Are you someone who reads a book and wants to save passages or quotes to think about later? With print books you do this by taking your trusty highlighter and marking lines (please, don’t do this with our library books!). But how do you do this with e-books?

Recently, I was reading Lori Gottlieb’s bestseller, Maybe You Should Talk to Someone. As I read, there were so many takeaways that I wanted to save and think about later. I used the highlight feature in Libby to mark the passages. When I finished the book, I started to go back and write (pen and paper) all those quotes and passages in my reading journal. As I started to do this I thought, there has got to be an easier way. There is! Libby allows you to export your notes, highlights and bookmarks for a title (even after it expires)! Notes, highlights and bookmarks can be exported to an excel spreadsheet or web page.  How cool is that? I found this easier to do using the browser version of Libby.

Happy Reading!

P.S.  One of my favorite quotes from this book is, “Uncertainty, I’m starting to realize, doesn’t mean the loss of hope—it means there’s possibility. I don’t know what will happen next—how potentially exciting! I’m going to have to figure out how to make the most of the life I have, illness or not, partner or not, the march of time notwithstanding.”



Citations:

Gottlieb, Lori. Maybe you should talk to someone: a therapist, HER therapist, and our lives revealed. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2019. EPUB edition.

 

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This blog was written by Amy Richard, digital collections coordinator at Charlotte Mecklenburg Library.

New year, new you? You bet.

A new year gives us a chance to define, commit and achieve the personal goals that help us grow into better versions of ourselves. If you're looking for resources to help you set obtainable goals, Charlotte Mecklenburg Library has you covered. Myers Park Library Leader Harold Escalante shared some of the self-improvement titles below with WCNC Charlotte Today host, Beth Troutman. Which one will you add to your reading list?

Watch the segment here

Click here to borrow titles from the “New Year, New You” book list

Adult fiction

The Alchemist by Paul Coelho

A special 25th anniversary edition of Paulo Coelho’s extraordinary international bestselling phenomenon - the inspiring spiritual tale of self-discovery that has touched millions of lives around the world. Combing magic, mysticism, wisdom and wonder, The Alchemist has become a modern classic, selling millions of copies around the world, and transforming the lives of countless readers across generations. Paulo Coelho's masterpiece tells the mystical story of Santiago, an Andalusian shepherd boy who yearns to travel in search of a worldly treasure. His quest will lead him to riches far different--and far more satisfying - than he ever imagined. Santiago's journey teaches us about the essential wisdom of listening to our hearts, of recognizing opportunity and learning to read the omens strewn along life's path, and, most importantly, to follow our dreams.”
 

My Grandmother Asked me to Tell You She’s Sorry by Fredrik Backman

From the author of the internationally bestselling A Man Called Ove, a charming, warmhearted novel about a young girl whose grandmother dies and leaves behind a series of letters, sending her on a journey that brings to life the world of her grandmother's fairy tales.”
 

Adult Nonfiction

The Self-Care Solution:  A Year of Becoming Happier, Healthier and Fitter—one Month at a Time by Jennifer Ashton

Dr. Jennifer Ashton is at the top of her field as an ob-gyn and news correspondent. But even at the top there's still room to improve, and with The Self-Care Solution, she upends her life one month at a time, using her own experiences to help you improve your health and enhance your life. Dr. Ashton becomes both researcher and subject as she focuses on twelve separate challenges. Beginning with a new area of focus each month, she guides you through the struggles she faces, the benefits she experiences, and the science behind why each month's challenge - giving up alcohol, doing more push-ups, adopting an earlier bedtime, limiting technology - can lead to better health. Month by month, Dr. Ashton tackles a different area of wellness with the hope that the lessons she learns and the improved health she experiences will motivate her (and you) to make each change permanent. Throughout, she offers easy-to-comprehend health information about the particular challenge to help you understand its benefits and to stick with it. Whether it's adding cardio or learning how to meditate, Dr. Ashton makes these daily lifestyle choices and changes feel possible - and shows how beneficial a mindful lifestyle can be.
 

Bounce Back.  How to Rescue Your Finances During Tough Times by Mitch Horowitz

The five works abridged and introduced by historian and New Thought scholar Mitch Horowitz in Bounce Back give you the greatest possible opportunity to navigate economic crisis and poise yourself for recovery. Revolutionize your budgeting skills and be ready to take advantage of economic upswing with George S. Clason's classic guide to personal finance, The Richest Man in Babylon. How to Attract Money is Joseph Murphy's most effective program of visualization. Offering specific prayers and affirmations, Murphy brings you closer to your goals and helps you attain the life you want.  Russell H. Conwell's motivational classic Acres of Diamonds teaches you to think in practical ways and transform seemingly modest ideas into large returns. Transcendentalist philosopher Ralph Waldo Emerson offers his principles for self-directed living in Power and Wealth, helping you focus and exert your will in the world. Think and Grow Rich, the world's greatest book on successful living, provides Napoleon Hill's famous thirteen steps to wealth and achievement. Open the door to financial empowerment and bounce back from challenging times with these great primers of self-potential.
 

The Gifts of Imperfection by Brene Brown

In The Gifts of Imperfection, Brene Brown, a leading expert on shame, authenticity and belonging, shares ten guideposts on the power of Wholehearted living - a way of engaging with the world from a place of worthiness.
 

Maybe You Should Talk to Someone by Lori Gottlieb

Gottlieb (Marry Him) provides a sparkling and sometimes moving account of her work as a psychotherapist, with the twist that she is in therapy herself. Interspersing chapters about her experiences as a patient with others about her work, she explains, "We are mirrors reflecting mirrors reflecting mirrors, showing one another what we can't yet see." By exploring her own struggles alongside those of her patients, Gottlieb simultaneously illuminates what it's like to be in and to give therapy. As she observes, "Everything we therapists do or say or feel as we sit with our patients is mediated by our histories; everything I've experienced will influence how I am in any given session at any given hour." From "John," a successful TV producer who has walled himself away from other people, to "Julie," who has a terminal illness and is struggling to find her way through her life's closing chapters, Gottlieb portrays her patients, as well as herself as a patient, with compassion, humor and grace. For someone considering but hesitant to enter therapy, Gottlieb's thoughtful and compassionate work will calm anxieties about the process; for experienced therapists, it will provide an abundance of insights into their own work.
 

Young Adults (YA)

Top 10 tips for Developing Money Management Skills by Larry Gerber

Readers are encouraged to think about money as a tool-like a Swiss Army knife that can be used for many different tasks, to create things we want in our lives. Money is like a tool, in more ways than one. It is an all-purpose survival kit because life gets tough without it. If we handle money carelessly, it can do serious damage. And just like any tool, sometimes it works great, sometimes it doesn't. The ten tips found in this book are ideas shared by many people, from billionaires to working-class moms, dads and kids. Readers will learn about spending, saving, investing, setting financial goals, budgeting, borrowing and seeking financial advice. Some tips involve doing specific things: writing, adding and subtracting. Others suggest ways of thinking about money and what we do with it. This volume is intended to help readers get the most out of this tool we call money, whether dealing with a lot of it, or just a little. Readers are encouraged to think further with 10 Great Questions to Ask an Economics/Finance teacher and Myths & Facts.
 

Chicken Girl by Heather Smith

Poppy used to be an optimist. But after a photo of her dressed as Rosie the Riveter is mocked online, she's having trouble seeing the good in the world. As a result, Poppy trades her beloved vintage clothes for a feathered chicken costume and accepts a job as an anonymous sign waver outside a restaurant. There, Poppy meets six-year-old girl Miracle, who helps Poppy see beyond her own pain, opening her eyes to the people around her: Cam, her twin brother, who is adjusting to life as an openly gay teen; Buck, a charming photographer with a cute British accent and a not-so-cute mean-streak; and Lewis, a teen caring for an ailing parent, while struggling to reach the final stages of his gender transition. As the summer unfolds, Poppy stops glorifying the past and starts focusing on the present. But just as she comes to terms with the fact that there is good and bad in everyone, she is tested by a deep betrayal.
 

Children

B is for Breathe: The ABC’s of Coping with Fussy and Frustrating Feelings, by Melissa Monroe Boyd

From the letter A to the letter Z, B is for Breathe celebrates the many ways children can express their feelings and develop coping skills at an early age. Fun, cute and exciting illustrations, this colorful book teaches kids simple ways to cope with fussy and frustrating emotions. This book will inspire kids to discuss their feelings, show positive behaviors and practice calm down strategies.

If you Come to Earth by Sophie Blackall

Meeting children from around the world gave Caldecott Medalist Blackall (Hello Lighthouse) a vision of a book "that would bring us together," she explains in an author's note. This exquisite catalogue of human experience is the result. A child with an elfin red cap, white skin, and black hair frames the story, addressing a "Visitor from Outer Space." Magnificent spreads journey through the solar system and descend toward the Earth's surface, zeroing in on a quilted landscape. Fragmentary, often droll descriptions of Earth-side existence follow, about bodies and aging, home and travel, eating and drinking ("Some of us have more food than others") and relationships ("Sometimes we hurt each other. It's better when we help each other"). Wide-eyed human characters of varying shapes, ethnicities, and abilities show kind regard for each other: a librarian offers a tissue to a man overcome; dinner table companions share animated conversation. Even for the accomplished Blackall, the artwork is dazzling. Encyclopedic paintings of the natural world - birds, sea life, an acorn and more - are rendered in painstaking detail and brilliant colors. It is a book that can be shared with strangers, visitors, friends old and new - a work in which differences build to reveal an inclusive human family on a single, precious planet.

A Year in Our New Garden, by Gerda Muller

Anna and Benjamin move with their parents to a new house in the middle of a busy city. The wonder of this house is that it includes a large garden among the tall apartment buildings. Muller explores the design and planting of this city garden through the eyes of the children. This title can be read to younger kids as the story of a family creating a garden. Older readers will appreciate in-depth explanations about the actual components needed to design a real garden. The narrative follows the family as they move from planning to planting to harvest. Multiple illustrations cover each page. Larger drawings that show the garden as a whole are combined with small framed and unframed insets that highlight specific details. The beautifully detailed paintings invite close inspection as the seasons change and the children play, picnic, plant, harvest and enjoy the garden's wildlife.

This blog was written as part of Charlotte Mecklenburg Library's Black Lives Matter program initiative. Learn  more about the program and corresponding events here.

I often find myself relating my feelings with music as it seems to express my sentiments exactly when my own words fail me. Other times, I'll read a sentence confirming, once again, I'm not alone in the ongoing negative sequences specifically related to Black folks. Solange’s album A Seat at the Table, and Amanda Seales’ book Small Doses made me feel seen and heard as a Black woman. While it's been four years since the release of Solange's most notable album and one year since Amanda Seales' debut book release, the need for acknowledgment by other Black women is still ever-present. Solange’s album and Amanda Seales’ book gave me a presence as a Black woman. My words no longer fail me, and hopefully, others will feel seen and heard as well. Below, you will find lyrics and thoughts from Solange Knowles and Amanda Seales accompanied by my interpretation of their work.

“Word,” a shortened phrase from "Word is bond," is used in a sentence as a question, comment or statement. It means "truth" or "I speak truth."

Ex:

"Word is bond, I checked out 99 books yesterday."

"Word? 99 books. Say, word."

"Word."

Word to Solange and Amanda Seales

"Don't touch my soul/ When it's the rhythm I know."-- Solange

Having to move through life always on the defense, while our white colleagues whimsically live life on the offense, inserting themselves in conversations instead of listening, and claiming allyship with bare minimum effort while audaciously high expectations of reward and recognition. Knowing your smile isn't owed to anyone but expected to soften the blow of truth because fragile feelings take precedence. This is the price you pay when you're Black and work in corporate America.

"When they go low, we keep the same energy."-- Amanda Seales

This is the thought process of every person of color when dealing with colleagues — or any person who checks the "white" box on survey sheets — who meets them with microaggressions, racial complicity or bias. Unfortunately (and fortunately for others), our way of action is often, if not always, a watered-down version of the reflection. We must always remain professional and calm in the face of clear wrongdoings because our tone, body language and facial expressions are heavily considered before our words. Even still, when armed with facts and professionalism, your chances of being called into Human Resources are often too great. To anyone who's lived life at the center of everyone else's world, accountability will always feel like an attack.

"Don't test my mouth/ they say the truth is my sound." -- Solange

2020 called out and urged organizations to state their position in the movement of racial injustice and inequity. Across industries, companies have filled their leadership boards of vital decision-makers. Where diversity lacked, there was an acknowledgment and pledge to diversify. While leadership roles are important, it's the critical roles of decision making that are important to have filled by people of color — especially if your organization magnifies its efforts with equity and diversity training across departments. Yet still, it doesn't reflect its diversity speech in administration roles.

The promises of tomorrow with what can be done today gives little hope to those who believe in the companies they work for. It gives, "We want your opinions, but we'll box them up and store them in the basement for never later" vibes.

"Don't touch my crown/ they say the vision I've found."-- Solange

There was an unmasking and undoing taking place when we clocked out of work for the evening. Now, more than ever, in the face of racism and racial inequity, we remain undone and unmasked, showing our true selves without apology. Taking up space and creating tables to fit our needs. Our dreams, desires and needs are no longer deferred but made into reality on our own accord.

P.S. "I'm not hostile, I'm passionate." -- Amanda Seale

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This blog post was written by Tiffany Grantham, a senior library assistant at West Boulevard Library.