eBranch Blog

May 24, 2007

In the Spirit of Solitude - West U. Librarian's Article in LJ

Keddy Outlaw, branch librarian at West University Branch Library, has contributed a third article entitled "In the Spirit of Solitude: Singular Reads" to the Reader's Shelf column, in Library Journal. Keddy explores the joys of solitude through literature. The Reader's Shelf column is edited by Neal Wyatt.

Joan Anderson. A Year by the Sea: Thoughts of an Unfinished Woman
Karen Karper. Where God Begins to Be
Anita Brookner. Leaving Home
Henry David Thoreau. Walden; Or, Life in the Woods
Sonny Brewer. The Poet of Tolstoy Park
Merilyn Simonds. The Holding
Michelle Herman. Dog: a Short Novel
Thomas Merton. Thoughts in Solitude
Alix Kates Shulman. Drinking the Rain

See the article for descriptions of the books.

See Also
Women Painters in Print - West U. Librarian's Article in LJ from 9/2006
West U. Librarian%2's Article Published in Library Journal from 12/2005

May 15, 2007

Harris County Commissioners Court Participates in the Big Read

May 01, 2007

2007 Edgar Awards Announced

The Edgar Awards are named in honor of Edgar Allen Poe. They are awarded annually for best mystery novel. The award is sponsored by the Mystery Writers of America.

Best Novel
Jason Goodwin. The Janissary Tree
The Janissary Tree is the first in the series, and the year is 1836. Europe is modernizing, and the sultan of the Ottoman Empire feels he has no choice but to follow suit. But just as he's poised to announce sweeping political change, a wave of murders threatens the fragile balance of power in his court. Who is behind the killings?

Best Juvenile
Andrew Clements. Room One: A Mystery or Two
Ted Hammond, the only sixth grader in his small Nebraska town's one-room schoolhouse, searches for clues to the disappearance of a homeless family.

Best Young Adult
Robin Merrow MacCready. Buried

2007 Pulitzer Prize Winners

The 2007 Pulitzer Prize winners were announced in April. The following are the Pulitzer Prize winners for Letters & Drama.

Fiction
Cormac McCarthy. The Road
America is a barren landscape of smoldering ashes, devoid of life except for those people still struggling to scratch out some type of existence. Amidst the destruction, a father and his young son walk, always toward the coast, but with no real understanding that circumstances will improve once they arrive. Still they persevere, and their relationship comes to represent goodness in a world that is utterly devastate.

Nonfiction
Lawrence Wright. The Looming Tower: Al-Qaeda and the Road to 9/11
Explores both the American and Arab sides of the September 11th terrorist attacks in an account of the people, ideas, events, and intelligence failures that led to the attacks.

Biography/Autobiography
Debby Applegate. The Most Famous Man in America
No one predicted success for Henry Ward Beecher at his birth in 1813. The blithe, boisterous son of the last great Puritan minister, he seemed destined to be overshadowed by his brilliant siblings - especially his sister. Harriet Beecher Stowe, who penned the century's bestselling book Uncle Tom's Cabin. But when pushed into the ministry, the charismatic Beecher found international fame by shedding his father Lyman's Old Testament-style fire-and-brimstone theology and instead preaching a New Testament-based gospel of unconditional love and healing, becoming one of the founding fathers of modern American Christianity.

History
Gene Roberts & Hank Klibanoff. The Race Beat
This is the story of how America awakened to its race problem, of how a nation that longed for unity after World War II came instead to see, hear, and learn about the shocking indignities and injustices of racial segregation in the South - and the brutality used to enforce it. It is the story of how the nation's press, after decades of ignoring the problem, came to recognize the importance of the civil rights struggle and turn it into the most significant domestic news event of the twentieth century.

Special Citations & Awards
Ray Bradbury

Drama
David Lindsay-Abaire. Rabbit Hole

Poetry
Natasha Trethewey. Native Guard

New Bestsellers 4/30/07

The following books are appearing on the best seller lists for the first time this week. For a complete listing see our collection of Best Seller Lists.

We are currently transitioning several of our bestseller lists to Newsletter format including New York Times Fiction and Nonfiction, Publisher's Weekly Fiction and Nonfiction and USA Today. Others may be transitioned to this format as well. Through this format you can subscribe to the lists by email or RSS feed.

The Publisher's Weekly Audio list has been updated for April 30, 2007.

E = Essence Magazine
NYT = New York Times
PW = Publisher's Weekly
USA = USA Today
* = Titles that have previously appeared on the bestseller lists but are new to our catalog.

Fiction

Harlan Coben. The Woods (NYT #2, PW #2, USA #6)

Andrew Gross. The Blue Zone (NYT #12, PW #11)

Alexander McCall Smith. The Good Husband of Zebra Drive (NYT #4, PW #3, USA #13)

JRR Tolkien. The Children of Hurin (NYT #1, PW #1, USA #2)

Nonfiction

Bernard Goldberg. Crazies to the Left of Me, Wimps to the Right: How One Side Lost It's Mind and the Other Lost It's Nerve (NYT #9, PW #15)

Lee Iacocca. Where Have All the Leaders Gone? (NYT #4, PW #10)

Jim Karas. The Cario-free Diet (PW #5)

John Kerry & Teresa Heinz Kerry. This Moment on Earth: Today's New Environmentalists and Their Vision for the Future (NYT #8)
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Richard Preston. The Wild Trees: A Story of Passion and Daring (NYT #10)

New Titles Cataloged in Past 30 Days Updated

The New Titles Cataloged in the Past 30 Days have been updated for April 2007.

The lists are in PDF file format and require the free Adobe Reader to view. We hope you enjoy the new format. If you have any questions, comments, or suggestions about this change please use our Feedback Form.