Baby It's Cold Outside

Although it hasn’t been bad, we are still in the middle of the winter season. Just these past couple of weeks, we’ve had to deal with frigid temperatures, along with rain, sleet, snow and wind but it is Chicago after, so it’s nothing new.

When this happens, there’s not a whole lot we can do but hopefully you can stay home and watch some classic romance movies to warm your heart. The following are guaranteed to make you feel good all over. At the top of the list is Gone With the Wind (1939), with Clark Gable and Vivien Leigh in the lead roles. She won the best actress award, and Tara’s Theme was nominated for best music. Next is Shop Around the Corner (1940) starring Margaret Sullavan and James Stewart. Then there’s Humphrey Bogart and Ingrid Bergman in Casablanca (1942) which won the best picture award with that unforgettable song As Time Goes By.

Not as old, but certainly just as memorable are: An Affair to Remember (1957), with Cary Grant and Deborah Kerr. It won the best music for Our Love Affair.  Breakfast at Tiffany's(1961) with George Peppard and Audrey Hepburn. Last but not least is Love Story (1971) with Ryan O'Neal and Ali MacGraw.

Some of these movies have been remade, but none can compare to the original.  Come and check these out, get your popcorn and perhaps a box of tissue ready, and enjoy!!

Love WAS in the Air....A Post Valentine's Tribute to Love Stinks Teen Reads

Five stories of love...or not...for a tribute to relationships, and breakups!  All titles mentioned are in the Teen Scene.    

Forever
Blume, Judy
Katherine and Michael, along with various friends and acquaintances in suburban New Jersey, discover the possibilities and limitations of love and personal commitment.

How To Ruin Your Boyfriend's Reputation
Elkeles, Simone
Spoiled Amy Nelson-Barak is excited about going to see her boyfriend, who is in the Israeli Army, until Amy learns that she has to take basic training and her boyfriend is going to be her commanding officer.

I Love You, Beth Cooper
Doyle, Larry
Recklessly announcing his love for the head cheerleader during his valedictorian commencement speech, Denis Cooverman is inducted into the wilder side of youth culture by the object of his affection, who turns out to be more than he bargained for.

Girl Meets Boy: because there are two sides to every story
Halls, Kelly Milner
Twelve authors of young adult fiction collaborate on this collection of paired stories told alternately from the point of view of the boy and the girl.

Why We Broke Up
Handler, Daniel
Sixteen-year-old Min Green writes a letter to Ed Slaterton in which she breaks up with him, documenting their relationship and how items in the accompanying box, from bottle caps to a cookbook, foretell the end.

Decadent reads

They say you shouldn't judge a book by it's cover, but I have to be honest, a book with covers (and titles) such as these look pretty good to eat, I mean: read!

Be sure to have a box of chocolates or a plate of cupcakes handy when you read.

Chocolat by Joanne Harris
When the beautiful and mysterious Vianne moves to Lansquenet and opens a chocolate shop across from the church, the inhabitants of the tiny village find themselves torn between the solemn law of religion and the joyful rewards of Vianne's confections.

Red Velvet Cupcake Murder by Joanne Fluke
When one of her famous Red Velvet cupcakes is thought to have caused the death of her rival--a scandalous Lake Eden legend who was trying to steal her boyfriend--Hannah Swensen becomes the unlikely suspect in a murder investigation.

Illegally Iced by Jessica Beck
When donut shop owner Suzanne Hart's argument with the local blacksmith ends in murder, everyone in the town of April Springs believes that she is responsible, and, to get out of this sticky situation, she must catch the killer herself.

How to Eat a Cupcake by Meg Donohue
When former best friends Annie Quintana and Julia St. Clair form a tentative alliance to open a cupcake shop, they become the target of a dangerous enemy bent on sabotaging their bakery, while they try to get past the betrayal that tore them apart years earlier.

When in Doubt, Add Butter by Elizabeth Harbison
Dedicating herself to her culinary patrons, private chef Gemma Craig goes home every night to boxed cereals until an unexpected event compels a confrontation with the past and an unexpected romance.

Southern Exposure

There is something uniquely appealing about a good Southern novel. When winter seems never-ending, readers can become immersed in a powerful story that takes place in a warmer climate. Booklovers have debates about what must be included on the Best Southern Novels list. The following are some of the books most often nominated:

The Sound and the Fury - William Faulkner (1929): The Sound and the Fury is the tragedy of the Compson family, featuring some of the most memorable characters in literature: beautiful, rebellious Caddy; the man-child Benjy; haunted, neurotic Quentin; Jason, the brutal cynic; and Dilsey, their black servant.

The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn - Mark Twain (1885): Huckleberry Finn, rebel against school and church, rafter of the Mississippi, and savior of Jim the runaway slave, is the archetypal American maverick. Fleeing the respectable society that wants to "sivilize" him, Huck Finn  shoves off with Jim on a rhapsodic raft journey down the Mississippi River.

To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee (1960): A young girl growing up in an Alabama  town in the 1930s learns of injustice and violence when her father, a widowed  lawyer, defends a black man falsely accused of rape.

The Moviegoer - Walker Percy (1961): Winner of the 1961 National Book Award, this dazzling novel established Walker Percy as one of the major voices in Southern   literature. The Moviegoer is Binx Bolling, a young New Orleans stockbroker who surveys the world with the detached gaze of a Bourbon Street dandy even as he yearns for a spiritual redemption he cannot bring himself to believe in.

Wise Blood - Flannery O’Connor (1952): This classic of twentieth-century literature tells the story of Hazel Motes, a twenty-two-year-old caught in an unending struggle against his desperate fate; this tale of redemption gives us one of the most riveting characters in twentieth-century American fiction. Wise Blood is a savage satire of America's secular, commercial culture, as well as the humanism it holds so dear.

Their Eyes Were Watching God - Zora Neale Hurston (1937): Hurston's beloved classic--one of the most important American novels of the 20th century--follows the fortunes of Janie Crawford, a woman who was married three times and had been tried for the murder of one of her husbands in the black town of Eaton, Florida.

Look Homeward Angel - Thomas Wolfe (1929): The novel follows the trajectory of Eugene Gant, a brilliant and restless young man whose wanderlust and passion shape his adolescent years in rural North Carolina. Wolfe’s largely autobiographical story about the quest for a greater intellectual life has resonated with and influenced generations of readers, including some of today's most important novelists.

 All the King’s Men - Robert Penn Warren (1946): Set in the 1930s, this Pulitzer Prize- winning novel traces the rise and fall of demagogue Willie Stark, a fictional character who resembles the real-life Huey "Kingfish" Long of Louisiana. Stark begins his political career as an idealistic man of the people but soon becomes  corrupted by success and caught between dreams of service and an insatiable lust for power.

Forthcoming Fiction in March

Here are some titles coming out this March. You can reserve these by going to our Online Catalog, or by calling the Reader Services Desk at 847-729-7500 x7600.

Deadly Virtues by Jo Bannister

Death of Yesterday by M.C. Beaton

Murder Below Montparnasse by Cara Black

The Family Way by Rhys Bowen

Breaking Point by C.J. Box

The Children of Kings: a Darkover Novel by Marion Zimmer Bradley

Bloodfire Quest by Terry Brooks

The Gate Thief by Orson Scott Card

Sweet Tea Revenge by Laura Childs

Six Years by Harlan Coben

The Striker by Clive Cussler

You and I, Me and You by Maryjanice Davidson

Family Pictures by Jane Green

What Darkness Brings: a Sebastian St. Mystery by C.S. Harris

Hellhole Awakening by Brian Herbert

The Chance by Karen Kingsbury

Ordinary Grace by William Kent Krueger

The Guardian by Beverly Lewis

Killer Honeymoon by G.A. Mckevett

Gotcha! by Fern Michaels

The Accursed by Joyce Carol Oates

The Boyfriend by Thomas Perry

Night Moves by Randy Wayne White

A Matter of Trust by Lis W. Wiehl

Leaving Everything Most Loved by Jacqueline Winspear

Fade into Some New Music

Some new titles are starting to turn up in the music CD collection these days as our ordering season is ratcheting up and 2013's first releases emerge from the musical tundra of winter. With the year barely a month old it's probably premature (if not wholly misguided) to start penciling in your favorite records  already but that's exactly what I'm prepared to do. It's just the first week of February--but I'm perfectly happy to carve the name of Yo La Tengo's new record (Fade for those keeping score) in my forehead now so I can't forget in December how much I enjoyed this record through mid-January's terrible chill. Fade was recorded in Chicago last summer with John McEntire (Tortoise, The Sea and Cake) and ranks comfortably among the band's best and might be their most personal statement yet. Check out the band's first video in fifteen years, beautifully shot by long time associate Phil Morrison for the stark  Bert Jansch-like "I'll Be Around":

Fade is Yo La Tengo's 13th full-length album in 29 + years -- and it's as clear and as declarative a statement to a music career that I've heard from a band that I've been following for at least as long. Listening has been a supremely satisfying ride, and I'm happy to hear them in 2013 so comfortable, confident and in total control of their considerable musical powers. Other bands would have cooled the wheels of the touring bus and exhausted their creative ability long ago but Yo La Tengo keep on keepin' ON. They come to the plate and deliver yet another batch of heartfelt songs. I'll spare you a full history of the band (you can read that here) but I'll leave you with another song, some kinda weird inverted anthem for the times, with modest (almost child-like) lyrics that reveal a simple truth, an unfortunate reality that "Sometimes the bad guys come out on top, sometimes the good guys lose, we try not to lose our hearts, not to lose our minds" before they suggest we not lose hope and try make the best of each moment: "lose no more time, no time".

So, yeah, there's still hope in the end, so long as Yo La Tengo are still coming out on top.

Let it Snow!

I was just reading that we are far behind our average snowfall for this winter.  The last time we saw measurable snow was in March of 2012.  Some Chicagoans love the snow while others love to curse it.  Which ever camp you are in, here are some snowy titles to make up for the shortage.

Snow Falling on Cedars by David Guterson
Snow Child by Eowyn Ivey
Snow Flower and the Secret Fan by Lisa See
Summer Snow by Nicole Baart
An Echo Through the Snow by Andrea Thalasinos
Light on Snow by Anita Shreve