Staff Reviews: Books, Films, Music, and More

 

Cándida Miniño, Outreach Librarian, recommends the film, Bullet Train.

This action-packed dark comedy film follows the hitman (code name Ladybug) who believes he is the unluckiest in the world because his jobs, though successful, usually end up becoming harder than expected. 

His handler gives him the job to retrieve a suitcase on board the Shinkansen, the Japanese bullet train.  

What starts as an easy job starts becoming increasingly difficult as different hitmen converge on the train for reasons that intersect in the end. 

The first half of the film introduces all these characters and their mostly violent backgrounds. After that, the story unfolds, showing how the characters are interconnected, why they are aboard the train, and how karma plays its part for a satisfying ending. 

I found this bloody, funny movie and its memorable assassins like Lemon, who “reads people” by comparing them to the engine characters in the Thomas and Friends series, very entertaining. 

Find it on DVD here.

Find the book on which the film is based here.

Kelley Moulton, Regional History Librarian, recommends Prisoners of Geography: Ten Maps That Explain Everything About the World by Tim Marshall.

I love maps. A map can tell us the political boundaries created by conquerors or leaders and at the same time show the natural boundaries and history as told by the rivers and mountains. One of the most memorable classes I took in college was a geography class. It involved memorizing physical attributes like rivers and mountains. The professor also encouraged us to think about geography beyond the lines representing the natural barriers, and to look at the political geography of the continents.

According to Merriam-Webster, political geography is “a branch of geography that deals with human governments, the boundaries and subdivisions of political units (such as nations or states).Political geography plays a huge role in the politics and cultures of each and every country, throughout history and to this day.

Prisoners of Geography: Ten Maps That Explain Everything About the World by Tim Marshall examines several scenarios in which geography has played a role in both the political history of various countries and continents as well as the impact that can still be felt because of the boundaries created by nature. Each of the main chapters looks at either a different continent or set of countries, tied together in some way.

“In the end, we might all be prisoners of geography. For better or for worse, only time will determine.”  

For example, Western Europe covers a whole chapter and within those pages, Marshall does a small dive into why Europe was able to boom and at the same time have so many different cultures and languages develop in a relatively small area. Other chapters focus on the African continent, India and Pakistan, and the Arctic to name a few. 

Marshall admits that geography is not the only element in play regarding any of these countries and continents. Trade, technology, and politics all play a huge part in the world in which we live.

In the end, we might all just be prisoners of geography. Geography, people, politics, and countries are all constantly changing. For better or for worse, only time will determine.

Find it in print and eaudiobook here.

Misty Sohl, Gold Mine Drop-off Manager, recommends Legends, a reggae DVD by Bob Marley.

I have a passion for music. 

When you really love something, you often don’t give it a second thought. Without you realizing, it becomes a must in your life.  Like food or water, you can’t imagine it not being there. It’s a part of you. That’s how music is to me.

There are no limitations in the form of music. It is a very powerful medium to reach a person’s emotions and expressions that go beyond the words. It has been scientifically proven that music has helped people get out of mental and physical illnesses.

One of my favorite forms of music is reggae. The rhythm of reggae calms me down and sets my heart at ease.  

Music has been one of the most important things throughout my life. It has always been there for me. Living without music would be impossible for me. It has helped me face some difficult situations in my life and has helped me motivate myself. Some music resembles the journey of my life. I love listening to music while driving.

One of my favorite forms of music is reggae. The rhythm of reggae calms me down and sets my heart at ease.  Reggae is often about empowerment, love, equality, and just feeling good.  Some of my favorite reggae singers are Bob Marley, Peter Tosh, Gregory Isaacs, Ziggy and Damian Marley and Yellowman. But these are just a few. I encourage anyone going on vacation or just spring cleaning to have a listen to this medicinal style of music.  

Find Bob Marley’s “Legend” here.

Craig Barry, Managing Director of the Gold Mine Stores, recommends The True Cost, a documentary film by Michael Ross.

A cornerstone of the Gold Mine’s success is the clothing it sells.  And while we sell plenty of housewares, sporting goods and books, it would appear that our patrons’ main shopping motivation is fashion.

I wanted to find out more about a phenomenon I’ve been hearing about called “fast fashion”.  In the past, fashion houses and leading clothing stores would unveil their fashion lines on more of a seasonal basis. Problem is you can only sell so much in a “season” before what’s fashionable fades into being unfashionable.  To address this, businesses worked to shorten the fashion cycle – instead of a seasonal cycle, why not a monthly or even weekly cycle? Shortened fashion cycles prime the pump and profits.

The problem with this is how do you increasingly make more clothing at a quicker pace and at a price that people could afford on, say, a weekly basis – enter “fast fashion”.

The True Cost documentary traces just how this fast fashion trend has fueled clothing consumption and exacerbated labor and environmental issues abroad, all while corporations fattened their bottom lines.

Economies across the planet have long embraced the global economy, searching for ways to drive down costs, boost profits and become more competitive in the marketplace. The fashion industry is ideally suited for moving abroad. The industry moved quickly to locate production to where labor was less expensive, environmental regulations looser and materials cheap. Now to be sure, the fashion industry is not the only industry to make this move but it is an industry in which the labor needed is largely low skill.

The True Cost documentary traces just how this fast fashion trend has fueled clothing consumption and exacerbated labor and environmental issues abroad, all while corporations fattened their bottom lines. The documentary reveals how an industry has worked to change how we use clothing from articles that we use to pieces that we use up, disposing of them with the next fashion cycle.

While second hand stores, like the Gold Mine, won’t reverse this global economy, we can slow it down. So the next time you’re buying something from or donating to a second hand store, you are lengthening the fashion cycle, making an important contribution to strengthening the sustainability of the clothing industry and bolstering your local economy and The Community Library.

Find The True Cost in the Library’s DVD Collection, here.

Lee Dabney, Children’s Librarian and Story Time leader, recommends This Little Kitty by Karen Obuhanych.

If you are a regular attendee of Monday-morning story times, you know that I am a self-professed crazy-cat person. So when This Little Kitty by Karen Obuhanych showed up on the new picture book display, I was thrilled.

This sweet and hilarious book does not disappoint. Obuhanych’s crisp and bright illustrations are enough to satisfy any cat lover, but accompanied with her rhyming text, she demonstrates her deep and nuanced understanding of cat behavior.

Please come down and see us in the children’s section of the Community Library to check out This Little Kitty or one of the hundreds of other amazing picture books in our collection. I guarantee there is a book waiting to delight you.

Children’s Librarian, Judy Zimmer, recommends Farmhouse by Sophie Blackall.

Caldecott medalist Sophie Blackall’s picture book Farmhouse brought me back to my childhood. It brought back memories of my grandparents’ farm and the house I grew up in, built at the very end of the 1800s and filled with a boisterous, large family.   

The story and the illustrations in Farmhouse were pieced together from bits and pieces and memories of a family of twelve children who were born and raised in a falling-down farmhouse. Playful rhymes describe the daily life of the family and the illustrations allow a  peek into their lives as if you’re looking inside a dollhouse.

This story reminds us to share our stories with our children and grandchildren so that the stories stay alive long after our children grow up. 

The family’s and the author’s stories merge when she addresses the reader directly telling them how she found the house and created the picture book. Photos of the house and the salvaged materials and more details are revealed on the back pages of the book.  

This story reminds us to share our stories with our children and grandchildren so that the stories stay alive long after our children grow up. 

Find it in Picture Books J EASY BLA here.