Exterior painting started earlier this week. The front doors were removed from the frames to sand and scrape off several years worth of varnish and dirt.
Read, Rhythm, and Rhyme Storytime
This is an excellent storytime we are running every Wednesday through Summer Reading.
Extricate by Graham Wynd. Here's a unique one, I saw this online and ordered it up.Man falls for a woman and starts removing obstacles to her love, starting with his wife.
Charlie Martz and Other Stories by Elmore Leonard. Unpublished stories by the writer who passed away in 2013.
Country by Danielle Steel. Steel continues her reign. Widow starts on a new life.
The Ultimatum by Dick Wolf. TV producer Wolf's last novel did well. Here is a sequel.
Wildfire in His Arms by Johanna Lindsey. Romance novel cover but the male model has his shirt on. With a hat. And a horse. I cannot tell if the horse is wearing a hat.
The Truth According to Us by Anne Barrows. Rich young woman forced into Writer's Project job in 1938. Sent to West Virginia to write a city history.
Paradise Sky by Joe R. Lansdale. Fictionalization of cowboy and shootist Nat Love. The library also owns Lansdale's Black Hat Jack: the true life adventures of Deadwood Dick, as told by his ownself which has short stories about Love.
The Defenders of Shannara: The Darkling Child by Terry Brooks. Thirty years ago I read the first Shannara books. There must be another 50-60 since then.
Second Street Station: a Mary Handley Mystery by Lawrence H. Levy. I like the cover. Late 19th Century woman detective in New York City. Levy wrote for television and credits include Saved By The Bell and Seinfeld. Yeesh, what a contrast.
Blueprints by Barbara Delinsky. Family turmoil with work trouble, sudden death and new love.
The Fixer by Joseph Finder. Man renovating his father's house finds millions of dollars hidden in the walls.
NonFiction
Tales From the Blue Line by Rob Riley. Riley has written a series of piece for Crimespree Magazine about his time with the Milwaukee Police Department from 1971 to 2001. This collects 29 of those stories.
Some photos from Monday afternoon's game and LEGO time, and Tuesday's Lunch with a Hero with Chief of Police Patrick Matuszewski
and Sgt. Troy Oestreich.
Copenhagen Connection by Elizabeth Peters. Originally published in 1982. This new paperback has a really nice cover illustration. Musicians Musicalize Music on Music Discs
Music In Exile by Songhoy Blues. Malian singers sing music in Benin and move to London. The story with these guys is that extremists in Mali banned music and the band hoofed it. How the heck do you stop music? And why? Another great tune I heard while listening to BBC 6 Music.
Audiobook on CD
Black List by Brad Thor. 10CDs at 12 hours. Spy guy shoot'em up. This is from 2012 but was a donation and we don't already have it.
Large Print
A Memory of Violets by Hazel Gaynor. Victorian London.
Second Sister by Marie Bostwick. White House politics.
Sea Garden by Marcia Willett. Painting in Devon.
Snow Queen by Michael Cunningham. Central park and Brooklyn.
Lillian on Life by Alison Jean Lester. Attack robots in Arkansas. Just kidding.
Fiction Concrete Angel by Patti Abbot. Manipulative mother starts using her toddler son as a criminal accessory. Her grown daughter decides to step in. Library Journal gave it starred review. "What about Kirkus's review?" you ask. "Let's not talk about Kirkus," I say, read the book for yourself.
DVD
The Driver starring Ryan O'Neal and Bruce Dern. Getaway driver is pursued by police detective. I used to study Roger Ebert's annual film guides and read all his old reviews. Ebert praised The Driver so I watched it and I enjoyed it. Someone online - maybe author Anthony Neil Smith - linked to an article about the screenplay and that got me thinking that people would enjoy watching this one.
Musicians Play Music That is Recorded, Mixed Together, and Embedded on Super Thin Layers of Metal That Are Then Sandwiched Between Layers of Plastic
Postcards from Paradise by Ringo. Singer sings songs of being Ringo. The title reminds me of a Mark Knopfler song.
Only Me by Rhonda Vincent. Bluegrass musician sings songs of bluegrass. We have another album of hers that has circ'ed well.
Now That's What I call Music! 53 by various. Now that's what I call singers singing songs.
Now That's What I call Music! 54 by various. Now that's what I call more singers singing songs.
Large Print
A Deadly Web by Kay Hooper. A book about things.
The Daring Exploits of a Runaway Heiress by Victoria Alexander. A book about more things.
Blueprints by Barbara Delinksy. A book about more and more things.
Piranha by Clive Cussler. A book about more and more and more things.
Finders Keepers by Stephen King. A book about more and more and more and more things.
Our Souls at Night by Kent Haruf. A book about more and more and more and more and more things.
Cuba Straits by Randy Wayne White. A book about more and more and more and more and more and more things.
What I Love About You by Rachel Gibson. A book about more and more and more and more and more and more and more things.
Eight Hundred Grapes by Laura Dave. Woman hears "explosive" secret from fiance and heads to family vineyard. Explosive.
In the Unlikely Event by Judy Blume. Woman returns to New Jersey home in 1987 to commemorate 1952. "Blume imagines and weaves together...generations of families...disasters...vivid portrait...Elizabeth Taylor haircuts...A-bomb hysteria...young journalist who makes his name reporting tragedy."
Finders Keepers by Stephen King. No tunes come to mind.
Cash Landing by James Grippando. Broke restauranteur in Miami teams with others to rob an armored car of $7.4 million. No tunes come to mind, but how about this?
NonFiction Blue Men and River Monsters: folklore of the North edited by John Zimm. Oral history culled from the WPA's work in Wisconsin that run from 1935 to 1937. Watertown was know for it's geese, "Cooked noodles are every day crammed down their throats by their owners, a wooden pestle being used for this purpose."
The Heart of Things: a Midwestern almanac by John Hildebrand. Guy from Northwestern Wisconsin writes about the "humor and drama in everyday life." Page 97 says, "Floating down the North Fork one summer with my daughter in the bow, we spotted what appeared to be a dead fish at the bottom of a rocky pool. It was a sleeping catfish, long as my arm, and as our canoe passed overhead it slowly tail-finned into deeper water. Late this afternoon when I reach the rocky pool, I'm a little disappointed to find the sleeping catfish isn't there."
Little Hawk and Lone Wolf: a memoir by Raymong C. Kaquatosh. Lonely nine-year-old Menominee boy befriends a timber wolf in the '30s. He grows up, goes to war, gets a job, and the wold is still around.
Putting Down Roots: gardening insights from Wisconsin's early settlers by Marcia C Carmichael. Gardening history with lots of pretty pictures from Old World Wisconsin.
Blaze Orange: whitetail deer hunting in Wisconsin by Travis Dewitz. Photo book of hunting up north.
Perimeter: a contemporary portrait of Lake Michigan by Kevin J. Miyazaki. Portraits of people who live and work around the lake with interspersed two-page photos of the water.
Blackhat starring Chris Hemsworth. There is an actor in here named, get this, Yorick van Wageningen. Michael Mann made this one. I like Mann's films but this computer hacker stuff just seems silly.
Interstellar starring [famous actors]. Someone the other day said they liked this. Did you ever watch the Los Angeles police show Mann did a few years ago? Robbery Homicide Division? That was a good program but only lasted for one season at ten episodes.
Outlander: season one, volume one starring [people]. Sold in two volumes so that you have to pay twice to get a full season. This is unrelated to that awful swords and aliens film series.
Fifty Shades of Grey starring [other people]. Woman meets uber-rich guy who wears ties. Or something. I don't know, I never read those books.
Imitation Game starring Benedict Cumberbatch and Keira Knightley What's the big deal about Cumberbatch? I don't get it.
Wild starring Reese Witherspoon. Woman gets upset and goes hiking. I think that sounds like a decent plan. What I do not agree with is writing an entire book about a huge hike and not printing one stinking picture.
Unbroken starring Jack O'Connell. You ever seen that David Bowie POW movie, Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence? I should try watching that again.
American Sniper starring Bradley Cooper and Sienna Miller. Is the baby prop as awful as commenters said?
Hunger Games Mockingjay, Part One starring Jennifer Lawrence, many others. Girl with arrows shoots arrows at people.
The Hobbit: the Battle of the Five Armies starring Hobbits, Elves, Orcs, one dragon, one Dark Lord. Neil Finn did a tune for one of these things. The premiere was in Wellington. I just looked at a map and Wellington is on a small peninsula. Google Maps says it is a 12.5 hour drive from Dunedin. Oof. That's a long haul. Taking the train is a two day trip.
Audiobooks on CD and Stuck in Plastic Travel Cases
Wicked Appetite by Janet Evanovich. 7 CDs at 7 hours. Characters do something and other things happen.
Love in a Nutshell by Janet Evanovich and Dorien Kelly. 6 CDs at 6.5 hours. Doriem Kelly went to Michigan. That's a black mark.
The Grand Finale by Janet Evanovich. 5 CDs at 5 hours. More people doing things.
Summer Rental by Mary Kay Andrews. 12 CDs at 15 hours. No disc count or time listed on the cover. I found that info in the catalog. I also found a brief plot description of "in an attempt to find themselves, three friends vacation at a beach house." Yeah, good luck with that.
Dead Wake: the last crossing of the Lusitania by Erik Larson. 11 CDs at 13 hours. The Lusitania is most famous, of course, for being the passenger cruiser with an awful name.
Robert Ludlum's The Bourne Directive by Eric Van Lustbader. 12 CDs at 14.5 hours. Spies spy.
Large Print
Cover Your Eyes by Mary Burton. Cover image has a woman covering her eyes. Really? That's your best effor?
NonFiction
Entrepreneurship: create your own business with 25 projects by Alex Kahan. This is a kids book. I'll reclass this dude for the children's collection.
The Storm Murders by John Farrow. Recently retired Montreal Sergeant-Detective Emile Cinq-Mars is called to a consult on double murder case. Fourth entry in a great series.
I read City of Ice when it came out in 1999 and thought it was great. Ice Lake was also good. I have no idea about River City because there was no darn U.S. release. I've not hunted long to find a used copy, the one I did see was quoted at $2,796.72. That seems a bit high.
Off the Page by Jodi Picoult and Samantha van Leer. Is this the daughter-mom duo? Let me check...yes, it is. The dual bio on back says van Leer is in college. I wonder if they timed the release so that she could do promotion during summer. Then again, they'd be doing promotion well before hand to prep the release, right? I ask because I don't actually know.
Mapmaker's Children by Sarah McCoy. This one sounds familiar. Let me check...nope, I was mistaken. This is about hidden maps used for the Underground Railroad. Yes, as a child I did wonder how they built all those underground train tunnels, and where the engine smoke went to.
Patriot Threat by Steve Berry. I wonder where Berry lives. Let me check...the book does not say, I will not look it up. Ex-spy chases after stolen documents in Europe.
Our Souls At Night by Kent Haruf. Haruf sets another novel in small town Eastern Colorado. Haruf died in 2014. Did someone finish this for him? Let me see...it doesn't say. I presume he finished the book before he died.
Scarlet Gospels by Clive Barker. Does this have one of those black-and-white author portraits that Barker's husband does? Let me see...Nope, it's a color photo and says "Courtesy of the author." Dang, I must have seen that B&W photo on an old book because there were lawsuit issues between those two in 2012.
What Burns Away by Melissa Falcon Field. I'm not sure what this is about. Sounds like some deeply depressed woman is self-destructive. I wonder where Field is from. Let's see...Huh. She lives in Madison. It also says she spends her summer in Maine. I went to Maine once.
NonFiction
The Wright Brothers by David McCullough. I always mix up McCullough with James M. McPherson. McPherson is 3 years younger at 78-years-old. Where does McClullough live? I do not know, let's see...McCullough lives in an underwater lair under the coast of Jamaica and he directs his minions using a radio transmitter hidden within a buoy.
Seveneves by Neal Stevenson. Some sort of SciFi thing. I've not read his other books.
Worm by Anthony Neil Smith. Newcomer to the Bakken oil fields in North Dakota runs into trouble. Of course he runs into trouble, it's a Smith novel.
Radiant Angel by Nelson DeMille. I think it would be funny if someone screwed up the title as Radian Angle and it went to print that way.
Double Down by Fern Michaels. One of her Sisterhood books. The same author photo with Michaels on a couch with her dogs. Michaels philanthropy is impressive.
Piranha by Clive Cussler and Boyd Morrison. Another Cussler novel, another cover with flames and boats.
The Jesus Cow by Michael Perry. Farmer has a cow bearing bearing the image of Jesus. Laughter ensues.
I, Ripper by Stephen Hunter. Hunter writes about Jack The Ripper. I guess he won't add in his usual Remington .308 sniper rifle with it's 168 grain boat tail sniper hard as nails sniper GRRRRR! stuff.
Uprooted by Naomi Novik. This needs a "New" sticker. Hey! Novik is married to the great Charles Ardai, founder of Hard Case Crime!
NonFiction
Find the Good: unexpected life lessons from a small-town obituary writer by Heather Lende. Page 47 says, "He decalred he wasn't going to hassle with any so-called inflatable suspenders."
Mysteries Li'l Tom and the Pussyfoot Foot Detective Bureau: the case of the Parrots Desparecidos by Angela Crider Neary. Some sort of cat mystery, alligator presence is undetermined. I used to check out her blog that had photos of spots in the Bay Area. I cannot find that site but she has some on Facebook.
Ghost Fields by Elly Griffiths. Norfolk England with a dead guy in a WWII era fighter plane.
Ming Tea Murder by Laura Childs. Childs has three mystery series. Huh. She must have fans pestering her for more books because that's a lot of books to write.
Tail Gait by Rita Mae Brown. I refuse to list a cat as co-author. This cover has a silhouetted cat holding a cheer pom-pom. I kinda recall doing a silhouette art project in elementary school.
I Need A Coffee by Give Me A Minute.
Canary by Duane Swierczynski. I've always enjoyed Swizziricivxz's books. An Honors Student is forced into being confidential informant for the police and she runs into trouble. Everyone in Swizxixiccxz novels run into trouble.
NonFiction
Bound: over 20 artful handmade books by Erica Ekrem. And yet this is a paperback. Page 85 says, "Draw the needle out through sewing station 5."
The Bridge by Robert Knott. 6 CDs at 7.5 hours. Robert B. Parker's characters Virgil Cole and Everett Hitch do something. I'm not sure what they do because the description on the cover is really vague.
Motive by Jonathan Kellerman. 9CDs at 11.5 hours. Some guys named Milo and Alex solve crimes.
Natural Born Heroes: how a daring band of misfits mastered the lost secrets of strength and endurance by Christopher McDougall. 11 CDs at 14 hours. Story about a resistance group on wartime Crete.
The Assassin by Clive Cussler and Justin Scott. 9 CDs at 10.5 hours. A horse drawn fire wagon does something.
Last One Home by Debbie Macomber. 9 CDs at 10.5 hours. Sisters grow up, sisters fight, sisters reconcile.
The Buried Giant by Kazuo Ishiguro. 10 CDs at 12 hours. Reminds me of this:
Ashes in My Mouth, Sand in My Shoes by Per Petrterson. Short stories in a tiny book that is 61mm high. Page 57 says, "No one called him Fatso to his face."
Australian Woman Whiskey and Charlie by Annabel Smith. Two very different twins and one of them has bad accident. Uninjured twin wonders how he will get along without his brother. Page 242 says "And they're both full."
New Jersey Lady Seeing Like A Rover: how robots, teams, and images craft knowledge of Mars by Janet Vertesi. Dustcover says: Every photo from Mars is "processed, manipulated, and interpreted - and that comes after team members negotiate with each other about what they should be taking photographs of in the first place.
Turkish Gal Architect's Apprentice by Elif Shafak. 12-year-old is an animal tamer in 1540 Istanbul. He apprentices with an architect. I think this one sounds interesting, but Page 424 says, "The entourage entered a cobbler's workshop."
Huh. Shafak's note says she wrote the novel in English and it was first published in Turkey. Was it published in English or Turkish? If in Turkish did Shafak do the translation?
California Woman Butternut Summer by Mary McNear. Girl home from college works for her mom and gets new boyfriend. Page 412 says "Minneapolis...bank...is...like an albatross.:
Farmer's Market
Commons Park - across the street from the library - hosted the first Farmer's Market of the year on Wednesday. I took some photos with my fancy computer box telephone.
Dunedin, you might have candied popcorn down there. Kettle corn is popcorn with a sugar coating. There was a guy - he was absent Wed. - who brings a trailer with a large copper cooking kettle and he'll mix in the sugar as the popcorn popped up.
There are always several cheese vendors.
Puzzle Table
Staff put this table in our magazine room and I declare that it was a good idea.
Donation check
Lake Mills Market sponsors a "Round Up" program every other month. The Round-Up allows customers to round their final bill up to the next dollar and that amount of change goes to a local organization. The Round Up earned $4,504.01 for the library's Summer Reading Program.
The lighting in this kinda makes it look like I and Mitch, store owner to the far right, are photoshopped in.
Little Free Library
Someone on north Main Street put up a Little Free Library. I guess this one is not an official Little Free Library since it is not on the organization's map. But, that map is missing at least one other one that was installed a couple years ago.