Grandin describes how a life of sensory overload – loud noises, sudden changes, and large crowds, for example, can cause an autistic person intense distress.  It’s as if the filter that most people have that prevents us from sensing and responding to more than is necessary in our environments is either not present or damaged in an autistic person.  The movie provides many glimpses into Grandin’s mind as she becomes more and more able to relate how her thinking works.  What is clear to me after watching, is that autism was and still is a completely misunderstood disorder.

As a child, Grandin’s mother was told that they should institutionalize her.  Luckily for her, the animal world, and us, her family did not listen and persisted with her education.  The road was not without great challenges for Temple and her family, but I think her life is  a wonderful example of how not writing one’s intelligence off because they do not function “normally” is imperative.  We are only yet to understand this complicated disorder and, until we do, understanding, love, patience, and kindness seems to have the potential to help unlock the autistic mind.

We have everything you need at the library (and know how to point you to the best of the ‘net!) to learn more about Temple Grandin and her accomplishments as well as autism:

BOOKS

Animals in Translation: Using the Mysteries of Autism to Decode Animal Behavior by Temple Grandin

Animals Make Us Human: Creating the Best Life for Animals by Temple Grandin

Developing Talents: Careers for Individuals with Asperger Syndrome and High-Functioning Autism by Temple Grandin & Kate Duffy

Humane Livestock Handling by Temple Grandin & Mark Deesing

Thinking in Pictures: And Other Reports From My Life With Autism by Temple Grandin

The Unwritten Rules of Social Relationships: Decoding Social Mysteries Through the Unique Perspectives of Autism by Temple Grandin & Sean Barron

WEBSITES

Autistic Girl Expresses Profound Intelligence
My nephew is autistic so someone forwarded me this powerful story about Carly. It’s an amazing short piece that really demonstrates how intelligent and capable many people afflicted with this disorder are.

A Conversation with Temple Grandin (NPR)
This is the first I had heard of Dr. Grandin back in 2006 and the interview is fascinating.

Dr. Temple Grandin’s Official Autism Website
This website links to all of Dr. Grandin’s presentations, books, articles, and more on autism. You can also ask Dr. Grandin questions about autism and she’ll respond on the website.

Dr. Temple Grandin’s Web Page
This page links to Dr Grandin’s works about animals and her designs for the humane slaughter of livestock.

In Depth with Temple Grandin
A video interview from C-SPAN BookTV

Temple Grandin: The World Needs All Kinds of Minds
A TED talk by Grandin in which she discusses how her mind works and the world’s need for many different types of minds.

Posted by Bonnie, a second floor librarian

First on my list is Colleen Morton Busch’s 2011 nonfiction piece, Zen Monks: Zen Mind Meets Wildfire at the Gates of Tassajara. I picked up this read almost entirely because of the cover art: a striking photo of five monks wearing a mish-mash of wildland firefighting gear and traditional robes. What I didn’t expect was Busch’s ability to weave a tactical discussion of wildland firefighting effortlessly within a larger narrative of Zen Buddhism as it exists in the mountains of the Los Padres National Forest.

Coincidentally Tassajara features a few yurts that had to be defended from the flames, which leads me to my next recommendation. Becky Kemery’s Yurts: Living in the Round allows readers to take a walk on the rounder side of living. Kemery offers a detailed and thoroughly researched historical account of yurts as they existed in times gone by. She compliments this with a discussion of more contemporary yurt structures both here and abroad. Adding to her thorough research is a wide array of beautiful photographs and a yurt resource list at the back of the book. Did you know that there are two large yurt manufacturing companies right here in our backyard? Check out yurts.com and yurtworks.com to view contemporary yurt offerings in Eugene and Cottage Grove.

Vegetable basics: 84 Recipes Illustrated Step by Step by Jody Vassallo is my final suggestion for those looking to make some lifestyle changes of the dietary variety. Vassallo’s cookbook can inspire even the pickiest eater to reconsider the world of vegetables. Photographs by Clive Bozzard-Hill jazz up already great recipes and highlight some of the cooking techniques needed to make them a hit in your household. Vegetables make regular appearances in my kitchen, but in 2012 they are coming back around with a whole new attitude.

Posted by Ashley, Extensions Librarian

I’ve discovered two things: 1. 1984 is a phenomenal book for fans of sci-fi and great literature alike, and, 2. 1Q84 seems only loosely related to 1984, so I could have skipped it and still understood the Murakami novel.  Reviews of 1Q84 have ranged from glowing to scathing, but no matter what I personally end up thinking of it when I finally finish 700 or so more pages (!), I will be forever grateful to it for encouraging me to read a bold, intense classic I’ll never forget.

Reading 1984 is in keeping with last year’s New Year’s resolution to read more classics I’ve missed.  I also read Love in the Time of Cholera (boring!) and tore through Wuthering Heights (loved it!)  Have you read a classic recently that has knocked your socks off?  What are some of the best classics out there, in your opinion?  Reading classics has definitely given me a greater appreciation for and understanding of my favorite genre, contemporary fiction.  Classics are key to fully appreciating great literature.

If you’re a fan of 1984 or 1Q84, below are some other books you might enjoy.  Also, don’t forget about our amazing database, Novelist ( look under “N” in the A-Z list of databases and use your library card to access it from home).  If you want to find books to read based on other books you’ve enjoyed that have been recommended by a trained and well-read librarian, take a look at Novelist.

If you like 1984 try:

The Children of Men by P.D. James

Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? by Philip K. Dick

The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood

Neuromancer by William Gibson

Player Piano by Kurt Vonnegut

If you like 1Q84, try:

Brida by Paulo Coehlo

The Changeling Kenzaburo Oe

Ficciones by Jorge Luis Borges

V. by Thomas Pynchon

Villa Incognito by Tom Robbins

Posted by Bonnie, a second floor librarian

Take a look around the Booklist site (you’ll need to enter your library card to access it from home) where you’ll find other great lists such as Top 10 Food Books 2011 and the monthly High Demand Hot List .  This is a great database which we librarians use as one of our selection tools.  We think you’ll enjoy it too for getting reading suggestions.  The library has a subscription so it’s free to you with your library card.

You’ll find Booklist listed alphabetically under the A-Z list on our “Research” page along with all our other subscription databases.

Let us know what you think of Booklist!

Posted by Alex, a second floor librarian

	This life is in your hands : one dream, sixty acres, and a family undone /Melissa Coleman.“With urban farming and backyard chicken flocks becoming increasingly popular, Coleman has written this timely and honest portrait of her own childhood experience in Maine with her two homesteading parents during the turbulent 1970s. Inspired by the back-to-the-land lifestyle of Scott and Helen Nearing, Coleman’s parents, Sue and Eliot, decided to create their own idyllic reality on 60 acres of land in Maine that was sold to them by the Nearing family for a token sum. While Coleman emphasizes the beauty of growing up in a family culture that valued the bounty of nature and freedom of expression, she does not hesitate to also expose farming’s detrimental effect on family life-her own well-being as well as the accidental death of her younger sister.” From Publishers Weekly.
	Feeding the dragon : a culinary travelogue through China with recipes / Mary Kate Tate & Nate Tate“With little more than two backpacks, a camera, and a tarp, Mandarin-speaking American brother and sister Nate and Mary Kate Tate traveled more than 9,700 miles throughout China to share the country’s inspiring culture and cuisine with kitchens in the West. What began as a travelblog (feedingthedragon.com) documenting the duo’s journey has evolved into a visual narrative of food, culture, and travel inside Feeding the Dragon.”
	A visit from the Goon Squad / Jennifer Egan.“Time changes both everything and nothing in this novel about former punk rocker-turned-music executive Bennie Salazar and Sasha, his indispensable secretary with an unhappy past. A host of characters from San Francisco’s 1970s music scene collide in ways that are hard to summarize, with peripheral characters in one chapter more fully developed in others. These well-defined characters and the engaging narrative are hallmarks of Egan’s earlier fiction, which include Look at Me, a National Book Award finalist, and the best-selling The Keep. Here, we learn that power is transient, authenticity is not all it’s cracked up to be, and friendships are often fragile, but the connections among people matter terribly. Often, we survive the self-destructive tendencies of youth only to realize that we’ve just exchanged one set of problems for another. Verdict In the end, this novel does offer hope, but it is the grubby kind that keeps you going once you’ve been kicked to the curb.” From Library Journal.
	Teach us to sit still : a skeptic’s search for health and healing / Tim Parks“Teach Us to Sit Still is the visceral, thought-provoking, and inexplicably entertaining story of how Tim Parks found himself in serious pain, how doctors failed to help, and the quest he took to find his own way out. Overwhelmed by a crippling condition which nobody could explain or relieve, Parks follows a fruitless journey through the conventional medical system only to find relief in the most unexpected place: a breathing exercise that eventually leads him to take up meditation. This was the very last place Parks anticipated finding answers; he was about as far from New Age as you can get. As everything that he once held true is called into question, Parks confronts the relationship between his mind and body, the hectic modern world that seems to demand all our focus, and his chosen life as an intellectual and writer. He is drawn to consider the effects of illness on the work of other writers, the role of religion in shaping our sense of self, and the influence of sports and art on our attitudes toward health and well-being. Most of us will fall ill at some point; few will describe that journey with the same verve, insight, and radiant intelligence as Tim Parks”– Provided by publisher
	Before I go to sleep : a novel / S.J. Watson.Nearly strangled to death in her twenties, Christine awakens each morning with absolutely no memory of what happened then-or since. The stranger in her bed must explain that he is her husband, Ben. With the help of a doctor who determines to circumvent Ben, Christine starts a journal-though she must reread it each day, and the doctor must call to tell her where it is. The truth she uncovers is nothing like you’d expect. I’ve seen this debut, and, yes, it’s a gripping, one-sitting psychological thriller.
	Lost in Shangri-la : a true story of survival, adventure, and the most incredible rescue mission of World War II / Mitchell Zuckoff.Award-winning former Boston Globe reporter Mitchell Zuckoff unleashes the exhilarating, untold story of an extraordinary World War II rescue mission, where a plane crash in the South Pacific plunged a trio of U.S. military personnel into the jungle-clad land of New Guinea
	The social animal : the hidden sources of love, character, and achievement / David Brooks“Following the example of Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s Emile, Brooks offers fictional characters Harold and Erica to illustrate how humans communicate, are educated, and succeed or don’t. Synthesizing research on human unconsciousness, Brooks meshes sociology, psychology, and economics to show how character is formed and how we strive for happiness and success. He follows Harold, from a solid middle-class background, and Erica, from a working-class background, from birth, through school, work, love, marriage, and into old age, detailing their lives, the choices they make given the complexities of their personal histories, the histories of their families, and the backdrops of their lives. Through Harold and Erica, Brooks masterfully details how we all are led to the choices we make and how they define our lives. He offers a new look at the assumptions we make about life and a close, deep examination of the failure of social and economic policies that do not take into account the complexities of human behavior, treating us as if we were totally rational and guided by our thoughts rather than some combination of intellect and emotion.” From Booklist
	White shotgun : an FBI special agent Ana Grey novel / April Smith.“A white shotgun, or lupara bianca in the organized-crime parlance of southern Italy, is a murder for which the body is never found. The open-endedness of the disappearance is intended to haunt and torture those left behind. This is an apt metaphor for the latest Ana Grey series entry, in which the FBI special agent is asked repeatedly to venture into situations of great ambiguity, in which violence is suddenly unleashed. Ana is a credible, fascinating heroine, both worldly and rueful about her unsettled life (her current lover is a hired gun who often leaves at the drop of a cell-phone message). This time out, Ana is in London, where she witnesses a harrowing drive-by shooting outside a restaurant, goes into disaster-recovery mode, and almost immediately is sent to Sienna to preserve her cover. The larger reason for this scenario is that Grey’s half sister, whom she has never met, has married into the network of Italian Mafias and provides an excellent excuse for Grey to infiltrate. Much of the action involves Sienna itself, including the annual running of the horses (the Palio) in the main piazza and the ways medieval family rivalries still persist. Tight suspense and fascinating background.” From Booklist
	The Shakespeare thefts : in search of the first folios / Eric Rasmussen.The first edition of Shakespeare’s collected works, the First Folio, published in 1623, is one of the most valuable books in the world and has historically proven to be an attractive target for thieves. Of the 160 First Folios listed in a census of 1902, 14 were subsequently stolen-and only two of these were ever recovered. In his efforts to catalog all these precious First Folios, renowned Shakespeare scholar Eric Rasmussen embarked on a riveting journey around the globe, involving run-ins with heavily tattooed criminal street gangs in Tokyo, bizarre visits with eccentric, reclusive billionaires, and intense battles of wills with secretive librarians. He explores the intrigue surrounding the Earl of Pembroke, arguably Shakespeare’s boyfriend, to whom the First Folio is dedicated and whose personal copy is still missing. He investigates the uncanny sequence of events in which a wealthy East Coast couple drowned in a boating accident and the next week their First Folio appeared for sale in Kansas. We hear about Folios that were censored, the pages ripped out of them, about a volume that was marked in red paint-or is it blood?-on every page; and of yet another that has a bullet lodged in its pages. Part literary detective story, part Shakespearean lore, The Shakespeare Thefts will charm the Bard’s many fans”– Provided by publisher.
	The filter bubble : what the Internet is hiding from you / Eli Pariser        In December 2009, Google began customizing its search results for each user. Instead of giving you the most broadly popular result, Google now tries to predict what you are most likely to click on. According to MoveOn.org board president Eli Pariser, Google’s change in policy is symptomatic of the most significant shift to take place on the Web in recent years-the rise of personalization. In this groundbreaking investigation of the new hidden Web, Pariser uncovers how this growing trend threatens to control how we consume and share information as a society-and reveals what we can do about it.
	The keeper of lost causes / Jussi Adler-Olsen.”Since a shooting left him injured and his partner paralyzed, Copenhagen detective Carl Mørck has lost his way. His difficult personality, formerly tolerated because of his skills, has made him a liability. So his boss puts him in charge of Department Q, a cold-case Siberia that consists of Mørck and a genially obtuse assistant, Assad. There Mørck becomes intrigued by the file of Merete Lynggaard, a beautiful politician lost at sea five years ago. Here’s the kicker: We know that Lynggaard is still alive, imprisoned in horrific circumstances. Adler-Olsen deftly advances both stories simultaneously. As Mørck uncovers the truth about Lynggaard’s fate, Lynggaard learns why she has been singled out for an elaborate revenge. The reader’s desire for the narratives to meet is so painful it’s palpable.” From Booklist
	Elizabeth and Hazel : two women of Little Rock / David Margolick. “The names Elizabeth Eckford and Hazel Bryan Massery may not be well known, but the image of them from September 1957 surely is: a black high school girl, dressed in white, walking stoically in front of Little Rock Central High School, and a white girl standing directly behind her, face twisted in hate, screaming racial epithets. This famous photograph captures the full anguish of desegregation — in Little Rock and throughout the South — and an epic moment in the civil rights movement. In this gripping book, David Margolick tells the remarkable story of two separate lives unexpectedly braided together. He explores how the haunting picture of Elizabeth and Hazel came to be taken, its significance in the wider world, and why, for the next half-century, neither woman has ever escaped from its long shadow. He recounts Elizabeth’s struggle to overcome the trauma of her hate-filled school experience, and Hazel’s long efforts to atone for a fateful, horrible mistake. The book follows the painful journey of the two as they progress from apology to forgiveness to reconciliation and, amazingly, to friendship. This friendship foundered, then collapsed — perhaps inevitably — over the same fissures and misunderstandings that continue to permeate American race relations more than half a century after the unforgettable photograph at Little Rock. And yet, as Margolick explains, a bond between Elizabeth and Hazel, silent but complex, endures”–Provided by publisher.

Posted by Alex, a second floor librarian

However tall the mountain : a dream, eight girls, and a journey home / Awista Ayub.

Describes how the Afghan-born author flourished throughout her upbringing in America thanks to organized athletics, her founding of the Afghan Youth Sports Exchange for Afghan girls after the fall of the Taliban, and the personal stories of eight young soccer players. [Also available as a downloadable ebook]

Born to run : a hidden tribe, superathletes, and the greatest race the world has never seen / Christopher McDougall.

McDougall reveals the secrets of the world’s greatest distance runners–the Tarahumara Indians of Copper Canyon, Mexico–and how he trained for the challenge of a fifty-mile race through the heart of Tarahumara country pitting the tribe against an odd band of super-athletic Americans. [Also available as a downloadable audiobook or ebook]

The real all Americans : the team that changed a game, a people, a nation / Sally Jenkins.

Journalist/author Jenkins revives a forgotten piece of history and crafts an inspirational story about a Native American football team that is as much about football as Lance Armstrong’s book was about a bike. If you guessed that Yale or Harvard ruled the college gridiron in 1911 and 1912, you’d be wrong. The most popular team belonged to an institution called the Carlisle Indian Industrial School.

Dead lucky : life after death on Mount Everest / Lincoln Hall.

Outlines the dramatic 2006 survival story of a famed Australian mountain climber who was pronounced dead and abandoned by Sherpas during a climb of Mount Everest only to be discovered alive the next day.

Posted by Lindy, a second floor librarian

Image credit: Morning by h. Koppdelaney on Flickr

	The unconquered: in search of the Amazon’s last uncontacted tribes by Scott Wallace.”The Unconquered tells the extraordinary tale of a journey into the deepest recesses of the Amazon to track one of the planet’s last uncontacted indigenous tribes. In this gripping first-person account of adventure and survival, the author follows a 34-man team into the Amazon’s uncharted depths, discovering the rainforest’s secrets while moving ever closer to a possible encounter with the mysterious flecheiros – or “People of the Arrow” – a seldom-glimpsed tribe of deft archers known to defend their lands with showers of deadly arrows before melting back into the forest shadows.”
	The lost city of Z: a tale of deadly obsession in the Amazon by David Grann.”In 1925, the legendary British explorer Percy Fawcett ventured into the Amazon jungle, in search of a fabled civilization. He never returned. Over the years countless perished trying to find evidence of his party and the place he called “The Lost City of Z.” In this masterpiece of narrative nonfiction, journalist David Grann interweaves the spellbinding stories of Fawcett’s quest for “Z” and his own journey into the deadly jungle, as he unravels the greatest exploration mystery of the twentieth century.”
	The river sea: the Amazon in history, myth, and legend by Marshall De Bruhl.”Derived from firsthand accounts and secondary histories about Amazonian exploration, and informed by an authorial journey to South America, this work embraces discoverers, conquistadors, missionaries, naturalists, and environmentalists who have been mesmerized by the world’s most stupendous river. Throughout, De Bruhl injects landscape and geographical description into a narrative anchored to historical personages. This usefully depicts the imposing scale of the Amazon, from its width and length to its source in the craggy recesses of the Andes Mountains, as the daunting stage for the ambitions of those who would exploit it. After recounting the fall of the Inca in the era of Spanish and Portuguese conquest, for example, De Bruhl introduces various desperadoes who sought riches in the rain forest; he then describes the scientific expeditions—Alexander von Humboldt’s being the best remembered—that yielded their shares of discovery and drama. Sequencing from botanists such as Alfred Russel Wallace to Amazonian economic conflicts over rubber and deforestation, De Bruhl empathetically regales readers with an Amazon that is alluring, intimidating, and ecologically fragile.”
	The mapmaker’s wife: a true tale of love, murder, and survival in the Amazon by Robert Whitaker.”Only an exceptional life could connect the Enlightenment salons of Paris with the tribal villages of the Amazon jungle. Peruvian-born Isabel Grameson lived such a life, and now a prizewinning science writer has retraced its improbable course in a riveting narrative. That story begins with eighteenth-century physicists debating theoretical issues that only observers positioned in South America can resolve. But the French academics who set out to make these observations soon leave behind the empyreal world of pure formulas: only by traversing unmapped rivers, scaling Andean peaks, enduring vexatious insects, and pacifying murderous Peruvians do these resolute savants obtain the longitudinal data they seek. Ultimately, though, these scientific adventurers endure the disappointment of seeing their work validate a British rather than a French paradigm! Finally, too, the expedition sees all its scientific valor eclipsed by the heroism of one beautiful young Peruvian woman–Isabel Grameson–who marries one of the group’s cartographers. For it is this woman who–when cruelly separated from her husband–braves perils far beyond those faced by the scientists. Readers can only marvel at how Isabel survives a rain-forest journey (personally repeated, afoot and afloat, by Whitaker) that claims the lives of all of her companions and leaves her stranded and presumed dead. A rare story, taut with intellectual controversy, romantic passion, and harrowing danger.”

These books are all well reviewed and should appeal to the reader who likes history with their adventure.

Posted by Alex, a second floor librarian

Here are four historical novels to try.  Three are new this year and one is an old favorite:

	The time in between by Maria Duenas
	A month in the country by J.L. Carr
	Caleb’s Crossing by Geraldine Brooks
	Madame Tussaud by Michelle Moran

Posted by Alex, a second floor librarian

Image credit: Stark by Steve-h on Flickr

Here’s how it works:

Check out the options for the current month. If something sounds interesting to you, check the box next to it and then enter your email at the bottom of the page.

After that, you’ll receive a chapter a day for a week, delivered right to your email. At the end of the preview, you’ll know if you want to commit further and can check out the book through us. Read at your leisure. No fuss!

Our online book clubs offer new books every week, and include many popular authors such as James Patterson, Nicholas Sparks, Debbie Macomber and Laura Hillenbrand, just to name a few. If you’re interested in what our online book club is offering in the future, we have information available through February.

Happy Reading!

Posted by Lindy, a Second Floor Librarian

“In Flanders Fields”
by Lieutenant Colonel John Alexander McCrae

In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie,
In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.

from “In Flanders Fields and Other Poems” by John McCrae

Thanks Veterans!

Posted by Christopher, a second floor librarian.