Our library theme for 2020 is Your Library Card, Your Ticket to the World–because with the library, you truly can travel around the world without ever leaving the comfort of your own home. Every month in 2020, we’ll be landing at a new place on the globe. In September, we’re in Italy.
Continue reading “Your Library Card, Your Ticket to the World: Italy”Category: history (books)
Book Buzz: Pilgrim Brides, Medieval Amateur Detectives, and Mysterious Relics
Every month, we’re profiling new-ish releases that are getting critical and commercial buzz. For August, we’re looking at a family saga of romance and American history, medieval murder, and a new look at a very old historical debate, the Shroud of Turin.
Continue reading “Book Buzz: Pilgrim Brides, Medieval Amateur Detectives, and Mysterious Relics”
Hadley Freeman’s House of Glass
When journalist Hadley Freeman set out to write about her enigmatic French Jewish grandmother Sala, she thought she would write about Sala and her quintessentially French fashion sense, which her grandmother maintained despite living for decades in America and being surrounded by decidedly less chic company. Instead, Freeman ended up writing a dual biography of Sala and her brothers, who remained in France. It’s a heartbreaking and inspiring story about World War II, the Holocaust, the French Resistance, and yes, French fashion and culture (Picasso and Dior both make appearances), but more than anything, it is a story about family, secrets, social mobility, assimilation, and identity. I’ve been wanting to read this book since I read an excerpt published earlier this year, and it did not disappoint. Thanks so much to Julie for ordering it for me!
Your Library Card, Your Ticket to the World: Russia
Note: I’d been debuting these posts at the beginning of each month, but things got off schedule with the pandemic, so I am slipping this one in at the end of the month. Obviously, real travel right now is not a good idea, but it’s all the better reason to travel anywhere through a good book. 🙂
Our library theme for 2020 is Your Library Card, Your Ticket to the World–because with the library, you truly can travel around the world without ever leaving the comfort of your own home. Every month in 2020, we’ll be landing at a new place on the globe. We’re in Russia for April.
Continue reading “Your Library Card, Your Ticket to the World: Russia”
Book Buzz: Pack Horse Librarians, Camels out West, and Presidential Assassinations
Note: Back to regularly scheduled blogging. Though our library building is still currently closed to the public, you can still request these books–or any item in our system–through our online catalog and receive them through our curbside pickup service. The link to the catalog will be at the end of the post. Thanks!
Every month, we’re profiling new-ish releases that are getting critical and commercial buzz. For March, we’re looking at the If All Arkansas Read the Same Book pick for 2020, an unusual Western, and the most comprehensive look at a significant American tragedy.
Book Buzz: Bollywood-Style Pride and Prejudice, Gritty British Mysteries, and the Rough Riders
Every month, we’re profiling new-ish releases that are getting critical and commercial buzz. For January, we’re looking at a gender and culture-swapped retelling of Pride and Prejudice, a series of intense crime thrillers, and a history of the Rough Riders, Theodore Roosevelt, and the Spanish-American War.
Evan S. Connell’s Son of the Morning Star
Last year, I was helping a patron with reference request for the Battle of the Little Bighorn. I was a bit surprised we didn’t have the classic Son of the Morning Star. I talked to Julie about it, and she bought it to add to the collection. Thanks so much, Julie!
Continue reading “Evan S. Connell’s Son of the Morning Star”
Jeff Guinn’s The Vagabonds (2019)
In the 1910s and 1920s, Henry Ford and Thomas Edison were two of the most famous men in America. They were also friends who regularly vacationed with each other. In his latest book, Jeff Guinn chronicles the quirky friendship between these two prickly historical figures, as well as their numerous road trips across a changing, modernizing America.
Shawn Levy’s The Castle on Sunset: Life, Death, Love, Art, and Scandal at Hollywood’s Chateau Marmont (2019)
“If you must get in trouble, do it at the Chateau Marmont”–Harry Cohn
“If you want to be seen, go to the Beverly Hills Hotel. If you don’t want to be seen, go to Chateau Marmont.”–pretty much everyone who was anyone in Hollywood since the 1930s
Need a relatively quiet place to write a screenplay or stay while you film a project in town? Check into the Chateau Marmont!
Need a private place to stay after your spouse kicked you out of the marital home? Check into the Chateau Marmont!
Need a discrete place to stay for, ahem, extracurricular activities that could endanger your reputation? Check into the Chateau Marmont!
(Obviously I missed my calling writing ad copy for this place. . . .)
Nita Gould’s Remembering Ella (2018)
One of the more infamous crimes in our local area is the gruesome 1912 murder of Ella Barham in rural Boone County, which is just next door to us here in Berryville. I must confess, I had never actually heard of the crime until I read this book. Author Nita Gould has family ties to the case–Ella is a cousin, though one who died long before Gould was born. As Gould quickly learned when she started researching the case, local oral tradition of the case is unreliable and contradictory, so she instead turned to the extensive news coverage of the crime and court files to detail the murder of the vivacious eighteen-year-old and the subsequent arrest and trial of one of her neighbors. Thank you to Julie for ordering this book for me!
Berryville Book Buzz 