Denio's blog

Our 19th Season at The Library Theatre came to a close with Pam Tillis-In Concert. The child of music royalty, Pam Tillis is a superstar in her own right. With two Grammy awards, three CMA awards and a shiny new IBMA award on her mantle, she has racked up 14 Top Five hits including six that hit #1, and has sold over six million records. Also an accomplished songwriter, Pam's compositions have been recorded by Martina McBride, Chaka Khan and many others. She was one of the first women in Nashville to produce her own record, and was inducted into the Grand Ole Opry in 2000. See pictures of her concert here.

As spring dwindles down and everyone starts gearing up for the summer, it is time to start thinking about your summer vacation! As you pick your destination hot-spot you might want to consider browsing through the travel magazines available at the Hoover Public Library to help with your decision. The library has many great travel magazines, in addition to our extensive travel book collection, that would be a great resource in helping you decide where to go! Whether it’s abroad or just down the road, you will be sure to find your next destination at the library! Here are just a few of the titles that we have available:

• National Geographic Traveler
• Islands
• Travel + Leisure
• Budget Travel

Did you know that Hoover's Senior Center has a book group? Each month the members get together to discuss a book of the group's choosing. May's selection is The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson and June's discussion is on Jeffrey Zaslow's The Girls from Ames.

If you are a member of the Senior Center, we would love for you to come and join us for a lively book discussion on the second morning of each month at 9:30 a.m. And if you are not a senior, but know someone who is, pass this along!
-PB

First it was organic foods, then locally produced, in recent years the move towards using animal power in lieu of diesel for farm production has increased substantially.

Normally relegated to pioneer reenactments, animal power is making news (On Small Farms, Hoof Power Returns), even though they are generally seen as only feasible for small farms.

Check out the documentary, The Farmer and the Horse, for the ups and downs of using animal power.
-AD

Mary White Sowell is an experimental artist working mostly with acrylics and mixed media. Her favorite subjects are of a figurative nature plus abstracts with many textures. For ten years, she managed her own Art to Wear jewelry business, Melange, with accounts throughout the United States, Canada, Mexico and the Caribbean. Her line was primarily centered around hand sculpted porcelain and paper jewelry.

The Postmistress by Sarah Blake

The First Thursday Book Group will meet to discuss this book on Thursday, May 5th from 10:00 a.m. to 12:00 in the Theatre-level conference room.

Radio gal Frankie Bard, poses a question to a dinner party, “What would you think of a postmistress who chose not to deliver the mail?” This serves as the dramatic backdrop of Sarah Blake’s compelling novel, The Postmistress. As war rages through Europe, two women isolated physically and emotionally, reside in fictional Franklin, Massachusetts, on the coast of Cape Cod, listening to war reporter Frankie Bard as she details the blitz in London. For the postmaster (never call her a postmistress), Iris James, it’s only a matter of time before the war ends up on Franklin’s

This month our Artisans on the Plaza series picks back up with Mary Liz Ingram www.MaryLizIngramArt.com.

Join us while this local artist shows off some of the techniques she uses to bring life to her subjects. While her works favor inspiring landscapes, animal and people, she also accepts portrait commissions in either pastels or graphite.

She has also been providing art lessons to adult and children for over 5 years. She currently teaches pastels at Forstall Art Center in Homewood on Wednesday afternoons.

I just finished reading Rawhide Down by Del Quentin Weber, a reporter for the Washington Post. The book is about the attempted assassination of President Ronald Reagan March 30, 1981 outside the Washington D.C. Hilton hotel. It reads like a thriller even though we all know the outcome.

Weber has a unique way of following those involved: the E.R. trauma team at George Washington Hospital, surgeons, nurses, Mrs. Reagan, White House staff, Vice President Bush, the President's cabinet, Secret Service agents, FBI agents, D.C. police and, the shooter, John Hinckley, Jr. He weaves a tapestry of 24 hours in the people whose lives intersected that day.

The month of March always brings out the Irish in me, and I have just enjoyed two books set in Ireland: the audio version of Patrick Taylor's Irish Country Girl and the print version of Maeve Binchy's Minding Frankie.

The first is read by John Keating and it is delightful to hear his variety of Irish accents, changing for each character. This book is the latest in Taylor's Irish country doctor series and fills in the background of the doctor's housekeeper, Kinky Kincaid. In Minding Frankie, I love the continuing saga of Binchy's residents of St. Jarlath's Crescent, in Dublin. She skillfully interweaves the lives of a diverse population and makes the reader want it to keep on going. I can't wait for the next book in either series!

Inside Job received the top prize for documentaries at last month’s Academy Award ceremony. It examines the build up to the current global financial crisis.

Although the filmmakers are passionate about the subject, clearly evidenced in Ferguson’s Academy Award acceptance speech, “Forgive me, but I must start by pointing out that three years after a horrific financial crisis caused by massive fraud, not a single financial executive has gone to jail, and that’s wrong,” the documentary appears to be well researched with interesting interviews, and some notables who declined to be interviewed.