Author: Ann

Seed Library Opening at 11:45am Today!

- Ann Leave a comment

Tiger’s Eye beans. Swenson Swedish snowpeas. Dragon carrots. Wapsipinicon Peach tomatoes. Grandma Einck’s dill. Grandpa Ott’s morning glorys. French Breakfast radishes. These are all names of heirloom seeds and all of them – and many more! – are now available from the Davenport Library’s Seed Library!

There will be a brief ribbon cutting ceremony on Tuesday, April 19 at 11:45am to kick off this new library program.

The Seed Library has 107 varieties of vegetables, 42 different flowers and 29 herbs. Currently, all of our seeds are from Seed Savers Exchange in Decorah, Iowa and all of them are heirloom varieties (some seeds were purchased and some are from a grant from Seed Savers). Many of these varieties have interesting stories about how they were handed down through different generations and how they were prized for their delicious flavors and ease of growing.

Sometime after World War II, the US population moved away from a largely agriculture background and to a more urban one. Farming and gardening habits faded away just as Madison Avenue advertising executives decided Americans only wanted to buy perfect, unblemished vegetables and only flowers suitable for bouquets. To meet these imagined desires, plants were bred to produce vegetables and flowers that were uniform in color and size and able to withstand long-distance shipping without damage. This meant that flavor (and in the case of flowers, fragrance) was sacrificed for uniformity and many heirloom seeds were in danger of disappearing altogether. Seed Savers is dedicated to preserving  unique varieties before they are lost. By growing some of these heirloom seeds in your own backyard you too are helping to keep them alive.

To participate in this program, stop by the Davenport Library Main library at 321 Main Street and browse our notebook which has entries for every seed that we carry, plus basic growing tips. Choose up to five varieties of seeds per family per month (we have checklists that you can use to mark your choices) Library staff will pull your seeds for you. Be sure to log your choices in the Seed Log – there will be a drawing for a garden gift basket on May 1 from the names listed in the log! Now the fun begins – growing your seeds! If you post about your seeds on social media, be sure to tag us @davenportlibrary and use #dplseeds.

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Our Woman in Moscow by Beatriz Williams

- Ann Leave a comment

At the height of the Cold War, with fears running high and no one can be trusted, a woman must make a risky journey into the Soviet Union to save her sister in Our Woman in Moscow by Beatriz Williams.

Ruth Macallister hasn’t spoken to her sister Iris since 1940, when a serious disagreement forced them to part on difficult terms. Ruth leaves for the United States while Ruth remains in a Europe to stay with a US Embassy official, Sasha Digby, whom she has fallen in love with. Hurt feelings, the war and distance prevents reconciliation. When Iris, her husband and their children disappear in 1948 and it’s discovered that Sasha has been spying for the Soviet Union, Ruth doesn’t know if they’ve defected or been eliminated by the Soviets. With no word she carries on with her life as a successful career woman in New York and puts that part of her life behind her.

The past is brought back in full force when in 1952, out of the blue, Iris sends Ruth a postcard that appears to be a distress signal. Within days, Ruth has joined a daring plot to rescue her sister when she poses as the wife of Sumner Fox, an American counterintelligence agent. Together they fly to Moscow, where Ruth sees Iris again for the first time in 12 years.

What follows is a tense, emotional and dangerous flight from the Soviet Union in a precarious dash for freedom. There are plot twists, flashbacks to the past, the revealing of secrets all bound by the fierce love between sisters.

This is a great read full of intrigue and hold-your-breath moments. If you are following the Online Reading Challenge this year, this book is one of the alternate titles for the April Book Flight,  which explores women spies, intelligence work and sacrifice.

Code Name Verity by Elizabeth Wein

- Ann Leave a comment

This gem of a book is a compelling combination of hope and tragedy, of sacrifice and friendship, of loyalty and brilliant  intelligence and of trust and love in Code Name Verity by Elizabeth Wein.

Maddie is a working class girl who dreams of becoming a pilot. “Verity” is  casually wealthy and carefree. Despite their very different backgrounds, they become fast friends, creating  an unbreakable bond that strengthens and deepens as they train to be spies in World War II.

In 1943 the two women are to sent to war-torn France on a spy mission. However, their plane crashes behind enemy lines; “Verity” is captured by the Gestapo while the Maddie is left for dead. The French Resistance is able to help Maddie and she begins searching, against all hope, for “Verity”.

Meanwhile, “Verity” is being tortured by the Nazi’s for information. After horrible pain and suffering, she agrees to write out her confession which she promises will provide information on the Allies and their plans. This is where the book opens, with “Verity’s” confession except that she is taking her time, writing in detail about her friendship with Maddie and other stories unrelated to the war, with just enough information sprinkled throughout that the Germans allow her to continue.

This book is often heartbreaking, but it also has a lot of humor and even joy. The friendship gives both women, even when they’re apart, great strength and perseverance. And the ending holds a brilliant twist. Highly recommended.

If you are joining us for the 2022 Online Reading Challenge, this title works perfectly with our April theme of women spies, intelligence work and sacrifice.

Online Reading Challenge – April

- Ann Leave a comment

Welcome Readers!

It’s time for a new Online Reading Challenge assignment! Our theme is female spies, intelligence work and sacrifice. There are some brilliant books to explore this month, covering spycraft from World War I through the Cold War. I highly recommend The Alice Network and Code Name Verity, two of my favorite books, and I also recommend Our Woman in Moscow.

This month’s main title is The Alice Network by Kate Quinn. In 1915, Eve Gardiner burns to join the fight against the Germans and unexpectedly gets her chance to serve when she’s recruited to work as a spy for the English. Sent into enemy-occupied France during The Great War, she’s trained by the mesmerizing Lili, the “Queen of Spies”, who manages a vast network of secret agents, right under the enemy’s nose. Thirty years later, haunted by the betrayal that ultimately tore apart the Alice Network, Eve spends her days drunk and secluded in her crumbling London house until a young American barges in uttering a name Eve hasn’t heard in decades, and launching them both on a mission to find the truth … no matter where it leads.

This title is also available as an e-book and an e-audiobook.

Alternate titles include: Code Girls: the untold story of the American women code breakers of World War II by Liza Mundy. This documents the contributions of more than ten thousand American women who served as codebreakers during World War II, detailing how their efforts shortened the war, saved countless lives, and enabled their subsequent careers.

Our Woman in Moscow by Beatriz Williams. Autumn, 1948: Iris Digby, her American diplomat husband Sasha, and their two children vanish from London. Were they eliminated by the Soviet intelligence service? Or have the Digbys defected to Moscow with a trove of the West’s most vital secrets? Four years later Ruth Macallister receives a postcard from Iris, the twin sister she hasn’t seen since their catastrophic parting in Rome in the summer of 1940. Now Ruth is on her way to Moscow, posing as the wife of counterintelligence agent Sumner Fox in a precarious plot to extract the Digbys from behind the Iron Curtain.

This title is also available in Large Print and as an e-book.

American Spy by Lauren Wilkinson. It’s 1986, the heart of the Cold War, and Marie Mitchell is an intelligence officer with the FBI. She’s brilliant, but she’s also a young black woman working in an old boys’ club. Her career has stalled out, so when she’s given the opportunity to join a shadowy task force aimed at undermining Thomas Sankara, the charismatic revolutionary president of Burkina Faso whose Communist ideology has made him a target for American intervention, she says yes. In the year that follows, Marie will observe Sankara, seduce him, and ultimately have a hand in the coup that will bring him down. But doing so will change everything she believes about what it means to be a spy, a lover, a sister, and a good American.

This title is also available as an e-audiobook.

Code Name Verity by Elizabeth Wein. In 1943, a British fighter plane crashes in Nazi-occupied France and the survivor tells a tale of friendship, war, espionage, and great courage as she relates what she must to survive while keeping secret all that she can.

This title is also available as a Book on CD and as an e-book.

Check for these titles and more featured in displays at each of the Davenport Library buildings!

New at the Library!

- Ann 2 Comments

We’re so excited to tell you about another new service at the Davenport Library!

Want to add some instant curb appeal to your house? Is your yard looking tired and worn after the winter months? Spring is (mostly) here which makes it the perfect time to turn your attention to your yard! Become the envy of the neighborhood with a little help from the library! Freshen up your space with our new Garden Library service!

The Garden Library is easy to use. Simply look through our catalog of available plants – which include trees, shrubs and perennials – and choose your favorites. (TIP: If you need help deciding, you can use our Book a Librarian service for expert design advice!). Our inventory includes ornamental and fruit trees, shrubs of all kinds and perennials such as peonies, daylilies, hosta and black-eye susan. Your yard will become vibrant and colorful in no time!

Plants are available at all three of our locations – check the catalog for availability. Plants check out for three weeks and can be renewed one time if no one else has reserved it. To return the plant, please dig it up and return it to the library building that you checked it out from – be mindful of the plant’s root system! Any damaged foliage or infestation of disease or insects will be billed to your account. Overdue fees are $1 per day per item.

Now get out there and start dreaming up your perfect yard!

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Haha! April Fool! We do not – I repeat, do not – have live garden plants for you to check out! Libraries have a huge variety of products and services to borrow (for instance, we have wi-fi Hotspots, video games, e-books, guitars and movies among many other items!) but it’s unlikely we’ll be lending out trees (imagine having to dig it up again after three weeks!) anytime soon/ever!

However, we DO have a new garden-related service which will be arriving on April 19 – a Seed Library! Our Seed Library, which will be housed at the Main library, is made up of envelopes that contain a small number of seeds, which you will be able to take to plant in your own garden. You are not required to return the seeds! We have (through a combination of purchasing and a grant) a wide variety of vegetable, herb and flower seeds, all of which have been obtained from Seed Savers Exchange in Decorah, Iowa. These seeds are all heirloom varieties, many of which you won’t find in seed racks at the store and many of which have interesting stories, having traveled from across the world and preserved for generations in family gardens.

Watch this space and other Library media outlets for more information and plan on stopping by the Main library starting on  April 19 to take a look at the Seed Library and pick up a few gems for your own garden!

 

Online Reading Challenge – March Wrap-Up

- Ann 2 Comments

Hello Fellow Readers!

How did your reading go this month? Did you read our main title, Station Eleven, or did you find something else to read?

Station Eleven is one of my favorite books, but it can be difficult to read at times. The fear, the isolation, the unrelenting unknown can sometimes cut a little too close to what we went through with Covid. Fortunately, Covid was not quite as deadly or as fast acting (although close enough) to the flu that swept through the population in Station Eleven and while our world has not changed as dramatically as it did in the book, it is different from what was before.

One thing I love about Station Eleven is the traveling band of actors and musicians, spreading a little bit of culture and beauty, that despite all of the loss and heartbreak, humans crave something more. (The quote from Star Trek that Mandel uses reflects this beautifully – “survival is not enough”) The traveling band provides some relief, a sense of community and ties to a past that is gone forever. I also liked how the passage of time after their pandemic is shown, how the “before” time slowly become stories and legends – it made me wonder about our history and how much of it has faded and shifted over time.

In the end I found Station Eleven to be full of hope – that good still exists, that humans can adapt and move forward, that even at the end of the world, there is reason to carry on.

How did you feel about the book you read this month? Was there a theme of fear and isolation in, but also optimism for the future? Or were people too burdened by grief and heartbreak? How do the worlds in each book look different from before and after? What are the lasting affects on the survivors? Has your thinking about the past and how stories are remembered changed? How are memories an imperfect record of the past, but also powerful reminders?

Let us know in the comments what you thought of this month’s reading challenge!

The Diamond Eye by Kate Quinn

- Ann 1 Comment

I really hesitated to post this review. I read this book several months ago, before it was published, with a Reader’s Advance copy. As a fan of Kate Quinn I couldn’t wait to read it and, typical of Quinn’s other titles, I couldn’t put it down. Since then, the world has changed dramatically and, while this book takes place in 1941 during World War II, the locations and circumstances are eerily, heartbreakingly similar to the current situation in Ukraine. Please read with caution.

All Mila Pavlichenko wants to do with her life is study, work as an archivist and raise her son. Unfortunately, history intervenes and she is forced into a role she never wanted when Germany invades her homeland in World War II in The Diamond Eye by Kate Quinn.

While war had been simmering for months, Germany’s invasion into the Soviet Union is sudden and brutal. Mila’s careful and ordered life is thrown into chaos and she volunteers for the army almost immediately. Having been part of a shooting club while in school, she already knows how to shoot. Her sharp eye and steady hand soon advance her to sniper and she is soon recognized as one of the best. Mila is tough, determined and nearly fearless making daring forays into enemy territory to hit the enemy at it’s weakest points.

Her job is also incredibly dangerous. More than once Mila is shot as the Germans learn how to locate and eliminate the snipers that harass their troops. The Germans refer to her as Lady Death, a lethal hunter of Nazis. She also suffers the loss of fellow soldiers, many of whom she has relied on to watch her back and provide back-up. Yet the war grinds on, bloody and unforgiving.

When Mila records her three hundredth kill she is declared a national heroine and the Soviet government pulls her from the battlefields and sends her on a goodwill tour of America. Still suffering from serious wounds and devastated by loss, Mila is leery of and isolated from the glittering world of Washington, DC, so shockingly different from the battlefields. She strikes up an unexpected friendship with First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt – who seems to understand that Mila is worn down by grief behind the facade of the perfect Soviet soldier – and is then thrust into a deadly duel with another sniper.

As with Kate Quinn’s other titles (The Alice Network, The Huntress and The Rose Code), The Diamond Eye is based on a true story about an incredibly strong-willed woman who sets aside her own personal comfort to defend and protect. It is sharp and fast-moving and frequently devastating, a reflection of the sacrifice shown in the book.

The reason I had so many doubts about posting the review is that it takes place in Ukraine (although Ukraine was part of the Soviet Union during World War II) and much of the action takes place in Kyiv and Odessa. It is different governments and different enemies, but here is Ukraine in 2022, fighting again for their homeland and suffering devastating losses. It is difficult to read now, but it is also a reminder of how history repeats itself and how freedom and democracy are never a sure thing, but must be defended always.

 

Hurrah! It’s Spring!

- Ann Leave a comment

While an Iowa spring is usually a bit slow and hesitant to appear, it is on the way! Time to start planning your garden. Here are the latest books available at the library to inspire you.

Four Season Food Gardening by Misilla Dela Llana. Unlike most other vegetable gardening books this one approaches the subject through the lens of what you can grow during each of the four seasons, even if you live in a cold climate. Using season-extension techniques, such as cold frames, mini hoop houses, and thick mulches, combined with a thoughtful mixture of annual and perennial crops, you’ll discover that eating from your backyard through all 12 months is possible.

The Garden Refresh: how to give your yard a big impact on a small budget by Kier Holmes. This is a thoughtful, accessible, and creative guide for the savvy home gardener on how to create a beautiful, productive and healthy garden without spending crazy amounts of cash or using an excess of Earth’s valuable natural resources.

Grow More Food : a vegetable gardener’s guide to getting the biggest harvest possible from a space of any size by Colin McCrate. How to plan your garden carefully, maximize production in every bed, get the most out of every plant, scale up systems to maximize efficiency, and expand the harvest season with succession planting, intercropping, and season extension

Grow Now: how we can save our health, communities and planet – one garden at a time by Emily Murphy. We now recognize that plots in towns and cities are critical to supporting planetary diversity, and by instituting organic, regenerative practices and growing some of our own food, we can sequester carbon as well as shift toward living in a more ecologically responsible way.

Midwest Gardener’s Handbook: all you need to know to plan, plant and maintain a Midwest garden by Melinda Myers.  gardeners in the north central US are handed all the know-how they’ll need to grow a lush, productive garden.

 

The Elegant and Edible Garden: design a dream kitchen garden to fit your personality, desires and lifestyle by Linda Vater. Learn how to create a one-of-a-kind food garden that’s just as beautiful as it is functional.

 

Gardening for Everyone: growing vegetable, herbs and more at home by Julia Watkins. An author and sustainability expert shares how to grow vegetables, fruits, and herbs in a backyard garden, providing detailed information on creating and caring for a garden including planning, building, planting, tending, and harvesting.

Online Reading Challenge – March

- Ann Leave a comment

Hello Fellow Readers!

It’s time for a new Book Flight! This month our books focus on pandemics and how individuals react to a post-pandemic world. There is exploration of what was lost and how to move forward, the search for answers and cures and basic survival. They are not without hope though, as the protagonists in each title grow and change and even thrive.

Pandemics are not new to human history with the bubonic plague and the 1918 influenza being two of the most notable. Because we are still recovering from COVID-19, some of the subject matter may be triggering. Please read with caution!

This month’s main title is Station Eleven by Emily St John Mandel. Written before 2020 and the arrival of COVID-19, it nevertheless has several eerie similarities.

One snowy night Arthur Leander, a famous actor, has a heart attack onstage during a production. Jeevan Chaudhary, is in the audience and leaps to his aid. A child actress named Kirsten Raymonde watches in horror as Jeevan performs CPR, pumping Arthur’s chest as the curtain drops, but Arthur is dead. That same night, as Jeevan walks home from the theater, a terrible flu begins to spread. Hospitals are flooded and Jeevan and his brother barricade themselves inside as life disintegrates outside. This novel charts the strange twists of fate that connect five people: the actor, the man who tried to save him, the actor’s first wife, his oldest friend, and a young actress with the Traveling Symphony, caught in the crosshairs of a dangerous self-proclaimed prophet.

This book is also available as an e-book on Libby.

Alternate titles are: Year of Wonders by Geraldine Brooks

This gripping historical novel is based on the true story of Eyam, the “Plague Village,” in the rugged mountain spine of England. In 1666, a tainted bolt of cloth from London carries bubonic infection to this isolated settlement of shepherds and lead miners. A visionary young preacher convinces the villagers to seal themselves off in a deadly quarantine to prevent the spread of disease. The story is told through the eyes of eighteen-year-old Anna Frith, the vicar’s maid, as she confronts the loss of her family, the disintegration of her community, and the lure of a dangerous and illicit love. As the death toll rises and people turn from prayers and herbal cures to sorcery and murderous witch-hunting, Anna emerges as an unlikely and courageous heroine in the village’s desperate fight to save itself.

Also available as an e-book on Libby.

Ghost Map by Steven Johnson

A chronicle of Victorian London’s worst cholera outbreak traces the day-by-day efforts of Dr. John Snow, who put his own life on the line in his efforts to prove his previously dismissed contagion theory about how the epidemic was spreading.

As Bright as Heaven by Susan Meissner

In 1918, Philadelphia was a city teeming with promise. Even as its young men went off to fight in the Great War, there were opportunities for a fresh start on its cobblestone streets. Into this bustling town, came Pauline Bright and her husband, filled with hope that they could now give their three daughters a chance at a better life. Their dreams are short-lived. Just months after they arrive, the Spanish Flu reaches the shores of America. As the pandemic claims more than twelve thousand victims in their adopted city, they find their lives left with a world that looks nothing like the one they knew. But even as they lose loved ones, they take in a baby orphaned by the disease who becomes their single source of hope. Amidst the tragedy and challenges that surround them, they learn what they cannot live without–and what they are willing to do about it.

Also available in Large Print and as an e-book on Libby.

The Pull of the Stars by Emma Donoghue

A novel set in 1918 Dublin offers a three-day look at a maternity ward during the height of the Great Flu pandemic. In an Ireland doubly ravaged by war and disease, Nurse Julia Power works at an understaffed hospital in the city center, where expectant mothers who have fallen sick are quarantined into a separate ward to keep the plague at bay. Into Julia’s regimented world step two outsiders, a woman doctor who is a rumored Rebel, and a teenage girl, Bridie, procured by the nuns from their orphanage as an extra set of hands.
Also available as an e-book and an e-audio book, both on Libby.
I actually read Station Eleven shortly after it was published in 2015 (and I loved it – highly recommended) so I’m going to read As Bright as Heaven for this month’s challenge. I think this will be an interesting and eye-opening month of reading!

Online Reading Challenge – February Wrap-Up

- Ann Leave a comment

Hello Challenge Readers!

How did your February reading go? Did you enjoy your book of choice? Or did you pass on this month’s Book Flight?

Our main title for February was A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles. This is one of my favorite books – I read it a few months ago and can’t say enough good things about it. The writing, the plot, the building of tension, the twist at the end, the characters, all work together to create something beautiful and intricate, heartbreaking yet hopeful.

In A Gentleman in Moscow,  Count Alexander Rostov is accused of writing subversive essays against the Bolshevik government and is sentenced to house arrest in 1922. Striped of his wealth and all but a few possessions, Rostov now lives in an attic room of the luxurious Metropol, a grand hotel situated across from the Kremlin. It is from here that Rostov witnesses some of the most tumultuous decades in Russian history.

This brief overview makes the book seem dark and depressing but in fact, it is filled with humor, fascinating characters and people enjoying life no matter the challenges. I found that this was an optimistic and uplifting book and enjoyed it immensely.

Since I had already read the main selection, I read one of the alternatives, The Martian by Andy Weir. Set in the future, a group of astronauts are exploring the surface of Mars. An unexpected, violent storm forces the astronauts race to their ship.  In the midst of the chaos the crew believes that one of the astronauts, Mark Watney, has died. Barely escaping, they leave the planet and begin their return trip to Earth. However, Mark is very much alive. He now faces nearly impossible odds and must use ingenuity, skill and grim determination to keep himself fed, sheltered and safe while somehow figuring out how to let everyone back on Earth that he is here and he is alive.

I really enjoyed this book. Watching Mark figure out how to grow his own food, survive the harsh Martian climate and communicate with Earth was fascinating. I have read some comments that the science in this book isn’t always accurate, but I think that misses the point. What I saw was someone that didn’t give up, that was constantly thinking outside the box and making the best of a terrible situation. There’s quite a bit of humor too, and lots of tension that makes it difficult to put the book down! An excellent read.

February’s theme was of isolation and resilience. In all four of the books from the “flight”, the protagonist becomes isolated, either voluntarily or forced by circumstance. How did they react to their isolation? Each had to find new depths within themselves to survive – did they simply survive or were they able to thrive and grow? What, if any, pieces of their past do they have to confront? How are they different from the person at the beginning of each book, to the person they’ve become by the end of the book?

I was struck by the resilience and optimism of the main character in each of these books, how difficulties were turned into opportunities and how each learns both practical lessons and about themselves when problems arise, how isolation forces them to rely on themselves and creates clarity and empowerment.

How did you feel about this month’s reading? Let us know in the comments!