The Eastern Regional Libraries Show - 22nd July & 29th July

Library staff members Lesley Conway and Pia Butcher run a radio show each Wednesday 12:05pm-12:45pm on Eastern FM 98.1 called The Eastern Regional Library Show. Tune in next Wednesday for a great show. We've got updates for the last couple of radio shows.

22nd July

Pia reviewed a range of novels today, the first four falling into the adult and young adult category.

A lion called Christian by Bourke and Rendall grew from a 2008 Youtube.com film clip about the emotional reunion of two young men and their pet lion, Christian. They had left him in Africa with Born Free's George Adamson, who would introduce the lion into his rightful place in the wild. This is their story written by those young men. (View the amazing story of Christian, Bourke & Rendall, with links to the video....webgurl)

Dewey: the small town cat who touched the world by Myron is the tale of a kitten who was found in a library overnight chute and grew up to being a loyal companion in the Spencer, Iowa library. Dewey helps Vicki Myron, the author, and the people of the town of Spencer to face life.

Crank is a very sad tale of a young girl with a bright future damaged by drugs. A verse novel skillfully written by Ellen Hopkins from her own experiences of her young daughter's addiction. And Glass also by Hopkins, the continuing story of Kristina and her spiral into the depths of drug addiction.

The last two books reviewed are Picture books. Me, Oliver Bright by De Kantzow and Rippen, in which Oliver Bright explores how much life has changed since his Grandpa's times through his school project. A warm hearted look at families and how the adventure of growing up. And Jasper McFlea will not eat his tea by Fox and Vane which deals with Jasper McFlea who will not eat his tea, only pasta. But what will it take to get Jasper to eat everything from avocado to zucchini? A delicious rollicking feast.


29th July

For some time there has been a debate about whether electronic information would wipe out the appeal and usefulness of the book. Evidence would suggest that both the computer and the book have their unique qualities, and will co-exist happily. Today, I featured some of the interesting electronic resources which are making both information and fiction easily available to us all. You may already have looked up magazines like Choice on our ERL Onefile database, but have you discovered that you can access an enormous range of e-magazines via the catalogue? When you do a simple subject search for 'australia history e-magazine' you will get a list of 25 titles; a search of 'diabetes e-magazine' gives you 15 titles. From the icon in the bottom right hand corner, you are taken to the magazine records where the issues are listed by year, and once into the records you can put in a subject search.

Another wonderful resource is e-books, material which is out of copyright or which authors have decided to put in the public domain and forgo copyright. Try putting e-books into a Google search to see something of the huge range available. Another interesting search is to go go to www.gutenberg.org, the site of the first project to put books out in the public domain. You may have heard too that Google are working with libraries around the world to put material which is out of copyright onto the web. What this means boggles my mind, but is also very exciting. A useful example of this accessible material is when a student asked recently if our libraries held a copy of a letter Oscar Wilde wrote called De Profundis. She needed it for study, her university library has all copies on loan, and to buy a copy would cost $35. A quick check on the Internet, and we found that it is freely available.

Music today was from The Royal Australian Navy Band's CD A flagship recital

----Lesley

The Eastern Regional Library Show

Sorry for the lack of blogging lately. I've been off work sick for a few days in the past two weeks and have been trying to catch up with everything. That includes having to print off 600 overdue and hold notices for the past few days (which actually wasn't a lot considering) and sending out about 70 PINs this morning. "Easter Tuesday" is actually the busiest day of the year at our libraries. Branch visits are up and the volume of items returned are huge, which is great actually. It's nice to be missed.

Anyhoo, library staff members Lesley Conway and Pia Butcher run a radio show each Wednesday 12:05pm-12:45pm on Eastern FM 98.1 called The Eastern Regional Library Show. Tune in next Wednesday for a great show. The following is a summary of the radio show for the 13th March......Cheers, Maryanne

Reading book reviews can be very exciting, and sometimes frustrating. Books which you decide you must read as soon as possible, have barely made it into the bookshops, and are in the library catalog, but not on shelf yet. This is when a reservation is the best option. Reservations are free, and you can put on as many as you need.

I was inspired by a recent review of A voyage round John Mortimer : the authorized biography by Valerie Grove. I have long been a fan of Mortimer's Rumpole of the Bailey, and of the writing of his first wife Penelope Mortimer. This is a revealing, robust and affectionate portrait of a multi-faceted, talented, flawed human being.

An Australian novel which I first discovered through a review is The art of the engine driver by Steven Carol. It is a tale of 'ordinary' suburban lives, on the fringe of Melbourne in the 1950's. It is a story of one summer evening when Vic, an engine driver, his wife and son go to a party given by one of their neighbours, which gently unfolds to reveal layers of complexity and drama.

And for light relief The meaning of tingo and other extraordinary words from around the world by Adam Jacot de Boinod ( originally titled Toujours Tingo ). I came accross an article about this book in Country Life magazine December 13 2007, and it intrigued me immediately. As the author Jacot de Boinod says, " we must encourage the survival of some rare and wonderful languages which are, tragically, becoming extinct at the rate of one a fortnight". For example the Tsonga word poyipoyii, which means 'a person who talks at length, but doesn't make sense', or the Hindi kanjus makkhichus which is a person 'so miserly that if a fly falls into his cup of tea, he'll fish it out and suck it dry before throwing it away'. My favourite is the Nilo-Saharan barbarian-on, 'to sit in a group of people warming up in the morning sun', enough to make you elmosolyodik, Hungarian for 'break into a smile'.

---- Lesley

Review - A long way down by Nick Hornby

On a cold New Year's Eve in London, four very different people meet on the 15th floor of Toppers Tower, a notorious suicide location. You could not imagine a more diverse group - a middle aged TV presenter who has lost his family, job and self-respect; a single mother with a severely disabled teenage son; eighteen year old Jess who seems determined to self-destruct; and an American rock 'n roll musician whose band and girlfriend have deserted him. They decide to postpone the moment and go in search of Jess's no-good boyfriend, since this is all she wants to make her life worth persevering with. The gradual building of fragile trust and hope is fascinating, funny and moving.

---- reviewed by Lesley

I'm working on a few changes with the library website and one of the things I'd like to include are members book reviews. Just wondering, would you read a review blog/wiki and send in some reviews? Please send me a comment...cheers, Maryanne

Review - Lean Mean Thirteen by Janet Evanovich

Stephanie Plum's ex-husband, Dickie, goes missing just after she attacks him in a ruse to plant a bug. Stephanie's the prime suspect and has to get to the bottom of the mystery whilst evading the usual threats and fires and juggling the attentions of Morelli and Ranger. I read this one in a single weekend and loved it. If you haven't been reading this series, I can't recommend it highly enough and if you have be sure to place your hold now before the queue gets huge.
---- reviewed by Maryanne

For more great staff selections check out our Staff Picks page on Reader's Corner.

Cheers, Maryanne