Hello all – I am your newest Cook blogger. I have always been a reader, getting my first library card at age eight when my reading obsession was Mozart biographies. As I have grown so have my reading interests which now range from mystery and romance to science and historical fiction. I like it all.…
“Let me just exist with you, happier than ever.” For much of his life, Canadian actor Elliot Page experienced gender dysphoria that made him extremely uncomfortable in his own body. The intense pressure Page felt to dress and act in a certain way almost drove him to quit show business during the aftermath of his…
A Career in Books, written and illustrated by Kate Gavino, might feel both fresh and familiar to anyone who enjoys watching The Bold Type. Three Asian American women graduate from college and secure jobs in the publishing industry. Shirin, Silvia, and Nina share a tiny apartment, nicknamed “the hallway,” in New York City. We follow…
Ten years ago this month, the Cook Memorial Public Library launched The Past is Present blog to help patrons learn about local history within our library district. We are proud to have shared over 120 posts and podcasts during the past decade. Thanks to the librarians who have researched and written posts on a variety…
Staying is not always a choice, and I have lived and lost enough to know that. But the way I think about grief is that it is the great tug-of-war, and sometimes the flag is on the side you don’t want it to be on. And sometimes, the game has exhausted all of its joy,…
As superpowers go, time travel seems like the best one for a bookish person -- it would let you loop back around as needed, until every last page was read. Then again, time loops, as anyone who has ever watched Groundhog Day can tell you, are tricky things. Holly Smale's adult debut, Cassandra in Reverse…
New York Times bestselling author and master of nonfiction spy thrillers Larry Loftis writes the first major biography of Corrie ten Boom, a Dutch watchmaker who saved the lives of hundreds of Jews during WWII—at the cost of losing her family and being sent to a concentration camp, only to survive, forgive her captors, and…
It's possible that the biggest race ever held at the One Mile track was not a horse race, but an automobile race. The event took place in August 1913 and made headlines in the the Lake County Independent: "Biggest Race Carnival of Year at Libertyville,” “Speed Kings of Country to Race at Libertyville” and “World’s…
Brave the Wild River: the untold story of two women who mapped the botany of the Grand Canyon by Melissa L. Sevigny is a narrative nonfiction "genre bender". Part history, part adventure story, and part popular science work, this fun-loving book might be perfect to read during a camping trip. Botanists Elzeda Clover and Lois…
Creating special language to influence people’s behavior and beliefs is so effective in part simply because speech is the first thing we’re willing to change about ourselves . . . and also the last thing we let go.” Amanda Montell, Cultish: The Language of Fanaticism What makes cults so captivating? What makes them powerful? And could cult influence…
