LET’S GET COOKING!

Now that there’s a snap in the air, I can see myself cooking more. In the summer, it’s so easy to just fire up the outside grill or make salads – all wonderful of course, but isn’t there something more homey about making soups, stews, quiches, etc?

So here we have some of the latest cookbooks for you:
The Ski House Cookbook: Warm Winter Dishes for Cold Weather Fun, by Tina Anderson and Sarah Pinneo, 641.5 ANDER
You’ll find slow cooked meals, après-ski snacks, beverages and more.

Talk with Your Mouth Full: The Hearty Boys Cookbook, by Dan Smith and Steve McDonagh, 641.5 SMITH
The authors are two former actors who waited tables in between acting jobs. The Hearty Boys was the name of their catering company once they got into the food business. This book provides recipes, of course, and also some great menu ideas, with insights into the lives of the two authors.

Bobby Flay’s Mesa Grill Cookbook: Explosive Flavors from the Southwestern Kitchen, by Bobby Flay, with Stephanie Banyas and Sally Jackson, 641.5784 FLAY
From the man who gave us a new appreciation of all things Southwestern– his first Mesa Grill opened in 1991. The menu has evolved over the years, but stays true to its Southwestern roots.

Cristina’s Tuscan Table, by Cristina Ceccatelli Cook, 641.59455 COOK
With many menus from her restaurant in Sun Valley, Cristina gives us true Tuscan delights. She describes the food and wine that accompanies it. She puts so much of her own personality into her restaurant.

--The Reference Staff

Our Picks!: Books About Food

Check out our brand-new Youth Services' Our Picks! list for November 2007-- it features tasty books about food. You can view the full list here.

Also, you might want to check out some of the very newest additions to our kids' cookbook collection:

• Cool Lunches to Make and Take: Easy Recipes for Kids to Cook, by Lisa Wagner, J 641.53 WAGNE
• Cool Meals to Start Your Wheels: Easy Recipes for Kids to Cook, by Lisa Wagner, J 641.53 WAGNE
• Cool Sweets and Treats to Eat: Easy Recipes for Kids to Cook, by Lisa Wagner, J 641.53 WAGNE
• Lunch Munch, by Bobbie Kalman, J 641.5 KALMA
• The Spatulatta Cookbook, by Isabella and Olivia Gerasole, J 641.5 GERAS
  

The Books Are Weeping

"The Books Are Weeping," by Brenda Scott Royce, at the Huffington Post.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/brenda-scott-royce/the-books-are-weeping_b_70465.html

"My first visit to a school library forever changed the way I think about books. After giving us a tour and describing the Dewey decimal system in terms kindergarteners could understand, the librarian told us that while some books were always in demand, others had never been checked out at all. She said that if you listened closely, you could actually hear these overlooked books crying."

Scariest Characters in Literature

Just in time for the scariest night of the year, abebooks.com polled visitors on the 10 scariest characters in literature.

The results:
1. Big Brother from 1984 by George Orwell
2. Hannibal Lecter from the novels by Thomas Harris
3. Pennywise the Clown from It by Stephen King
4. Nurse Ratched from One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest by Ken Kesey
5. Count Dracula from Bram Stoker's Dracula
6. Annie Wilkes from Misery by Stephen King
7. The demon from The Exorcist by William Peter Blatty
8. Patrick Bateman from American Psycho by Bret Easton Ellis
9. Bill Sykes from Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens
10. Voldemort from the Harry Potter books by J.K. Rowling

What's in a Name?

Sophie? Caitlin? Fiona? Matthew? Cody? Cameron? Zarabella? These are just some of the names given to babies born recently at Greenwich Hospital (source: Greenwich Time, Sunday, October 28, 2007)

One of the most entertaining of book quests is a look for books featuring characters with kids’ very own names (which might be a little tough for Zarabella, but we could try for Arabella, or Zara, or Bella, or even Ella!).

As an example, let’s look at a few picture books with a ‘Sophie’ connection:
WHAT TO DO? WHAT TO DO? (E TEEVI)
THERE’S A DRAGON DOWNSTAIRS (E MCKAY)
DON’T LET THE PEAS TOUCH! (E BLUME)
And there are at least 39 other books in Perrot’s YS collection that have a Sophie as the author or as a featured player!

So what’s in a name?
Maybe a book!
Come pay us a call –
we’ll help you look!

TALES FROM... NIGHTMARES

TERRIBLE TALES FROM.....

N I G H T M A R E S

• CLICK TO HEAR. . . THE SORCERESS OF SILVERMINE. She tells the tale of a man who lived near a graveyard. Every day he cut through the graveyard to get to work, but then he began hearing a voice calling, "TURN ME OOOOOVER. . ."
  
  
  
• CLICK TO HEAR. . . THE HAG. She tells us of one very mean teacher, whose fate rests in the hands of her students. . .
  
  
  
• CLICK TO HEAR. . . THE CRONE OF COS COB. Lady Mary is engaged to be married, but doesn't know much about her suitor. That is, until she visits his castle and finds a room full of bloody corpses. . .
  
  
  
  [All sound clips are in MP3 format.]

Book Recommendation: My Dearest Friend

My Dearest Friend: Letters of Abigail and John Adams, edited by Margaret A. Hogan and C. James Taylor

Ms. Hogan is Managing Editor and Mr. Taylor is Editor in Chief of the Adams Papers at the Massachusetts Historical Society. Exciting for us also at Perrot is the fact that Margaret Hogan was a former library page in the 1980’s. Nice to think we started her on her literary career! This book has been very well received in the review media. John and Abigail Adams really had a partnership. She was his chief advisor and confidante on political matters and policies. This is an intimate look at their relationship during the years of the creation of the United States.

October is Family History Month

October is Family History Month and there are many ways to celebrate this:

This is the best time to get together family photographs and start a scrapbook of extended family members to help tell their stories to the next generation. You may also want to chart your family tree, if you haven’t already. A form to do this is available online at Ancestry Library.
The Library also has numerous genealogy books that you can borrow. If you are new or fairly new to family history research, there are two books that can be of help:

• Family History 101: A Beginner’s Guide to Finding Your Ancestors is a great book resource to start with. Written by Marcia Melnyk, this book helps you along with the beginning steps of family research using both online and other resources
• The second “beginner’s” book is Genealogy for the First Time: Research your Family History, by Laura Best. Hers is a more illustrated book, with her own family pictures and antiques in the background. She shows Heritage scrapbooking, which is a relatively new concept, as a means to preserve and protect personal and family histories. This can be a fun and meaningful activity for the family.

Continue your search with our two genealogy databases:

• Ancestry Library: This database allows for a search by name to get birth, marriage and death records. If you can supply at least a birth date, you can narrow the results to get a more likely return. There is also census information and immigration information, such as the names of passenger ships, and a section for school yearbook photographs. This database is only available inside the Library.
• HeritageQuest: By checking all U.S. Census data, you can search from 1790 to 1930 for family histories. It also includes primary sources in full image. One can search in the section for periodicals or books to get information about family members. HeritageQuest is available both inside the Library and remotely.
  

Anne Enright Wins Booker Prize

Irish author Anne Enright won the Man Booker Prize yesterday for her book The Gathering. The Booker prize, Britain's best-known literary award, is given annually to a novel written by an author from Great Britain or Ireland.



A Synopsis: "The nine surviving children of the Hegarty clan are gathering in Dublin for the wake of their wayward brother, Liam, drowned in the sea. His sister, Veronica, collects the body and keeps the dead man company, guarding the secret she shares with him— something that happened in their grandmother’s house in the winter of 1968." Click here to request this book.

The Scariest Books of All Time

While poking around on the internet, we found CNN's list from a few years ago, called The Scariest Books of All Time.

The scariest books were...

• Dracula, by Bram Stoker
• The Shining, by Stephen King
• The Exorcist, by William Peter Blatty
• The short stories of Edgar Allan Poe
• The Haunting of Hill House, by Shirley Jackson

Which book gets your vote for the most terrifying ever? Comment on this post!

DVD Diva: Ready for Halloween?

With Halloween approaching, why not start thinking about inviting some friends over for a horror movie night. Create a scary costume for yourself and even a costume for your pet. You can find some great recipes and ideas for a Halloween party at: http://familycrafts.about.com/od/halloweentreats/

Then sit down and watch some good-old-fashioned horror movies that are available at Perrot:

• 28 Days Later


• From Dusk Till Dawn


• Psycho


• Alien


• The Shining (or try the original Stephen King)


• Dawn of the Dead
  

And for some Halloween comic relief:

• Young Frankenstein (or is that “-steen”...)
  
• Fright Night


• Attack of the Killer Tomatoes


• Shaun of the Dead


• Hocus Pocus

A list of the top 50 horror movies can be found at the Internet Movie Database.

New Perrot Library Tote Bags

Announcing... brand new Perrot tote bags available for sale! Our new bags are canvas and washable, and feature the Perrot cupola logo at left. They're big enough to fit quite a few books. They're also great for toting toys or groceries, or for going trick-or-treating!

Bags are available for sale at both the Adult and Youth Services circulation desks, and are only $5 each.

Literary News x2

Both the National Book Award Finalists and the winner of the Nobel prize in Literature have been announced...

The National Book Award is given annually to an American-born author in each of the following categories: Fiction, Non-Fiction, Poetry, and Young People’s Literature. The winners will be selected in November. The Fiction finalists are:

• Fieldwork, by Mischa Berlinski
• Varieties of Disturbance, by Lydia Davis
• Then We Came to the End, by Joshua Ferris
• Tree of Smoke, by Denis Johnson
• Like You’d Understand, Anyway, by Jim Shepard

View the rest of the finalists at the National Book Award website.

Also, the Nobel Prize Winner in Literature was announced-- British author Doris Lessing. At age 88, Lessing is the oldest person to win the Literature award. She is most famous for her 1962 novel, The Golden Notebook.

Cover of the Fourth Percy Jackson Book Revealed

The cover of Rick Riordan's fourth Percy Jackson and the Olympians book has been revealed! The book is entitled The Battle of the Labyrinth. Riordan says, “It’s the beginning of a big war between the titans and the gods, and Percy must come to terms with his role in this perplexing world. There’s an invasion in the works and Percy takes his crew into the most dangerous place known in mythology—the labyrinth. This was a fun one to write.” Watch for it in May of 2008!

Jumping Jack-o-Lanterns!

If you buy your pumpkin at a grocery store, it probably hails from Illinois, California, Ohio, or Pennsylvania. These states produced more than 9 million pounds of pumpkins in 2005! (Source: Real Simple magazine, October 2007)

For more fascinating facts about cultivating, collecting, and carving these traditional October-time orbs, visit our YS Halloween book collection. We also have titles on costume-making, trick-or-treat baking, and skeleton-shaking!

Here are a couple of particularly tempting treats:

• Dracula and Frankenstein Are Friends, by Katherine Tegen (E TEGEN)


• Aliens Don’t Carve Jack-O-Lanterns, by Debbie Dadey (J-3 DADEY)


• 101 Costumes for All Ages, All Occasions, by Richard Cummings (J 792.02 CUMMI)

Banned Books Week: Youth Services

Who challenges books? Why? What’s the difference between a challenge and a ban?
Take our quick quiz, below; then visit http://www.ala.org/ala/oif/bannedbooksweek/bannedbooksweek.htm to learn all about it!

Banned Books Quiz:

1. What is the most challenged children’s book title of 2006?

2. Which popular early chapter book character is being accused of talking trash?

3. Fund-raiser fraught with issues: which ‘classic’ high school novel is consistently challenged?

4. Which wizard’s seven stories top the list as the MOST CHALLENGED books of the 21st century?

5. What’s normal? Can you name this highly-challenged children’s book on human development?

Answers:
1. And Tango Makes 3, by Peter Parnell and Justin Richardson

2. Junie B Jones series, by Barbara Parks

3. The Chocolate War, by Robert Cormier

4. Harry Potter series, by J. K. Rowling

5. It’s Perfectly Normal, by Robie Harris

Banned Books Week: September 29th-October 6th, 2007

What do the following books have in common?

The Catcher in the Rye. . . Of Mice and Men. . . The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. . .

. . .They were all banned books at one time. They have recently been joined by Beloved and The Bluest Eye, by Toni Morrison, and the Gossip Girls series by Cecily Von Ziegesar– all of them are among the 10 most challenged books of 2006.

According to the American Library Association’s Office for Intellectual Freedom, more than a book a day faces removal from free and open public access in U.S. schools and libraries. During Banned Books Week, thousands of libraries and bookstores throughout the nation will celebrate a democratic society’s most basic freedom– the freedom to read.

Join us to show you agree with this freedo – come check out a banned book! For this week only, we will display books in the Rand Room that have been challenged at one time or another. --Linda