Big Book Sale this Weekend

Don't forget this weekend the

Blue Mountains City Library is holding its annual

Big Book Sale

Blaxland Community Centre

Friday 29 April 12noon—5pm

Saturday 30 April 9am—4pm

Come along & grab a bargain!

Read It 2011 Online Discussion

Tonight there will be real time twitter discussion for #readit2011.

At 8pm (AEST) come online to talk about this month's #oznzreads. What titles did you enjoy reading?

To participate you will need a twitter account. Don't forget to use #oznzreads in your tweet. If you don't have a twitter account you can still watch the discussion by going to twitter search http://search.twitter.com/ and searching on #oznzreads.

For more information about #readit2011 go to http://readit2011.wordpress.com/

The Coo-ee March, 1915, “The biggest wash-up I ever heard of!”

This special ANZAC Day post commemorates the famous Coo-ee March as it came through the Blue Mountains and was originally posted in the Blue Mountains Local Studies blog.

“The Allies”, said the editor of the Blue Mountains Echo of 13 August 1915, “can make no further progress in the Dardanelles until reinforced with troops. Our own men there are calling for assistance.” One response to the desperate need for reinforcements originated in Gilgandra in October 1915 with 26 men, the brain wave of local plumber WT (Bill) Hitchen, captain of the Gilgandra Rifle Club and his brother Richard. The Coo-ee March was the first of many privately organised recruiting marches of the time, which gathered recruits as they progressed and became known as snowball marches.

As the march wound its way to the Sydney Domain through country towns and villages with names such as Wongarbon, Mumbil, Boomey and Yetholme, the recruits were decked with roses and treated to lunches of roast lamb and plum pudding. After ascending the western side of the Blue Mountains via Berghofer’s Pass, they reached the Explorers’ Tree at Katoomba on 5 November, where the mayor, Alderman George James, welcomed “the boys from the western plains”. The recruits responded as one with their rousing Coo-ee war cry and wearing their new blue dungaree uniforms and white canvas hats, marched into Katoomba to the accompaniment of the Leura Brass Band and the cheers of locals from footpaths and balconies, “streamers and brightly coloured bunting arched the principal thoroughfares and many public and private housed were gaily bedecked.”

After further speeches of welcome and loyalty at the official dinner at the California guesthouse that evening, Alderman Tabrett proposed the toast to “Our Boys at the Front”, declaring “the whole world would ring with the praises of the Austral heroes who were ably defending the liberty of the world. We want thousands more like you”, he told the Coo-ees, “I sincerely hope Australia will always be noted for its workers and not its shirkers.” The recruiting rally after the dinner was one of the “biggest meetings ever seen in Katoomba”, at which “no less than 21 recruits offered and were accepted”, reported the Echo. The Katoomba Red Cross Comforts Fund presented the Coo-ees with a bale of socks knitted by local ladies, including ten pairs from the industrious Mrs James, the Mayoress.

At Wentworth Falls, a road worker downed tools and stepped into the ranks to rousing coo-ees from the men, although his two mates decided “to think it over”. At Lawson they were addressed by the Governor General and ten new recruits were welcomed to the ranks.

The Coo-ees entered Springwood on Monday morning 8 November through the smoke from nearby bushfires and bearing their banner with the motto “First Stop Berlin”, accompanied by an escort of four mounted policemen, a piper playing stirring highland marches, a squad from the Springwood Rifle Club and cheering school children. “Hitchen’s Own” then made camp on the Homedale Estate.

A thousand people from Springwood and surrounds attended the evening open-air concert and recruiting meeting where more young men joined up. A local reporter wrote: “How well Springwood entertained is best told in the words of a lady who helped, ‘It was the biggest wash-up that I ever heard of,’ she said, and that is saying something coming from the sex that reckons life is one wash-up after another.” The next morning at nine o’clock with the piper again in attendance the Coo-ees marched out of town.

The 263 Coo-ees who reached Sydney on November 12 went into action on the Western Front, in particular the Albert, Pozieres and Moquet Farm battlefields; many now lie with their comrades somewhere in France and a number were decorated for bravery. The bible on which five Springwood recruits were sworn in is held in the Local Studies collection at Blue Mountains City Library.

Images: Top: Coo-ees march through Springwood

Centre: Katoomba Comforts Fund workers with socks and clothing for the troops, Mrs James may be number 10, in black, seated left

Bottom: Coo-ees in Macquarie Rd, Springwood

© 2010 Blue Mountains City Library

John Merriman, Local Studies Librarian

Read It 2011 April Online Discussion

On Tuesday there will be real time twitter discussion for #readit2011. At 8.00pm (AEST) on Tuesday 26th April come online to talk about this month's #oznzreads - Australia and New Zealand reads.

What titles did you enjoy reading for this category? To participate you will need a twitter account. Don't forget to use #oznzreads in your tweet. If you don't have a twitter account you can still watch the discussion by going to twitter search http://search.twitter.com/ and searching on #oznzreads.

For more information go to the Read It 2011 blog.

What Library staff are reading . . .

I had almost a week in bed with the flu - I look pretty good on it don't I? Flu does wonders for your reading though. See what my colleagues and I have had our noses into this month . . .

• An exclusive love by Johanna Adorjan – Johanna’s grandparents, holocaust survivors, took their own lives in their old age after her grandfather was diagnosed with a terminal heart condition. In this book their last day is imagined


• Mr Shakespeare’s bastard by Richard B Wright – historical fiction


• Sarah’s Key by Tatiana de Rosnay – also a film


• Blindness by Jose Saramago


• The girl who played with fire by Stieg Larsson


• Whisky Galore by Compton Mackenzie – hilarious goings on in wartime Scotland


• The art of travel by Alain de Boton


• Laidlaw by William McIlvaney – tartan noir


• The elegance of the hedgehog by Muriel Barbery – tried this a while ago and gave up about half way. This time I got over half way and got to the charming bit


• Me talk pretty one day by David Sedaris – my apologies to those who had to endure me guffawing in the lunchroom


• I recently read, on a customer’s recommendation, The Guernsey Literary & Potato Peel Pie Society by Mary Ann Schaffer – it was gorgeous! Was so sad to discover this was the author’s only work and that she died before she ever saw it published!!


• Have also been working my way through a historical murder mystery series by C.J Sansom – the Matthew Shardlake series, set in England during the time of Henry VIII - started with no. 4 Revelation which really did live up to its cover claim of being un-put-downable - Wow! Great read! Have since gone on to read nos. 1-3 – (Dissolution, Dark Fire, & Sovereign) which have also been also very good - but I think Revelation has been the best of the bunch so far – looking forward to no. 5 Heartstone!


• The Five People You Meet in Heaven – Mitch Albom Only a short one, but a very good story all the same! I like that Albom chose an older protagonist; it made the idea a bit more unique (he didn’t need the death of a teenager or twenty-something to produce a bit of tragedy and make the ending an enlightening one!)


• The Distance between us by Maggie O’Farrell – intriguing like The Hand that first held mine, another O’Farrell novel. I love the way her stories unravel.


• On Chesil Beach by Ian McEwan - I’m of two minds on this one- love the writing (as always), but confused by the concept…what point was he making?? Think I missed it.


• The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas by John Boyne - Probably one of the more clever stories based around the Holocaust that I have read. I wasn’t sure at first about the point of view being the young boy’s, but that ended up being the thing that made it so enjoyable! He was quite a funny kid, but also a good choice for conveying the more heartbreaking aspects of the story.


• Salem Falls by Jodi Picoult - Only just begun this one, so I don’t have too much of an impression yet, but being a Picoult book, I’m preparing myself for the intricate details of a few crimes, followed by a court case! Can’t wait ;)


• Muriel Barbery The elegance of the hedgehog – charming in parts, longwinded in others I think.


• Emma Donoghue Room – couldn’t put it down, couldn’t forget it, have read it now three times in a week!


• Pamela Freeman Blood Ties, the first in a trilogy – fantasy fiction, need I say more?


• Ajahn Brahm Opening the door of your heart – I’m actually listening to it, it’s Buddhist mediations really.


• Dan Brown The Lost symbol – tried this once before and got bored with the formula Brown uses. I read a bit more this time.


• Trudi Cadavan The Ambassadors Mission – fantasy fiction. Am thinking of writing to her publisher to explain that when one removes something from someone and gives it to someone else one ‘takes it from’ them not ‘takes it off’ them, nearly pulled my hair out. Otherwise the tale was a good one.


• Arthur and George by Julian Barnes - The lives of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and a quiet, unassuming Anglo-Indian named George, intersect. What a fabulous book! Intriguing always, Barnes’ writing style chiming well with the Victorian era he writes of.


• Natural Flights of the Human Mind by Clare Morrall. (on Talking Book) - Interesting rather than riveting. Talking books encourage a certain laziness of attention, which doesn’t help.


• The Writing Circle by Corinne Demas - about a group of people who get together to discuss their writing, and the tortuous internal politics of the group. This was serious fun. I’m a sucker for anything around the subject of writing.


• The Grand Hotel by Gregory Day, an Australian writer with a vernacular tone - a tall-story mentality and a sardonic attitude to modern life. The words tend to pour out of him in an unedited way; there’s a touch of Peter Carey here. I’m enjoying this book.


• La’s orchestra saves the world by Alexander McCall Smith – a lovely read.


• Preincarnate: A Novella by Shaun Micallef - a charming, mysterious little adventure story, with nostalgic illustrations and a peppering of Micallef’s trademark surreal humour. Very Douglas Adams.


• Room by Emma Donahue – emotional, raw, compelling – a mind-blowing read.


• Vampire Academy by Richelle Mead – a cross between Twilight and Harry Potter (because it is based at a boarding school). Great Read! Highly recommend for your angsty teenagers.


• The littlest bitch written by David Quinn and Michael Davis illustrated by Devon Devereaux part of the not for children childrens books. This is a graphic novel I picked up when the Internet went down at Lawson Library. What a great little read about a little toddler who ends up running a huge company and lives with her family who are completely not on her wavelength. A laugh out loud little escape from reality.


• From the Dust Returned by Ray Bradbury – series of short vignettes around a family, their haunted home, their past and their future … are they vampires or something more? Really interesting read. You don’t have to read the stories in order and I actually started, read the last story and then went back to the others


• Cold Iron by Sophie Masson – a retelling and embellishment of an English Fairy Tale. This was a very sweet story of Tattercoats and the adventures she and her friends went on. Funnily enough I enjoyed the Authors note at the end of the Story which explained the historical context, the fairy tale and where she got the inspiration for the characters and their names. Then the book finished with the original fairytale which again, I thoroughly enjoyed. This was a YA novel but would suit Junior YA


• Mary Anne in Autumn by Armistead Maupin – loved loved loved this latest instalment of my San Fran friends. Picks up when they are in their sixties and the life choices they have made. Actually relates to the first series of books really well with lots of interthreads (is that a word???) back to the original stories!


• I’ve been reading graphic novels – for the first time since being a young adult (so long ago!) – I have read Coraline which I loved, such a spooky story, and I also read Maus, which was a frank account of a holocaust survivor (as told to his adult son). I’ll be reading more graphic novels - as I was really impressed with the quality of the storytelling and, for me, the visuals add to the whole reading experience, not detract.

Miles Franklin Literary Award Shortlist 2011

The 2011 Miles Franklin Literary Award shortlist has been announced this morning and consists of :

Bereft by Chris Womersley

That Deadman Dance by Kim Scott

When Colts Ran by Roger McDonald

The judging panel reflected on Miles Franklin's desire for a unique character in Australian literature. "These shortlisted books have a distinctive, indelible Australian voice. It’s a voice that has nothing to do with reflex nationalism, or jingoism - rather the reverse. The shortlisted books this year are like barometers of the state of our culture: they take the readings, and give them back to us in fiction of extraordinary accomplishment. They force us to look again at ourselves, and to think - hard." Look back on the 2011 longlist here.

Alison's Picks - April 2011

David Sedaris : Squirrel seeks Chipmunk

Alison Wong : As the Earth Turns Silver

Peter Behrens : The Law of Dreams

Gregory Day : The Patron Saint of Eels

Library Closures over Easter and ANZAC Day 2011

All Blue Mountains Library branches will close over the Easter and ANZAC Day long weekend.

Library branches will be open Thursday April 21 with normal opening hours.

This closure will affect the public holidays of

Good Friday 22nd April

Easter Saturday 23rd April

Easter Sunday 24th April

Anzac Day 25th April

Easter Monday Public Holiday on Tuesday 26th April

The Libraries will resume normal opening hours on Wednesday 27th April.

Click on this link for the library opening hours.

Did you know you can get FREE one-on-one computer assistance?

What kind of a reader are you?

Wattpad, a booky social networking thingy (unfortunately for us Down Under it looks, at first glance anyway, very US oriented) has got this reader quiz. I think I came out as The Realist but it was kind of hard to follow all those lines on the 'pooter so I think I might have to print it out. If you double click on the pic you can get it a bit bigger. Have fun and don't let your eyes go screwy!!

2011 National Biography Award shortlist announced

Established in 1996 The National Biography Award, which is administered and presented by the State Library of New South Wales, is Australia's richest prize ($20,000) for biographical writing and memoir. The shortlisted titles are:

• Alan ‘The Red Fox' Reid: Pressman Par Excellence by Ross Fitzgerald & Stephen Holt


• Grand Obsessions: The Life and Work of Walter Burley Griffin and Marion Mahony Griffin by Alasdair McGregor


• Macquarie: From Colony to Country by Harry Dilion & Peter Butler


• My Father's Daughter: Memories of an Australian Childhood by Sheila Fitzpatrick


• Piano Lessons by Anna Goldsworthy


• Playing With Fire: The Controversial Career of Hans J Eysenck by Roderick Buchanan

The judges, Carmen Lawrence, Peter Rose and Peter Skrzynecki, said in a statement that this year's entries 'maintain the standards of this prestigious award' which 'has become synonymous with research, the highest skills of writing, a variety of styles and subject matter'.

The winner will be announced on 16th May from 11am in the Friends Room, State Library of NSW as part of the Sydney Writers' Festival. Admission is free but bookings are essential. Morning tea will be served and there will be book signings by the winning author.

International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award Shortlist

Another literary prize shortlist, this time for The International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award which is worth €100,000 (approx. AUD$138,400).

The Mayor of Dublin, Gerry Breen, yesterday confirmed the titles on this year’s shortlist which have been nominated by public libraries in Australia, Barbados, Belgium, Canada, England, Germany, Greece, Ireland, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Scotland, South Africa, Switzerland, and the USA.

The 2011 shortlist includes three Australians -David Malouf , Evie Wyld and Craig Silvey

Galore by Michael Crummey (Canada)

The Lacuna by Barbara Kingsolver (USA)

The Vagrants by Yiyn Li (China/USA)

Ransom by David Malouf (Australia)

Let the Great World Spin by Colum McCann (Ireland)

Little Bird of Heaven by Joyce Carol Oates (USA)

Jasper Jones by Craig Silvey (Australia)

Brooklyn by Colm Toibín (Ireland)

Love and Summer by William Trevor (Ireland)

After the Fire, a Still, Small Voice by Evie Wyld (Australia)

You can read our post on the longlist here.

Orange Prize 2011 Shortlist

The shortlist for this year's Orange Prize for Fiction, awarded for the best novel of the year written by a woman in the English language, has been announced overnight and include :

Room by Emma Donoghue - Read the Telegraph's review here

The Memory of Love by Aminatta Forna - Read the Telegraph's review here

Grace Williams Says It Loud by Emma Henderson

Great House by Nicole Krauss - Read the Telegraph's review

The Tiger's Wife by Téa Obreht - Read the Telegraph's review

Annabel by Kathleen Winter

The winner will be announced on June 8th at a ceremony at the Royal Festival Hall on London's Southbank.

Children's Book Council of Australia (CBCA) Book of the Year Awards

The shortlists for this year's Children's Book Council of Australia (CBCA) Book of the Year Awards were announced at a reception in Adelaide today.

Older Readers shortlist :

• Graffiti Moon by Cath Crowley


• The Midnight Zoo by Sonya Hartnett


• About a Girl by Joanne Horniman


• The Life of a Teenage Body-Snatcher by Doug MacLeod


• The Piper's Son by Melina Marchetta


• Six Impossible Things by Fiona Wood

Younger Readers shortlist :

• Just a Dog by Michael Gerard Bauer


• Henry Hoey Hobson by Christine Bong


• Violet Mackerel's Brillant Plot by Anna Branford & Sarah Davis


• The Red Wind by Isobelle Carmody


• Duck for a Day by Meg McKinlay & Leila Rudge


• Toppling by Sally Murphy & Rhian Nest James

Early Childhood shortlist :

• The Tall Man and the Twelve Babies by Tom Niland Champion, Kilmeny Niland & Deborah Niland


• The Deep End by Ursula Dubosarsky & Mitch Vane


• Noni the Pony by Alison Lester


• It's Bedtime, William! by Deborah Niland


• Look See, Look at Me! by Leonie Norrington & Dee Huxley


• Maudie and Bear by Jan Ormerod & Freya Blackwood

Picture Books shortlist :

• Mirror by Jeannie Baker


• Why I Love Australia by Bronwyn Bancroft


• Hamlet: Staged on the Page by Nicki Greenberg


• Family Forest by Kim Kane & Lucia Masciullo


• Two Peas in a Pod by Chris McKimmie


• My Uncle's Donkey by Tohby Riddle

Eve Pownall Award for Information Books shortlist :

• Theme Parks, Playgrounds and Toys by Nicolas Brasch


• Drawn from the Heart: A Memoir by Ron Brooks


• Zero Hour: The Anzacs on the Western Front by Leon Davidson


• The Return of the Word Spy by Ursula Dubosarsky & Tohby Riddle


• Wicked Warriors & Evil Emperors: The True Story of the Fight for Ancient China by Alison Lloyd & Terry Denton


• Our World: Bardi Jaawi Life at Ardiyooloon by One Arm Point Remote Community School

The 2011 Crichton Award for new illustrators shortlist :

• The Flying Orchestra - Clare McFadden


• Starry Starry Night - Sarah Kate Mitchell


• Can I Cuddle the Moon? - Lisa Stewart & Kerry Brown


• The Monster Maintenance Manual - Adele K Thomas & Peter Mcinnes


• The Glasshouse - Jo Thompson & Paul Collins


• The Lighthouse Kids of Maatsuyker Island - Jonah Wiltshire, Evie Wiltshire & Sheryl Hamilton

The winners of the 2011 awards will be announced and presented on Friday 19 August, which marks the beginning of Children's Book Week (20 August - 26 August 2011).

Big Book Sale

Blue Mountains City Library is holding its annual

Big Book Sale

Blaxland Community Centre

Friday 29 April 12noon—5pm

Saturday 30 April 9am—4pm

Come along & grab a bargain!

Kate Greenaway Medal shortlist

One of our family favourites, Bob Graham, has made it on to the shortlist for the 2011 CILIP Kate Greenaway Medal, which is presented each year for distinguished illustration in children's books. Graham has been shortlisted for his book April Underhill, Tooth Fairy. Other shortlisted books include:

• FarTHER by Grahame Baker-Smith


• Me and You by Anthony Browne


• Jim : a cautionary tale - text by Hilaire Belloc, illustrated by Mini Grey


• The Heart and the Bottle by Oliver Jeffers


• Big Bear, Little Brother - text by Carl Norac, illustrated by Kristin Oftedal


• Ernest by Catherine Rayner


• Cloud Tea Monkeys - text by Mal Peet and Elspeth Graham, illustrated by Juan Wijngaard

You can read more about each shortlisted book here.

The Carnegie Medal shortlist has also been published. The Carnegie Medal is awarded annually to the writer of an outstanding book for children. The shortlist for 2011 includes :

• Prisoner of the Inquisition by Theresa Breslin (Ages 12+)


• The Death Defying Pepper Roux by Geraldine McCaughrean (Ages 10+)


• Monsters of Men by Patrick Ness (Ages 14+)


• The Bride's Farewell by Meg Rosoff (Ages 12+)


• White Crow by Marcus Sedgwick (Ages 12+)


• Out of Shadows by Jason Wallace (Ages 14+)

Read more about the Carnegie Medal shortlisted books here.

The winners of the 2011 Carnegie and Kate Greenaway Medals will be announced on 23 June. The shortlists for the awards can be seen here.

Aussie Author Month

The inaugural Aussie Author Month is up and running and will go until the end of April.

The campaign aims to support and promote Australian writing and will also raise funds for the Indigenous Literacy Foundation

Conversations about the campaign can be followed on Twitter with the hashtag #ausbooks and donations to the Indigenous Literacy Foundation as part of the campaign can be made here.

Environmental Peace Banner

Blue Mountains Libraries will host the Environmental Peace Banner to allow people to write their messages of hope for the earth on the banner.

This banner came out of “The Care and Celebration of the Land” which was an Interfaith Gathering to Celebrate the Environment, held at the Brahma Kumari’s property 17 October 2010. Buddhist, Muslim, Brahma Kumari, Christian and Indigenenous representatives joined to create a Blue Mountains Interfaith network to take action for the environment and climate change, in solidarity for all who are concerned for our earth. The 2010 event included an indigenous ceremony, prayer, meditation, dance and music.

The banner is currently being displayed at Katoomba Library until Friday April 22, when it will move to Springwood Library for two weeks.

Sydney Writers' Festival Program

The program for the Sydney Writers' Festival (16th-22nd May) has been released and can be viewed by clicking here. "The 2011 Sydney Writers' Festival proudly presents some of the world's finest poets, novelists and authors of literary nonfiction, including 2010 Man Booker Prize winner Howard Jacobson; Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Hours and By Nightfall, Michael Cunningham; the acclaimed David Mitchell (Cloud Atlas and The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet) and Aminatta Forna (The Memory of Love), as well as internationally renowned Australians Peter Robb, Kim Scott, Markus Zusak, Sonya Hartnett and John Tranter." Click here for the highlights.

Carolyn's Books of the Month - April 2011

Best read : The Bread with Seven Crusts by Susan Tembly

Thriller : Blood Vines by Erica Splindler

General Fiction : Sticks and Stones by Isla Evans

Saga/Romance : Minding Frankie by Maeve Binchy and The Holly Tree by Nicola Thorne

Australian Author : I Came to Say Goodbye by Caroline Overington

Crime : Running Scared by Lisa Jackson

eResources from the State Library of NSW

Below is a selection of the State Library of NSW eResources that you can access from home with a Reader's card. Find out how to get a Reader's Card on our Premium Sites page.

AustLit

Provides access to the Australian Literary Database which covers Australian creative writing and Australian writers. Subjects covered by the database include books, poems, short stories, articles and reviews and can be searched by author title, genre or award. The database contains records from 1880s to the current day, with comprehensive coverage from 1988.

Biography In Context

Biography in Context is a comprehensive biographical database containing nearly 600,000 brief biographies of more than 525,000 people gathered from over 780 volumes from 120 reference sources published by Gale. In addition it includes the full text of articles from over 280 periodicals.

Book Review Digest Plus

This bibliographic database indexes and abstracts current English language fiction and nonfiction books for children and adults published or distributed in the United States or Canada. Periodical coverage includes leading magazines from the United States, Canada and Great Britain although at least one review must be from a periodical published in the United States or Canada. Reviews of textbooks, government publications, and technical books in the law and sciences are excluded.

Cambridge Collections Online

Cambridge Collections Online offers subject or theme based collections of content within a functional, fully cross-searchable online environment. CCO contains two sub-collections comprising the Cambridge Companions in Literature and Classics and the Cambridge Companions in Philosophy, Religion and Culture. Each collection is updated with new Companions on publication.

The Columbia Granger's World of Poetry

The Columbia Granger's World of Poetry contains 250,000 poems in full text and 450,000 citations, numbers that will continually expand with each update. The poems in full text are the most widely-read in the English language, as well as in Spanish, French, German, and Italian. Included also is poetry in Portuguese, Polish, Yiddish, Welsh, Gaelic, and other Celtic languages, as well as poems in the ancient languages: Anglo-Saxon, Provencal and Latin

Facts on File World News Digest

A complete archive of the Facts on File World News Digest, updated weekly. It covers all major political, social, and economic events since November 1940. Includes an extensive full-text collection of biographies, historical documents, editorials, and background articles.

General Science Full Text

This bibliographic database provides the full text of over 60 journals published in Great Britain and the United States. In addition, popular science magazines as well as professional journals are indexed. Types of materials covered include feature articles, biographical sketches, reports of symposia and conferences, review articles and book reviews. Abstracting begins in 1993, full text coverage begins in 1994.

Humanities Full Text

This bibliographic database indexes articles from 400 English language periodicals covering a wide range of disciplines in the humanities. Periodicals covered include some of the best-known scholarly journals and numerous lesser known but important specialized magazines. Sources include interviews, obituaries, bibliographies, reviews, and original works of fiction, drama, and poetry. Full text coverage from selected journals begins in 1995.

INFORMIT Online

Provides online access to a wide range of Australian, Asia and Pacific research and information resources covering social sciences, education, law, criminology, film studies, health, medicine, accounting and economics, business, management, drug information, and sport. includes: AGIS Plus Text : AGIS comprehensively indexes and abstracts articles from over 120 Australian, New Zealand and Pacific law journals. Some articles are in fulltext.

JSTOR

JSTOR is a high quality, interdisciplinary digital archive of scholarly material in the social sciences and humanities and the sciences. It includes the full text of non-current issues from over 1,000 leading academic journals as well as select monographs and other materials. Academic journals form the majority of the content of the archive and are included from the earliest issue onwards except for the most recent 3–5 years of issues. All titles in JSTOR are fully searchable and interlinked by citations and references. The State Library subscribes to the Arts & Sciences Collections Parts I – VIII and the Nineteenth Century British Pamphlets collection.

Library PressDisplay

Library PressDisplay is a web-based portal which provides access to 60-day back issues of over 1,400 newspapers and magazines from more than 82 countries in 39 languages.

Macquarie Dictionary

Updated annually, this online Australian dictionary includes the Macquarie Thesaurus online.

Oxford Art Online

Oxford Art Online contains Grove Art Online, The Oxford Companion to Western Art, Encyclopedia of Aesthetics and The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Art Terms with 21,000 biographies, 500,000 bibliographic citations, 40,000 image links and 5,000 images.

Oxford Music Online

Oxford Music Online contains Encyclopedia of Popular Music, The Oxford Dictionary of Music, Grove Music Online and The Oxford Companion to Music with articles on composers, performers, conductors, individual works, instruments and notation, forms and genres, as well as biographical encyclopedia of rock, pop, and jazz artists etc from 1900 to the present.

ProQuest

A multidisciplinary collection of 37 separate databases. The subject coverage is from the humanities to the pure and applied sciences, and the geographic coverage is international.

Shakespeare Collection

Use The Shakespeare Collection to access and study an extensive collection of authoritative materials supporting literary, textual, historical, and performance studies. Resources include the complete works, as well as editions and adaptations of Shakespeare's works, other works published during Shakespeare's time, prompt books, the Gordon Crosse Theatrical Diaries, criticism, reviews, images, and reference.

Sydney Morning Herald Archives

The SMH archives contain 820,000 pages in almost 13,000 issues from January 1st, 1955 to December 31st, 1990. The contents of all issues of the Sydney Morning Herald and Sun Herald are fully text searchable including advertisements, captions and birth, death and marriage notices. Full-text results are returned in an exact digital reproduction of the printed pages as they were originally published

Who's Who in Australia

A browsable and searchable database of biographies of prominent Australians. It includes various categories like Nobel Prize Winners, Diplomats in Australia and more.

World Book

An online reference source that contains every article from the 22-volume print set of the World Book, etc. It also contains multimedia, maps, editor-reviewed Web sites.

The Good, the Bad, the Ugly : Reviewed by You

This review is by Library user, Joy, in one of our The Good, the Bad, the Ugly : Reviewed by You journals.
The Ship of Brides by Jojo Moyes

Review : Another unusual, informative book with in-depth characters.

Set in 1946 when Australian brides who had married British servicemen were taken by ship to the UK. A trip that changed many lives, including those of the crew.

You will meet simple and complex characters, all of them very different and interesting.

A great read.




Look out for The Good, The Bad, The Ugly : Reviewed by You in your library and add your own review

Blackheath Library "April - Bookworms"

Read It 2011

So here we go for the next big adventure. April in the great Read It 2011 Twitter book group challenge is #oznzreads - time to explore literature from Australian and New Zealand authors .

Try reading some Indigenous authors from Australia and New Zealand.

Delve into the histories of these countries, explore romance or politics, revisit stories surrounding our ANZAC heritage. It may be a time to re/discover the amazing writing for children and young people, or the natural history.

If you would like to share your favourite antipodean reading experiences, you can tweet while you read by adding the hashtag #oznzreads to your twitter posts about reading.

You can also use this tag on other websites like Flickr (search using 'oznzreads'), on your blog or on the Read It 2011 blog to share with us what you are reading.

There will be a twitter discussion at 8pm (AEST) on 26 April to discuss #oznzreads. See you online then.

International Children's Book Day on Saturday 2nd April 2011

Since 1967, on or around Hans Christian Andersen's birthday, 2 April, International Children's Book Day (ICBD) is celebrated to inspire a love of reading and to call attention to children's books.

International Children's Book Day is a project of International Board on Books for Young People (IBBY). IBBY was founded in 1953 and is a non-profit organization which represents an international network of people from all over the world who are committed to bringing books and children together. IBBY's mission is to :

• promote international understanding through children's books


• give children everywhere the opportunity to have access to books with high literary and artistic standards


• encourage the publication and distribution of quality children's books, especially in developing countries


• provide support and training for those involved with children and children's literature to stimulate research and scholarly works in the field of children's literature

Activities include Children in Crisis Programme which provide support for children whose lives have been disrupted through war, civil disorder or natural disaster. Here books and storytelling are used therapeutically and book collections are created or replaced as appropriate. This programme has been active in Haiti, Chile, Afghanistan and Gaza in recent years.