Tag: recommendations

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Booklists Recommendations

New Books by Black Authors

by Adult Services Library Associate Nichole

Black History Month is an annual celebration of achievements by African Americans and a time for recognizing their central role in U.S. history. Also known as African American History Month, the event grew out of “Negro History Week,” the brainchild of noted historian Carter G. Woodson and other prominent African Americans.

By the late 1960s, thanks in part to the civil rights movement and a growing awareness of Black identity, Negro History Week had evolved into Black History Month on many college campuses.

President Gerald Ford officially recognized Black History Month in 1976, calling upon the public to “seize the opportunity to honor the too-often neglected accomplishments of Black Americans in every area of endeavor throughout our history.”

Since 1976, every U.S. president has officially designated the month of February as Black History Month. Other countries around the world, including Canada and the United Kingdom, also devote a month to celebrating Black history.

history.com/topics/black-history/black-history-month
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Booklists Recommendations

Celebrating Toni Morrison

by Adult Services Manager Whitney

February 18 is Toni Morrison Day, a statewide holiday in Ohio due to legislation passed late last year. It also would have been her 90th birthday.

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Booklists Recommendations

A Romance for Every Reader

by Adult Services Librarian Leann

Romance books are hitting the mainstream like never before. Have you ever heard of Julia Quinn’s Bridgerton book series? No more do we shame people for reading delightful little paperbacks with scantily clad pirates or kilt-wearing-Scottsmen! (Or rather, we shouldn’t.) “Romance” is for everyone. Don’t believe me? Ask bestselling, blockbusting series like The Hunger Games, Game of Thrones, Lord of the Rings, or Outlander. Try to name a popular TV show, movie, or book that doesn’t include some sort of romance intrigue or love triangle. Even highfalutin literature is mostly about love or love lost or unrequited love. Let’s face it people, Where the Crawdads Sing is a romance novel and that’s okay.

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Booklists Covid-19 Information Recommendations

Mental Health and Your Family

by Adult Services Library Associate Nichole

This Thursday at 7PM, Dr. Parker Huston, PhD, a licensed clinical psychologist and Clinical Director of the On Our Sleeves Program at Nationwide Children’s Hospital, will be discussing how children and families are impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic, including ways to talk about mental health with children.

Dr. Huston’s passion is rooted in providing education and opening doors so that children and their families can achieve their maximum potential and feel like they have agency in their lives. He believes that improving children’s mental health is important to set them up for success as adolescents and adults. Focusing on good mental health practices during childhood can create healthy habits throughout the life span. You can learn more about this Zoom event here.

Whether you’re looking for books to read to your children about their emotions and mental health or are wanting to get more in tune with your own, now is a better time than ever and BPL has plenty titles to choose from!

  • Where Happiness Begins by Eva Eland | print
  • Ravi’s Roar by Tom Percival |print
  • How Do You Feel by Lizzy Rockwell | print
  • Breathing Makes it Better by Christopher Willard | print
  • Bunny Breaths by Kira Willey | print

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Booklists Recommendations

‘Tis the Season

by Adult Services Library Associate Nichole

While the holidays feel different this year, I’m incredibly grateful that the library has helped me keep up the cheer with books, movies and music!

When I’m not listening to Taylor Swift’s latest album Evermore (currently available on Hoopla!) these are the albums I have playing on repeat:

  • A Christmas Album by The Drifters | digital
  • Christmas with the Rat Pack | CD / digital
  • The Christmas Album by Leslie Odom Jr. | CD / digital

My holiday book picks are sure to make you miss the ones you love, but they’ll also make you appreciate any “me time” you get this season!

I don’t know about everyone else, but I always watch the same Christmas movies every year; Home Alone, The Santa Clause, Krampus (we all have our favorites!). But this year, with so much time spent at home, I’m finding new holiday favorites to throw into my yearly rotation. Even better, the following titles are available on Hoopla so you don’t even have to leave your couch to find some Christmas cheer!

From all of us as BPL, we wish you a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!   

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Bexley History Booklists Recommendations

A Century Before Covid-19, Bexley’s First Pandemic

by Local History Librarian David

Research for this article contributed by Scott King-Owen, Ph.D, Teacher, Bexley City Schools.

One month before the First World War ended a second wave of the deadly Spanish Influenza pandemic, initially spread in military encampments by troop movement, found its way into the civilian population of central Ohio. Like Covid-19, a century later, the absence of medicine for treatment or a vaccine for prevention necessitated avoiding crowds, through isolation or quarantine, to control spread of the respiratory virus. 

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Booklists Recommendations

Hanukkah Sameach!

by Adult Services Library Associate Nichole

Hanukkah is right around the corner, so what better time to dive into our collection and find books that will help us celebrate this special time of the year. 

If you’re looking for books to sharpen your hosting skills or to learn more about Hanukkah, look no further than these titles:

If you’re looking for books to share with the little ones to teach them more about the Festival of Lights, check out these titles:

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Booklists Recommendations

BPL Staff Favorites of 2020

by Adult Services Library Associate Nichole

As 2020 comes to a close, I asked staff to reflect on their favorites books, movies, and albums from this year. Some staff found it easy to narrow it down, while others couldn’t choose just one! Here are the BPL staff favorite books of 2020:

  • Christian’s Pick – The Lucky Star by William T. Vollmann | print
  • David’s Pick – COVID-19: The Pandemic that Never Should Have Happened and How to Stop the Next One by Debora MacKenzie | print
  • Hannah’s Pick – Wilderness Chef: The Ultimate Guide to Cooking Outdoors by Ray Mears | print
  • Juliana’s Favorite Memoir – This Is the Night Our House Will Catch Fire by Nick Flynn | print
  • Juliana’s Favorite Fiction Read – Writers & Lovers by Lily King | print / digital
  • Leann’s Science Fiction Pick – A Beautifully Foolish Endeavor by Hank Green | print / digital
  • Leann’s Favorite Thriller – The Guest List by Lucy Foley | print / digital
  • Nichole’s Pick – Being Lolita by Alisson Wood | print
  • Sue’s Pick – Deacon King Kong by James McBride | print / digital

Our favorite films from 2020 include:

  • Christian’s Pick – Feels Good Man *currently unavailable through the CLC
  • Juliana’s Pick – The Devil All the Time *currently only available on Netflix
  • Nichole’s Pick – The King of Staten Island | DVD / Blu-Ray

And finally, our BPL staff favorite albums from 2020 include:

  • Christian’s Pick – Heaven to a Tortured Mind by Yves Tumor | CD
  • Hannah’s Pick – Old Flowers by Courtney Marie Andrews | CD
  • Jeff’s Pick – Lianne La Havas | CD / digital
  • Juliana’s Pick – Punisher by Phoebe Bridgers | CD
  • Kim’s Pick – Women in Music Pt. III by HAIM | CD
  • Nichole’s Pick – Circles by Mac Miller | CD / Vinyl / Digital

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Booklists Recommendations

Native American Heritage Month

by Adult Services Library Associate Nichole

This November marks the 30th anniversary of Native American Heritage Month, as declared by President George H. W. Bush in 1990.

The month is a time to celebrate rich and diverse cultures, traditions, and histories and to acknowledge the important contributions of Native people. Heritage Month is also an opportune time to educate the general public about tribes, to raise a general awareness about the unique challenges Native people have faced both historically and in the present, and the ways in which tribal citizens have worked to conquer these challenges.

National Congress of American Indians

To celebrate the writers of the Native American community, check out these titles which are available with your Bexley Public Library card:

  • Heart Berries by Terese Marie Mailhot | print / digital
  • Abandon Me: Memoirs by Melissa Febos | print
  • Tending the Fire: Native Voices & Portraits | print
  • Bad Indians: A Tribal Memoir by Deborah Miranda | digital
  • Crazy Brave by Joy Harjo | print
  • The Pale-Faced Lie by David Crow | print / digital

Categories
Bexley History Booklists Recommendations

Is Jeffrey Mansion Haunted?

by Local History Librarian David

The feeling of a ghostly presence, knickknacks moved out of place, someone or something tapping one’s shoulder, but is Jeffrey Mansion, the Jacobethan Revival home on North Parkview Avenue, haunted?

Tales of its haunting have been attributed to unidentified individuals and their mysterious and unreported deaths. Perhaps it’s the spirit of a young woman, said to have been murdered there, that haunts the third floor, or that of a man, one supposedly hung himself in the tower while another from the staircase.

Donated to the City of Bexley in 1941, the original owner, former Mayor of Columbus Robert Hutchins Jeffrey, had the stone and brick residence built in 1905. He had long since moved out when he died in 1961 at Grant Hospital. His wife Alice Kilbourne Jeffrey died inside the home in 1922, but only after an illness lasting several months.

During the seventies, children experienced sightings of a witch, her white hair outlined by light in a second floor window. Then, opening the window, in a “scratchy, shaky, haunting voice,” the woman scared the children off. 
But, that was just Violet Ketner, who with her husband John, were live-in caretakers for nearly two decades. “I’m not really afraid,” she told a reporter from the Dispatch. “I’ve never seen anything.”  

For more ghostly tales and scary stories from around Columbus and Ohio explore these titles:

  • Haunted Ohio Series by Chris Woodyard / print
  • Haunted Ohio: Ghosts and Strange Phenomena of the Buckeye State by Charles A Stansfield / print | digital
  • A Haunted History of Columbus, Ohio by Nellie Kampmann / print
  • Columbus Ghosts: Historical Haunts of Ohio’s Capital by Robin L. Smith / print
  • Columbus Ghosts: More Central Ohio Haunts by Robin L. Smith / print