If you haven't seen The Red Shoes you should know that the library has a remastered copy of it.  This is a visually spectacular movie from the 1940s that is known world-wide for it's stunning, award winning scenery and for it's ballet within a movie.  Don't be put off by the word ballet if you're not a fan - this movie is so much more.  Based on the Hans Christian Anderson fairytale The Red Shoes, which is the story of a young girl taken over by a pair of red shoes who dances herself to death, it's the story of Vicky, the young ballerina waiting for her big break, Julian the composer, likewise ready to launch his career, and Boris Lermontov, the ballet company owner who controls their fates. Partway into the movie we see the creation of a new ballet which launches the careers of Vicky and Julian.  That ballet is The Red Shoes which is then shown within the movie (approximately 20 minutes long).  Not to be missed!  SG

Read a Banned Book!

In 1937, writer and ethnographer Zora Neale Hurston published her greatest work to little fanfare -- Their Eyes Were Watching God was largely ignored, and was even viewed as tawdry.  Decades later, scholars and readers rediscovered her classic and fell under the spell of its heroine, Janie Crawford, a strong-willed African-American woman who narrates the passionate and tragic events of her life in 1930s Florida.  It is now regarded as one of the most important works in 20th century African American literature.

Their Eyes Were Watching God is just one of many books that the American Library Association has recorded as being banned or challenged by various groups -- check out our Banned Books display in the Adult Department.  HM

Author Les Standiford delves into the story of one of the most ubiquitous tales in Western culture in The Man Who Invented Christmas: How Charles Dickens's 'A Christmas Carol' Rescued His Career and Revived Our Holiday Spirits. Beginning with Dickens' own impoverished childhood, Standiford chronicles the writers' ascent to stardom and fall to near bankruptcy at the time of his penning A Christmas Carol in 1843. With his story of the miserly Scrooge, Dickens was able to turn his career around and ignite a public sentimentality that had been long missing from the Christmas holiday (along with a massive increase in turkey sales).

Be sure to also check out some of Oxford's movie adaptations of Dickens' classic. HM

Worth a Second Look

I've heard a lot of people say that they started to read A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, but never made it through to the end. If there is one book that is worth a second try, it's Betty Smith's classic coming-of-age tale. Set in the early part of the 20th century, A Tree Grows in Brooklyn follows the trials and triumphs of young Francie Nolan as she navigates a bittersweet childhood in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. Francie's story is punctuated with the comings and goings of a variety of strong secondary characters, who serve to move the narrative in unexpected and sometimes heart-wrenching directions. This is definitely a book where the characters stick with you long after you've finished the last page. HM

Apocalypse Now

Alas, Babylon by Pat Frank is one of the first novels written about nuclear war, published over 50 years ago it is a timeless classic still relevant today. The novel takes place in a small Florida town where the survivors of a global nuclear holocaust are forced to come together as a community in order to survive.

Other post-apocalyptic novels include The Passage by Justin Cronin, The City of Ember by Jeanne DuPrau, The Road by Cormac McCarthy, Left Behind by Tim LaHaye, One Second After by William Forstchen, and Earth Abides by George Stewart. SG