Ayako

Osamu Tezuka

Osamu Tezuka is arguably one of the greatest manga authors of all time and in this book, first serialized in the 1970s, he gives us his take on post World war II Japanese society.

The story revolves around the Tenge family, the remnants of the aristocratic landowners of feudal Japan, and their desperate attempt to hold onto the power and prestige of earlier days. When four 4 old Ayako witnesses a crime which could bring the family name into disrepute they decide to fake her death and lock her in a storage shed. Here she will remain for 23 years.

Tezuka's naturalistic story telling style fits this grim graphic novel perfectly. He portrays a rotten family in a world changing too fast for comfort. As well as the personal story of Ayako Tezuka draws on several true scandals from the late 1940s and the effect is not flattering for the Japanese government of the day and America's involvement with it. A worthwhile read for anyone who isn't offended easily and has an interest in this often forgotten era of Japanese history.

Southland Festival of the Arts

It is Southland Festival of the Arts time again, and Invercargill City Libraries have teamed with the Dan Davin Literary Foundation (with support from the Community Trust of Southland and the Invercargill Licensing Trust) to present Readers and Writers Alive! , a literary programme which has something to interest nearly everyone. Pick up a programme from the Library for detailed information and start planning your timetable of events now. Events with Library involvement are highlighted below.

WORKSHOPS:

Writing different worlds with Tim Jones

Saturday 30 April, 10am-2:30pm, Invercargill Public Library Meeting Room, $25.00 (or $40.00 if attending both workshops)

Reading for writing with Joanna Preston

Sunday 1 May, 10am-2pm, Invercargill Public Library Meeting Room, $25.00 (or $40.00 if attending both workshops) Open to adults and secondary students. Numbers are strictly limited and pre-payment is required to secure your place in the workshops. Tickets are available from Information Services on the first floor of the Invercargill Public Library. For further information, pick up a registration form from the Library or contact Rebecca on 027 2252 664 or dandavin@xtra.co.nz or Kirsty on 211 1763.

FOR ADULTS:

Book Lovers’ Dinner with Jenny Pattrick

Thursday 12 May, 7pm, The Cabbage Tree, $40.00 Enjoy a two-course meal at The Cabbage Tree with bestselling New Zealand historical fiction author Jenny Pattrick. Tickets are available from Information Services on the first floor of the Invercargill Public Library.

Poetry in the Stack

Friday 29 April, 6pm, Library Meeting

Room, $5.00 door sales Enjoy an evening of poetry and wine with poets Lynley Dear, Tim Jones, Kay McKenzie Cooke, and Joanna Preston.

Joy Cowley talks about writing for children

Saturday 7 May, 1 : 3 0 pm, L i b r a r y Meeting Room, $5 door sales Lynley Dear talks to Joy Cowley about her career as a writer.

FOR KIDS:

Storytime with Joy Cowley & the Dreamweaver, Liz Miller

Saturday 7 May, 10:30am, Library Meeting Room, gold coin donation

Story & Song: The very important godwit

Friday 13 May, 10:30am, gold coin donation The Pattricks will share the story and songs from their recent picture book.

In praise of 5 foot bunny rabbits

If your in the adult's library today keep a look out for the Easter bunny aka Glen the AV Librarian. In what has become library tradition you'll find him giving out Easter eggs to patrons each Thursday before Easter.

What you might not know is that this isn't a library funded initiative. Our Easter bunny takes it upon himself to brighten the day of a few hundred people with free chocolate. He supplies the eggs himself and nobody has to ask him to dress up. It's all his doing.

Why does he do it?, you ask. Well that's one of life's mysteries. Some say it's because he's a chocoholic who's trying to get others addicted. Some say he just wants an excuse to dress up and have all the girls squeeze his tail. I like to think he's just one of those people who likes putting a smile on the face of others. Perhaps we'll never know.

Anyway here's a few photos of this years Easter bunny.

(Note the big teeth on the bunny slippers. I'm not sure what they mean but it has me worried.)

Selected new adult's fiction

The life and times of a brown paper bag

Kevin Milne

Kevin Milne’s memoir is not just about his life, but also a potted history of his 4 decades working in the broadcasting industry. Milne is probably one of the more well-known television presenters in New Zealand having spent 27 years with that good old consumer affairs programme, “Fair Go”. Battling on behalf of the little guy, taking on scammers, con artists, dodgy dealers and big business bullies, Kevin Milne has ended up in 2010, being voted the most trusted face on television.
The life and times of a brown paper bag gives us an insight into the cases (some of them hilarious) investigated by the Fair Go team and is a reminder of just how compelling, good investigative journalism can be.
Milne also opens up about his family and home life and his colleagues at TVNZ. A really good read – lots of laughs.

(Reviewed by Jill)

Easter Opening Hours:

Friday 22 April CLOSED

(Observing Good Friday)

Saturday 23 April OPEN

Library open 10am-1pm

Sunday 24 April CLOSED

(Observing Easter Sunday)

Monday 25 April CLOSED

(Observing Easter Monday &

ANZAC Day)

Tuesday 26 April OPEN

Library open 9am-5pm only

(Observing Southland Anniversary

Day)

The Radleys

Matt Haig

The Radleys are a normal family: Mum (Helen), Dad (Peter) and two teenage children. Except they all have to wear SPF 60 sunscreen all the time, are violently allergic to garlic, and are constantly thirsty (the kids never understanding why). The parents know: they are all "abstaining" vampires (who have rejected the vampire way of life and try to live as normal "unbloods", never tasting live blood).

They have kept their children in the dark until one day teenager Clara discovers the joy of drinking blood when a boy attacks her. Suddenly the parents have to explain to their children who they really are. A secret anti-vampire police unit comes looking for Clara and Peter calls his estranged brother Will (a practising vampire) for help, little knowing that Will is the last person Helen ever wants to see.

This is a darkly comic and unconventional look at modern vampire life in the suburbs, but is just as much about families and family secrets, and is definitley not suitable for the kids! Some of the funniest moments come as teenager Rowan tries to come to terms with being a vampire as well as a normal teenage boy.

(Reviewed by Angela)

Oxford English Dictionary

Here is the perfect database for all those “word issues” in life – be it a need for a quotation for an assignment, the correct spelling for a crossword answer, or just curiosity about the history of a word. This database is so much more than a dictionary.

From the home page you can:
• Perform a word search in the quick search feature
• Browse the dictionary from A-Z
• Browse categories for words by subject, usage, region, or origin
• Browse timelines to see when a word entered the English language
• Browse sources to explore the top 1,000 authors and works quoted in the OED
• Browse the historical thesaurus of the OED contents
The “Sources” feature is useful because you can click on that option to see the list and then click on a link in blue, for example William Shakespeare, and then you can see from the results that there are quotes from his plays. Then if you click on Hamlet, for example, you will be taken to an alphabetical word list of results and then from there you can click to see a quotation from the play. You also will see other quotations that use the same word.
When you choose to click on “Historical thesaurus” you get a choice of three headings: the external world, the mind, and society. You then see a list of subheadings to choose from. These further sub-divide and each step you go down shows the link to the previous list. From the home page there is also “This month’s feature”. This is useful for seeing what is new to the site.

Also on the home page there is:
• A “word of the day” feature
• A list of newly added words. Words are embedded frequently; for example “podcasting” is now included
• A list of helpful resources

Overall, there is a huge amount of information on the site but it does take a bit of drilling down to access it. All you budding etymologists will enjoy!
To access this go to our “Databases”. Scroll down the alphabetical list and click on the “Oxford English Dictionary” link.

Vanessa

When Hungry Eat

Joanne Fedler

When the “Food Fascist” calls her ‘obese’, author Joanne Fedler knows she has to do something about her weight. A fear of being “fat and forty” gives Fedler the determination to develop a new attitude towards food and eating. Fedler examines her past to discover what has caused her to gain weight and in the process goes on a journey to self-acceptance. ‘When hungry, eat’ is a wonderful mix of philosophy and spiritualism which also provides an insight into the Fedler family’s experience of leaving their home, their friends and their family in South Africa, to forge a new life in the relative safety of Australia. A really good read.

(Reviewd by Jill)

Let the Library come to you

Do you love to read but find it difficult to get to the Library because of age or disability? Why not let the Library come to you? The Housebound service is available to you in your own home, and with the help of volunteer couriers, can provide books in standard and large print as well as audio books, magazines, videos, DVDs, and music CDs. This is a free service for those people who live within the Invercargill City Council rating area.
If you are interested in becoming a member or know of someone else who would benefit from the service, please contact me. I will then arrange for a home visit to discuss your requirements and explain how the service operates. Please phone me on (03) 211 1444 or email me at housebound@ilibrary.co.nz I look forward to meeting some new housebound members.

Alison Fraser, Housebound Librarian.

Young Adult New releases

More New Releases

The Jewel of St Petersburg

Kate Furnivall

The Jewel of St Petersburg is set in Russia, 1910. The country is ripe for revolution. Valentina is the daughter of a government minister and she charms the world with her beautiful piano skills. When she accidentally stumbles upon a Bolshevik meeting, her life is changed forever. Guilt-ridden by the catastrophic consequences, Valentina decides to become a nurse. But in order to do this, she must make a deal with her parents and is pushed into a loveless engagement with a man she despises. At the same time, Valentina falls in love with Jens Friis, a Danish architect determined to make St Petersburg cleaner and healthier for the factory workers.
As Russia edges closer and closer to revolution, Valentina is forced to make decisions that will change her life forever, as she tries her hardest to protect her sister and all those whom she loves, and the life she has always known. This was a very exciting book that had me glued to it from page one. Fans of Kate Furnivall may notice characters from her previous novels.
I would recommend this for anyone who enjoys historical books, particularly Russian history. It shows how Russia changed between 1910 and 1917, as revolution gripped the country.

(Reviewd by Jasmine)

Even silence has an end: my six years of captivity in the Colombian Jungle

Ingrid Betancourt

Betancourt was campaigning for the Presidency in Colombia in 2002, when she was abducted by the FARC, a Colombian guerrilla organisation. For the next six and a half years, she and the other hostages were held captive in the depths of the Colombian jungle. Each time the authorities came close to finding the guerrilla strongholds, the camps were packed up and the hostages were forced to march at gun point (and often chained to each other), through miles of dense rainforest to a new location.
Even Silence … is a gripping account of Betancourt’s captivity, her numerous escape attempts and her relationships with both the other hostages and her captors. Being held in such close confinement it was only natural that petty squabbles and personality conflicts would arise and it is these tensions that contribute to the pace, the realism and the truth of this memoir. An awesome read.

Reviewed by Jill

Poetry Wall

The ever-popular Poetry Wall will again be making an appearance in the Library Foyer for the month of April. Submit your original poems (limit 3 per poet, no more than 1 A4 page in size) to the Adults’ Help Desk.

Entries in the Children’s, Teens and Adults sections will be judged by Joanna Preston who is taking a reading for writing workshop on 1 May.

The rapture

by Liz Jensen

An eco-thriller set in the not-too-distant future where global warming is wreaking havoc on the world and scores of people have converted to various forms of religion in the belief that "end times" are coming.

Gabrielle is a psychotherapist who starts work at a facility for disturbed, violent children, where she meets 16-year-old Bethany. Bethany makes garbled predictions about future weather events but has been dismissed because of her mental state. When her predictions start to come true, Gabrielle begins to believe and enlists the help of scientist Fraser to try to convince the world that a cataclysmic event is drawing near.

While fast-paced, the characters in The rapture are vividly drawn and flawed. Gabrielle is confined to a wheelchair after a car crash in which she lost her lover two years ago. She blames herself and no longer thinks of herself as a woman, until Fraser teaches her to love again. This novel pulls no punches and is a thought-provoking exploration of our potential future under global warming.

(Reviewed by Angela)