Jeannie Recommends "Girls and their Horses"

A great American Girl book. Age 8 and older.

Jeannie Recommends "Brothers Forever"

True story of two men who laid down their lives for America; their friendship, courage and families. A new Adult biography.

Jeannie recommends "Fearless"

This biography is the best I’ve read! I feel lucky to have gotten to know Adam Brown through this book. An Adult recommendation.

Beth recommends "Bellweather Rhapsody"

Part mystery, part coming-of-age, part horror – and absolutely wonderful story-telling – Bellweather Rhapsody by Kate Racculia is hard to categorize and this reader found it impossible to put down.  The characters lingered in my mind long after I finished reading.  Statewide - an annual music convention featuring the top high school talent in New York - occurs one weekend each year at the Bellweather, a hotel in the Catskills which has seen better days.  Definitely not one of those better days occurred 15 years ago, when it was the scene of a grisly murder-suicide.  The action  takes place during one weekend and features some very engaging  characters, each harboring his or her own secrets – twins Alice and Rabbit Hatmaker, their chaperone Natalie, their conducter Fisher, the evil head of the conference, Viola, the missing prodigy Jill, and a sad, elderly  concierge who has seen it all.   Into this mix add Minnie who, as a child, witnessed the tragedy in Room 712 years ago.  The atmosphere of the creepy, worn hotel and the imminent snowstorm add just the perfect touch of shiver. 

Recommended for Adults and Young Adults

Kate recommends "The Thing with Feathers"

In his nonfiction book The Thing with Feathers, author Noah Strycker explores a variety of fascinating bird behaviors and compares them to human thoughts, emotions, and actions.  Believe it or not, it’s a real page-turner!  From Bowerbirds that spend months decorating their nests to impress the females to apparent altruism expressed by wrens, the author makes bird watching seem like an incredibly stimulating and rewarding hobby.  Though the book has no pictures, the author references several YouTube videos that show exactly the birds and actions he is describing.  This book can make a person view the birds they see around them every day in a startling new light.

Recommended for adults and young adults.

Beth recommends: "The Sixth Extinction: An Unnatural History"

There have been five major extinctions in the history of our planet, eliminating large percentages of species each time.  Natural history writer and reporter Elizabeth Kolbert traveled around the world to observe and document a sixth extinction in the making.  The cause this time?  Us.  Human beings.  With our existence, mobility, creativity, appetites - as well as greed and careless use of resources -  we are changing the environment faster than evolution can keep pace.  It is fascinating being out in the field with Kolbert, whether it is searching for golden frogs in Panama, climbing a mountain in the Amazon, marveling at a coral reef, or visiting a bat cave – but the scientific observations of the researchers she spends time with are sobering and disturbing.  I highly recommend this book for its wealth of interesting information and its insight into the losses we can expect in the future if we don’t make significant changes now.

Recommended for adults, young adults

Kathy recommends "Elizabeth the First Wife"

Kathy recommends “Elizabeth the First Wife”

Elizabeth Lancaster, an English professor at Pasadena City College, finds her perfectly dull but perfectly orchestrated life upended one summer by three men: her movie-star ex-husband, a charming political operative, and William Shakespeare. Until now, she’d been content living in the shadow of her high-profile and highly accomplished family. Then her college boyfriend and one-time husband of seventeen months, A-list action star FX Fahey, shows up with a job offer that she can’t resist, and Elizabeth’s life suddenly gets a whole lot more interesting. She’s off to the Oregon Shakespeare Festival for the summer to make sure FX doesn’t humiliate himself in an avant-garde production of A Midsummer Night's Dream.  As she did so skillfully with her first novel, Helen of Pasadena, which spent more than a year on the Los Angeles Times Bestseller List, Lian Dolan spins a lively, smart, and very funny tale of a woman reinventing her life in unexpected ways.

For other recommendations, please join our librarians at the Main Library on Wednesday, April 30, 2014 from 7-8 pm for Chapter One.  Chapter One is our re-designed semi-annual book talk program.  Formerly known as Once Upon a Crime, we have broadened the scope to include all genres of fiction, and possibly some nonfiction.  Four librarians will give you the inside scoop on books – new and not-so-new – that you might enjoy!