Read, Listen, Watch

Staff Picks and Suggestions

Curling up with a good mystery

Picture this, cup of tea, piece of cake, and you curled up on the sofa!  Doing what, you asked?  Reading a great mystery, that’s what!  Haven’t heard of any good titles?  Well do I have one for you!  Heard of James Patterson’s Alex Cross series? No? You don’t know what you’ve been missing.  One of my favorites is The Big Bad Wolf.  While this wolf won’t blow your house down, you may want to lock your doors and check your windows after reading.  Patterson’s characters jump off the pages right into your scary heart.  Enter in Dr. Alex Cross, detective and psychologist all rolled into one.  He’ll need both those skills to help solve the murders he encounters.  Will he be able to? I can’t give away much more of the storyline, but you can read all about the adventures of Alex Cross.  Where, you asked?  Snell Library that’s where.  Check him out, you won’t be disappointed.

Reading For Free

Neil Gaiman has a series of wonderful posts about reading, buying books, and free books. His publisher, by the way, is offering his book American Gods online for free through March 28. Neil Gaiman talks the talk and walks the walk. He writes really well too – and now’s your chance to read one of his more popular books for free if you aren’t familiar with him. When you’re done with American Gods, don’t forget that you can check out many of his other works here at the Snell Library!

Library Architecture

I recently came across this slide show on Slate, titled “How do you build a public library in the age of Google?” It’s an interesting tour of current library architecture, and the different ways cities are trying to adapt libraries into popular public spaces. What do you think? Do you have a favorite public library? How does the building design play into your appreciation? I know I prefer smaller libraries, and sometimes I find some modern architecture a little too sterile for my taste. In any event, I still plan on checking out books for a long time to come!

Authors Thomas Cathcart and Daniel Klein at the Library

Authors of Aristotle and an Aardvark Go to Washington: Understanding Political Doublespeak through Philosophy and Jokes, Thomas Cathcart and Daniel Klein will be speaking in 421 Snell Library on Wednesday, February 20, 2008 @ Noon as part of the Meet the Author series.

The Family Fortune

Keeping up with my Austen kick, another slightly chick lit adaptation that I read recently (this fall) was The Family Fortune by Laurie Horowitz.  This modernizing update of Persuasion was recommended to me by a friend.  Even though I’m well familiar with the story, I still found myself dying to get back to reading it.  Somehow, these stories still manage to generate in me a page-turning suspense.

I thought certain aspects of this update worked better than others.  Jane Fortune, the Anne Eliot stand-in works for her family’s literary journal, the Euphemia Review.  While in keeping with Jane’s literary interests (and the opportunity for meeting her Captain Wentworth figure, writer Max Wellman), something about the unrealistic nature of her career bothered me.  The story is set in Boston, which makes it a fun read. 

While no Austen, and at times oddly irksome, I still found myself captivated by The Family Fortune.  What do you think of the cottage industry of chick lit ‘Austen’ retreads?  Do you have a book that fully captured your interest despite its faults?