All About Baseball

With spring finally here, we can start thinking about baseball season! The library has a lot of books, movies, and more about America’s pastime.

Books:

• Baseball: a history of America's favorite game by George Vecsey. A survey of the game that includes historical landmark events and personalities, from baseball's ancient beginnings up through the present day. 
• Baseball, a Celebration! by James Buckley, Jr. A picture-rich volume that displays baseball history through famous and less-known photographs. 
• The Lords of Baseball: a wry look at a side of the game the fan seldom sees, the front office by Harold Parrott. Baseball management gets an in-depth look in this historical examination of the famous Brooklyn Dodgers.
• The Ultimate Baseball Book by Daniel Okrent and Harris Lewine. Just what it sounds like - an encyclopedic text devoted to all things baseball and baseball history.
• Juiced: wild times, rampant 'roids, smash hits, and how baseball got big by Jose Canseco. A memoir by one of baseball's biggest stars and most notorious steroid users provides a look at how the era of body-builder baseball began. 

Movies:

• Baseball, a series by Ken Burns. Documentary maker Ken Burns digs in to baseball history in this nine-volume set. 
• Field of Dreams, the classic midwestern baseball story starring Kevin Costner.
• Bad News Bears, a remake of the classic starring Billy Bob Thornton as the Coach. 
• Bull Durham, a celebration of small-town minor league teams, starring Kevin Costner and Susan Sarandon.

Other:

• Baseball Forever!: 50 years of classic radio play-by-play highlights from the Miley Collection. Enjoy this audio collection of baseball history highlights. 

Save the date: On May 21st at 1:30, UW-Milwaukee professor Mariann Maris will present on the history of baseball with a special focus on the history of baseball parks and stadiums. Join us for this special presentation at the library!

"Cli-Fi" books at EFPL

A recent story broadcast on National Public Radio's Weekend Edition received a lot of attention from book fans. The story was about a growing literary sub-genre nicknamed "Cli-Fi" in honor of its primary subject matter: climate change.

Over the past decade, more and more writers have begun to set their novels and short stories in worlds, not unlike our own, where the Earth's systems are noticeably off-kilter. The genre has come to be called climate fiction — "cli-fi," for short.

The sub-genre differs from the genre of dystopian fiction, which is a genre that explores the world from a futuristic and often post-apocalyptic perspective. Rather, "cli-fi" novels focus their attention on a world feeling the often brutal effects of significant changes to their climate.

 Read the full story on NPR.

Titles in the Eager Free Public Library in the "cli-fi" sub-genre, at least according to NPR's list, include:

State of Fear by Michael Crichton (F Crichton)
Flight Behavior by Barbara Kingsolver (F Kingsolver) - read our post about this title!
The Carbon Diaries: 2017 by Saci Lloyd (YA - coming soon!)

Keep an eye out for Odds Against Tomorrow by Nathaniel Rich (due out this year) - the novel that prompted the NPR story and whose plotline will sound strikingly familiar to many Manhattanites who lived through Hurricane Sandy late last year.

Happy National Library Week!

Since yesterday was the kickoff to National Library Week, you will probably not be surprised to hear that our post theme today is all about libraries, librarians, and books. Today our focus is on some of our favorite kids' books that are especially related to libraries and reading.

Amelia Bedelia, Bookworm by Herman Parish. Our favorite scatterbrained housekeeper returns in this installment of the easy-reader series, and she's determined to provide her local librarian a helping hand...
Find it on the shelf: +ER Parish 3

Beatrice Doesn't Want To by Laura Joffe Numeroff. Beatrice doesn't like books, but her older brother is working on a report on dinosaurs so she's stuck at the library after school. Emphasizes the importance of finding the right book for the right reader!
Find it on the shelf: +P Numeroff red

No T. Rex in the Library by Tony Buzzeo. A rampaging tyrannosaurus rex demonstrates the problem with beastlike behavior to an out-of-control little girl in the library.
Find it on the shelf: +P Buzzeo aqua b

The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore by William Joyce. Morris Lessmore loves words, colors, and pictures. When he's abruptly transported to a dreary, colorless world, he comes upon a library full of books that need his help.
Find it on the shelf: +P Joyce red 1

I Took My Frog to the Library by Eric A. Kimmel. Again with the animals-in-libraries theme...a young girl brings her pets to the library, a visit with predictably disastrous results.
Find it on the shelf: +P Kimmel silver

L is for Library by Sonya Terry. A library-loving cat leads readers on an ABC-themed romp exploring all the different parts of their library.
Find it on the shelf: +P Terry red

Library Lily by Gillian Shields. Lily's mom introduces her to the library, and Lily falls in love with reading. Then she meets a new friend, Milly, who dislikes reading - but loves adventure.
Find it on the shelf: +P Shields pink

Find these and so many more at the Eager Free Public Library! And don't forget, kids can still enter the library's drawing contest sponsored by Culver's. Sheets available at the children's desk.

Non-Fiction Roundup Part 1

Last week I picked up a copy of The Great Pearl Heist by Mary Caldwell-Crosby from our new non-fiction shelf. I've been on a non-fiction kick lately, particularly of historical events of a dramatic nature (lots of  stories about crime and epidemics) so I thought I'd share a roundup of titles, some recent and some a little older that fall into this category. Click on the links to view each title's record in RockCat.

The Great Pearl Heist: London's greatest thief and Scotland Yard's hunt for the world's most valuable necklace by Mary Caldwell-Crosby (354.16 Crosby). Fast-paced, well-researched book about a jewel heist that took place in Edwardian London. Caldwell-Crosby does a really nice job of setting the scene and providing plenty of historical social and economic context.

Devil in the White City: Murder, magic, and madness at the fair that changed America by Erik Larson (364.1523 Larson). One of the most popular non-fiction titles in recent years, Larson's book is a fascinating exploration of Chicago leading up to and during the World's Fair in 1893. It's a treat for everyone from architecture buffs to true crime fans.

The Ghost Map: the story of London's most terrifying epidemic -- and how it changed science, cities, and the modern world by Steven Johnson (614.514 Johnson). An examination of London during the dreadful cholera epidemic of the mid-nineteenth century. Not for the squeamish reader.

In Cold Blood: a true account of a multiple murder and its consequences by Truman Capote (364.1 Capote). Originally published in 1966, Capote's title is considered by some to be the earliest example of a non-fiction work, and by most accounts it's certainly one of the first titles that would fall into the category of "true crime."

Black Fire: The true story of the original Tom Sawyer -- and of the mysterious fires that baptized Gold Rush-era San Francisco by Robert Graysmith (979.4 Graysmith). Graysmith paints an interesting picture of the boy that inspired Mark Twain's popular literary hero and reveals the story of "torch boys" or boy firefighters that were an important asset to San Francisco during the city's unstable boom days.

Other titles to try:

• In the Garden of Beasts: Love, terror, and an American family in Hitler's Berlin by Erik Larson (943.086 Larson)
• The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot (616.0277 Skloot)
• The Murder of the Century: the Gilded Age crime that scandalized a city and sparked the tabloid wars by Paul Collins (364.152 Collins)
• Portrait of a Killer: Jack the Ripper by Patricia Cornwell (364.5423 Cornwell) 
• Destiny of the Republic: a tale of madness, medicine, and the murder of a president by Candice Millard (973.8409 Millard)

Audiobooks for Grown-Ups

Lots of patrons here at the Eager Free Public Library check out audiobooks, to listen to over morning coffee or in the car on the way to work. With summer vacations not too far off, now's a good time to start thinking about what titles you might want for that road trip too.

Highlights from our adult audiobook collection include the following bestselling titles (all are books on CD):

• Alex Cross, Run by James Patterson
• A Week in Winter by Maeve Binchy
• Deadly Stakes by Judith A. Jance
• The Fifth Assassin by Brad Meltzer
• Coolidge by Amity Shlaes
• Private Berlin by James Patterson

Of course we have many titles by favorite authors such as Janet Evanovich, Danielle Steele, Nora Roberts, David Baldacci, and Clive Cussler to name a few. Visit RockCat, the library's catalog, to search for specific authors and titles.

Non-fiction titles of interest include:

• Baseball Forever! from the John Miley collection; 50 great radio moments from baseball history
• Nickel and Dimed: on (not) getting by in America by Barbara Ehrenreich 
• Devil in the White City by Erik Larson
• Three Cups of Tea: one man's mission to fight terrorism and build nations one school at a time by Greg Mortensen

For those readers with kids at home, don't forget our lineup of fun spring break activities happening at the library this week! Check out the events calendar on our website for all the details.