Tuesday, May 26, 2009

The Adult Summer Reading Program is Starting Its Engine

"Race Into Reading (Or Why Should The Little Readers Have All the Fun?)"is the theme of the Crawfordsville District Public Library's summer reading program for adults that starts June First. The Youth Department is using a similar theme so the building is bedecked in snazzy black and white. Adults will race their cars by reading different kinds of books labeled along their racetrack. The champion will be crowned in the Winner's Circle August 31st, receiving the drawing's big prize. The track is already posted on the south circulation wall. These three months promise to be both fun and mind-expanding for all. Here are the final new May mysteries. "A Death in Vienna" by Frank Tallis is set in the 1902 Austro-Hungarian Empire's days, introducing a young physician who uses psychoanalysis to combine intuitive examination and hard evidence in crime solutions. The same author's "Vienna Blood" takes us to the same place at the same time when a serial killer leaves cross-like symbols with his victims. In "An Incomplete Revenge" by Jacqueline Winspear, her World War I aftermath character Maisie Dobbs investigates a potential land purchase in Kent, England, and finds evidence of criminality . "The Redbreast" by Jo Nesbo finds detective Harry Hole monitoring neo-Nazi activities in Oslo when members of the nation's government willingly collaborated with Nazi Germany. "The Likeness" by Tana French features returning Dublin Murder squad detective Cassie Maddox who finds that a certain victim is her "double". "The Return" is Hakan Nesser's Inspector Van Veeteren mystery about a nearly perfect murder. Parnell Hall's "Hitman" a Stanley Hastings story features the "unlikeliest private eye in New York City". New Dilbert volumes by Scott Adam have arrived. These are clever graphic books, meaning written in cartoon form. Number 6 is "It's Obvious You Won't Survive By Your Wits Alone". No. !0 is entitled "Seven Years of Highly Defective People" which is the author's guided tour of the evolution of Delbert featuring comic strips from previous Dilbert books. No. 12 is called "Journey to Cubeville (Population: You)". No. 14 is "Dilbert Gives You the Business" as a lawyer, entrepreneur, secretary, intern, programmer, accountant, and as other professional workers. The other arrivals are "It's Not Funny If I Have to Explain It", "What Would Wally Do?", and "What Do You Call A Sociopath In A Cubicle?". The other new graphic book is "Reflections" the Fifteenth Anniversary collection of Cathy cartoons by Cathy Guisewite. Some readers favor commentaries. "A Tolerable Anarchy" by Jedediah Purdy is described (upside down on the cover) as "rebels, reactionaries, and the making of American freedom". "Stealing MySpace" is Julia Angwin's treatise on the battle to control the most popular website in America. Peter Singer's advice on acting now to end world poverty is called "The Life You Can Save". How common sense can rescue American foreign policy is discussed in Leslie Gelb's "Power Rules". Next are books about animals. In "American Buffalo" Steven Rinella contemplates the 14,000 years of hunting in North America and the place of this animal in the American experience, after learning that there were 40 million at the time of the Revolutionary War. It's a total study of this lost icon. "Deer World" by Ontario wildlife photographer Dave Taylor follows the calendar year viewing species of the deer world, namely wolves, foxes, cottontails, beaver, and moose.

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