We are pleased to announce the featured title in our second annual "One Book, One District" community read. The 2021 title is Stamped: Racism, Antiracism, and You by Jason Reynolds and Ibram X. Kendi.

The purpose of this reading program is to promote the value of reading and encourage dialogue amongst family, friends, and neighbors to strengthen community identity, unity, and understanding.

Stamped was chosen to address the issue of social justice and start conversations about how community members can take positive steps toward change. Through a gripping, face-paced, and energizing narrative, Stamped shines a light on the many insidious forms of racist ideas – and on ways you can identify and stamp out racist thoughts, leading to a better future.

There will be two opportunities to be part of a respectful dialogue with fellow readers this summer. The Senior Center Book Club will discuss it at their meeting on June 2, and the Dundee Library Book Club will do the same on June 30. All participants of the book clubs will receive their own complimentary copy of the book.

Summer Reading Challenge participants will earn an activity badge by reading or listening to the book, attending a book club discussion, or attending a related virtual program, “Juneteenth: Past, Present, and Future” on June 19. Juneteenth is the oldest nationally celebrated commemoration of the ending of slavery in the United States.

For our younger readers, two award-winning titles have been chosen for their relevance and acclaim.

New Kid by Jerry Craft is a winner of the Newbery Medal, Coretta Scott King Author Award, and Kirkus Prize for Young Readers' Literature. It is a timely, honest graphic novel about starting over at a new school where diversity is low and the struggle to fit in is real. Students in Grades 3-6 can get in on a discussion at “Between the Panels” on July 15. Summer Reading Challenge participants will earn an activity badge by reading or listening to the book or attending a book club discussion.

Last Stop on Market Street by Matt de la Peña received the Newbery Medal in 2020 and was on the list of Notable Books for a Global Society and the ALA Notable Children’s Books in 2016. In this picture book, a young boy rides the bus across town with his grandmother and learns to appreciate the beauty in everyday things. Students in Grades K-3 can get in on a discussion at “Book Explorers” on June 17. Summer Reading Challenge participants will earn an activity badge by reading or listening to the book or attending a book club discussion.

One Book, One District titles are available in many different formats including hard copy, eBook, audiobook, Playaway, and CD. Just search our online catalog at www.frvpld.info to find your favorite!

We see every day how much the AAPI (Asian American and Pacific Islander) community is hurting as horrific attacks and racist insults are in the news. This certainly isn’t a new problem, but it has become strikingly more visible in the past year. There are many tangible ways we can all help out, and if you’re curious about educational resources or where to make donations, please don’t hesitate to ask at a library information desk. A few links that are helpful: Stop AAPI Hate, where you can report a hate incident; Asian American Feminist Collective, a group that brings people together and creates public and policitcal educational programs; We Are Not a Virus, a movement to end the social stigma against Asian Americans during Covid-19; and the Chicago branch of Asian Americans Advancing Justice, a group working towards racial equity.

Does reading a book by an AAPI author in itself fix anything? Of course not. But I’m a firm believer that reading creates empathy,  and it certainly doesn’t hurt anyone to get inside someone else’s worldview for the time it takes to read a book. It’s also important to support and lift up the voices of communities that face inequity, so in that vein, here is a selection of books by AAPI authors. Some speak to a character’s experience as an immigrant or early generational American, some don't touch on that plot at all. Some are heavy and some are just plain fun. After the novels are a handful of non-fiction selections in order to hear the author's own voice rather than a character's. These authors and their works are as rich and varied as any reader could hope for.

FICTION: 

• Everything I Never Told You by Celeste Ng: Lydia is dead. But they don't know this yet. So begins the story of this exquisite debut novel, about a Chinese American family living in 1970s small-town Ohio. Lydia is the favorite child of Marilyn and James Lee; their middle daughter, a girl who inherited her mother's bright blue eyes and her father's jet-black hair. Her parents are determined that Lydia will fulfill the dreams they were unable to pursue--in Marilyn's case that her daughter become a doctor rather than a homemaker, in James's case that Lydia be popular at school, a girl with a busy social life and the center of every party. When Lydia's body is found in the local lake, the delicate balancing act that has been keeping the Lee family together tumbles into chaos, forcing them to confront the long-kept secrets that have been slowly pulling them apart.

• My Year Abroad by Chang-Rae Lee: Tiller is an average American college student with a good heart but minimal aspirations. Pong Lou is a larger-than-life, wildly creative Chinese American entrepreneur who sees something intriguing in Tiller beyond his bored exterior and takes him under his wing. When Pong brings him along on a boisterous trip across Asia, Tiller is pulled into a series of ever more extreme and eye-opening experiences that transform his view of the world, of Pong, and of himself.

• White Ivy by Susie Yang: Ivy Lin is a thief and a liar but you'd never know it by looking at her. Raised outside of Boston, she is taught how to pilfer items from yard sales and second-hand shops by her immigrant grandmother. Thieving allows Ivy to accumulate the trappings of a suburban teen and, most importantly, to attract the attention of Gideon Speyer, the golden boy of a wealthy political family. But when Ivy's mother discovers her trespasses, punishment is swift and Ivy is sent to China, where her dream instantly evaporates. Years later, Ivy has grown into a poised yet restless young woman, haunted by her conflicting feelings about her upbringing and her family. Back in Boston, when she bumps into Sylvia Speyer, Gideon's sister, a reconnection with Gideon seems not only inevitable, it feels like fate.

• The Kiss Quotient by Helen Hoang: Stella Lane thinks math is the only thing that unites the universe. She comes up with algorithms to predict customer purchases--a job that has given her more money than she knows what to do with, and way less experience in the dating department than the average thirty-year-old...It doesn't help that Stella has Asperger's and French kissing reminds her of a shark getting its teeth cleaned by pilot fish. Her conclusion: she needs lots of practice--with a professional. Which is why she hires escort Michael Phan. The Vietnamese and Swedish stunner can't afford to turn down Stella's offer, and agrees to help her check off all the boxes on her lesson plan--from foreplay to more-than-missionary position... Before long, Stella not only learns to appreciate his kisses, but crave all of the other things he's making her feel. Their no-nonsense partnership starts making a strange kind of sense. And the pattern that emerges will convince Stella that love is the best kind of logic.

• Sex and Vanity by Kevin Kwan: The Crazy Rich Asians author's latest novel. On her very first morning on the island of Capri, Lucie Churchill sets eyes on George Zao--and instantly can't stand him. Especially when he kisses her in the darkness of the ancient ruins of a Roman villa and they are caught by her snobbish, disapproving cousin Charlotte. The daughter of an American-born Chinese mother and a blue-blooded New York father, Lucie has always sublimated the Asian side of herself in favor of the white side, and she adamantly denies having feelings for George. Several years later, when George appears in East Hampton where Lucie is weekending with her new fiancé, Lucie finds herself drawn to George again.

• The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan: In 1949 four Chinese women begin meeting in San Francisco to play mah jong, invest in stocks, eat dim sum, and say stories. They call their group the Joy Luck Club. Nearly forty years later, one of the members has died, and her daughter has come to take her place, only to learn of her mother's lifelong wish and the tragic way in which it has come true. The revelation of this secret unleashes an urgent need among the women to reach back and remember.

• Chemistry by Weike Wang: You must love chemistry unconditionally...' When we meet the narrator of Weike Wang's taut debut novel, this is the credo she's striven to follow for most of her life. But now, three years into a graduate program at a demanding Boston university, she finds her onetime love for chemistry to be more hypothesis than reality. She is frustrated by reminders of her failed research from her peers, her advisor, and most of all her Chinese parents, who have expected nothing short of excellence from her since she was young. On top of all this looms the marriage proposal from her devoted boyfriend, a fellow scientist, whose path through academia has been free of obstacles, and with whom she can't make a life before finding her own success. The pressure of these volatile elements eventually mounts so high that she has no choice but to leave behind everything she thought she knew about her future--and herself.

• The Incendiaries by RO Kwon: Phoebe Lin and Will Kendall meet their first month at an elite American university. Phoebe is a glamorous girl who doesn't tell anyone she blames herself for her mother's recent death. Will is a misfit scholarship boy transferring in from Bible college, waiting tables to get by. What he knows for sure is that he loves Phoebe. Haunted by her loss, Phoebe is increasingly drawn into a religious group--a secretive cult tied to North Korea--founded by a charismatic former student with an enigmatic past involving Phoebe's Korean American family. Will struggles to confront the obsession consuming the one he loves, and the fundamentalism he's tried to escape. When the group bombs several buildings in the name of faith, killing five people, Phoebe disappears. Will devotes himself to finding her, tilting into obsession himself, seeking answers to what happened to Phoebe and if she could have been responsible for this violent act.

• Here and Now and Then by Mike Chen: Stranded for eighteen years since the 1990s, time-traveling agent Kin Stewart, suffering from memory loss, has started a new life, but when rescuers from the year 2142 finally arrive, he must choose between his current family and the one he left behind in the future.

• The Farm by Joanne Ramos: Ensconced within a Hudson Valley retreat where expectant birth mothers are given luxurious accommodations and lucrative rewards to produce perfect babies, a Filipino immigrant is forced to choose between a life-changing payment and the outside world.

• Interior Chinatown by Charles Yu: Willis Wu doesn't perceive himself as a protagonist even in his own life: He's merely Generic Asian Man. Sometimes he gets to be Background Oriental Making a Weird Face or even Disgraced Son, but he is always relegated to a prop. Yet every day he leaves his tiny room in a Chinatown SRO and enters the Golden Palace restaurant, where Black and White, a procedural cop show, is in perpetual production. He's a bit player here, too, but he dreams of being Kung Fu Guy--the most respected role that anyone who looks like him can attain. At least that's what he has been told, time and time again. Except by one person, his mother. Who says to him: Be more.

• The Leavers by Lisa Ko: One morning, Deming Guo's mother, an undocumented Chinese immigrant named Polly, goes to her job at the nail salon and never comes home. With his mother gone, eleven-year-old Deming is left with no one to care for him. He is eventually adopted by two white college professors who move him from the Bronx to a small town upstate. Set in New York and China, The Leavers is the story of how one boy comes into his own when everything he's loved has been taken away--and how a mother learns to live with the mistakes of her past.

• Must I Go by Yiyun Li: Lilia Liska has shrewdly outlived three husbands, raised five children, and seen the arrival of seventeen grandchildren. Now she has turned her keen attention to the diary of a man named Roland Bouley, with whom she once had an affair--the man who was the father of her daughter Lucy. Lilia tells her rather different version of events revealing the surprising, long-held secrets of her past. And she returns inexorably to her daughter, Lucy, who took her own life at the age of twenty-seven. This is a novel about life in all its messy glory--life lived, for the extraordinary Lilia, absolutely on her own terms.

• The Empress of Salt and Fortune by Nghi Vo: A young royal from the far north, is sent south for a political marriage in an empire reminiscent of imperial China. Her brothers are dead, her armies and their war mammoths long defeated and caged behind their borders. Alone and sometimes reviled, she must choose her allies carefully. Rabbit, a handmaiden, sold by her parents to the palace for the lack of five baskets of dye, befriends the emperor's lonely new wife and gets more than she bargained for.

• Miracle Creek by Angie Kim: In rural Virginia, Young and Pak Yoo run an experimental medical treatment device known as the Miracle Submarine-- a pressurized oxygen chamber that patients enter for therapeutic 'dives' with the hopes of curing issues like autism or infertility. When the Miracle Submarine mysteriously explodes, killing two people, a dramatic murder trial upends the Yoos' small community. The ensuing trial uncovers unimaginable secrets from that night-- trysts in the woods, mysterious notes, child-abuse charges-- as well as tense rivalries and alliances among a group of people driven to extraordinary degrees of desperation and sacrifice.

NON-FICTION: 

• The Making of Asian America: a history by Erika Lee: Asian Americans have helped change the face of America and are now the fastest growing group in the United States. But as award-winning historian Erika Lee reminds us, Asian Americans also have deep roots in the country. The Making of Asian America tells the little-known history of Asian Americans and their role in American life, from the arrival of the first Asians in the Americas to the present-day.

• Dear Girls by Ali Wong: In her hit Netflix comedy special Baby Cobra, an eight-month-pregnant Ali Wong resonated so strongly with viewers that she became a popular Halloween costume. Wong told the world her remarkably unfiltered thoughts on marriage, sex, working women, and why you never see new-mom comics on stage but you sure see plenty of new dads. Wong's sharp insights and humor are even more personal in this completely original collection. She shares the wisdom she's learned from her career in comedy and reveals stories from her life off stage, including the brutal single life in New York (e.g., the inevitable confrontation with erectile dysfunction), reconnecting with her roots (and drinking snake blood) in Vietnam, being a wild child growing up in San Francisco, and parenting humiliations. Though addressed to her daughters, Ali Wong's letters are absurdly funny, surprisingly moving, and enlightening (and gross) for all.

• Know My Name by Chanel Miller: She was known to the world as Emily Doe when she stunned millions with a letter. Brock Turner had been sentenced to just six months in county jail after he was found sexually assaulting her on Stanford's campus. Her victim impact statement was posted on BuzzFeed, where it instantly went viral--viewed by almost eleven million people within four days, it was translated globally and read on the floor of Congress; it inspired changes in California law and the recall of the judge in the case. ... Now she reclaims her identity to tell her story of trauma, transcendence, and the power of words.

• Minor Feelings: an Asian American reckoning by Cathy Park Hong: Poet and essayist Cathy Park Hong ... blends memoir, cultural criticism, and history to expose fresh truths about racialized consciousness in America ... Binding these essays together is Hong's theory of 'minor feelings.' As the daughter of Korean immigrants, Cathy Park Hong grew up steeped in shame, suspicion, and melancholy. She would later understand that these 'minor feelings' occur when American optimism contradicts your own reality--when you believe the lies you're told about your own racial identity. Minor feelings are not small, they're dissonant--and in their tension, Hong finds the key to the questions that haunt her. With sly humor and a poet's searching mind, Hong uses her own story as a portal into a deeper examination of racial consciousness in America today.

• All You Can Ever Know by Nicole Chung: Chung investigates the mysteries and complexities of her transracial adoption in this chronicle of unexpected family for anyone who has struggled to figure out where they belong.

On Thursday, April 1^st, Lynda.com will officially be upgraded to LinkedIn Learning! You may recall that this was originally going to happen a couple of years ago, but LinkedIn put the upgrade on hold while they worked out some complications on their end. I will review the upgrade process in detail below. If you are a current Lynda.com user, please review the information carefully so you can be fully prepared for the coming changes.

NOTE: All screenshots used below were provided by LinkedIn.

Why is Lynda changing?

LinkedIn has been running their own online learning platform, LinkedIn Learning, while also maintaining Lynda.com after acquiring it in 2015. They are now merging the two by taking everything from Lynda.com and moving it to LinkedIn Learning. This means all the content will be in one place on a single platform.

How is the content changing?

All of the courses that are on Lynda.com will transfer over to LinkedIn Learning. You will also gain access to the 13,000+ courses that were already on LinkedIn Learning, so there will be even more content. This additional content includes courses that are in languages other than English, such as French, German, Japanese, Spanish, Mandarin, and Portuguese. All of the courses are still video-based and work the same as before. There is also a LinkedIn Learning mobile app and you will be able to use that as well.

What will happen to my Lynda.com data?

All Lynda.com data will transfer to LinkedIn Learning, so you’ll be able to pick up where you left off. This includes your learning history and your certificates of completion. The data is tied to your library card, so once you create a profile for LinkedIn Learning you’ll be able to put in your card number and that will get your Lynda.com data added to your LinkedIn Learning account. Although the data will transfer, we recommend you download copies of your certificates of completion from Lynda.com before the April 1^st change, just to be safe.

When is this upgrade happening?

This change will occur on Thursday, April 1^st. Lynda.com will be down that day and could potentially be down for up to 24 hours; however, they anticipate it will only take 2-2.5 hours for everything to be moved over to LinkedIn Learning. Once the transition is complete, we will update our Research page with a new link that takes you to LinkedIn Learning instead of Lynda.com. Any links to Lynda.com will automatically redirect you to LinkedIn Learning. On your first visit to LinkedIn Learning, you will have to go through the initial setup of your account.

Setting up your LinkedIn Learning account

When this upgrade was first being planned a couple years ago, patrons were going to be required to create a LinkedIn profile in order to use LinkedIn Learning. One of the biggest changes between now and then is that patrons are no longer required to make a LinkedIn profile. Instead, there are just a few simple steps you will need to follow to set up your LinkedIn Learning account.

1.  The first time you click the link to go to LinkedIn Learning, a welcome screen will come up saying that your library invites you to LinkedIn Learning. Click on the blue “Get Started” button to begin.

2.  You will be asked to put in your library card number and PIN. The PIN is the password you use to log in to your library account on our website. Now, rather than having a separate password for LinkedIn Learning, you will use the same password as your library account. Type in that information and then click “Continue.”

3.  You will now see a screen that says, “Welcome to LinkedIn Learning.” Click on “Sounds Good” to continue.

4.  A list of topics will come up and you are asked to choose ones that you are interested in. You must pick at least one in order to click “Continue” and move on. This information is used to recommend courses to you and alert you when new courses about a given topic are added. You can always go back and edit this information after your account is set up. Click on at least one topic and then click on “Continue.”

5.  Next, you will be asked to set a weekly goal. Choose a goal and then hit “Set goal” or click “Maybe later” if you want to skip this for now. You can always go back and change this after your account is set up.

6.  In the last step, you will see some courses that fit the topic(s) you chose in step 4. You have the option to save any of these courses for quick access in your account. If you want to save any, just click on the name of the course before you hit “Continue.” Whether you choose to save any or not, click “Continue” to finish the setup.

Your account should now be set up and you should be in the LinkedIn Learning platform. You are now ready to explore the platform and enjoy all of the content that it has to offer!

How to use the LinkedIn Learning mobile app

Another new feature that comes with this upgrade is the use of the LinkedIn Learning mobile app. The LinkedIn Learning app is available on Apple and Android devices, and can be downloaded for free from the App Store or Google Play Store, respectively. When you download the app and open it, you first will see a sign in screen. Tap on "Sign in with your library card." Then, you will be asked for a Library ID. Our Library ID is frvpld (all lower case). Type in that Library ID and then hit "Continue." Finally, you will be asked for your library card number and PIN, so enter that information and hit "Continue" again and you should then be logged in to the app.

There’s a lot of information here, but I wanted to make sure everything about the upgrade was explained clearly. If you have any questions, comments, or concerns, please feel free to go to the Information Desk, call 847-428-3661 and ask for the Information Desk, or email us at libraryhelp@frvpld.info.

Write a poem about the environment, and share it with your library! One winner will be selected from three categories: elementary school, middle and high school, and adult. Submissions will be accepted March 1 through April 16. Winners will be announced on Earth Day, April 22.

How do I enter the contest?

Email your submissions to contest@FRVPLD.info. We ask that you limit your writing to 1,000 words. Please include your name, age, city and contact information. You must live within the library district to be eligible for participation. Library card is not required.

Tell me about the Prizes!

Each winner will have their poem published on our website and receive a $50 gift card.

• Elementary: Around the Corner Candy
• Middle & High School: Village Pizza
• Adults: Platt Hill Nursery

Whatever your writing style, however you view the environment, we'd love to read your work.

February saw the release of the novel Nick by Michael F. Smith, which is the story of The Great Gatsby’s Nick Carraway before the events of that novel. Smith wrote this book years ago but had to wait until 2021 to publish it once the copyright on Gatsby expired and its contents became part of the public domain.

Nick got me thinking about all the other retellings in modern literature. Greek tragedy, Shakespeare (whose plays themselves are retellings), and Jane Austen in particular are ripe for exploration because they deal with emotional universals that never go out of style. There are enough Austen retellings published in the last couple years alone for their own blog post, but I’ll limit this list to just one representation of each classic author.

Some of these are straight retellings of the events of a classic tale in a modern time period, others show events through the eyes of another character, and some take a character outside the context of the story of the original. But all of the below novels are inspired by tales that stand the test of time and speak to different parts of the human experience.

• Nick by Michael F. Smith (The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald): Before Nick Carraway moved to West Egg and into Gatsby's periphery, he was in the trenches and tunnels of World War I. Floundering in the wake of the destruction he witnessed, Nick delays his return home, hoping to escape the questions he cannot answer about the horrors of war. He embarks on a redemptive transcontinental journey that takes him from a doomed, whirlwind romance in Paris to the debauchery and violence of New Orleans.

• Hyde by Daniel Levine (The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson): Mr. Hyde is hiding, trapped in Dr. Jekyll's surgical cabinet, counting the hours until capture. As four days pass, he has the chance, finally, to tell the story of his brief, marvelous life. We join Hyde, awakened after years of dormancy, in the mind he hesitantly shares with Jekyll. We spin with dizzy confusion as the potions take effect. We tromp through the dark streets of Victorian London. We watch Jekyll's high-class life at a remove, blurred by a membrane of consciousness. We feel the horror of lost time, the helplessness of knowing we are responsible for the actions of a body not entirely our own. Girls have gone missing. Someone has been killed. The evidence points to Mr. Hyde. Someone is framing him, terrorizing him with cryptic notes and whisper campaigns. Who can it be? Even if these crimes weren't of his choosing, can they have been by his hand?

• On Beauty by Zadie Smith (Howards End by E.M. Forster): Howard Belsey, a Rembrandt scholar who doesn't like Rembrandt, is an Englishman abroad and a long-suffering professor at Wellington, a liberal New England arts college. He has been married for thirty years to Kiki, an American woman who no longer resembles the sexy activist she once was. Their three children passionately pursue their own paths: Levi quests after authentic blackness, Zora believes that intellectuals can redeem everybody, and Jerome struggles to be a believer in a family of strict atheists. Faced with the oppressive enthusiasms of his children, Howard feels that the first two acts of his life are over and he has no clear plans for the finale. Or the encore. Then Jerome, Howard's older son, falls for Victoria, the stunning daughter of the right-wing icon Monty Kipps, and the two families find themselves thrown together in a beautiful corner of America, enacting a cultural and personal war against the background of real wars that they barely register.

• I Am Heathcliff edited by Kate Mosse (Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte): 16 short stories by popular authors inspired by Cathy and Heathcliff’s love.  In `Terminus' a young woman hides in an empty Brighton hotel; in `Thicker Than Blood' a man sits in a hot tub stalking his newly-married love on social media; and in `A bird half-eaten' an amateur boxer prepares for a match. A woman recalls the `Heathcliffs I Have Known' and the physical danger she has borne at their hands; in `Anima' a child and a fox are unified in one startling moment of violence; and in `One Letter Different' two teenagers walk the moors and face up to their respective buried secrets. Curated by Kate Mosse and commissioned for Emily Bronte's bicentenary year in 2018, these fresh, modern stories pulse with the raw beauty and pain of love and are as timely as they are illuminating.

• Meg & Jo by Virginia Kantra (Little Women by Louisa May Alcott): The March sisters--reliable Meg, independent Jo, stylish Amy, and shy Beth--have grown up to pursue their separate dreams. When Jo followed her ambitions to New York City, she never thought her career in journalism would come crashing down, leaving her struggling to stay afloat in a gig economy as a prep cook and secret food blogger. Meg appears to have the life she always planned--the handsome husband, the adorable toddlers, the house in a charming subdivision. But sometimes getting everything you've ever wanted isn't all it's cracked up to be. When their mother's illness forces the sisters home to North Carolina for the holidays, they'll rediscover what really matters. One thing's for sure--they'll need the strength of family and the power of sisterhood to remake their lives and reimagine their dreams. (The sequel, Beth & Amy, is coming in May.)

• The Dark Descent of Elizabeth Frankenstein by Kiersten White (Frankenstein by Mary Shelley): The events of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein unfold from the perspective of Elizabeth Lavenza, who is adopted as a child by the Frankensteins as a companion for their volatile son Victor.

• Wide Sargasso Sea by Jean Rhys (Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte): The “madwoman in the attic” is given a voice. This mesmerizing work introduces us to Antoinette Cosway, a sensual and protected young woman who is sold into marriage to the prideful Mr. Rochester. Rhys portrays Cosway amidst a society so driven by hatred, so skewed in its sexual relations, that it can literally drive a woman out of her mind.

• Rebecca’s Tale by Sally Beauman (Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier): April 1951. It has been twenty years since the death of Rebecca, the hauntingly beautiful first wife of Maxim de Winter, and twenty years since Manderley, the de Winter family's estate, was destroyed by fire. But Rebecca's tale is just beginning. Colonel Julyan, an old family friend, receives an anonymous package concerning Rebecca. An inquisitive young scholar named Terence Gray appears and stirs up the quiet seaside hamlet with questions about the past and the close ties he soon forges with the Colonel and his eligible daughter, Ellie. Amid bitter gossip and murky intrigue, the trio begins a search for the real Rebecca and the truth behind her mysterious death.

• Home Fire by Kamila Shamsie (Antigone by Sophocles): Isma is free. After years of watching out for her younger siblings in the wake of their mother's death, an invitation from a mentor in America has allowed her to resume a dream long deferred. But she can't stop worrying about Aneeka, her beautiful, headstrong sister back in London, or their brother, Parvaiz, who's disappeared in pursuit of his own dream, to prove himself to the dark legacy of the jihadist father he never knew. When he resurfaces half the globe away, Isma's worst fears are confirmed. Then Eamonn enters the sisters' lives. Son of a powerful political figure, he has his own birthright to live up to--or defy. Is he to be a chance at love? The means of Parvaiz's salvation? Suddenly, two families' fates are inextricably, devastatingly entwined, in this searing novel that asks: What sacrifices will we make in the name of love?

• Twist by Tom Grass (Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens): Eighteen-year-old Twist doesn't have much. No money, no home, and no family. All he has is his reputation as one of the most daring street artists in London. But when he finds himself on the run from the police, he knows that he could be about to lose the last thing he has left - his freedom. Until he is saved by the mysterious Dodge. When Dodge introduces him to con artist and art collector Cornelius Faginescu, Twist realizes that he finally has the chance to be part of something. All he has to do is put aside his moral objections and learn to steal.

• The Wrath and the Dawn by Renee Ahdieh (One Thousand and One Nights/The Arabian Nights): In this reimagining of The Arabian Nights, Shahrzad plans to avenge the death of her dearest friend by volunteering to marry the murderous boy-king of Khorasan but discovers not all is as it seems within the palace.

• Macbeth by Jo Nesbo (Macbeth by William Shakespeare): Set in the 1970s in a run-down, rainy industrial town, the novel centers on a police force struggling to shed an incessant drug problem. Duncan, chief of police, is idealistic and visionary, a dream to the townspeople but a nightmare for criminals. The drug trade is ruled by two drug lords, one of whom--a master of manipulation named Hecate--has connections with the highest in power and plans to use them to get his way. Hecate's plot hinges on steadily, insidiously manipulating Inspector Macbeth: the head of SWAT and a man already susceptible to violent and paranoid tendencies. (This is one of 7 books in the Hogarth Shakespeare series, with other plays reimagined by Margaret Atwood, Anne Tyler, and other bestselling authors. Take a look at the series titles here.)

• All Stirred Up by Brianne Moore (Persuasion by Jane Austen): Susan Napier's family once lived on the success of the high-end restaurants founded by her late grandfather. But bad luck and worse management has brought the business to the edge of financial ruin. Now it's up to Susan to save the last remaining restaurant: Elliot's, the flagship in Edinburgh. Chris Baker, her grandfather's former protégé--and her ex-boyfriend--is also heading to the Scottish capital. After finding fame in New York as a chef and judge of a popular TV cooking competition, Chris is returning to his native Scotland to open his own restaurant. Susan and Chris are re-drawn into each other's orbit--and their simmering attraction inevitably boils over. But darkness looms as they find themselves in the crosshairs of a gossip blogger eager for a juicy story--and willing to do anything to get it.

• Anna K. by Jenny Lee (Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy): Told from multiple viewpoints, while seventeen-year-old Anna K seems above the typical problems of her Manhattan friends and siblings, finding love with a notorious playboy changes everything.

• The Silence of the Girls by Pat Barker (The Iliad by Homer): Briseis was queen of one of Troy's neighboring kingdoms, until Achilles, Greece's greatest warrior, sacked her city and murdered her husband and brothers. Briseis becomes Achilles's concubine, a prize of battle, and must adjust quickly in order to survive a radically different life, as one of the many conquered women who serve the Greek army. She eventually finds herself caught between the two most powerful of the Greeks when Agamemnon demands her for himself. Achilles refuses to fight in protest, and the Greeks begin to lose ground to their Trojan opponents. Briseis finds herself in an unprecedented position to observe the two men driving the Greek forces in what will become their final confrontation, deciding the fate, not only of Briseis's people, but also of the ancient world at large...Briseis is just one among thousands of women living behind the scenes in this war--the slaves and prostitutes, the nurses, the women who lay out the dead--all of them erased by history. Fans of this book will also want to check out The Song of Achilles and Circe by Madeline Miller if they haven't already done so.

The Dundee Library and Randall Oaks Library will welcome patrons back into their buildings starting Monday, February 8. The last day for curbside pickup will be Sunday, February 7. Patrons are invited back to browse and make their selections for check out, but will be unable to linger or gather and are asked to limit their visit to 60 minutes. Social distancing procedures will be practiced, and masks will be required to enter the library. Capacity limits will be followed, and patrons will be asked to wait for entry if necessary.

FRVPLD looks forward to welcoming patrons back into the buildings to offer the following services:

• License Plate Renewal will be available at the Dundee Library.
• Printing service will be available. Up to 20 pages can be printed free of charge. Email items to be printed and picked up at the Dundee Library to libraryhelp@frvpld.info. Email items to be printed and picked up at the Randall Oaks Library to randalloakslibrary@frvpld.info.
• Cold Suppers for kids 18 and under can be picked up at the Dundee Library Monday through Friday from 3 to 7 p.m.
• Tax forms will be available at the Dundee Library. Hard copies of 1040s are available, and the library will print up to 20 pages of other forms for free. Tax forms can also be printed at the Randall Oaks Library.
• Home Delivery will continue.
• Notary service will be by appointment only at both locations. Please call (847) 428-3661 to make an appointment.
• Voter registration will be available at the Dundee Library.
• 3D Printing will be available at the Dundee Library.

 Not yet…

• Public computers.
• Donations of books, DVDs, etc.
• Faxing service.
• One on One tech appointments in person. This service is available via Zoom or phone.
• In-person programs, classes, and storytimes. Click here to visit our calendar of virtual events for all ages.
• Digital Conversion Equipment.
• Scanning
• Newspapers
• Toys and games in the Youth Services Department.
•  

The library will return to regular hours of operation:

Dundee Library
Monday—Thursday from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. 
Friday and Saturday from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.
Sunday from 1 to 5 p.m.

Randall Oaks Library
Monday—Thursday from 9 a.m. to 8 p.m.
Friday and Saturday from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.
Sunday from 1 to 5 p.m.

Questions? Call us at (847) 428-3661 or send an email to libraryhelp@frvpld.info.

Just over 2 weeks of our Winter Reading Challenge remain, which is plenty of time to finish off your activities in order to claim your prize. It’s not even too late to register if you haven’t done so yet! See Kirstin’s blog post here to learn how to sign up.

For adult and teen readers, two of the activities are “Diverse books: read a book by a diverse author” and “Jet setter: read a book set in a different country”. If you’re having trouble coming up with a title for either of those, below are some newer additions to our collection that fit the bill. There is certainly overlap between these two activities and you’ll see some of these titles could easily fit under either header.

Jet setter: Read a book set in a different country

• The Empress by Laura Martinez-Belli: (Mexico) It's 1863. Napoleon III has installed a foreign monarch in Mexico to squash the current regime. Maximilian von Habsburg of Austria accepts the emperor's crown. But it is his wife, the brilliant and ambitious Princess Charlotte, who throws herself passionately into the role. Known to the people as Empress Carlota, she rules deftly from behind the scenes while her husband contents himself with philandering and decorating the palace. But Carlota bears a guilty secret. Trapped in a loveless marriage, she's thrown herself into a reckless affair. Desire has blinded Carlota to its consequences, for it has left her vulnerable. As Carlota grows increasingly, maddeningly defenseless, both her own fate and that of the empire are at stake.
• A Castaway in Cornwall by Julie Klassen: (United Kingdom) Laura Callaway feels like a castaway in North Cornwall, always viewed as an outsider even as she yearns to belong. When a man is washed ashore after a wreck, Laura acts quickly to protect him from a local smuggler determined to destroy him. As Laura and a neighbor care for the survivor, they discover he has curious wounds and, although he speaks in careful, educated English, his accent seems odd. Other clues wash ashore, and Laura soon realizes he is not who he seems to be. With danger pursuing them from every side, and an unexpected attraction growing between them, will Laura ever find the answers she seeks?
• The Faberge Secret by Charles Belfoure: (Russia) St Petersburg, 1903. Prince Dimitri Markhov counts himself lucky to be a close friend of Tsar Nicholas II and Tsarina Alexandra, cocooned by the glittering wealth of the Imperial court. But when Dimitri is confronted by the death and destruction wrought by a pogrom, he is taken aback. Dimitri soon meets Doctor Katya Golitsyn, who is determined to help end Russian oppression. The two embark on an unlikely affair and Katya exposes Dimitri to the horrors of the Tsar's regime and the persecution of the Jewish people, and he grows determined to make a stand . . . whatever the cost.
• The Revolution According to Raymundo Mata by Jim Apostal: (Philippines) A faux memoir by one Raymundo Mata, a half-blind bookworm and revolutionary, tracing his childhood, his education in Manila, his love affairs, and his discovery of writer and fellow revolutionary, Jose Rizal. In telling the contested and fragmentary story of Mata, Apostol finds new ways to depict the violence of the Spanish colonial era, and to reimagine the nation's great writer, Jose Rizal, who was executed by the Spanish for his revolutionary activities, and is considered by many to be the father of Philippine independence. 
• The Mermaid from Jeju by Sumi Hahn: (South Korea) In the aftermath of World War II, Goh Junja is a girl just coming into her own. Her mother dies and she sends her younger siblings to live with their estranged father. Junja remains grief-stricken and haunted but the world moves on without her. The political climate is perilous. Still reeling from Japan's forced withdrawal from the peninsula, Korea is forced to accommodate the rapid establishment of US troops. Junja's canny grandmother, who lived through the Japanese invasion that led to Korea's occupation understands the signs of danger all too well.

• Hades, Argentina by Daniel Loedel: (Argentina) In 1976, Tomás Orilla is a medical student in Buenos Aires, where he has moved in hopes of reuniting with Isabel, a childhood crush. But Isabel dives ever deeper into the ranks of the insurgency fighting an increasingly oppressive regime. Years later, a summons back arrives for Tomás, now living as Thomas Shore in New York. It isn't a homecoming that awaits him, however, so much as an odyssey into the past, an encounter with the ghosts that lurk there, and a reckoning with the fatal gap between who he has become and who he once aspired to be.
• Snowdrift by Helene Tursten: (Sweden) Detective Inspector Embla Nyström receives a phone call that sends her reeling. It's been fourteen years since her best friend disappeared from a nightclub in Gothenburg, but Embla recognizes her voice before the call abruptly disconnects. Embla is thrilled to learn Lollo is still alive, but before she can dive into the case, she gets another phone call. A man has been found shot dead in a guest house in rural Sweden. The dead man is Milo Stavic, a well-known gang member and one of the last people seen with Lollo. Further mysteries pile up, leaving Embla hoping the truth will bring her closer to finally finding Lollo.
• Our Italian Summer by Jennifer Probst: (Italy) When Francesca’s teenage daughter Allegra is arrested for drug possession, Francesca gives in to her mother's wish that they take a summer vacation to trace their family roots in Italy. Allegra wants to make her grandmother Sophia happy, but she hates the idea of forced time with her. Sophia knows her girls are in trouble. She hopes to show them the importance of the bonds of family and believes a summer filled with the possibility for change is what they all desperately need.
• Snake Island by Ben Hobson: (Australia) In an isolated town on the coast of southern Australia, Vernon Moore and his wife, Penelope, live in retirement, haunted by an unspeakable act of violence that sent their son, Caleb, to serve time in prison and has driven the couple apart. Ashamed, they refuse to talk about him or visit, but when a close friend warns Vernon that Caleb has been savagely beaten, he has no choice but to act to protect their only child.
• His Only WIfe by Peace Adzo Medie: (Ghana) Afi Tekple is a young seamstress in Ghana who has been convinced by her mother to marry a man she does not know. Elikem is a wealthy businessman whose mother has chosen Afi in the hopes that she will distract him from his relationship with a woman his family claims is inappropriate. But Afi is not prepared for the shift her life takes when she is moved from her small hometown of Ho to live in Accra, Ghana's gleaming capital, a place of wealth and sophistication. She has agreed to this marriage in order to give her mother the financial security she desperately needs, and so she must see it through. Or maybe not?

Diverse books: Read a book by a diverse author

• Lakewood by Megan Giddings: When Lena's beloved grandmother dies, the black millennial drops out of college to support her family and takes a job in the mysterious and remote town of Lakewood, Michigan. On paper, her new job is too good to be true. High paying. No out-of-pocket medical expenses. A free place to live. All Lena has to do is participate in a secret program. An eye drop that makes brown eyes blue, a medication that could be a cure for dementia, golden pills promised to make all bad thoughts go away. As the truths of the program reveal themselves, Lena learns how much she's willing to sacrifice for the sake of her family.
• Nights When Nothing Happend by Simon Han: From the outside, the Chengs seem like so-called model immigrants. Once Patty landed a tech job near Dallas, she and Liang grew secure enough to have a second child, and to send for their first from his grandparents back in China. Isn't this what they sacrificed so much for? But then little Annabel begins to sleepwalk at night, putting into motion a string of misunderstandings that not only threaten to set their community against them but force to the surface the secrets that have made them fear one another. How can a man make peace with the terrors of his past? How can a child regain trust in unconditional love? How can a family stop burying its history and forge a way through it, to a more honest intimacy? 
• Let's Get Back to the Party by Zak Salih: It's just weeks after the historic Supreme Court marriage equality ruling, and all Sebastian Mote wants is to settle down. A high school art history teacher, newly single and desperately lonely, he envies his queer students their freedom to live openly the youth he lost to fear and shame. Oscar Burnham, a friend from childhood, takes a different view- he's outraged by what he sees as the death of gay culture: bars overrun with bachelorette parties; friends getting married, having babies. As they collide again and again, both men must come reckon not just with one another, but with themselves.
• Hurricane Season by Fernanda Melchor: The Witch is dead. And the discovery of her corpse--by a group of children playing near the irrigation canals--propels the whole village into an investigation of how and why this murder occurred. Rumors and suspicions spread. As the novel unfolds in a dazzling linguistic torrent, with each unreliable narrator lingering on new details, new acts of depravity or brutality, Melchor extracts some tiny shred of humanity from these characters that most would write off as utterly irredeemable, forming a lasting portrait of a damned Mexican village.
• Detransition, Baby by Torrey Peters: Reese almost had it all. She had scraped together what previous generations of trans women could only dream of: a life of mundane, bourgeois comforts. The only thing missing was a child. But then her girlfriend, Amy, detransitioned and became Ames, and everything fell apart. Ames isn't happy either. He thought detransitioning to live as a man would make life easier, but that decision cost him his relationship with Reese--and losing her meant losing his only family. When Ames's boss and new lover, Katrina, reveals that she's pregnant with his baby, Ames wonders if this is the chance he's been waiting for. Could the three of them form some kind of unconventional family--and raise the baby together?

• Black Buck by Mateo Askaripour: An unambitious twenty-two-year-old, Darren is content working at Starbucks in the lobby of a Midtown office building. All that changes when he receives an exclusive invitation to join an elite sales team on the thirty-sixth floor. Darren, the only Black person in the company, reimagines himself as "Buck," a ruthless salesman unrecognizable to his friends and family. But when things turn tragic at home and Buck feels he's hit rock bottom, he begins to hatch a plan to help young people of color infiltrate America's sales force, setting off a chain of events that forever changes the game.
• A Spy in the Struggle by Aya de Leon: When Yolanda’s prestigious New York law firm is raided by the FBI, she turns in her corrupt bosses to save her career--and goes to work for the Bureau. Soon she's sent undercover into an African-American "extremist" activist group back in her California college town. Yolanda is determined to finish this, head back to corporate law, and regain her comfortable life...Until an unexpected romance opens her heart--and a suspicious death opens her eyes. As the stakes escalate, and one misstep could cost her life, Yolanda will have to choose between betraying the cause of her people or invoking the wrath of the country's most powerful law enforcement agency.
• We Could Be Heroes by Mike Chen: Jamie woke up in an empty apartment with no memory and only a few clues to his identity, but with the ability to read and erase other people's memories--a power he uses to hold up banks to buy coffee, cat food and books. Zoe is also searching for her past, and using her abilities of speed and strength...to deliver fast food. And she'll occasionally put on a cool suit and beat up bad guys, if she feels like it. When the archrivals meet in a memory-loss support group, they realize the only way to reveal their hidden pasts might be through each other.
• Her Lady to Love by Jane Walsh: Lady Honora Banfield arrives in London with one mission: to catch a husband. Miss Jacqueline Lockhart is having too much fun in her sixth season to ever consider settling down. When Lady Honora agrees to exchange invitations to the most exclusive events in return for Jacqueline's introductions to eligible gentlemen, neither expects their friendship to ignite passion. The two begin an affair with the strict understanding that it will end once Honora is married, but as a proposal becomes more imminent, choosing between a conventional life without love, or certain ruination if they stay together, isn't as simple as it seems.
• The Last Story of Mina Lee by Nancy Jooyoun Kim: Margot Lee's mother is ignoring her calls. Margot can't understand why, until she makes a surprise trip home to Koreatown, LA, and finds that her mother has suspiciously died. Determined to discover the truth, Margot unravels her single mother's past as a Korean War orphan and an undocumented immigrant, only to realize how little she truly knew about her mother, Mina. Thirty years earlier, Mina Lee steps off a plane to take a chance on a new life in America. Stacking shelves at a Korean grocery store, the last thing she expects is to fall in love. But that moment leads to repercussions for Mina that echo through the decades, leading up to the truth of what happened the night of her death.