Meredith @ Bellevue Archive.

I have a 2 1/2 year old who will eat pretty much nothing but raisins and cheerios.  This hasn't fazed us, however. We continue to offer him foods we enjoy, like sushi and hummus.  We figure one day he might just surprise us all and try some!

Matthew Amster-Burton is of the same mind.  His book, Hungry Monkey: A Food-Loving Father's Quest to Raise an Adventurous Eater, is part memoir and part cookbook.  His anecdotes about his daughter and her interactions with food are hilarious and down to earth. As a proper foodie, Amster-Burton cooks amazingly diverse dishes, utilizing Seattle's bounty of farmer's markets and international grocery stores. He also involves his daughter in every step of the process.  Four year old Iris operates a meat grinder and makes pancakes in her very own electric fry pan.  She memorizes cookie varieties in recipe books, and chastises her dad when he brings home inferior bacon.  Iris is a future foodie in the making, for sure.   Sure, she still wants her burger plain and eschews Brussels sprouts, but her parents continue to cook and expose her to a wide variety of flavors. 

Amster-Burton does mention some of the popular books on feeding children (mainly agreeing with Ellyn Satter, as I do), but this is much more an entertaining read about the quirks of feeding a child and how to make food a fun and interactive experience for your child, even if they will only eat goldfish crackers.

Also, check out Matthew Amster-Burton's blog!

Matthew Amster-Burton will be appearing at the King County Library System Foundation's 2010 Literary Lions Gala.

 

 

People generally think of their dogs as being loyal. We expect them to bark ferociously at intruders, revel in our love and attention, and greet us at the door with a joyously wagging tail. But can loyalty go too far?  Even for the sake of family harmony?

Prince believes in the Labrador Pact, which states that it is all Labradors' sacred duty to protect their families and keep them together. This proves a difficult job for Prince, whose family, the Hunters, is plagued by every home-wrecking issue in the book: infidelity, drugs, suicide, and depression, to name a few.  As Prince desperately tries to hold his family together, he finally makes a decision that will be his own undoing.

Like Sight Hound by Pam Houston, The Labrador Pact by Matt Haig is not a cutesy animal book.  Prince begins his story in the veterinarian's office where he is waiting to be put down, and ends in the same place.  But finding out how he got there, while discovering the unique perspective a dog has on the workings of a family, will keep you reading.

My great-great-grandparents fled from the pogroms of Eastern Europe and arrived in America to start a better life. It's a well known and often told story. Less common is the story of someone who decides to go back.

Lillian Leyb is only 22 when her entire family is brutally murdered in a Russian pogrom. During the turmoil, she is separated from her 3 year old daughter, who is presumed dead. After arriving in New York in 1924, Lillian manages to survive as a seamstress for a Yiddish theater company, becoming the mistress not only of the theater's star actor, Meyer Burstein, but also of his father, Reuben. When she hears a rumor that her daughter may be alive and living in Siberia, she sets off across the country on a precarious quest to find her. From Chicago, to Seattle, to the Yukon, Lillian meets fascinating, though usually tragic, characters who help, and sometimes hinder, her along the way.

With an ending I didn't expect, Away by Amy Bloom was a detailed and sensitive look at the underdogs of society in this era.

Sometimes I hear news of some breakthrough in genetic engineering or cloning and I immediately think, "Wow, it's like some science fiction novel."  I never really believe that these scientific advancements will be put into practice in my lifetime...but what if they were? 

Growing up at Hailsham, a private prep school in England, Kathy H. was taught that she was special.  All Hailsham students knew they were special, and different.  What was never explained to them was that they had been cloned as organ donors.  Now that Kathy H. has grown up and become a carer, she is reunited with her Hailsham friends, who have started donations.  Her reconnection with them allows her to examine their past together, and gives her one last chance to find love and possibly salvation from the fate that even Hailsham never quite prepared them for.

 

Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro isn't really science fiction, it's a story of love and forgiveness.  But it's also an interesting starting point for discussion about what happens when science moves ahead faster than ethics.  Unlike many books with this subject, it doesn't take place in some distant future that we have no connection to...it takes place right now; it may even have taken place already.  An excellent choice for bookclubs.

Like many people, I enjoy cooking, and I love to eat. I always thought I had a passion for good food and cooking, but after reading this book, what I call passion seems lukewarm.

La Cucina is the story of Rosa Fiore, a woman who used cooking as a kind of therapy throughout her life. And no one in could blame her for needing some therapy. After Rosa's first love was murdered by his own father (who happened to be involved with the mafia), she locked herself in la cucina and prepared all types of pastas: rigatoni, ravioli, spiralli, cannelloni, linguini. She baked ciabbata and focaccia. She brewed sauces of tomatoes, anchovies, saffron, and pine nuts. She bottled fruits and jams, cured meats, and made ricotta by the barrel. Then, when she had cooked everything on their estate, she packed up a few clothes and her parrot, and left to become a librarian in Palermo.

It wasn't until twenty five years later that another man entered her life, a foreigner. L'Inglese, an English chef, arrived at her library and awakened desires and passions didn't even realize she possessed. As they spent the summer cooking and discovering each other, anyone could see that it was too wonderful to last...and besides, disaster always seemed to follow Rosa.

Fans of Like Water for Chocolate and Joanne Harris may enjoy La Cucina by Lily Prior.

There's an Irish Wolfhound named Dante in Sight Hound who has cancer, but this is not a book about a dog who has cancer. I'm very sensitive to the treatment of animals, and I really hate it when an animal is used as a device to play with my emotions, but this book doesn't do that. When you hear the description, you may think it sounds like a sappy animal story, but I assure you, that's not what it is, either. In fact, it can be quite gritty. What this book is about is a woman named Rae and her journey toward love and self acceptance.

As you read this book, you get to hear from all the characters, including the animals (Rae has another dog and a cat). But again, this is not done in a cutesy way. Dante quotes Buddha and Lao-tzu, and is truly wise. His mission (this time around) is to teach Rae that it is alright to hope, and to find her a human who will love her after he is gone. Rae and Dante have a deep effect on everyone around them, and each has a chance to speak. All of this takes place for the most part on Rae's Colorado ranch, a beautiful setting that changes with the tide of the story and the emotions of the characters.

If you have ever found it difficult to love yourself, or easy to love a dog, try Sight Hound by Pam Houston.

...there was Sunshine by Robin McKinley. Known for her award-winning fantasy books, McKinley creates a familiar-feeling world where vampires and magic are very real, but so are coffee and cinnamon rolls.

Rae lives in the small town of New Arcadia, where she wakes up at 4am everyday to bake Cinnamon Rolls as Big as Your Head for a coffee shop in Town. She doesn't really mind getting up early, since she loves the warm morning light, and the feel of soft dough between her fingers. Sounds kind of cozy, huh? Well, then, let me tell you a little more about New Arcadia. One branch of the police force there is called SOF: Special Other Forces. They deal with the Others, the most dangerous of these being the Suckers. That is, vampires. There are Others that aren't really legislated against, like Weres, Demons, and Sprites...I mean, everyone knows someone with a little sprite or peri blood in them. But it's the Darkest Others, the vampires, that you really want to avoid.

So when Rae takes a nighttime drive out to her parents' cabin by the lake, she's not really surprised when she gets kidnapped by a gang of suckers, tied hand and foot, and left in an abandoned house...but not alone. She's been put there as supper for Constantine, the gang's rival, who does end up surprising her, in more ways than one.

This refreshing fantasy presents a world where the supernatural is normal, but so are friends, family, and fragrant baked goods.<

Have you ever thought about how wonderful it is to be able to make decisions? The freedom to decide what to wear, how to act, or even who to marry?Or maybe you've felt that something was guiding, no, pushing you toward certain choices? If you have ever felt that you had no control over the path of your life, then you might just understand what it's like to be Elena Klovis.

Elena lives in one of the Five Hundred Kingdoms, which are governed by a powerful magical force called simply The Tradition. This magic gathers thickly around people who appear to be following a familiar fairytale path, and then ensures that they complete that path. And if you remember your fairytales well, you'll know that not all endings are happy. Elena was supposed to be a Cinderella, but the prince in her kingdom was only eleven years old! So she slaved under a cruel step-family as magic gathered around her, frustrating her, making her feel that she was supposed to do or be something else.

When her predictably evil step-mother and step-sisters leave her penniless to fend for herself, she goes in search of a job...and finds herself apprenticed to a Fairy Godmother. All the magic gathering around her gets put to good use as she dispenses potions, attends royal christenings, and tests questing knights and princes. Everything's going well for Godmother Elena, until she tests an unusually disagreeable prince, and decides to teach him a lesson. Unfortunately, The Tradition has other plans for them. Elena must try to find a way to break Tradition, but there's only one problem: no one has been able to do it before.

Mercedes Lackey creates a warm, strong, and witty character in The Fairy Godmother, and a story that is easy to cuddle up with when life has got you down. This is the first book in the Five Hundred Kingdoms series.

The Birth of Venus by Sarah Dunant is a story of art and passion in 15th century Italy.

Florence under the Medici family was a city rich in art, culture and luxury. Alessandra grew up in this world of beauty and affluence, but at fifteen, she had never had the freedom to enjoy it. As the daughter of a wealthy cloth merchant, her purity had to be under close guard until she was safely wed. That meant being cloistered in her family's palazzo, and never going anywhere without a chaperone. But finding a husband for tall, awkward, and outspoken Alessandra was a challenge. In a world where women were taught to be hostesses and homemakers, her intelligence and gift for drawing made her freakish and undesirable. When her father brings home a young artist to decorate their chapel walls, Alessandra becomes entranced by his talent, and intrigued by his quiet intensity.

Soon enough her parents have married her off to a much older man, but the freedom that she expects as a married woman is cut short by the rise of the fundamentalist monk Savonarola. Florence becomes a city full of fear and hellfire, where no one is safe, even from their own secrets, and Alessandra must decide whether to risk exploring her own passions, both of the spirit and of the flesh...

This is a vibrant choice for those who enjoy art and historical fiction along the lines of Girl with a Pearl Earring.

Meet The Author!
Sarah Dunant will read from her new book, Sacred Hearts, at the Bellevue Regional Library on Tuesday, July 21 at 7pm.

So, you've already discovered that the library offers you streaming music.  Did you know we also have streaming video and online scores?  Over 13,000 scores and close to 200 videos are available to you online right now through Music Online, a general portal that also covers our other streaming music databases (Classical Music Library, African American Song, and Smithsonian Global Sound). 

Videos include opera and dance performances, artist interviews, and documentaries.  How about a classic *Aida performance?  Links to subtitles and liner notes are provided, too.

Scores cover everything from Mozart *piano sonatas to *Creole music.

The Music Online database is still growing, so check back often and click "What's New" at the top of the page to see recent additions.  Don't forget that you can sign up for a free account and save your own playlists!