THIS WEEK! Thursday, August 15 | 6:00 pm | Page to Stage: Private Lives ty Noel Coward | tickets free to members when registering
FEATURED EVENTS Thursday, August 22 | 6:00 pm | In Conversation: Jenny Odell with Cathy Park Hong | tickets free to members when registering Thursday, September 5 | 6:30 pm | In Conversation: Tommy Orange with Steve Wasserman
SEMINAR SERIES Tuesday, August 27 | Tuesday, September 3 | Tuesday, September 10 5:30pm - 7:00 pm: | First in a Series of Four Seminars on James Baldwin's Books
Have you heard that Mel Gibson is preparing to write a television series set in San Francisco? In a recent article on Hoodline, the series “Barbary Coast” will reportedly be set in the Financial District, Chinatown and North Beach, and based upon the book by Herbert Asbury with the same name.
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With the US presidential election nearing, what better time to showcase titles in our collection that highlight the stories surrounding world leaders from history and the present day? Stop by the DVD display on the 2nd floor to check out selections ranging from made-for-television political thrillers, documentaries, dramatic retellings of hoary kings and queens, fiction based on current affairs and even some comedies.
Heather recommends:...
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More than a year ago, I picked up a copy of the infamous bestseller, The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up. I did not take it seriously at the time-- only that Kondo’s delivery has much to be desired-- however the seed was planted. It might have been the repetitive Kondo-isms, or her practical advice of why one does not need to keep a file of every greeting card anyone has ever gifted (sorry Mom!)...
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BOOKS
FICTION
Charles Bock Alice & Oliver
Jennifer S. Brown Modern girls
Edna O'Brien The little red chairs
Sunjeev Sahota The year of the runaways
Léon Werth...
My brother Jay (right) and I (on the left) joined the Mechanics’ Institute Chess Club in late 1972, soon after Bobby Fischer wrestled the World Championship title from Boris Spassky in Iceland. We were chess-mad, spending as much time at the club as the constraints of school and our parents’ good will allowed. The club then was probably not what a parent of today would think of as a healthy environment for kids: thick with cigarette and cigar smoke, populated by adults (some without visible m...
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BOOKS
FICTION
Chris Bachelder The throwback special
Mischa Berlinski Peacekeeping
Philip F. Deaver Forty martyrs
Boris Fishman Don't let my baby do rodeo
Lisa Graff...
Baseball season is in full swing, and you may see me at a game with a spiral bound book open on my knees, scribbling some inscrutable code onto a grid littered with little diamonds. Fans sitting nearby are always hitting me up for conversation about what it’s like scoring a game, or “what just happened!?”, or “hey, how many RBIs does that player have in today’s game?”
I love the camaraderie my scorebook sparks between us fans, but scoring a game also keeps me alert to what’s happening...
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Schools include extracurricular activities to add benefit and incentive to students. Sports keep kids active and healthy, while clubs or cultural activities broaden their perspective on the world and keep their interest if the academic subjects don’t. A trend in education in the last few decades has been to hold chess classes as a fun way to get kids to think.
Chess had been in the schools of several foreign countries for almost a century, but in the United States the trend really sta...
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BOOKS
FICTION
Eric Bogosian Mall
Elizabeth Bowen To the north
Fariba Hachtroudi The man who snapped his fingers
Jonathan Hull Losing Julia
Cherie Priest...
In conjunction with the Voices of the Easter Rising 1916 event taking place on April 28th in the 2nd Floor Library, April’s Staff Picks are related to all things Irish. Works by Colm Tóibín, James Joyce, Roddy Doyle, Tana French, and others are on the Staff Pick’s display waiting to be read. Need some inspiration? How about:
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