What’s All the Hoopla?

What is Hoopla?
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For those that have never explored our digital offerings, Hoopla is a free service that is available to Cheshire library card holders (just like Overdrive)! All you need to register is your library card number, and then you create your own user name and password, which you will use to sign in from your computer or mobile device. (If you are a cardholder from another library, you may have access to the service through your own library. If you are unsure check with your home library.)

hoopla Welcome Header CPLHoopla offers users digital access to videos (movies & TV), full music albums,  audiobooks, e-books & comics  and more twenty-four hours a day. While there is a limit to how many items you can borrow per month with this service (six per user per month) as long as you are not binge watching a television series, this should not cause much frustration. Many people use this service to watch movies without having to wait their turn on a holds list. I tend to use it to watch the harder to find titles like Anime or Foreign Films that are less likely to be found in our physical collection.

The varied genres and search categories Hoopla offers can make it easy to find the documentary that was recommended but you somehow never got to see, or that weird children’s movie that your kids keep asking for but your old VHS or DVD is no longer working.  My husband, who is not a big reader, has caved to the influence of myself, a coworker, and some of his favorite shows, and started reading graphic novels. What we do not hand him, he reads via Hoopla. I have since used the service for the same thing.

Want to take a moment and browse the huge collections available via Hoopla? Well, no time like the present! Take a quick gander at all the Audiobooks, Movies, Music, Comics, Ebooks, and  Television Shows at your fingertips!

Want to know some of the curious and simply interesting things I have found via Hoopla just to get you started? How hoopla3about the non-fiction mythology guide Percy Jackson’s Greek Heroes, or a book with instructions and patterns for Quick & Easy Crochet Cowls. Perhaps the very first episode of the original Lone Ranger television show or the Audiobook of The Scarlet Pimpernel is more your speed? Do you want to help you children learn french with the help of cartoon dinosaurs, or maybe try a new work out from Jillian Michaels? Personally, I am currently reading the hoopla2first graphic novel of Lucifer, while my husband is pursuing a variety of titles after having finished up all the published volumes of The Walking Dead.

The variety is huge! Frankly, I am sometimes overwhelmed by the the choices and have to pace myself so that I do not hit my limit of materials before the end of any given month- simply because there are so many choices and I am too excited to read or watch something right now to hold back from clicking that borrow button.

Need some technical help with Hoopla or still have some questions? Please comment below and I will answer any questions I can, and if I do not know the answer I will get the information for you. If you do not want to wait for me to get back to a computer to answer, you can also try our information page, the official hoopla support page, or give us a call at 203-272-2245 and choose the reference desk option.

Dark Justice

       4810718-7340774645-the-b_Arl6x9k I don’t read comic books; the drawings v. words are too visually distracting for me. The ones I hold tight in my file cabinet you’ve probably never heard of. But I love Batman. Adam West Batman. Super Friends Batman. Keaton, Clooney, Kilmer, Bale, I like them all. And yes, I had no problem with Affleck’s performance. Nine Batman films have raked in a combined profit of more than $2.2 Billion – no small change. I like Wonder Woman, and Spiderman, and don’t get me started on how much I love the Avengers.

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But I don’t like Superman. Never did. My favorite would be Super Friends Superman, and after that it’s Chris Reeve or nothing. Perhaps he’s too squeaky-clean – far more than Captain America, and too powerful. Krypton is one of the rarest gases, one part per million of our atmosphere. You would have to sift an awful lot of air to gain enough Krypton to affect him. Barring Lex Luthor, Superman is more or less invincible, and no one likes a prissy Lawful Good (this is the same problem fought in the X-Men series, Watchmen, and Captain America: Civil War). What good is a hero who has no faults and can’t be harmed?

51omO8G3K-L._AC_US160_Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice – due on DVD July 16 – didn’t grab me from the start, but I went to see it because – well, Batman. If you haven’t seen the last reboot of the Superman franchise, Man of Steel, be prepared for confusion, for BvS takes up right where Man of Steel left off. Batman is mighty ticked at Superman for all the damage he wrought in lives and property, and takes it upon himself to curtail Superman in a surge of animosity that seems to come out of nowhere. Batman’s good for a simmering revenge, not a sudden “You need to be taken down, I don’t like you” petty vindictiveness. Batman, a mere mortal with cool toys, tries to take down a superbeing who cannot be stopped. Needless to say, it does not go well.

Batman v. Superman seems lost in its own purpose. It’s a fair Batman film, a wooden and flat Superman film (Spider-Man has more lines in Civil War than Superman did in BvS), and if Batman-V-Superman-Zack-Snyder-Trinitythere’s any shining hero here, it’s Wonder Woman. If anything, it’s merely a clunky prequel to 2017’s Wonder Woman movie. In fact, you probably could have cut the whole rivalry down to 30 minutes, then began the Wonder Woman movie, and had a much better film.

My biggest gripe with the film, writing and directing aside, is that Batman breaks character. Guns are not Batman’s forte. Batman does not carry them, Batman does not shoot them. Batman is about outsmarting the villain and bringing them TO justice, not carrying it out himself. Batman is the thinking man’s hero. Batman never even kills the Joker. But here’s  Batman, shooting and killing like Rambo. That was my breaking point. And it is quite established that Batman is well-versed in martial arts; Batman’s moves in BvS are poor at best; slow and unconvincing.

batman-vs-superman-dawn-of-justice-movieIf you hunt for it, there are enough good bits to make the film worthwhile; all the Wonder Woman scenes among them. It is certainly nowhere near the abysmal level of 1992’s Batman Returns, with Danny DeVito as a deformed demented Penguin – surely the lowpoint of his career. Forbes magazine nails the issues with the film quite nicely here: http://www.forbes.com/sites/insertcoin/2016/05/09/captain-america-civil-war-shows-exactly-why-batman-v-superman-failed/#6dda5e6446bb.

If you really love the superhero genre, then by all means watch it. There are far worse superhero films out there – Green Lantern and Eric Bana/ Incredible Hulk (2003) come fast to mind. But if you really want to see superheroes eating their own and winning at it, wait for Captain America: Civil War.

Books that Defy Genre Labels and Description

Part of my job in labeling and cataloging books includes deciding if it needs a genre label and which one(s). Some books are easy. With some books I know right away that it needs a mystery, fantasy, or science fiction sticker. Particularly if the publisher is nice enough to include that information in a subtitle or in the book description. Sometimes it takes a little more research, but the author or publisher often include the intended genre pretty clearly somewhere, if you know where to look. However, there are some books that are simply beyond categorizing. Sometimes this is because the book covers so much ground very well, sometimes it is because it simply defies description, and sometimes it is because it crosses so many genre lines that there is not enough room to defygenre1include all the relevant genre stickers.

Here are a few examples of fascinating reads that defy simple genre classifications:

The Bone Clocks by David Mitchell
Interweaves six narratives spanning the period between 1984 and the 2030s to chronicle a secret war between a cult of soul-decanters and a small group of vigilantes who would take them down. By the award-winning author of Cloud Atlas.defygenre2

Flatland: a Romance of Many Dimensions by Edwin A. Abbott
A century-old classic of British letters that charmed and fascinated generations of readers with its witty satire of Victorian society and its unique insights, by analogy, into the fourth dimension.

Hard-boiled Wonderland and the End of the World by Haruki Murakami; translated by Alfred Birnbaumdefygenre3
Tracking one man’s descent into the Kafkaesque underworld of contemporary Tokyo, Murakami unites East and West, tragedy and farce, compassion and detachment, slang and philosophy.

2666 by Roberto Bolaño; translated from the Spanish by Natasha Wimmer
An American sportswriter, an elusive German novelist, and a teenage student interact in an urban community on the U.S.-Mexico border where hundreds of young factory defygenres4workers have disappeared.

The Incarnations by Susan Barker
Receiving mysterious letters from someone claiming to be his soulmate, a Beijing taxi driver learns about their shared relationships in numerous past lives before becoming increasingly certain that someone is watching him.

defygenrebtmMore suggestions for indescribably interesting reads include: Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell, Geek Love by Katherine Dunn, Valis by Philip K. Dick, Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer, Here, There be Dragons by James A. Owen, Frost in May by Antonia White, The Secret History by Donna Tartt, If on a Winter’s Night a Traveler by Italo Calvino,Gun, With Occasional Music by Jonathan Lethe,Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell by Susanna Clarke,The Marvels by Brian Selznick, In the Shadow of Blackbirds by Cat Winters, and The Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov.

Have you ever read a book that left you changed but still somehow wondering what exactly it was that you just read? What is your favorite book that left you speechless when it came down to recommending it or describing it to someone else?

Here are the 2017 Nutmeg Nominees!

NUTMEG-LOGOThe Nutmeg Children’s Book Award is the “Children’s Choice” Award for Connecticut. The goal of the committee is to encourage children in grades two through twelve to read quality literature. Here is a listing of the nominees, divided by the four grade based categories. The library has purchased and cataloged multiple copies of each book. There might be a waiting list for the book(s) you are interested in most, but if you place a hold on the item we will contact you when it is your turn.

The links that I have included for each title are for searches that include all formats of the material that we own, including the print copy, audiobooks, and digital formats. How many have you already read? Are there any that you loved, hated, or are surprised by?

High School (Grades 9-12)
Mosquitoland by David Arnold
The Queen of the Tearling by Erika Johansen
Those Who Wish Me Dead by Michael Koryta
A Death-Struck Year by Makiia Lucier
How It Went Down by Kekla Magoon
I’ll Give You the Sun by Jandy Nelson
Gabi, a Girl in Pieces by Isabel Quintero
Jackaby by William Ritter
Challenger Deep by Neal Shusterman
Sway by Kat Spears

Teen (Grades 7-8)
The Night Gardener by Jonathan Auxier
Turn Left at the Cow by Lisa Bullard
The Iron Trial by Holly Black and Cassandra Clare
Swagger by Carl Deuker
Memoirs of an Imaginary Friend by Matthew Dicks
Sure Signs of Crazy by Karen Harrington
The Mark of the Dragonfly by Jaleigh Johnson
Far Far Away by Tom McNeal
Endangered by Eliot Schrefer
A Time to Dance by Padma Venkatraman

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Intermediate (Grades 4-6)
Gaby, Lost and Found by Angela Cervantes
Red Berries, White Clouds, Blue Sky by Sandra Dallas
Space Case by Stuart Gibbs
Escape from Mr. Lemoncello’s Library by Chris Grabenstein
Roller Girl by Victoria Jamieson
Masterminds by Gordon Korman
The Misadventures of the Family Fletcher by Dana Alison Levy
A Snicker of Magic by Natalie Lloyd
The Boundless by Kenneth Oppel
Eddie Red Undercover: Mystery on Museum Mile by Marcia Wells

Elementary (Grades 2-4)
Mr. Ferris and His Wheel by Kathryn Gibbs Davis & Gilbert Ford
Phineas L. MacGuire Gets Cooking by Frances O’Roark Dowell & Preston McDaniels
Skateboard Party (The Carver Chronicles) by Karen English & Laura Freeman
Queen of the Diamond: The Lizzie Murphy Story by Emily Arnold McCully
Grandma in Blue with Red Hat by Scott Menchin & Harry Bliss
Ranger in Time: Rescue on the Oregon Trail by Kate Messner
One Plastic Bag: Isatou Ceesay and the Recycling Women of the Gambia by Miranda Paul & Elizabeth Zunon
Quinny and Hopper by Adriana Brad Schanen & Greg Swearingen
Winter Bees and Other Poems of the Cold by Joyce Sidman and Rick Allen
Star Stuff: Carl Sagan and the Mysteries of the Cosmos by Stephanie Roth Sisson
Hana Hashimoto, Sixth VIolin by Chieri Uegaki & Qin Leng
In a Village By the Sea by Muon Van & April Chu
Hamster Princess: Harriet the Invincible by Ursula Vernon
Lulu’s Mysterious Mission by Judith Viorst & Kevin Cornell
Hilo: The Boy Who Crashed to Earth by Judd Winick

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Who do you think will win?

International Authors for Children and Young Adults

I am not sure how many people are aware of the number of fantastic international authors available in the children’s room. Many such authors are already popular, but the fact that the books were originally published in another language or overseas is simply not part of the cover art or publicity that the books receive. inkheart

For instance, Cornelia Funke, best known for her Inkheart series which is popular in book and movie format, is German. Although she lives in California now, the majority of her works were originally written in German and published in Germany well before being translated and published in the United Kingdom and the United States.

Some of the books in our collection that are translations might surprise you. Particularly some of the classic picture books. This is a small sampling of the picture books, children’s chapter books, and young adult books that have been translated from other languages. There are many more great ones, if I missed one of your favorites, please mention it in the translate3comments for everyone to enjoy.

Picturebooks:
The Rainbow Fish by Marcus Pfister; translated from German by J. Alison James.  The most beautiful fish in the entire ocean discovers the real value of personal beauty and friendship.

Press Here and Mix it up! by Hervé Tullet; translated from French by Christopher Franceschelli. Instructs the reader on how to interact with the illustrations to create imaginative images.
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My Heart is Laughing by Rose Lagercrantz; translated from Swedish by Julia Marshall. Dani’s been trying her best to stay happy ever since her best friend Ella moved away.

Big Wolf & Little Wolf by Nadine Brun-Cosme; translated from French by Claudia Bedrick. Big Wolf has always lived alone, so when a little wolf suddenly arrives one day, he does not know what to think.

Nutcracker by E.T.A. Hoffmann; translated by Ralph Manheim. After hearing how her toy nutcracker got his ugly face, a little girl helps break the spell.

Puss in Boots by Charles Perrault; translated by Malcolm Arthur. A clever cat wins his master a fortune and the hand of a princess. translate2

Children’s Chapter Books:
Ring of Fire by Pierdomenico Baccalario ; translated by Leah D. Janeczko. Four seemingly unrelated children discover they are destined to become involved in an ancient mystery.

Igraine the Brave, Dragon Rider, and many more by Cornelia Funke; translated from the German by Anthea Bell. The daughter of two magicians, twelve-year-old Igraine wants nothing more than to be a knight.

Lost Treasure of the Emerald Eye and the original books from the Geronimo Stilton pseudonym were translated from translate5Italian by Lidia Tramontozzi. Geronimo’s sister, Thea, discovers an old, mysterious map showing a secret treasure hidden on a faraway island.

Pippi Longstocking by Astrid Lindgren; translated from Swedish by Tiina NunnallyRing of Fire by Pierdomenico Baccalario ; translated by Leah D. JaneczkoRing of Fire by Pierdomenico Baccalario ; translated by Leah D. Janeczko. Escapades of a lucky little girl who lives with a horse and a monkey–but without any parents.

Princess Pistachio by Marie-Louise Gay; translated from French by Jacob Homel. Pistachio knew all along that she was a princess, but her ‘real’ parents, the king and queen of Papua, have sent her a message at last.
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Young Adult:
Ruby Red and more by Kerstin Gier; translated from the German by Anthea Bell. Sixteen-year-old Gwyneth discovers that she, rather than her well-prepared cousin, carries a time-travel gene.

The Dragons of Darkness and Tiger Moon by Antonia Michaelis; translated by Anthea Bell. Two boys from very different backgrounds are thrown together by magic, mayhem, as they battle deadly dragons.

Reckless by Cornelia Funke; translated by Oliver Latsch. Jacob and Will Reckless have looked out for each other ever since their father disappeared, but when Jacob discovers a magical mirror that transports him to a  world populated by witches, giants, and ogres, he keeps it to himself. 
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Why We Took the Car by Wolfgang Herrndorf; translated by Tim Mohr. Mike Klingenberg is a troubled fourteen-year-old who thinks of himself as boring, until a Russian juvenile delinquent includes Mike in his criminal activities.

My Family for the War by Anne C. Voorhoeve; translated by Tammi Reichel. Ten-year-old Ziska Mangold is taken out of Nazi Germany on one of the Kindertransport trains, to live in London with a Jewish family.

The Prince of Mist by Carlos Ruiz Zafón; translated by Lucia Graves. Thirteen-year-old Max Carver and sister, fifteen-year-old Alicia, with new friend Roland, face off against an evil magician who is striving to complete a bargain made before he died.

The Prophecy of the Stones by Flavia Bujor; translated by Linda Coverdale. Three girls, known as the Stones of Prophecy, are drawn to a land called Fairytale, where they and seek a magical creature who explains their role in a battle between Good and Evil.

The Storyteller by Antonia Michaelis; translated by Miriam Debbage. Seventeen-year-old Anna begins to fall in love with her classmate, Abel, a drug dealer from the wrong side of town, when she hears him tell a story to his six-year-old sister.