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Martha Canfield Library E-news - January 2012
Welcome to the January 2012 edition of the Martha Canfield Library’s e-newsletter. If you have any suggestions, you can email them to our hotmail account or leave them in our suggestion jar on the front desk.
A New Year
By Phyllis Skidmore, Director, and Martha Folsom, Trustee Chair
As we start a new year it is always helpful to look back on what we’ve accomplished in the past year. The biggest project we undertook was the reorganization of space in the Library to use the space more efficiently and add a new Youth Room. We still have a little more work to do to finish the office area and add some study carrels. All of this was funded by a donor in honor of her parents.
We were able to add 10 new computers for access to the internet, thanks to a donation from Mack Molding. And, thanks to a challenge grant from the Vermont Country Store, and all of your gifts to help match that, we upgraded our library catalog so you can now check it from home. Just click on the “Library Catalog” icon on our new web page, redesigned thanks to Marc Evans for his technical expertise, and to Martha Folsom and Mark Hyde for design and layout. Check it out at marthacanfieldlibrary.org. In addition, an eVermont Broadband grant provided us with digital equipment for preserving the historical materials in the Russell Collection and with a presenter to give workshops on computer skills. And, last but not least, The Tool Factory, in Sunderland, donated a digital camera and a Flip video camera.
A volunteer group of Library Friends got together to help with fundraising, including the weekend book sale at Fisher School in August, a bake sale, and wish list displays for the front desk. They also organized the Anniversary Celebration/Open House in May.
We were saddened by the death of former trustee and long-time volunteer and book sale coordinator Marge Hanson. Her energy and enthusiasm is missed by many of us.
And so, we look forward to another year of working toward creating the best library we can for everyone. Especially important are your suggestions, ideas, and financial help and we thank you for all you do for your Library. We wish all our readers a happy and healthy New Year.
For Kids
We have a new volunteer to read stories to preschoolers on Wednesday mornings at 10:30 am. Norma Peebles loves to read to children, and volunteers at the school to help beginning readers. So stop in and see which stories she has picked out each week.
In the Canfield Gallery
Our gallery will be undergoing a minor face-lift in January, in preparation for a new season of shows. Beginning February 2, Chris Smith will be exhibiting a collection of paintings. Come and meet the artist at a reception on Saturday, February 4 from 3:00 to 5:00 pm.
The Russell Vermontiana Collection
By Bill Budde, Curator
This past month we scanned and partially indexed a collection of about 140 photographs by Herbert W. Congdon taken ca. 1904 – 1913. The photographs were donated to the Community House by his grandson, Stephen Congdon. In return for a high quality archival scan of the originals we were able to obtain a copy of the collection for the Russell archives. Thanks to Ken Nicholson for coordinating this project.
We have been grateful to be the benefactor of a subscription to “Family Tree Magazine,” a periodical focused on genealogy tips, how-to advice, and latest news in the field. The latest issue is available with the other magazine subscriptions received by the library, and past issues are available in the Russell Collection. Thanks to Jean Miller for the subscription.
The Southwest Vermont Career Development Center has scheduled ‘Genealogy 1 & 2’ at the Martha Canfield Library. It will be held Tuesday evenings from 6:00 to 8:00 pm March 20 through April 10. There is a fee for this training. For additional information you may call the CDC at 802-447-3596 or email www.svcdc.org.
Book Sale
Our book sale in the Community House is now closed for the season, although we are still selling some books in the Library during regular hours. Please do not leave book donations outside the Community House, but you can bring them to the Library during our regular hours. But, please, we can’t use books with mold, mouse droppings, dirt or insects. Mold on books can be a health hazard for staff and for you, especially if it spreads to other books in the building. Mold is not always obvious as it often hides under the paper dust jackets. Please check any books you plan to donate, it costs the Library money to dispose of moldy books.
Also, we can’t use textbooks, Readers’ Digest Condensed Books, encyclopedias, old medical books and magazines that are not current.
Volunteer Opportunities
We need people to work at the checkout desk in the Library on Wednesdays or Friday afternoons. If you like helping people and are good with computers, we’d appreciate your help.
The Russell Collection needs a typist to help with odd jobs and someone to help with data entry. If you are interested, please see Bill in the Collection on Tuesdays.
The Mystery Corner
Winter Mysteries
By Martha Folsom
These are cold, winter weather mysteries. Put a log on the fire and grab a cup of hot chocolate and enjoy.
The Corpse in the Snowman, by Nicholas Blake - Blake belongs among the cream of the "Golden Age" writers (Christie, Tey, Sayers) and this book is one of his best. The late poet-laureate Cecil Day-Lewis, father of Daniel Day-Lewis, used the pen-name Nicholas Blake to write exceptional mysteries featuring Nigel Strangeways and lots of excellent red-herrings. A typical English manor-type mystery.
61 Hours, by Lee Child - Jack Reacher always travels light; but when he is stranded in South Dakota during a blizzard with the predicted temperature with wind chill factor at 50 below zero he wishes he had a warm coat. This book leaves our 6'5" hero in a real cliff-hanger.
Raven Black, by Ann Cleeves - The Shetland Isles in the dark of winter and a body in the snow is at the heart of this mystery, the first of four Shetland mysteries featuring Inspector Jimmy Perez. Read them in order. Only a very few will guess who-dun-it in these books.
Thai Die, by Monica Ferris - With all the dark winter viciousness in this month's column we really need a light-hearted cozy. This fits the bill. Yes, there is a Minnesota blizzard, but Betsy Devonshire, owner of the Crewel World shop and police Sgt. Mike Malloy make Thai Die a very enjoyable, light read.
Smilla's Sense of Snow, by Peter Høeg - Smilla Jaspersen is half-Greenlander, half-Danish and she lives in Copenhagen. When a young Greenlander boy falls off the roof to his death the police think it is a case of suicide, but Smilla's 'sense of snow' tells her the boy was chased off the roof. It's a long book (499 pages) but worth it in the end.
40 Words for Sorrow, by Giles Blunt - "Husband murdered, and now her daughter, too. Never mind about snow, Cardinal mused, what people really need is forty words for sorrow." There is snow, lots of snow, in this first novel with Detective John Cardinal in Algonquin Bay. Algonquin Bay is a very thinly disguised North Bay, Ontario, Canada. The story is very graphic, so it's not for cozy mystery fans, but it is an excellent beginning to this police procedural series.
The Cold Dish and Hell is Empty, by Craig Johnson - Wyoming in the winter is a good definition of cold. The Cold Dish is the first in the series with Sheriff Walt Longmire and Hell is Empty is the latest. Both will have you reaching for a lap rug and that cup of hot chocolate.
Winter Prey, by John Sandford - Here the terrible coldness of a Wisconsin winter blizzard and a vicious killer known as 'The Iceman' is counter-balanced by a developing romance between ex-cop Lucas Davenport and Dr. Weather Karkinnen, a lady who's just right for Davenport whether he knows it or not.
Gorky Park and Polar Star, by Martin Cruz Smith - More bodies face down in the snow in Gorky Park. This time we are in Russia and it is Homicide Detective Arkady Renko that must solve the crime. This is one of the true 'modern' mystery classics. The story of Renko continues in Polar Star where he is on a fishing trawler in the Bering Sea. (Now that's a place that's cold!)
Snow Angels, by James Thompson - Good grief, another body in the snow. I guess it makes for a visual picture. This time the body is found in the snow on a reindeer farm in Finland, north of the Arctic Circle. It's the first book introducing Inspector Kari Vaara. Like Stieg Larsson's trilogy it is very graphic; not for the cozy mystery fan.
Reader's Pick by Martha Folsom
The Wizard of Dark Street, by Shawn Thomas Odyssey (junior fiction - the book jacket says readers 8 - 12)
It is 1877, and 12-year-old Oona Crate is the Wizard's Apprentice of Dark Street. Dark Street is the last of thirteen Faerie roads connecting the World of Man with the World of Faerie. There are gates at both ends. The gate at the World of Man opens onto a street in New York City once a day, for one minute at the stroke of midnight. The gate of the World of Faerie remains closed.
Being the Wizard's Apprentice is an important task, but what Oona longs to be is a detective. Soon enough she must become a detective and solve one of the most important cases imaginable. Her helpers are Deacon, a black raven that can talk, and Samuligan, the Wizard's faerie servant.
There are lots of suspects (as there are in any good classical type mystery) and she must use logic to solve the mysteries that surround her. Dark Street is a magical place, filled with witches, an odd faerie or two and goblins.
The Wizard of Dark Street is a well plotted story that would stand up favorably against any "adult" mystery. The necessary clues are there, if you can see them; the outcome logical. And there is the magic element that makes it so much fun.
Wanted: More Reader's Picks
How about a Biography Reader's Pick for this newsletter? Or a History Reader's Pick, a Young Adult Reader's Pick -- even a Cookbook Reader's Pick? Send us short reviews of favorite books you think other like-minded readers will enjoy.
By the way, if the Library doesn't yet own the book, perhaps you'd like to purchase a copy -- at the Library's 20-45% discount -- and gift it to the collection. Talk to Phyllis.
New Books
Fiction
The Next Always, by Nora Roberts
The Christmas Wedding, by James Patterson
Kill Alex Cross, by James Patterson
11/22/63, by Stephen King
Prey, by Linda Howard
The Brave, by Nicholas Evans
Heat Wave, by Nancy Thayer
Left Neglected, by Lisa Genova
Miles To Go: the Second Journal of the Walk, by Richard Paul Evans
The Motive, by John Lescroart
Starbound, by Joe Haldeman
The Affair, by Lee Child
The Widow’s War, by Sally Gunning
Misery Bay, by Steve Hamilton
The Buddha in the Attic, by Julie Otsuka
Mystery
V is for Vengeance, by Sue Grafton
Red Mist, by Patricia Cornwell
Explosive Eighteen, by Janet Evanovich
Carrot Cake Murder, by Joanne Fluke
Cream Puff Murder, by Joanne Fluke
Dangerous Undertaking, by Mark de Castrique
Edge, by Jeffrey Deaver
An Impartial Witness, by Charles Todd
Murder Your Darlings, by J. J. Murphy
Plum Pudding Murder, by Joanne Fluke
Prayer of the Dragon, by Eliot Pattison
I Am Half Sick of Shadows, by Alan Bradley
Non-fiction
Food Rules: an Eater’s Manual, by Michael Pollan
Rin Tin Tin: the Life and Legend, by Susan Orlean
That Used To Be Us: How America Fell Behind in the World It Invented and How We Can Come Back, by Thomas L. Friedman and Michael Mandelbaum
When Gadgets Betray Us: The Dark Side of Our Infatuation with New Technologies, by Robert Vamosi
The Art of Lake Champlain, developed and produced by Gary Chassman
Help! My Puppy Is Driving Me Crazy, by Diana Delmar
To End All Wars: a Story of Loyalty and Rebellion, 1914-1918, by Adam Hochschild
Hawks at a Distance, by Jerry Ligouri
The Twilight Garden: a Guide to Enjoying Your Garden in the Evening Hours, by Lia Leendertz
The Beekeeper’s Lament, by Hannah Nordhaus
The Reading Promise: My Father and the Books We Shared, by Alice Ozma
The Pruning Book, by Lee Reich
Founding Gardeners: The Revolutionary Generation, Nature and the Shaping of the American Nation, by Andrea Wulf
Lost in Shagri-la: a True Story of Survival, Adventure and the Most Incredible Rescue Mission of World War II, by Mitchell Zuckoff
DVD
Change and Motion: Calculus Made Clear, by Michael Starbird
Young Adult
Crossed, by Ally Condie
Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Cabin Fever, by Jeff Kinney
The Apothecary, by Maile Meloy
Wonderstruck, by Brian Selznick
Inheritance, by Christopher Paolini
Beauty Queens, by Libba Bray
Five Flavors of Dumb, by Antony John
Death Cloud, by Andrew Lane
Words in the Dust, by Trent Reedy
Seizure, by Kathy Reichs
Island’s End, by Padma Venkatraman
Chime, by Franny Billingsley
Children
Fiction
Bull Run, by Paul Fleischman (VT Reads 2012)
Waiting for the Magic, by Patricia MacLachlan
Troublemaker, by Andrew Clements
Liar, Liar, by Gary Paulsen
Non-Fiction
Let’s Go Hiking, by John McKinney
Thanksgiving Crafts, by Amy Bailey Muehlenhardt
Thanksgiving Recipes, by Ronnie Rooney
Fabulous: a Portrait of Andy Warhol, by Bonnie Christensen
Easy Readers
Class Picture Day, by Margaret McNamara
The Discovery in the Cave, by Mark Dubowski
Dragon’s Leaf Collection, adapted by Becky Matheson
A Fairy Frost, by Tennant Redbank
Happy Thanksgiving, by Margaret McNamara
I Do Not Like Greens, by Paul Orshoski
I Spy an Apple, by Jean Marzollo and Walter Wick
Kat’s Maps, by Jon Scieszka
Fancy Nancy and the Mean Girl, by Jane O’Connor
Picture Books
Dinosaur vs. the Library, by Bob Shea
It’s a Little Book, by Lane Smith
Homer, the Library Cat, by Reeve Lindbergh
Llama, Llama Home with Mama, by Anna Dewdney
The Butterfly Tree, by Sandra Markle
Fancy Nancy: Our Thanksgiving Banquet, by Jane O’Connor
Over and Under the Snow, by Kate Messner
Shopping With Dad, by Matt Harvey and Miriam Latimer
Sounds Around Town, by Maria Carluccio
Mine!, by Shutta Crum
Cat Secrets, by Jef Czekaj
Everything I Need To Know Before I’m Five, by Valorie Fisher
Dot, by Patricia Intriago
Olivia and the Snow Day, by Farrah McDoogle
George Flies South, by Simon James
Ten Little Caterpillars, by Bill Martin, Jr.
A Ball for Daisy, by Christopher Raschka
Blackout, by John Rocco
I’m Adopted, by Shelley Rotner
Reading to Peanut, by Leda Schubert
The Loud Book, by Deborah Underwood
Audio CDs
The Misfits, by James Howe
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