Please Help the Free Library of New Hope and Solebury
Secure Promised Funding from Solebury Township

The Free Library of New Hope and Solebury receives funding from the State of Pennsylvania, Solebury Township, and the Borough of New Hope. The rest of the money to run our library is raised by the staff and the Board mostly through fund drives and personal donations from our loyal community.

In 2009, we have not received any money from Solebury Township. As you may have read in the local newspapers, Solebury Township is experiencing budget issues. Our library was notified in January, 2009 that Solebury Township had allocated $35,000 to fund Library operations. The allocation of this money was contingent on certain budget conditions.

It is now June and we have been advised that it is possible that we will receive no money at all from Solebury this year. If we lose all or a portion of Solebury’s funding, this may endanger our ability to qualify for state aid. The combined loss of state aid and Solebury funding would be devastating.

We need your help!
Please help us secure vital funding from Solebury Township by writing or calling the Supervisors

Please contact Solebury Township Supervisors at:
3092 Sugan Road, PO Box 139
Solebury Township, Pennsylvania 18963
Telephone: (215) 297-5656 Fax: (215) 297-8402
Email: soleburytownship@soleburytwp.org

The Supervisors are: Michael A. Kennerley, Chair ; Dennis Mankin, Vice-Chair; Peter Augenblick; Dominic Marano; Ruth Ann Wilson


Fast Facts

• The Library’s total operating budget for 2009 is only $169,000. Solebury’s contribution of $35,000 ($4.52 per capita) represents 21% of our funding

58% of our service transactions are generated by Solebury residents
73% of our local cardholders come from Solebury
62% of our volunteers are Solebury residents
More than 60% of attendees at library programs live in Solebury

• We provide a full range of essential library services to people of all ages: lending fiction, informational, print, and audiovisual material; provision of reference books and services (e.g. helping to locate online job resources); free Internet and wireless access; and programs for children and adults.

• We present valuable preliteracy programs for children and informational programs for seniors, including programs on finding local resources for health care and social welfare.

• Financial hard times mean increased library usage. Residents increasingly rely on library services, especially Internet access. We are receiving an ever-increasing number of requests for Internet access, wireless access, help with resumes and cover letters, and books on job hunting, resumes, cover letters, interviewing, and foreclosure.

• Our circulation rose by 20% in 2008, and an additional 14% so far in 2009.

• We are a good investment. A state study on return-on-investment shows public libraries return $5.50 in value for every dollar spent.

There’s a varied and fascinating selection of new non-fiction, but due to time demands of our children’s summer programs, we can’t summarize them this week. Many titles (and subtitles) speak for themselves.

By His Own Rules: The Ambitions, Successes, and Ultimate Failures of Donald Rumsfeld by Bradley Graham

Crazy for the Storm: A Memoir of Survival by Norman Ollestad

The Ramen King and I: How the Inventor of Instant Noodles Fixed My Love Life by Andy Raskin

Annie’s Ghosts: A Journey Into a Family Secret by Steve Luxenberg

Rogue’s Gallery: The Secret History of the Moguls and Money that Made the Metropolitan Museum by Michael Gross

It’s Our Turn to Eat: The Story of a Kenyan Whistle-Blower by Michela Wrong

Catastrophe: How Obama, Congress, and the Special Interests are Transforming… a Slump into a crash, Freedom into Socialism, and a Disaster into a Catastrophe by Dick Morris and Eileen McGann

Catching Fire: How Cooking Made Us Human by Richard Wrangham

1969: Woodstock, the Moon, and Manson: The Turbulent End of the ’60’s from Time Magazine

Fingerprints of God: The Search for the Science of Spirituality by Barbara Bradley Hagerty

Sacred Places North America: 108 Destinations by Brad Olsen

Birds of North America from the American Museum of Natural History, Editor in Chief: François Vuilleumier

The Adopted Dog Bible: Your One-Stop Resource for Choosing, Training and Caring for Your Sheltered or Rescued Dog by Kim Saunders

Credit Repair by Robin Leonard and John Lamb

Fiction: General
The Fixer Upper by Mary Kay Andrews - When her DC lobbying job goes south, Jo Killebrew goes South herself… to Georgia, to help her dad fix up a moldering mansion. Definitely light beach reading.

Fiction: Mystery and Suspense
Finger Lickin’ Fifteen by Janet Evanovich – Stephanie Plum, a murdered celebrity chef, and a plate of barbeque – c’mon, what more could you want?

Sworn to Silence by Linda Castillo – The first in a new series featuring Kate Burkholder, once a young Amish girl whose community was ravaged by a serial killer, now a grown woman, and her home town’s chief of police.

The Doomsday Key by James Rollins – The latest Sigma Force novel links a Princeton geneticist, a Vatican archaeologist, and US Senator’s son… also a mummified corpse in a peat bog, an ancient talisman, the fate of mankind. Oh, you get the picture.

The Memory Collector by Meg Gardiner – Forensic psychologist Jo Beckett must try to piece together snippets of information from an erratic airplane passenger with retrograde amnesia in order to save her city, San Francisco.


DVDs
The Old Curiosity Shop
The Pallisers
True Blood
The Wrestler

Fiction: General
The Angel’s Game by Carlos Ruiz Zafón

In the Kitchen by Monica Ali

Awakening by S. J. Bolton

Strangers by Anita Brookner

Dune Road by Jane Green

Queen Takes King by Gigi Lavangie Grazer

Fiction: Mystery and Suspense
Roadside Crosses by Jeffery Deaver

Relentless by Dean Koontz

Knock Out by Catherine Coulter

The Fate of Katherine Carr by Thomas H. Cook

The Neighbor by Lisa Gardner

Robert Ludlum’s The Bourne Deception by Eric Van Lustbader

Fiction: Short Stories
Thriller 2: Stories You Just Can’t Put Down edited by Clive Cussler (if you follow the title link, please page down to see the Publisher's Weekly review of this book)


Audiobooks
Cemetery Dance by Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button and Other Stories by F. Scott Fitzgerald


DVDs
All the Days Before Tomorrow
A Doll’s House
How About You
Nothing Sacred
Revolutionary Road

Our Life in Gardens by Joe Eck and Wayne Winterrowd

Building a Home With My Husband: A Journey Through the Renovation of Love by Rachel Simon

Stormy Weather: The Life of Lena Horne by James Gavin

Byron in Love: A Short Daring Life by Edna O’Brien

1959: The Year Everything Changed by Fred Kaplan.

Kissinger: 1973, The Crucial Year by Alistair Horne

The Rise and Fall of Communism by Archie Brown

Enough: Why the World's Poorest Starve in an Age of Plenty by Roger Thurow and Scott Kilman

Prime for Life: Functional Fitness for Ageless Living by Randy Raugh

Reaching the Animal Mind: Clicker Training and What it Teaches Us about All Animals by Karen Pryor

Non-Fiction – Biography and Memoir
Resilience: Reflections on the Burdens and Gifts of Facing Life’s Adversities by Elizabeth Edwards

Satchel: The Life and Times of an American Legend by Larry Tye

Merv Griffin: A Life in the Closet by Darwin Porter

The Garth Factor: The Career Behind Country’s Big Boom by Patsi Bale Cox

Non-Fiction – Interesting Journeys
American Passage: The History of Ellis Island by Vincent J. Cannato

99 Drams of Whiskey: The Accidental Hedonist’s Quest for the Perfect Shot and the History of the Drink by Kate Hopkins

Time and Tide in Acadia: Seasons on Mount Desert Island by Christopher Camuto

Non-Fiction – Politics
The Last Best Hope: Restoring Conservatism and America’s Promise by Joe Scarborough

Non-Fiction – Inside Your Brain
Wednesday is Indigo Blue: Discovering the Brain of Synesthesia by Richard E. Cytowic and David M. Eagleman

A Brain Wider than the Sky: A Migraine Diary by Andrew Levy

Non-Fiction – How to Do Things
The Gourmet Garden: An Organic Gardening Book by Virginia Hayes

How to Cheat at Gardening and Yard Work: Shameless Tricks for Growing Radically Simple Flowers, Veggies, Lawns, Landscaping, and More by Jeff Bredenberg

Cook Yourself Thin: A Delicious Way to Drop a Dress Size by Candice Kumai, Harry Eastwood, and Allison Fishman

The Book Whisperer: Awakening the Inner Reader in Every Child by Donalyn Miller

Audiobooks
The River of Doubt: Theodore Roosevelt’s Darkest Journey by Candace Millard

DVDs
We Shall Remain

Fiction: General
Brimstone by Robert B. Parker (sequel to Appaloosa)

Matters of the Heart by Danielle Steel

The City & the City by China Miéville

A Reliable Wife by Robert Goolrick

The Little Stranger by Sarah Waters

The Story Sisters by Alice Hoffman

Come Sunday by Isla Morley

Heartless by Diana Palmer

Fiction: Mystery and Suspense
The Lovers by John Connolly

Die for You by Lisa Unger

Fugitive by Phillip Margolin

Nightwalkers by P. T. Deutermann

Medusa by Clive Cussler with Paul Kemprecos

The Cheater by Nancy Taylor Rosenberg

Dropped Dead Stitch by Maggie Sefton

Fiction: Short Stories
My Father’s Tears and Other Stories by John Updike

Fiction: Graphic Novel
The Dresden Files: Storm Front: Volume 1: The Gathering Storm original story by Jim Butcher, adaptation by Mark Powers, illustrated by Adrian Syaf


Audiobooks
HRH by Danielle Steel
Loitering with Intent by Stuart Woods
Look Again by Lisa Scottoline
The Scarecrow by Michael Connelly
Wicked Prey by John Sandford


DVDs
Alfred Hitchcock: The Legend Begins
The Closer (Season 4)
Cold Play
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
The Glass Menagerie
Last Chance Harvey
New in Town
October Sky
Rosemary’s Baby
Valkyrie

The good news is that we're having a Book Sale! Starting Wednesday, June 10, please come to the Library to get great deals on all your summer reading: beach books, kids videos, and lots more!

The bad news is that means there will be no more Story Hours until after our Summer Reading Programs have ended. To find out more about Summer Reading, click here. Sign-ups start this Saturday, June 6, so don't miss out!

Fiction: General
Woodsburner by John Pipkin – A year before Henry David Thoreau built his cabin on Walden Pond he accidentally started a fire that destroyed 300 acres of woods. The fire changes Thoreau’s life and the lives of three characters he encounters on the fateful day: a Norwegian farmhand who covets his master’s wife, a bookseller who dreams of being a playwright, and an opium-soaked fire-and-brimstone preacher.

Shanghai Girls by Lisa See – Sisters Pearl and May Chin are young and wealthy and enjoying life in 1937 Shanghai. When the Japanese attack, the sisters begin a dangerous journey to a new and unexpectedly threatening life in unwelcoming Los Angeles. See’s previous novels, Peony in Love and Snow Flower and the Secret Fan, were popular with many book clubs.

Rooftops of Tehran by Mahbod Seraji – Teenage best friends become entangled in revolution in 1973 Tehran. This debut novel explores coming of age and falling in love. Recommended for anyone who liked The Kite Runner.

Censoring an Iranian Love Story by Shahriar Mandanipour – This novel of Iran is both mischievously funny and deadly serious. How can a writer create a love story in culture which never allows an unmarried man and woman to be alone together? How can he live in a repressive, Kafkaesque political system? You’ll have a chance to read a novel by Shahriar Mandanipou in which the main character, a writer named Shahriar, writes a novel. You can read that novel within a novel, both the words Shahriar is allowed to write and the ones he has to cross out. It’s a very impressive shell game.

Hello Goodbye by Emily Chenoweth – During one summer vacation a family prepares for the loss of one of its own: mother, wife, friend. This is a bittersweet change from the usual summer beach reading.

Three Times Blessed by Lori Copeland – This inspirational romance pairs a widow and widower in a small town in 19th century Texas. Thunder Ridge battles storms, floods, and sickness as Audrey and Eli slowly find their path to happiness together.

Fiction: Mystery and Suspense
The Scarecrow by Michael Connelly – Jack McEvoy is about to be laid off from the LA Times, so he decides to stake his all on one huge murder story. Of course, being a good investigative reporter sometimes meaning stirring up killers who’d rather be left quietly alone. Jack may have set him up for worse things than a layoff.

The Way Home by George Pelecanos – Chris Flynn and his friends are working for his father Thomas’s remodeling business. Thomas is just happy Chris seems to be straightening out and making a life for himself. Everything seems to be ok, until one day when Chris doesn’t show up for work. Could his disappearance be related to the $50,000 cash he found under the floorboards in the house where he’s been working? Pelecanos skillfully ties together a suspenseful thriller and a thoughtful look at hope and redemption.

Dope Thief by Dennis Tafoya – Small-time crooks set up a sweet little sting ripping off even smaller-time drug dealers. Works great, until they pick on the wrong mark. Tafoya is a local Bucks County author; this is his first novel.


Audiobooks
The Winner Stands Alone by Paulo Coelho
About Face by Donna Leon
The 8th Confession by James Patterson
Beer by Tom Robbins

Non-Fiction – General
The Finest Hours: The True Story of the U.S. Coast Guard’s Most Daring Sea Rescue by Michael J. Tougias and Casey Sherman – 1952: a brutal nor’easter slams new England, causing two oil tankers to split in two. Coast Guard rescuers took to sea in cutters and 36-foot lifeboats to try to reach both vessels in time.

My Remarkable Journey by Larry King – King juxtaposes his own life story with commentary from family and friends.

The Center of the Universe: A Memoir by Nancy Bachrach – When a freak boating accident killed Bachrach’s father she had to return home from Paris to Providence to care for her mother, rendered comatose by the accident. Of course, her mom is normally crazy, so comatose may be easier to deal with… This is a witty, irreverent look at a seriously dysfunctional family. It’s likely to appeal to readers of David Sedaris and Augusten Burroughs.

100 Essential Things You Didn't Know You Didn't Know: Math Explains Your World by John D. Barrow – Much more fun than you expect!

Audiobooks

NPR Road Trips: Roadside Attractions
NPR Road Trips: Postcards from Around the Globe
NPR Road Trips: National Park Adventures

Descriptions will resume next week.

Fiction: General
Far Bright Star by Robert Olmstead

Sunnyside by Glen David Gold

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies by Jane Austen and Seth Grahame-Smith

The Great Perhaps by Joe Meno

The Diary by Eileen Goudge

Hollywood Car Wash by Lori Culwell

Seducing an Angel by Mary Balogh

The Secret by Beverly Lewis

Fiction: Mystery and Suspense
Road Dogs by Elmore Leonard

Wicked Prey by John Sandford

The Last Child by John Hart

The Secret Speech by Tom Rob Smith

The Stalin Epigram by Robert Littell

Even by Andrew Grant

The Increment by David Ignatius

Sanctuary by Ken Bruen

The Shadow of Gotham by Stefanie Pintoff

Strong Enough to Die by Jon Land

Marine One by James W. Huston

Cold Choices by Larry Bond

Alexandria by Lindsey Davis

Assegai by Wilbur Smith

Fiction: Science Fiction
The Empress of Mars by Kage Baker

Fiction: Short Stories
Ladies and Gentleman, the Bible! By Jonathan Goldstein



Audiobooks
The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoyevsky
True Detectives by Jonathan Kellerman
At Last Comes Love by Mary Balogh
First Family by David Baldacci



DVD’s
Battle in Seattle
Glass
Little Dorrit
Lost in Austen
Netforce

Descriptions will resume next week.

The American Future: A History by Simon Schama

Not Becoming My Mother by Ruth Reichl

Smiling Bears: A Zookeeper Explores the Behavior and Emotional Life of Bears by Else Poulsen

Eiffel’s Tower: and the World’s Fair Where Buffalo Bill Beguiled Paris, the Artists Quarreled, and Thomas Edison Became a Count by Jill Jones

Bottom of the Ninth: Branch Rickey, Casey Stengel, and the Daring Scheme to Save Baseball from Itself by Michael Shapiro

Miracle Ball: My Hunt for the Shot heard ‘Round the World by Brian Biegel with Peter Thomas Fornatale

After Etan: The Missing Child Case That Held America Captive by Lisa R. Cohen

Lidia’s Family Table: More than 200 Fabulous Italian Recipes to Enjoy Every Day – With Wonderful Ideas for Variations and Improvisations by Lidia Matticchio Bastianich

Birdsong by the Seasons: A Year of Listening to Birds by Donald Kroodsma

The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Vegetable Gardening by Daria Price Bowman and Carl A. Price

Start Where You Are: Life Lessons in Getting from Where You Are to Where You Want to Be by Chris Gardner

Whoops! Librarian on Vacation - no reviews today. Some of the new fiction is written by unfamiliar authors, and merits a special look.

Fiction: General
Brooklyn by Colm Tóibín

Nobody Move by Denis Johnson

Burnt Shadows by Kamila Shamsie

The Bellini Madonna by Elizabeth Lowry

Pygmy by Chuck Palahniuk

The Family Man by Elinor Lipman

Dead and Gone by Charlaine Harris

Summer on Blossom Street by Debbie Macomber

The Beach Street Knitting Society and Yarn Club by Gil McNeil

Fiction: Mystery and Suspense
Dark Places by Gillian Flynn

Stone’s Fall by Iain Pears

The Killings on Jubilee Terrace by Robert Barnard



DVD’s
Dead Like Me, Season One
Dead Like Me, Season Two
Frost/Nixon
The Reader
The Spirit
Twilight
Wilde

Whoops! Librarian on Vacation - no reviews today.

Non-Fiction – General
The Indifferent Stars Above: The Harrowing Saga of a Donner Party Bride by Daniel James Brown

The Kennedy Legacy: Jack, Bobby and Ted and a Family Dream Fulfilled by Vincent Bzdek

Losing Mum and Pup by Christopher Buckley

Deciphering the Cosmic Number: The Strange Friendship of Wolfgang Pauli and Carl Jung by Arthur I. Miller

How Sex Works: Why We Look, Smell, Taste, Feel, and Act the Way We Do by Dr. Sharon Moalem

Worth the Wait: Tales of the 2008 Phillies by Jayson Stark

Fiction: General

B is for Beer: A Children’s Book for Grown-ups; A Grown-Up Book for Children by Tom Robbins – An illustrated fairy tale (sort of) about beer: what more could you want on a hot summer’s day? I particularly like the picture of the Beer Fairy, with her little bottle-cap headdress.

The Branch and the Scaffold: The True Story of the West’s Legendary Hanging Judge by Loren D. Estleman – A genuine Western novel about Judge Isaac Parker, the “Hanging Judge of the Border.” Estleman’s Westerns have five times won the Spur Award.

Laura Rider’s Masterpiece by Jane Hamilton – This small comic oddity concerns a Midwestern couple. She wants to write a romance. To help collect background material, she slyly encourages an affair between her husband and a public radio host. Jane Hamilton has won acclaim for other books from the New York Times, Washington Post, and Oprah.

Home Safe by Elizabeth Berg – Helen’s a newly widowed novelist who isn’t sure she’ll ever write again, and who keeps busy by meddling in her 27-year-old daughter’s life. Will the discovery of her late husband’s financial shenanigans confuse or enlighten Helen? Or maybe it’s a little of both?

Mr. and Miss Anonymous by Fern Michaels – Lily Madison decides she needs to donate her eggs in order to pay for college. At the fertility clinic she meets penniless student and sperm donor Peter Kelly. Nineteen years later, Lily and Pete, who have never forgotten each other, meet by chance at an airport and quickly become enmeshed in the case of two missing teenagers who may also be linked to the clinic.

Fiction: Mystery and Suspense

The 8th Confession by James Patterson and Maxine Paetro – The Women’s Murder Club confronts the murder of a millionaire, and the killing of a “saintly” pastor who may not have been quite what he seemed. As if that weren’t enough, there’s also the little matter of reporter Cindy Thomas’s feelings for detective Rich Conklin, which might be more than a little disruptive.

Rogue Forces by Dale Brown – What happens when a newly-elected US President who pledged to bring American troops home decides to count on a military contractor to handle a Kurdish/Turkish conflict in northern Iraq? And what if the firm is under the control of the hawkish ex-President?

Intent to Kill by James Grippando – Ryan James was almost a major league baseball player, but his wife’s death in a hit-and-run accident derailed that dream forever. Three years later, he’s a radio shock-jock in Boston, raising his daughter alone, unable to sleep, unable to forget. Then comes the tip-off: an anonymous message saying “I know who did it” and his wife’s “accident” is revealed as a murder.

The Language of Bees by Laurie King – Mary Russell and partner Sherlock Holmes return home from abroad to find Holmes’s colony of bees mysteriously missing. That’s only the beginning in a story that entangles the pair with a surrealist painter (who has a tie to Holmes’s past), an arcane religious cult, a set of London Bohemians, and a very dangerous killer. It’s worth starting this series at the beginning, which is The Beekeeper’s Apprentice. (Don't miss Laurie King's website; it's one of the coolest author sites going)

The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie by Alan Bradley – Don’t mistake this for a recipe-laden cozy. It may take place in a sleepy English village, circa 1950, but this Debut Dagger Award winner is something special. Eleven-year-old scientific prodigy Flavia is fascinated by two discoveries: a dead bird with a postage stamp in its beak (discovered on her doorstep) and dying man in her cucumber patch. What makes this twisting, turning, funny mystery even more fun is that it’s a first novel written by a 70-year-old. Would-be authors, it is not too late!


Audiobooks

The Front by Patricia Cornwell
DVD’s

Doubt
John Wayne Collection
Marley and Me