Daily Rituals by Mason Currey is incredibly fantastic, offering a peek into the lives (and perhaps minds) of great cultural figures. The project started as a blog, so it has that same short, easy-reading format. The book covers authors, composers, poets, artists, scientists, mathematicians, inventors, and filmmakers; and the huge variety in how different people create. Some toil waiting for inspiration, others chug ahead day…
Read moreWhen I sat down to start reading Lone Wolf and Cub, I wasn't entirely certain what to expect. I was vaguely aware of the movies based on it, most famously the movie Shogun Assassin (which was actually an American effort that spliced together parts of two of the original Japanese Lone Wolf and Cub movies). I knew that it was considered a 'classic', though…
Read moreJunior year at Pine Mountain Academy (PM) is going to be rough for fourteen-year-old Ryan Dean West. With a name like Ryan Dean, things don't come easy. Luckily, most of his rugby teammates called him Winger after his rugby position or Eleven after his jersey number. After Winger steals a teacher's cell phone to make long distance calls to his crush and friend Annie, he…
Read moreThe World Below tells two different stories; one about Cath, a new divorcee who moves across country to her Grandmother's house to pick up the pieces of her life, and also that of her Grandmother Georgia, a woman who went to a sanatorium for tuberculosis and the affect it had on her life. Chapters alternate between the two to show the differences and similarities between…
Read moreThe covers of a good book, that is! Look no further than Milwaukee Public Library. Whether you want to laugh at another's messy foibles as they search for love or live vicariously through their sexcapades, we've got a book for you to check out and enjoy today. The Rosie Project by Graeme Simsion is a fast-paced and often hilarious comedy--even though the ending was a little…
Read moreThrow the Damn Ball: Classic Poetry by Dogs by R. D. Rosen, Harry Prichett, and Rob Battles Let your poetry-loving pooch share the couch for a read-aloud of this collection--poems from the canine perspective accompanied by photos of dogs being dogs. Most of the focus is on food, sticks, toys and body and potty humor--which is where it's at for dogs! Especially fun are…
Read moreHe was an American civil rights activist, leader, Pan-Africanist, sociologist, educator, historian, writer, editor, poet, and scholar. William Edward Burghardt Du Bois, better known as W.E.B Du Bois, was all these things and more. He helped found both the Niagara Movement and the NAACP, was the first African American to receive a Ph. D from Harvard, served as chairman of the Peace Information Center, and…
Read moreNAACP pamphlet, 1917 Click each image, above, to enlarge. The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) is the nation's oldest, largest and most widely recognized grassroots-based civil rights organization. The NAACP was formed in 1909 with the goal to secure for all people the rights guaranteed in the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments to the United States Constitution. Drawing in members of earlier…
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