By Staff
The library will be hosting "Jetta and the Jelly Beans" at the Riverfront Park Amphitheater on Sunday, Aug. 7 at 1 p.m. Kids of all ages will enjoy the rock-n-roll group's high-energy performance. Summer Reading program prizes will be awarded at this event also.
The performance and awards brings another year's Summer Reading program to a close. The theme was "Dragons, Dreams and Daring Deeds." The goal of this program is to encourage reading throughout the summer and it was a roaring success. This year 507 young people read 6,120 hours. The number of hours read reflects a 13 percent increase from last year. Adults read 3,425 hours, an increase of 30 percent from last year.
Of course, the end of summer is just as good a time to start reading as the beginning of summer. Here are a few of the newer books we have available for check-out in the library.
Red Leaves by Thomas H. Cook
Eric Moore has a prosperous business and a stable family life in a quiet town. Then, on an ordinary night, his teenage son is asked to babysit the eight-year-old daughter of a neighboring family. The next morning the girl is missing. Suddenly Eric is one of the stricken parents he has seen on television, professing faith in his child's innocence. Except that Eric is not so sure his son is innocent. And if his son might do the same thing again, what then should a father do?
The Summer We Got Saved by Pat Cunningham Devoto
Tab is fast growing into an opinionated, intransigent teenager until Aunt Eugenia comes for a summer visit and whisks Tab off to a strange place in the mountains of Tennessee where integration flourishes. Charles, Tab's father, has always conformed to the political dictates of family, going back to the time of slavery, until this summer, when he sees new hope for his community and his state in the guise of a candidate for governor. Maudie, Tab's childhood friend, couldn't care less about the civil rights movement as long as she gets to leave the confines of the Tuskegee Polio Clinic, until she lands in the backwoods of Alabama and starts a voting school for members of the the local church.
The Hummingbird's Daughter by Luis Alberto Urrea
Teresita is the daughter of an illiterate, poor Indian mother of which she knows little about. She has no idea that her father is a wild and rich owner of a vast ranch or that the elderly healer who takes Teresita under her wing knows secrets about her destiny. And she has no idea that soon all of Mexico will rise in revolution, crying out her name. When Teresita is a teenager, she discovers she has the power to heal. But such a gift can be a burden. Before long, the ranch is crowded with pilgrims and with agents of a Mexican government wary of anything that might threaten its power.