Posts from Mid-Manhattan Library

You are what you eat is the common adage, but What you eat describes who you are is more appropriate for circa 1960s Madison Avenue and New York City.

The power lunch. Two-for-one happy hour. The business dinner. A sandwich from the corner diner. Scotch at 11am.

Food and drink play an important role in Mad Men.

For this month's Reader's Den, we'll be hosting an online book discussion of Will Eisner's The Contract With God Trilogy: Life on Dropsie Aveue. This is only the second time we have featured a graphic novel (the first was Joe Sacco's Palestine in October 2010).

Tinta, Papel, y...Café, una serie de tertulias que nace en la biblioteca Mid-Manhattan, cuenta con un grupo muy interesante de participantes. Todas tienen una historia que contar, como lo demostraron los escritos leídos el primer día de la reunión. Poemas que nos hicieron añorar nuestros países de origen, relatos que parecían haber sido sacados de un mundo garcíamarquezco, historias neoyorquinas come de película, relatos biográficos que nos sacaron más de una lágrima.

This summer at Mid-Manhattan Library: revisit the vital, gritty streets of 1970s New York City on Film, discuss great NYC books online with Reader's Den, and relax as librarian Lois Moore reads you short stories from The New Yorker and New York-based authors during Mixed Bag.

All of these events are part of our summer reading program for older teens and adults called NYC Summer. Watch this space for announcements of even more events and book recommendations! You can also quickly access this page at: bit.ly/nycsummer-nypl.

Well, here we are past the end of April and that means it's my final post for A Visit from the Goon Squad.

Even though the Reader's Den will be moving on to a new book in May, you can always read previous posts and comment on them.

How important were navies to the outcome of the Civil War? What's the key to preparing delicious meatless meals? What in the world is mycophilia? Who conceived and engineered Grand Central Terminal? What was Jewish New York at the turn of the 20th century? What is it like to be a refugee in the United States? How did Joseph P. Kennedy get from East Boston to Washington's inner circle? How did one man's incurable amnesia provide invaluable insight to neuroscientists?

I recently caught the end of an NPR program that hosted the author Aleksandar Hemon. Upon hearing the gentle sound of his voice on the radio speaking about his newest and first work of non-fiction, The Book of My Lives, I immediately placed it on reserve. When the book arrived and I saw the cover art, there was a picture of what Hemon describes as a blue alien, and though still prepared to read the book, I also kept hoping that it was not going to be a book of essays that included science fiction.

Welcome back to the Reader’s Den. In the early chapters of A Visit from the Goon Squad we meet Bennie Salazar. In his middle age Bennie is divorced, has a son and works as a record company executive. But Bennie fondly remembers his days playing bass in a punk rock band.

Jeff Stone is one busy guy. A Detroit native, he is an avid mountain biker and martial artist in addition to being an author of several children's books. I read his latest book last year, the first in a new series, and throughly enjoyed it. I had a few questions for Mr. Stone about most recent work, his diverse cast of characters, and what's next for him. I thought it was only fair to share his amazing responses with all of you. 

The April 2013 theme for Mixed Bag: Story Time for Grown-Ups is 'Ambrose Bierce: Civil War Stories.' One hundred fifty years ago the American Civil War (1861-1865) was in mid-course, and April was a significant month in its history. The Battle of Shiloh was fought on April 6-7, 1862 in southwestern Tennessee. The Surrender at Appomattox Court House was on April 9, 1865. President Abraham Lincoln was assassinated at Ford's Theatre in Washington, D.C. on April 14, 1865, coincidentally the evening of Good Friday.

Visit NYPL's BiblioCommons for these lists and many more. See below for some interesting staff picks from the past couple months, on topics both timely and timeless:

Hello readers. This month the Reader's Den is reading A Visit from the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan.

Titles and cover images often give readers a clue as to what lies within a book but I admit I was baffled about this one. 

A guitar and a goon squad? It didn't make sense. On the other hand, A Visit from the Good Squad was awarded a Pulitzer Prize (2011) and a National Book Critics Circle Award (2010). Plus, it was always checked out. I thought maybe I should give it a chance.

Classic New York City architecture, the cleverness of crows, the real Toscanini, being good, color and commerce, anarchists, a call to secularism, the Asian underground railroad, gourmet food carts, escaping the Nazis, environmental crisis, structural tile vaulting and sexual discrimination in the workplace. What do these disparate topics have in common?

Hear the audio version of this blog post. Narration: Kevin Gillins. Music performed by La Capella Reial de Catalunya; Le Concert des Nations; conductor: Jordi Savall.

I am looking at Monet's Weeping Willow series and want to describe these works to people who cannot see. I think music, with its sensual and dramatic language will most elegantly convey the power of these works.

I hope you have enjoyed reading Leaving the Atocha Station by Ben Lerner. Listed below are suggestions of novels, poetry and non-fiction that might also be of interest to you.

The author of Leaving the Atocha Station, Ben Lerner, is originally from Kansas and has a BA in political science and an MFA in creative writing from Brown University. He was a 2003-2004 Fulbright Scholar in Spain and he currently teaches in the English Department at Brooklyn College. Leaving the Atocha Station is Lerner's first novel, but he has several published books of poetry and critical works.

Developed by Yager and published by 2K Games, Spec Ops: The Line (2012) has been one of the most-discussed video games of the past year.

Imagine a world gone mad, where everyone seems to be after you behind a backdrop of pointless, unending war. All you want to do is protect your newborn child from danger, but it looms whatever just beyond every path you take.

Welcome to the Reader's Den for March. This month we will be discussing Leaving the Atocha Station by Ben Lerner. It is a novel set in Spain, written by a New York author. The novel follows Adam Gordon to Madrid in 2004 on a fellowship to write poetry influenced by the Spanish Civil War. We learn about Adam's relationships as a poet-tourist-student and his process of writing and self-discovery through experiences outside of his control.