Free photos with the EASTER BUNNY!

Friday April 22nd
1- 2:30 pm
Kids can enjoy spring crafts and get their picture taken with the Easter Bunny
All FREE
The pictures will be emailed to you to print and share.

Pictures - Book Chatters following our February meeting

Kristina & Cheryl with author Jamie Ford at book signing following an excellent Community READS presentation on March 25, 2011

Book Chatters'

Book Chatter's Review - The Shadow Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafón and Lucia Graves

 

Review -  The Shadow of the Wind contained several stories within the main frame of the story, thus creating many characters.  It was difficult to follow without taking notes while reading. Our group gave it thumbs down.

Pat

For our April meeting we are planning to see the movie WATER FOR ELEPHANTS.  We read and discussed the book back in May 2008.  We look forward to viewing then comparing the book and movie.  The book is almost always better, however this movie does look rather good! 

    Visit the official movie website - www.waterforelephants.com

    and a fan site - http://waterforelephantsfilm.com

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks

Her name was Henrietta Lacks, but scientists know her as HeLa. She was a poor black tobacco farmer whose cells—taken without her knowledge in 1951—became one of the most important tools in medicine, vital for developing the polio vaccine, cloning, gene mapping, in vitro fertilization, and more. Henrietta’s cells have been bought and sold by the billions, yet she remains virtually unknown, and her family can’t afford health insurance.

Soon to be made into an HBO movie by Oprah Winfrey and Alan Ball, this New York Times bestseller takes readers on an extraordinary journey, from the “colored” ward of Johns Hopkins Hospital in the 1950s to stark white laboratories with freezers filled with HeLa cells, from Henrietta’s small, dying hometown of Clover, Virginia, to East Baltimore today, where her children and grandchildren live and struggle with the legacy of her cells. The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks tells a riveting story of the collision between ethics, race, and medicine; of scientific discovery and faith healing; and of a daughter consumed with questions about the mother she never knew. It’s a story inextricably connected to the dark history of experimentation on African Americans, the birth of bioethics, and the legal battles over whether we control the stuff we’re made of. ~Rebecca Skloot (rebeccaskloot.com)

I have read this book and found it to be a great read. You could feel how much the author cared about sharing Henrietta's story with others. This story grabs your attention from the first page and holds it until the end. This book makes you think about the past and what will happen next in medicine. I highly recommend this book even for people who normally don’t read non-fiction. ~ Holly Emahiser

Author video

Friends of the N.B Library Spring Book Sale

Thursday Apr.28 5-8 pm / Friday Apr. 29 10am - 5pm / Saturday Apr. 30 10am - 4pm (Bag sale begins @ 1pm)
Preview Sale for members of Friends Wednesday Apr. 27 5- 8pm
Volunteers needed to set up sale and work

Review of Water for Elephants by Sarah Gruen – Connie Phillips

This book is set in the 1930’s during the Great Depression, and also in today’s time. 
The main character Jacob Jankowski is an old man who has great memories of a life on the Benzini Brothers Most Spectacular Show on Earth. As a young man, nearly a college graduate as a veterinarian, Jacob is faced with a great conflict and emotional disaster in his life.  It is this disaster that puts Jacob on the train of the show with nowhere else to go.

The inner workings and conflicts of circus life are so well described that you can picture yourself there. It also touches on how the elderly are treated in a nursing home.  It’s a book that really makes you think.  Some things are very difficult to read but it does have a very surprising happy ending.  I really liked this book and I look forward to seeing the movie.

The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society By Mary Ann Shaffer and Annie Barrows

I almost made the mistake of not reading this wonderful little book.  But glancing through it and reading some of the first chapter, it hooked me and I was compelled to finish it.     The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society is the story of an English author named Juliet Ashton who survives World War II and finds herself assigned a writing project.  While working on the assignment and traveling about England, she receives a letter from a man living on the Isle of Guernsey in the English Channel who bought one of her old books at a second-hand shop.  She responds to Dawsey Adams’ letter and begins a series of letters that will change her life and impact the lives of the people living on Guernsey.  The inhabitants of Guernsey lived under Nazi occupation for years and as Juliet learns more about them she finds out about the experiences of these courageous men and women who formed the Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society as a cover to protect themselves from the Germans.  As Juliet reads each successive letter, she becomes so intrigued with the stories of the people who survived she decides to move temporarily to the island.  Once there, she finds herself caught up in the lives and relationships of those remarkable people.     I found myself drawn into this island community.  The pages kept turning under my fingers and I found it hard to put it down until I knew the fate of the friends and family who were taken away by the Nazis and were still missing. By the end of the book I felt as though I had booked a flight to Guernsey and walked the shore of this community with Juliet and Dawsey.    I know the subject of World War 2 and its aftermath has been written about from every angle imaginable, but this book has found a heart-warming and refreshing way to address the subject one more time.  My advice is to take a few nights and sit in your favorite chair with a hot cup of tea and visit Guernsey through the eyes of these wonderful authors.   Stephen Cram