Month: August 2017

National Days in September

Posted on by Shelby

September is the month when the air starts to turn brisk in the mornings, giving you a small taste for Fall, but by the afternoon, it’s sweltering again. Monday, September 4 is Labor Day, where most business (including the Aurora Public Library District) will be closed. But what about the other National Holidays taking place in September?

September 2: National Tailgating Day & National College Colors Day

September 4: National Wildlife Day & Labor Day

September 5: National Cheese Pizza Day

September 6: National Read a Book Day

September 8: National Stand Up to Cancer Day

September 9: National Hug Your Boss Day

September 11: Patriot Day & National Day of Service and Remembrance

September 12: National Day of Encouragement & National Chocolate Milkshake Day

September 13: National Peanut Butter Day

September 15: National Online Learning Day

September 16: National Step-Family Day & National Working Parents Day

September 17: National Wife Appreciation Day

September 19: National Talk Like a Pirate Day & National IT Professionals Day

September 22: First Day of Autumn

September 23: National Singles Day & National Family Health and Fitness Day

September 24: National Punctuation Day

September 25: National Comic Book Day

September 26: National Pancake Day & National Voter Registration Day

September 28: National Good Neighbor Day

September 29: National Coffee Day

September 30: National Ghost Hunting Day

Click on the underlined links to brows our collection on these different topics! Enjoy these days!

5 End of Summer Reads for your list

Posted on by Michaela

Summer is almost over! Did you just have a panic attack like I did? No more days at the lake, time on the beach and the days are getting shorter.

BUT just because the summer is ending doesn’t mean it is time to give up your summer reading plans quite yet. Take a look below for our suggestions of some quick end of the summer reads to lead you into fall!

Come Sundown, by Nora Roberts

One plus one, by Jojo Moyes

Beautiful Ruins, by Jess Walter

A hundred summers, by Beatriz Williams

Summerland, by Elin Hilderbrand

Come into the library today and pick up one of these titles to read over the long weekend!

Series Starters: Divergent

Posted on by Shelby

For young adults, sometimes it feels like the dystopian genre is overused; sometimes it feels like the apocalyptic/end-of-the-word/new society story has been told over and over again so that it’s hard to see how new stories are still released. However, Veronica Roth’s dystopian trilogy, Divergent, manages to be extremely innovative and will keep you on the edge of your seat until the very last page.

Beatrice Prior lives in “the City,” a dystopian version of Chicago, where the citizens are divided into five virtue-based factions: Candor (honesty), Erudite (intellect), Dauntless (bravery), Abnegation (selflessness), and Amity (peacefulness). Beatrice and her family are Abnegation, so they put others before themselves every minute of every day, which is something Beatrice struggles with. On a special day every year, those who have turned sixteen in the past year are required to choose the faction in which they will spend the rest of their lives after taking several placement tests to help them decide. During the tests, it is determined that Beatrice is Divergent, which means that her personality does not favor one faction over another; instead she tests equally into three factions, which is the most dangerous thing she could be. After making the choice that surprises both her and her parents, she renames herself Tris and struggles to survive the intense initiation of her new faction. As the novel intensifies, it becomes more clear that Tris is in great danger… and so is the rest of her city.

Veronica Roth published Divergent, the first in the trilogy, in 2011 when she was only twenty-three years old, which makes me extremely jealous. A prequel of short stories to the series, Four: A Divergent Collection, was released in 2014, a year after the third installment. Her newest standalone novel, Carve the Mark, was released earlier this year. The Divergent series has been made into three movies so far, with a fourth movie on the horizon.

I loved this series. I listened to the audiobooks when I was driving back and forth to work, but I am planning on rereading them once I get through the mountain of other books I want to read. And while many fans were critical about how the series ended, I thought that it couldn’t have ended any other way. I can’t give anything else away because of, you know, spoilers, but there is some respect for an author like Roth. I would definitely recommend this series.

The Aurora Public Library District owns physical copies of each movie and book, as well as digital copies of the books on the Indiana Digital Download Center.

Happy Reading!

Storytime is Coming to the Library!

Posted on by Peggy

I’ve missed all my young friends and will be happy to see them again when the Library District kicks off the Fall session of Storytime! There has been a change in the time for two of our Storytime programs. The Dillsboro Storytime will still take place on Tuesdays, but will now begin at 10:30 AM. The Aurora Storytimes will be on Wednesdays with sessions at 10:30 AM or 1 PM. Each week’s program will be filled with stories, poems, songs, and a craft or activity. This program is for ages 3-6 and we do ask that you register your child in advance, so I know approximately how many crafts to prepare.

Storytimes are a great chance for your child to get comfortable listening to stories in a group and to interact with other kids. I plan the programs using the principles of the American Library Association’s Every Child Ready to Read Program which emphasizes the following activities: Reading, Writing, Singing, Talking, and Playing. These programs also provide a time for you to connect with other parents of young children.

We’ll be getting started on September 5th and 6th with a PIG theme!

Piggy and Dad Go Fishing by David Martin

Rrralph by Lois Ehlert

Other September themes will include books by Lois Ehlert, Boats, and Apples. Storytimes will run through the middle of December.

Toy Boat by Randall de Seve   The apple Pie Tree by Zoe Hall

You can register your child for Storytime at any circulation desk, by calling us at 812-926-0646, or online at https://eapld.org/programs/

See you in September!

Sookie Stackhouse: Telepath Extraordinaire

Posted on by Ashton

A couple years ago, I was obsessed with the HBO television series: True Blood. So eagerly I requested the box set of the first eight books for Christmas one year. After I received them, I put them on my shelf in my bedroom and forgot about them. A couple months later, I grabbed them out and tried to read the first book and just couldn’t. I’m one of those people that have to be in the mood for first person point of views and back then I just refused to even try to be in the mood. So there they sat on my bookshelf slowly gathering particles of dust. A couple weeks ago, I just got this sudden and unexplainable urge to start the series, so I checked out the first book of the Sookie Stackhouse Series on the Digital Download Center.

The Sookie Stackhouse Series by Charlaine Harris is such a beautiful and unique tale of the supernatural that I just couldn’t help but continue reading. It didn’t hurt that the first few books followed the television show almost to a T. The television show and the books are completely different after the first two books! Even some characters in the television show aren’t even in the books!!!

Like all the summaries of all 13 books start out, Sookie Stackhouse is a small-time cocktail waitress in small town Louisianna. We follow her on her journey of loving different men, finding killers, and protecting those she loves. Though Sookie is a magnet to death and danger primarily because of her telepathy and her hint of faerie blood, she has the love of several supernatural beings willing to lay down their lives to protect her. Through the death of her co-workers to faerie wars, we watch as everyone within her books slowly grow and develop into better characters as well as better people. Though each book is set with a serious situation, Sookie always finds a way to make me laugh!

Though I’m only on book 11, I’ve already hated and I’ve already loved Charlaine Harris’s writing. Though, she captures and keeps you entertained throughout her books, sometimes you may find yourself having to force yourself into staying and reading the books. I struggled with about two books so far and that’s only because I needed to get past my love of a specific character to allow another character to come into the picture.

All the Sookie Stackhouse novels are such grand masterpieces that I couldn’t help but buy the last five before I was even on book 6! The story is such an entertaining and hilariously heart wrenching story that you can’t help but fall in love with Sookie and her blunders. The supporting characters were just so perfect, each character we see brings out a unique and different side of Sookie that you just can’t help but love.

“The world seemed a bad and terrible place, all its denizens suspect, and I the lamb
wandering through the valley of death with a bell around my neck.”

The books are strewn throughout both libraries and are able to be placed on hold for pick-up at the library you wish.

They are also within our Digital Downloads library and available to be checked out to you on your device.

Series Starters: The Trials of Apollo

Posted on by Shelby

If you’ve read any of my blogs before, you’ll already know that I am a giant fan of Rick Riordan and everything he writes. The newest series he’s working on, along with his Magnus Chase series, is The Trials of Apollo.

Apollo, the Greek god of music, healing, prophecy, and the sun, has angered his father Zeus enough to be exiled as a human to Earth. Without his powers, Apollo has been transformed into a weak, dorky human who must now figure out how to survive long enough to get back in his father’s good graces. Of course, Apollo — whose new name is Lester Papadopolous — has many mortal and immortal enemies who would love to get their hands on him, so a trip to Camp Half Blood is the only option. Some familiar faces from Riordan’s other series appear– like Percy Jackson and more (I can’t tell you because it will spoil it!), so fans will appreciate the appearances.

I was wary to read this series because I didn’t want the beloved voice of Percy Jackson to sound anything like the god Apollo, but I needn’t have worried because Riordan had it mastered. Apollo’s voice in the novels has been compared to Gilderoy Lockhart, which is perfect and hilarious. The second book in the series just came out on May 2nd with a third book to be released early next year.

Happy Reading!

A Song of Ice and Fire: A Game of Thrones

Posted on by Shelby

The first book in George R.R. Martin’s epic A Song of Ice and Fire fantasy series, A Game of Thrones, was first published in 1996, and in those twenty-plus years, it has become iconic, especially with the recent television series airing on HBO since 2011. If you’re wondering what all the hype is about (or you’re just ready to jump on the bandwagon since Season 7 has just begun), the Aurora Public Library District is here to help you get started!

A Game of Thrones follows three different storylines simultaneously, introducing numerous important characters and plots in which families fight for control over the Iron Throne. In the first book, we are introduced to the Stark and Lannister families, Jon Snow, Prince Joffrey, Princess Daenerys, and more; each character has his or her own agenda. Families are split apart, alliances are made, and characters are forced to make decisions that test their characters. And hanging over all the plots and subplots is the fact that winter is coming with no end in sight. The series is filled with high fantasy scenes with dragons and magic, vivid descriptions of guts and gore, and human characters who fall into a category of grayness in which even the villains are not entirely evil.

The Aurora Public Library District owns the first five books in the series both as physical copies and as digital copies on the Indiana Digital Download Center. We also have the audiobook versions of the series, but it can definitely get confusing to listen to and keep track of all the different characters.

The television series is said to be fairly faithful to the books, although the timelines of certain plot points are a little off. The Aurora Public Library District owns Seasons 1-6 housed at the Aurora Public Library that you can check out for one week. DVDs cannot be renewed, but you can bring the DVD back into a branch to check back out to yourself. If you are a Dillsboro patron, you can also request that the DVDs to be sent to the Dillsboro Public Library for you to pick up at your convenience.

Happy Reading (and Watching)!

Series Starters: Throne of Glass

Posted on by Shelby

The Throne of Glass series by Sarah J. Maas has been on my to-read list for a year now, but I had been putting it off because I was skeptical. I thought it would be another typical YA series with yet another heroine destined to save the world, overthrow the government, and fall in love all at the same time. And while these elements are the bare bones of the plot, I was not prepared for the whirlwind that was the first book in this series.

Celaena Sardothien is the world’s most notorious assassin — or, at least, she was until she was captured and imprisoned as a slave a year ago. An unlikely offer from Crown Prince Dorian Havilliard pulls her out of the depths of slavery and launches her into a competition to become the King’s Champion, where she must defeat twenty-three other infamous assassins, thieves, and soldiers to regain her freedom. However, what Celaena thought would be a run-of-the mill test of her wits and strength quickly becomes something more sinister. Evil is lurking in the castle and something is killing off the competitors one by one. Now it’s up to Celaena to find whatever monster it is that is killing her competition, survive a tyrannical king who has brutally conquered most of the countries on the continent, allow her new acquaintances close enough to be friends, and become the King’s Champion so she can be free again.

This is a slower read to get into as Maas draws readers to her characters first, allowing the action to pick up during the second half of the novel. I was invested in Celaena almost from the start because Maas does such a great job of closing her off from everyone around her, even the reader; I was as frustrated as Dorian and Chaol when she shuts down and refuses to talk about her past! There are still unanswered questions at the end of the novel, so it’s a good thing that there are four other books following the first as well, as well as the sixth and seventh books being published in September 2017 and May 2018, respectively.

The Aurora Public Library District has the five existing novels available from the Indiana Digital Download Center as well as a couple hard copies of some of the books available for check out today. Also available from the Indiana Digital Download Center are prequel novellas from the Throne of Glass universe that can be checked out as well.

It looks like I’ll be absorbed in this series for awhile, but I don’t think I mind. I’ll just be over here, impatiently awaiting the release of the final two novels!

Happy Reading!

Author Biographies: J.K. Rowling

Posted on by Shelby

Monday, July 31 was an extremely important day:

Harry Potter — the Chosen One, the Boy Who Lived– turned 37 years old. This means that the Battle of Hogwarts took place 19 years ago (Do you feel old yet?). July 31 was also J.K. Rowling’s birthday! To her, we Potterheads are eternally grateful.

Joanne Rowling writes under the pen names of J.K. Rowling and Robert Galbraith. She was born in Gloucestershire, England in 1965 and knew from a very young age that she wanted to be a writer. She received her Bachelor of Arts from Exeter University in French and Classics. The idea for Harry Potter came to her in 1990 while waiting for a train, and she began writing immediately when she got home. Over the next five years, she planned the seven books in the series and continued to write mostly in notes on napkins and scraps of paper. Rowling wrote whenever she could, finishing the manuscript for Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone in 1995. Rowling was initially rejected by publishers, but the first book in the series was finally published in the United Kingdom in 1997.

Rowling is best-known for the Harry Potter series, but she has also written novels for adults, screenplays, spinoff novellas, and essays. She is a philanthropist who is involved in numerous charities and organizations, as well as founding Lumos, an international children’s charity. She has received numerous awards for her writing and charity work. Currently she lives in Edinburgh with her husband and children.

It isn’t often that a children’s series can influence generations of readers, but Rowling has managed to do just that. Stop by the Aurora or Dillsboro branch today to relive, re-read, or enjoy for the first time the Harry Potter series. You can also check out audiobooks of the series or DVD’s based on the series. Or you can check out the books Rowling has written for adults, too! And don’t forget the Indiana Digital Download Center to take your favorite books and audiobooks with you on the go!

Happy Birthday, J.K. Rowling and Harry Potter! And Happy Reading!