Derby Day

The 137th Kentucky Derby will be run on May 7.  Once the most exciting two minutes in sports are over, maintain the glow with some classic horse stories.  How about a horse biography?  Read about Seabiscuit, Man o’ War, Secretariat, or Funny Cide.  Feeling more like fiction?  Try the mystery thrillers of former jockey Dick Francis, or Fern Michaels’ horse farm trilogy of Kentucky Rick, Kentucky Heat, and Kentucky Sunrise.  Horse movies abound.  Check out The Black Stallion, The Derby Stallion, National Velvet, Seabiscuit, Secretariat, Shadow of the Thin Man, and Virginia’s Run.  For a behind the scenes look at the lives of trainers and their horses, watch the documentary The First Saturday in May.

Win a Kobo eReader

This is your chance to share your story – a memoir, or the story of a family member. Write a non-fiction essay describing a personal experience. You’ve got 1,500 words or less, so make them count!

Stories may be submitted in a branch or here by April 30.

The first prize is a Kobo ereader. Runners up will receive bag of CCPL goodies and a journal.

Your stories become the property of the Clermont County Public Library and will not be returned after the judging.

Need some help or inspiration?

* Books about authorship
* Creative writing
* Short story writing
* Our Williamsburg Branch has a weekly writing group.

Fool me once, Fool me twice?

April Fool’s Day is defined as “A day of practical jokes intended to make fools of unsuspecting people.” Unlike other holidays that have a clear origin, many stories of when, where, how and why April Fool’s Day is celebrated abound, lending to the foolishness of even trying to be serious about the day!

Watch out for pranksters, practical joksters, jesters, humorists or anyone looking to play a hoax on someone.  You may end up being a noodlehead of their wit and humor when you least expect it!

“The first day of April is the day we remember what we are the other 364 days of the year” – Mark Twain

Spring Quote Challenge

Who wrote the following quotes about spring?  Find the answers in the eBook links below!

1.    “It was a lover and his lass, / With a hey, and a ho, and a hey nonino, / That o’er the green cornfield did pass, / In the spring time, the only pretty ring time, / When birds do sing, hey ding a ding, ding; / Sweet lovers love the spring. “
2.   ”Then came the lovely spring with a rush of blossoms and music, Flooding the earth with flowers, and the air with melodies vernal.”
3.   ”O! how this spring of love resembleth / The uncertain glory of an April day.”
4.   ”I have no doubt that certain learned men, now that the novelty of the hypotheses in this work has been widely reported—for it establishes that the Earth moves, and indeed that the Sun is motionless in the middle of the universe—are extremely shocked, …”
5.   ”Spring in the world!  And all things are made new!”
6.   ”In the spring a livelier iris changes on the burnished dove; / In the spring a young man’s fancy lightly turns to thoughts of love. “
7.   ”I’ll see you again, / Whenever spring breaks through again. “
8.   ”The year’s at the spring / And day’s at the morn; / Morning’s at seven; / The hill-side’s dew-pearled; / The lark’s on the wing; / The snail’s on the thorn: / God’s in his heaven— / All’s right with the world! “

 

The Oxford Dictionary of Quotations  edited by Elizabeth Knowles;

The Oxford Dictionary of Scientific Quotations  edited by W.F. Bynum and Roy Porter;

The Oxford Dictionary of American Quotations selected and annotated by Hugh Rawson and Margaret Miner;

The Oxford Dictionary of Modern Quotations by managing editor, Elizabeth Knowles;

The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Quotations by edited by Elizabeth Knowles;

or come visit us in the library and find the authors in one of the print books listed under the subject Quotations in our catalog.

Good luck!

100 Weeks and Counting

This week, Kathryn Stockett’s The Help celebrated it’s 100th week on the New York Times Best Seller list.  While that’s an impressive run, several books have stayed on the list much longer.  Can you guess which book lasted 694 weeks?  Find out the answer, along with other marathon books in this recent New York Times article.