Two or three times a year, Katie and I (Hi! It's Holley here!) host a presentation of new books to be published about which we and/or publishers are excited. Our last book preview program was earlier this month and, due to popular demand, we're sharing it with everyone! Keep in mind, most of these books have not yet been published and may not yet be available to order. I have included links to the PLJC's catalog, where available!
The summer programming is almost over here at the library,
but we are by no means done with fun!
Tuesday, August 1st at 6:30pm is the final program (and fan favorite!)
for adult Summer Reading (ages 18 and up) so be sure to mark your calendars for Bad Art
Night! Prizes will be awarded for the
absolute worst work of the night J
We’ll also be drawing winners for our Grand Prize Baskets. Dinner will be catered by Taziki’s so come
hungry!
Our next Documentaries After Dark evening will be on
Tuesday, August 15th at 6:30pm and we’ll be showing Holy Hell. This film is not rated but is intended for adult audiences.
Here is the description from www.holyhellthedocumentary.com:
"Just out of college, a young filmmaker joins a loving, secretive, and spiritual
community led by a charismatic teacher in 1980s West Hollywood. Twenty years
later, the group is shockingly torn apart. Told through over two decades of the
filmmaker’s archival materials, this is their story."
EOL, in partnership with Choice Home Care, will host another
Community Conversation on Aging on Tuesday, August 22nd at 10am. This morning session will focus on home
health, home care, hospice care, and everything you need to know about
choosing, paying for, and handling care options.
Wednesday, August 23rd is the last Art House Film of the
summer! Slow West is the story of a
young Scottish man traveling across America in pursuit of the woman he loves,
attracting the attention of an outlaw who is willing to serve as a guide.
And last, but certainly not least, our August GRG meeting is
on Tuesday the 29th at 6:30 pm and the topic up for discussion is plays and
theater.
July’s meeting was one of our biannual Salon Discussions,
where there is no assigned topic!
Picks up 25 years after the inhabitants of a quaint
northwestern town are stunned when their homecoming queen is murdered.
Speak by Louisa Hall
A thoughtful, poignant novel that explores the creation of Artificial
Intelligence—illuminating the very human need for communication, connection,
and understanding.
In a narrative that spans geography and time, from the
Atlantic Ocean in the seventeenth century, to a correctional institute in Texas
in the near future, and told from the perspectives of five very different
characters, Speak considers what it means to be human, and what it
means to be less than fully alive.
A young Puritan woman travels to the New World with her
unwanted new husband. Alan Turing, the renowned mathematician and code breaker,
writes letters to his best friend’s mother. A Jewish refugee and professor of
computer science struggles to reconnect with his increasingly detached wife. An
isolated and traumatized young girl exchanges messages with an intelligent
software program. A former Silicon Valley Wunderkind is imprisoned for creating
illegal lifelike dolls.
Each of these characters is attempting to communicate across
gaps—to estranged spouses, lost friends, future readers, or a computer program
that may or may not understand them. In dazzling and electrifying prose, Louisa
Hall explores how the chasm between computer and human—shrinking rapidly with
today’s technological advances—echoes the gaps that exist between ordinary
people. Though each speaks from a distinct place and moment in time, all five
characters share the need to express themselves while simultaneously wondering
if they will ever be heard, or understood.
Monsieur Perdu can prescribe the perfect book for a broken
heart. But can he fix his own?
Monsieur Perdu calls himself a literary apothecary. From his floating bookstore
in a barge on the Seine, he prescribes novels for the hardships of life. Using
his intuitive feel for the exact book a reader needs, Perdu mends broken hearts
and souls. The only person he can't seem to heal through literature is himself;
he's still haunted by heartbreak after his great love disappeared. She left him
with only a letter, which he has never opened.
After Perdu is finally tempted to read the letter, he hauls anchor and departs
on a mission to the south of France, hoping to make peace with his loss and
discover the end of the story. Joined by a bestselling but blocked author and a
lovelorn Italian chef, Perdu travels along the country’s rivers, dispensing his
wisdom and his books, showing that the literary world can take the human soul
on a journey to heal itself.
Internationally bestselling and filled with warmth and adventure, The
Little Paris Bookshop is a love letter to books, meant for anyone who
believes in the power of stories to shape people's lives.
Finalist for the 2011 Pulitzer Prize in General Nonfiction:
“Nicholas Carr has written a Silent Spring for the literary
mind.”―Michael Agger, Slate
“Is Google making us stupid?” When Nicholas Carr posed that
question, in a celebrated Atlantic Monthly cover story, he tapped into a
well of anxiety about how the Internet is changing us. He also crystallized one
of the most important debates of our time: As we enjoy the Net’s bounties, are
we sacrificing our ability to read and think deeply?
Now, Carr expands his argument into the most compelling exploration of the
Internet’s intellectual and cultural consequences yet published. As he
describes how human thought has been shaped through the centuries by “tools of
the mind”―from the alphabet to maps, to the printing press, the clock, and the
computer―Carr interweaves a fascinating account of recent discoveries in
neuroscience by such pioneers as Michael Merzenich and Eric Kandel. Our brains,
the historical and scientific evidence reveals, change in response to our
experiences. The technologies we use to find, store, and share information can
literally reroute our neural pathways.
Building on the insights of thinkers from Plato to McLuhan, Carr makes a
convincing case that every information technology carries an intellectual
ethic―a set of assumptions about the nature of knowledge and intelligence. He
explains how the printed book served to focus our attention, promoting deep and
creative thought. In stark contrast, the Internet encourages the rapid,
distracted sampling of small bits of information from many sources. Its ethic
is that of the industrialist, an ethic of speed and efficiency, of optimized
production and consumption―and now the Net is remaking us in its own image. We
are becoming ever more adept at scanning and skimming, but what we are losing
is our capacity for concentration, contemplation, and reflection.
Part intellectual history, part popular science, and part cultural
criticism, The Shallows sparkles with memorable vignettes―Friedrich
Nietzsche wrestling with a typewriter, Sigmund Freud dissecting the brains of
sea creatures, Nathaniel Hawthorne contemplating the thunderous approach of a
steam locomotive―even as it plumbs profound questions about the state of our
modern psyche. This is a book that will forever alter the way we think about
media and our minds.
Ticket to Write includes interviews with some of
the top music journalists from the 1966-81 era. Ticket to Write truly
is a film for those who know almost everything about rock n’ roll.''
Images of America is an ambitious collection of
chronicles that accurately capture the essence of what gives each American
small town, neighborhood, and downtown its unique flavor. Each one is penned by
a seasoned local expert and features hundreds of vintage images, local
memories, personal stories, and unique points of view in regards to a variety
of iconic events. At present, the series encompasses thousands of volumes and
counting.
Pat Conroy’s great success as a writer has always been
intimately linked with the exploration of his family history. As the oldest of
seven children who were dragged from military base to military base across the
South, Pat bore witness to the often cruel and violent behavior of his father,
Marine Corps fighter pilot Donald Patrick Conroy. While the publication
of The Great Santini brought Pat much acclaim, the rift it caused
brought even more attention, fracturing an already battered family. But as Pat
tenderly chronicles here, even the oldest of wounds can heal. In the final
years of Don Conroy’s life, the Santini unexpectedly refocused his ire to
defend his son’s honor.
The Death of Santini is a heart-wrenching act of reckoning whose ultimate
conclusion is that love can soften even the meanest of men, lending
significance to the oft-quoted line from Pat’s novel The Prince of Tides:
“In families there are no crimes beyond forgiveness.”
Tom Brokaw has led a fortunate life, with a strong marriage
and family, many friends, and a brilliant journalism career culminating in his
twenty-two years as anchor of the NBC Nightly News and as bestselling
author. But in the summer of 2013, when back pain led him to the doctors at the
Mayo Clinic, his run of good luck was interrupted. He received shocking news:
He had multiple myeloma, a treatable but incurable blood cancer. Friends had
always referred to Brokaw’s “lucky star,” but as he writes in this inspiring
memoir, “Turns out that star has a dimmer switch.”
Brokaw takes us through all the seasons and stages of this surprising year, the
emotions, discoveries, setbacks, and struggles—times of denial, acceptance,
turning points, and courage. After his diagnosis, Brokaw began to keep a
journal, approaching this new stage of his life in a familiar role: as a
journalist, determined to learn as much as he could about his condition, to
report the story, and help others facing similar battles. That journal became
the basis of this wonderfully written memoir, the story of a man coming to
terms with his own mortality, contemplating what means the most to him now, and
reflecting on what has meant the most to him throughout his life.
Brokaw also pauses to look back on some of the important moments in his career:
memories of Nelson Mandela, the Dalai Lama, the fall of the Berlin Wall, the
morning of September 11, 2001, in New York City, and more. Through it all,
Brokaw writes in the warm, intimate, natural voice of one of America’s most
beloved journalists, giving us Brokaw on Brokaw, and bringing us with him as he
navigates pain, procedures, drug regimens, and physical rehabilitation. Brokaw
also writes about the importance of patients taking an active role in their own
treatment, and of the vital role of caretakers and coordinated care.
Generous, informative, and deeply human, A Lucky Life Interrupted offers
a message of understanding and empowerment, resolve and reality, hope for the
future and gratitude for a well-lived life.
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