Library Corner: Springvale

Springvale Library’s biggest ever Annual Book Sale is happening Friday, September 17 and Saturday, September 18, from 10:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. on our lawn at 443 Main St. Jimmy Mac will be playing music from noon to 1:00 on Friday, and we’ll have three talented musicians joining us on Saturday.  There will be pumpkin bird feeder craft kits for the kiddos, a book folding demonstration table, jewelry, and of course, books, cds, dvds, and tons of puzzles. There will be many bargains to be found, so come and stock up on books and puzzles for the coming months!

TAG Teen Afterschool, Wednesdays 3:30-4:30 pm at Springvale Library starting Sept 15. What does TAG mean? It stands for Teen Activity Group!  We are starting a new group for teens ages 12 and up to have fun and relax after school.  Want to try some crafts like making duct tape wallets, slime, or Halloween luminaries?  Want to try an online escape room?  Want to talk about the latest book you are reading? We plan to do all that! All materials and SNACKS will be provided!  Masks are required inside the library, but we will do the crafts outside on the patio if the weather is nice.

New Books:

Fiction: More Than I Love My Life by David Grossman. “A remarkable novel of suffering, love, and healing—the story of three generations of women on an unlikely journey to a Croatian island and a secret that needs to be told… More Than I Love My Life was inspired by the true story of one of David Grossman’s longtime confidantes, a woman who, in the early 1950s, was held on the notorious Goli Otok (“the Adriatic Alcatraz”).” —  Provided by publisher

Non-Fiction: The Icepick Surgeon; Murder, Fraud, Sabotage, Piracy, and Other Dastardly Deeds Perpetrated in the Name of Science by Sam Kean. “The Icepick Surgeon masterfully guides the reader across two thousand years of history, beginning with Cleopatra’s dark deeds in ancient Egypt. The book reveals the origins of much of modern science in the transatlantic slave trade of the 1700s, as well as Thomas Edison’s mercenary support of the electric chair and the warped logic of the spies who infiltrated the Manhattan Project. But the sins of science aren’t all safely buried in the past. Many of them, Kean reminds us, still affect us today. We can draw direct lines from the medical abuses of Tuskegee and Nazi Germany to current vaccine hesitancy, and connect icepick lobotomies from the 1950s to the contemporary failings of mental-health care. Kean even takes us into the future, when advanced computers and genetic engineering could unleash whole new ways to do one another wrong.”– Provided by publisher.

Young Adult: The Blackbird Girls by Anne Blankman – Set during the time of the Chernobyl explosion of 1986, this historical fiction novel is a stunning and complex story of two girls who were enemies before the reactor explodes. In alternating voices, they share their experiences and growing friendship when they are forced together during a sudden evacuation. They each have secrets and lies to overcome as they forge a new way of living in Leningrad with one of the girl’s estranged grandmother. The author provides an account of the real disaster in her back notes. This is on the Maine Student Book Award list for this school year.

Children’s: Above the Rim: How Elgin Baylor Changed Basketball by Jen Bryant, Illustrated by Frank Morrison – “Hall of Famer Elgin Baylor was one of basketball’s all-time greatest players-an innovative athlete, a team player, and a quiet force for change.  Elgin took risks on and off the court.  Known for his acrobatic style of moving and shooting, he inspired other to get creative with their game.  But when traveling for away games, some hotels and restaurants turned Elgin away because he was Black.  Then, on one particular night, Elgin had had enough-and staged a one-man protest that captured the attention of the press, the public and the National Basketball Association.” (from inside front cover.)