Non-Fiction

It’s National Talk Like Pirate Day, Celebrate with Picturebooks!

/ Sharon Tyler / 1 Comment

Today is National Talk Like Pirate Day! Celebrate this fun day with us by enjoying some great pirate themed picturebooks! Everyone loves a great pirate tale, and these are fun stories that you can share with the whole family while getting into the spirit of a silly holiday.

Pirate Pete’s Talk Like a Pirate by Kim Kennedy
In search of a crew, Pirate Pete and his parrot look for “stanky scallywags” who possess certain conversational skills.

The Pirate Princess by Sudipta Bardhan-Quallen
Tired of the royal life, Princess Bea boards a pirate ship and sets out for adventure on the high seas but soon finds she is not good at swabbing decks, cooking in the galley, or keeping watch from the crow’s nest.

Small Saul by Ashley Spires
Small Saul is a different kind of pirate. Will Small Saul be able to prove his worth as a pirate or will he be thrown overboard?

Henry & the Buccaneer Bunnies by Carolyn Crim
Captain Barnacle Black Ear, baddest of the Buccaneer Bunnies, is ashamed of his book-loving son, Henry, until the day a great storm approaches.

You might also want to check out  The Pirates Next Door: Starring the Jolley-Rogers by Jonny Duddle, Pirate vs. Pirate: the Terrific Tale of a Big Blustery Maritime Match by Mary Quattlebaum, The Gingerbread Pirates by Kristin Kladstrup, The No-Good Do-Good Pirates by Jim Kraft, or Henry & the Crazed Chicken Pirates by Carolyn Crimi.

Would you prefer to learn about real pirates instead of reading picturebooks, or to follow up a fun tale with factual adventures? Then check out these children’s nonfiction books that they whole family can enjoy.

The Pirate Queen by Emily Arnold McCully, Women of the Sea: Ten Pirate Stories by Myra Weatherly, Blackbeard, the Pirate King: Several Yarns Detailing the Legends, Myths, and Real-life Adventures of History’s Most Notorious Seaman: Told in Verse by J. Patrick Lewis, Pirates: Facts, Things to Make, Activities by Rachel Wright, I Wonder Why Pirates Wore Earrings: and Other Questions about Piracy by Pat Jacobs, Pirates by Peter Chrisp, Real Pirates the Untold Story of the Whydah from Slave Ship to Pirate Ship by Barry Clifford, Pirates : Robbers of the High Seas by Gail Gibbons, and Sea Queens: Women Pirates around the World by Jane Yolen.

No Meat Please: Vegetarian Cookbooks

/ Jenn / Leave a comment

October 1st is World Vegetarian Day, and I get to celebrate it this year! In March my husband and I decided to become vegetarians, for a variety of reasons, and we haven’t looked back since. I get asked all the time, “So how IS it being a vegetarian???” Let me tell you, my carnivorous friends, it’s really not that bad. I thought I would crave burgers and chicken, but not really. The only thing I really miss is… bacon! It’s my trigger word.

When we made the decision to go veggie, I took out a LOT of vegetarian cookbooks and looked through them. Many of them have rather unusual, and frankly weird ingredients that my husband and I just aren’t ready for (some of these things you need to ease into). And tofu will never be a part of our diet. No matter how it’s prepared, it always tastes like a pencil eraser to me. But to each their own.

Whether you decided to be, or already are a vegetarian, or just like meatless cooking options, here are a few vegetarian cookbooks we have added to our collection this year:

Small Planet, Small Plates

  1. Small Planet, Small Plates: Earth-Friendly Vegetarian Recipes by Troth Wells. There are over 100 recipes from all around the world in this cookbook, dishes ranging from Africa, Latin-America, and the Middle East. Wells is a firm believer in low-impact eating and moving towards a vegetable-based diet as a sustainable method for our planet to survive. Picture with each recipe.

    French Market Cookbook

  2. The French Market Cookbook: Vegetarian Recipes From My Parisian Kitchen by Clotide Dusoulier. Dusoulier is the blogger behind the popular blog ChocolateandZucchini.com and is not a vegetarian. But like a lot of people, she has chosen to eat fewer meat dishes. She includes 82 recipes using fresh, in season, and ripe ingredients that do not have a lot of cheeses, creams, or dairy.

    Meatless

  3. Meatless: More Than 200 Of the Very Best Vegetarian Recipes by Martha Stewart. Meatless has over 200 recipes, all with pictures, that are for the vegetarian and meat-eater alike. What is cool about this book is a guide on how to stock a vegetarian pantry, with essentials like beans, vegetable stock, and pastas.

    Simply Satisfying

  4. Simply Satisfying: Over 200 Vegetarian Recipes You’ll Want To Make Again and Again by Jeanne Lemlin. This is a reinvention of Lemlin’s first cookbook, published more than 25 years ago as Vegetarian Pleasures: A Menu Cookbook. In this new cookbook, Lemlin’s first in more than 10 years, she uses fresh, easily available (key in my book), and robust flavors. One recipes that sounds to die for is fragrant vegetable stew with corn dumplings. YUM!

    Welcome To Claire’s

  5. Welcome to Claire’s: 35 Years of Recipes and Reflections From the Landmark Vegetarian Restaurant by Claire Criscuolo. We are lucky enough to live within a half and hour of Claire’s Corner Copia and hope to make it there soon. If you’ve been to Claire’s before, you’ve likely tried her Lithuanian Coffee Cake. The recipe is included here!

See you in the stacks,

Jenn

On Our Shelves: New Fiction & Non-Fiction

/ Linda / Leave a comment

New Fiction

 Snow Hunters by Paul Yoon – This is the story of the extraordinary journey of Yohan, who defects from his country at the end of the Korean War, leaving his friends and family behind to seek a new life on the coast of Brazil.

The Gravity of Birds by Tracy Guzeman – A family lake house, two sisters, and a young painter living next door – the decisions they make one summer will have lasting effects for all of them.

The Rathbones by Janice Clark – A gothic, literary adventure set in New England, Janice Clark’s haunting debut chronicles one hundred years of a once prosperous and now crumbling whaling family, told by its last surviving member.

The Queens Gambit by Elizabeth Fremantle – A tale inspired by the life of Henry VIII’s sixth wife follows her reluctant marriage to the egotistical and powerful king in spite of her love for Thomas Seymour, a situation that compels her to make careful choices in a treacherous court.

Little Black Book of Murder by Nancy Martin – Nora Blackbird may have been to the manor borne, but these days money is so tight, she can’t afford to lose her job as a society columnist. So when her new boss at the Philadelphia Intelligencer—Australian tabloid editor Gus Hardwicke—tells her to work the celebrity gossip beat or start checking the want ads, the choice is easy.

New Non-Fiction

 Boy 30529 by Felix Weinberg – Born into a respectable Czech family, Felix’s early years were idyllic. But when Nazi persecution threatened in 1938, his father traveled to England, hoping to arrange for his family to emigrate there. His efforts came too late, and his wife and children fell into the hands of the Fascist occupiers.

Nine Years Under by Sheri Booker – “Six Feet Under” meets The Wire in a dazzling and darkly comic memoir about coming-of-age in a black funeral home in Baltimore.

The Art of Thinking Clearly by Rolf Dobelli – This book by world-class thinker and entrepreneur Rolf Dobelli is an eye-opening look at human psychology and reasoning — essential reading for anyone who wants to avoid “cognitive errors” and make better choices in all aspects of their lives.

Serving Victoria by Kate Hubbard – Serving Victoria follows the lives of six members of her household, from the governess to the royal children, from her maid of honor to her chaplain and her personal physician.

Stonehenge – A New Understanding by Mike Pearson – Despite its being one of prehistory’s most alluring landmarks, before the Stonehenge Riverside Project led by noted archeologist Mike Parker Pearson, only half of Stonehenge itself—and far less of its surroundings—had ever been investigated, and many records from previous digs are inaccurate or incomplete.

New Romance

 Castaway Cove by JoAnn Ross – Single dad Mac Culhane has traveled to some of the world’s most dangerous war zones, but now he and his young daughter have settled in Shelter Bay, where he’s become the late-night DJ for the local radio station. The last thing he expects is to connect over the airwaves with a caller….

Behind His Blue Eyes by Kaki Warner – The first in a brand-new Western trilogy set in Heartbreak, Colorado, starring an advance man for the railroad—and the woman whose trust (and heart) he longs to win.

Midnight Games by Elle Kennedy – A master of disguise, Isabel Roma spends her life pretending to be other women.  Normally, her emotions are reined in tight—but sexy mercenary Trevor Callaghan has a knack for getting under her skin. The elite operative’s quiet strength and raw magnetism are a distraction that can quickly turn deadly in their dangerous line of work…

Surrender to Sultry by Mary Beckett – How do you stay under the sheriff’s radar in a town that prides itself on knowing everyone’s business? Leah’s not sure it’s possible, but she’s determined to avoid Colton Bea for as long as she can. Seeing him again would be too heartbreaking-and she knows from experience his bone-melting kisses are way too tempting.

Cowboy Seeks Bride by Carolyn Brown – Rancher Dewar O’Donnell is just an old-fashioned cowboy at heart, and he can’t wait to reenact the historic Chisholm Trail ride with his buddies. The trial-run cattle drive for a reality TV show sounds like a great time—until H.B. McKay pulls up in her slick red sports car…

Non-Fiction Summer Reading

/ Linda / Leave a comment

There’s no reading quite as wonderful as summer reading.  Here are some terrific non-fiction books that are perfect for a relaxing summer day.

I Wear the Black Hat by Chuck Klosterman –  Mr. Klosterman questions the modern understanding of villainy and delivers perceptive observations on the complexity of the anti-hero in a very humorous way.  He blends cultural analysis with self-interrogation and imaginative hypotheticals.

The Astronaut Wives Club by Lily Koppel – This is the true story of the young American wives whose husbands were sent into space as part of the Mercury Seven program.

Difficult Men by Brett Martin – An entertaining and insightful look at the creators of some highly rated recent television series such as Breaking Bad, The Shield, Six Feet Under, The Sopranos and Deadwood.

The Good Life Lab – Radical Experiments in Hands-On Living by Jehanara Tremayne.  An inspirational story of how one couple ditched their careers and life in New York City to move to rural New Mexico to live self-sufficiently.

Mickey and Willie: Mantle and Mayes, the Parallel Lives of Baseball’s Golden Age by Allen Barra.  The combined biographies of two baseball greats.

 

Susan Reads: The Immortal Game: A History of Chess

/ Susan O. / 1 Comment

[Cover] People have been doing it for more than 1300 years.  James Bond did it. So did Kirk and Spock.  Ben Franklin was addicted to it. Harry Potter did it the wizard way, but never once did Doyle ever directly say Sherlock Holmes did. I picked up The Immortal Game: A History of Chess, expecting it to be the dorkiest book ever written, a checkered feather in my Nerd cap.  I expected it to be boring and confusing, full of that chessy shorthand I can’t seem to follow despite its simplicity, and I never expected to actually finish it.

            I was so wrong.

            Author David Shenk presents a surprisingly fascinating history of the game, starting with its roots in India in the 600’s, played in similar fashion on a squared but monochrome board. The game spread to the Middle East just as Mohammad was gathering his followers, and the spread of Islam throughout the Mediterranean carried the game to Spain, where it spread upwards all the way to the Vikings. Chess underwent several incarnations as different kings and clerics tried to ban it, adding the familiar two-toned board to make it easier to follow.  In the late 1400’s, the king’s minister became the all-powerful queen, in response to the presence of several very strong queens in Europe at the time, such as Isabella of Spain and Mary, Queen of Scots. It was during this renaissance that our current game was born.

            Chess has been used throughout the ages as a teaching tool of the masses, from teaching peasants their place in society, to teaching the peasants that they are just as powerful as kings and helping to fuel revolutions (Ben Franklin allegedly told a player who check-mated him to go ahead and take his king; America had no need of kings and he would continue to play without it), to teaching battlefield strategies, to almost freeing the imprisoned Napoleon, but the man sent to tell him of the rescue plans stored in the game died en route.

            Shenk alternates his chapters of history with play-by-play explanations of one historic game, explaining why each move was important. This breaks up the history with examples of strategy, without delving too deep into QH4/BH3 shorthand, and makes for an enjoyable and educational read. Shenk argues that chess masters are made, not born (reiterating M. Gladwell), and that any person can become a Grand Master at any age, if enough practice is given. I am no chess master, playing on an entertainment level in a very random and haphazard fashion and doing rather well at it. However, after reading the book, with very little thought effort on my part, I was able to beat my computer chess program – four times in a row.

            A very painless and interesting book whether you actually play or just want to read about it. As Spock would say : Fascinating.