Author: Molly

Posted in Adult, eBooks & eAudio, Fiction, Mystery, Teen & Young Adult

Proper Ladies Buck Convention

Posted on by Molly

Take a look at the list of books I have been reading lately. They each feature woman or girl protagonists who are in possession of indomitable spirits and a penchant for solving mysteries. While the books take place anywhere from 1815-1950, they are mostly set in Victorian England, and sometimes the old girl herself makes an appearance. The mysteries are usually murders, and in the cozy tradition, happen “off-screen” and are somewhat sanitary, as far as murders go. Each book listed is the first in a series, often with new titles still being published. 

The Body in the Garden (2020) by Katherine Shellman
Protagonist: Lily Adler
Setting: 1815 Edwardian London
Books in the series: three
Queen Victoria appearance: she wouldn’t be born for four more years
Lily Adler is unconventional because she is a young widow who prefers solving the mysteries of upper-crust London social circles she belongs to, rather than searching for a second husband. Completely cozy series with charming protagonists and ongoing story threads that connect book to book. The mysteries are complex, satisfying, and comfy like a warm bath.
Available on Hoopla in audio and e-book formats

Etiquette & Espionage (2013) by Gail Carriger
Protagonist: Saphronia Angelina Temminnick, age 14
Setting: 1851 Victorian London
Books in the Finishing School series: four
Queen Victoria appearance: yes
Yes, I’ve written about Gail Carriger in the past, and I will write about her again. This book is ridiculous in the best ways possible and the world needs to know. In this awesome steampunk version of Victorian England, vampires and werewolves are real and figure into parliamentary politics and society functions just like their human counterparts. Schools float in the sky. Pets are made of clockwork. Tea cakes are consumed with abandon. I loved getting to know the complex cast of characters over the four-book run, and then delighted in meeting them again in some of Carriger’s later work. The audio version is a particular joy if you enjoy the plummy tones of English society women. And I must ask, who among us does not?
Available on Libby in audio and e-book formats

Crocodile on the Sandbank (1975) by Elizabeth Peters
Protagonist: Amelia Peabody
Setting: 1884 England
Books in the series: twenty
Queen Victoria appearance: no, but expect to encounter real-life historical figures such as famous archaeologist Howard Carter.
This is the oldest series on my list, and while I am certain there are books about Victorian ladies striking out to fulfill their unconventional dreams published prior to this, Peters is for sure an OG refiner of the trope. Tropes include: unconventional lady inherits a fortune; has unbendable will; is the smartest person in the room; attracts an irascible male counterpart; is brave and resourceful to an almost sociopathic degree. One of the fun things about the Amelia Peabody books is that she ages from book to book as opposed to being rooted in a static, unchanging timespan. This beloved series is great for those who like a bit of ancient Egyptian history with their cozy mysteries.
Available on Libby in audio and e-book formats and on Hoopla in audiobook format

A Curious Beginning (2015) by Deanna Raybourn
Protagonist: Veronica Speedwell
Setting: 1887 Victorian London
Books in the series: seven with the eighth publishing in 2023
Queen Victoria appearance: yes
Oh, Veronica, how I adore her. If I had to choose a favorite character on this list it would be a toss-up between Veronica here and Gail Carriger’s Saphronia. Not only is Ms. Speedwell smart, tenacious, cunning, and ribald, she has a libido and a hilarious approach to men and love. Her handsome male counterpart, Stoker, provides a terrific foil to Veronica’s outrageous (at the time) actions and statements. The mysteries are extremely well-constructed and the running storyline is compelling. The audio production is so good I’ve listened through the series twice. 
Available on Libby in audio and e-book formats and on Hoopla in audiobook format

A Study in Scarlet Women (2016) by Sherry Thomas
Protagonist: Charlotte Holmes
Setting: Late 19th century London
Books in the series: six with a seventh publishing in 2023
Queen Victoria appearance: unsure, I have not read the whole series. 
One cannot throw a stone in a library without hitting a Sherlock Holmes adaptation (do not throw stones in the library plz). Along with Big Bird, Han Solo, and Frankestein, Sherlock Holmes is one of the most recognizable and enduring fictional characters in the western world. We collectively cannot get enough of this prickly, seemingly omnipotent detective. My favorite adaptations gender swap the Holmes and/or Watson character (looking at you CBS’s Elementary) so naturally, I was drawn to The Lady Sherlock series. Part of the fun is recognizing the beats lifted from the source material and how they change from one interpretation to the next. Don’t fret if this Holmes adaptation does not appeal. There are a LOT more where that came from. 
Available on Libby in audio and e-book formats and on Hoopla in audiobook format

The Widows of Malabar Hill (2018) by Sujata Massey
Protagonist: Perveen Mistry
Setting: 1920 Bombay
Books in the series: three with a fourth publishing in 2023
Queen Victoria appearance: she had been dead for nineteen years in 1920
This is the farthest afield of the series on this list. Our protagonist, Perveen, is one of the first female lawyers in India. Given that Indian patriarchy persists to this day, her arrival to the legal scene was not met with great enthusiasm and often open contempt. I loved this book because I got to learn about Indian history, religions common to India, and the British Raj. The mystery itself is intriguing and the writing was beautiful.
Available on Libby in audio and e-book formats and on Hoopla in audiobook format

Cocaine Blues (1989) by Kerry Greenwood
Protagonist: Phryne Fisher
Setting: late 1920s Melbourne
Books in the series: twenty two
Queen Victoria appearance: nope!
Many are by now familiar with Phryne Fisher from the excellent Australian television series Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries. Phyrne is the role model of our dreams. She drinks, dances, has adult dalliances to relieve stress, and carries a gold plated pistol. She’s basically the coolest lady ever. And she’s rich so she can get away with such shocking behavior for a woman of her station. This series gives golden age of detective fiction by taking us from squalid back alleys to glimmering cruise ships to speakeasies and beyond. Phryne might be the most glamorous unconventional lady on the list, and I think she would get on like a house on fire with Veronica Speedwell.
Available on Libby and Hoopla in e-book format

The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie (2009) by Alan Bradley
Protagonist: Flavia DeLuce, age 11
Setting: 1950 England
Books in the series: ten
Queen Victoria appearance: of course not, but I believe Churchill shows up sometime down the line
Eleven year old Flavia De Luce has grown up feril in Buckshaw, a crumbling family estate in a quintessentially bucolic English village. Her mother has been missing for years and her father is coping with the loss as well as his WWII experience in the stiff-upper-lip English way. Flavia is a precocious chemistry genius (one might even say mad scientist) who uses her innate curiosity and desire to impress the police Inspector Hewitt to solve baffling murders in the are. Flavia is an appealing character for many reasons, but I love that although she is a chemistry genius she often overlooks aspects of the case that any regular 11-year-old would miss. The forensic descriptions of Flavia’s observations are a little intense, but that’s part of the fun. I do NOT recommend the audio version of this series as the narration did not align with how I characterized Flavia’s voice in my own head at all. Too wistful, I think. Flavia is NOT wistful.
Available on Libby in audio and e-book format

If your reading whims differ greatly, not to fret. Mead Library has this rad book recommendation tool called Your Next Five Books. Take five minutes to fill out & submit and within a few days you will receive a personally tailored list of books based on your favorites. Not digging email as a way to reach out? Call us at 920-459-3400 option 4 to speak to a real live librarian. We can help with book picks, troubleshooting Libby and Hoopla, book requests, you name it. Anything to help you find a book you will love.

Posted in Adult, eBooks & eAudio, Fiction, Mystery, Science Fiction, Staff Picks, Thrillers

Books I Hated and What to Read Instead

Posted on by Molly

Let’s get one thing straight up front: These are not BAD books. They’re actually wildly popular for the most part, and objectively well-executed, I just happened to hate them. Personal taste does not have to be rooted in reality or logic. We like what we like. For instance, I will put most books and movies down that feature a love triangle because they make my skin crawl. Below, I listed several best-selling books I was led to believe I would enjoy, but did not, and what I would recommend reading instead.

An Absolutely Remarkable Thing (2018) by Hank Green
Why I hated it: So, so, so many reasons. This is one of the only books I’ve ever rage-quit and had it been a physical and not audio copy I may have hurled the book into a different room so it would no longer offend my eyes. Based on this title alone, Hank Green cannot write female characters. The protagonist is a bisexual 20-something Asian woman. Cool, diversity is cool, but Green used this character’s sexuality like a cheat code for objectifying the other female characters in the story. Also, this book features giant robots mysteriously appearing around the world. How awesome, right? IT IS NOT the robots didn’t do SHIT. And the book ends on a cliffhanger, which I only know about because I looked up the ending online after rage quitting. Finally, the use of modern youth vernacular will NOT age well in this novel. I was wincing when I read it and the ink had hardly dried. 

Read instead:

A Master of Djinn (2021) by P. Djeli Clark
Why it’s great: Where Green totally biffed writing women characters, Clark excels. Most characters of consequence in this book are women. It blows my mind that in the year of our lord 2022 I am feeling grateful to encounter a whole book full of multidimensional female characters that don’t focus on their looks or a man to make their way in the world. Read this book for access to a mostly female cast of vibrant and memorable characters, gorgeous world building, and incomprehensible eldritch beings trying to cross into nice, semi-horror filled early 20th century Cairo. Did I mention Cairo is a world superpower because someone figured out how to let djinn and other spirits back into the world? And that’s not even a spoiler.

Nobody’s Fool (1993) by Richard Russo
Why I hated it: Sully, the titular character, is a perennial loveable loser who squandered his life being moored down by family trauma and a can’t-do attitude. Russo seems to be in love with his own prose as well as protagonist Sully, and I just don’t get it. Indeed, the writing itself cannot be beat, it was the ideas within however, which I took umbrage. For instance, a horrid racial epithet is casually bandied about at one point to describe the nature of work Sully engages in, and the level of male wish fulfillment appearing throughout was kinda gross. Every book its reader, and I am not the one. I made it about half way through the almost 600 page doorstop before I put it down. Save yourself some time and watch the 1994 screen adaptation of Nobody’s Fool starring the ever-wonderful Paul Newman instead of trying to slog through this brick.

Read instead:

Empire Falls (2001) by Richard Russo
Why it’s great: This is Russo’s Great American Novel. It won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction over a Jonathan Franzen book, thank god, because it deserved the honor. Now, I don’t normally stan boomer-age whiteguy authors, as they tend to write books for other men (see above for criticism of Russo’s earlier work), but this book shines with an undeniable light that we can all bask in. Empire Falls was adapted into a very passable miniseries for HBO starring Ed Harris. Watch the series for sure, but be sure to read the book too, so as not to miss out on an evil cat giving protagonist Miles a run for his money, amongst other things. 

The Spellman Files (2007) by Lisa Lutz
Why I hated it: Lutz published six Spellman books in the 2010ishes and all I could think about while reading the freshman installation was how badly this was not working for me so how could they possibly be popular enough to demand so many installations. Spellman strives to assemble a quirky and interesting family of private detectives whose dysfunction is more a feature and less a bug, but they come across as a watery Royal Tannenbaum situation with more severe antisocial disorders. And not in a fun way! While the protagonist was meant to be a daring and independent young woman, all I could see was somebody who would benefit from therapy, a reinforcing of boundaries, and maybe a damn hug. 

Read Instead:
Claire DeWitt and the City of the Dead (2011) by Sara Gran
Why it’s great: I love a hot mess protagonist and where The Spellman Files falls short, Clare DeWitt succeeds in spades. DeWitt is the self-described world’s best PI who is obsessed with the work of obscure French detective Jacques Silette. In the City of the Dead, she has found herself in a recently post-Katrina New Orleans which DeWitt fled years earlier when her mentor was unceremoniously murdered. She is back to track down a missing DA as well as try to untangle her violent past. While none of that sounds earth-shattering, there is something about DeWitt and her unflinching self-destruction and devotion to Silette’s teachings that I found completely compelling. So far, Gran has graced us with three Claire DeWitt novels, and they get successively better. Read them in order for the best experience. If you’re a Mead card holder, all three are available in ebook and audio format on Hoopla, so no wait time for you. 

Lock Every Door (2019) by Riley Sager
Why I hated it: Some authors never resonate. This is the case for Sager. He is massively popular and has several titles that on paper seem like they’ll be right up my alley but in execution I can’t get into it. Lock Every Door initially appealed because it takes place in an early 20th century construction of a fabulous spooky Manhattan apartment building. There’s a Rosemary’s Baby vibe happening, but no Satanists, and buddy I got to tell you that was one of the biggest disappointments I’ve ever had in my leisure reading life. The solution to this “mystery” was pretty irritating and I wish I had the time back that I used to read this. I also read Lock Every Door which has a supernatural switcheroo as well, so maybe it’s a theme in Sager’s work. I dunno. It doesn’t do it for me. 

Read instead:

There’s Someone Inside Your House (2017) by Stephanie Perkins 
Why it’s great: First and foremost, before you read any further, take a moment to say the title of this book out loud. No wait, don’t just say it, SCREECH it. Try it, you’ll like it. Besides the very fun-to-yell title, this YA thriller has a brisk pace, interesting character arcs and juicy secret pasts to unfold. The creep-factor is high and the central mystery has a satisfying and hard to predict solution. Most who enjoy thrillers or mysteries would enjoy this highly consumable and appealingly candy-colored book.

Would I say my taste in books is highly individualistic and not based on any objective literary criticism? Yes, yes I would. That’s the beauty of leisure reading. We get to pursue what we like without justifying the reasons. Some people only read Amish romance. Some people only read nonfiction accounts of Arctic expeditions. Some people only read graphic novels and manga. Guess what, they are all valid in their reading pursuits because there’s no wrong way to leisurely read.  

If you are casting around for book recommendations consider using our reader’s advisory service, Your Next Five Books, by clicking HERE. If you are in need of ebook or audiobook troubleshooting, or help requesting books, please call us or stop in for help, and happy reading. 

Posted in Adult, Fiction, Horror, Mystery

Spooky Books Best for Camping, or Laying in a Hammock, or Being Woods-Adjacent

Posted on by Molly
Spookyass woods

Look, I don’t like camping, okay? Sleeping in a tent for more than one night is not restful. Being hot and stinking of bug repellent is not restful. Peeing in a hole is not restful. Plus, ax murderers live in the woods, which is not restful. The closest I ever get to camping is booking a creepy motel room that is woods-adjacent. Last year I drove up to Duluth and the scariest part was the last leg north of Spooner that is mostly pine forest and nothing else. NOTHING ELSE. This is not my element. I kept checking my gas gauge even though I knew it was full. Miles and miles would pass without seeing another car. Should my rental break down I was certain that murderers and sasquatch lined the highway, just beyond my line of sight, I knew it in my bones! Imagine my relief when I spotted Superior in the distance after cresting a hill. Civilization. Anyplace with Kwik Trip stations every three blocks is civilized, you see. While I personally do not cope well with the wide-open spaces, and being for-real scared, I thoroughly enjoy being pretend-scared from the comfort of a rented room while on vacation. If I can see woods from the room, all the better. Below, I listed several books with spooky woods featuring heavily in the plot. 

Small Spaces (2018) by Katherine Arden
Horror isn’t just for adults. That’s right, children can and should have the everloving hell scared out of them on the odd occasion. Books are a great way to scare your children. For instance, Small Spaces deals with the horror of grief as well as the more existential threat of wood-dwelling creatures that come out in the dark to eat you. Scary! Small Spaces is the first in a horror trilogy and I really think Arden gave us all a little gift with these books since parents and kids will both enjoy the series. The stakes are high and the woods are dark and dreadful. Age up with Arden and check out her gorgeous Winternight Trilogy which is basically Russian fairy tales updated for a mature readership. Save it for cold weather, tho. 

In the Woods (2007) by Tana French
This is the first book in Tana French’s beloved Dublin Murder Squad series. One of my favorite tropes in mystery fiction is when the traumatized youth grows up to be seemingly well-adjusted but then must confront the source of their trauma. In this case, the protagonist’s childhood friend vanished without a trace twenty years earlier and now a similar crime has happened in the same woods. Dublin Murder Squad books can be read in any order, but I think In the Woods is the right place to start this astonishing series. 

Near the Bone (2021) by Christina Henry
I love books about wreaking revenge on terrible men. I like books about monsters and being scared in the woods. Near the Bone combines all of these elements to great effect. A young woman and her husband live far away from civilization in the mountains. The man controls the woman’s every movement and has done for a very long time until an unseen and howling beast throws his carefully isolated life into chaos. Perhaps the unseen terror in the woods will mean salvation from the known horror of the young woman’s captor.

Watchers (1987) by Dean Koontz
This is not a good book, but it was a GREAT vacation read. The premise hooked me right away. Our protagonist crosses paths with a friendly golden retriever who manages to warn him from walking any further into the Oregon foothills. See, the golden retriever is super smart, see, and the laboratory that created him also made this super smart malevolent thing, right, that is basically the evil counterpart to the very good boy golden retriever, see. Oh and also the dog can tell if people are good or evil. And also also the creature has a psychic link with the dog! And it stalks the man and the dog! And there is a pretty lady in need of rescuing! I liked this book for a vacation read because it required very little brain power to enjoy or understand. My main criticism is that Koontz should refrain from writing sex scenes. This book came out in 1987 so maybe he got better at it, but lord was I a-cringing. 

In a Dark, Dark Wood (2015) by Ruth Ware
The best mysteries feature isolated locales, unreliable narrators, and lots of wild twists and turns. Ruth Ware has a knack for just such a mystery. In A Dark, Dark Wood takes place of course, in the middle of an isolated wooded English settlement. A group of old friends gathers for a traditional “hen do” and piss-up before one of them gets hitched. Things start out fun enough but then something goes very, very wrong. How did the power get cut off if no one can come in or out? If a stranger came into the house, where are their footprints in the snow? And it goes on like that. Most satisfying.

Here are some additional spooky woods-adjacent books to enjoy from the safety of your hotel room. Poolside enjoyment is also acceptable:

The Box in the Woods (2021) by Maureen Johnson

The Twisted Ones (2019) by T. Kingfisher

Spider Lake (2019) by Jeff Nania

The Shadows (2020) by Alex North

Uprooted (2015) by Naomi Novick

Please, enjoy camping on my behalf. Just like Homer Simpson, I prefer to be where my food and bed is. If none of the above titles hold any appeal, please reach out to us for book recommendations or consider using our book recommendation tool Your Next Five Books which will provide you with personalized book picks. Either way, we love hearing from you.

Posted in Adult, Fantasy, Horror, Mystery, Science Fiction, Teen & Young Adult

Best Beach Reads According to ME

Posted on by Molly

Despite preferring to sit very still, even indoor kids like me enjoy summer weather. We might not want to move around very much, but we have our ways of utilizing the longer, warmer, brighter days. For instance, when the weather warms up I go a little bananas and fill my backpack with snacks, a blanket, and books to take with me to the beach. I find someplace in the shade (we burn easily, you see) and make myself comfortable. Since Lake Michigan is conveniently close, and since Sheboygan has minimum three beautiful beaches to lounge on, I never have to think very hard about how to spend my days off. Parking isn’t a problem and my gas bill doesn’t exist because I ride my bike. This is what my low-maintenance summers are shaped like and it never gets old. Below, I listed several fantastic books that pair nicely with summer escapism. For book recommendations that are tailored to a specific taste, please consider using Mead Library’s Your Next Five Books book recommendation service. 

Continue reading “Best Beach Reads According to ME” →
Posted in Adult, Bookish Bingo, Teen & Young Adult

Mid-year Bookish Bingo Check-in

Posted on by Molly

It will be June four days after this post goes up. Almost impossibly, the sixth month of the year is already at hand. How have you treated your time so far in 2022? Did you spend time with the ones you love? Did you learn anything new from watching Wheel of Fortune? Did you mark off any squares on your 2022 Bookish Bingo Challenge? If so, awesome! If not, there is a whole other half a year left to reach your bingo reading goals. 

To keep the bingo challenge exciting, and to assess who is reading the Mead blog, I would like to give the first five people to email me a super secret and valuable prize. Email  publicservices@meadpl.org by July 10th to get in on the prize action. Your email should include at least one book that checked off one square of the Bookish Bingo 2022 card. That means even if you haven’t marked off a single square til June, you can still win a fabulous prize. Just like on Wheel. 

Below, I explore some approaches to crossing off a square on your Bingo card to help get the reading challenge juices flowing:

Little Free Library

Read a book from a Little Free Library

This might be my favorite square. There are no limits beyond the receptacle from which you find your book. It’s hard to walk more than a few blocks in Sheboygan without encountering a Little Free Library. There’s a map one can refer to in order to find the “official” LFLs throughout Sheboygan. This means the LFL “host” has officially registered with the Little Free Library organization. Take a look at the map HERE. It’s not required to register and you will find many fold more “unofficial” Little Free Libraries than the official ones listed on the map. My personal favorites in Sheboygan include the one outside the John Michael Kohler Arts Center on the 6th Street-side, the one on the corner of 7th and St. Claire, and the one near the YMCA. Not to say these are the BEST, they just happen to appeal to me, personally. 

Read a memoir by a comedian

Yes, Seth Rogan was only a standup during his teenage years before landing his first starring role on Freaks and Geeks, but lord was this book good, so I am including it. I LOLed so hard I cried at several passages. Also, if you have the means, I am begging you to listen to this in audio format. The cast of famous voices is staggering and I had to keep looking up if the person I was hearing was the person I thought it was. 

That’s the thing about comedian memoirs, though. They tend to translate very well into audio productions. We see a similar effect with the work of Amy Poehler (Yes Please; 2014), Tina Fey (Bossypants; 2011), and Steve Martin (Born Standing Up; 2007). Below, I listed several other highly acclaimed comedian-penned memoirs that can be found on Hoopla or Overdrive/Libby, in addition to the hard copy:

  • The Last Black Unicorn (2017) by Tiffany Haddish
  • Fresh Off the Boat (2013) by Eddie Huang
  • Why Not Me? (2015) by Mindy Kaling
  • Let’s Pretend This Never Happened (2012) by Jenny Lawson
  • Dear Girls (2019) by Ali Wong

You’re in luck if you enjoy the above work and want more, since most of the authors I listed have published more than one humorous title. In the case of Steve Martin, he’s also published more “traditional” fiction offerings such as his 2000 novella Shopgirl. It never hurts to investigate back catalogs, in any case.

Read a book about food that isn’t a cookbook, or the food memoir, as it were

Cookbooks are excellent for reading, don’t get me wrong, but the food memoir is where it’s at for some deep and delicious narrative goodness. Julia Child was a wonderful writer and the memoir of her time in France is such a delight. The “warbling giantess” is so full of curiosity, humor, warmth, and SNARK! that is not always evident when watching her on one of her many iconic cooking shows. Julia has several non-cookbook-books to her name, but if you aren’t a Child stan like I am, perhaps one of the below titles would be of interest:

  • The Man Who Ate Too Much: The Life of James Beard (2020) by John Birdsall
  • Kitchen Confidential (2000) by Anthony Bourdain
  • How to Cook a Wolf (1942) by MFK Fisher
  • Garlic and Sapphires (2005) by Ruth Reichl
  • The Cooking Gene (2017) by Michael Twitty

If you are in need of a 2022 bingo card stop into the library and ask at the first floor desk. If you have completed a row across, down, or diagonally, submit your sheet at the first floor desk to receive a small prize. Bingo cards that are completely full will be entered into a drawing at the end of 2022 for a big prize. In the meantime, don’t forget to email me at publicservces@meadpl.org for a crack at receiving a mid-year bingo incentive! In lieu of that, we are always happy to help find books that fit bingo squares, or for any reading goal you have in mind. Please also consider using our book recommendation tool Your Next Five Books which can be found HERE.

Posted in Adult, Nonfiction

GATEKEEPING in Pop Non-Fiction

Posted on by Molly

Have you ever met anyone who takes it upon themselves to decide what or who does and does not qualify for a particular group or designation? That’s a gatekeeper folks, and they are the worst. Gatekeepers are all over the place, but the first that come to mind exist in fandoms like Doctor Who (CW for language), heavy metal (CW for language), and believe it or not: public libraries. This is counterintuitive, no? Libraries are meant to welcome all. ALL. EVERYONE. So who is doing the gatekeeping? I see gatekeeping pop up in conversations about whether or not listening to an audiobook is “really” reading (it is!) and don’t even get me started about the total lack of respect reading communities have for romance as a genre. There’s also this ongoing literary fiction vs chick lit “debate” because obviously anything women like is less-than /s. 

Additionally, these days I have been noticing gatekeepers lurking in our hallowed halls of non-fiction. The narrow view I encounter in the course of my work is that only very SERIOUS books about SERIOUS things like WAR and MEN are “real” non-fiction and everything else is a fluffy nonsensical waste of time. The point being missed by these non-fiction gatekeepers is that non-fiction encompasses all aspects of our lives. Non-fiction as a collection is vast, deep, and wide, and is certainly not limited to dusty academic screeds about World War II and, oh, I don’t know…Ulysses S. Grant. Below, I highlighted several subsections of the non-fiction side of the library that are not only very popular, but full of excellent information. Click on each title to see the catalog listing which often features a brief description.

TRUE CRIME

Invisible (2018) by Stephen L. Carter
The subtitle of this true crime book tells us everything we need to know: “The forgotten story of the black woman lawyer who took down America’s most powerful mobster.” I’m in. I don’t even care which mobster is being referred to, I want to read about the smart lady being smart in a world that didn’t make space for people who look like her. 

Under the Banner of Heaven: A Story of Violent Faith (2003) by Job Krakauer
Y’all. This book. It’s a history lesson on the absolute bananas story of the Church of Latter Day Saints as well as the shocking crime the church’s most controversial tenets helped precipitate. Under the Banner of Heaven is getting the small-screen treatment, and I am going to watch the hell out of it, but this book is not to be missed. Krakauer is kind of a stud in the pop nonfiction world, and most of his titles bear a closer look; Into Thin Air (1997) and Into the Wild (1996) are two of his other most-popular titles, both with well-received screen adaptations.

Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil (1994) by John Berendt
Forget the movie adaptation. It does no justice here. If you have not had a chance to read this book in the last thirty or so years, there’s no time like the present. Midnight is a true crime book that reads like a zany caper novel crossed with the society gossip pages, but people really died. Non-fiction gatekeepers would NOT include this book in their list of REAL non-fiction, and that truly is their loss. 

BIOGRAPHY/MEMOIR

Know My Name: A Memoir (2019) by Chanel Miller
A must-read for anyone who is baffled at the unmitigated nightmare of rape culture, and why the justice system is so preoccupied with protecting the perpetrators of rape, but not so much the victims (hint: it’s misogyny). 

The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down: A Hmong Child, Her American Doctors, and the Collision of Two Cultures (1997) by Anne Fadiman
My Sheboygan public school experience in the 1980s and 90s could have been so much richer if lessons about the culture and experiences of our Hmong immigrant neighbors had been incorporated into the regular curriculum. We can make up for this deficit ever so slightly by reading The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down.

Essays

Men Explain Things To Me (2015) by Rebecca Solnit
Solnit is one of the best American essayists of all time, and she’s still in her prime. This 2015 collection features her arguably most famous essay, Men Explain Things To Me (2008) which you can read HERE. Solnit was able to articulate how infuriating it is to be doubted as an expert in your field, often by men, and managed to help coin the term “mansplain”. Real queen shit, you know?

Bad Feminist (2014) by Roxane Gay
Another luminary in the essayist community. Gay is an acute cultural observer who writes from the perspective of a black woman of size in a world that wants us to be small and quiet. Gay’s observations on feminism, politics, and popular culture is some of the most engaging writing published so far in the 21st century. Her influence is more profound than one may realize, as she has been writing for the excellent Black Panther: World of Wakanda graphic novel series.

POPULAR SCIENCE

Hallucinations (2012) by Oliver Sacks
Sacks has been gone for seven years now, but I don’t think I will ever stop recommending his work. He dedicated his life to neurology and learning about brain function, eventually becoming a compassionate giant in his field. Sacks’ career was punctuated by publishing collections of what are essentially case studies every few years. Hallucinations was his penultimate work, and I cannot bring myself to read his final book Gratitude, because I do not feel like weeping openly. He wrote Gratitude knowing he would die within months from terminal cancer, so he took the opportunity to document his own brain decline. Oliver Sacks was a generous, patient, brilliant person and the world is poorer without him. His most famous work includes Awakenings, which was adapted into a major motion picture, and The Man Who Mistook His Wife For a Hat (1985), still excellent 40 years later. 

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks (2010) by Rebecca Skloot
The fascinating tale of how the polio vaccine was developed, as well as an examination of the infuriating and ongoing history of black bodies being used in industry without consent or compensation. 

The Emperor of All Maladies: a Biography of Cancer (2010) by Siddhartha Mukherjee
Massively, perennially popular, book club pick til the end of days. Read it to learn what all the heartbreaking fuss is about. Why is science so often heartbreaking?

If the inclusion of any of the above listed titles fills you with impotent rage, the gatekeeping is coming from inside the house. Let people enjoy things. I will probably never read anything by Brene Brown, but that doesn’t mean I don’t appreciate the value everyone else finds in her work. Let’s stop measuring the perceived worth of the media we love against the media other people love. I think it’s weird that people will go out of their way to denigrate other people’s favorites & this is my small bid to encourage thought before judgement.

As ever and always, do not hesitate to reach out for more book recommendations (consider using the Your Next Five Books tool HERE) or help requesting material. You can reach Mead librarians by emailing publicservices@meadpl.org or call 902-459-3400. Go on now, go on and git.

Posted in Adult, Film, Staff Picks, Teen & Young Adult

Coming Soon to a Screen Near You

Posted on by Molly

Cinema has been taking a cue from literature since Georges Méliès adapted The Brothers Grimm and Shakespeare for film as early as 1899. Film as a medium expanded the narrative potential and, much like photography, changed art and our collective perception forever. For better or worse, we have been steeped in and obsessed by screen adaptations of the written word ever since. 

Screen adaptations have also enriched us with the classic and endless argument: WAS THE BOOK BETTER. Short answer, in general, is “yes”. My go-to example that demonstrates the rule is One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. The film version won five Academy Awards including Best Picture and Best Director in 1976. Objectively, a Very Good Film. In fact Ken Kesey, the author, famously hated the film for the same reason I felt underwhelmed. Milos Foreman chose not to narrate the story from Chief Bromden’s point of view. However, the absence of Bromden’s narration, inner life, and hallucinations were impossible to depict on-screen with the technology available at the time, thus creating a very different tale than Kesey intended, indeed. 

Below, I listed several upcoming book-to-screen adaptations that I am particularly excited about, whether they will outshine their source material or not:

Death on the Nile (1937 book cover; 2022 movie poster)

Westerners have collectively lost their shit over Agatha Christie adaptations for the better part of a century now. Reboots can be infuriating, but Christie’s work begs to be told again and again. Lately, Kenneth Branagh has been taking his turn at the helm of good ship Hercule Poirot. Starting with 2017’s Murder on the Orient Express, Branagh seems to be having a great time starring as Poirot as well as directing the pictures. I’m a David Suchet stan, so while I don’t mind the occasional Peter Ustinov or Kenneth Branagh portrayal, I tend to prefer the PBS version of the funny little Belgian. Will still be watching the ever-lovin’ heck out of this, however mind you. (In theaters now).

Deep Water by Patricia Highsmith (book cover 1957; movie poster 2022)

This film was supposed to come out in 2019, but got pushed back to 2020 and then SOMETHING happened and it’s still waiting to be released. The screen adaptation stars Ben Affleck, while not a personal favorite, he does excel at playing the oily love interest who may not have his partner’s best interest in his heart ala Gone Girl. Perhaps you saw Ana de Armas in the delightful Knives Out. I adore her and think she’ll shine in this adaptation. (Hulu March 18th, 2022).

Anatomy of a Scandal by Sarah Vaughan (book cover 2017; Netflix advert 2022)

I started listening to this book earlier in the week. Got to say, I am hooked. Give me a juicy story about horrible people being horrible to each other and I am IN. Throw in an insane power imbalance, sexual politics, and what I believe is turning into a revenge plot and I’m as happy as can be. I’m going to risk it and say that this is going to make for one hell of a TV adaptation. (Netflix April 15, 2022)

‘Salem’s Lot by Stephen King (book cover 1979; TV series poster 2022)

That’s right, it’s time for another ‘Salem’s Lot adaptation. The 1979 version is still a lot of creepy fun, but looks pretty terrible. The 2004 adaptation looks great but never quite ascends to the creep level present in 1979. I’m excited for this redo for one because vampires are fun and gross and two, I promised a friend I would finally read something by Stephen King. I read ‘Salem’s Lot, almost entirely enjoyed it, and now look forward to a new take on an old tale. (In theaters September 9th, 2022).

I listed four projects I am personally excited for, but that is not to say there aren’t tons and tons of additional book-to-screen adaptations slated for 2022. Check out a longer list HERE. Did you notice that Denis Villeneuve is on board to direct Arthur C. Clarke’s Rendesvouz with Rama when he finishes up with the Dune sequel? I wish I cared about Dune, but I just don’t. Rama, now that is a story I would love to see writ large at the multi-plex. What about you? What adaptation are you most excited about? What is your historic favorite? We won’t ask Kesey tho, he’s bitter about it.

Posted in Adult, Bookish Bingo, Teen & Young Adult

Presenting: Mead Bookish Bingo Reading Challenge 2022

Posted on by Molly
Do not eat these chips fam

New year, new books, amiright? While I don’t do New Year’s resolutions, I love to make a reading resolution. There are many ways to go about resolving to read. Personally, I’m a Goodreads Book Challenge kinda gal. All one needs to do is pick a number and try to read that many books in a calendar year. For those who crave more structure, Mead’s Bookish Bingo Challenge is a great way to get creative with your reading list and get out of a reading rut. Mead’s reading challenge is a good fit for people who struggle with deciding what to read next or for people who enjoy reading books that might fall outside of their comfort zone. Here’s how to play Mead’s Bookish Bingo Challenge 2022: Print a bingo card HERE or come into Mead and pick one up at the first or second floor desk. One title can be used to cross off one square. Once you complete your Bingo – down, across or diagonal – please submit your card to publicservices@meadpl.org or in-person at Mead Public Library to receive a small prize and an additional entry in the Summer Library Program drawing for your first Bingo. If you complete the Bingo card, and submit it by December 31, 2022, you will be entered into an additional drawing for a surprise gift. 

I present to you Mead’s Bookish Bingo Challenge 2022 card:

Pretty sweet, huh?

Key of Terms BIPOC = Black, Indigenous and People of Color LGBTQIA+ = Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Pansexual, Transgender, Genderqueer, Queer, Intersexed, Agender, Asexual, and Ally community STEM = Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math

Check back with the Mead Blog throughout the year to get suggestions and encouragement on how to complete a square. Do you like the idea of a reading challenge, but aren’t too crazy about the one we provided? Please take a moment to check out the intense array of reading challenges found throughout the internet HERE and HERE.

As always, we are eager to help you connect with the library material you need, from bingo square to book report. Reach out via call, chat, email, or in-person for book picks, research help, etc. Let’s make it a great year of reading and meeting our goals, perhaps at the same time!

Posted in Adult, Bingo 2021, eBooks & eAudio, Fiction, Film, Magazines

Bookish Bingo Reading Challenge 2021 Wrap-Up

Posted on by Molly

Well, it certainly has been a bit of a year, hasn’t it? While things were a little too pandemic-y and censorship-y around the country to make this year a pleasant one to remember, I do not think it was completely without merit. Take, for instance, reading challenges. More specifically, Mead’s Bookish Bingo Challenge, that, when complete, makes the player eligible for FABULOUS PRIZES. Readers still have until the first week of January to submit their bingo cards at the first floor desk. Those who completed a row across, down, or diagonally will receive a stylish and useful Mead tote bag. In addition to this, those who were able to complete the entire card will be entered into a drawing for $50 Chamber Cash. Wow! Talk about fabulous! 


Above: Mead’s Bookish Bingo Challenge bingo card. Download and print your own HERE. 

Did you miss the bingo boat this year? Do not despair. You have a couple options. The first of which is to engage with Mead’s Bookish Bingo Challenge 2022 for a whole new year of challenges to complete. 

The second option is to spend the next two holiday weekends completing at least one row of the bingo card. Here’s how I would do it:

Top row middle: Read a Book Recommended by the Staff on the MPL Blog

Mead staff has been posting book, movie, magazine, website, and more, recommendations for roughly the past three years. Books for all ages, really. Many to choose from and many of which can be read in one easy sitting. No one will fault you for reading a book from a post about children’s books. If you feel like this is cheating (it’s not; children’s lit is worthy and excellent), certainly no one will fault you for reading a book in audio form while you finish last minute holiday preparations around the house or drive to and from work, etc. I would listen to something with a full-cast reading like Dealing with Dragons by Patricia Wrede or maybe the highly-acclaimed The Gentleman’s Guide to Vice and Virtue by Mackenzie Lee, both of which were blogged about by yours truly a couple years ago. Super fun series, honestly. 

Second row middle: Read a Book that is Connected to the Winter Solstice

Greenglass House by Kate Milford

Hmmm, if only there were a holiday, or several holidays, that landed on or around the Winter Solstice. What I am getting at, and what you may have gathered from my advice about the first square, is that reading challenges are a perfect opportunity to bend some rules. Greenglass House by Kate Milford takes place over a boy’s winter break. It’s a snowed-in mystery that, while not specifically about the Winter Solstice, is definitely solstice-adjacent. Get creative. Is the book set in winter? I bet you could shoehorn that thing into this bingo square.

Third row middle: READER’S CHOICE!!!!!!!!!

Okay, is THIS cheating? It is not. Any book you read gets this square crossed off the list. May I humbly suggest a little Murderbot?

Fourth row middle: Read a Magazine on Overdrive/Libby

Our 2021 reading challenge saw some changes to Mead services over the course of the year. Primary of these to effect Bookish Bingo was the absorption of RB Digital into Overdrive/Libby. RBD used to be the place to check out e-magazines and audiobooks until mid-2021, so if you read your magazine there, feel free to mark off the square. Latecomers should head to Overdrive/Libby. I really dig on America’s Test Kitchen so I would probably read an issue of their Cook’s Country magazine. 

Fifth row middle: Watch a Film with Subtitles on Kanopy

Kanopy can be accessed anywhere you have an internet connection. I use the Roku app and it’s pretty slick. To find the film with subtitles, head to “Browse” and then select “World Cinema”.  Watch Parasite (2019) if you haven’t yet because buddy, you are missing out. 

Everyone at Mead hopes everyone reading our blog enjoyed participating in this inaugural reading challenge. What were your favorite squares? What were the most difficult? What do you wish we would do differently? Click HERE to download your last-ditch 2021 bingo card and stay tuned for access to the 2022 edition. Please do not hesitate to reach out for help troubleshooting tech stuff, for last minute book recs, or anything else, really. Enjoy the holiday season, and to those of you attempting to complete a bingo row over two holiday weekends, best of luck, you can do it!

Posted in Adult, Nonfiction, Teen & Young Adult

Manifestos: Not Always Terrifying

Posted on by Molly

What even is a manifesto? The very boring dictionary definition of manifesto is “a public declaration of policy and aims, especially one issued before an election by a political party or candidate”. For further clarity, I learned this derives from the Latin manifestum which means “clear or conspicuous”. So basically, if one publishes a manifesto, one is clearly defining their stance on some topic for public consumption. For me, the word “manifesto” immediately conjures images of the Unabomber wanted poster, and of Valerie Solanas, who infamously shot Andy Warhol during a dispute over her proto-feminist SCUM Manifesto. In more recent years, spree killer Elliot Rodger left behind hundreds of hours of weblogs detailing why women deserved to die for rejecting him. It seems to me, content being created by violent fringe-dwellers is generally labelled as “manifesto”. This got me wondering if any wholesome manifestos exist, and if so, would one want to engage with them? Below, I listed several library items that contain the word “manifesto” in the title. 

But first, I wanted to demonstrate that not all manifestos are impenetrable screeds detailing the evils of technology. In fact, sometimes they exist as simple lists. For instance, here is the 10-point manifesto Frank Lloyd Wright would give his apprentices:

1. An honest ego in a healthy body.
2. An eye to see nature
3. A heart to feel nature
4. Courage to follow nature
5. The sense of proportion
6. Appreciation of work as idea and idea as work
7. Fertility of imagination
8. Capacity for faith and rebellion
9. Disregard for commonplace (inorganic) elegance
10. Instinctive cooperation

Great list, Frank. Love it. Direct, abrupt, to the point, and information-rich. I think if I were walking into an apprentice situation under a living genius, receiving a list like this would be empowering and exciting.

Here are some other manifestos of varying subject matter available in the Monarch catalog that have nothing to do with domestic terror, multiple murders, or the shooting attack of important 20th century artists. Book descriptions sourced from Goodreads:

Party of One: The Loners’ Manifesto (2003) by Anneli S. Rufus
The Buddha. Rene Descartes. Emily Dickinson. Greta Garbo. Bobby Fischer. J. D. Salinger: Loners, all — along with as many as 25 percent of the world’s population. Loners keep to themselves, and like it that way.

In Party of One Anneli Rufus has crafted a morally urgent, historically compelling tour de force in defense of the loner, then and now.

Women & Power: a Manifesto (2017) by Mary Beard
In Women & Power, Beard traces the origins of this misogyny to its ancient roots, examining the pitfalls of gender and the ways that history has mistreated strong women since time immemorial. As far back as Homer’s Odyssey, Beard shows, women have been prohibited from leadership roles in civic life, public speech being defined as inherently male. From Medusa to Philomela (whose tongue was cut out), from Hillary Clinton to Elizabeth Warren (who was told to sit down), Beard draws illuminating parallels between our cultural assumptions about women’s relationship to power—and how powerful women provide a necessary example for all women who must resist being vacuumed into a male template. With personal reflections on her own online experiences with sexism, Beard asks: If women aren’t perceived to be within the structure of power, isn’t it power itself we need to redefine? And how many more centuries should we be expected to wait?

Custer Died for Your Sins: an Indian Manifesto (1969) by Vine Deloria
In his new preface to this paperback edition, the author observes, “The Indian world has changed so substantially since the first publication of this book that some things contained in it seem new again.” Indeed, it seems that each generation of whites and Indians will have to read and reread Vine Deloria’s Manifesto for some time to come, before we absorb his special, ironic Indian point of view and what he tells us, with a great deal of humor, about U.S. race relations, federal bureaucracies, Christian churches, and social scientists.

See No Stranger: A Memoir and Manifesto of Revolutionary Love (2020) by Valarie Kaur
How do we love in a time of rage? How do we fix a broken world while not breaking ourselves? Valarie Kaur—renowned Sikh activist, filmmaker, and civil rights lawyer—describes revolutionary love as the call of our time, a radical, joyful practice that extends in three directions: to others, to our opponents, and to ourselves. It enjoins us to see no stranger but instead look at others and say: You are part of me I do not yet know. Starting from that place of wonder, the world begins to change: It is a practice that can transform a relationship, a community, a culture, even a nation.

Dear Ijeawele, or, A Feminist Manifesto in Fifteen Suggestions (2017) by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
A few years ago, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie received a letter from a dear friend from childhood, asking her how to raise her baby girl as a feminist. Dear Ijeawele is Adichie’s letter of response.

Here are fifteen invaluable suggestions–compelling, direct, wryly funny, and perceptive–for how to empower a daughter to become a strong, independent woman. From encouraging her to choose a helicopter, and not only a doll, as a toy if she so desires; having open conversations with her about clothes, makeup, and sexuality; debunking the myth that women are somehow biologically arranged to be in the kitchen making dinner, and that men can “allow” women to have full careers, Dear Ijeawele goes right to the heart of sexual politics in the twenty-first century. It will start a new and urgently needed conversation about what it really means to be a woman today. See also Adichie’s excellent We Should All Be Feminists, Half a Yellow Sun, and Americanah. Everything she writes glows with intelligence.

Valerie, or, The Faculty of Dreams (2019) by Sara Stridsberg
This is not actually a manifesto, but it IS about Valerie Solanas, who I mentioned at the top. Valerie died alone in squalor at the age of 52. This book included the last of her writing as well as biographical information that frames this strange and tragic woman’s life of struggle with mental illness and addiction, in addition to being an enduing radical feminist icon.

I think I have amply proven that manifestos are as diverse as the people who write them, and most of us are probably walking around filled with enough passion, intelligence, and information to create manifestos of our very own. All of the listed titles are available in the Monarch catalog, often in a variety of formats. Not interested in any of these books or manifestos in general? No sweat, there are people, many people, at Mead Public Library who want nothing more than to take a crack at helping you get the books, movies, and music you are looking for. Reach out for reader’s advisory (book recommendations) by calling (920-459-3400), emailing (publicservices@meadpl.org), or consider using Mead’s Your Next Five Books service.