Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter

It seems there is no end to the vampire story - even U.S. presidents find themselves fighting these night creatures.  Well, maybe not all presidents, but turns out that Abraham Lincoln did more than write the Gettysburg Address and have to deal with a national civil war - yes, he was plagued with blood suckers...according to author Seth Grahame-Smith.  Sure, his work has been called a novel, but who knows for sure???  Check out this book trailer and decide for yourself (warning: it's a bit violent - in other words, don't expect a cozy parlor scene).     

Food...or science?

There are foodies, and there are geeks, but can you be both?  Of course!  Enter Alton Brown, (who, by the way, I'm not calling a geek, cuz you wanna know geekiness? how about shy, bookish, former band member, now chainsaw-wielding librarian - GEEK!), who somehow manages to make food and science immensely appealing to both culinary and, ahem, thinking (not geeky!) readers.  Get your name on the waiting list for Good Eats: The Early Years to prove that cool, suave, debonair library patrons know what's "good" and what's "leftovers" (course, leftovers in the food world, can be pretty darn fine). 

Too much stuff

We have a new book on order called The Story of Stuff by Annie Leonard.  Ms Leonard is an environmental activist who takes a close look at all of the "stuff" we produce, consume and trash.  When I think about what my grandparents got by on, and then I look at what I'm accumulating and discarding, I'm a bit ashamed.  Thinking about putting this title on hold...

Hands-on experience

In my last posting I wrote about book covers.  Well, now I'd like to write about a very specific book cover that has become pretty darn famous over the past few years.  If you're a "twi-hard" you might already know this, but for the rest of us, this factoid has probably slipped right on past us: the original cover of Stephenie Meyer's Twilight shows two hands cupping an apple, and those hands belong to a part-time model named Kimbra Hickey.  And she gets lots of fan attention...just for that cover!  I'm somewhat mystified by the whole thing, but it's yet another example of the power of a book cover (so I took a photo of my hand holding a book - watch out, fame, here I come!)  If you want to see the face attached to the apple-holding hands, check out this article found on www.thebigmoney.com.  You'll also find out about the hand model used for Palmolive's soap label, as well as which celebrity has such ugly thumbs, substitute hands had to be used during a tv commercial.  Guess that's a "thumbs down!"

In this case, please judge...

It's a cliche, but "judging a book by its cover" can be a lot more fun when you actually have covers to judge, say, American vs. British covers.  An interesting column from the web site, www.themillions.com, presents U.S. and U.K. covers for 10 different titles, and the writer offers opinions on which version is better.  Take a look and judge for yourself...  

Oscar time!

But I'm not referring to the famous golden statue.  In this case, Oscar is a cat, and he is a pretty special guy.  He lives (and works!) at a nursing and rehabilitation center in Rhode Island, and his "job" is to give comfort to those who are about to pass away.  You may say, well, any cat could do that, but Oscar doesn't just provide comfort, he actually senses when a person is about to die, and he stays with that person during the final hours.  It's an amazing story about an amazing feline, and it just proves once again that animals often possess uncanny abilities.  If you'd like to see some photos and videos of Oscar, visit here, and if you want to read more about him, place a hold on Making Rounds With Oscar: The Extraordinary Gift of an Ordinary Cat.