Noe Valley Voice May 2005
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Books in our Branch

This month's book list, chosen by Noe Valley librarians Carol Small and Catherine Starr, and Voice bookworm Karol Barske, features Shakespeare's fictional memoir, bistro cuisine for babies, and the first book of The Spiderwick Chronicles. To find out which books are available at our branch, go to www.sfpl.org, call 355-5707, or visit the Noe Valley­Sally Brunn Library at 451 Jersey Street near Castro Street. Besides books, the library offers magazines, newspapers, DVDs, music CDs, Internet access, and the archives and index to the Noe Valley Voice. Branch hours are Tuesdays, 10 a.m. to 9 p.m.; Wednesdays, 1 to 9 p.m.; Thursdays, 10 a.m. to 6 p.m.; Fridays, 1 to 6 p.m.; and Saturdays, 10 a.m. to 6 p.m.

Adult Fiction

- In Bruce Cook's Young Will: Confessions of William Shakespeare, the 52-year-old playwright and poet looks back on "the sins of his youth" and his life in 1600s London.

- A young man returns to the hard luck and blood feuds of his poor rural Louisiana hometown, in Welcome to the Fallen Paradise, a first novel by Dayne Sherman.

- In Claire Davis' thriller Season of the Snake, a herpetologist faces the conflict between her difficult sister and her husband, who is living a double life.

- The News from Paraguay by Lily Tuck is based on the life of Ella Lynch, an Irish courtesan who became the mistress of Paraguayan dictator Francisco Solano Lopez ("Franco").

Adult Nonfiction

- In The Secret Language of Children: How to Understand What Your Kids Are Really Saying, Lawrence E. Shapiro stresses the importance of reading facial expressions, posture, and gestures.

- Wired: A Romance by Gary Wolf chronicles the rise of Louis Rossetto and Jane Metcalfe's magazine Wired, "the mouthpiece of the digital revolution," from its launch in San Francisco in the early 1990s to its fall in 2000.

- Joohee Muromcew's The Baby Bistro Cookbook features simple, upscale (but easy to follow) recipes to coax the toddler into eating lightly spiced solid foods.

- Forensic anthropologist Emily Craig describes her work at Waco and the World Trade Center in Teasing Secrets from the Dead: My Investigations at America's Most Infamous Crime Scenes.

New Children's Fiction

- His little brother lets the ducks out of Grandpa's yard and uses other people's stuff without asking, but author/illustrator David McPhail's big brother concedes that My Little Brother is sometimes "not so bad." Ages 3 to 7.

- Despite a warm long-distance relationship through phone calls and letters, little Albert is shy at first when he meets his grandmother in person, in Anna Grossnickle Hines' My Grandma Is Coming to Town, with soft watercolors by Melissa Sweet. Ages 3 to 6.

- The author/illustrator of My Kindergarten, Rosemary Wells, uses watercolors, music, and poetry to capture a young bunny rabbit's first year of school. Ages 4 to 6.

- Using color-infused collages, local author Bob Barner's Bug Safari explores the world of insects as an imaginative boy follows an ant trail. Ages 4 to 8.

- In The Birthday Doll, written by San Francisco author Jane Cutler and illustrated by Hiroe Nakata, Franny receives two very different dolls as gifts. Ages 4 to 8.

- Eddie apologizes for throwing up on Mrs. Hartwell's socks and Margaret praises the teacher for vaulting a rail "like a real track star" to save a stuffed buffalo, in First Year Letters by Julie Dannenberg, illustrated by Judy Love. Ages 5 to 9.

- In Tony DiTerlizzi and Holly Black's The Field Guide (Spiderwick Chronicles Series #1), siblings Jared, Simon, and Mallory discover a secret room in their great-aunt's house. Ages 8 and up.

- Fourteen-year-old Shauzia lives in harsh conditions in Peshawar, Pakistan, but dreams of going to France, in Mud City by Deborah Ellis. Ages 10 and up.

LIBRARY EVENTS

Saturday Lapsit

- Infants and toddlers, with a parent, will enjoy the stories, songs, and finger plays at the lapsit at 10:30 a.m. on Saturday, May 28. The library is at 451 Jersey Street near Castro.

Preschool Story Time and Films

- Children ages 2 to 5 are invited to attend a preschool story time at 10 a.m. on Tuesdays, May 3, 10, and 21. An hour of short films will be shown for kids ages 3 to 5 on Tuesday, May 24, at 10 and 11 a.m.