What happens when a vice presidential candidate also happens to have written a book?
National Entertainment News
As an avid reader of sci-fi and fantasy books, visualizing the world the author is creating is crucial. Being able to take the words from the page and build them into rich worlds that are interconnected and vital to the story is key, yet most people will visualize characters and settings dif…
The heat of summer is upon us, and many of us will fill the few nice days with outdoor activities: hikes, trips to the zoo, the county fair, and, of course, the ever-calling draw of swimming.
I got into comics as a kid, then Japanese manga as a teen, but it wasn’t until a college course on “The Graphic Novel” that I read my first graphic memoir.
“Hidden,” because it mostly occurs in private residences, the most common type of caregiving is unpaid, provided by friends and families.
There are a few things I’m truly proud of, and one of them is being the eldest sister of my three brothers.
Wildly varying temps and time off school lead to plenty of reading time. These signal that the Kansas summer is upon us.
Nostalgia and new adventures seem to be at odds these days with the plethora of remakes and reboots vying for attention against original movies at the box office. But what if you didn’t have to choose?
As the saying goes, April showers bring May flowers. Flowers, along with allergies, are in full bloom around Manhattan. May also brings the return of thunderstorms, and as this last week has shown us, it is definitely spring in Kansas, tornados and all.
A little over a year ago, I reviewed Joe Posnanski’s “The Baseball 100,” an 800-page monster which I really liked but is probably a little dense for the kind of people who don’t care that three of the four players with the most career Defensive Wins Above Replacement (dWAR) were Baltimore Orioles.
“Reading is a passport to countless adventures,” writes Mary Pope Osborne, author of the popular Magic Tree House series. “You can travel anywhere in the world, to any time and any place – and still be home in time for dinner!”
April is significant this year for many reasons: a once in 20 years eclipse, the first day of spring Earth Day, Library Workers Appreciation Day, and Manhattan’s Little Apple Pride Festival.
As a child, I was told I had a wild imagination. My family would engage in dramatic adventures with me, using every pillow we owned. And before bed, we would read. Though the books my parents read to me grew longer with fewer pictures, picture books always held a special place in my heart. M…
Denver hasn’t always been like it is now. Known currently for weed, skiing, and exorbitant housing prices it used to be a far more provincial city. It also used to be the prime hunting ground for con men looking for dupes in the masses of summer vacationers.
With spring arriving, most people will want to get out of their houses to enjoy the weather. One thing I like to do when the weather is better is photography. Photography has a special place in my life; it was my minor in college, and at one time I had my own photography business.
There’s nothing like a good romance to help us see into lives and places different from our own while also providing the entertainment of a great story. I’ve picked some of my recent favorites that will take you from Regency England to current day Toronto.
We all are aging, day by day and year by year, but some of us have had a head start. Dr. Rosanne Leipzig’s new book, “Honest Aging: An Insider’s Guide to the Second Half of Life,” is essentially a health handbook for seniors, broadly defined. Leipzig is, as she explains in her preface, “a ge…
Spring is springing, or is it? We won’t truly know until it has passed us by, especially in Kansas. What I do know is that March has long been set aside to celebrate the amazing things women have done throughout history.
Mitt Romney was the Republican Party candidate for United States President in 2012, but lost to then-President Barack Obama.
Sometimes it’s fun to be reminded of your high school days when the most stressful situations surrounded who was asking who to prom, what you were going to wear to impress your crush and why your friend blew off your plans.
Fandoms may remind you of screaming fans at a concert or somebody cosplaying as their favorite fantasy character at a convention. Regardless of what comes to mind, fandoms have been around for decades because of how important they are to the entertainment industry, and they might represent m…
It’s February. Beyond celebrating the wintery weather, super great for this Michigan girl, 2024’s Black History Month is being celebrated across the country in homes, schools, libraries, and museums.
Timothy Egan is one of those writers who can describe an earlier period with such vivid detail that you can feel like you are viewing the action in real time. Some Mercury readers may remember Egan’s visit to our community several years ago when his book on the 1930’s dust bowl, The Worst Ha…
The Budget, those are two daunting words no one usually likes to hear. However, in my own life these words have recently reared their ugly head. Individuals usually are unable to plan for drastic life changes. Be that as it may, sometimes we have time to adjust and properly execute the chang…
The cold weather has me wanting to curl up with a hot beverage and read a book, or ten. While I normally will do this without needing any reward, we at Manhattan Public Library do want to reward you for your winter reading! If you haven’t already, head on over to our reading challenges webpa…
It is amazing how fast the year goes and supports the old cliché that time flies when you’re having fun! 2023 was a big year for the Manhattan Public Library; we met goals, exceeded expectations, and started making plans for the year ahead. As we turn the last page of this year, let’s take a…
Winter is one of my favorite times of the year. It’s the season for great food, spending time in good company and staying cozy indoors. In my opinion, winter is also an eerie time of year. The nights are long and the world feels a little quieter than normal. It’s no surprise that, historical…
From one feast to another, winter months are filled with reasons to cook, join with family and friends, and eat our hearts out. In my family, feasting also comes with the tribulations of food allergies and aversions. For years, I’ve struggled to find things that will satisfy everyone. You wo…
All of us experience grief. We grieve people we have lost to time, unkind words and death. We grieve experiences and opportunities. This deep feeling is hard to navigate for each of us. It can be especially hard for children.
Changing genres is hard. Being a good musician in one lane makes it more likely you can be good in another, but not a guarantee, and some skills translate better than others. If you want proof of this, simply listen to thirty seconds of Pat Boone’s hilarious attempt at a jazzy reinterpretati…
As Kansas welcomes fall, I am rapidly approaching a milestone birthday. I’ve been contemplating where I am in my life, as many of us do as we reach midlife. The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines “midlife crisis” as “a period of emotional turmoil in middle age caused by the realization that …
I’ve never been in a book club.
Carlo Rovelli is a theoretical physicist , author of many books, mostly about space, time and quantum gravity. All pretty heavy stuff for a non-physicist. This book, Anaximander is an outlier from his past writings. It is a book that I was able to understand and enjoy without being a physici…
In 1938, two University of Michigan botanists, Elzada Clover and Lois Jotter, along with a handful of men, “braved” the wild Colorado River from Southern Utah to Lake Mead. This is the exciting story of that venture, but the narrative also weaves together numerous other themes: the history o…
Spooky season is upon us and my Sunday was filled with Halloween movies, potions bottles and skeletons. This is my favorite season with the weather changes and the lead-up to a plethora of family events. If you read my last column, you know I typically read romance, paranormal romance to be …
It may be the end of September, but National Hispanic Heritage Month is still going strong! Hispanic Heritage Month started September 15 and runs through October 15. Now is a great time to find a new book by or about Hispanic people at Manhattan Public Library.
This is a timely book with a meaningful message. “The central argument,” the author notes, “is that American democracy will endure only if obligations join rights at the core of a widely shared understanding of citizenship.” (P. 155.)
Edgar Allan Poe is a man shrouded in mystery and mythology. Like other mythical American figures, such as P.T. Barnum and George Washington, most of what the man on the street knows about Poe is wrong. Most people know him as the black haired, frail, drug addicted, half mad horror author who…
Are you enjoying the cooler weather? I am. With the temps dropping back into the acceptable-to-be-outside range, I start thinking about laying in my hammock reading — being outside with a good book.
I have on more than one occasion heard fellow oldsters say, “If I had known I would live this long, I would have taken better care of myself.”
As far back as I can remember, I’ve enjoyed listening to the stories of others. Now that I am in charge of delivering books to homebound patrons, I’ve had the privilege of meeting some amazing people who have shared their stories with me as well. Hearing what it was like to be a woman and we…
You know how the smell of certain foods or the scent of rain-soaked soil can usher in memories you almost feel? Books do that for me. While reading this summer, I’ve had loads of memories find their way into my “feels” after my dad died, my daughter gave birth, my son and his family moved, a…
Reading connects us and more than through our Manhattan Public Library. Questions aboutwhat you’re reading and what you like to read are familiar icebreakers and even appear as questions on needlessly long online dating questionnaires. For many, these questions about our reading habits are n…
Summertime at Manhattan Public Library is always busy and we are fortunate to have amazing teen volunteers help with summer reading. These awesome teens help by staffing the special desk where kids of all ages turn in their reading minutes for prizes. Teen volunteers also learn valuable skil…
Your public library — Manhattan Public Library — plays many different roles in our community. It is a gathering place to shape and share ideas. A place to start or continue your education, a place to look for work, scholarships and grants. A welcoming place to meet neighbors and learn new skills.
Quick quiz for you, dear reader. What do the 2008 financial bubble, the opioid crisis, the trend of insurance companies stonewalling on payouts, the killing of Saudi journalist, and the exponential increase in CEO compensation over the past 70 years have in common?
Summer has made a strong appearance in Kansas; as the temps go up many opt to stay inside, point a fan directly at their toasty selves and read a good book. If you are one of these people, here are five bestselling books featuring diverse characters.
“Addiction is a compulsive condition … you are driven toward your own ruin,” Manhattan author, Mike Matson, wrote in “Courtesy Boy: A True Story of Addiction,” his story of compulsion and recovery. Published in 2021, “Courtesy Boy” is Mike’s second book and a memoir about his young adult lif…
Most obituaries are written by one of two people. The first is a stressed and confused family member who just lost someone close to them. The funeral is in a week or less, and they have to sit down and slam something out the door. The other is a funeral director, like me, who knows very litt…
Finding the time to read an entire book can be difficult. As someone who works full-time while completing my master’s degree, I know too well the struggle of actually finishing a book. I recently counted the number of books I’ve read this year and was disappointed with my progress. I’ve chec…
In another tragic example of the senseless violence that has become endemic to American academia, a Princeton professor by the name of Harold James in his recent book opened fire with a shower of jargon and statistics. One person, Aaron Pauls, was caught in the barrage and went down. When EM…
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