• recommended
• Baby Rock'n'Rhyme
• storytime

What's new @ Island Bay

Matariki - Maori New Year

Come along to Island Bay library and celebrate the spirit of Matariki

Island Bay Thursday 25th June 6-7pm
'Matariki well-being and Choices'

We have two speakers to encourage us with ideas for this season.

Rebeka Whale is a networker and creative support for the Sustainability Trust, She will be talking about the Sustainability Trust's new community programme called Choices, which helps people look after themselves and the planet simultaneously.
Sister Loyola Galvin, is an inspirational mentor, speaker and gardener. She actively works on Common Ground, the community gardens at the Home of Compassion in Island Bay, and was named national NZ Gardener of the Year 2008 by NZ Gardener magazine.

New displays ...

DVDs: Book to film

Adaptations galore: All the films on display this month have been adapted from successful novels. Some are fantastic, other less so! It's up to you to decide if it was worth all the time and effort to get it on the big screen. There's a selection of cult, popular and box office hits to check out.

Soundtracks

It's a film theme this month so we've brought in a bunch of film soundtracks. Soundtracks so often make a mediocre film great, and our selection covers everything from pop-filled modern scores through to older, more refined orchestral pieces.

Meg, Mog and Mog

A selection of children's books with Meg the witch and her cat, Mog. Mog, the Forgetful Cat rounds off our friendly collection of cat related stories!

Baby Rock and Rhyme

Engages baby, involves action songs and nursery rhymes and entertains!
Odette and Joy will take your babies through their musical paces. They'll introduce forgotten songs from your childhood and gems you've never heard of. Each week the group reads together from a collection of specially selected board books. These are chosen from the Library collection and include classics like 'Brown Bear Brown Bear, what do you see?'

Contact Joy if you'd like to know more or inquire at Island Bay Library.

All free and at Island Bay Library!

What: Baby Rock and Rhyme
Time: Every Wednesday at 9.30 am during school terms.

Storytime

• Storytime is every Thursday at Island Bay Library at 10:30am in the children's area
• Storytime runs for about half an hour, with stories and songs
• Pre-school storytimes are fun and free - there's no charge, and you don't have to book
• Storytime is aimed at pre-school age children (three and four years old) - but younger siblings are always welcome!

Staff Spotlight

This month we talk to Julie...

Q: You have just completed the Oxfam Trail walk. Could you tell us what it was like to walk 100 kms non stop?

A:If you had asked me this at 8.30am on Sunday 5th of April, as I crossed the finish line I would have given you quite a different answer to this. By now my blisters have had a chance to heal and I would say it was quite an amazing experience. We set off in the dark at 6am on Saturday morning, walked across some beautiful countryside in perfect Autumn weather, continued walking across farmland through the night and then finished with a 7km walk along the Taupo foreshore. It challenged me mentally and definitely physically but something I am so pleased I have done. I can even say I would go back for a second time.

Q: You work for 20 hours / week in the collection development team. What areas of the collection do you focus upon?

A: At the moment I am purchasing the DVDs, Philosophy/Psychology, Health, Performing Arts and Literature.

Q: In the past you used to grow plants for sale. Are you still a keen gardener and do you have any favourite gardening books?

A: Yes, I am still a keen gardener, although gardening in Wellington on a quarter of an acre hillside section is quite different to when I was living on 4 acres west of Whangarei. There, I was fortunate to be able to spend ten years at home with my children, creating a garden and selling perennials from home. I love to read gardening books by Beth Chatto and John Brookes as they both have a very natural style of design.

Julie's recommended books:

Garden Masterclass and Small Garden by John Brookes

The Dry Garden and The Garden Tapestry by Beth Chatto

Wind gardens : how to create beautiful gardens in how to create beautiful gardens in exposed places
by Jacob De Ruiter

Book Group Notes:

The girl with the dragon tattoo
by Stieg Larsson
This first volume of a trilogy combines murder mystery, family saga, love story, and financial intrigue into one satisfyingly complex and entertainingly atmospheric novel. Harriet Vanger, scion of one of Sweden's wealthiest families, disappeared over forty years ago. All these years later, her aged uncle continues to seek the truth. He hires Mikael Blomkvist, a crusading journalist recently trapped by a libel conviction, to investigate. He is aided by the pierced and tattooed punk prodigy Lisbeth Salander.

The persimmon tree
by Bryce Courtenay
The story opens in Indonesia in 1942 on the cusp of Japanese invasion and the evacuation of Batavia (Jakarta) by the Dutch. Seventeen-year-old Nicholas Duncan is on holiday there, in pursuit of an exotic butterfly known as the Magpie Crow. It's an uncertain, dangerous time to be in Indonesia, and Nick's options of getting out are fast dwindling. Amidst the fear and chaos he falls in love with Anna, the beautiful daughter of a Dutch acquaintance, and she nicknames him Mr Butterfly. Anna's father gifts Nick his prized yacht, Vlermuis, to escape to Australia. Vlermuis is not long out of Batavia when Nick is forced ashore for repairs.

Miracles of life
by J.G. Ballard
Miracles of Life opens and closes in Shanghai, the city where J.G.Ballard was born, and where he spent the most of the Second World War interned with his family in a Japanese concentration camp. This memoir is both an enthralling narrative and a detailed examination of the events which would profoundly influence his work. Beginning with his early childhood spent exploring the vibrant surroundings of pre-war Shanghai, Ballard charts the course of his remarkable life from the deprivations and unexpected freedoms of the Lunghua Camp to his return to a Britain physically and psychologically crippled by war. He explores his subsequent involvement in the dramatic social changes of the 1960s, and the adjustments to life following the premature death of his wife.

Under the Osakan sun : a funny, intimate, wonderful account of three years in Japan
by Hamish Beaton
A young New Zealander arrives to teach English in Japan under the JET programme, Jetlagged and dazed, he is swept up into a mystifying world. As he tries to make sense of it, he encounters an fascinating cast of characters - young women with clothing fetishes, middle-aged women who cook him meals in exchange for English conversation, a bizarre elderly couple who take him on nerve-wracking expeditions, other foreigners behaving badly, fellow teachers with strange habits - and his students, whom he must somehow instruct, despite a total lack of teaching experience. Along the way he engages in an ever more desperate quest to find a girlfriend - but things don't always work out the way he hopes.

The Point of Rescue
by Sophie Hannah
Sally is watching the news with her husband when she hears a name she ought not to recognise: Mark Bretherick. Last year, a business trip Sally had planned was cancelled at the last minute. Desperate for a break from her busy life juggling work and a young family, Sally didn't tell her husband that the trip had fallen through. Instead, she booked a week off work and treated herself to a secret holiday. All she wanted was a bit of peace - some time to herself - but it didn't work out that way. Because Sally met a man - Mark Bretherick.

What: Island Bay Book Group
Time: Wednesday, 6 May 2009, 10.15am

Staff Recommend:

Movies:

Good luck Chuck (DVD)
Beautiful Jessica Alba, handsome Dane Cook - and - thousands of good looking women. Funny, naughty, offensive - hilarious! --Violetta

CDs:

Somewhere back in time : the best of 1980-1989, Iron Maiden (CD)
Magnificent compilation of Iron Maiden's grandest years. Covering their early 80's releases this album manages in 60 minutes to be the summation of every conceivable cliche and ridiculous posture we associate with heavy metal. A glorious and majestic album, grab this one and you'll never need to hear another metal album ever. Actually that's completely and utterly untrue, you'll need plenty more after this, but you get the point. --Craig

Books:

Death of a dissident : the poisoning of Alexander Litvinenko and the return of the KGB, by Alex Goldfarb with Marina Litvinenko
This is a very interesting and shocking book. It's about connections, money, power, Russian politics, KGB, the Chechnyan war, Putin and massacres executed in the name of democracy. --Violka

For parents:

Jazz for kids sing, clap, wiggle and shake
I don't usually like jazz. I don't usually like kids' music either. This compilation album "Jazz for Kids: Sing, Clap, Wiggle and Shake", combines both in such an appealing way even I can appreciate the catchy tunes."Jazz for Kids" is a clever pairing of famous singers like Ella Fitzgerald and Louis Armstrong with songs that kids know and love like "Old MacDonald"and "The Muffin Man". This is one CD that parents will not mind listening to again and again and again.
If you enjoy listening to "Jazz for Kids" you may want to try the three "For the Kids" compilations we have at the library. These compilations are also well known kids' songs but rehashed by contemporary folk rock/pop artists. Also, if you have wee ones, another good end of the day option are the Rockabye Baby! albums with lullaby renditions of favorite rock bands like Nirvana and Led Zeppelin.
--Lucy