Book Review: Library on Wheels by Sharlee Mullins Glenn

Library on Wheels: Mary Lemist Titcomb and America’s First Bookmobile
by Sharlee Mullins Glenn [j Biography Titcomb]

I’ve heard various stories over the years of what the very first Bookmobile in the United States was, but had never seen any of those stories codified into book form until seeing this lovely little gem of a juvenile biography recently.

This marvelous book is both a biography of Mary Lemist Titcomb, and a chronicle of the history of her development of a mobile library. This volume is not told in purely traditional book form, but instead is a collection of artifacts — ticket stubs, program itineraries, newspaper articles, personal diaries, and much more. Some are reproductions of actual documents and some are stylistic recreations. They all combine to make an absolutely fascinating read.

Though this book is classified as a juvenile biography, I found it a compelling read as an adult, and recommend this for anyone interested in library history, bookmobile history, and the lives of significant women in American history.

[ publisher’s official Library on Wheels web site ] | [ official Sharlee Glenn web site ] 

Recommended by Scott C.
Bennett Martin Public Library

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New reviews appear every month on the Staff Recommendations page of the BookGuide website. You can visit that page to see them all, or watch them appear here in the BookGuide blog individually over the course of the entire month. Click the tag for the reviewer's name to see more of this reviewers recommendations!

Book Review: The First King of Shannara by Terry Brooks

The First King of Shannara
by Terry Brooks

This novel is the prequel to ‘The Sword of Shannara’ trilogy, which really ought to be read before this one; however, doing so does make you aware from the onset that the main quest here is not quite doomed, but certainly not as successful as the characters hope it to be. Brona, a rouge Druid, also known as the Warlock Lord, is at large and taking over all the land with his massive army of trolls, demons and Skull Bearers. The Druids, Bremen, Mareth, Tay, and Risca go on their own separate quests with the common goal to wage war and discover a way to overtake evil before the world is totally destroyed. One of these quests is to forge sword to serve as a talisman to overcome the great magic of Brona as no physical means could defeat him. After seeing the sword, later named the Sword of Shannara, in the book of the same name it was really fun to see it’s origin and creation in this story. It was also really enjoyable to see characters who only existed in lore in the later stories living their adventures in this book. What I like about this book, and others in the series, is discovering who is related to who, as quite often it’s the same families drawn together again and again throughout the Shannara tales even though they can be set hundreds of years apart. I highly recommend the series to fantasy readers, just be a bit thoughtful to which order you read them in – Brooks’ website has a reading order guide , but I’m sure there are other fan made ones out there.

[If you enjoy this, you may also wish to try The Sword of Shannara, The Elfstones of Shannara, or The Wishsong of Shannara, all also by Terry Brooks.]

[ Wikipedia page for The First King of Shannara ] | [ official Terry Brooks web site ] 

Recommended by Kristen A.
Gere Branch Library

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New reviews appear every month on the Staff Recommendations page of the BookGuide website. You can visit that page to see them all, or watch them appear here in the BookGuide blog individually over the course of the entire month. Click the tag for the reviewer's name to see more of this reviewers recommendations!

New Booktalk Booklist: No Foolin' - Just Good Recommendations From Becky and Scott

Married library co-workers Becky (Walt Branch) and Scott (Bennett Martin Public Library) presented another tandem booktalk to both the Bethany and Gere BooksTalk groups in April.

Check out their combined list of recommended reading at the following link: 

No Foolin': Just Good Recommendations From Becky and Scott

Review: The Good Girl by Mary Kubica (as audiobook)

The Good Girl
by Mary Kubica [downloadable audio version]

I really enjoy books like this, especially when I listen to the audio version: books that have varying chapters as told by the various characters in the book. It’s fun to get different people’s perspective on the same situation as the story unravels. This book was very interesting and I really enjoyed the ending! The characters were developed well, and I could actually see, in my mind’s eye, the different locations as they were described. Well done, Mary Kubica!

[If you enjoy this, you may also wish to try Truly, Madly, Guilty.] [ official The Good Girl page on the official Mary Kubica web site ]

Recommended by Tracy T.
Anderson and Bethany Branch Libraries

Have you read or listened to this one? What did you think? Did you find this review helpful?

New reviews appear every month on the Staff Recommendations page of the BookGuide website. You can visit that page to see them all, or watch them appear here in the BookGuide blog individually over the course of the entire month. Click the tag for the reviewer's name to see more of this reviewer’s recommendations!

Review: In the House in the Dark of the Woods by Laird Hunt

In the House in the Dark of the Woods
by Laird Hunt [currently available only in e-book form on Overdrive]

“I told my man I was off to pick berries and that he should watch our son for I would be gone some good while. So away I went with a basket”….

So begins ‘In the House in the Dark of the Woods,’ a kind of colonial American ‘Alice in Wonderland’ for adults. It’s about a woman who enters the woods and doesn’t return for a long time because she has a string of adventures: violent, horrific adventures with a small cast of characters who all seem to want her to side with their own schemes against the others. The voice of this book comes off as naive at first, but its simplicity of observation layered on top of the wild happenings makes for a delightfully weird reading experience.

When I read this book, I kept thinking about how it was written by a man despite how deeply it is about being a woman. I don’t mean sexist stereotypes of being a woman, but the sort of self-satisfaction and willpower that patriarchy has feared for so long, including in historical New England.

Recommended for readers who love psychological suspense, horror, historical fiction, fairy tales, and reading about what happens when someone who is already an adult comes of age again.

[ publisher’s official The House in the Dark of the Woods web site ] | [ official Laird Hunt Twitter feed ]

Recommended by Garren H.
Bennett Martin Public Library

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New reviews appear every month on the Staff Recommendations page of the BookGuide website. You can visit that page to see them all, or watch them appear here in the BookGuide blog individually over the course of the entire month. Click the tag for the reviewer's name to see more of this reviewer’s recommendations!

Review: The New York Musicals of Comden & Green: The Complete Book and Lyrics by Comden and Green

The New York Musicals of Comden & Green: The Complete Book and Lyrics
by Betty Comden and Adolph Green [Music 782.14 qCom]

Marvelous look back at three classic Comden & Green Broadway musical shows — “On the Town”, “Wonderful Town” and “Bells Are Ringing”. Each musical gets a couple of pages of reminiscences from the playwrights, then the complete script is reproduced, complete with plenty of production photos of the original casts and crews. Nicely packaged.

I’ll have to admit, I enjoyed reading each of these scripts while listening to the original Broadway soundtracks — pausing after each of the songs to catch up on the bits of each show that didn’t feature music. Or, you can find video and audio from various past productions of the shows on YouTube. But, there’s nothing like reading the original scripts to give you a full sense of what the show should’ve been like.

Strongly recommended for any fans of classic Broadway musicals, particularly for fans of shows that explore New York City. I’ll be humming some of these showtunes for weeks, particularly “New York, New York”, “Conga”, and “It’s a Simple Little System”!

Recommended by Scott C.
Bennett Martin Public Library

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New reviews appear every month on the Staff Recommendations page of the BookGuide website. You can visit that page to see them all, or watch them appear here in the BookGuide blog individually over the course of the entire month. Click the tag for the reviewer's name to see more of this reviewer’s recommendations!

New BooksTalk Booklist: Debbie's Reads - 2019

Former Lincoln City Libraries staff member Debbie A. returned to give a Bethany BooksTalk on April 19^th, 2019, and shared some of the books she’s recently enjoyed.

Check out her list of recommended reading at the following link: 

Debbie’s Reads - 2019

Review: The Muppet Movie (on DVD)

The Muppet Movie
[DVD j Muppet]

Jim Henson first introduced the “Muppets” in Sam & Friends, a short-lived TV series in Washington D.C. in 1955. After making appearances in TV advertising and occasionally popping up on late-night talk shows, the next significant appearance of Muppets was when they were integrated into the new Childrens Program, Sesame Street in the mid-1960s. There, characters like Bert & Ernie, Cookie Monster, Big Bird, Oscar the Grouch and many others, taught children lessons in spelling, counting, and general learning concepts with love and affection. One of the most popular and famous Sesame Street Muppets, and long thought to be Jim Henson’s alter-ego, Kermit the Frog then served as the central character on The Muppet Show, a syndicated half-hour variety comedy series, which introduced dozens and dozens more new felt friends from 1976 to 1981.

This 1979 film (yes -- it is celebrating its 40th anniversary this year!!) was a spin-off of The Muppet Show, and served as kind of an “origin story” for many of the characters on that series — Kermit, Fozzi Bear, Miss Piggy, Gonzo the Great, Ralph the Dog, the Swedish Chef, critics Statler and Waldorf, and Dr. Teeth and the Electric Mayhem (including Animal the drummer). Kermit is a swamp-dwelling, sensitive, musically-inclined frog, who decides to seek his fame and fortunate in Hollywood, by going on a road trip and picking up friends along the way. There are cameos from numerous big-name stars (Edgar Bergen, Milton Berle, Mel Brooks, James Coburn, Dom DeLuise, Elliott Gould, Bob Hope, and many more), plus numerous musical numbers featuring songs by famed Nebraska musician Paul Williams, including the film’s central number “The Rainbow Connection”.

For anyone who grew up with The Muppets, this is essential viewing. For anyone who’s been living under a rock for the past 40 years, this is a wonderful introduction to the whole manic gang, and should be followed up by viewing all the seasons of the original Muppet Show. This is literally one of my all-time favorite films — I can’t recommend it highly enough!

[If you enjoy this, you may also wish to try all the seasons The Muppet Show.]

[ Internet Movie Database entry for this film ]

Recommended by Scott C.
Bennett Martin Public Library

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New reviews appear every month on the Staff Recommendations page of the BookGuide website. You can visit that page to see them all, or watch them appear here in the BookGuide blog individually over the course of the entire month. Click the tag for the reviewer's name to see more of this reviewer’s recommendations!

Review: The Wishsong of Shannara by Terry Brooks

The Wishsong of Shannara
by Terry Brooks

This novel is the third in a trilogy; the preceding titles are ‘The Sword of Shannara’ and the ‘Elfstones of Shannara’. I wouldn’t say it’s absolutely critical that they be read in order, but I strongly encourage it as previous events and characters overlap in these novels. Wil and Eteria from the adventures of the last book have since been married and have two mostly grown children, Brin and Jair, who are quickly whisked away by the druid Allanon on adventures of their own. The beginning is familiar as it’s how the other two in the series begin; a grave danger threatens all the lands and all its peoples, and the attempt to save it all requires the help of the Ohmsford family. Jair and Brin, both born with the magical gift of the Wishsong, which is a way of singing to change reality or appear to, are separated in the early stages of the quest each with their own mission in the grand scheme to destroy the source of dark magic of the Warlock Lord from the first book in the trilogy. I really have enjoyed this trilogy, which is set among a larger series of Shannara books. All I’ve read so far have engaging plots, character development and a world rich in history that readers can experience by reading/visiting the same places, seeing some of the same events and magical items so many years apart.

[If you enjoy this, you may also wish to try The Sword of Shannara and The Elfstones of Shannara, the first two books in the trilogy, or The First King of Shannara, a prequel — all by Terry Brooks.]

[ Wikipedia page for The Wishsong of Shannara ] | [ official Terry Brooks web site ]

Recommended by Kristen A.
Gere Branch Library

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New reviews appear every month on the Staff Recommendations page of the BookGuide website. You can visit that page to see them all, or watch them appear here in the BookGuide blog individually over the course of the entire month. Click the tag for the reviewer's name to see more of this reviewer’s recommendations!

Review: They Call Me Guero by David Bowles

They Call Me Guero
by David Bowles [jPB (Non-Fiction) Bowles]

This is a charming collection of poems written by a middle-schooler living on the border, not only between Texas and Mexico, but also between grade school and young man, and the border of cultures: as a “guero” his fair-skin can complicate his life as he lives on the border between being hispanic and white. While his classmates might tease him for fair skin and red hair, his father admonishes him to use those attributes to help open doors for the rest of the family.

In my favorite poem, Spanish Birds, Bowles compares the different “melodies” that each of his family members uses when speaking Spanish to different kinds of birdsong. It evokes my most significant takeaway from this book–Bowles’ family is made up of quite the cast of characters and they’re held together by their love for one another.

Of course, you can’t have a book about a middle-schooler that doesn’t feature a confrontation with a bully, and this is no exception . . . except that . . . when the bully calls him a name, the hero of our story retaliates by writing a furious and clever poem in rap.

Poem by poem, Bowles constructs a world and furnishes it with scenes and characters that engage the reader and enrich their understanding of life on the border.

I read a lot of YA books about immigrants/refugees/New Americans; I’m especially interested in stories told from the viewpoint of the children. This one was particularly engaging.

[ publisher’s official They Call Me Guero web page ] | [ official David Bowles web site ]

Recommended by Carrie K.
Bennett Martin Public Library

Have you read this one? What did you think? Did you find this review helpful?

New reviews appear every month on the Staff Recommendations page of the BookGuide website. You can visit that page to see them all, or watch them appear here in the BookGuide blog individually over the course of the entire month. Click the tag for the reviewer's name to see more of this reviewer’s recommendations!