When you think of a favorite book, what are its likable characteristics? The author probably writers well enough if he has been published, though a critic might argue otherwise. The book is about an intriguing topic and weaves a story that keeps you flipping pages when you should be sleeping. Personally, I like the narrator’s voice that pops in my head as I read. In the end, a favorite book is one that gets under your skin, and stakes a claim upon a piece of your life as a friend.

An article in The Guardian by Rick Gekoski called “Some of My Worst Friends Are Books,” has me thinking about my own personal experiences with books. I remember being shocked by the end of Brave New World¹ and the choice made by the main character. I felt encouragement and warmth after following a young woman’s passage through grief in P.S. I Love You. Devil in the White City had me dreaming of the 1893 World’s Fair and I devoured books about the architects for months. The empathy I felt with the woman in The Yellow Wallpaper as she descended into madness. For the reader Mr. Gekoski writes, “we suspend the everyday, ignore the telephone and doorbell, eat with our eyes fixed to the page, overcome, ravaged by the demands of the text.” I feel the same way about friends and family.

Though we are busy with living our lives we make time for friends and family whether living or in letters. Sometimes we may not see each other or have enough quality time, but the bookcase in my house reminds me that we will find a way to meet.

There are books about books in the library, to help one find new friends and others can be found through MeLCat.

Check out these titles:

• Bloomsbury good reading guide [electronic resource] by Nick Rennsion
• Book Lust: Recommended Reading for Every Mood, Moment, and Reason by Nancy Pearl
• How to Read and Why by Harold Bloom
• How to Read Literature Like a Professor: A Lively and Entertaining Guide to Reading Between the Lines by Thomas C. Foster
• Read This Next: 500 of the Best Books You Will Ever Read by Sandra Newman and Howard Mittelmark

1. Yes, I often recommend this book.

March 3: 10AM – 2PM
March 4: 1PM – 5PM
March 5 – 11: Closed
March 12: Reopen at 7:30AM

I don’t know about you, but I am totally looking forward to spring break! Fun, sun, and a week without classes – how awesome is that?

With the Grand River Winds Community Ensemble having a mythology based performance tonight at St. Cecilia Music Center, it may be a great time to introduce the collection of mythology materials found in the library and online. Robert Graves, Joseph Campbell, and Edith Hamilton are all excellent writers on mythology with numerous books found in our library.

In addition, check out the books below on fables, fairy tales, and myths to find your new favorite. Enjoy!

• Aesop’s Fables [electronic resource] by Aesop
  Here is a collection of short fables to teach children morality and are still used today.
• Brewer’s dictionary of Irish phrase & fable by Sean McMahon and Jo O’Donoghue; foreword by Maeve Binchy
  Get to know the stories and language of Ireland in this book found in the Reference Area. The collection can also be searched through in Credo Reference.
• Bulfinch’s Mythology by Thomas Bulfinch
  Used as an instructional guide to mythology, this book is actually an anthology of three books separately published.
• The complete fairy tales of the Brothers Grimm [electronic resource] translated and with an introduction by Jack Zipes; illustrations by John B. Gruelle
  The Brothers Grimm have influenced numerous authors and moviemakers. More on the Brothers Grimm at the library can be found here and here.
• Handbook of Inca mythology by Paul R. Steele, with the assistance of Catherine J. Allen
  Some of the music the Ensemble will be performing is based upon Machu Picchu, so this will be an excellent resource to understand the background of the lost city.
• The Library of Greek Mythology by Apollodorus, translated by Robin Hard
  This is not an introduction to Greek Mythology, but a primary source of Greek Mythology that has been referenced by numerous writers, including Robert Graves.
• Literature and film as modern mythology [electronic resource] by William K. Ferrell
  This book analyzes a few movies, like The Shawshank Redemption and Field of Dreams that used myth to tell an amazing story.
• The Oxford companion to world mythology by David Leeming
  This is a book broken down into an online resource found in Oxford Reference. The entries include hyperlinks to the details of each article allowing the reader to create comparisons between the myths.

Big Heart of Art - 1000 Visual Mashups by Qthomas Bower

February 14th has been the traditional date for St. Valentine’s Day. It is a day to express love to your partner through food, trinkets, and personal favors. Information on the history of St. Valentine’s Day can be found on Wikipedia, of course, and on History.com which includes fun videos about different aspects of the day. The library carries books about relationships and chocolate.

• Chocolate chocolate by Lisa Yockelson
• Lean on me : the power of positive dependency in intimate relationships by Marion F. Solomon
• Maintaining relationships through communication : relational, contextual, and cultural variations edited by Daniel J. Canary and Marianne Dainton
• Perfect love, imperfect relationships : healing the wound of the heart by John Welwood

February is also an important month for healthy heart awareness. The Center for Disease Control and American Heart Association are celebrating American Heart Month. To begin the awareness, people wore red to show support against Heart Disease on February 3rd. The Center for Disease Control is co-leading the Million Hearts program to prevent 1 million heart attacks and strokes. To be there for those who may need it, Valentine’s Day share February 14th with National Organ Donor Day to promote the organ donor registry. Below are items about taking care of your heart:

• The healthy heart cookbook for dummies by by James M. Rippe, with Amy G. Myrdal, Angela Harley Kirkpatrick, and Mary Abbott Waite
• Eat your way to a healthy heart : features chocolate and 99 other foods that help your heart by Liz Applegate

The woman’s heart : an owner’s guide by John A. Elefteriades and Teresa Caulin-Glaser

If St. Valentine’s Day and organ donation are not interesting, today is also Ferris Wheel Day. It might be too cold to ride one, but look here to see the world’s tallest Ferris wheels. If you would like to start a journey around the world instead, look here for information about the first Ferris wheel. We also have two titles in the catalog on George Ferris and the Ferris wheel to check out:

• Circles in the sky : the life and times of George Ferris by Richard G. Weingardt
• Engineering legend : great American civil engineers : 32 profiles of inspiration and achievement [eBook] by Richard G. Weingardt

Enjoy the day!

In recent months, a group of choice librarians and Library Journal reviewers were selected to evaluate databases which exist today for library use. In the end, the finalists were placed in specific categories, highlighting numerous resources of which several can be found right here at your GRCC Library. Below are the databases that made the “Top Database List” in their respective categories and they are available for access right now (requires RaiderLogin off campus):

Best Overall
Credo Reference

Most Ambitious in Scope or Content
Gale Virtual Library
Runner-up: Ebscohost eBooks (Formally NetLibrary.)

Most Elegant Runner-up: Oxford Art Online
Best Original Content Runner-up: CQ Researcher
Patron’s Favorites Runners-up: JSTOR and Naxos Music Library

To view a full list of the databases we offer alphabetically, click here. (We also offer the option of searching for databases by subject area.) We do our best to provide you with the most up-to-date & quality resources we possibly can, so although many of our databases did not “make the cut,” don’t doubt for a second that they aren’t just as useful for your research. Check them out today!

To view the rest of the finalists & runner-ups, click here.

Jesse Buttrick Davis

Nan Schichtel, our information literacy and outreach librarian, will be lecturing tonight, February 9, on the behalf of the Grand Rapids Historical Society on the early days of the Grand Rapids Jaycees. Her presentation, Jesse Buttrick Davis and “His Boys”: A History of the Early Grand Rapids Junior Chamber of Commerce, 1909-1929, highlights Schichtel’s on-going research on Davis and early days of Grand Rapids Jaycees, which also cumulated in research for completion of her Masters in Public Administration from GVSU. Schichtel is a life member of the Grand Rapids Jaycees and a trustee at the Grand Rapids Historical Society.

Jesse Buttrick Davis was a prominent national educational and West Michigan civic leader during the 19-teens. Davis is recognized internationally as one of the fathers of the vocational guidance movement. Historian / editor Z.Z. Lydens called Davis one of “Greeson’s Triumvirate.” Today, this highly-regarded Central High School principal is remembered for serving as the first president of Grand Rapids Junior – now Community – College. Those reputations are correct, but for members of one Central High club, he was much more.

Hired to rid the GR’s public schools of bad influences including gambling and “other lewd activities” in downtown hotels, Davis formed innumerable school clubs, bands, and choirs. Collaborating with the Grand Rapids Board of Trade (now Area Chamber of Commerce), he started the Junior Board of Trade – the precursor to the Junior Chamber of Commerce, a.k.a. Jaycees. Grand Rapids Public Library’s archival collections are rich with examples of how, by harnessing the exuberant energies of junior high, high school, and college boys, Davis and “his boys” helped make GR a better place to live, and the boys developed into respected members of the community.

All Grand Rapids Historical Society lectures/programs are held the second Thursday of the month. All programs are co-sponsored by the Gerald R. Ford Museum and are held at the museum, 303 Pearl St NW, at 7:00 p.m. Each program is followed by a reception with light refreshments. Historical Society programs are free and open to the public, with the exception of the May Meeting/Banquet which is open to members and their guest. Free parking at the museum.

Every year, the International Darwin Day Foundation celebrates Charles Darwin and all of his incredible work with a week long celebration of science and reason around the time of his birthday. Locally, the Center for Inquiry for Michigan has a jam packed schedule of events. Included is a lecture tonight by GRCC’s own Dr. Gregory Forbes entitled, “Dogma, Doctrine & Deduction; Darwin’s Life of Discovery”. The lecture will be held at the Women’s City Club and is open to the public. You can also find additional events by CFI here for Darwin Day and beyond.

In addition to Darwin’s seminal works, On the Orign of Species and Descent of Man, GRCC library has additional materials by Charles Darwin, as well as books about humanism, evolutionary biology, natural selection, and creationism to quench your intellectual thirsts.

Today is Charles Dickens 200th birthday! Many of us know him from the treasured Christmas classic, A Christmas Carol or from his other seminal works such as Oliver Twist, Great Expectations, and A Tale of Two Cities. Over the course of his life, Dickens completed nearly 20 novels and dozens of short stories, many which were serialized. Dickens’ work was so popular, that he not only defined and became the voice of the Victorian era but he also became the world’s first literary super star.

To help celebrate his birthday, here is a little known fact about me: I’m related, on my mother’s side, to the birthday boy himself! Here are a few more obscure facts about Dickens:

• Dickens World, in honor of Charles Dickens, in Kent, England, is one of, if not the only, literary theme park in the world.
• Dickens named his children after his favorite authors, like Henry Fielding Dickens and Alfred d’Orsay Tennyson Dickens
• He believed in Spontaneous Human Combustion and the character Krook, from Bleak House dies from it.
• Dickens was a member of The Ghost Club, a highly select club for paranormal research. Future members would include Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, the creator of Sherlock Holmes.

If this has whet your appetite about Dickens, check out what we have in audio, print, and eBooks.

The February 2012 book display in the Library & Learning Commons is titled, African-American Soldiers in the Civil War. The display features copies of photos from the Library of Congress Liljenquist Collection.

With the Black Student Union, the LLC is sponsoring the February 15th screening of Glory, to be held in the Calkins Science Auditorium from 4:00-6:00 PM. The 1989 film starring Matthew Broderick, Cary Elwes, Morgan Freeman, and Denzel Washington tells the story of the 54th Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry, the first totally African-American unit to serve in the War Between the States, as told by its commanding officer.

The seminal author, journalist, and social activist Jeff Johnson will be at the Fountain Street Church, February 15, as the next speaker in the Diversity Lecture Series. Johnson, the author of Everything I’m Not Made Me Everything I Am, is

…renowned both for his conversations with world figures in the political, business and entertainment arenas and his grass-roots work seeking to inspire the next generation of leaders. Johnson is a trailblazing social entrepreneur and authentic voice for change. Sometimes called the “conscience voice” of BET Networks, Johnson looks for ways to merge the worlds of politics and popular culture, through broad-based communication, including as a contributor to the Tom Joyner Morning Show.

In additon to Everything I’m Not Made Me Everything I Am, the GRCC Library also has the following materials on or about Johnson, some which may require you to user your RaiderID for access.

• “Analysis: School segregation, Gulf Coast immigration.” News & Notes, 19 Oct. 2005.
• “Interview: George Curry, Callie Crossley and Jeffrey Johnson discuss
  the president’s approval rating and Ralph Nader using the N-word.“
  News & Notes, 20 June 2005.
• “Interview: Julianne Malveaux, Jeff Johnson and Pedro Noguera talk about Supreme Court quotas, military recruitment, the US space program and corporate crime.” News & Notes, 14 July 2005.
• “Social justice in Kurdistan.” Washington Times. 23 July 2009: A18.
• Stelter, Brian. “Black TV Is Wearing Its Politics On Its Sleeve.” New York Times, 6 Nov. 2008: 6(L).

If you are also interested in the topics of achievement motivation and self-actualization, in addition to Johnson’s Everything I’m Not Made Me Everything I Am, GRCC Library also has the following titles available on these subjects:

• Catch! : a fishmonger’s guide to greatness by Cyndi Crother and the crew of the World Famous Pike Place Fish
• The change cycle: how people can survive and thrive in organizational change by Ann Salerno & Lillie Brock [eBook]
• Come on, people : on the path from victims to victors by Bill Cosby & Alvin F. Poussaint
• Learned optimism : how to change your mind and your life by Martin E.P. Seligman
• Motivation and learning strategies for college success: a self-management approach by Myron H. Dembo [eBook]
• The power of purpose: find meaning, live longer, better by Richard J. Leider [eBook]
• Rewards and intrinsic motivation: resolving the controversy by Judy Cameron and W. David Pierce [eBook]
• The seven minute difference: small steps to big changes by Allyson Lewis [eBook]
• Success is a journey: make your life a grand adventure by Brian Tracy [eBook]
• The winning spirit : 16 timeless principles that drive performance excellence by Joe Montana and Tom Mitchell