The Smallest room, Spydus and Simultaneous Storytime!

It’s all happening at the Library this week! The builders have started work on the new project at the Library. A disabled toilet including baby change facilities will be constructed in the space where the existing toilets are, thanks to Federal Infrastructure funding. However, this means that the Library won’t have any toilet facilities until the project is completed. The nearest public toilets are in Hunter Park, or behind Target, in the carpark.

Our computer software upgrade took place last week, and we’re gradually finding our way with the new version of our library management program, Spydus. For our customers, the biggest change is to the catalogue website. The website has a new look, but it is still under construction. Please bear with us while the links and information are completed. For customers who have already set up a PIN number at the Library, so that they can reserve books from home; the place to login is the Log In box on the top left hand corner of the page.

And finally, this is Library and Information Week, and to celebrate, we’re participating in National Simultaneous Storytime. On Wednesday 27 May at 11am, we will join organisations from Broome to Hobart, reading the picture book “Pete the sheep” to more than a quarter of a million Australian children. Our special guest reader is Mr Ian McCutcheon, who, along with his wife, Dianne, has done some great work with youth in Gilgandra over many years. Mr McCutcheon is also a farmer and grazier, and may have to forget his knowledge of the wool industry and suspend his disbelief considerably to read this story to our children!

“Pete the sheep” was written by Jackie French and illustrated by Bruce Whatley. It tells the story of Shaun, a new shearer in town, who has a sheep sheep instead of a sheep dog- Pete. Pete wears an Akubra and the sheep really like him. Instead of the conventional short back and sides, Shaun creates some wonderful new “dos” for the sheep he shears. Eventually, even the sheep dogs get in on the act!

So you can see that we are looking forward to a fun week at the Library. Hope you are enjoying whatever you are reading this week, as much as we enjoy “Pete the sheep”. As the book’s author, Jackie French, said recently: “Just think, at a certain moment hundreds of thousands of people all over Australia are going to be saying 'Baa! Baa!' How can life ever be the same?”

Memoirs of meth addiction

This week the Library will be upgrading the computer software we use to manage our loans and records- “Spydus”. We will have limited access to some of the features of Spydus during the upgrade, so we ask all borrowers to make sure they bring their library cards with them this week.

The Library recently purchased two books, one by David Sheff and one by his son Nic Sheff. “Beautiful Boy: a father’s journey through his son’s addiction” is David Sheff’s chronicle of Nic’s descent into crystal meth addiction. Before meth, Nic was an accomplished athlete, top student and award winning journalist. After meth, he was a trembling wreck who stole money from his eight year old brother and lived on the streets. David writes of his son’s journey, from the first subtle warning signs, through attempts at rehab, to the way past addiction. Armistead Maupin has said of this story “Beautiful Boy is so beautifully written that it will come as a welcome balm to millions of parents and loved ones who thought they were making this journey alone."

After Nic Sheff’s recovery a book editor contacted him and asked if he was interested in writing a memoir about his experience, one that might inspire other young people struggling with addiction. The result is the book “Tweak: growing up on methamphetamine”. Reyhan Harmanci, staff writer at the San Francisco Chronicle, wrote of this book “Man, the kids are not "alright." But then wholesome childhoods and healthy living were never the stuff of memoir.... Nic Sheff's Tweak: Growing Up on Methamphetamines seldom pulls punches. [He does] an admirable job of telling his story clearly and avoids heavy-handed exposition, and the effect is often moving. The trajectory of drug addiction is nothing new, but Sheff's lucid, simple prose makes the heartbreaking journey seem fresh. More than once, adults praise him for his candor - he lies frequently in his constant quest for more money and more drugs, but he also comes clean (so to speak) many times in the process. It's one of his most appealing aspects, and it's a necessary quality to autobiographical writing. One senses that he's not holding much back. [He] is a writer with a big future ahead of him.”

Both “Beautiful boy” and “Tweak” are available from the Library.

New books at Gil

The Library stocktake is now complete, a source of great relief for the people who work there. We would like to thank Gilgandra residents for their patience while the Library was closed. The good news is that we only need to stocktake every 2 years, so this won’t happen again until 2011. The stocktake triggered a stock rotation, so a lot of our books have been sent on to other branches of North Western Library. Over coming weeks, the other libraries will commence their stocktake, and our shelves will gradually fill again, as their books are sent on to us.

This week, we received a new book for older teenagers by Paul Jennings. Jennings books are well known and very popular, but he has previously written mainly for younger readers, with book series such as “Rascal the dragon”, “Wicked!” and “Deadly!” “The nest” is his first venture into “young adult” writing. On his blog , Jennings writes that it took him 4 years to write this book.

“It’s about a 16 year old boy who gets unwanted images flashing through his mind and questions about his past haunt him as he searches for clues within himself and his own writing”.

Another new arrival at the Library is “Choir Man” by Jonathon Welch. Jonathon Welch is known to most of us as the Founding Musical Director of the Choir of Hard Knocks. He is also a well known opera singer and conductor. This is the story of his personal life; his childhood in suburban Melbourne where he showed theatrical tendencies, his family story, the story of his wonderful opera and theatre career, and his involvement in the Choir of Hard Knocks. It should be a good read.

On Jonathon Welch’s website Jimmy Barnes is quoted as saying "Jonathon is not only compassionate, warm and friendly but is also extremely brave. Not because he has worked with people who are in need but because of the demons of his own that he shows to the world — his own frailty, his own fears and his own dreams. I think this is what makes him a special person. When I look at him, I see someone who is like me and someone who I'd like to be."

We hope you are enjoying whatever you are reading this week!

Treasure indeed!

The World Digital Library (http://www.wdl.org/en/) was launched on 21 April, 2009. It is an international digital library operated by UNESCO and the United States Library of Congress. The digital library is made up of images of objects, manuscripts, maps, rare books, musical scores, recordings, films, prints, and photographs from around the world. So far the collection is relatively small (1,170 items), but the items are truly wonderful. They include an audio recording of a 101-year-old former American slave, Fountain Hughes, recorded in Baltimore, Maryland, in 1949. Only 26 audio-recorded interviews of ex-slaves are known to exist, and now we can hear this interview from any internet connection.
We can also examine the Waldseemüller map, or “Map of the entire world”, the earliest map to mention America by name. This is the only known copy of this particular world map. The World Digital Library includes some of the world's first films from the Lumiere brothers. Auguste and Louis Lumière are credited with the development of the Cinématographe in 1895. The Cinématographe was a light, portable device that brought the camera (weighing just over seven kilograms) out of doors. The Lumières sent crews around the world to record a wide array of scenes and images. These films were shown to audiences which were amazed to see moving action projected on an inert screen. The short films available on the World Digital Library date from 1896, and include processions at Lourdes and Seville, and bullfighting scenes.
We hope you enjoy exploring the World Digital Library. Dr. James H. Billington, from the US Library of Congress, has said that “These are really great treasures, not merely miscellaneous things about a country or culture.” As yet, there is not much Australian content in the World Digital Library, but we understand that the project leaders are looking for an Australian partner, and content will grow with time.

As we mentioned last week, Gilgandra Shire Library will be closed from Monday to Friday this week, for our biannual stocktake. We will be taking every item down from the shelf and scanning it, to help us to maintain the accuracy of our records. We apologise for any inconvenience this may cause you, and thank you for your patience.

Library card magic with NoveList

In previous weeks, we have described how you can use your library card to get access via the internet to World Book encyclopedia online and other great e-resources. This week, we’ll tell you how to get to another useful e-resource called NoveList.

To get there, first go to the library catalogue website (http://nwls.spydus.com). Click on “Databases” in the top menu bar, and you will see a drop-down menu. Click on “NSW NET.” The first time you go into NSW.net from your computer, you may see a screen that says “Please select your library”. Click on the arrow next to this and from the drop down menu, select “North Western”. Click on “Go”. This gives you a list of e-resources you can access from home, beginning with ANZ Reference Centre. Click on the At Home “Connect” button and you will see a log in page. Type in your library card number and click “Login”. Then click on “NoveList”.

NoveList is all about fiction books and finding something good to read next. There is a search box at the top of the screen, where you can type the name of an author, book or series. Try typing “Tom Clancy” into this box, then click on Search. You’ll see a list of his books, with plot summaries and star ratings. Click on the “Author Read-alikes” tab at the top of the page. You will see two articles. Click on the first one by Joyce Saricks. You will see that she suggests Stephen Coonts and Dale Brown as other authors whose writing you might enjoy, if you like Tom Clancy.

Perhaps there is a kind of book that you particularly enjoy- for example; forensic detective stories set in the United States. Type “forensic detective United States” into the search box, select the radio button below the search box for “Describe a plot”, then click Search. This brings up a list of 23 books you might like to try. Not all of these will be available locally, as NoveList is an American database, but some of them will be.

Using the same kind of search, you can look for a book you’ve heard about, but can’t remember the title of. Perhaps you remember that it was a medieval mystery story, about a monk. Try typing in “Medieval mystery monk”, selecting “Describe a plot” and clicking Search. This yields a long list of similar books, one of which may be your mystery book. NoveList is a great tool for readers of all kinds of fiction, and a wonderful way to find some new authors to track down. We hope you enjoy exploring NoveList.

Next week, the Library will be closed for five days for our biannual stocktake, from Monday 4th May to Friday 8th May. This is necessary as every item in the library must be scanned; all 17,000 of them! We apologise for any inconvenience this may cause you. Items may be returned while we are closed via the book return chute. Please do not hesitate to contact us on 6817 8877 if you have any questions.

More Library card magic!

Here's another great e-resource you can access using your North Western Library card; the Literary Reference Centre.

Go to the library catalogue website ( http://nwls.spydus.com). Click on “Databases” in the top menu bar, and you will see a drop-down menu. Click on “NSW NET.” The first time you go into NSW.net from your computer, you may see a screen that says “Please select your library”. Click on the arrow next to this and from the drop down menu, select “North Western”. Click on “Go”. This gives you a list of e-resources you can access from home, beginning with ANZ Reference Centre. Click on the At Home “Connect” button and you will see a log in page. Type in your library card number and click “Login”.

Click on “Literary Reference Centre”. This is a great resource for anyone who loves English literature, or for students in Year 11 and 12. It combines information from over 1000 books, major literary encyclopedias and journals, and reference works. Literary Reference Centre (LRC) contains detailed information on the most studied authors and their works. You can type in the name of an author or book, or browse lists of authors or works.

For example, to search for Tim Winton, type in “Winton, Tim”. This will bring up a page of biography, and links to an interview with Tim Winton, plot summaries, some literary criticism, and reviews of his works.

Another feature of LRC is that it gives access to the full text of a lot of classic books. On the home page of LRC, click on “Browse works”. You should see a screen with the word “Select” beside a box, at the top of the page. Click the drop down arrow beside the box. Choose “Full-text classics” by highlighting it, and clicking “Go”.

This brings up a massive list of books that you can download and read. These have mostly been made available by Project Gutenberg, and are older classics (out of copyright or “public domain” works) which have been typed up by volunteers. You could also access these works from the Project Gutenberg home page http://www.gutenberg.org. If you haven’t come across Project Gutenberg before, you will be amazed at what is available.

In addition to providing links to the Gutenberg e-books, the Literary Reference Centre (LRC) provides links to literary criticism, plot summaries and biographies of the authors for each of these books. Using LRC, I downloaded a copy of “Cranford” by Elizabeth Gaskell. I could save it as either a web page (.html) or a plain text file (.txt).

I was also able to read about Elizabeth Gaskell’s life, and there were 11 articles which discussed the language, imagery, themes and ideas in “Cranford”. I learned that Elizabeth Gaskell began writing “Cranford” in 1851 when Charles Dickens invited her to send tales for his new weekly journal, “Household Words”. Dickens and Gaskell were so pleased with the first two “Cranford” stories, which depicted a community of genteel single women in a retired country village, that Gaskell went on to write fourteen more!

We hope you enjoy exploring the Literary Reference Centre.

How would it be if you were a boy raised by dogs?

A recent arrival at the Library is the book “Dog boy” by Eva Hornung. This story begins in a deserted Moscow apartment building where four-year-old Romochka waits for Uncle to come home. Outside the snow is falling, but after a few days hunger drives Romochka outside. Overlooked by passers-by, he follows a street dog to her lair in a deserted basement at the edge of the city. There he joins four puppies suckling at their mother's teats. And so begins Romochka's life as a dog. (The Daily Telegraph Big Book Club)

This book was selected recently for the Daily Telegraph Big Book Club, and it has met with good reviews. Mary Phillip reviewed “Dog Boy” for the Brisbane newspaper, the Courier-Mail, on March 13, 2009, and this is part of what she had to say: “Romochka is the hero of this book – and what a hero. Barely able to speak, absolutely illiterate, unskilled in the intuitive ways of dogs, he nevertheless masters his environment. He manages to survive in both worlds, veering towards one or the other as circumstances demand. His love for his adopted family is immense, and he grows strong on their loyalty.

When humans intervene in Romochka's life it is hard not to view them with a critical eye. So immersed was I in the underworld of feral dogs and subways that I resented this intrusion, believing that humans would wreck the balance that these dogs had constructed to survive.
Vivid and visceral in its depiction of street life, this can be a confronting book, but it is so creatively imagined that readers will be rewarded.”

Christopher Bantick interviewed Hornung for the Courier-Mail (March 14, 2009) and quotes her as saying the following: “I've always been interested in outsiders. I am one in some ways myself. I'd been writing a few stories, really to see the limitation of my own imagination. By using the consciousness of a creature, you are making a loud statement about stepping outside the novel. I'd read a news story a while ago about a boy living with animals and I wanted to speculate as to what this may mean.”

The Library will be receiving most of the books featured in the Daily Telegraph Big Book Club from now on, and we hope our readers enjoy the books in this selection