New E-books!

Our e-book collection is getting more use everyday!  Powered by Overdrive, we are part of a consortium with almost 70 other East Texas libraries.  Each library is required to purchase books at least once a year and we purchased 46 new titles last week.  We try to order a mix of books, so that we add things that will appeal to everybody.

This year we added several Goosebumps books for young readers including:

We also purchased a few Nora Roberts books for our romance lovers, including her most recent release:

We have been asked several times for cozy mysteries, so we added the Merry Muffin Mystery series.

We also look at what our patrons have on hold and try to order a few of those books, to reduce wait times.

And finally, we added a few non-fiction books to the collection.

If you have a request for a specific e-book that is not available in our collection, please let us know.  We will try to honor your request, if at all possible, the next time we purchase e-books.  Overdrive is a great resource for finding the books you most want to read, or listen to (the audiobook collection is huge).  FCL houses a physical collection of about 17,000 books, but our e-book collection numbers nearly 60,000 items!  Come in today and let us set up your device for checking out e-books!

 

Tom's Two Cents : Woman in Gold

The Franklin County Friends of the Library began its Fall Film Fest this past Thursday with the presentation of a BBC 2015 film, "Woman in Gold," starring Helen Mirren and Ryan Reynolds as Maria Altmann, an older California Jewish woman originally from Austria, and her family friend, Randy Schoenberg, an aspiring young lawyer with Austrian roots.  The film focuses on a Nazi art theft in 1939 during Hitler's occupation of Austria (the "Anschluss ") and its subsequent persecution of the Jews in Vienna in particular.  A poignant series of flashbacks tells both the early story of Maria's growing up years in a wealthy Jewish family in Vienna and her later story as its last surviving member in Pasadena, California, where she owns a ladies' shop.

Ostensibly this is a tale of Maria's attempts to retrieve her stolen art property, in particular a portrait of her Aunt Adele by the famous Austrian artist, Gustave Klimpt, hanging in the Belvedere Museum in Vienna.  She is aided and supported by a young American lawyer, whose grandfather was none other than the famous atonal composer, Arnold Schoenberg.  On a much deeper level, this is a story about family, loss, justice and retribution, all of these threads woven together into a series of legal suspense episodes of the "will-she," "won't-she" obtain justice type.  Like any good legal-suspense story, the movie keeps the viewer guessing almost to the end.  But it is also a true story.

With settings like Pasadena and Vienna, the film has a lot going for it from the beginning, but it is the authenticity of the flashback episodes, especially the intimate scenes of this cultured family in Vienna before the War, that make it work most successfully.  Helen Mirren is, as always, supremely in command of her role, and the interaction between her and Reynolds, both as friend, supporter and sometimes even antagonist, makes for a convincing personal conflict.  Also, among the seemingly endless films about World War II, and the Holocaust in particular, this is a different and more personal perspective.  Quality films of this type rarely make it to the Provinces, and we are especially lucky to have our local Library Friends sponsor such events.

Chance's Corner: The Conjuring 2 Review

It's nearly October, and I've got the itch for cooler weather and to be scared senseless. The weather keeps failing me, but we do have a few horror flicks here at the Franklin County Library - classics such as The Shining and The Texas Chain Saw Massacre and even contemporary films like The Babadook and The Conjuring.

The Conjuring is based off one of the case files of paranormal investigators Ed and Lorraine Warren. The Warrens are mainly known for their research into the house in Amityville. What house? Maybe you heard of The Amityville Horror? The Conjuring takes place before the Warrens went to Amityville, and revolves around a family being terrorized by the spirit of a witch in their new farmhouse. The events are said to be true. True or not, The Conjuring is one spooky and unnerving movie.

The Conjuring 2 recently came out on DVD, and knowing how good the original movie was, I was very excited to see what comes next. This time the Warrens are investigating another famous case, the Enfield Poltergeist, which is claimed to be one of the most well-documented hauntings in history. 

Amityville House

In the prologue, the movie opens with the camera pulling back from a seemingly peaceful view, through a pane of glass, to reveal a pair of infamous quarter-moon windows. Nothing happens, but an instant chill sets in. I just knew this was going to be good... and then it wasn't.

Lorraine Warren (Vera Farmiga) roams the haunted halls of 112 Ocean Drive, Amityville, and claims to have seen Hell (more of a personal hell, as it turns out), but all I saw was lackluster scares. Something's wrong when you can't make the house in Amityville scary.

Then the movie moves on to the Enfield case. The ball really doesn't start rolling until much later when the poltergeist starts to verbalize in his signature growl. The plot hits all the highlights of the  Enfield case - the policewoman witnessing the chair move, the possession shown on television, the photos of the girls being tossed about in their rooms, Janet bending spoons, and so on and so forth. This all actually happened, whether real or conjured up.



Is she jumping? Or is she being tossed around? 



That's what I really like about The Conjuring 2. The Warrens don't march into the house and immediately start to cleanse it. They are skeptical throughout, pointing out that the girls were probably just jumping off their beds in the photos. I also enjoy the human aspect of the story, like Ed Warren (Patrick Wilson) just strumming the guitar and singing Elvis for the kids to alleviate their terror. Moments like that really set this series apart from other horror films.

What did I not like about this film? The Crooked Man, whether claymation or not, is absurd. I laughed! Every time he showed up I was completely taken out of the experience. The Demon Nun is very scary, but uh... the purpose was? There was just too many manifestations that really had nothing to do with the "true" haunting.

I think the real problem is that this film had too big of a budget - it's actually double the budget of The Conjuring. The simple scares of the original are amplified to dizzying (and unscary) heights. I've seen a crucifix turn upside down many times, maybe on not such a large scale, but still... The whole final confrontation is just overblown and uninspired (and never happened).

I was very disappointed by this film, so I guess I'm missing out on the cooler weather and being scared senseless. Tragic.

The Conjuring 2 is now available at the Franklin County Library.

Poet's Perch : Loyalty by Berton Braley

Loyalty

He may be six kinds of a liar,

He may be ten kinds of a fool,

He may be a wicked highflyer

Beyond any reason or rule;

There may be a shadow above him

Of ruin and woes to impend,

And I may not respect, but I love him,

Because - well, because he's my friend.

I know he has faults by the billion,

But his faults are a portion of him;

I know that his record's vermilion,

And he's far from the sweet Seraphim;

But he's always been square with yours truly,

Ready to give or to lend,

And if he is wild and unruly,

I like him - because he's my friend.

I criticize him but I do it

In just a frank, comradely key,

And back-biting gossips will rue it

If ever they knock him to me!

I never make diagrams of him,

No maps of his soul have I penned;

I don't analyze - I just love him,

Because - well, because he's my friend.

Berton Braley

Marvelous Monday Returns!

After a hiatus for Summer Reading, we resumed Marvelous Monday this week.  We kicked things off by making a hoop glider.  Similar to a paper airplane, a hoop glider is made from a straw, an index card, and some tape.

Come next Monday at 4:15 and see what new project we get into!

Chance's Corner: The Birds Review

Flocks of birds swarmed Capitola, California in 1961 and hurled themselves into people's homes (puked a bit, too), which caused quite a panic. Alfred Hitchcock caught wind of their plight, read Daphne du Maurier's shocking novelette, and was inspired to create The Birds.

The Birds starts with shrill squawks and caws - the only soundtrack composer Bernard Herrmann helped curate for this film. Other than a little ditty on the piano and a haunting a cappella children's melody, there are no violins to punctuate the horror. Just the sounds of ravenous birds.

Most of The Birds is filled with build-up and character development. Hitchcock doesn't just toss Tippi Hedren & Company into the fray - he eases them into it - until the tension is almost palpable. The crows slowly converging at the school playground is one of the most iconic and frightening scenes in film history. The last act plays out a little like George A. Romero's Night of the Living Dead - birds pecking away at boarded windows and doors - Tippi & Co sitting in the darkness, and seeking comfort in tight corners.

The only drawback to The Birds is its resolution - or lack thereof. What lies beyond the bend in the road? Why did the birds go cuckoo? Hitchcock didn't know the answer. And no one in Capitola, California knew, either, until decades later. The birds had ingested domoic acid, which is produced by red algae. The birds just simply lost their minds and died.

The Birds is available at the Franklin County Library!

Square Triangle Circle Squiggle

Here's a quick quiz:  From the following shapes, pick the one that you like best.

Picked your shape?  Good.  You've just taken a personality test!  

The library staff took this quiz yesterday.  I won't tell you who's who - you'll have to figure that out for yourself - but we have on staff one square, one triangle, one squiggle, and one circle-y squiggle.

So what does it mean?

A square is someone data driven and structure oriented.  They like routines, rules, and stability.  They prefer to work alone and need expectations to be clearly spelled out.  They are very organized.

A triangle is someone who is focused on the bottom line.  They don't need to know all the details, but do want to know the "why."  They are impatient, confident, and decisive.  They hate meetings. 

A circle is fun-loving, social, and good at communication.  They are caregivers and peacemakers.  They can over commit and have a hard time saying no.  They like people.

A squiggle is a creative visionary.  They are enthusiastic and like to try new things.  They are easily bored and have difficulty with completion.  They are spontaneous.   

Why is this important?  In an office as small as ours, personality conflicts can become a big deal.  Understanding why our coworkers' minds work the way they do can go a long way to keeping irritations at a minimum.   Each of us bring different strengths to the job, too, and we can learn to use all the different assets we have at our disposal.

I took this quiz and the analysis from http://listening2leaders.com/shape-quiz-learn-colleagues/.