Suspense? Horror? (certainly not boring)

This profile picture used to be recognizable to almost anyone who watched television or movies.  He was the master of the "MacGuffin" and the king of suspense.  He was a creative innovator who irrevocably changed the way people viewed the movies.  When "Funeral March of a Marionette" came on TV, it was time to stop what you were doing and brace yourself.  Inevitably the story that he would present would send chills down your spine or involve a plot twist that could cause you to ask someone else in the room to explain what just happened.  He still claims a spot as a premier film director, Alfred Hitchcock.

March 28th of this year marked the 50th anniversary of the Hitchcock classic, The Birds.  Birds are not frightening creatures to most human beings.  People who live on farms or raise poultry in their backyard may have a fracas with a fowl on occasion but those confrontations normally end with the birds coming out the loser.  In Hitchcock's version, there is no explanation for the sudden appearance of an alarming number of birds in one small town.  Nor is there any reason for the birds to suddenly flock together and attack.  The genius of the movie is that there are no simple explanations but rather a series of strange events that become more menacing as the movie progresses.  Based on a story by Daphne du Maurier, this movie will cause you to think twice about filling up your bird feeder in the backyard.  

 Hitchcock had favorite actors and actresses that he preferred to use multiple times in his films.  Jimmy Stewart appears in both Vertigo and Rear Window.  In contrast to The Birds, these films focus on the human characters and their flaws and weaknesses.  In Vertigo, Stewart's character is a pawn in another man's scheme.  His physical weaknesses, vertigo and depression, are used to make him the witness (and therefore an alibi) in an apparent suicide.  As his character recovers and attempts to find an explanation for the terrible events, the audience discovers that there is no happy ending for this Hitchcock classic, there is merely an end.
Rear Window, starring Jimmy Stewart and Grace Kelly begins in a much lighter tone.  As the story line progresses, the audience is led to contemplate the wisdom and ethics of watching one's neighbors too closely.  One is inclined to tell Jimmy Stewart's character Jeff to put down the binoculars and do something useful.  However, when presented with the growing pile of evidence it becomes clear that he has uncovered something nefarious.  Then the fear starts to take root as the audience, who has now become attached to the various characters, watch helplessly while their danger grows.  It starts as a character study in an apartment courtyard and ends with a deadly duel of wits.
Finally, there is Psycho.  If you haven't witnessed the terror that is Psycho, you've never been frightened.  This is the classic suspense/horror film that keeps other directors working on the genre until they get it just right, just like Hitchcock.  On Friday, April 19th, 2013 there will be a Hitchcock film marathon at the Manitowoc Public Library starting in the morning.  If you haven't had a good scare lately, join us for one of these movie classics.  National Library Week starts Sunday April 14th when we offer a plethora of fun activities and events.  Come celebrate with us!

Your Library: the no-judgment zone

Looking for your next favorite read?  Look no further than your favorite librarian please.  Libraries and librarians have the keys to help you find your next favorite series, character, or author.  If you've ever asked a librarian for help finding something new to read, you will recall how that person's face lit up with excitement.  They eagerly started asking you questions and you stood back and wondered why you were getting the third degree.  However, your answers to a few key questions will help the librarian help you.  Those are the "book seeds" that will help you branch out in your reading adventures.

For example, if you tell someone that the last three books that you enjoyed were The Girl Who Chased the Moon by Sarah Allen Addison, Between Shades of Gray by Ruta Sepetys, and Star Lake Saloon and Housekeeping Cottages by Sara Rath they are not going to automatically recommend that you read the latest Dresden Files book by Jim Butcher because that is what they like and are currently reading.  They are going to ask you what it was specifically that you liked about the books you remembered.  The books you listed are clues for a librarian to follow as they contemplate which direction to steer you.  The questions will become specific to the books you mentioned.  

They may ask you what you have read recently that you really didn't like.  Maybe the last book you couldn't force yourself to finish was Safe Haven by Nicholas Sparks.  Naturally the next question to follow will be what didn't you like about it?  There are no wrong answers to any of these questions.

What you like to read is your choice, your preference, for your own enjoyment.  Librarians aren't waiting to sit in judgment of you because you would like to read something similar to Fifty Shades of Grey.  They can't wait to tell you to try Sylvia Day's books next.  They are eager to share their own catalogs and websites like whatshouldireadnext.com,  librarything.com, novelist, or overbooked.org with patrons who like to explore on their own.

Come and ask the experts what you should read next.  Then make sure that you tell them on your next trip how much you liked (or didn't like) their recommendations.  Tell them what you think they should read next.   It's an imperfect science but one that can be an endless source of enjoyment.

Is it "snow fatigue" or are the zombies among us getting sloppy?

The evidence is clear, people.  Stop preparing for the zombie apocalypse.  It is useless.  Clearly we are experiencing the zombification of our fellow human beings right now.  Social critics will attempt to gloss over the gradual deterioration of polite society by placing blame on one societal ill or another.  Parents will claim that bizarre teen behavior can be logically explained away by out of control hormones and acne issues.  Teachers will give evidence that students have been unable to raise their hands in the classroom for years and that one word answers or grunting is the norm.  Let us open our eyes to reality and resolve to learn to navigate this new world together.
People are quick to dismiss the evidence of the widespread zombie affliction with terms like "snow fatigue" or "winter fatigue".  Symptoms of these syndromes range from insomnia (zombies don't sleep) to the inability to concentrate (zombies can't form words or sentences, much less read them) to overall clumsiness or a feeling of physical malaise or fatigue.  Ask yourself, is it winter depression and lack of warmth and sunlight that is ailing you or it is the thought of lurching through life like a zombie while you watch your various body parts wither, decay and fall off?  Anyone who has had to drive in the past few weeks knows that there are zombies driving on our roads terrifying the rest of us.  (Evidence:  They can't read or follow road signs. They pass when they shouldn't. They aren't able to slow down on ice-covered roads. They forget how to use the gas pedal and turn signals.  This list is endless.)
Thankfully, Isaac Marion has written a book filled with zombie hopes and dreams.  Zombies are not eternally doomed to a life of mindlessly attacking humans and eating their brains.  With will, determination, and education, they can get better.  In time, they will recover.  (This is the same advice given to the parents of teens.)  They can relearn how to feel and dream and become a useful part of society.  How will you know that the zombie working in the cubicle next to you is recovering?  They will stop trying to eat your brain every chance they get.  Grunts and one word replies will eventually become complete sentences.  Motor skills will slowly but steadily improve.  They will start to remember their old life.  They will respond to their name.  They will vow to keep you safe from the other zombies which means they have feelings for other people again.
 While we await this day of recovery, we need to arm ourselves by studying informational literature about zombies.  In the past several years, it has become clear that this virus is sweeping our nation but we have been reluctant to admit it.  Perhaps "The Walking Dead" is actually reality television, not a fictional drama/horror series.  (After all, it's on TV and they can't put anything on TV that isn't real, right?)  Max Brooks has even written a book about the zombie war and a zombie survival guide.  (If it's in a book and it's labeled non-fiction, it must be true, right?)  The reality check for non-believers is that there are zombie action figures being made for children to play with. (A conspiracy of socially functioning zombies, perhaps?)
Time to check your teen for a pulse and a temperature.  If they lack either of these essential signs of life, head to your library for an instructional manual on how to care for them.  Teens seem to be the group most vulnerable to this disease.  Zombies won't laugh at your jokes, they won't eat your food, they certainly won't listen to you, and they get angry if you tell them you don't like how they're driving.  (When they do eat, they attack their food voraciously.)  Zombies spend copious amounts of time sitting or laying in one place but when they want something, they are relentless.  Does any of this sound familiar?  Better hope the zombie instructional guide is checked in.

"I see funny people."

"And now, here's something we hope you'll really like!"  Let's hope it's the sun. Let's hope it's a weather report with good news such as the temperature soaring above 32 degrees.  Spring in Wisconsin is a fickle thing.  In one week we can go from snowplowing driveways to sitting in blazing hot 70 degree weather watching a baseball game or a track meet.  (Seventy degrees is hot after months of freezing weather.)  It's the waiting for those "outside days" that makes it seem like spring will never arrive.  How to keep ourselves occupied inside while waiting to enjoy outside is the question.
Share something silly with the people you spend time with.  Introduce your children to the cartoons you enjoyed as a child.  Stay up late on Friday night and remind yourself why Monty Python and the Holy Grail was so funny when you were in high school or college.  ("It's just a flesh wound!")  Check out your favorite John Hughes 80's movie and relive teen angst at its best....or worst.  Indulge yourself with a guilty pleasure, a musical.

How could anyone watch Seven Brides for Seven Brothers and not crack a smile?  Think you have the winter blues?  Try being snowbound in the mountains for months with seven angry women.  With a songs like "Bless Your Beautiful Hide" and "Lonesome Polecat", this musical is the epitome of what the genre is all about.  An interesting or quirky little story made into a stage or screen spectacle thanks to a liberal sprinkling of singing and dancing.  Not cheerful enough?  How about Singin' in the Rain?  The Sound Of Music?  The practically perfect Mary Poppins?  For something classy, there's My Fair Lady.  If you like to gamble on love, pull out Guys and Dolls.  For sweeping drama and heartbreak, Show Boat or West Side Story are just the ticket.  Watching with the kids?  Then you can't go wrong with The Wizard of Oz.  You don't have to go back fifty years or more to find a good musical.  Remember this?  "I laughed.  I cried.  It was better than Cats!"  Cats ran on Broadway for eighteen years, the longest run in history until is was surpassed by The Phantom of the Opera.

Realistically, most people can only pull out their favorite musicals when their better half is in the woods or out on the ice.  Most guys won't sit through a musical.  Due to the vast selection at your library, that isn't an issue.  Check out National Lampoon's Vacation, it will help you recall your last summer family car trip.  Or try calling on Ghostbusters, the music alone will put a smile on your face.  Too much weekend and not enough activities planned?  There are four Indiana Jones movies to choose from as well as six Starwars episodes to ponder.  Lately, Ferris Bueller's Day Off has been played at our house to rave reviews.  I guess the idea of "playing hooky" never goes out of style.  In winter, each day can seem to repeat itself over and over.  Watch Groundhog Day to find out what you could be doing with those lost hours.

There's no guarantee that we will be doing the Snoopy happy dance in a field of flowers any time soon.  Might as well plan on Spring coming when it normally does to Wisconsin, in June.  Meanwhile, share some DVD brain candy with your fellow sufferers and know that the sun will come out tomorrow, there's no place like home, and tomorrow is another new day.  Or as James Fennimore Cooper so eloquently put it, "Stay alive, no matter what occurs!"  Sometimes winter is just about surviving.

Garden Spells and other delights

The perfect snow is heavy, easy to pack into snowballs, slippery for sledding and causes the cancellation of school.  For the perfect snow day, the wind dies down to the extent that the children and hounds can be released from the house to expend their energy outside.  This perfect day ends with homemade comfort food and a last rousing ping-pong tournament before bedtime.  For all of us who have recently experienced this "perfect day", let us cherish it as spring begins it's teasing dance.
Thoughts of spring brings to mind Tennyson's famous line,"In the spring a young man's fancy lightly turns to thoughts of love."  During the upcoming month of March, we will expend hours attempting to decipher what the weather has in store for us.  The dance of romance is similar in nature with each participant tentatively advancing and retreating while attempting to discern the object of their affections' intentions.  Fortunately, there are a variety of resources to help the romantically-challenged.

Looking to catch the eye of that certain someone?  Take some tips from a classic love story.  (A classic is a story of enduring value to readers and lasting quality.  They're often unfairly maligned due to the fact that they routinely become assigned reading.)  A universal favorite classic romance author is Jane Austen.  While many readers are familiar with Pride and Prejudice and Emma, Persuasion is an over-looked gem of a love story.  The title reflects the major theme of the novel, that various pressures and influence of family, friends, and the world around us can cause one to choose unwisely.  As in her other titles, Austen's book is populated with a few characters who are caricatures that provide comic relief while speaking against the restrictions of the society of the day.  In contrast, the main characters' story has poignant moments of grief, heartache, and hope.  This lovely little book is about a subject near and dear to the romantic at heart, a second chance at love.

Charlotte Bronte's Jane Eyre is another title that has been used as a standard for romance.  The young orphaned heroine is abused and rejected by her aunt and cousins.  Eventually, she is sent off as a charity student to a boarding school to learn her place in life and prepare her for a life of servitude.  While at school, Jane's resilience is further tested and developed.  When she finally strikes out on her own as a governess, the only position available is in a lonely, isolated location.  Due to her background and upbringing, she is able to endure the solitude but everything changes when her employer, Mr. Rochester, finally makes an appearance.  The May-December romance was not uncommon during that time period and the reader remains undisturbed by it.  The Flight Of Gemma Hardy by Margo Livesey is a modern retelling of the tale.  There the reader may have a more visceral reaction to the idea of the relationship between the two lovers.  In modern times, many relationships with a large age disparity tend to make one recall Hugh Hefner and his girlfriends which is not anybody's idea of romance.
In a romance, the characters develop a relationship while learning to trust one another or regain trust in one another.  There is always a problem that must be overcome for the relationship to blossom.  For a magical twist on romance, Garden Spells by Sarah Addison Allen will get you in the mood to start that spring planting.  The reader may find it to be a gentler version of Alice Hoffman's Practical Magic.  Lisa Kleypas is another author who provides magic and romance in her Friday Harbor series.  For those looking for a second chance at love, there's Mary Kay Andrews' Spring Fever.  Susan Elizabeth Phillips' Wynette Texas series of interconnected novels also uses the themes of forgiveness, redemption, and second chance relationships as well.
You can't ignore it.  Spring is in the air. While we may not be able to go outside in the sun without our winter coats and boots, our thoughts have definitely taken a warmer turn.  Time to spice up your reading.  Maybe it will make the snow melt that much sooner.

It's so romantic and exciting except when you're hiding

As children many of us enjoyed the "Little House" books with their gentle frontier stories about Ma, Pa, Mary, Laura, Carrie, and little Grace.  As adolescents we were thrilled by the courtship of Laura and Almanzo.  As adults we bought the entire "Little House" series for our children and sat down with them at night to read aloud from the books.  These books have a lovely balance of adventure and excitement blended with an enduring sense of family loyalty and love. The overall themes of resilience and family perseverance remained the same throughout each book.  Wilder made life on the frontier exciting and a little dangerous.  We learned to believe that families that stick together can overcome any hardship.  Hard work and a little luck were all you needed to be successful in the big woods or on the prairie.  

These gentle frontier family stories are a startling contrast to Thomas Maltman's The Night Birds.  There is no fiddle-playing, fun-loving Pa to ease the monotony of long winter nights.  No gentle Ma to lead the children to the right decision.  This book focuses on the harsh realities and hardships of pioneer life and how those factors affect family life.  It is a book about the consequences of the decisions made while struggling to survive.

The family in The Night Birds must deal with neighbors' prejudices and suspicions when they move from Missouri to Minnesota.  They live in constant fear of crop loss and Indian attacks.  However, they have moved north to escape the racial prejudices of the south and they are able to forge a tentative relationship with the Indians on the nearby reservation.  This relationship will save some of them during the Sioux uprising but it will also be the source of ongoing condemnation of the family by their surviving neighbors.

The narrator of the story is a young boy who does not understand the ongoing prejudices of the people around him.  He learns his family history when his Aunt Hazel is released from a mental institution and comes to live with his family.  She is the first person willing to share the details of their family settlement in the area and the secrets that continue to fester just below the surface of his life.  Slowly the story unwinds to reveal the harsh realities of frontier life and the decisions for survival that continue to impact the characters' lives.  There is also an element of mysticism which lends insight into the Native American culture and helps the reader to understand the motivations behind the actions of the Indians.  While there's no Nellie Oleson in this book, there are a host of people with continuing resentments and prejudices that contribute to making life lonely and miserable for the narrator and his aunt.  In the end, the author allows the reader to see glimpses of hope and acceptance combined with the enduring pioneer spirit as the narrator becomes an adult with clearer understanding of his past.

You may ask, "What shall I read while I wait for Thomas Maltman's next book, Little Wolves?"  Willa Cather's My Antonia or O Pioneers! are exceptional examples of pioneer fiction.  Perhaps a title like The Round House by Louise Erdrich if The Night Birds has whet your appetite for stories involving American Indians and the impact that reservations have had on their culture.  For action and adventure, try an epic like Larry McMurtry's Lonesome Dove saga or the Berrybender narratives.  These are excellent reads that will take you back in time and allow the reader to experience a taste of life on the frontier.  None of these titles are simple "cowboy and Indian" westerns, they're stories about hardship and life and taking chances with a dash of "western dressing" to add flavor. 

Miles of Smiles, Thanks Double D

Sometimes being a fan means letting go of a beloved player.  Professional sports being a business, fan favorites will jump the fence to seek greener pastures.  (This is particularly difficult when they join despised rivals like the Minnesota Vikings or the Chicago Bears.  How could they?)  This may result in followers' feelings abruptly changing from affection to loathing for that player.  Fans will wipe the player from their collective memories and deliberately neglect to acknowledge any contributions that player may have made during their years with the team.  The break-up between fan and player can become so bitter with acrimony on both sides that it may never diminish, resulting in a chorus of verbal insults from fans and bad behavior from the player when they visit.  The "beloved" becomes the despised, never to be welcomed back into the stadium.

Fans across Wisconsin should be grateful that the man with the effervescent smile has decided to retire.  No one wants him to leave.  Everyone would gladly watch him play any position just to see the joy on his face when he makes a play.  However, number 80 has been at a crossroads in his career for the last year and a decision had to be made.  Everyone knows that one cannot wait too long or opportunity will go sailing by.  All fans of the Green Bay Packers should be celebrating because their beloved "Double D" has chosen a path worthy of his career.  (Fans' hearts could not have taken another break-up like the Favre fiasco.)  Donald Driver understands that he holds in his hands the goodwill of the entire "Packers Nation" and that is a form of currency that goes beyond mere money.   

Libraries across the state of Wisconsin own his children's books centered on the character "Quickie".  "Quickie" is the childhood nickname of the author whose books are aimed at helping children understand and cope with difficult life lessons.  If Donald goes on to write a dozen more in the series, they will be snatched up because of his enduring reputation and popularity.  If Driver chooses to move into the adult arena as an author, he will be welcomed.  For years library patrons have wondered where they could find a full biography of the Packers wide receiver.  Now he will finally have time to write it.  (On a side note to Mr. Driver, "Please write your biography.  From what little we know, it sounds like it would be universally inspiring.")

People will continue to compare Donald Driver to other outstanding athletes, particularly other "franchise players" which are becoming increasingly rare.  They will honor his integrity, his work ethic, his many accomplishments.  Whatever path he chooses, we know that smile will never fade.  It may acquire more laugh lines through the years, but it will continue to burn brightly.  Whatever the future holds for him, he will always have a place in the heart of the true sports fan, especially those who bleed green and gold.  Unlike many people who might be overwhelmed when faced with the prospect of finding new employment, he need have no fear.  His countless accomplishments both on and off the football field speak for themselves.  The most difficult decision he faces won't be what will he do, but rather, what can't he do?  Here's hoping that the next phase of his career is as auspicious and inspiring as the last thirteen years.  Thank you, Donald Driver, from the bottom of our hearts. We can't wait to see what you do next.