Staff Recommendations
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Stone Blind
by Haynes, Natalie
Reviewed by: Daryl M., Librarian, West Valley Regional Branch LibraryMarch 13, 2023
"I only see them for an instant. Then they're gone. But it's enough. Enough to know that the hero isn't the one who's kind or brave or loyal. Sometimes -- not always, but sometimes -- he is monstrous. And the monster? Who is she? She is what happens when someone cannot be saved. This particular monster is assaulted, abused and vilified. And yet, as the story is always told, She is the one you should fear. She is the monster.
We'll see about that."
In Stone Blind, Natalie Haynes retells the story of Medusa, one of the three Gorgon... Read Full Review
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Superspy Science: Science, Death and Tech in the World of James Bond
by Harkup, Kathryn
Reviewed by: Sheryn Morris, Librarian, Literature & FictionMarch 6, 2023
Call Number: 823 F597Ha
"Bond's the name, Jame Bond," is how he introduces himself. In the books and films we learn that he has a license to kill, which he uses to get any number of baddies who stand in his way of eliminating super villains. He is helped in this endeavor with an arsenal of quirky, powerful weapons, gadgets, cars, planes and other paraphernalia that are beyond belief. Over the years the franchise, both book and film, has expanded and readers and viewers know they will be in for lots of thrills with Bond always the cool, calm hero. Ian Fleming, the creator of James Bond, said that in some... Read Full Review
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The essential Dick Gregory
by Gregory, Dick
Reviewed by: Sheryn Morris, Librarian, Literature & FictionFebruary 28, 2023
Call Number: 812.092 G822-3
According to producer and director Andrew Gaines (The One and Only Dick Gregory), “For me, the personal experiences of Dick Gregory were like listening to a walking history lesson. It took only a few hours into my journey to make this film for me to realize that Dick Gregory was one of a kind, and I became totally consumed.” According to Christian Claxton Gregory, editor of his father's thoughts, “What a life, what a blessing. Dick Gregory... Read Full Review
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Dr. No : a novel
by Everett, Percival
Reviewed by: Sheryn Morris, Librarian, Literature & FictionFebruary 21, 2023
If you are a fan of Percival Everett, his most recent novel is for you. If you love satire then this novel is for you. It is satire on fire, by way of Everett’s genius and ingenuity to riff on various subjects: the competitive, snooty know-it-all attitude among professionals who work in subject areas and subdivisions of physics, mathematics, philosophy, and in public and private agencies. Add to this a narrative that is rich with double entendres and quadruple entendres about names, words, sentences, ideas, complex theories and novels. Percival Everett plays this like a master... Read Full Review
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The wind at my back : resilience, grace, and other gifts from my mentor, Raven Wilkinson
by Copeland, Misty
Reviewed by: Sheryn Morris, Librarian, Literature & FictionFebruary 14, 2023
Call Number: 793.324 C782-2
Ballerina Misty Copeland was the first Black ballerina to become a principal ballerina in the American Ballet Theatre. In her autobiography, Life in motion: an unlikely ballerina, she wrote about her early life and how she became involved in ballet, and was accepted into American Ballet Theatre. In itself, her early life was one of struggle, but in ballet she found her calling. She has written many other books about her life and about what it... Read Full Review
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The Family Chao
by Chang, Lan Samantha
Reviewed by: Michael C. Baradi, Librarian, Mid-Valley Regional Branch LibraryFebruary 6, 2023
Somewhere towards the end of Lan Samantha Chang’s third novel, The Family Chao, I kept thinking about the first story in Maxine Hong Kingston’s seminal work The Woman Warrior, where a woman takes her own life by jumping into the family well, just hours after giving birth in a pigsty. She was Kingston’s aunt back in China, during the Warlord Era in the 1920s, when the country splintered into regions controlled by local leaders,... Read Full Review
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How to Take Over the World: Practical Schemes and Scientific Solutions for the Aspiring Supervillain
by North, Ryan
Reviewed by: Daryl M., Librarian, West Valley Regional Branch LibraryJanuary 30, 2023
Call Number: 500 N866
In How to Take Over the World, Ryan North, an award winning comics and science writer and computer scientist, provides a primer for those considering supervillainy as a career. He provides step by step instructions, beginning with where to build a secret lair (no matter what you see in movies, television, or comics, do NOT build a lair in an active volcano – North explains why!), potentially villainous schemes to pursue, along with explorations of the existing, or soon to exist, science, including physics, mathematics, biology, history, genetics, along with political... Read Full Review
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Studio 54
by Schrager, Ian, 1946-
Reviewed by: Michael C. Baradi, Librarian, Mid-Valley Regional Branch LibraryJanuary 24, 2023
Call Number: 793.15 S377 folio
These days when we think about the 1970s, we’re assaulted with memories of the energy crisis, the Vietnam War, Richard Nixon’s resignation as President of the United States after the Watergate scandal, and, of course, disco. Many of us equate disco with the 1970s, a genre of dance music that emerged from nightlife scenes and subcultures in the United States. Disco was a kind of reaction to the dominance of rock music in the 1960s, when dance music was stigmatized. And thus, band names like Earth Wind & Fire, the Bee Gees, ABBA, KC and the Sunshine Band - just to... Read Full Review
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Jacques Pépin: art of the chicken : a master chef's paintings, stories, and recipes of the humble
by Pépin, Jacques.
Reviewed by: Sheryn Morris, Librarian, Literature & FictionJanuary 17, 2023
Call Number: 641.665 P422
We all know him as a master French chef, sidekick to Julia Child in many cooking television programs, and a TV presenter for his own cooking programs. Among his many accomplishments, which include innumerable cookbooks and magazine articles, he is a prodigious artist. It is unlikely that the chicken has been portrayed, in one book, in such a vibrant, multifaceted and witty style. In this homage to the chicken and its versatility, Jacques Pépin has created a memoir with recipes, accompanied by his own paintings. Growing up in the French countryside, he learned many... Read Full Review
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Babel: Or the Necessity of Violence: An Arcane History of the Oxford Translators' Revolution
by Kuang, R. F.
Reviewed by: Andrea Borchert, Librarian, Koreatown Media LabJanuary 9, 2023
Babel: Or the Necessity of Violence: An Arcane History of the Oxford Translators' Revolution is the story of a young man, who is named Robin Swift by the English guardian who refuses to let him use his birth name. Robin was taken from Canton and raised by his guardian, a cold and exacting Oxford Don, specifically for the purpose of obtaining an Oxford education in magic, and using that magic to ensure Britain's power over its colonies in an alternate 1830s England.
This book has so many things that are enticing about a dark world, academia, books,... Read Full Review
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Paperback Jack
by Estleman, Loren D.
Reviewed by: Daryl M., Librarian, West Valley Regional Branch LibraryJanuary 3, 2023
The year is 1946. WWII has ended and Jacob Heppleman is one of the many veterans returning home from the European conflict. For Jacob, home is New York City. Before the war, he wrote detective, western, and war stories for the pulp magazines. He even published a novel that was released just prior to the attack on Pearl Harbor and the United States’ entry into the war.
Desperate to re-start his writing career, Jacob steals a typewriter from a local pawnshop and begins to write again. He finds that he is simply unable to write the fictionalized version of war after... Read Full Review
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Gallant
by Schwab, Victoria
Reviewed by: Daryl M., Librarian, West Valley Regional Branch LibraryDecember 27, 2022
Call Number: YA
Olivia Prior has lived at Merilance since she was two years old. While Merilance calls itself a school, the truth is that it is closer to an asylum, a prison. It is a place where girls and young women who are not wanted are sent when they have nowhere else to go. They are supposed to be cared for, but they are not. They are supposed to be educated, but they are not. The children in residence at Merilance are supposed to be prepared for life after they leave the school, but they are not. As terrible as Merilance is, the outside world is worse, and the girls that leave, fleeing... Read Full Review