2014 Librarians' Choice list is Now Available

We are proud to present the 2014 Librarians’ Choice; our favorite books of the year. We hope you enjoy them!

Lost Lake by Sarah Addison Allen

Behind the Shattered Glass by Tasha Alexander

Falling in Honey by Jennifer Barclay

The Visitors by Sally Beauman

Only in Spain by Nellie Bennett

Broken Monsters by Laura Beukes

Murder of Crows by Anne Bishop
While Beauty Slept by Elizabeth Blackwell

Lucky Us by Amy Bloom

Lucky Dog by Sarah Boston
This House is Haunted by John Boyne

Can’t We Talk About Something More Pleasant by Roz Chast

Season of the Dragonflies by Sarah Creech

The Horse Lover by H. Alan Day

Travels With Casey by Benoit Denizet-Lewis

A Hundred Pieces of Me by Lucy Dillon

All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr

As You Wish by Cary Elwes

A Paris Apartment by Michelle Gable
The Signature of all Things by Elizabeth Gilbert

The Ice Cream Queen of Orchard Street by Susan Jane Gilman

Vintage by Susan Gloss

I Don’t Know What You Know Me From by Judy Greer

Driving with the Top Down by Elizabeth Harbison

I am Pilgrim by Terry Hayes

Elizabeth is Missing by Emma Healey

The Museum of Extraordinary Things by Alice Hoffman

The Blessings by Elise Juska

The Opposite of Loneliness by Marina Keegan
The Invention of Wings by Sue Monk Kidd

Girls of Atomic City by Denise Kiernan

Mr. Mercedes by Stephen King

You Should Have Known by Jean Hanff Korelitz

The Sea Garden by Deborah Lawrenson

The Glass Kitchen by Linda Francis Lee

Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel

Dollbaby by Laura Lane McNeal

A Good year for Roses by Gil McNeil

One Plus One by Jojo Moyes

Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage by Haruki Murakami
I Always Loved You by Robin Oliveira
Rustication by Charles Palliser

The Bees by Laline Paull

The Accident by Chris Pavone

Yes Please by Amy Poehler
Still Life with Breadcrumbs by Anna Quindlen

The Midnight Rose by Lucinda Riley
The Smartest Kids in the World and How They Got That Way by Amanda Ripley

Deadline by John Sandford

Help for the Haunted by John Searles

A Well-Tempered Heart by Jan-Phillipp Sendker
The Bone Season by Samantha Shannon

Astonish Me by Maggie Shipstead

Some Luck by Jane Smiley

Lisette’s List by Susan Vreeland

The Martian by Andy Weir

A Long Time Gone by Karen White

That Summer by Lauren Willig

Rainbows on the Moon by Barbara Wood

The Storied Life of A.J. Fikry by Gabrielle Zevin  

Borrow a Kindle Fire!

     In addition to the library’s six Kindle ebook readers (which currently contain over 100 books), library patrons now have the option to borrow one of two new Kindle Fire tablets which not only hold the library’s selection of ebooks, but also a wide-ranging collection of useful apps and popular games. Plus, the Kindle Fires display in color!

     Some of the games we’ve installed on the Kindle Fires include: Color Sheep, Doodle Jump, Words with Friends, Drawing Pad, Gems Journey, GT Racing, Jetpack Dragon Hunting, My NBA 2K14, Real Speed, and Temple Run 2.

     Some of the apps offered include: Ancestry, the Merriam-Webster Dictionary, Duolingo, IMDb, iTranslate, Jamie’s 20-minute Meals, Netflix, NPR News, PBS Video, Pet First Aid, Pinterest, Facebook, Quizlet, Skype, Spotify, Tumblr, Wolfram Alpha and Workout Trainer. Some of these apps require the user to establish their own personal account. Accounts can sometimes be created for free (e.g. Facebook or Pinterest) but others (e.g. Ancestry, Spotify or Netflix) do charge the user a monthly or annual fee to join. To clarify, the library provides access to the apps through the Kindle Fires, but will not pay for individual users to, for example, rent a movie. If you have a Netflix account, you may certainly be able to stream your movie choice and watch it on a library Kindle Fire.

     We would suggest that if you just want to read ebooks, you check out one of the six Kindle ebook Readers. They are simple to use and lighter to hold. If you’d like to try some apps, check out a Kindle Fire. Play some games and try some of the free apps. If you’re really intrigued with the fee-based services, establish your own personal account (usually tied to your credit card) and pay for content as you use it.

The Kindle Fires and the Kindle Readers may each be checked out for a three-week borrowing period. Late fees are $.25 per day.

"Empire of Cotton" includes Dover references!

Our very own Dover, New Hampshire and its early 19th century cotton mills are mentioned a few
times in a new, highly-praised book, "Empire of Cotton: A Global History". Sven Beckert's comprehensive history of the growth of the cotton manufacturing industry has been called one of the best non-fiction books of 2014.

Entrepreneurs and powerful statesmen combined imperial expansion and slave labor with new machines and wage workers to change the world. Here is the story of how, beginning well before the advent of machine production in the 1780s, these men captured ancient trades and skills in Asia, and combined them with the expropriation of lands in the Americas and the enslavement of African workers to crucially reshape the disparate realms of cotton that had existed for millennia, and how industrial capitalism gave birth to an empire, and how this force transformed the world.

"Cotton is everywhere, has been for a long time, and was the dominant commodity during the early years of our country. It fostered war capitalism among European nations. It helped launch the industrial revolution in England. It drove slavery. The story of cotton is the story of modern capitalism, and in Empire of Cotton, author Sven Beckert shows how a worldwide crop that came in multiple forms and was cultivated and produced in many different ways came to be dominated by the late coming Europeans, and later Americans, often through violent means, reshaping both the world economy and the world itself—for better or worse—along the way." – Chris Schluep

Dover was certainly shaped (both literally and figuratively) by the cotton manufacturers who built their huge brick mills aside the Cochecho River in the 1820s. This book is a fascinating look at the world-wide implications of the the cotton trade and the growth of capitalism. Although just a small part of Beckert's story, we should be proud to be included in this history.

2014 Ladybug Picture Book Award Winner

And the winner is....

The winner of the 2014 Ladybug Picture Book Award is If I Built a House by Chris Van Dusen. This year 23,093 New Hampshire children (at 170 voting sites) voted for their favorite book from a list of 10 nominated titles and If I Built a House won by a landslide with 10,231 votes. I love the thought of over 23,000 little kids voting for their favorite book, and my son will be so excited that his favorite won!

Museum Monday

Museum Monday

Have you visited the oldest continuous operating museum?  Do you know which museum this is?  It is the Peabody Essex Museum in Salem, Massachusetts! 

Founded in 1799 by America's first global entrepreneurs, the Peabody Essex Museum is a museum of international art and culture dedicated to connecting art to the world in which it is made. Its collections of contemporary and historic American, Asian, Maritime, Oceanic, Native American, and African art and culture, as well as its archival library and historic American and Chinese houses, are among the finest of their kind.  To reserve a Dover Public Library pass for the Peabody Essex Museum, or one of our other 15 museum passes, please visit our web site or call 516-6050.

Looking for unique Dover gifts?

You can finish your Christmas shopping at the Library. We offer an assortment of gifts unique to Dover.

Dover Public Library Bookbag. The latest design of our popular bookbags has a zippered pocket inside, handy for keys and library cards, as well as a pocket on the front of the bag. $15.00

Birds Eye View of Dover 1888, a poster sized map from the Friends of the Library.$5.00

Notepaper featuring five historic scenes of Dover. $4.00

The Port of Dover: Two Centuries of Shipping on the Cochecho by Robert Whitehouse and Cathleen Beaudoin. $25.00

Come on in and see what else we have to offer!

"Becoming Wild: Eastern Coyote in New England" Dec. 17, 7pm

      Thousands of eastern coyotes live among us---rarely seen, often heard, and frequently discussed. Some people resent their presence and fear them as predators of pets, livestock and game animals. Others admire their resilience and are thrilled to hear their return-to-the-wild howl and all it represents. In short, the coyote is a topic of contention.

      On Wednesday evening, December 17 at 7pm, the Dover Public Library will welcome Project Coyote Representative and Wild Canid Ecologist Christine Schadler to discuss this controversial animal and how people and wildlife can coexist through compassionate conservation.

      Christine earned a Master’s of Science in Conservation Biology at Antioch University. Her thesis focused on the natural recovery of the Eastern Timber Wolf in Michigan.  She taught Conservation Issues, Dendrology, and Wolf Ecology at UNH, and continues to instruct and mentor adult degree candidates in the UNH System at Granite State College.

      While wolf recovery was the focus of her early work, Chris’s attention shifted to the eastern coyote when she moved to New England.  She chose a farm with known coyote problems to raise sheep and train her border collies.  Using sound livestock management and common sense, she avoided any predation. She is also working on a book “Becoming Wolf:  The Eastern Coyote in New England”.  Between presentations she can be found at camp in northern New Hampshire researching coyote feeding patterns in a mosaic of farms and woodlots.

      This program is free and open to the public. For more information call the Dover Public Library at 603-516-6050.

Museum Monday

Museum Monday:  Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston

Isabella Stewart Gardner was born in New York City on April 14, 1840.  Isabella spent her life traveling the world and collecting art that she hoped to one day display in her own museum.  She was a patron and friend of leading artists and writers of her time, including John Singer Sargent, James McNeill Whistler, and Henry James.  The Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum is a real treat and a place where art comes to life!  To reserve a pass please visit our web site or call 516-6050.

Museum Monday

Museum Monday

Have you had a chance to visit a Frank Lloyd Wright designed house?  No need to travel further than The Currier Museum of Art in Manchester, NH, and if you borrow the Dover Public Library's pass it is free!  The Currier Museum of Art is an internationally renowned art museum which features European and American paintings, decorative arts, photographs and sculpture, including works by Picasso, Monet, O'Keeffe, Wyeth, and LeWitt with exhibitions, tours, and programs year-round. The museum also offers tours of the Frank Lloyd Wright-designed Zimmerman House -- reservations required. The Currier Museum Art Center offers studio workshops and classes for children and adults.  To reserve one of the Library museum passes online visit our website, or give us a call at 516-6050.