1001 Foods You Must Taste Before You Die

For those of you who often read this column, let me assure you that I do not only read books about food. It just seems that way.

That said, today I’m writing about “1001 Foods You Must Taste Before You Die.” It’s one of six books we have on things you must see/do/hear/whatnot before you die. This one was kind of fun, so maybe I’ll check into “1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die” or “1001 Historic Sites You Must See Before You Die” soon.

The book is primarily concerned with ingredients, but there are some prepared dishes (primarily baked goods and candies) included. The book is divided into fruits, vegetables, dairy, fish, meats (including game), aromatics (which includes herbs, spices and condiments), grain, bakery and confections.

The vast majority of the descriptions have a picture of the food described as well as a half page of information, including where the food comes from and the common uses of it. The bottom of each entry gives a description of the taste of the food. The authors did a great job there, flavor descriptions not being easy (try it yourself if you don’t believe me — describe the taste of a watermelon).

Here’s the description of the taste of cherimoya fruit: “The cherimoya’s delicious, creamy white flesh tastes like a gentle blend of banana, papaya and pineapple with subtle hints of coconut, mango and vanilla.” I’d like to get hold of one of those after reading that!

There were a surprising number of fruits and vegetables that I had never even heard of, mostly tropical but a few from Europe and other regions. Sea buckthorn, anyone? How about a nice marula, mazhanje or mamoncillo?

As far as vegetables go, I wasn’t aware that anyone ate yucca flowers, specifically those of the flor de izote. I think I’ll pass on ackee, which must be fully ripe and even then only the pulp is edible. Unripe ackee pulp and all the rest of the plant is toxic and can be fatal. Goody. I had no idea there were so many types and varieties of soy products and I think I’ll content myself with just the knowledge of stinky tofu (hey, that’s what it’s called, don’t blame me). Apparently, it is generally eaten as street food, the authors suggesting that perhaps the aroma has something to do with that.

I like dairy, so I was enjoying myself reading the large section about the various cheeses available until I came to casu marzu. Due to its peculiar and unique composition, it is banned even in Sardinia, its country of origin. Given that some of you are no doubt reading this over breakfast or brunch (maybe a nice bagel with a schmear of cream cheese), I’ll leave it at that. If you want to know more, you’ll either have to read the book or google it.

There are, though, a number of much-lovelier sounding dairy products detailed, although I’ve had gjetost and once was enough. I would like to try some of the others, though. Maybe a nice idiazabal, a semihard to hard (depending on age) sheep’s milk cheese from the Pyrenees, available either smoked or not. Much yummier sounding than the aforementioned casu marzu.

There are quite a number of fish that I’d never heard of, including the large and omega-3 rich spotted sorubum from Brazil. It can grow over 5 feet long and weigh more than 176 pounds, so that would be quite the grilling festival!

Of course, they also cover fugu, the Japanese delicacy that, if not properly prepared, will kill you rather quickly and very unpleasantly. The authors report that “Many say, however, its taste is surpassed by the thrill of the experience of eating it.”

Personally, I’m not eating anything that has a chance of killing me if it isn’t the best thing I’ve ever tasted, so I believe I’ll pass.

There isn’t enough space here to cover more, but I’m sure any foodie would heartily enjoy reading this book, if not eating the dread casu marzu.

Bon appétit!

~Linda- Circulation Supervisor/Collection Development Librarian

Farewell Reception for Susan Wray

A farewell reception for Joplin Public Library director Susan Wray has been scheduled for Thursday, Sept. 3.

Residents are invited to visit Wray in the large meeting room at the library anytime between noon and 3 p.m. that day.

Wray has resigned to return to her hometown of Kansas City. She will be manager of the Blue Springs north branch of the Mid-Continent Public Library.

She will leave the Joplin post on Sept. 9.

Graphic novel makes Macbeth easier to read

Macbeth: The Graphic Novel

By William Shakespeare

Illustrated by Jon Haward

You read the headline right, Shakespeare lovers (and haters). Macbeth is now a graphic novel! Not only is it a graphic novel, it is unabridged with original text.

Macbeth is set in Scotland in 1040 AD. King Duncan has been in charge for six years, but things are still tumultuous between the king and some tribes who do not want to be peacefully ruled as a single nation under a single king.

To help maintain order and offer Scotland a chance at peace, Duncan commands a large army led by trusted noblemen who have the experience and will to be successful in battle. Macbeth is not only Duncan’s cousin, he is the king’s most trusted and most powerful army leader.

As Macbeth and his friend Banquo return from a battle, they come upon three witches who tell Macbeth that he will become Thane of Cawdor and, more importantly, king of Scotland. When Macbeth finds out that the king is — as the witches said — making him Thane of Cawdor, he is overjoyed and wonders if the rest of the prophecy will come true.

He shares the news and the prophecy with his calculating, scheming, and not very nice wife Lady Macbeth. As luck would have it, King Duncan is going to stay with the Macbeths for a night and the two come up with a dreadful plan that will make sure the rest of the prophecy will come true. They kill King Duncan and frame his two sons, thus making Macbeth, a blood relative, king of Scotland.

Now that Macbeth is king, he must hold onto his power and in so doing, things begin to spin wildly out of control in very interesting and tragically Shakespearian ways.

Shakespeare, with the best of teachers and footnotes, is difficult to understand. The language takes getting used to and is, for some, enough to prevent them from attempting to even try to read his works.

Reading the graphic novel makes things a little easier — even for a librarian who loves Macbeth. Because Macbeth is a play, it is best understood with the scenes clearly illustrated for the reader and this graphic novel adaptation does exactly that.

The words are as Shakespeare wrote them (minus line breaks) and the illustrations are vivid and cast the perfect dark atmosphere over the book. With the cast of characters clearly drawn and labeled in the front of the book, all characters are easily identified.

In the back of the book, readers will find a brief biography of Shakespeare and of the real Macbeth, discussion of Shakespeare’s relevance today, and other information useful to understanding the play.

All-in-all, I’d say this graphic novel is a great resource for anyone interested in reading Macbeth and it is especially good for students struggling with the play in school.

~Cari- Teen Librarian

NEW LIBRARY HOURS

As of September 1, 2009 the Joplin Public Library will be open the following hours:

Monday - Thursday 9am to 8pm
Friday - Saturday 9am to 6pm
Sunday 1pm to 5pm

In 2006 Joplin residents approved a levy increase to allow the library to be open four evenings a week, increase programming and buy additional materials. The voter approved levy was received for one year. The following year the Library was subject to an involuntary rollback as per State statutes. As property values decline, revenue remains flat. Because of this the Library Board of Trustees has made the difficult decision to cut hours effective September 1.

The Library remains dedicated to being open four nights a week and will continue that by shaving one hour off each evening Monday – Thursday. Friday and Saturday hours remain unchanged. Sunday hours will return to 1-5 p.m., the same hours prior to the levy increase.

The new hours will not affect programming, which is very popular and heavily attended. The purchasing of new materials will also not be affected.

The Board of Trustees are committed to reinstating the lost hours if and when funding improves.

--Susan Wray, Library Director

“Nightwalkers”

By P. T. Deutermann

(compact disc audiobook)

“Nightwalkers” begins with a Civil War train robbery and massacre. That chapter segues into the present day with Cam Richter surveying Glory’s End, a sprawling, 700-acre ante-bellum mansion complete with secret tunnels and hidden rooms in the North Carolina countryside.

Cam wants to take a break from his thriving private-eye business, “Hide and Seek Investigations.” He purchases the estate even though he realizes that it could take years and thousands of dollars to restore the mansion to its former grandeur. He quickly discovers that his quirky neighbors, the Lees, still live as if in the Civil War era, complete with their long dresses and mannerisms. One of the Lee family members (everyone knows him as the “crazy” Major) is a Vietnam veteran who truly believes he is a Confederate major and patrols on a horse at night for Yankee spies.

Cam shortly recognizes that he has more serious problems than a mansion money pit and eccentric neighbors. Someone is trying to kill him and he is clueless as to who or why. He assumes it must be someone from his past because he hasn’t lived in the community long enough to have made enemies — or has he? Cam relies on his German Shepherd companions, Frick, Frack and Kitty, and the guys from “Hide and Seek Investigations” to help protect him as he tries to stay alive and find out who is trying to murder him.

This is an intriguing complex mystery with its eccentric characters and historic setting. The plot, filled with twists and turns, led to an unexpected and surprising conclusion. Dick Hill’s excellent narration adds to the suspense. I highly recommend “Nightwalkers” to anyone who enjoys mysteries with a little Civil War history and an “old South feel” setting.

“Below Zero”

By C. J. Box

(compact disc audiobook)

The ninth installment in the Joe Pickett series finds the game warden living and working in a remote area in Wyoming known as “The Place where Game Wardens are Sent to Die.”

The governor sent Joe there to keep him out the public eye after one of his cases went wrong. Joe hurries home when his wife calls to tell him that their oldest daughter, Sheridan, received a text message reading “tell Sherry April called.” April, their foster daughter, was killed in an explosion six years ago — or so everyone thought. The family is stunned when Sheridan receives more text messages from the person who says she is April. The person texting provides information that only April could know. Joe has his doubts about April still being alive, but what if by some means, she escaped that horrific episode years ago? Moreover, if it is April, where has she been and what has she been doing for six years?

Joe begins the hunt for the person sending the messages along with Sheridan, since she is the sender’s contact and Joe knows nothing about texting.

Joe calls on one of his friends in the FBI when the texter mentions in one of the messages a Chicago mobster called Stenko. In addition, the sender knows about apparently unrelated murders that have taken place at various locations in the West — and eventually the messages are traced to those areas. Joe calls upon Nate Romanowski, a character from a previous book, and along with Nate and Sheridan he embarks on a desperate search for a person who may or may not be April.

“Below Zero” is an excellent read with a fast-paced plot, interesting characters and wonderful descriptions of Wyoming. The bad guys are revealed early on but the ending definitely comes as a surprise. The author provides enough background information that you can read this as a stand-alone mystery, but I highly recommend reading the other books in the series. Joe is a heroic character with a deep sense of integrity and is a devoted family man. David Chandler narrates Box’s latest Joe Pickett mystery.

~Phyllis- Technical Services Librarian

Co-worker recommendations

I'm constantly searching on Amazon, the New York Times, blogs and other random websites to find a good book. After many months of being let down by best sellers and books that got great reviews, I finally did what I should have done in the first place: asked my co-workers for recommendations. The first book I read was The Help by Kathryn Stockett, recommended to me by Judy, a children's department staff member.


Set in Jackson, Mississippi during the civil rights movement, this novel follows the lives of the black women trusted to not only raise white children but also be the backbone of the entire white household. Not one person questions how these black maids are treated until Eugenia "Skeeter" Phelan, returns from college, degree in hand, and struggles to find a story that not only speaks to her, but also to potential readers. After viewing firsthand the injustices these black maids face, Eugenia begins to seek out the stories of these maids. Their stories are happy, depressing, touching and wonderful, allowing you into the little known lives of maids from the South.
This book leaves you thinking about how you would have acted, had you lived during the civil rights movement.Would you have been brave enough to speak out against the injustice, or would you have sat back while someone else raised your child, waiting for them to bring you more tea? Free of stereotypes and cliches, this is definitely a book to pick up.

Breana- Children's Assistant

Dog trainer offers up some ‘Lessons Learned’

‘Dog Talk: Lessons Learned from a Life with Dogs’

By Harrison Forbes

My kennel club friends often refer to the first dogs we trained as our “practice” dogs. Indeed, I learned a lot from raising my now aged rottweiler-German shepherd mix from puppyhood and training him in obedience and agility — sometimes it was a case of what not to do the next time around.

Harrison Forbes is no exception. In “Dog Talk: Lessons Learned from a Life with Dogs,” Forbes, the host of a radio talk show called “Pet Talk” and a longtime trainer of police dogs, takes a look back at the dogs he has known.

He does dispense some training tips along the way, but ultimately it all boils down to knowing your dog, not following one particular training regimen. “My training method is the anti-method,” he writes. “You need to be open to every method and throw your preconceived notions out the window. Understanding dogs and their behavior is a never-ending process.”

As someone who teaches beginning obedience and puppy classes, I found myself nodding in agreement.

So if you’re looking for a straight-up training book, “Dog Talk” probably isn’t for you. (There are, however, plenty of good ones in the Joplin Public Library collection by people such as Ian Dunbar, Sarah Hodgson and Tamar Gellar.) But if you want to spend a couple hundred pages with someone who has worked with and loved many dogs — some of them not so loveable — this book fits the bill.

The dogs that Forbes has owned made me look at mine and think, “Hey, you might have chewed through drywall once in a while, but at least you never did that.”

There was Lex, who badly mauled his K-9 handler’s wife when she foolishly leaned down to kiss him on the muzzle. And Ivan, who was so traumatized by a previous master that he would periodically withdraw into himself, whimpering and sucking on his rear leg like it was a pacifier. Bart had a disconcerting way of showing he disliked someone: “He would get right in front of them and shove his muzzle up between their legs and look right up at them with a look that said, ‘If I open my mouth, you’re castrated.’”

At the other end of the spectrum, there was the first dog he owned. He’d received permission from his mom and stepfather, who thought he’d pick out something small like a chihuahua. Imagine their surprise when the dog Forbes chose was a big, beautiful American Staffordshire terrier named Praise Jesus — PJ for short — by his evangelical Christian breeder. Forbes learned a lot from owning PJ, who was so good around children that he could take a Dorito to the eye without drama but protective enough that he body-slammed two German shepherds that went after Forbes’ mother.

Later in Forbes’ career, he acquired Akbar, a German shepherd who had suffered such horrific abuse early in life that he often reacted with fear-based aggression toward his K-9 handlers. Forbes literally saved the dog at the last minute, as he was about to be euthanized, and rehabilitated him, teaching him how to trust again. He later placed him with a bounty hunter who provided the constant companionship the dog needed, and Akbar lived out his days happily riding around in the front seat of a pickup truck.

“Dog Talk” isn’t just success stories, however. Forbes owns up to making some seriously boneheaded mistakes — purchasing a wolf when he was still in college, buying his daughter a poorly-bred shih tzu from a pet store, getting bitten more than once by his own dogs, and unintentionally setting off a dog fight because he wasn’t managing his dogs properly. But the guy has a lot of confidence in his abilities and his dogs, so he always shrugs it off and looks at such mistakes as lessons learned.

To Forbes, that’s what it’s all about, and I have to agree. Perhaps more important, beneath the authoritative trainer of tough animals is a man who deeply loves dogs. Of his relationship with his current pet, a marshmallow of a pit bull, he writes, “I forgot how much I love to have a big old huggie dog.”

So if you’ll excuse me, I’m off to commune with my own big old huggie dog.

~Lisa E. Brown- Administrative Assistant

‘Prayers for Sale’ features beautifully woven stories

‘Prayers for Sale’

By Sandra Dallas

Eighty-six year-old Hennie has been in Middle Swan, Colo., high in the mountains, for longer than just about anyone else in town. She came there about 70 years ago when an old school friend invited her to come out and meet a male friend. Hennie’s husband died in the Civil War and her young daughter had died in a tragic accident, so after some thought to her friend’s offer, Hennie moved.

Much to her delight, Jacob Comfort is just who she’s looking for and soon they marry. At 60, Jacob passes on, leaving Hennie a home and plenty to get her by for many years to come.

When Nit and Dick Spindle move to town, Hennie takes a shine to the 17-year old young bride and proceeds to introduce her to Middle Swan, the women in the quilting group and life in the mountains.

As author Sandra Dallas did in “The Persian Pickle Club,” stories are woven and sewn together as neatly and beautifully as the quilts Hennie makes. This is a well-written historical fiction novel that is perfect with a cup of tea (or coffee) and a good conversation with friends around a quilting frame or your kitchen table.

‘Killer Keepsakes’

By Jane K. Cleland

When one of Josie Prescott’s reliable and helpful employees fails to show up for work after vacation, Josie sets out to find out what has happened.

Gretchen has worked at Prescott’s Antiques and Appraisals for four years. Josie hired her more on gut instinct than traditional hiring practices. When Gretchen seemingly disappears on the day she was to return from her week-long vacation, Josie comes to realize how little she really does know about her employee and how little the rest of the staff knows about Gretchen’s life prior to coming to New Hampshire.

This is the fourth installment in the Josie Prescott Antiques Mystery series. Cleland weaves lots of information on antique appraisals in between the sleuthing and the twists and turns of the story. Because this series is still relatively new, the reader does not have to be familiar with Josie and the other characters to follow along.

This is a good page-turning cozy to settle back in a comfy chair and escape in for a few hours.

‘Wrongful Death’

By Robert Dugoni

Having won a dozen cases in California before his marriage and move to Seattle, David Sloan continues to build his reputation as one of the best wrongful-death attorneys in the country with his latest win.

He is ready for his much-anticipated vacation in Cabo San Lucas with his wife and stepson when he is stopped by Beverly Ford on his way out of the courthouse. Sloan has been recommended to her as the one person who can get the answers she is looking for in the death of her husband, who died while serving in Iraq.

He is fairly certain this case cannot be won. James Ford died while serving his country and therefore his family cannot sue the government. Sloan agrees to look at the file Beverly obtained through the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) before leaving on his trip. In looking through the witness statements, something is off.

First, if the claim has been denied, why send the family the paperwork now? Second, witness statements are considered classified even under the FOIA, so why did were they given to Beverly? Finally, all four witness statements read almost word for word and it is known that no two witnesses ever report the same thing, let alone four.

In taking on the case, Sloan opens a can of worms someone does not want opened. One by one, the other men involved in the incident that killed James Ford are dying, Sloan’s family is being threatened and someone is out to kill him.

This is a fast-paced thriller that keeps the reader turning the pages wondering if James really died “incident to service” or not. Dugoni has done his research (as stated in the acknowledgments), creating a very believable story about the Iraq war, its affect on families and the government’s involvement.

Susan Wray- Library Director