It's a Wild Light

Marjorie M. Liu's newest entry in the Maxine Kiss series is titled A Wild Light. Like outher books in the series, the heroine is a demon hunter who, by day, wears demons on her body as tattoos and by day, fights enemies alongside them after they have peeled off her body. The series is action-packed and exciting with lots of supernatural elements. The characters are well-defined and likable and like all good heros and heroines, Maxine has her own flaws. I do have to say that while this entry in the series does have the same characters as the other three, Liu was very ambitious in this book. She was very involved with strengthening the plot of the book rather than furthering the story. I believe Liu is setting up a "new level" in the series because at the end of this book Maxine completes her transformation into another type of being, a transformation that began with the first book. This is a great supernatural fantasy that is engaging and thought-provoking.

Simplify Your Christmas

The current recession has made changes in the way we live our lives--some of these changes are for the better. As we celebrate the holidays, people seem to be looking at a way to simplify and have a more joyful Christmas. To that end, here are some titles that may help. Hundred Dollar Holiday by Bill McKibben offers some suggestions on how to rethink Christmas, so that our current obsession with present buying becomes less important than the dozens of other possible traditions and celebrations. Working through their local churches, McKibben and his colleagues found that people were hungry for a more joyful Christmas season. For many, trying to limit the amount of money they spent at Christmas to about a hundred dollars per family was a real spur to their creativity--and a real anchor against the relentless onslaught of commercials and catalogs that try to say Christmas is only Christmas if it comes from a store. McKibben shows how the store-bought Christmas developed and how out of tune it is with our current lives, when we're really eager for family fellowship, for community involvement, for contact with the natural world and also for the blessed silence and peace that the season should offer. Christmas is too wonderful a celebration to give up on, too precious a time simply to repeat the same empty gestures from year to year. This book will serve as a road map to a Christmas far more joyful than the one you've known in the past.

Christmas on Jane Street by Billy Romp with Wanda Urbanska tells the story of the Romp family who every year came to New York City from their home in Vermont to sell Christmas trees on Jane Street. They arrive from Vermont the day after Thanksgiving and leave just in time to make it home for Christmas morning--and for a few weeks they transform a corner of the Big Apple into a small village community. For the Romps, the Christmas tree business is also a serious business. A good sales season can make the year for this frugal family. Under tremendous financial pressure this particular year, Billy is counting on his family to pitch in as they always do when he faces an unexpected obstacle. His oldest child and best helper Ellie, sets her sights on attending the extravagant Nutcracker ballet and testing her winds outside her close-knit family. How Billy reconciles Ellie's transformation from a tomboyish female version of himself into a graceful, independent young lady is at first a struggle and later a revelation. Along the way he must learn how to let his daughter dream her own dreams--even when they diverge from his own. In setting her free, Billy learns the ultimate lesson of Christmas.

Elaine St. James is the best-selling author of Simplify Your Christmas: 100 Ways to Reduce the Stress and Recapture the Joy of the Holidays. In this book she shares--in brief, easy-to-read essays--a variety of tips that will help readers deal with the seasonal overload. Her simplifying ideas cover every aspect of holiday hassels; dismantling Christmas past, creating a new approach, gift giving, cooking the Christmas goose, decking the halls, holiday spending and much more. Everyone who adopts at least some of St. James' intelligent approaches to the season will have a happier, healthier Christmas.

Mississippians

Mississippians is a wonderful coffee table book that is a celebration of the people of our great state--their vision, their creative talents, their drive and their diversity. With wonderful color and black and white photograpsh and interesting narrative, Mississippians are covered in these categories--icons, music, television and stage, sports, writing and literature, innovators and visionaries, journalists, little-known Mississippians, people to watch and colorful characters. This book would make a great gift for your friends and family members who wish to celebrate the uniqueness that is Mississippi. Be sure and check out the books website at http://www.mississippians.com/.

Magazines Help with Christmas Preparation

This blog post is by Evangeline, Local History Librarian



It's that time of year again...



In just a few days, the holidays will be upon us! You know what that means--food, food and more food! Now is a good time to start planning for those holiday meals and the library has just what you need. I'm not talking about our wonderful selection of holiday cookbooks, but our great assortment of magazines featuring the latest holiday recipes and decorating ideas. What better way to celebrate the season than with ideas from three of my favorite magazines for recipes, period--Country Living, Southern Living and Taste of Home. All three of these magazines contain classic "southern" and "country" style cooking. Their recipes are usually very easy to follow and full of flavor.



The November issue of Country Living features recipes from "The Great Thanksgiving Cook-Off." The magazine asked five chefs to come up with a Thanksgiving meal using traditional ingredients like turkey, stuffing, potatoes and cranberries. Some of the dishes that caught my eye included: cornbread stuffing with sweet peppers, onions and celery, roast turkey with hoisin gravy and roasted wild mushrooms with garlic and shallots. All of the recipes are listed in the back on page 120 and there are great ideas for leftovers beginning on page 111.



My all-time favorite magazine for recipes and all things decorative is Southern Living. I come from a long line of typical southern mothers. I learned from them how to cook and keep house on a budget starting at a young age and, as I get older, I appreciate those skills more and more. Southern Living's November issue offers four Thanksgiving menus that you can mix and match to suit your own family's taste. The menus start on page 93 and offer both traditional and non-traditional fare. The Brussels Sprouts with Pancetta picture on page 96 (recipe on page 98) looks fantastic and the Green Beans with Garlic (recipe on page 102) is a super simple recipe that will go well with any holiday meal. For a list of all the recipes in the November issue you can turn to page 140. Not the cook this Holiday? You may also want to check out the "Family Weekend Getaways Under $500" and the excerpt from Fannie Flagg's new novel I Still Dream about You.



Another go-to magazine for delicious recipes is Taste of Home. One of the reasons I love this magazine so much is that it is written and edited by every-day folks like you and me. The recipes are simple, down-home fare easily prepared by even a novice cook (Thanksgiving is definitely not the time to learn how to cook, however). In the October/November issue, page 54 has a recipe for Maui-inspired Turkey Breast Roll that looks simply delicious. There are ste-by-step pictured instructions to help and some quick and easy appetizer ideas on page 47. Another good article to check out contains tips by cookbook author Katie Lee.



If you don't want to worry with heavy cookbooks or if you want a new twist on the traditional holiday meal, the magazines here at the library are a good choice for you. Remember that the newest magazine issues do not check out, but you may make copies of any recipe that tempts you. Magazines that do check out may be kept for one week only and then they must be returned so that others may enjoy them. Please remember to take care of the library's magazines--they are easily torn and damged with food and drink. You can also find recipes on the magazines websites: http://www.countryliving.com/, http://www.southernliving.com/, and http://www.tasteofhome.com/.

The Confession by John Grisham

I have been listening to the audio book in CD format of John Grisham's latest book, The Confession, for the past week as I drive to and from work. This is an audio book that has made me want to pass up my exit and keep driving until I finish the book! The novel is a tense look at the death penalty in Texas, through the eyes of the accused, the victim's family and the murderer. The book is jam-packed with typical Grisham characteristics---crooked politicians, detailed legal proceedings, lawyers interpreting the law as they see fit, and strong small-town citizens just trying to do the right thing. The writing is very detailed and Grisham portrays the citizens of Texas in a believable way. I do not want to give away any good details of the plot, but the basic story is that Dante' Drum is a 26-year-old African American man who was convicted of the murder of Nicole Yarborough, a white high-school cheerleader, when they were both 18 and Seniors at Sloan High School. Dante' has been on death row for nine years and the story opens six days before his scheduled execution. Lots of events occur within the six days, and I guarantee that you won't predict what happens. If you love riveting legal thrillers, then this book is the one for you! If you like this book I also suggest you try reading Greg Iles' 24 Hours, another tense thriller that will make your pulse pound. This book is true Grisham writing and I predict that this book will soon become a movie.