What a Wonderful World: November

This year, our theme at the library is What A Wonderful World. We’re focusing on a different color for each month, and November’s is peaceful periwinkle. To that end, we’re highlighting books at the library with that color (or something close to it) on the cover!

Book Buzz: Short Story Anthologies, Standalone Debuts, and Libraries

Every month, we’re profiling new-ish releases that are getting critical and commercial buzz. For January, we’re looking at a prestigious annual literary collection, a standalone mystery from one of the most popular crime writers working today, and a profile of the Los Angeles library system.

Book Buzz: Alice in Wonderland Fan Fiction, Small-Town Olympic Glory, and Intergalactic Adventures

Every month, we’re profiling new-ish releases that are getting critical and commercial buzz. For March, we’re looking at a fantasy anthology that celebrates a classic work, a profile of a small Vermont town that generates an unusually high number of Olympians, and a coming-of-age science fiction trilogy.

Oddly-Specific Genres: If They Can Write A Book, So Can You!

Are you ready to unleash your writing superpowers? That’s the theme of this November’s NaNoWriMo, the annual writing challenge that requires participants to write a novel in the span of 30 days.

Think you couldn’t write a book in 30 years, let alone 30 days?

Well, if these decidedly non-author celebrities can write fiction, why can’t you?

Oddly-Specific Genres: 2017 Books in Bloom Authors

It’s that time of year again!

And by that time of year again, of course, I mean Books in Bloom.

We hope you’ll join us on May 21st in Eureka Springs at the Crescent Hotel for another afternoon of books and author talks.

Like last year, we’re giving you the scoop on who will be there, so you can get a head-start reading some of the offerings from this year’s authors.

2016 Library Challenge: A Book of Short Stories

Don’t feel like you have the emotional energy to devote to an entire novel?

Still looking for something different but the nonfiction post from last week isn’t really your thing?

Try a short story collection!

Personally, I love a good short story. This may be a form of heresy to many readers, but if I had to pick between a good short story and a good novel, I’d pick the short story just about every time.

To that end, here are a few short story collections released in the last year or so!

2016 Library Challenge: A Book That Might Make You Cry

Last week, we looked at books that make you laugh, so this time, I figured we might as well look at the exact opposite–a book that might make you cry.

Now, depending on how given you are to crying while reading, this challenge could be really hard or really easy.

I don’t usually cry when reading (or watching movies or actually much in general), even if the scene is very sad, and when I do cry , it’s usually at some odd scene that’s probably not supposed to be the one that makes you cry. So, it’s probably just as well that, rather than crying, I am more likely to respond to sad books by just feeling incredibly hollow and depressed for days afterward. But every now and then, a book will make me sob uncontrollably.

And so to honor sad books, here’s a round-up of books that might make you cry. As always, be sure to check our online catalog for more details.

2016 Library Challenge: A Book by a Female Author

Tomorrow, March 8th, is International Woman’s Day, and we decided to celebrate by blogging about the challenge that asks you to read a book written by a female author.

Of course, we’ve already covered a lot of great female authors over the past couple of months, including but certainly not limited to Jane Austen, the Brontë sisters, Daphne Du Maurier, Barbara Kingsolver, and Margaret Atwood.

But I thought I’d use this blog post to be more reflective than usual and chat about some of my favorite female authors, though this list certainly doesn’t include all of them. As always, if you are interested in reading any of the books mentioned, just follow this link to our catalog.