Friends of the Great Falls Public Library

The Friends of the Great Falls Public Library will meet on Thursday, April 3,
at 5:30 p.m. on the third floor of the Great Falls Public Library.  You need not
be a member to attend, you just need an interest in supporting the library
through advocacy, special projects, and volunteering.

This meeting shall focus on the upcoming Montana Book Award Reception
(April 10) and the Friends booksale, which will take place at the library in
mid-May.

For more information call Patsy Sowers at 453-2797.

Great Falls Public Library Takes Home Honorable Mention in CANstruction Competition

Cans from the Canned Food for Fines drive and from donations were used to create the Great Falls Public Library LOVE 2 READ structure. Members of our Young Adult Advisory Council and our staff worked late on Friday evening to building the structure. It was available for viewing all day on Saturday

The structure was made using 1,672 cans of food. It was 4 feet high and 9.5 feet long.

Total Lunar Eclipse Tonigh

From the NASA site...
A total eclipse of the Moon occurs during the night of Wednesday, February 20/21, 2008. The entire event is visible from South America and most of North America (on Feb. 20) as well as Western Europe, Africa, and western Asia (on Feb. 21). During a total lunar eclipse, the Moon's disk can take on a dramatically colorful appearance from bright orange to blood red to dark brown and (rarely) very dark gray.

An eclipse of the Moon can only take place at Full Moon, and only if the Moon passes through some portion of Earth's shadow.

Foreign and Independent Film Series

The Great Falls Public Library continues its Foreign and Independent Film Series on Wednesday, February 13, 7:00 p.m. and Saturday, February 16, 2:00 p.m. in the Cordingley Room of the library.

February’s selection is the award-winning Finnish film Mother of Mine. Finland’s evacuation of more than 70,0000 children to Sweden, Denmark, and Norway during World War II, the world’s largest such undertaking, receives affecting treatment in Mother of Mine, the official Finnish submission to the 2006 Academy Awards. This fictional story of one of the “war children” unfolds with fierce restraint under Klaus Haro’s helm, and the film departs from most memory pieces about the war in its emphasis on the complex psychology of its characters, brought to vivid life by the strong cast. The screenplay by Jimmy Karlsson and Kirsi Vikman, based on the novel by Heikki Hietamies, delivers sharp insights into the ways people use children to fill their needs.

The featured short is Uncle.

Films will be shown each month on the second Wednesday and the following Saturday. The series, which runs September through May, is free and open to the public. Be forewarned, some films may contain strong language or adult situations. They are not rated by MPAA but in our brochures we have tried to indicate content. Brochures are available at the library.

For more information call Jude Smith at 453-0349.

Armchair Travel Series

The Great Falls Public Library’s Armchair Traveler Series continues on Thursdays, in February. Programs are free and open to the public and begin at 7:00 pm, in the Cordingley Room of the library. The series schedule follows.

February 7 Three Walks: Cinque Terre, Lake Como, The Swiss Alps

Library Director Jim Heckel shares digital slides and stories from an autumn trip he and his wife took to the Swiss Alps. He will focus on three spectacular walks they took over the three week trip.

February 14 Canoeing to the Arctic Ocean

Randy Gray will share images and adventures from a recent adventure canoeing to the Arctic Ocean.

February Art Exhibit

The Great Falls Public Library is hosting an art exhibit of photographs by Georgia Miller and eclectic beadwork by beaders from Eclipse Beads owned by Dawnella Whitney. The exhibit will be up through the month of February.

Upcoming Music at the Library

The Great Falls Public Library hosts an evening with Piano Jack Myllymaki. Piano extraordinaire Myllymaki will entertain with a wide repertoire of piano stylings from traditional Finnish to Blues to jazz. Expect the unexpected when listening to Piano Jack, and expect to be entertained.

We're starting to experiment with adding video clips to our web and blog pages. Hope you enjoy the preview of Piano Jack. Be sure to join us for Tickle the Ivories Thursday, February 21, 7:00 p.m.

Three New Free Databases

The Great Falls Public Library is please to announce FREE access to three NEW Library Databases.

To access the library’s online databases from a home or office computer enter the library’s URL www.greatfallslibrary.org and then click on the link to Databases A-Z located on the left hand side of the page.

Use of these resources requires a password. Please call the Great Falls Public Library Information Desk at (406)-453-0349 for more information.

You must be a registered library card holder to get a password --
but library cards are free to Cascade County residents!

CINAHL® with Full TextCINAHL® with Full Text is the world's most comprehensive source of full text for nursing & allied health journals, providing full text for more than 580 journals indexed in CINAHL. With full-text coverage dating back to 1981, CINAHL with Full Text is the definitive research tool for all areas of nursing and allied health literature.

Environment Complete™Environment Complete™ offers deep coverage in applicable areas of agriculture, ecosystem ecology, energy, renewable energy sources, natural resources, marine & freshwater science, geography, pollution & waste management, environmental technology, environmental law, public policy, social impacts, urban planning, and more.

Small Engine Repair Reference Center™ Small Engine Repair Reference Center™ is the definitive online tool for small engine repair assistance, including: ATVs, commercial mowers, farm tractors, generators, motorcycles, marine (boats), outdoor power equipment, PWC (personal watercraft/jet ski), snowblowers, snowmobiles, tillers and other small engines. This comprehensive resource contains 407 reference books in full text with original photos and illustrations that guide the user through every job.

Caldecott Medal Winners

2008 Medal Winner

The 2008 Caldecott Medal winner is The Invention of Hugo Cabret by Brian Selznick (Scholastic)

From an opening shot of the full moon setting over an awakening Paris in 1931, this tale casts a new light on the picture book form. Hugo is a young orphan secretly living in the walls of a train station where he labors to complete a mysterious invention left by his father. In a work of more than 500 pages, the suspenseful text and wordless double-page spreads narrate the tale in turns. Neither words nor pictures alone tell this story, which is filled with cinematic intrigue. Black & white pencil illustrations evoke the flickering images of the silent films to which the book pays homage.

2008 Honor Books

Henry's Freedom Box: A True Story from the Underground Railrod by illustrated by Kadir Nelson, written by Ellen Levine (Scholastic)
Inspired by an antique lithograph, Kadir Nelson has created dramatically luminous illustrations that portray Henry “Box” Brown's ingenious design to ship himself in a box from slavery to freedom.

First the Egg, written and illustrated by Laura Vaccaro Seeger (Roaring Brook/Neal Porter)
Laura Vaccaro Seeger's innovative concept book on transformations, First the Egg uses strategically placed die-cuts to provide an astonishing visual explication of the word “then.” Her richly textured brushstrokes creatively reveal the process of metamorphosis for young readers.

The Wall: Growing Up Behind the Iron Curtain, written and illustrated by Peter Sís (Farrar/Frances Foster)
The Wall: Growing Up Behind the Iron Curtain, a graphic memoir of Sís's youth in Prague, brilliantly weds artistic and design choices to content: tight little panels with officious lines and red punctuation; full-bleed line-and-watercolor spreads of nightmares and dreams; color and absence of color.

Knuffle Bunny Too: A Case of Mistaken Identity, written and illustrated Mo Willems (Hyperion)
Willems sets the stage for one of the most dramatic double-paged spreads in picture-book history in Knuffle Bunny Too: A Case of Mistaken Identity. Masterful photo collages take Trixie and her daddy through their now-familiar Brooklyn neighborhood to the Pre-K class where Trixie discovers that her beloved Knuffle Bunny is not “so one-of-a-kind anymore.”

Newberry Medal Winners

The 2008 Newbery Medal winner is Good Masters! Sweet Ladies! Voices from a Medieval Village by Laura Amy Schlitz , published by Candlewick.

In “Good Masters! Sweet Ladies! Voices from a Medieval Village,” thirteenth-century England springs to life using 21 dramatic individual narratives that introduce young inhabitants of village and manor; from Hugo, the lord's nephew, to Nelly, the sniggler. Schlitz's elegant monologues and dialogues draw back the curtain on the period, revealing character and relationships, hinting at stories untold. Explanatory interludes add information and round out this historical and theatrical presentation.

2008 Honor Books

Elijah of Buxton by Christopher Paul Curtis (Scholastic)
In Elijah of Buxton, Elijah is the first free-born child in Buxton, a Canadian community of escaped slaves, in 1860. With masterful storytelling, vibrant humor, and poignant insight into the realities of slavery and the meaning of freedom, Curtis takes readers on a journey that transforms a “fra-gile” 11-year-old boy into a courageous hero

The Wednesday Wars by Gary D. Schmidt (Clarion)
In The Wednesday Wars, seventh-grader, Holling Hoodhood, is convinced his teacher hates him. Through their Wednesday afternoon Shakespeare sessions she helps him cope with events both wildly funny and deadly serious. “To thine own self be true” is just one of the life lessons he learns.

Feathers by Jacqueline Woodson (Putnam)
Feathers tells the story of how a new boy's arrival in a sixth-grade classroom helps Frannie recognize the barriers that separate people, and the importance of hope as a bridge. Transcendent imagery and lyrical prose deftly capture a girl learning to navigate the world through words.