Get your cameras ready!

Ingleburn Library Youth Week Photo Competition

2011

Music!

If you’re aged 13-18, grab your camera, use your imagination and start snapping photos of everything musical. It can be someone playing music, listening to music, a musical instrument, CD, radio – let your imagination run free. As long as the photo illustrates the theme “music”, it’s ok.

There will be two categories, for ages 13-15, and ages 16-18, with prizes of movie tickets for first and second place in each category.

Just fill in an entry form at the library, get your entry number and email your number and photo to IngleburnLibrary@gmail.com. We will upload your photo to the Ingleburn Library Facebook page Youth Week 2011 photo competition album.

IngleburnLibrary@gmail.com

www.facebook.com/ingleburnlibrary

Catch up wth the local news

We've probably all caught up with the news from the online editions of the Sydney and national newspapers. But you may not know that our two local newspapers are also online. You can go to either the Macarthur Chronicle or the Macarthur Advertiser websites and find out what's happening in your local area. Both sites are updated constantly and are a great way to keep up with local news.

Looking for something new to read?

It can be so frustrating when you've read everything by an author you like. Who else writes like...? is a great website where you can find out who else writes in a similar style to your favourite author. You can also find lists of authors in different genre's, search by key characters, their occupation or even the type of environment in which the action takes place. It's a great way to expand your list of favourite writers, or maybe branch out into a new style of writing.

The library now has a subscription to this great resource. Just go to the Readers Lounge and click on the link to Who else writes like ...? to be automatically logged into the site.

Cute video from the Finnish Library Association

Book Club for 2011

Ingleburn library's book clubs are starting up again next week, and there are still a few places left. The first meeting for the Monday Night club will be on the 24th of January, at 6.30pm, and the first meeting for the Friday Morning club will be on the 28th of January at 10.30am.

The book for Monday Night is The Slap by Christos Tsiolkas, and the Friday Morning club are reading House Rules by Jodi Picoult    .

If you're interested in joining in just ask at the desk or ring 9605 5336. There are just a couple of places left in each club so be quick!

Read It 2011

In 2011 public libraries in NSW will be participating in a twitter reading challenge. This is open to all public library staff and library customers. It is called #readit2011 and every month there will be a different theme to chose your books from.
Then as you read each month you are encouraged to "tweet" about what you are reading so that others can see and discuss it with you. Each month there will be a different hashtag which allows all the tweets to be grouped together to make them easier to find. Even if you don't want to tweet you can read what everyone else is saying.
A website has been set up that contains all the links you need to participate in this challenge and you can click here to get there.

Have you tried Overdrive?

Overdrive Digital Media Collection

You can use this site to browse and search hundreds of great Audiobooks & eBooks, download them to your computer, and transfer them to a portable device for your listening pleasure anywhere, anytime. MP3 Audiobooks downloaded from this site can be used with many devices including most cell phones, PDA’s and MP3 players such as iPods, iPhones and the iTouch. Some titles can be burned to CD as well. Try it, it's easy! If you are a first time user, click here to find out more.

Come and see the Noiseguy Charlie Williams!

To kick off the new year we have the Noiseguy, Charlie Williams performing at the library as our first fantastic school holiday activity for 2011.

Charlie Williams, the zany czar of sound, is a kids comedian and vocal sound impressionist. He teaches humor as a life skill and shows kids how to put some ompf into onomatopoeia.

He has been performing full time for 10 years, published 3 books and released 8 albums of noisy fun. Enjoy traditional and not-so-traditional stories told in an energetic new way.


Good, noisy, family fun! Friday, January 7th at 2.00pm.


Tickets are only $2.50 available from the library, or ring 02 9605 5336 for more information.


Why not check out Charlie's Website 

Richard Glover

We were lucky enough to have a visit from Richard Glover on Wednesday night. Those hardy souls who braved the rain enjoyed a very funny talk from Richard, who told us something about the process of writing and how he gets his inspiration for his work. There was also time for the audience to ask questions.

 Richard very generously spent quite a long time signing books and talking to people after the formal part of his talk, which was much appreciated.

Overall it was a fitting end to our series of Talking Heads author visits for 2010. Hopefully we'll be able to line up some great writers again in 2011!

Macarthur Nature Photography Competition

You can see the entries in the Macathur Nature Photography Competition at Ingleburn Library at the moment. There are some beautiful photographs, all taken in the Macarthur area - it's amazing the natural beauty that can be found locally.

For more Information about the competition, go here . Come and check out the exhibition, and why not have a go at entering the competition next year?

Richard Glover @ Ingleburn Library

Richard Glover is the author of twelve books, including Why Men Are Necessary - a collection of his comic pieces as featured on ABC radio's Thank God It's Friday. His weekly humour column has been published in the Sydney Morning Herald for over twenty years.

His books have been published in Poland and Italy. He's also author of Desperate Husbands, In bed with Jocasta, The Dag's Dictionary, and The P-Plate Parent (co-written with Angela Webber). His book The Mud House - the story of building a mud-brick house in the middle of nowhere with no power tools - was published in 2009.

Richard has written a few stage shows, including Lonestar, a stage show about country music, which toured nationally with Genevieve Lemon, and A Christmas Story, which was performed at the Sydney Opera House, with Richard Wherrett directing. He was also one of the co-authors of Breast Wishes.

Richard Glover has written two short novels for children - The Dirt Experiment and The Joke Trap. And a version of the Dag's Dictionary for kids, under the title The No-Minute Noodler.

Richard Glover will be talking about his latest book, Why Men Are Necessary , at Ingleburn Library on Wednesday, December 1st at 7.30pm. Tickets are $5, available at the library.

What about the Genres?

About five years ago, in response to some feedback from our customers, we divided the fiction collection at Ingleburn into Genres. The reasoning was that people usually like to read the same kinds of books, for example mysteries or romances. By grouping all the same kind of fiction together, we wanted to make it easier for our customers to find their favourite kind of books, and also to help them locate other authors who write in the same genre. At the same time, we kept a General Fiction section, for books that are hard to categorise, or which straddle two or more genres.

The change was one of the most popular things we ever did to the collection, based on the feedback we recieved. Of course, there are some customers who preferred the old arrangement. But frankly we were surprised by how much positive feedback we got! It was very satisfying - we like happy customers!

Over time we've made a few tweaks to the fiction genres. This year we've made a couple of major changes, adding the Classics and Chick Lit genres. We've wanted to add a Classics section for a long time, and a big donation of classics at the end of last year allowed us to form a basis for this collection. And the Chick Lit collection is a response to trends in popular fiction, and is proving to be one of our most popular genres.

Have you checked out the Readers Lounge  at the main Campbelltown Library website? There are some great links there for avid readers, where you can find information on new authors in your favourite genre, best seller lists, which books come in which order in series and the book version of your favourite film. It's worth checking out.

How do the Zones work?

People have been asking about our non-fiction Zones. The idea behind the zones is to group recreational or popular non-fiction together in one area, rather than have it spread out in different areas of the library. For example, the Children and Parenting Zone has materials in it from the 150, 300 and 600 Dewey classifications. Traditionally, these items would have been spread out around the library building - the Zones are an attempt to bring them all together.

More academic, or "study" materials are still in their traditional Dewey number order, in the main non-fiction section of the library.

Many libraries are trying different ways of organising their collections these days, to try to meet the changing needs of our customers. The Dewey classification system can be confusing for many people, and while it works well for academic libraries it doesn't always work for a modern public library. Hopefully the Zones allow people to sit and browse through all the books and magazines in the area they are interested in. And they have a great view of the park!

At present our Zones are: Technology, which includes computers and machines of all kinds; Arts, Crafts and Hobbies, which is pretty much as it sounds; Body, Mind and Spirit, including self-help, exercise and matters spiritual; Children and Parenting; Travel, and lastly, Biographies.

What do you think of our Zones? Do you like them? Hate them? Didn't know they existed? Let us know in comments.

No-Cook Cooking at Ingleburn Library

School Holiday Activities

It's an Alien Invasion!

Ready to blast off!

More than 50 kids descended upon the library for a morning of space crafts today. With a space collage, alien masks and rockets to make there was plenty to keep them occupied. As usual it was organised chaos for the staff, with our regular preschool storytime going on simultaneously! But it's well worth the effort to see the kids enjoying themselves at the library. They always surprise us with their creative interpretations of the crafts. It's a good opportunity for the whole family to visit the library, have some fun and do something different during the holidays.



Space Kittens?



Book Review - The Patron Saint of Eels by Gregory Day.

The Patron Saint of Eels is Gregory Day's debut novel.

It is set in the coastal town of Mangowak.

It is a book about eels stuck in a ditch.

The Patron Saint of Eels is Australian bush magical realism. With property developers smashing up the town, tourism sadly blossoming and the locals observing Council workers installing road signs about road signs, the people take to the pub to play pool and drink beers. That mad thrashing sound of the eels stuck in a ditch can't help but be analogous to local lives lived within the insularity of a small town, awaiting liberation - or death.

Grim it seems, but Day takes a look around him and finds nature to be the redemptive motif amongst a seemingly boring, meaningless existence. The characters themselves are, by their linked histories, warm and funny. Day's empathy for his regional dwelling cast really makes you consider this livelihood as one of the few remaining possibilities of a community. A community aware of each others vulnerabilities but all too prepared to overlook, or at least ridicule these shortcomings with outback backslapping and shouts all 'round.

The eels provide a lot of splashing in the early parts of the novel. It's unpleasant thinking about these trapped slimy beasts and Day uses their noise accompaniment to increase the anxiety of the reader and the protagonist alike. It's about here that Day asks you to believe him and he himself, as the story moves from a Country yarn to an International, interstellar leap of faith.

The Patron Saint of Eels wears a beanie, smokes cigarettes and loves chocolate. Fra Ionio takes over the novel as the central storyteller and tells us of his previous 300 or so years of eel handling and how he came to be in Mangowak and address the trapped Eels with basically a song and a prayer.

Whether or not you believe Fra Ionio will determine the success of the book, but I, like Day, am all too happy to open myself to the endless possibilities and sometimes miracles of the natural and imagined World.
An excellent debut with good ears for the sound of rural Australia.

Reviewed by: what

The Patron Saint of Eels is available for loan or reserve at Ingleburn Library.

The Olden Days

While finding some materials for a class visit, we came accross this shot of the old Ingleburn Library, before it became the library. At the time of this photo, around 1960, this was the Ingleburn RSL Club. Things are very different today, with our fantastic new building! Those of us who worked there can still be a little nostalgic at times about the old building, which had a certain charm - leaky roof and all.

You can check out the rest of Campbelltown City Library Service's historic photo collection here.

Ingleburn Public School at the library

Over the next two days we're being visited by 160 kids fom Ingleburn Public School as part of their walking tour of the community. During their library tour we show them around the library, tell them about membership, the Bookalicious reading club, and show them the variety of resouces available for young people. It's great to be able to introduce kids to the library, and our team leader Virginia works hard showing them around. It's a rewarding but noisy job! We give the kids a "Show Bag" when they're leaving, full of information about the library, colouring, bookmarks and so on. Marina works hard collating all the materials and filling the bags, and they help to make the visit a little special.

Morris Gleitzman Visit

We were lucky enough to have the famous children's author Morris Gleitzman at the library today, giving a talk to about 300 children from local schools. Morris has written over 30 books, and gave an inspirational and very funny talk to a very appreciative audience. It was a great opportunity for local kids to meet one of their favourite authors. They really enjoyed finding out about Morris and the writing process.

If you want to find out more about Morris and his books, visit his website: http://www.morrisgleitzman.com/

Monday Night Book Club

We're starting a new book club! Our Friday morning book club has been going for almost a year now, so we've decided to add one to meet on Monday nights, for those who can't make it during the day. It will be held on the last Monday of each month, starting at 6.30pm. We're aiming to have our first meeting on September 27th, so if you're interested ask at the front desk, or call the library on 9605 5336. Numbers will be limited to about 10, so get in touch with us soon.

For those who are intersted in online book discussions, here are some links to online book clubs you might find interesting:

Online Book Club - http://onlinebookclub.org/  This site offers those people who love to read a wide range of book reviews and book recommendations. Also included are many interactive discussions and polls about books. At this book club you can find information and discussions about classic books as well as new releases, both in the old solid form and the relatively new eBook form.

First Tuesday Book Club - http://www.abc.net.au/tv/firsttuesday/  The popular ABC TV show has some good online forums, as well as reviews and information about special guests to be featured on upcoming shows.

Readers' Paradise - http://glyphs.gardenweb.com/forums/paradise/  This forum is for the discussion of all topics related to reading and literature. Its name is derived from something Jorge Luis Borges once said: "I have always imagined that Paradise would be a kind of library.."

There are many more out there - just Google "Online Book Club" or "Book Discussion" and you're bound to find something interesting.