Math for Everyone

Are you someone who couldn’t comprehend multiplication tables by the time friends had mastered them or never got beyond high school algebra? Ian Stewart, author of more than 80 books on popular mathematics, suggests a few written for the curious novice ("Ian Stewart's Top Ten Popular Mathematics Books," The Guardian, Jan. 18, 2012).

Magical Mathematics by Persi Diaconis and Ron Graham

The Man Who Knew Infinity by Robert Kanigel

Gödel, Escher, Bach by Douglas Hofstadter

The Colossal Book of Mathematics by Martin Gardner

What Is Mathematics, Really? by Reuben Hersh

Read the Book First

In 2012 film adaptions of both bestsellers and classics will feature all-star casts and well-known directors, reports The Huffington Post ("The 10 Most Anticipated Book Adaptations of 2012," Jan. 21, 2012). Ralph Fiennes will star in “Great Expectations.” Keira Knightly will play Anna Karenina. Baz Luhrmann is directing “The Great Gatsby” in 3D with Leonardo DiCaprio as Gatsby, Toby McGuire as Nick and Carey Mulligan as Daisy. Director Ang Lee is at the helm for a 3D “Life of Pi.”

So, get ready for this year’s crop of literary flicks and read the books first. Here are a few more book-to-film titles in 2012:

Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell

The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins

Cosmopolis by Don DeLillo

The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien

The Wettest County in the World by Matt Bondurant

Nordic Noir

Thanks to the popularity of Steig Larsson’s dark thrillers, Nordic noir is thriving, writes USA Today staffer Carol Memmott ("Chill with the Season's New Nordic Noir," Jan. 16, 2012). Appropriate to the season, she offers recommendations for several new thrillers set in wintry Scandinavian landscapes. Our staff offers a few older titles others to try.

1222: A Hanne Wilhelmsen Novel by Anne Holt

Cell 8 by Anders Roslund and Borge Hellstrom

Night Rounds: An Inspector Irene Huss Investigation by Helene Tursten (coming soon; place a hold)

The Leopard by Jo Nesbo

Missing by Karin Alvtegen

To shake the post-holiday blahs, libraries in Great Britain are promoting books to lift the spirits, reports The Guardian ("Glad Tidings of Mood-Boosting Reading," Jan. 10, 2012). According to The Reading Group, which organized the promotion, some research “shows reading improves mental well-being and reduces stress by over two-thirds.” Chosen by reading groups in the United Kingdom and endorsed by a British mental health professional, the entire list of recommendations is available at LibraryThing. In the meantime, here is a sampling:

The Big Over Easy by Jasper Fforde

Notes From a Small Island by Bill Bryson

The Pursuit of Love by Nancy Mitford

Big Stone Gap by Adriana Trigiani

Cider with Rosie by Laurie Lee

The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett

Resolved

It’s that time of year. Resolutions abound. We want to lose weight, exercise more, spend less and become better people in general. Recently, Stanford psychologist Kelly McGonigal, writing in The Huffington Post, offered some suggested books to help us achieve our 2012 goals. She believes that the best reading may not be in self-help books, but that “sometimes the most life-changing ideas and advice are found in the science section.” Scientific studies often offer “ah ha” moments for changing behaviors, McGonigal believes. Here are a few of her recommendations:

The End of Overeating: Taking Control of the Insatiable American Appetite by David Kessler

Spark: The Revolutionary New Science of Exercise and the Brain by John J. Ratey and Eric Hagerman

Why We Buy: The Science of Shopping: Updated and Revised for the Internet, the Global Consumer and Beyond by Paco Underhill

Carrots and Sticks: Unlock the Power of Incentives to Get Things Done by Ian Ayres

Looking for more help? Check out some of our staff choices on our website at Our Staff Recommends: Books for a New You.

Holiday Stories

Looking for some holiday reading? USA Today recently published a list of novels for the season ("Christmas Novels Spread Holiday Cheer," Dec. 19, 2011). Holiday-themed stories are great last-minute gifts. Here are a few you can preview in our catalog:

The Nine Lives of Christmas by Sheila Roberts

I Am Half-Sick of Shadows by Alan Bradley

His Mistress by Christmas by Victoria Alexander

Lost December by Richard Paul Evans

Hanukkah Lights: Stories of the Season from NPR’s Annual Holiday Special
by National Public Radio

Personality Plus

Nancy Pearl, who the New York Times calls “the talk of librarian circles”, loves books with memorable characters. The librarian and author of the Book Lust series recently shared her favorite "7 Books With Personality" with National Public Radio. Here they are:

In Zanesville by Jo Ann Beard

A World on Fire by Amanda Foreman

Blind Sight by Meg Howrey

The Summer of the Bear by Bella Pollen

By George by Wesley Stace

Vaclav & Lena by Haley Tanner

Down the Mysterly River by Bill Willingham

2011’s Top Fiction at FCPL

As 2011 winds down, this is the season for lists and the Fairfax County Public Library is no exception. Below is a list of the top ten fiction books that library customers checked out this year, compiled by staff in our Collections and Acquisitions Department:

The Confession by John Grisham

Hell’s Corner by David Baldacci

The Help by Kathryn Stockett

The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest by Steig Larson

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Steig Larson

Sing you Home by Jodi Picoult

Toys by James Patterson & Neil McMahon

The Reversal by Michael Connelly

Safe Haven by Nicholas Sparks

Port Mortuary by Patricia Cornwell

Zoo Stories

With last week’s release of Betty White’s Betty & Friends: My Life at the Zoo and the upcoming film version of the memoir, We Bought a Zoo, starring Matt Damon, our nation’s menageries are in the news. USA Today recently interviewed White on her longtime relationship with the Los Angeles Zoo and Botanical Gardens as a trustee, benefactor and volunteer ("For Betty White It's Still Happening at the Zoo" Nov. 29, 2011). She told writer Bob Minzesheimer that she once had a friend named Gita – an Asian elephant, “who liked to have her tongue slapped,” and she was happy to oblige her.

We Bought a Zoo: The Amazing True Story of a Young Family, a Broken Down Zoo, and the 200 Wild Animals that Changed Their Lives Forever by Benjamin Mee relates the trials and tribulations of attempting to restore a dilapidated zoo and the comfort the project brought when tragedy struck the family.

If zoos intrigue you, here are a few more books (and one eVideo) to enjoy:

Life at the Zoo: Behind the Scenes with the Animal Doctors by Philip T. Robinson

Zoo: the Modern Ark by Jake Page

Zoo Story: Life in the Garden of Captives by Thomas French

Babylon’s Ark: The Incredible Wartime Rescue of the Baghdad Zoo by Lawrence Anthony

The New Zoos by PBS (eVideo)

Jane Austen: A Suspicious Death?

A British crime novelist, Lindsey Ashford, suspects Jane Austen’s early death at 41 may have been due to arsenic poisoning, according to The Guardian ("Jane Austen Died From Arsenic Poisoning," Nov. 14, 2011). Several years ago Ashford moved to Chawton, where Austen once lived, and became interested in old volumes of her letters. In one, she recognized Austen complaining of skin discoloration that sounded like symptoms of arsenic poisoning. As a crime writer, she had researched poisons. Arsenic was widely available in Austen’s era, used to treat everything from rheumatism, which Austen complained of, to syphilis.

But, Ashford doesn’t rule out a more nefarious conclusion. "I don't think murder is out of the question," she said. "Having delved into her family background, there was a lot going on that has never been revealed and there could have been a motive for murder.”

An editor for the Cambridge edition of Jane Austen disagrees, reports The Guardian. "I doubt very much she would have been poisoned intentionally. I think it's very unlikely. But the possibility she had arsenic for rheumatism, say, is quite likely," she said. "It's certainly odd that she died quite so young. [But] in the absence of digging her up and finding out, which would not be appreciated, nobody knows what she died of."

If you would like to read more about Austen, here are a few good biographies:

Jane’s Fame: How Jane Austen Conquered the World by Claire Harman

Becoming Jane Austen: A Life by Jon Spence

Searching for Jane Austen by Emily Auerbach

Jane Austen: A Penguin Life by Carol Shields

Jane Austen: A Life by David Nokes

The Best of 2011?

It’s only early November, but Publishers Weekly has released its list of the Best Books of 2011. It includes everything from Tina Fey’s Bossypants to great fiction from Ann Patchett and Jeffrey Eugenides, as well as biographies of Hemingway and Catherine the Great. Below is just a sampling. Let us know what you consider your best reading this year:

The Marriage Plot by Jeffrey Eugenides

The Devil All the Time by David Ray Pollock

Catherine the Great by Robert K. Massie

Hemingway’s Boat by Paul Hendrickson

One Day I Will Write About This Place by Binyavanga Wainaina

The Irresistible Sherlock Holmes

The first new Sherlock Holmes novel authorized by Arthur Conan Doyle’s estate, The House of Silk, was released yesterday, writes USA Today. (Sherlock Holmes: Alive and Well, Nov. 1, 2011).
Penned by Anthony Horowitz, author of the popular Alex Rider books for teens and the public television series “Foyle’s War,” it is but one of several new Holmes-inspired books either just published or in the works.
When Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Holmes’ creator, died in 1930, he had written four novels and 56 stories and didn’t realize he was creating an industry.
My favorite Holmes-inspired mysteries are those by Laurie King. The first in the series is The Beekeeper’s Apprentice, which introduces 18-year-old novice sleuth Mary Russell, who assists the retired Holmes in a new series of mysteries.

Here are a few others that feature the popular Victorian detective:

Sherlock Holmes: The American Years by Michael Kurland

Dust and Shadow: An Account of the Ripper Killers by Dr. John H. Watson
by Lindsay Faye

Ghosts in Baker Street by Martin Greenberg

An Opened Grave: Sherlock Holmes Investigates His Ultimate Case by L. Frank James

Of course there is nothing like the original: The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.

Horrors!

All Hallows Eve is less than a week away and for those who like a good scare, BookList Online, a publishing trade journal and valuable tool for librarians, recently published a list of the 2011’s Top Ten Horror Books. Here is a sampling:

Dust by Joan Frances Turner

Full Dark, No Stars by Stephen King

Ghost Story by Jim Butcher

The Glass Demon by Helen Grant

Jane and the Damned by Janet Mullany

Reading: The Power to Heal

The library has just ordered the well-reviewed Tolstoy and the Purple Chair: My Year of Magical Reading by Nina Sankovitch. In this memoir the author, after the death of a sister, chooses to savor a book a day for a year. One critic writes that her book “reminds us of the most primal function of literature-to heal, to nurture and to connect us to our truest selves."

Sankovitch is not the first writer to discover the nurturing power of the written word. Here are a few more:

The Reading Promise: My Father and the Books We Shared by Alice Ozma

My Reading Life by Pat Conroy

Reading Lolita in Tehran: A Memoir in Books by Azar Nafisi

The Year of Reading Proust: A Memoir in Real Time by Phyllis Rose

The Yellow-Lighted Bookshop: A Memoir, A History by Lewis Buzbee

The Zombie Phenomenon

It’s not everyone’s cup of tea, but zombies seem to have invaded American culture. It began with preteen and teen boys, but now the zombie phenomenon seems to be everywhere. Of course, there is the popularity of AMC’s “The Walking Dead.” Also, authors such as Max Brooks have memorialized the creatures in tongue-in-cheek books such as The Zombie Survival Guide and World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War, soon to be a movie with Brad Pitt. Brooks will discuss “10 Lessons for Surviving a Zombie Attack” on October 25 in the Board Auditorium at the Fairfax County Government Center. Seats are going fast. Sign up here.

A search of our catalog finds 119 items of zombie fiction listed. In addition to Brooks’ two books, here are a few more considered among the best:

Feed by Mira Grant

The Living Dead by John Joseph Adams

Monster Island by David Wellington

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies (and sequels) by Jane Austen and Seth Grahame-Smith

The Supremes

John Paul Stevens, who served on the U.S. Supreme Court for 35 years, has just published Five Chiefs, part memoir and part history of the chief justices of the United States. The 91-year-old Stevens was the third-longest-serving Supreme Court Justice when he retired in 2010.

The book’s appearance coincides with the first Monday in October, the Court’s traditional opening day each year. At 10 a.m. last Monday, the nine justices of the Court gathered to tackle decisions on the complex and controversial issues that will come before them this term. Stevens’ memoir is certainly not the first to offer a glimpse into the sometimes obscure workings of this influential body. If you want to learn a bit more about the nation’s highest court, try the books below. Many more are listed in our catalog. Just search “Supreme Court. United States.”

Making Our Democracy Work: A Judge’s View by Steven Breyer

The Majesty of the Law: Reflections of a Supreme Court Justice by Sandra Day O’Connor

My Grandfather’s Son: A Memoir by Clarence Thomas

The Nine: Inside the Secret World of the Supreme Court by Jeffrey Toobin

The Brethren: Inside the Supreme Court by Bob Woodward

Canine Celebrities

Susan Orlean, a New Yorker writer, best known for The Orchid Thief, a non-fiction account of John LaRoche and his band of Seminoles that poached orchards in south Florida, has now written a biography of Rin-Tin-Tin and his many descendants. One reviewer (“Rin Tin Tin: The Life and Legend,” Christian Science Monitor, Sept. 27, 2011) wrote: the “unfurling narrative of Susan Orlean’s Rin Tin Tin, about the canine movie star, unleashes a cultural history of German shepherds and the changing role of dogs from farm workers to war heroes to pets; the evolution of the motion picture industry from silents to talkies to television; and an exploration of why some cultural icons continue to beguile. ” Place a hold on this unique bio.

While Orlean’s wide-ranging curiosity is a delight, I also wondered what other canines – famous or otherwise – have merited their own bios. Here are a few:

First Friends: American Presidents and Their Best Friends by Roy Rowan

Millie’s Book by Barbara Bush

Shaggy Muses: The Dogs Who Inspired Virginia Woolf, Emily Dickinson, Edith Wharton, Elizabeth Barrett Browning and Emily Bronte by Maureen B. Adams

Laika by Nick Abadzis (Young Adult)

Storm Reading

It’s a bit late, perhaps. But, since we endured both the remnants of hurricanes Irene and Lee in recent weeks, you may want to sample some great fiction and nonfiction devoted to stormy weather. During Irene, The Daily Beast published its list of the best "hurricane lit." Here are some you can curl up with during the next bout of bad weather.

Sudden Sea: The Great Hurricane of 1938 by R.A. Scotti

The Perfect Storm by Sebastian Junger

Typhoon by Joseph Conrad

A High Wind in Jamaica by Richard Hughes

Isaac’s Storm by Erik Larson

Halls of Ivy

“School is a near universal experience,” wrote Rachel Syme in National Public Radio’s “Monkey See” blog last week ("Books With Class: Autumn Books That Bring Back the School Daze," Sept. 10, 2011). She admits that we recall our days of study in many different ways, but whether our memories are fond or otherwise, many reflect on our classroom experiences during the early days of September. Syme recommends five novels that attempt to capture those complex times – sometimes innocent and sometimes not:

A Separate Peace by John Knowles

The Secret History by Donna Tartt

Old School by Tobias Wolff

Prep by Curtis Sittenfeld

The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky

Fiction and 9/11

The BBC recently asked an interesting question online: "Is There a Novel That Defines the 9/11 Decade?" (Aug. 27, 2011). Writer Alizeh Kohari mentions several works of fiction: The Reluctant Fundamentalist by Mohsin Hamid; Incredibly Loud & Extremely Close by Jonathan Safran Foer; and Open City by Teju Cole, but concludes that a decade may not be long enough for a defining novel to emerge. After all, Tolstoy’s War and Peace appeared 50 years after Napoleon invaded Russia. According to Bowker’s Books in Print database, 164 works of fiction have appeared in the past 10 years that deal with the events of 9/11. Whether one of them will endure the test of time – or is still to be written -- may yet be determined.

The library’s catalog lists 40 novels with a 9/11 theme. Here are just a few:

My New American Life by Francine Prose

Falling Man by Don DeLillo

The Submission by Amy Waldman

The Writing on the Wall by Lynn Sharon Schwartz

The Whole World Over by Julia Glass