All three Davenport Public Library Branches are closed today, Monday, May 29th in observance of Memorial Day. Normal business hours will resume on Tuesday, May 30th.
Our physical locations may be closed, but you can still visit us virtually!
Your Davenport Public Library card gives you access to FREE digital materials such as e-books, digital audiobooks, magazines, movies, and music online 24/7.
Here are my top five favorite digital content resources! Check these out and we’ll see you again on Tuesday, May 30th when the library opens.
Libby – All you need to access e-books, digital audiobooks, and digital magazines is your Davenport Public Library card. We recommend downloading the Libby app for best performance.
Freegal – Freegal Music gives you access to millions of songs from over 40,000 labels. Stream 24-hours a day. Download up to 5 songs per week.
TumbleBooks – Both children and their parents will enjoy this online collection of animated, talking picture books that teach kids the joys of reading in an exciting, new format they will love.
QC Beats – Built in partnership with Davenport Public Library, River Music Experience and St. Ambrose University, QC Beats is an online streaming audio collection of original music of Quad Cities musicians and artists.
Kanopy – Provides a variety of popular and classic movies, documentaries, and foreign films to stream. Kanopy Kids offers parental controls.
The Great Courses present a wealth of learning.
Turn on the propane. Ignite the charcoal briquettes. Marinade the chicken. And season those steaks.
On your marks, get set, GRILL !
We’re off and running for another fabulous summer filled with good friends, good times, and good food.
One could say that the history of grilling began back in cave man times. Cooking gradually moved indoors, but the desire to toss a slab of meat on the grill or a shrimp on the barbie still calls to us today.
Want to grill it up right? Check out the following titles for tips and recipes that will make your eyes eager and your taste buds tingle:
Did you know that May 1st is Learn To Ride A Bike Day? Perhaps you remember having training wheels when you first learned? Or maybe you got the hang of it right away and started on two wheels?
I remember my initial experience with bike riding. My childhood friend, Jill, was going to receive a Schwinn Sting-Ray bicycle for her 9th birthday. She had been awaiting its arrival for weeks. Boy, was it cool! It was the color purple. And it had a banana seat, which had enough room for two people to sit on it. Sometimes I sat behind her as she wheeled around the Allendale parking lot.
One day she allowed me to try my hand. Now, in fact, I did not know how to ride a bicycle at age 8. This I told her, but she said that was okay; she would teach me. I got on that banana seat, placed both hands on the handle bars, placed one foot on a pedal, and picked up my other foot as I pushed down on the first pedal. I was bike riding! Bang! I ran into the Allendale’s brick wall. I had forgotten about braking. Or turning. I fell off, but the bike was unharmed! And, luckily, so was our friendship.
By age 12 I had mastered the art of two wheels. On sunny days you could find me exploring every dead end and cul-de-sac in Moline. This knowledge still serves me well as a car driver. I know the fastest routes throughout the city.
Do you want to remember the joy you felt when you first learned how to ride? Here are some titles to help you remember the feel the wind in your hair and the utter sense of freedom:
Still using the old OverDrive app? The time is upon you to switch to the newer Libby app.
The old OverDrive app will become inactive at the end of April. Downloading the Libby app takes just a few minutes. There is no impact to your account. The items that you have checked out and on hold will be there in the Libby app.
To use on a mobile device, you may need to update your Smartphone software. Ensure your device is running at least:
Android 4.4+ (you’ll also need Chrome, not the stock Android web browser)
Enter your App Store password to install the app on your device.
The app will ask you to associate your account with a library. Search for “Davenport” or “RiverShare.” (Be careful. Be certain to select Davenport, IOWA.)
Enter your library card number into the app.
After that, you should be good-to-go!
If you use a laptop or desktop to access OverDrive, you may still use OverDrive Read in your favorite browser. OverDrive Read is compatible with: Microsoft Edge, Firefox, Google Chrome, and Safari.
The end of April is fast approaching. Spend the time today to ensure you’ll be able to checkout in May!
Did you know that April 7th is International Beaver Day? Yes, we have an entire day to celebrate the joy and wonder of the Castor canadensis, the North American beaver, and the Eurasian beaver (Castor fiber).
Beavers are known for many things. For example, they transform their surroundings building dams to create pools of water. These dams typically are 32 feet to 100 feet long, although one dam was measured to be over 2800 feet long. These dams create ponds of water behind them. And in these ponds beavers will often build a home called a lodge, with entrances below water, and a roof above water, creating a nice, homey, dry space on the inside.
Beavers originally populated the Quad-City area, and can still be seen today in our area. One day last summer as I was walking on Sylvan Island I encountered a beaver running along the levee. He was faster than I was, but I followed his path and found his lodge built in the river abutting the levee. I looked and looked for any sign of him, but he was gone. Probably, inside his lodge, I thought. As I walked on I did notice the stumps of trees that he had created, pointing skyward.
Interested in learning more about beavers? Then check out these titles:
Please enjoy this guest blog by Jeff Collins, Library Director:
Even now, after her passing last summer at age 85, beloved children’s librarian Rochelle A. Murray is helping Davenport kids fall in love with reading.
“Miss Rochelle,” as she was known to generations of children, bequeathed to the Library a generous gift, which will help kids discover the fun of reading for many years to come.
Rochelle was a longtime children’s librarian, and although she had long since retired by the time I began my tenure as director, I have seen her touch throughout the Library and in the community. Now, her legacy will be indelibly marked, as Davenport Public Library embarks on an audacious $1.08 million-dollar private-donor funded project to bring vibrant new activities to the children’s areas at all three of our libraries: | Main | Fairmount | Eastern.
Davenport Public Library will add interactives, kiosks, wall panels, and more to our children’s areas in the coming year, helping kids to develop the early literacy skills so vital to their success in school and life. These vivid new spaces will allow children to engage in fun, multi-sensory activities that support early literacy and include letters and words, gears, magnetic pieces, song lyrics, varying textures, and other elements that are perfect for hands-on play. And of course, we will incorporate plenty of cozy nooks where children and their parents/caregivers can read books together!
Educational Learning Spaces
These enhanced spaces are educational and based on Every Child Ready to Read®, a research-based series of practices developed by the Public Library Association and the Association for Library Service to Children. Designed to help kids develop essential literacy skills and get on the right path to school readiness and student success, this program is based on two core concepts: 1) Reading begins at birth; and 2) Parents are a child’s first and best teacher. Every Child Ready to Read® focuses on emergent and early literacy development in the five practices of talking, singing, reading, writing, and playing. Public libraries provide opportunities for young children and their parents/caregivers to develop these skills in safe, non-commercial environments, with free access for everyone in the community. Davenport Public Library already utilizes Every Child Ready to Read® practices in our early literacy programming, including storytimes, 1000 Books Before Kindergarten, parent education workshops, and supporting materials to help parents/caregivers prepare children for reading.
Access to these free, educational spots, gives everyone living in Davenport a strong start in early literacy to ensure that they are ready for kindergarten and beyond. Each newly designed children’s area will reflect the theme of nature, with each library branch featuring aspects of its local ecosystem:
| Main will feature a water/riparian habitat due to its proximity to the Mississippi River.
| Fairmount will feature woodlands/wetlands due to the Duck Creek watershed.
| Eastern will feature a prairie theme as it is situated at Prairie Heights Park.
Help us reach our goal!
So, while we are deeply saddened by the loss of Rochelle Murray, it is with enormous gratitude that we honor her legacy by embarking on this mission to bring opportunities to play and learn at the Library.
We welcome the participation of all citizens in this campaign. As of March 31, 2023, this project is 58% funded, but we still need $450,000 to bring it to success. Gifts of all sizes are welcome. Anyone interested in making a gift can do so online, or gifts can be mailed to FRIENDS of the Davenport Public Library (321 Main Street, Davenport, IA 52801). Please designate your gift as for “Children’s Areas”. Donations of $5,000 or more will receive mention on a plaque at each library.
We need everyone in our community to help. Please join us in making early literacy a reality for Davenport children!
Filipe Melo and Juan Cavia’s graphic novel Ballad for Sophie is, for lack of a better word, a masterpiece. A truly and completely stunning masterpiece.
The story is set in two worlds, one in 1933 and one in 1997, and follows a young journalist on a quest to unearth the questionable history of retired world famous pianist Julien Dubois. Through a series of sit-down interviews with the reclusive musician, the journalist extracts an epic story of fame, rivalries, loss, and music.
What I found to be so striking about Melo and Cavia’s book is the way the illustrations seemed to leap off the page and hug me. They’re warm, both in color and in what they depict. Melo is a masterful storyteller, his narrative sending readers back and forth in time and wonderfully building tension and suspense at all the right moments. Alongside the language, Cavia’s illustrations are pungent with emotion, texture, and pigment. Coursing through the story are splashes of gold that give the often depressing story an atmosphere saturated with warmth.
As if this book was lacking in atmospheric elements, Filipe Melo wrote an original piece for Ballad for Sophie that beautifully accentuates the ending of the story. You can listen to it on Spotify.
The visual experience of this graphic novel is refrshing; I often find that while a graphic novels’ images may be high quality, the story they depict is not. That is not the case with Ballad for Sophie. Also, it’s being adapted into a television series, so get your hands on it before they release the show!
Nothing can ruin a book like a disappointing ending while nothing can make it more memorable than a fabulous last line. What follows is a sampling of some of the best last lines from beloved books. Some are poignant, some are funny but all are powerful reminders of that literary world you just experienced.
“I wish you all a long and happy life.” –The Lovely Bones, Alice Sebold
“So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.” – The Great Gatsby, F.Scott Fitzgerald
“After all, tomorrow is another day.” – Gone with the Wind, Margaret Mitchell
“But wherever they go, and whatever happens to them on the way, in that enchanted place on the top of the Forest a little boy and his Bear will always be playing.” –The House At Pooh Corner, A.A. Milne
“Whatever our struggles and triumphs, however we may suffer them, all too soon they bleed into a wash, just like watery ink on paper.” – Memoirs of a Geisha, Arthur Golden
“But I don’t think us feel old at all. And us so happy. Matter of fact, I think this the youngest us ever felt.” – The Color Purple, Alice Walker
“That might be the subject of a new story, but our present story is ended.” – Crime and Punishment, Fyodor Dostoyevsky
“Oh, my girls, however long you may live, I never can wish you a greater happiness than this.” –Little Women, Louisa May Alcott
“I ran with the wind blowing in my face, and a smile as wide as the valley of Panjsher on my lips. I ran.” –The Kite Runner, Khaled Hosseini
“And the tale I have to tell is so ludicrous, so incredible, that you’ll never believe a word of it, and yet” – she taps the end of his nose – “it’s true.” – Cloud Cuckoo Land, Anthony Doerr
“This is the happiest day of my life.” – The Martian, Andy Weir
“It is not often that someone comes along who is a true friend and a good writer. Charlotte was both.” –Charlotte’s Web, E.B. White
Now it’s my turn. After more than 1800 blog posts, thousands of dollars spent purchasing books for the library, countless reference questions answered and over 34 years working at the Davenport Library, I am heading off on the new adventure of retirement. It has been an honor and a pleasure.
This month the Online Reading Challenge travels to sunny California, the land of gold and dreams! Think sunny beaches and glamourous Hollywood for inspiration. Our Main title is the excellent Malibu Rising by Taylor Jenkins Reid. Here’s a quick summary from the publisher.
Four famous siblings throw an epic party to celebrate the end of the summer. But over 24 hours, their lives will change forever.
Malibu: August 1983. It’s the day of Nina Riva’s annual end-of-summer party, and anticipation is at a fever pitch. Everyone wants to be around the famous Rivas: Nina, the talented surfer, and supermodel; brothers Jay and Hud, one a championship surfer, the other a renowned photographer; and their adored baby sister, Kit. Together the siblings are a source of fascination in Malibu and the world over, especially as the offspring of the legendary singer Mick Riva.
The only person not looking forward to the party of the year is Nina herself, who never wanted to be the center of attention, and who has also just been very publicly abandoned by her pro tennis player husband. Oh, and maybe Hud, because it is long past time for him to confess something to the brother from whom he’s been inseparable since birth.
As always, check each of our locations for displays with lots more titles to choose from!
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