Wild Women of Maryland: Grit & Gumption in the Free State
Thursday, Sep 28 | 7 – 8:30 pm Miller Branch For adults. Register at bit.ly/wild_women_md
Author Lauren Silberman shares her tales of the Wild Women of Maryland. They may not always be role models, but they are always fascinating! Discover true stories behind the pretend-royal Sarah Wilson to the one-legged WWII spy Virginia Hall. From famous figures like Harriet Tubman to unsung heroines like “Lady Law” Violet Hill Whyte, discover Maryland’s most tenacious and adventurous women.
Silberman is the author of Wild Women of Maryland, Wicked Baltimore, and The Jewish Community of Baltimore. In partnership with Howard County Historical Society
Author Works: David Hugo Barrett
Saturday, Sep 30 | 2 – 3 pm Miller Branch For adults. Register at bit.ly/newark_barrett
David Hugo Barrett discusses his memoir, A Newark Childhood. Weaving through African American music, folklore, and more, he recounts a coming-of-age story from kindergarten through high school graduation.
Barrett spent his formative years in Newark, New Jersey. He attended Newark’s public schools before earning his undergraduate degree in mathematics from Rutgers University and a Master’s degree in computer science from Howard University. His community service, here in Howard County, includes director of the board of the Alpha Foundation of Howard County, Inc. and the Howard County Poetry and Literature Society, past president of the Howard County Library System Board of Trustees, past chairman of The Alpha Foundation of Howard County, Inc., former director of the Horizon Foundation, and past president of the Kappa Phi Lambda Chapter of the Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity, Inc.
As a native to central Maryland, I grew up regularly visiting some of the best museums in the country. My parents would herd us onto the Metro, and we would spend long days at the various Smithsonian Institution buildings – American History, Natural History, the Zoo – along with the National Gallery of Art. Everything was free and fascinating. To this day, I love to spend time in a museum. So, when I heard about All the Beauty in the World: The Metropolitan Museum of Art and Me, read by the author, it seemed like a good choice for an audiobook for my commute. I was right about that!
Patrick Bringley turned a similar childhood love of museums into a job during a particularly stressful period of his life. When, as a young man just out of college and working for The New Yorker, Patrick got the news that his beloved older brother was diagnosed with an aggressive form of cancer, he re-evaluated many of his choices. To be able to spend as much time as possible taking care of Tom, Patrick found a less demanding job as a security guard at The Metropolitan Museum of Art.
This memoir illustrates ten years of Patrick’s life, in which he grieves his brother, falls in love, works in close proximity to some of the world’s most famous fine art, and moves from being a novice to a veteran at the museum. It’s a loving look at family, and a fascinating, up close view of what it’s like to spend 8-10 hours of every working day on your feet among both ancient and contemporary art. He details some of his favorite pieces, including Fra Angelico’s Crucifixion and Peter Bruegel’s The Harvesters, and he spends the better part of one chapter mesmerized by quilts and their makers. Bringley recounts camaraderie with his cohort along with amusing interactions with visitors, including the tourist parents who are looking for the dinosaurs (oops, wrong museum … will mummies do?).
This slim, beautifully written volume presents an interesting cross-section of Bringley’s life, one that reminded me of why great works of art exist – to help people of all generations and historical eras express faith, love, grief, and the human condition. The most lovely part of this book seems to be the author himself, who embodies a sort of Midwestern niceness and willingness to take the world at face value. He approaches and interacts with the art surrounding him from a genuine humility of spirit, looking for the author’s intent and the common human truths to be found. I don’t read a lot of nonfiction, but I do enjoy the occasional memoir. This was one of the best, told in a self-deprecating style that focused on the wonders (personal and creative) around the author as much as on the author himself.
Kristen B. is a devoted bookworm lucky enough to work as the graphic designer for HCLS. She likes to read, stitch, dance, and watch baseball in season (but not all at the same time).
Thu, Sep 21 | 6 – 7 pm Howard Community College Monteabaro Recital Hall (free parking available) 10901 Little Patuxent Pkwy, Columbia
Join us for the annual Bauder Lecture at Howard Community College, featuring acclaimed author Nadia Owusu.
Nadia Owusu is a Brooklyn-based writer and urbanist. Her memoir, Aftershocks, was selected as a best book of 2021 by more than a dozen publications, including Time, Vogue, Esquire, and the BBC, and has been translated into five languages. It was a New York Times Editors’ Choice pick, named one of Barack Obama’s favorite books of the year, and selected by Nobel Peace Prize laureate Malala Yousafzai for her Literati book club.
From the Publishers Weekly review: The biracial daughter of an Armenian mother and Ghanaian father, Owusu’s early life was fractured by her parents’ divorce and multiple moves necessitated by her father’s U.N. career. Living in Rome at age seven, she was visited by her long-absent mother on the day a catastrophic quake hit Armenia, seeding an obsession with earthquakes “and the ways we try to understand the size and scale of impending disaster.”
Nadia Owusu is the winner of a Whiting Award in nonfiction and has received fellowships from Yaddo and Art Omi. Her writing has appeared in The New York Times, Orion, Granta, The Paris Review Daily, The Guardian, The Wall Street Journal, Bon Appétit, and Travel + Leisure. She teaches creative writing at Columbia University and at the Mountainview MFA program at Southern New Hampshire University, and she is the Director of Storytelling at Frontline Solutions, a consulting firm supporting social-change organizations.
Tope Folarin, a Nigerian-American writer based in Washington, D.C., will be introducing Ms. Owusu and moderating the discussion. He serves as Director of the Institute for Policy Studies and the Lannan Visiting Lecturer in Creative Writing at Georgetown University. He is the recipient of the Caine Prize for African Writing, the Whiting Award for Fiction, and a fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts, among other awards. He was educated at Morehouse College and the University of Oxford, where he earned two master’s degrees as a Rhodes Scholar. His debut novel, A Particular Kind of Black Man, was published by Simon & Schuster.
The Bauder Lecture by Howard Community College is made possible by a generous grant from Dr. Lillian Bauder, a community leader and Columbia resident. Howard Community College will present an annual endowed author lecture known as The Bauder Lecture, and the chosen book will be celebrated with two student awards. Known as the Don Bauder Awards, any Howard Community College student who has read the featured book is eligible to respond and reflect on the book in an essay or other creative format. The awards honor the memory of Don Bauder, late husband of Dr. Lillian Bauder and a champion of civil rights and social justice causes.
Aftershocks was selected by the Howard County Book Connection committee as its choice for the 2023–2024 academic year. The Howard County Book Connection is a partnership of Howard Community College and the Howard County Poetry and Literature Society (HoCoPoLitSo). Visit the Howard County Book Connection web page for additional information.
Aftershocks is available from HCLS in print, large print, e-book, and e-audiobook formats. HoCoPoLitSo will also have copies available for purchase at the event.
In partnership with Howard Community College and HoCoPoLitSo.
As a general rule, I don’t enjoy audiobooks. Call me Lady Old School, but I prefer the tactile ritual of turning the pages of a book. Not to mention, my thoughts tend to drift and instead of being engrossed by the audiobook of, say, The Hate U Give, I’m idly thinking about the film version or the name of the actress playing the lead and so on. However, I made an important, no regrets decision to listen toFinding Me by Viola Davis.
I’m often drawn to the real-life stories of powerful women, especially those who have battled obstacles in life and not only weathered those storms but prevailed. I knew very little about Davis’ life, with the exception of her award-worthy and, often times, award-winning turns in films such as Doubt, The Help, and Fences. She’s been through some major stuff. Born in South Carolina and raised in Central Falls, Rhode Island, Davis grew up in poverty, wet the bed until age 14, and experienced taunts from classmates for being Black and smelling like urine. Raised by an alcoholic father who abused her mother for years, Davis took on maternal duties in caring for her younger siblings, in particular her youngest sister Danielle.
Readers will be entranced by Davis’ audiobook, which is narrated by the author herself. Davis’ rich and soothing voice transforms from her own to the various family members or characters in her life; the narration is what I would imagine captivated audiences during the Golden Age of Radio. Her voice draws laughs; her voice haunts and inspires, in equal measure.
Davis shares her journey to Hollywood after college (including Juilliard), marriage, and motherhood. In Finding Me, you will find tales both heart-breaking and motivating of an actor grateful for her place in life.
Carmen J. is a teen instructor at HCLS East Columbia Branch. Among her favorite things are great books, all things 80s, shamelessly watching The Bachelor, gardening, and drinking anything that tastes like coffee.
Thu, Jul 13 7 – 8 pm Miller Branch Learn more and register here.
Trail Dogs and Firefighters: A Memoir from the Burning West is an enthralling story about Robert J. (Bob) Roller’s unexpected plunge into the intense world of trail “dogging” and wildland firefighting. The story brings to life the beauty of the American West, the community of interesting people who seek the danger of this lifestyle, and the bonds forged in this environment, in a way that only someone who lived through these experiences can describe.
Trail Dogs and Firefighters captures the dangerous early season efforts to clear isolated routes high in the Wyoming mountains, and it climaxes with a series of intense wildfires fought across the intermountain west.
This is the perfect book for anyone interested in the real lives of wildland firefighters or anyone who simply enjoys reading about people who rise to meet impossibly challenging situations by relying on their training, luck, and faith in each other.
Roller has deployed to wildfires, mass migrations, hurricanes, and pandemics. He is a Certified Emergency Manager, a Nationally Registered Paramedic, and a civilian graduate of the US Army’s Command and General Staff College. Roller was the vice president of Cabin John Park Volunteer Fire Department, where he has served as a firefighter, paramedic, and special operations swiftwater rescue technician, and he has also served on three mid-Atlantic mountain-rescue teams.
March Madness historically has been known as one of the most exciting sporting events of the calendar year. Before you fill out your bracket for the men’s and women’s NCAA basketball tournaments, consider brushing up on your basketball bona fides with the Library. Sixty-eight teams earn spots in the men’s tournament and 32 teams for the women every year. All teams compete in the three-week basketball tournament in their respective regions, vying to make it through to the Sweet Sixteen and Final Four on their way to the Championship game.
Read some terrific accounts celebrating the joy of the game from HCLS’ collection. Former NBA player and ESPN analyst Jalen Rose wrote Got to Give the People What They Want to explain his experiences as a student-athlete at the University of Michigan. Rose was a part of the first college basketball team to start five freshmen in a season.
Kwame Alexander’s Newbery Award-winning The Crossover is a great book for teens who have a passion for sports and poetry. The Crossover is available in a number of accessible formats for teens. The original novel is available as a print book, an audiobook on CD, an e-book and an e-audiobook from Libby/OverDrive, and as an e-book from CloudLibrary. The 2019 graphic novel version, which was a nominee for the Black-Eyed Susan Award, is available in print and as an e-book from Libby/OverDrive.
You can also watch some of the great basketball films to get in the spirit. The classic film Hoosiers, starring Gene Hackman, showcases a team that battles adversity and triumphs just like all the colleges in the NCAA tournament. Love and Basketball stars Sanaa Lathan and Omar Epps and tells the story of two childhood friends who share their love for each other through their basketball journey.
Just like a great novel or film, the end or destination is not the best part but the journey. When the champion is crowned at the NCAA tournament this year, hard work, determination and adversity, are important characteristics that will help them succeed. It’s time for the tip-off; enjoy the games!
Brandon is a Customer Service Specialist at HCLS Central Branch who loves reading, football, and taking nice long walks around his neighborhood.
“I used to think healing meant ridding the body and heart of anything that hurt. It meant putting your pain behind you, leaving it in the past. But I’m learning that’s not how it works. Healing is figuring out how to coexist with the pain that will always live inside of you, without pretending it isn’t there or allowing it to hijack your day. It is learning to confront ghosts and to carry what lingers. It is learning to embrace the people I love now instead of protecting against a future gutted by their loss.” (P.312) This passage from Suleika Jaouad’s inspiring memoir, Between Two Kingdoms: A Memoir of a Life Interrupted, resonated so much with me that I had to write it down.
At the tender age of twenty-two, when Suleika’s peers were looking forward to their futures, she was diagnosed with leukemia with a 35 percent chance of survival. It started with an intolerable itch all over her body, followed by mouth sores and extreme fatigue. When the diagnosis came down like a heavy anvil, she was, understandably, shattered. Thus began a tremendously painful journey of chemotherapy, clinical trials, a bone marrow transplant, waiting for biopsy results, and interminably long stays at the cancer ward in hospitals. During those stays, Suleika felt she had limited time left on this earth so she decided to do something meaningful while she still could. After her anger at the unfairness of her fate dissipated some, she took up writing blogs geared towards young adults suffering from cancer. The New York Times published her blogs under the column Life, Interrupted. She got an outpouring of letters and emails of support from people from various parts of the country.
After three years of painful struggle, her cancer finally went into remission. However, Suleika discovered that she did not know how to come back to a life without cancer – the kingdom of healthy people. She found herself at a junction where she needed to relearn how to integrate into regular life again. Such a close brush with her mortality made her aware that life is much more than what she had envisioned at twenty-two, before she got sick. Like any young adult, Suleika had hoped for a successful career and love. After her remission, her definition of success changed. She adopted a puppy, Oscar, borrowed a friend’s car, learned to drive, and embarked upon a 100 day, 15,000 mile road trip across the country to meet with some people who had sent her letters of love and support when she was sick.
Between Two Kingdoms: A Memoir of a Life Interrupted is about Suleika’s fight against cancer, and so much more. It explores what living truly means and how to emerge to the other side of pain stronger with a clearer vision of the meaning of life. This book is about new beginnings.
We read books for many reasons. Personally, I love reading because books teach me empathy. They allow me to understand that everyone is fighting their own battle and I need to extend grace. In this particular book, Jaouad’s struggle against cancer was painful to read, however, I drew inspiration from her resilience, her fierce determination to win, her understanding and respect for other people’s pain, and by the love and support that held her up. The love came not only from her immediate family – her parents, brother, boyfriend, friends but also from complete strangers who never met her. The innate goodness of humanity shone brightly in this memoir, and it gave me hope.
Between Two Kingdoms: A Memoir of a Life interrupted by Suleika Jaouad is available in book, e-book, and e-audiobook formats.
Piyali is an instructor and research specialist at HCLS Miller Branch, where she facilitates Light But Not Fluffy and co-facilitates Global Reads. She keeps the hope alive that someday she will reach the bottom of her to-read list.
Harvey Fierstein, I beg to differ with your memoir title, I Was Better Last Night. Although I’ve never had the privilege of experiencing one of your shows two nights in a row, every time I have seen you, the performance has been remarkably bodacious and sincere, distinctive and familiar. You immerse the audience in worlds we’ve never seen before, drawing us in even deeper with elements resonating from our own lives. How could you have been even better?
I Was Better Last Night opens a treasure trove of stories for theater lovers. Did you know that Disney thought Newsies could never be a hit musical? That the original producers of 1983’s La Cage aux Folles vehemently nixed the gay couple’s kiss? That beloved actress Estelle Getty of The Golden Girls first found fame at age 59 in Torch Song Trilogy, starring in a role written just for her? Brimming with mostly loving, but occasionally scathing, Broadway backstage tales, Fierstein’s memoir exposes the details of show creation. We learn his insights into what worked and what didn’t and how the cast and creative crew contribute to the final product. We hear juicy tales of relationships gained and broken, Tonys won and lost, musicals with multiple revivals and singular flops.
As an actor, playwright, screenwriter, and proudly out gay icon, Fierstein has a lifetime of stories to tell, and the book truly spans his whole life. The memoir maintains a captivating balance between the personal and the professional. Some of the most poignant chapters in the book explore his evolving sexual identity and the context in which he places his own growth as a queer man within the current social environment. He spares few details when writing about New York City’s bathhouses and the HIV/AIDs epidemic.
Fierstein has won many awards and garnered extensive fame for his contributions to Mrs. Doubtfire,Hairspray, Fiddler on the Roof, La Cage Aux Folles, and Torch Song Trilogy, to name a few. It’s fascinating to learn how he credits his becoming a successful performer and writer to character, lucky timing, supportive mentors, and determination. In another life, he would now be a retired public school art teacher.
The book is available in print and electronic formats. Consider the audiobook version, if you enjoy Fierstein’s distinctive gravel-filled Brooklyn accent as much as I do. Describing the creation of the musical Kinky Boots, for example, he does a spot-on impersonation of Cyndi Lauper, the first solo woman to win a Tony for best original musical score. Offering lyrics he’s sung and lines he’s written, Fierstein is a compelling author-narrator, adding an additional layer of insight into his creative life. His self-deprecating sense of humor really shines. For the wonderful photographs, check out the print version as well.
And the title? Yes, Fierstein seems to have the ego we associate with stars. There’s no doubt he believes in himself and the strength of his work, but like the final principle of Lola’s six–step program in Kinky Boots, “You change the world when you change your mind.” He describes times he could have done better, admits missteps, and encourages everyone to open their minds and hearts.
Cherise Tasker is an Adult Instructor and Research Specialist at the Central Branch. When not immersed in literary fiction, Cherise can be found singing along to musical theater soundtracks.
I’m always thrilled to find a slim work of nonfiction that nonetheless packs a big punch. New Hampshire author and naturalist Sy Montgomery provides just that in her 79-page volume, The Hawk’s Way: Encounters with Fierce Beauty, a concise but wondrous celebration of raptors and their impact on her life. Accompanied by the stunning photography of artist Tianne Strombeck (see her wildlife photography galleries here), Montgomery’s story of her journey from hunting skeptic to passionate advocate for birds of prey will thrill any nature lover, or for that matter, any casual nonfiction reader.
It all begins with a visit to master falconer Nancy Cowan and a four-year-old Harris’s hawk named Jazz. Nancy warns Sy about Jazz – her unwillingness to cooperate, her feisty nature, and of course the fact that this easily provoked species can tear skin and pierce to the bones with their fierce talons – and yet, Sy is smitten: “I know I don’t matter to her at all. Yet, to me, she is everything” (16). As we see the progression of Sy’s work with Jazz and Cowan’s other raptors, we learn tidbits about the language, history, and specialized gear of falconry, all of which fascinates and contributes to our understanding of their bond. Yet, as interesting as these facts are, Montgomery confesses that, “From falconry I want only one thing: to get closer to birds of prey. Majestic, graceful, strong, big, brave, and smart: Who would not hunger for such company” (24)?
As Montgomery learns more about bird anatomy and vision, methods of catching a wild hawk to train, and even what it means for a hunting dog to “get birdy,” the reader is pulled along on her intellectual, ethical, and emotional journey. She questions whether she is really cut out to be a falconer; after all, she is told time and again by experts that the hawks will kill her precious domesticated chickens – no holds barred, no quarter given. The book is a compassionate, compelling, but stark look at the lives of these fierce creatures – sometimes bloody and violent, sometimes full of soaring elevation and elation, always and forever wild.
Sy Montgomery is the author of thirty-three books of nonfiction for both children and adults, including The Good Good Pig, How To Be a Good Creature: A Memoir in Thirteen Animals, and The Soul of an Octopus, which was a finalist for the National Book Award. Described as “equal parts poet and scientist” by The New York Times, she also scripted and narrated the National Geographic documentary based on her book Spell of the Tiger. The Hawk’s Way is also available as an e-audiobook from Libby/OverDrive. I listened to Montgomery’s narration as I read along, and the enthusiasm for her subject conveyed in her voice made this a wonderful listen.
Julie is an instructor and research specialist at HCLS Miller Branch who finds her work as co-editor of Chapter Chats very rewarding. She loves gardening, birds, crime fiction, all kinds of music, and the great outdoors.
You may know the actress Selma Blair from her notorious same-sex kiss in Cruel Intentions or her frenemy role inLegally Blonde. Most recently, she has been a Multiple Sclerosis (MS) advocate, following her diagnosis in 2018. She is also the creator of an ability-inclusive beauty brand, Guide Beauty. And even if you knew none of this or all of this, her 2022 memoir Mean Baby shows us another side of Selma Blair: gifted writer.
Mean Baby takes us on a sometimes-meandering journey of Blair’s childhood marked by trauma, her adventures in the career pursuit of acting, motherhood challenges, addiction battles, family and romantic relationships, and her MS diagnosis and advocacy. Between the pages, you’ll uncover an impressive writer with an eye for exposing the good, the bad, and the ugly of a life well-lived. Although not a light-hearted read nor a page-turner, you will find Blair’s detailed accounts are those to savor and reflect upon. Mean Baby showcases the life of a survivor, thriver, and fighter with the vivid writing of a robust storyteller.
Carmen J. is a teen instructor at HCLS East Columbia. Among her favorite things are great books, all things 80s, shamelessly watching The Bachelor, gardening, and drinking anything that tastes like coffee.
CHAPTER CHATS 