’s spoken belief that there is magic in the world, as opposed to Yolen’s use of magic as metaphor in her books. Library professor and lesbian Christine A. Jenkins wrote about how she had to discourage her students from writing about L’Engle because L’Engle fans were almost universally unable to look at her work with anything but uncritical adoration. (Probably guilty as charged, I’m afraid.) She also had understandable problems with L’Engle’s attitudes about homosexuality – which were liberal, I’ve always thought, for someone born in 1918. There was also a final word from Cynthia Zarin, the author of the infamous New Yorker profile, talking about her experience writing the piece, coming at is as a fan but ending up with a piece that many fans found offensive. In any case, fans of L’Engle’s works, critical or uncritical, should enjoy this broad and varied look at her from so many perspectives.

Shakespeare's Tremor and Orwell's Cough

Shakespeare's Tremor and Orwell's Cough: The Medical Lives of Great Writers by John J. Ross, M.D.
New Book Shelves - Upper Level - 820.9 R

This is a fascinating book! Did you know that Shakespeare's handwriting became shakier and shakier throughout his adulthood? He may have had syphilis, and the treatments in the 17th century were quite barbaric. This book gives all the gory details. John Milton went blind, probably due to a detached retina. The book gives a short day-in-the-life snippet of each author's life, followed by a medical fact about him. Some background on the history of the time, treatments of the time, and the author concludes with a diagnosis of the author's malady, and what probably caused it. Chapters can be read independently, so you can pick your way through your favorites in any order you like. One part medical history, one part literary history, all parts unique and interesting!

The Peculiar

The Peculiar by Stefan Bachmann
Youth New Book Shelves – Lower Level - BACHMANN

This is a Cybils Award finalist in the middle grade science fiction/fantasy department. This is also the book that came from the library with the last 30 pages missing – I had to take it back and wait for it to be reordered before I could finish it! If you were one of the two people to check it out before I got it – we have all the pages now.

Not so very long ago, as our story goes, the Faeries invaded England, and there was war. The humans won, but as the faery stayed in the first place because they couldn’t get back, they now have an uneasy coexistence with iron and church bells used to constrain the faeries. Both sides despise the other and despise worst of all the changelings or peculiars, half-breed children. One of our heroes, Bartholomew, is just such a child. He himself could pass for human at a distance, but his little sister Hettie has pointed ears and branches for hair. Both of them stay hidden, as the hatred of peculiars is so deep that lynchings are common. One day, watching from his attic window in a Bath slum, Bartholomew sees a sinister lady in plum velvet with a tiny, wicked face in the back of her head. As he watches, she draws the little neighbor changeling with thistle hair out of his house, and disappears with him in a flurry of black feathers. When Bartholomew’s good intentions go awry, he knows that he and Hettie are in danger as well. Meanwhile, in London, Mr Jelliby is a wealthy and idle member of the Privy Council, which includes some faery members. His conscience is pricked, however, when he watches the faery Mr Lickerish redirect council interest away from the mysterious string of murdered changeling children. As much as he fears trouble, he is drawn into investigating the murders himself. There are some steampunk aspects to the book as well, with a setting that feels 19th-century and clockwork birds used to communicate, clockwork horses, and a dirigible. This is dark fantasy with a whole lot of creepy mystery that kept me on the edge of my seat, and occasionally made me decide to save this for morning and pick something calmer for bedtime reading. It’s definitely not a world I’d want to live in, but it’s beautifully drawn, with characters and setting having equal importance to the exciting plot. I cared about both Bartholomew and Mr Jelliby. I will note that even with the last 30 pages, it does not end conclusively, so those who like to wait until a series is complete to start reading will want to hold off for a bit. There is a whole lot to like packed neatly and cleverly into this book, and I am very glad that it made it to the second round of Cybils considerations.

Major Taylor: Champion Cyclist

Major Taylor: Champion Cyclist
By Lesa Cline-Ransome
Illustrated by James E. Ransome
jBio—Lower Level—Taylor

In the late 1800s in Indianapolis, Indiana a young cycling phenom began his career. “Major” Marshall Taylor was extraordinary for a number of reasons. By age 13, he was the fastest rider in town. In races, no one came close to keeping pace with him.

At the same time that he swept local bike races, society discriminated against him because of his race. Major Taylor overcame the odds. He competed on cycling’s world stage and was the second African-American athlete to become a world champion.

With exciting text and beautiful illustrations, Major Taylor: Champion Cyclist will delight anyone who knows the feeling of freedom that riding a bicycle can bring.

Geek Mom

It’s like Christmas when I ask the librarians to buy something for me, and it shows up on the hold shelf for me. This was purchased by our lovely craft librarian.

Geek Mom by Natania Barron, Kathy Ceceri, Corrina Lawson and Jenny Williams.
New Book Shelves – Upper Level – CRAFTS 745.5 G

Geek Mom is a blog on Wired Magazine, related to the Geek Dad blog. Geek Dad the book came out a couple of years ago (my love got it for Father’s Day, and there are two others that we don’t have), and now there’s also a Geek Mom book. This, too, is full of projects and ideas for geeky parents, but written by the moms. It looks like I never reviewed it, and my memory is a bit hazy, the projects in that book looked awesome, but maybe requiring a bit more oomph in the supplies acquiring and time setting aside than we usually have. Geek Mom has more crafty, cooking and reading adventures than I remember from Geek Dad. There are still projects that involve electronics, explosions and computers, so don’t go thinking that being from moms makes the projects less cool in any way. There is the occasional fun sidebar, with topics like “10 Geeky Instruments We Wouldn’t Want to Live Without”. The first five were the accordion, ukulele, theremin, keytar, and moog synthesizer. I will note that the lute made the list, but the harp did not. Their Imagination chapter includes making a secret lair, steampunk and superhero costume ideas, learning about history through comics, exploring fandom with kids, and roleplaying with kids including recommended role-playing systems. Here my love opines that the Icons gaming system is much more kid-friendly than the Mouse Guard system they recommend, which is based on cute comic book mice but not especially simple. The Curiosity and Learning chapter includes lots of preschooler-friendly ideas, which can be tricky to find in books like these. It includes things like cartography, hosting a time travel party, topology, and linking classical and rock music. “Mothers and the Digital Revolution” covers a host of computer-related topics, including internet safety, screen time limits, website building, a history of computers (going back to when it was a job title!), and using tech for fitness. “Science at Home” has a lot of very fun projects, including self-propelled boats, a DIY lava lamp, a blob, making plasma in the microwave (only for use with microwaves you’re willing to risk losing) and much more. They use borax crystals to make a Cthulu rather than snowflakes. “Food Wizardry” includes directions for fixing a hobbit feast, catching wild yeast for sourdough bread, and a tetris cake and cephalopod cupcakes. Also, an essay on the pleasures of loose tea - yum. The sewing and crafting chapter includes felt monsters, a crocheted amigurumi, natural tie-dye, a battery light-up sculpture, and electric component jewelry. (Didn’t you make jewelry out of the resistors in high school physics?)

That was a very long list, and at that, just a sampling of the many cool projects. They are clearly described, with cost, age, time, and difficulty given at the start of each. Most of the projects are in the $5 to $10 range, with some more expensive and some with ranges depending on how much you want to put into them. The projects start working from about age 3, and some would be interesting up through the teen years, but most are aimed at elementary school aged kids. Yes, there were a few projects that I wasn’t interested in myself, some advice I didn’t quite agree with, but not enough to outweigh the many good ideas. This is an approachable book chock full of appealing ideas for active families to have all sorts of geeky fun together.

A Walk Across the Sun

A Walk aCross the Sun by Corban Addison
Adult New Book Display Main Level - ADDISON

What a great book! This one is highly recommended to adults and mature teens. It's not warm and fuzzy, but just as John Grisham said in his review across the top of the cover, it is beautiful in story and important in message.

It is about two teenage sisters in India whose family die in a tsunami, leaving them orphaned. The same day, they are kidnapped and sold into the Mumbai sex trade.  The sisters are ultimately separated, and the book tells their individual stories.

Then there is Thomas, a lawyer who leaves his high-profile corporate job to work for an NGO that tries to rescue girls from sexual slavery in India.  Thomas and his wife are separated, and she just happens to have returned to her family in India.  The two meet up and try to salvage their marriage.

I can't give away the whole story, but Thomas's story intertwines with that of the sisters'.  Will have be able to rescue them?  Will the sisters be reunited?

As disgusted as I was reading about human trafficking, I learned a lot from this story. I was moved by the plight of the sisters and the good intentions of the non-profits who work to help girls in their situation.  I was also horrified at the corruption in the Indian legal system and the issues of jurisdiction when the problem crosses borders.  Even those who want to help are hindered by legalities, loopholes, and international politics.

It's a reasonably-sized book at less than 400 pages, but its message is huge and worth hearing.  It's a riveting story, and although this is fiction, I'm afraid it is all too a reality in many young girls' lives.

Shall I Knit You a Hat?

Shall I Knit You a Hat? by Kate Klise. Illustrated by M. Sarah Klise.
Youth Holiday – Lower Level – K

When Mother Rabbit hears that a giant blizzard is expected for Christmas Eve, she knits Little Rabbit a hat to keep his long ears warm. He loves it so much that he asks if they can make hats for all their friends. They go out to the Market together, where all their friends are, and find sneaky ways to measure them all – the horse, the dog, the goose, the cat, the squirrel and the deer. Then they go home, where Little Rabbit takes the lead in designing the hats. He puts great effort into making hats just right for each friend, but of course, as Christmas is only a few days away, they can’t be all knit, and incorporate some household objects along with the knitting. Oh, the looks on the poor animals’ faces when they first see themselves in the mirror that Little Rabbit brings along with the gifts. Soon, however, it starts to snow, and all the animals realize how warm they are despite it and how perfectly suited the hats are to them. The bright acrylic illustrations make the story even cozier. This is a wonderful story of friendship and generosity, yarn and carrot cake for Christmas. It’s a little wordy for toddlers, but perfect for preschoolers through early elementary – both my 3 and 8-year old are loving it this season.

There are several more books about Little Rabbit, including

Why Do You Cry?
Imagine Harry
Little Rabbit and the Night Mare
Little Rabbit and the Meanest Mother on Earth
And newly published this year in a similar vein,
Grammy Lamby and the Secret Handshake.

The Lucifer Effect

The Lucifer Effect by Philip Zimbardo
Adult Non-Fiction-Upper Level 155.9 Z

Human beings (and social psychologists in particular) have often wondered what drives people to do horrible things. Are the situations we find ourselves in partially to blame for why normal people do morally questionable things? Famed psychologist Philip Zimbardo’s The Lucifer Effect: Understanding How Good People Turn Evil examines how situational forces and group interaction can cause the average person to commit inhumane acts. Zimbardo is best known for the Stanford Prison Experiment in August 1971 which the majority of this book discusses in detail. In this experiment, Zimbardo took a group of college volunteers and randomly divided them up into “inmate” and “guard” groups while inside a mock prison environment. To complete the illusion, the guards were dressed in realistic guard attire and carried around wooden clubs while the inmates were called by numbers instead of names and were also locked up at night. Zimbardo was interested in seeing how much a certain setting or situation contributes to a person’s actions and sense of identity.

The experiment did not take long to spiral out of control. While the guards were not allowed to physically hurt the inmates, they found other ways of asserting their authority. The guards took away food, forced the inmates to do repeated pushups, and committed other dehumanizing acts. The inmates tried different techniques to rebel such as hunger strikes and blocking the doors to their cells. The experiment was supposed to run for two weeks but was stopped after six days. The participants had completely disappeared into their roles. In the rest of the book, Zimbardo applies his findings to more current events such as the Abu Ghraib prisoner abuse scandal and discusses how the system failed the people involved. It appears that the book concludes that most people can be coerced into committing horrible acts under the right circumstances if the setting encourages it or does nothing to prevent bad actions. But all hope is not lost as Zimbardo offers steps to help people and society become more humane in order to make sure the situational factors which cause these atrocities can be lessened over time. All in all, a fascinating read for anyone who is curious about why mankind often strays from a nobler path.

Here Comes Hortense!

Here Comes Hortense! by Heather Hartt-Sussman
Picture Book Shelves Lower Level - HAR

I love this book! A little boy is taken to an amusement park by his Nana and her new husband Bob. Bob's granddaughter Hortense is there too. Hortense and Nana hit it off and ride all the scariest rides. Bob and the boy (who I don't think is ever named) prefer to stay closer to the ground, so they hang out together. The boy is jealous of the time Hortense is spending with Nana. The ending is very sweet - I won't give it away. The people in the illustrations are very cartoony with huge heads and mouths, and the action of the amusement park is well-captured. This is a very cute, modern story with a lot to discuss in the picture details.

The Shoemaker’s Wife

The Shoemaker’s Wife by Adriana Trigiani. Narrated by Annabella Sciorra and Adriana Trigiani.
CD Book Shelves – Main Level - TRIGIANI

I’ve enjoyed many Adriana Trigiani books in the past – Rococo is the only one I’ve reviewed here, but I’ve read 5 or 6 others that I can think of off the top of my head. Naturally, I went for this one, though I waited for the hold list here at the library calmed down a little.

This one is an epic based on the lives of her grandparents that Trigiani has been researching for 20 years. We meet Enza and Ciro as they are both teenagers in Alpine Italy. Enza is the responsible oldest daughter of a large brood; Ciro is the youngest of two, left with his brother at a convent after their father dies. It’s love at first sight when Enza and Ciro first meet as Ciro is digging Enza’s baby sister’s grave, but before they can meet again, Ciro is to emigrate to America. Enza and her father travel to America somewhat later, knowing nothing of Ciro’s fate. They are just hoping to earn enough money in the U.S. to build their family a house before returning home. In America, Ciro is apprenticed to a shoemaker in Little Italy, while Enza labors in a sweatshop in New Jersey, before finding a better job in the Metropolitan Opera’s costume shop, sewing for Caruso. After years of working, romances with other people, and Ciro fighting in World War I, they finally marry, but decide to stay in America rather than trying to return to Italy. As there are plenty of shoemakers in New York City, they move to the Iron Range in Minnesota, where Ciro and his fellow former apprentice become the only shoemakers to the miners.

Maybe if I’d remembered more of the reviews I read, I wouldn’t have been disappointed – but I was expecting Enza and Ciro to be married for most of a book titled “The Shoemaker’s Wife.” Instead, they got married about disc 9 of 12. Somehow, I was strongly reminded of L.M. Montgomery’s Anne of Green Gables series, and wished that this, too, divided the independent life, the courting, starting married life and having children into separate books. While I enjoyed the earlier parts, I felt like the last part, the part that was what I was expecting the book to be about, was rushed through, with years skipped over without transition. There were a few instances – Ciro’s first romance, and every upholstered item being covered in chenille – where I wondered about the historical accuracy, though it’s obvious that a lot of research went into it. Trigiani writes here, too, with a more emotional style than in her other books. I’m sure it’s deliberate, but sometimes when I could hear the violins in the background, it was a bit much for me. Writing along the lines of “If only Enza had known that she would never see her mother again, she would have hugged her longer” as part of a whole paragraph along those lines. It was Trigiani’s decision also, apparently, to switch to narrating the book partway through. I understood this decision a little more when I listened to her talk about it in the interview at the end, but it was initially very jarring to hear the characters talking in completely different voices, with New York accents while being described in the text as having strong Italian accents. That being said, while I personally preferred Sciorra’s narration, Trigiani read more expressively than many authors I’ve heard.

Despite its flaws, I sincerely cared about Ciro and Enza and their friends. Along with the Trigiani elements that I’d expect – the Italian family in America, the food, and the transformational trip back to Italy – there’s a lot of Caruso love, and a strong feeling both for the hardships that drove Italians to immigrate and the experience they had when here. If you’re in the mood to curl up with a historical novel set mostly only a hundred years ago, this is a fine choice.

Ruby Sparks

Ruby Sparks
New DVD Shelves – Main Level – Comedy RUB

Ruby Sparks is a clever and off-beat romantic comedy. It is the story of Calvin, a genius writer who published his first book while in high school. However, he is currently fighting both writer’s block and loneliness. He starts writing about his dream girl, Ruby, and one day she actually appears in his apartment. Calvin thinks he is going crazy until he realizes everyone else can see and hear Ruby as well; she is a real person. The rest of the film covers the ups and downs of their relationship as Calvin also deals with his own insecurities. Overall, Ruby Sparks is a unique love story with good performances by the two main actors, Paul Dano and Zoe Kazan. Kazan, granddaughter of Elia Kazan, also wrote and produced the film and it will be interesting to see what she does next as a filmmaker and actress.

The Richest Woman in America

The Richest Woman in America: Hetty Green in the Gilded Age
by Janet Wallach Upper Level New Book - BIO Green

Hetty Green should be at the top of the list of feminist icons. From the 1870's until her death in 1916, she exemplified the feminist ideal in many ways; she ran her own business, lived her life her by her own rules, and went down to Wall Street every morning and beat the men at their own game on their own turf. Her business acumen earned the respect of contemporaries such as J.P. Morgan, John D. Rockefeller, and Andrew Carnegie. She saved New York City from bankrupcy several times by loaning it money at below-market rates. And yet if she is remembered today at all, it is as "the witch of Wall Street", one of history's biggest misers.

In "The Richest Woman in America" Janet Wallach traces Hetty Green's life back to her Quaker upbringing that put her forever at odds with the media's idea of how women of her class should behave. They couldn't comprehend her plain personal tastes in someone with so much money. She simply didn't care about stylish gowns, opulent mansions, and lavish parties. And they mocked her relentlessly for it, ignoring the millions she spent building libraries and hospitals, endowing colleges, and helping those who genuinely needed it.

Hetty Green isn't remembered as one of the great american proto-feminists and iconoclasts because she never had time for the movement's marches and speeches and publicity stunts. She was too busy living the life that they wanted women to have the opportunity to lead. A fascinating life ably chronicled by Janet Wallach.

I Kissed the Baby

I Kissed the Baby by Mary Murphy.
Picture Books - Lower Level - MUR

Bold pictures, mostly white on a black background, with shots of bright yellow and pink, illustrate this story. Pond animals including fish, birds, a squirrel, and insects, all join to welcome a new baby. Each spread features two animals, the first asking the other a question about the baby: “I tickled the baby! Did you tickle the baby?” “Yes! I tickled the baby, the wriggly giggly thing!” Finally, at the end, we meet the adorable duckling that everyone is so excited about. Though it isn’t rhymed text, lots of attention is paid to the sound of the words for reading aloud. The short text and bold images make it perfect for reading to babies and toddlers, but it was still fun enough for my eight-year-old to want to read it to his sister, and she both asked for it and read it to herself over and over again. I often get asked about recommended books for new baby gifts, and this is a great one. It’s still in print in board book, which is ideal for the target age, and you can still find it in hardcover if you look.

Here are other board book favorites about baby love just right for new babies:
Everywhere Babies by Susan Meyers. Illustrated by Marla Frazee.
Picture Books - Lower Level - MEY

Hush, Little Baby by Marla Frazee.
Picture Books - Lower Level - FRA

Snuggle Puppy by Sandra Boynton.
Board Book Bins - Lower Level

All of Baby Nose to Toes by Victoria Adler. Illustrated by Hiroe Nakata.
Picture Books - Lower Level - ADL

Son

Son by Lois Lowry
Teen Zone New Fiction – Main Level – LOWRY

In this sequel to The Giver, Lois Lowry pulls together characters from the previous three books in ‘The Giver Quartet’ in a satisfying conclusion. Following Claire, a teenage girl chosen to be a ‘birthmother’, Son tells the tale of what happens when this young girl is unable to come to terms with being separated from her baby. Risking everything to be reunited with her son, Claire finds herself in new, strange places that are nothing like the community in which she was raised.

Readers young and old who loved any or all books in ‘The Giver Quartet’ will enjoy this page-turner that brings them back to the dystopia first created in The Giver. In this long-awaited conclusion, Lowry takes readers on an emotional and nostalgic journey that brings many of the quartet’s loose ends together at last.

The Convicts

The Convicts by Iain Lawrence
Teen Zone Fiction-Main Level LAWRENCE


Tom Tin’s life is about to get horribly worse. A young teen in 19th century London, Tom has already experienced the death of his sister, the ensuing madness of his mother, and finally Tom has to watch his father being thrown in debtor’s prison. Tom’s fortunes briefly appear to be turning around when he finds a diamond on the shoreline. However, Tom’s diamond is lost during a botched grave robbing attempt while soon afterwards a case of mistaken identity and false accusations will put Tom in a prison ship for boys. Here, he will have to find the strength to simply survive let alone possibly escape.

The Convicts by Iain Lawrence is the first part of a trilogy concerning Tom Tin and his friends. The novel is an excellent book for readers who are looking for a story with adventure or one that has characters overcoming adversity and changing for the better. Tom does not start out as a particularly noble young boy. He is more than a little selfish, self-serving, and sometimes even cruel. By the end however, he starts to value and look out for his friends and family more than before his ordeal. An enjoyable historical fiction read for any age.

Between

Between by Jessica Warman
Teen Zone Fiction - Main Level - Warman

Liz Valchar dies on her 18th birthday, and then spends the next several months with another dead teenager. They visit old memories and watch their family and friends, trying to figure out what happened to them. Liz and her friends are all rich, privileged teens with secrets and problems they hide from each other - and even from themselves in some cases.

Themes and subjects include: death, teens, anorexia, wealth, drowning, drug use, ghosts, afterlife, murder, and unsolved crimes. In other words, it is filled with lots of angst, fear, and worry, but ultimately peace and redemption. This haunting novel is recommended to mature teens and adults.

The Iron Wyrm Affair

The Iron Wyrm Affair. Bannon and Clare Book 1. by Lilith Saintcrow.
Adult New Books – Main Level – SCI FI SAINTCROW

The Iron Wyrm Affair drops us into the middle of a fight scene in a complex alternate-Victorian steampunk world. I think it was the complexity of this world that made the first couple of chapters feel slow to me, even though it started off with action and never slowed down. Emma Bannon is a top-level sorceress, a Prima, in service to Queen Victrix, current vessel of the ancient spirit Britannia. Emma is talented, beautiful, fashionable, and fiercely intelligent and has fought her way up from the gutter to be the only Prima among several male Primes. (Though she’s fashionable because she wants to be, her jewelry stores power for her and is always chosen carefully as an ensemble.) As our story begins, she’s searching for Archibald Clare, an unlicensed mentath. Here we must learn that a mentath is someone along the order of Sherlock Holmes, more intelligent than your standard-issue genius, who notices details without trying, processing them into patterns, and who will go crazy without enough information to process. Clare, having lost his license, is indeed on the verge of insanity, but Bannon is looking for him because he is the last mentath of any kind to be found in London, the rest having been recently murdered. Bannon’s out to protect Clare, but as long as he’s in her house, he might as well be useful – and all the murdered mentaths are the first pieces of a dark puzzle that leads to a threat against Queen Victrix herself. (Here I confess that I was did double takes the whole book, trying to keep straight that Bannon meant Emma and Clare, Archibald – I kept want Clare to be the woman. Oy.) Bannon is assisted by a single Shield, Mikal, a man with yellow eyes and a dark past, whom Bannon both can’t completely trust and can’t stop being attracted to (but not in a romance-novel, can’t focus on anything else kind of way, and we never see inside his head). As mentaths and sorcerers don’t really work well in close proximity, Bannon hires Ventinelli, an assassin whom Clare rightly immediately pegs as an aristocrat hiding as gutter scum, to act as Clare’s bodyguard. Bannon and Clare set off in opposite directions, she investigating the magical murder of another sorcerer as she was trying to interrogate him, and he to find out the reason there are suddenly no Prussian capacitors on the market, a line of investigation which leads to large clockwork war spiders. The combination of magic and Holmesian mystery is intriguing, the setting brought beautifully to life, the characters interesting. It’s not as funny as Gail Carriger’s Soulless, and deals much more with the dark and seamy side of politics, though with somewhat fewer serious underlying issues thanThe Iron Duke There are dragons and griffons here, rather than werewolves, vampires, or zombies. It still worked very well as a steampunk vision, and I’d look forward to reading more of Bannon and Clare’s adventures. It’s written for adults, and though the language is a little off-color, there’s nothing here in the way of sex or violence that action-loving teens would find exceptionable.

Find a Cow Now!

Find a Cow Now! by Janet Stevens & Susan Stevens Crummel
Youth New Book Shelves--Lower Level--STE

When a cattle dog gets tired of lying around his city house, he begins to throw chairs and shake rugs. This aggravates the family parakeet, who tells the cattle dog that he's supposed to herd cows. The parakeet, full of half-baked wisdom, does not know what a cow is but tells the cattle dog that cows live in the country. This sends the cattle dog on a journey to the country where he tries to herd a variety of farm animals until he finally gets it right.

Find a Cow Now! is a hilarious book that will delight children and adults alike. The illustrations are so beautiful and detailed that children will want to examine them after the story has ended. This is an especially good story to read aloud since it features a variety of animal noises and character dialogue. A truly wonderful read!