Paint the Town on Saturday, September 28th.

Paint the Town

The Main Street program's annual Paint the Town is this Saturday evening from 5:30 PM to 8:00 PM.  The library is participating and showing off our new interior renovation.  If you are attending please come by.  The party at the American Legion won't start until 7:30 PM anyway.

That is why I have been cleaning any marks off the new carpet and will touch up the dings in the new paint.

Parental Advisory CDs

Music Is Electronically Recorded and The Stored Within An Out Of Date Plastic Format

Why did it take a while to get these popular CDs?  Please, don't ask.

Blurred Lines by Robin Thicke.  There are about 50 parody videos of the Blurred Lines video.


Welcome to the Heist by Macklemore and Ryan Lewis.  Embedded video has cursing.  I approve of the silliness.

How Could I Not Order That?

Fiction

Murder of a Stacked Librarian by Denise Swanson.  Skye had noticed that although the temporary librarian had the hourglass figure of a Playboy Bunny, her outlook on life was more like Margaret Thatcher's than one of Hugh Hefner's average cottontails.

Final Cut by Catherine Coulter.  Another Coulter.  Another blah cover. Coulter has a real nice author photo.  They should have put that on the front.

Longest Ride by Nicholas Sparks.  Same dreamy cover style as usual.

Something Borrowed, Something Dead by M.C. Beaton.  A very yellow cover.  My eyes hurt now.

Thankless in Death by J.D. Robb. Same style cover as all the other Robb books by Nora Roberts.  Keep that brand moving.

Deadly Heat by Richard Castle.  Ghosted by Tom Straw.  If you like this Straw book and what non-Castle books you're out of luck.  He mostly writes for television.

AudioBook on CD

That's That by Colin Broderick.  7 CDs at 9 hours.  Born in Northern Ireland in 1968 Broderick grew up in a the weirdly schismed world of the Troubles.  Not allowed to speak to the neighbor kids on teh other side of the fence.  Not allowed to walk in one neighborhood or you'd disappear.  "Why?" he asks his mom.  His mom says, "That's that."  Narrator Gerard Doyle looks like this.  Library Director Gerard Saylor looks like this.

Books

Book One

Coming Clean by Sue Margolis.  Married couple separate. 

Book Two

NOS4A2 by Joe Hill.  Our first copy went missing.  I have no clue where it went but suspect theft.

Book Three

Secret Keeper by Beverly Lewis.  Amish anguish.  Again.  Someone goes to live with them or something.

Book Four

Secret Keeper by Beverly Lewis.  "Wait a minute?" you say.  "Isn't this the same as the previous book?"  No.  This is a paperback and the automated check for duplicates when I make orders does not give a result when the titles are different formats.

Book Five

Mayan Secrets by Clive Cussler.  Another Cussler novel.  Another cover with exploding vehicles and massive clouds of flames. Ka-Bloooeeyeyeyeye!

What to Read 51: Bill Crider's "Murder of a Beauty Shop Queen"

What to Read 51: Bill Crider's Murder of a Beauty Shop Queen.


With Aggie jokes!

Wasted Elements Watch

DVD

Hunting the Elements by NOVA.  Where do Nature's building blocks, called the elements, come from?


Fiction

W is for Wasted by Sue Grafton.  Milhone is called to the morgue for a John Doe who had her name and number in his pocket.

Second Watch by J.A. Jance.  Mystery novel.

Large Print Never Ends

The Pile Just Keeps Growing

The Rosary by Florence Barclay.

Wednesday Daughters by Meg Waite Clayton.

Resurrection in May by Lisa Samson.

Touch of Sage by Marcia Lynn McClure.

A Little Love Story by Roland Merullo.

Summer Girls by Mary Alice Monroe.

Tell Me by Lisa Jackson.

Large Print Nonfiction

Dear Mrs. Kennedy: the world shares its grief: letters, November, 1963 by Jay Mulvaney and Paul De Angelis.

You're Old, I'm Old...Get Used To It: 20 reasons why growing old is great by Virginia Ironside.

Larry, Lee, Lansdale,

Fiction

The Thicket by Joe R. Lansdale.  You know how I knew Lansdale had a new book coming out?  He wouldn't stop posting about it on Facebook.  When does that guy have time to write?  He's as bad as Bill Crider.

The Maid's Version by Daniel Woodrell.  Everyone's favortie Missouri crime author writes a fictionalized account of a 1929 explosion in a dance hall and Megan Abbott does a literary swoon.

A Blind Goddess by James R. Benn.  Benn writes another WWII mystery and the Library Director want to read it.

Homeland: Carrie's Run by Andrew Kaplan.  Kaplan is hired to pen a tie-in novel and fans of the show run to take it off the shelf (hopefully).

Happy in Hell by Tad Williams.  Williams writes a fantasy novel about an angel going to Hell to visit his demon girlfriend then Williams rushes back inside to sunscreen his shaved head.

Let Him Go by Larry Watson.  Watson delivers another plains novel with grandparents trying to take their dead son's boy.  Literary fiction fans fuss for fabulous fable.

MaddAddam by Margaret Atwood.  Canadian writes a novel whose dustcover precis makes no sense.  Library Director is reminded of full frontal nudes by Obi Wan Kenobi in Young Adam.

The Good Wife by Jane Porter.  A baseball player's wife worries,the novelist Porter thanks her husband, Ty, and the book goes back to processing because the spine label is incorrect.

Never Go Back by Lee Child.  Jack Reacher punches people and has sex.

Filming a TV Show in the Magazine Room

TV Show

Committee Films came to town last week to film an episode of America Unearthed for History Channel.  On Friday afternoon they used the library's reading room to film an interview between the show's host and a guest.  On Thursday they used mini-submarines to explore Rock Lake.  I did not get photos of the submarines.

Host is in the blue shirt.





Commercial for the television program.

America Unearthed from Splice Here on Vimeo.

Morgan Freeman Double Feature

Television Programs That Are Sold On DVD and Make Lots of Money For Snotty Network Executives

Single-Handed: Set 2 starring [Irish].


Walking Dead: the complete third season starring Andrew Lincoln, David Morrisey.  I never finished watching the second season.


Motion Pictures Made for Millions and Millions of Dollars

Oblivion starring Tom Cruise, Morgan Freeman, and Olga Kurylenko.  I was watching Quantum of Solace last night, Kurylenko is in that.



Mud starring Matthew McConaughey and some kid actors.  Guy is hiding out on island in the Mississippi.



Olympus Has Fallen starring Morgan Freeman, Aaron Eckhart, Gerard Butler.  Boy, this sure looks like a terrible movie.  Hey, Angela Bassett is in this, she does good work.  Still looks terrible.



42: the Jackie Robinson story starring Harrison Ford, Chadwick Boseman, Christopher Meloni's muscles.  Biopic of the ball player.

Fern Michaels. Again.

Fiction

Blindsided by Fern Michaels.  Vigilante group Sisterhood goes after judges who are getting kickbacks for sending juveniles to prison.

Blind Justice by Anne Perry.  Victorian crime.

Whole Enchilada by Diana Mott Davidson.  Nice cover.

Bones of the Lost by Kathy Reichs.  Criminal conspiracy and family turmoil.  My family still has not visited Montreal again.  Maybe I should take a week in the summer, stick the kids in the car, and drive over.  If my wife doesn't go we could camp in a tent.  Maybe drive North, across the U.P., go into Canada then head East.

Nothing New, Plenty of Car Photos

Super Cars and Coffee's Concourse on the Green from September 1st, 2013.

Third annual event surrounding two sides of the Commons Park triangle in downtown Lake Mills.  The regular Cars and Coffee event is one Sunday a month on Church St.  I sometimes go down with my kids and father, when he is in town.  Sweet Lips art gallery sells coffee and espresso drinks.  I usually buy an Americano.


View down Madison St.  The Library is off to the right.


View down Madison St.  The Library is to the left of the photographer.


1962 Lancia Zagato.  A beautiful car.


HRG Convertible.  A very rare car. 


Three Ford GTs were parked on the corner.  A fourth GT was on Lake street.


Nine Acura NSX sports cars lined up on Lake St. 


A cute kid in the police car.

Nothing New, Here Is A Song

Musical Interlude

A 2001 performance from some guy with fancy hair.





Don't Forget


Author and researcher Chad Lewis will speak at the library on September 26th at 7 PM on Haunted Places in Wisconsin.

Wisconsin Atlas and Bruce Campbell's Chin

DVD

Evil Dead: the ultimate edition starring Bruce Campbell's Chin..  Three discs with the a full frame disc, a wide screen disc, and Ladies of Evil Dead disc.



NonFiction

Southern Wisconsin All Outdoors Atlas and Field Guide by managing editor Todd Whitesel. Map icons for National Forests, Indian Reservations, Ranger stations, drinking water, designated trout lakes, waterfowl production areas, so on, so forth.

Why Did I Buy This?

Fiction

Tampa by Alissa Nutting.  There has been press and word-of-mouth about this novel of a female teacher who is a serial abuser of teen boys.  Megan Abbott wrote an opinion piece about Tampa for some online magazine. 

Impossible Monsters edited by Kasey Lansdale. Collection of horror short stories.  I bought this because the editor's father kept mentioning the book.  Lansdale is more musician than editor.

The Score: a graphic novel by Richard Stark, adapted and illustrated by Darwyn Cooke.  Why did I buy this one?  Because Stark's real name was Donald Westlake and his Parker series novels are genius.

NonFiction

Eating on the Wild Side: the missing link to optimum health by Jo Robinson.  Why?  Because it looks like something people would read.

Zealot: the life and times of Jesus of Nazareth by Reza Aslan.  Why?  Because a contentious news interview brought a lot of attention and book sales soared.

Crazy Rich: power, scandal, and tragedy inside the Johnson and Johnson dynasty by Jerry Oppenheimer.  Why?  Johnson and Johnson started off in Racine.  Why else?  Well, there is a song by Old 97s called Oppenheimer.

Chad Lewis and Haunted Real Estate

Programming

Author and researcher Chad Lewis will speak at the library on September 26th at 7 PM on Haunted Places in Wisconsin.

NonFiction

SmartEssentials for Selling Your Home: how to get the highest price in the shortest time by Deborah Rhoney.  "Concise, cuts to the chase, eliminates filler...learn everything that's essential for selling smart."

Most Gruesome Hauntings of the Midwest by Chad Lewis.  P. 86 says, "A werewolf looking creature prowls the area surrounding the bridge."

Wisconsin Road Guide to Gangster Hot Spots by Chad Lewis.  Wasn't one of AL Capone's former properties up for sale a few years ago and did not sell?Page 90 says, " L.C. Rowan, the assistant cashier, instead of lying down with the rest of the hostages, bravely darted off down the basement stairs and stomped hard on the alarm button."

Wisconsin Road Guide to Mysterious Creatures by Chad Lewis.  No chupacabras but there is Phantom Chickens of Chicken Alley.

Sweet Krueger

Fiction

Sweet Thunder by Ivan Doig.  1920 Butte, MT and Morrie Morgan starts work as a editorial cartoonist for the pro-union newspaper.

Tamarack County by William Kent Krueger.  You know who likes Krueger novels?  Most everyone.  A mystery set in Northern Minnesnowta in Christmas.

Death Dairyland Death Deer on Our Shoulder

DVD

The Private Life of Deer by PBS Nature.  With over 30 million deer in the United States, "how well do we know our neighbors from the natural world?  Not very well as it turns out."




The A-Team: Season Four starring Black Van With Red Stripe.





Fiction

Dead Man: Volume 5: Death Match, Black Death, Killing Floor by Christa Faust, Aric Davis, David Tully.  Three novellas in the continuing series featuring brought-back-to-life wanderer who fights evil.  Fun stuff.



Audiobooks on CD

Creating Dairyland by Edward Janus.  How caring for cows saved our soil, created our landscape, brought prosperity to our stte, and still shapes our way of life in Wisconsin.

NonFiction

Angels On Our Shoulders: World War II B-29 Superfortress by Edward F. Heiberger.  The Commemoratiev Air Force was in Madison recently.  We went to see some planes but had to stand in line about one hour to do a walkthrough of a B-24.  The B-29 came in to land as we were waiting.  Max Hastings's book Retribution: the Battle for Japan, 1944-1945 said the B-29s had all sorts of trouble because the plane was rushed into service.

77.5 Hours of Talk, Talk, Talk

Audiobooks on CD

Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill.  11 CDs at 13 hours.  Man, I'm thinking all the time and still don't have a barn-sized garage filled with cars and motorcycles and guns.

The Lucky One by Nicholas Sparks.  9 CDs at 10.5 hours.  Another Sparks novel to woo the women.  Marine in Iraq finds photo of girl and has lucky streak. 

Admission by Jean Hanff Korelitz.  15 CDs at 19 hours.  "Extraordinary journey of the heart that challenges everything she ever thought she believed." 

Rose Harbor in Bloom by Debbie Macomber.  8 CDs at 9 hours.  Is Macomber a fast writer or are these novels being ghosted?  Macomber has a TV show on the Hallmark Channel.

Last Kiss Goodbye by Karen Robards.  11CDs at 13.5 hours.  Robards should change her name to Robot.  That is easier to type and she could talk in a robot voice whenever she wanted.  I AM A ROBOT - GIVE ME COFFEE - KILL ALL HUMANS.

The Venus Throw by Steven Saylor.  10 CDs at 12.5 hours.  I think this was on sale with Blackstone Audio.  Saylor (no relation) writes good novels and the audio circulate well.

Finally Catalogued

Fiction

All The Young Warriors by Anthony Neil Smith.  I wonder if people won't read this book because our adhesive mylar cover has a bunch of air bubbles stuck underneath it.  It looks bad and feels weird.  Good book though.  Minnesota policeman is intent on going to Somalia and finding the two young men responsible for his girlfriend's murder  in MN.

Baddest Ass by Anthony Neil Smith.  This one has a bunch of trapped air bubbles as well.  I may try that thing where I take a pocket knife, poke the holes, and try to squeeze out the air.



Well, at least I can now read this in paper.  I was going to mess with the Kindle version and never got to it.

Adventures of Wynn and Edmund: book one of the "The Curse of the Amethyst Ring" by Kayleigh R. Wimpee.  I don't know what the heck the deal is with this one.  Did I order this?  Was it a donation?  It appeared out of nowhere.  Romance-fantasy novel that looks to play around with and turn around standard fairy tale ideas of princes and damsels.
The author (according to bio note) should have graduated high school that past Spring in Coldspring, TX.  Great, now I have to go look up Coldspring and figure out where it is...okay it's in east TX, just East of College Station.




Dead Man: volume 4 edited by Lee Goldberg and William Rabkin.



Stories by Joel Goldman, Lisa Klink, and Phoef Sutton.  The Dead Man travels the U.S. fighting evil with his axe.  I want to read the Klink story just so I can say "Klink goes klunk". The series has it's own theme song.



Buffalo Ridge by Forrest Peterson.  Again?  What the heck is it with books I have no memory of ordering?  This is a MN publisher so maybe the guy is from WI.  Young family in southwest MN struggling with farming, local drug scourge and "ordinary people trying to survive."

The Name of the Game is Death and One Endless Hour by Dan J. Marlowe.  Reprint from Stark House Press of hardboiled crime novels from 1962 and 1969.  Stark House published the most recent novel by the always brilliant Charlie Stella.

Inferno by Dan Brown.  I ordered a second copy.