Strange Goings On in the Library

I heard some peculiar noises upstairs after the carpeting installers left. When I went to investigate I could not believe my eyes. This is what happens when Librarians are so deliriously happy to get new carpeting- they make carpet angels.

Don't Miss Our Free Saturday Matinee!

This Saturday, Nov. 21st @ 2:00pm we will be showing Tinker Bell and the Lost Treasure in the Lecture Hall. This movie is rated G so it is perfect for the entire family. As always this is free and open to the public. Here is the description of the movie:

Tinker Bell's greatest adventure yet takes place in Autumn, as the fairies are on the mainland changing the colors of the leaves, tending to pumpkin patches, and helping geese fly south for the winter. The rare Blue Moon will rise, and when its light passes through the magical Fall Scepter that Tinker Bell has been summoned to create, Pixie Hollow's supply of pixie dust will be restored. But when Tinker Bell accidentally puts all of Pixie Hollow in jeopardy, she must venture out across the sea on a secret quest to set things right.

Upstairs Carpeting Update

Before

During

After

Fiction Twice-Removed

What do you call a popular new novel written by a fictional TV character? Heat Wave by "Richard Castle"! Although this literary device has been tried in the past by "Jessica Fletcher" and "Columbo" as "authors" of detective novels, it's never achieved the success of the new "Nikki Heat" series, based on ABC's "Castle" TV show. The premise of the television series is that author "Richard Castle", played by actor Nathan Filion, is writing a new mystery series based on the NYPD cases of "Det. Kate Beckett" and that's why he trails her around on murder investigations. "Heat Wave" has been incorporated into the show's plots this season, culminating in a book launch party on the October 19 episode. Actor Nathan Filion recently autographed 500 books as "Richard Castle" at a Borders in Northridge, CA and the novel, called "witty" and "fast-paced" by reviewers, is on several bestseller lists. Fiction begets fiction begets fiction!

Amazon's Hot Seller---the Kindle

Publishers Weekly (10/26/09) reports that the Kindle is now Amazon's best-selling item, and that sales at Amazon rose 28% (to $5.45 billion) in their third quarter. Amazon is optimistic about the 4th quarter of 2009 as well and sees no signs of sales slowing down.

Sometime in November, Amazon is due to release free downloads of "Kindle for PC", an e-reading app that will allow consumers to download Kindle e-books to a Windows-based PC and to read them on the PC. While the app will allow Kindle owners to read their previously purchased Kindle titles on their PC, it will also allow anyone with a PC to buy and download Kindle e-books directly to their PCs.

The Carpeting Project Has Commenced

Installers are hard at work tearing up the old carpet, revealing the hidden wood floors. I have been told that long ago when the Dover High School was next door, they used to hold classes in the Library and it sounded like a herd of elephants when all those teenage feet walked across wood floors!

We Need You! Please borrow 10 children's books!

The Dover Public Library is getting new carpeting! All the contents of the Children’s Room need to be packed and moved out for a few days, including about 20,000 books. We are asking our patrons to lend a hand by borrowing at least 10 children’s books before the move.
Library staff are asking for approximately 2,000 cardholders to visit the Children’s Room and checkout ten (or more if you wish!) books before Thanksgiving. If this can happen, we won’t have to pack, box and store all the books! In return, the books checked out will not be due for one month and there will be no fines on any Children’s Room items becoming overdue in December.
The Dover Public Library has over 26,000 cardholders; so if just 10% of our borrowers can help us out by taking 10 books home, we’ll have no books to pack, no boxes to lift, and can provide you with an ample supply of children’s books for your family to read at leisure. Please call the Children’s Room, 516-6052, for more information, and thanks for your help!

Things Librarians Think Are Cool

We were so taken with these floating bookshelves that we had to share them with you. They would not be practical, nor would they fit in at our Carnegie library; but floating bookshelves, how cool is that?
We have no affiliation with the company that makes these shelves, and this is not an endorsement of the product, we just thought it was a neat idea and you might enjoy seeing it.

Saturday Matinee

Join us this Saturday, November 14th at 2:00pm in the Library Lecture Hall for the movie UP. This is an animated comedy that is rated PG. Here is a description of the movie: Carl Fredricksen spent his entire life dreaming of exploring the globe and experiencing life to its fullest. But at age 78, life seems to have passed him by, until a twist of fate (and a persistent 8-year old Junior Wilderness Explorer named Russell) gives him a new lease on life.

This event is free and open to the public.

Where Have All the Books gone?

The big move to prepare for carpeting has commenced. You can still help us by checking out lots of materials and keeping them at your home until we are finished. To make this easier for you we are changing due dates; DVDs now go out for 14 days starting this week. Items in the Children's Room can be checked out for 30 days. No overdue fines will be charged for items from the adult collection from November 16 through November 28. No fines will be charged on Children's materials due in the month of December.

The Library Will Be Closed November 11th

The Library Will Be Closed Wednesday, November 11th, in honor of Veterans Day.

Acupuncture Lecture at the Library

Join us on Tues., Nov. 17, 2009 at 7:00pm in the Library Lecture Hall for a lecture on Acupuncture in the United States with Alice Meattey. The lecture will cover a brief general history of acupuncture and the history, in particular, in the United States and in New Hampshire. She will explain various theories of how acupuncture works and will demonstrate the actual needling process. A sharp question and answer will follow!

Alice Meattey is an acupuncturist, nationally certified and licensed in both New Hampshire and Maine. She is a graduate of The City College of New York and a 1991 graduate of the New England School of Acupuncture in Newton, Massachusetts. Alice was the chairperson of a group that worked to license acupuncturists in New Hampshire, and she has been a member of the New Hampshire Board of Acupuncture Licensing since 1997. She lives in Dover with her long-haired dachshund, Rudy.

Attention Dog-Lovers

Three really enjoyable books have come out lately that are sure to appeal to dog lovers. Dean Koontz has written about his beloved Trixie, a Golden Retriever who retired from being an service dog and became the light of his life. Trixie's antics in Big Little Life: a memoir of a joyful dog are sure to win you over.

Fans of James Herriot may enjoy Bruce Coston's Ask the Animals. The book covers his years at veterinary school and cases from his practices in Pennsylvania and Virginia. The story of dogs, cats, and their owners are amusing and touching.

Dogtown, a no kill shelter in Utah famous enough to have its own popular television show on the National Geographic channel, now also has a book written about it. Dogtown: tales of rescue, rehabilitation and redemption by Stefan Bechtel highlights some of the desperate, touching cases that have come through their doors. Victims of pet hoarders, war, Katrina, and cruelty all find a loving home at Dogtown. Knightly, the grieving Weimaraner who lost his home and his family when his elderly owners couldn't care for him anymore is a story that you won't soon forget.

I enjoyed all three books, but especially Big Little Life. Trixie is a memorable character, and the depth of the love she and Dean shared is evident in every word. He also captures the charming goofiness that highlights life in any household that has a Golden Retriever in it. I highly recommend listening to this on CD, Dean Koontz narrates which adds an extra dimension.

HELP US PACK!

We need to clear the Children's Room for new carpeting.

BORROW AS MUCH CHILDREN'S MATERIAL AS YOU LIKE BETWEEN NOW AND THANKSGIVING AND IT WON'T BE DUE FOR A MONTH!

BONUS: no fines on children's materials that become overdue in December.

Rob Pattinson on a Stick

It was late Tuesday night and we were busy closing the Library when I noticed a man lurking in the Teen Loft. It gave me quite a turn because I didn't think anyone was in the mezzanine. When I looked more closely I realized it was Rob Pattinson's sweet face staring back at me, not moving. For those of you without teenage girls in the family, and untouched by the Twilight novels hysteria, I will explain that Rob Pattinson is the actor who plays Edward Cullen in Twilight.

The next day I asked our Teen Librarian about it and she explained one of the teen magazines had published a Rob Pattinson poster and suggested using it for a Halloween mask. She craftily put Rob on a stick and placed him in a book in the Teen Loft. Since then he has mysteriously been moving all around the Teen Loft. She never knows where she will find him next.

Best Books of 2009

We haven't even finished 2009, and already the best books lists are coming out. Publishers Weekly and Amazon have both released their lists. There is only one book they chose in common, Stitches by David Small. The Library will not be releasing our Librarians' Choice list until January so you will have to wait for that one! What do you think of their choices?

Looking for Some Good Historical Fiction?

Look no farther than Grace Hammer: A Novel of the Victorian Underworld by Sara Stockbridge. I swept away by the story of Grace, a skillful thief, who is supporting her four young children quite nicely by thieving in the Whitechapel area of London. This novel has frequently been compared to Charles Dickens' books. There are similarities; a large cast of quirky characters with unusual names, and the squalor of London is vivid. "She is a sly piece of work, Mrs. Mirabel Trotter, like a great flabby toad lurking under a dank rock, staring out from the gloom at her dinner."

Grace's easy life is threatened by the hulking, violent Mr. Blunt, from whom she had stolen a large ruby necklace at the beginning of her career. Will she be betrayed or saved by her vast circle of friends and acquaintances amongst the prostitutes, thieves, fences, and drunkards that inhabit the squalor of London in 1888. The many twists and turns through atmospheric 19th century England make it a very interesting journey to find the answer.

WE'RE MOVING....

...furniture, books, computers!

The library is getting new carpeting beginning mid-November and we need you to help us clear out.

This project may possibly last through mid-December and will inevitably cause some interruptions to our services and some inconvenience to you when some sections of the library are closed. Therefore we will be extending our borrowing periods for various materials in the library as they become inaccessible: we want you to hold on to them as long as possible so we don't have to pack and move them. So that you won't incur fines during the disruptions we will also charge no fines for items from the adult collections from November 16 -28, and no fines for items from the children's section for the month of December. While the Children's Room is being carpeted it will be closed for a few days.

Do You Dare?

Halloween has come early to the Library....

Remembering Wax Candy

Another candy themed post in honor of Halloween, from Bill Bryson's memorable and amusing "Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid". Bill reminisces about the candies he loved as a child in the 1950s.

"Perhaps nothing says more about the modest range of pleasures of the age than that the most popular candies of my childhood were made of wax. You could choose among wax teeth, wax pop bottles, wax barrels, and wax skulls, each filled with a small amount of colored liquid that tasted very much like a small dose of cough syrup. You swallowed this with interest if not exactly gratification then chewed the wax for the next ten or eleven hours. Now you might think there is something wrong with your concept of pleasure when you find yourself paying real money to chew colorless wax, and you would be right of course. But we did it and enjoyed it because we knew no better. and there was, it must be said, something good, something healthily restrained, about eating a product that had neither flavor or nutritive value."