DATE CORRECTION!
NEXT LITERARY SALON - Wednesday, July 8 @ 4:30pm
Join us the 2nd Wednesday of the month to share favorite books, authors, or series. Literary Salon is a no-rules book club where you bring whatever you're reading to a round of interested listeners. You are welcome to come and be a listener, too. Eight people shared the following 11 titles and 2 series in June. Please join us at the next Lit Salon on Wednesday, July 8 at 4:30pm. Check lopezlibrary.org or email Beth for current information.

Recommendations
The Darkness Manifesto: On Light Pollution, Night Ecology, and the Ancient Rhythms That Sustain Life
by ö

This timely and captivating look at the hidden impact of light pollution is rich in revelation and insight...lyrical (The Wall Street Journal) and urges us to cherish natural darkness for the sake of the environment, our own well-being, and all life on earth.How much light is too much light? Satellite pictures show our planet as a brightly glowing orb, and in our era of constant illumination, light pollution has become a major issue. The world's flora and fauna have evolved to operate in the natural cycle of day and night. But in the last 150 years, we have extended our day-and in doing so have forced out the inhabitants of the night and disrupted the circadian rhythms necessary to sustain all living things, including ourselves.In this well-researched and surprisingly lyrical (The New Statesman, UK) book, Swedish conservationist Johan Eklöf urges us to appreciate natural darkness, its creatures, and its unique benefits. He ponders the beauties of the night sky, traces the errant paths of light-drunk moths and the swift dives of keen-eyed owls, and shows us the bioluminescent creatures of the deepest oceans. As a devoted friend of the night, Eklöf reveals the startling domino effect of diminishing darkness: insects, dumbfounded by streetlamps, failing to reproduce; birds blinded and bewildered by artificial lights; and bats starving as they wait in vain for insects that only come out in the dark. For humans, light-induced sleep disturbances impact our hormones and weight, and can contribute to mental health problems like chronic stress and depression. The streetlamps, floodlights, and neon signs of cities are altering entire ecosystems, and scientists are only just beginning to understand their long-term effects. The light bulb-long the symbol of progress and development-needs to be turned off.Urgent...vivid...eye-opening (Publishers Weekly), and ultimately encouraging, The Darkness Manifesto outlines simple steps that we can take to benefit ourselves and the planet. In order to ensure a bright future, we must embrace the darkness.
Son of Nobody
by Yann Martel

From the author of the international bestseller Life of Pi, a brilliant retelling of the Trojan War from two commoners: an ancient soldier and modern scholar. The past is never done with: always the song continues Harlow Donne has devoted his life to the Classical world. When a chance comes up to study an obscure collection of papyrus fragments at Oxford University, he seizes it. Though it means leaving his daughter and fracturing marriage back home in Canada, this is the kind of career break he desperately needs. In the depths of the Bodleian Library, Harlow discovers a lost account of the Trojan War, a glimpse into the founding of Western civilization itself. He names the epic poem The Psoad, after its protagonist, a Greek commoner identified as Psoas of Midea, but known to all as son of nobody. As sole translator and interpreter of The Psoad, Harlow dedicates the poem and its footnotes to his daughter, Helen. Under his gaze, the text unlocks echoes of Ancient Greece into the present day, and a personal message to his beloved child appears. Despite the two-thousand-year gap between the two, a thread hasn't frayed: the universal song of homesickness and regret, of ambition, love, and grief. In this masterpiece of myth, history, and domesticity, Son of Nobody explores how stories become facts, the price we pay to share them, and how we live--then, now, and always.
The Perfect Passion Company
by Alexander McCall Smith

As the new manager of The Perfect Passion Company at No. 24 Mouse Lane in New Town, Katie Donald has made it her mission to provide help to the lovelorn citizens of Edinburgh. With the help of her amiable and handsome office neighbor William Kidd, she finds herself making matches for the lonely hearts of Edinburgh who want a more personal touch. In this tale, Katie helps an airline pilot figure out what it is he really wants in a partner by sending him to cooking school. Another customer, a hotelier with a particularly overbearing mother, arrives looking for a bit of freedom - and space. Along the way, Katie learns that the work of the Perfect Passion Company may be a little broader in its scope than she had originally thought.--
Gathering Moss: A Natural and Cultural History of Mosses
by Robin Wall Kimmerer

Living at the limits of our ordinary perception, mosses are a common but largely unnoticed element of the natural world. Gathering Moss is a beautifully written mix of science and personal reflection that invites listeners to explore and learn from the elegantly simple lives of mosses. Robin Wall Kimmerer's book is not an identification guide, nor is it a scientific treatise. Rather, it is a series of linked personal essays that will lead general readers and scientists alike to an understanding of how mosses live and how their lives are intertwined with the lives of countless other beings, from salmon and hummingbirds to redwoods and rednecks. Kimmerer clearly and artfully explains the biology of mosses, while at the same time reflecting on what these fascinating organisms have to teach us. Drawing on her diverse experiences as a scientist, mother, teacher, and writer of Native American heritage, Kimmerer explains the stories of mosses in scientific terms as well as in the framework of indigenous ways of knowing. In her book, the natural history and cultural relationships of mosses become a powerful metaphor for ways of living in the world.
Crystal Cave (Arthurian Saga 1)
by Mary Stewart

Merlin, the illegitimate son of the South Wales princess, is aware at an early age of a great natural gift - the Sight. We see his emergence into manhood, and his dramatic role in the New Beginning - the coming of King Arthur.

#2 - The Hollow Hills
#3 - The Last Enchantment
#4 - The Wicked Day
#5 - The Prince and the Pilgrim
 
Last Branch Standing: A Potentially Surprising, Occasionally Witty Journey Inside Today's Supreme Court
by Sarah Isgur

A myth-busting glimpse into the inner workings of the Supreme Court in the Roberts era, revealing what we get wrong about the nine justices (and what they eat for lunch) and the right way to fix a Court in crisis-from the popular ABC news pundit and witty co-host of the top legal podcast in the US-- Provided by publisher.
The Creative Doer: A brave Woman's Guide from Dreaming to Doing
by Anna Lovind

A path for female creators, activists and magic makers. The Creative Doer offers a roadmap for women who are hungry for a more creative life and who are willing to ask a few burning questions. What if we stopped trying to follow in the footsteps of the Male Genius? What does devotion look like if it doesn't mean forsaking everything and everyone, including your kids, for your art? What would happen if we granted ourselves the permission we're waiting for and started doing our work, our way? In this insightful, no-bullshit guide you'll learn how to: Redefine creative work and bust the old myths about The Artist: Zoom in on your dream until it's doable. Claim the time and space you need to do your work. Understand fear and how to flow with it. Do self-care in a way that will change your creative life forever. Share your work, truthfully, tenderly and courageously.
The Dentist
by Tim Sullivan

Who was the unknown man whose weather-beaten body is discovered on Clifton Downs?Did the tragedy that led to a life on the streets also lead to his death? His police colleagues may dismiss it as a squabble among Bristol's homeless community, but Detective Sergeant George Cross is not convinced. An outsider himself, Cross's obsession with logic, detail and patterns does not always endear him to those who have to work alongside him-or his superiors. But he has the best conviction rate in the Avon & Somerset Constabulary. By far. As he delves into the dead man's past, Cross becomes convinced that to catch this killer, he needs to solve a cold case murder from years before. A murder that someone has spent fifteen years thinking they've got away with. And they have no intention of letting one eccentric, socially-awkward detective, change that now... The young woman standing in front of him was smiling. Cross was sure of this as her mouth was turned up at both corners, which was a definite sign. He wasn't sure what it meant though, because he didn't know her. With people he knew he would note the upturned mouth, together with what had been said, combine it with the tone in which it had been said and make his inference. Context was everything for Cross. His interpreter.
Shadow Ticket
by Thomas Pynchon

Milwaukee 1932, the Great Depression going full blast, repeal of Prohibition just around the corner, Al Capone in the federal pen, the private investigation business shifting from labor-management relations to the more domestic kind. Hicks McTaggart, a one-time strikebreaker turned private eye, thinks he's found job security until he gets sent out on what should be a routine case, locating and bringing back the heiress of a Wisconsin cheese fortune who's taken a mind to go wandering. By the time Hicks catches up with her he will find himself entangled with Nazis, Soviet agents, British counterspies, swing musicians, practitioners of the paranormal, outlaw motorcyclists, and the troubles that come with each of them--
Art & Fear: Observations on the Perils (and Rewards) of Artmaking
by David Bayles

What is your art really about? Where is it going? What stands in the way of getting it there? These are questions that matter, questions that recur at each stage of artistic development--and they are the source for this volume of wonderfully incisive commentary. Art & Fear explores the way art gets made, the reasons it often doesn't get made, and the nature of the difficulties that cause so many artists to give up along the way. This is a book about what it feels like to sit in your studio or classroom, at your wheel or keyboard, easel or camera, trying to do the work you need to do. It is about committing your future to your own hands, placing free will above predestination, choice above chance. It is about finding your own work.
The Complete Earthsea
by Ursula K. Le Guin

URSULA K. LE GUIN'S FANTASY MASTERPIECE, COMPLETE IN THE DEFINITIVE LIBRARY OF AMERICA EDITION OF HER WORKS. To return to Earthsea today is to encounter a different kind of fantasy work, where knowing oneself is a painstaking, ceaseless endeavor. . . . It is what the story is about, and the wonders Earthsea offers are scaled accordingly, to the sublime horizons of a life. --Ryu Spaeth, The New Republic Ursula K. Le Guin's Earthsea novels and stories are set in the far-flung archipelago of Earthsea. The original three novels in the 1960s and 70s were the first and most successful of the descendants of J.R.R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings and were the progenitors, in their turn, of all the wizard school and dragonlord fantasy series that have come since. But then Le Guin returned 18 years later, after all the thought and rethinking of the second wave of feminism, with 3 more novels to complete the series. Now, all 6 books are featured in Library of America's The Complete Earthsea, a handsome, heirloom boxed set. Included are: A Wizard of Earthsea (1968), the original wizard school fantasy, follows a young man called Sparrowhawk, whose true name--a source of power not to be shared with others--is Ged, as he both learns to wield the magic in him and discovers its shadow side.In The Tombs of Atuan (1971), Le Guin's focus shifts to a young woman whose true name was taken from her when she became priestess of the Nameless Ones, the dark old powers of Earthsea. When Ged arrives to steal her temple's greatest treasure, Tenar recovers her name and learns the gifts of interdependence and weakness. And in The Farthest Shore (1972), Ged is Archmage of all Earthsea when he embarks on a long journey with the teenage Prince Arren to find out why magic seems to be draining out of the Archipelago, a journey that will lead them to the end of the world and the dry land of death beyond. Tehanu (1990), in which the widowed Tenar adopts a badly burned and abandoned child, a girl she names Tehanu. When Ged returns to Gont after losing his magic, Tenar helps him learn to live on the edge of things, even while an evil mage threatens their new life. Tales from Earthsea (2001) both reaches back in time to explore the beginnings of the school for mages on Roke and of Ged's teacher Ogion, and, in Dragonfly, introduces Irian, a woman who realizes that she is other than what she seems. In The Other Wind (2001) Irian meets Tehanu after Alder, a village sorcerer, travels in search of Ged to find out why he dreams every night that the stone wall that divides Earthsea from the Dry Land of death is crumbling. The answer turns out to have to do with Tehanu, Irian, and the people like them--and with the origin of magic in Earthsea. Le Guin's Earthsea is one of the most beloved and influential fantasy series of the 20th century.
Pilgrim on the great bird continent
by Lyanda Lynn Haupt

A narrative account of Charles Darwin's five-year voyage along the coastline of South America describes his encounters with the region's rain forest, cliffs, and wildlife, a journey from which he emerged with profound philosophical insights that informed his scientific achievements.
Floodpath: The Deadliest Man-Made Disaster of 20th Century America and the Making of Modern Los Angeles
by Jon Wilkman

Just before midnight on March 12, 1928, the St. Francis Dam, a twenty-story-high concrete structure just fifty miles north of Los Angeles, suddenly collapsed, releasing a devastating flood that roared fifty-four miles to the Pacific Ocean, destroying everything in its path. It was a horrific catastrophe, yet one which today is virtually forgotten. With research gathered over more than two decades, award-winning writer and filmmaker Jon Wilkman revisits the deluge that claimed nearly five hundred lives. A key figure is William Mulholland, the self-taught engineer who created an unprecedented water system, allowing Los Angeles to become America's second largest city, and who was also responsible for the design and construction of the St. Francis Dam. Driven by eyewitness accounts and combining urban history with a life-and-death drama and a technological detective story, Floodpath grippingly reanimates the reality behind LA noir fictions like the classic film Chinatown. In an era of climate change, increasing demand on water resources, and a neglected American infrastructure, the tragedy of the St. Francis Dam has never been more relevant.