Not Quite Old School Anymore

phone

As I mentioned in a previous post, I’ve been lagging behind in embracing some technology.  I was still using a flip phone and was quite content with it.  But in keeping with my recent foray with new things (moving into a new home and buying way too many new things for it) and the fact that my phone was barely working, I took a huge leap and bought a smart phone.

It was quite a process and I took my time in researching the various options.  I started off by going to Cheshire Library’s website and under Research it! I clicked on Consumer ReportsFrom there I looked up the articles reviewing smart phones and thoroughly read them.  This was a great resource for someone who didn’t know anything about smart phones.  I settled on a phone I thought would be the best for me.  But in the end, knowing I would need some tech help from my daughters, I went with the same phone that they have.

cell phone 2If you are looking to move to a smart phone, or are thinking of replacing your current smart phone, the Cheshire Library is a great place to start.  Besides Consumer Reports, here are a few books that also might help you.

Galaxy S4 – The Missing Manual

Teach Yourself Visually –  android phones & tablets

IPhone: The Missing Manual

 

What’s Better Than Pizza and Cookies?

autumn

pizza 3Enjoying them in October!  Fantastic weather, beautiful foliage, and it’s National cookiesPizza month and National Cookie month!  Feeling a little down?  Go outside with a handful of your favorite cookies.  Find a picnic table and munch on hot pizza pie!  Soak up the beautiful weather and add some tasty food.  Want to be creative and make your own cookies and pizza?  The Cheshire Library has books to inspire and tantalize!

PIZZA

Pizza: grill it, bake it, love it!

Pizza: a slice of heaven

Cool Pizza to Make and Bake

Artisan Pizza and Flatbread in Five Minutes a Day

Revolutionary Pizza

American Pie: my search for the perfect pizza

 

COOKIES

Martha Stewart’s Cookies

Crazy About Cookies

Slice and Bake Cookies

Gluten-Free Cookies

Simply Sensational Cookies

The Gourmet Cookie Book

There are many more books to choose from.   Click on the headings Pizza and Cookies and our catalog will come up so you can browse to your heart’s content.

 

Book Club Picks – Thrillers

 

Open book resting on stack on booksThe days are getting shorter and the nights longer!  Pick up a thriller for your book club to read!

storied lifeThe Storied Life of A. J. Fikry – Gabrielle Zevin – When his most prized possession, a rare collection of Poe poems, is stolen, bookstore owner A. J. Fikry begins isolating himself from his friends, family and associates before receiving a mysterious package that compels him to remake his life.

The Life We Bury – Allen Eskens – After Joe Talbert interviews a dying the life we buryVietnam veteran for a college writing assignment, he discovers that the veteran is a convicted murderer recently released from prison and, suspecting that the veteran was framed, he begins a dangerous investigation into the thirty-year-old murder.

red sparrowRed Sparrow – Jason Mathews – Drafted against her will to serve the regime of Vladimir Putin as an intelligence seductress, Dominika Egorova is assigned to operate against first-tour CIA officer Nathaniel Nash, with whom she engages in a charged effort of deception and tradecraft before a forbidden attraction threatens their careers and the security of America’s most valuable mole in Moscow.

Dept. of Speculation – Jenny Offill – An unflinching portrait of marriage dept of specby the award-winning author of Last Things features a heroine simply referred to as “the Wife,” who transitions from an idealistic woman who once exchanged love letters with her husband and who confronts an array of universal difficulties.

silkwormThe Silkworm – Robert Galbraith – While investigating the brutal murder of a novelist who had just completed a manuscript featuring poisonous pen-portraits of almost everyone he knew, which would ruin many lives, P.I. Cormoran Strike must race against time to catch a killer unlike any he has ever encountered before.

Missing You – Harlan Coben – Spotting her ex-fiancâe’s photo on an missing youonline dating site, NYPD Detective Kat Donovan reaches out to him, hoping to rekindle the past, but her hope turns to suspicion and then terror as an unspeakable conspiracy is revealed.

blue labyBlue Labyrinth – Douglas Preston & Lincoln Child – Investigating the murder of a long-time enemy, Aloysius Pendergast journeys to an abandoned California mine only to uncover a dark secret from his family’s past and a plot by a vengeful killer.

descentDescent – Tim Johnson – When their daughter disappears while out for a morning run during a late-summer vacation in the Rocky Mountains, her parents embark on a harrowing journey down increasingly divergent and solitary paths where they must answer some difficult questions to find the truth

Wolf In the White Van – John Darnielle – Creating fantastical mail-order wolf inthe white vanrole-playing games from his apartment where he endures a life of solitude after a disfiguring injury, Sean is blamed for a disaster involving two high school student clients, an event that compels him to reevaluate his own past.

officerAn Officer and A Spy – Robert Harris – A tale inspired by the infamous Dreyfus Affair finds Georges Picquart, the recently promoted head of Paris’ late-nineteenth-century counterespionage agency, leading the effort to convict Dreyfus only to succumb to gradual doubts that a high-level spy remains at large in the military.

 

On Our Shelves: Cozy Mysteries

sleuth

Here’s a great selection of cozy mysteries for your reading pleasure!

Grace Cries Uncle (Manor House Mystery) – Julie Hyzy

Spellcasting in Silk (A Witchcraft Mystery) – Juliet Blackwell

Hooked on Ewe (A Scottish Highlands Mystery) – Hannah Reed

Peaches and Scream (A Georgia Peach Mystery) – Susan Furlong

Magic and Macaroons (A Magical Bakery Mystery) – Bailey Cates

Macaroni and Freeze (A Comfort Food Mystery) – Christine Wenger

Dead Men Don’t Eat Cookies (A Cookie Cutter Shop Mystery) – Virginia Lowell

Butter Off Dead (A Food Lover’s Village Mystery) – Leslie Budewitz

Caught Read-Handed (A Read ‘Em and Eat Mystery) – Terrie Farley Moran

Wound Up in Murder (A Yarn Retreat Mystery) – Betty Hechtman

Berried Secrets (A Cranberry Cove Mystery) – Peg Cochran

Loom and Doom (A Weaving Mystery) – Carol Ann Martin

Murder in the Paperback Parlor (A Book Retreat Mystery) – Ellery Adams

Dream a Little Scream (A Dream Club Mystery) – Mary Kennedy

The Cat, The Sneak and the Secret (A Cats In Trouble Mystery) – Leann Sweeney

I’m Still Old School

chair

Even though I work with computers all day at my job, I’ll admit I haven’t fully embraced all forms of technology.  I’ll never use an e-reader and I’d rather see a child reading a real book versus anything electronic.

My daughters were raised with tons of books in the house and they loved to read as much as I.  I now have two grandsons, ages 3 and 1, and I am so happy that they also have tons of books in their house.   The three year old is quite proficient in using a smart phone and computer.  He knows how to access videos (he loves watching himself) and games (Thomas the Train is a favorite).  But he really loves books too, and has embraced them with delight and wonderment.  And, of course, baby brother also takes delight in ‘reading’ a book – although it is often up side down!

press hereOne day I was babysitting and my grandson wanted me to read him a book.  He said he knew the perfect book that I would like and he went searching through his books to find it.  To my surprise, he chose Press Here by Herve Tullet – and he was right, it was the perfect book for me.  Each page of this surprising book instructs the reader to press the dots, shake the pages, tilt the book, to see what will happen next.  Dots multiply, change direction, and grow in size.  It’s a wonderful adventure that uses the imagination right on the flat surface of a simple, printed page.   I had such fun reading it to him.

 

 

mix it up

 

Herve Tullet has written a new book that is just as delightful – Mix it Up!In this book, you follow the artist’s simple instructions, and suddenly colors appear, mix, splatter, and vanish in a world powered only by the reader’s imagination. 

 

 

 

 

So every now and then, set aside the electronic gadgets, find a comfy chair, and share an adventure with your child from the pages of a good, old fashioned book!