Last chance!

There are only a few tickets left if you want to come and listen to author Michel Faber and Canongate Publishing’s Jamie Byng in conversation with Jenny Brown at Central Library. This event takes place next Tuesday (17 November) in the Central Library at 6.30pm. To reserve your place email helen@bridgereadings.net

Portobello Library – latest pictures

Can you imagine how it’s going to look? We’ve created a set of photos on our flickr page to keep you up to date with the refurbishment work at Portobello Library. Watch this space for details of our re-opening.

In the meantime remember we’re still offering a reduced service from outside the library: details on our web site

Libraries mean business

Thinking about starting up a business? Looking for a change in career? Maybe you’d like to research a company before a job interview, or need to investigate potential cutomers, competitors and markets.

Many people think they can get everything they need from Google. The reality is they can’t. There’s so much more information out there that you can use to give you that competitive edge. And that’s where we can help: saving you time, effort and money.

Take a look at our premium business information databases which you can access from the office, home, train or wherever -absolutely free of charge, 24 hours a day.  A private subscription to any one of these databases would be beyond the means of many businesses, but Edinburgh City Libraries have set up a deal where we can offer free access to all our members. And if you’re not already a member, join online today.

Find out more about how we can help your business grow: Libraries mean business!

 

 

A tour of Berlin

There’s lots in the news about Berlin at the moment: why not explore this fascinating, historic and creative city through our collections? Read about or listen to the music made there by Lou Reed, Iggy and Bowie. Or take a look at some of the most powerful, original and provocative grafitti from the Berlin Wall. If you’re looking to find out more about the history of the wall itself you can’t do much better than Frederick Taylor’s definitive account. Anna Funder’s acclaimed Stasiland is a revealing and powerful look at life in East Germany, and Wladimir’s Kaminer’s Russian Disco is an altogether more lighthearted collection of tales of everyday lunacy from the streets of Berlin.

How about a DVD? Our collection of films set in Berlin includes Downfall, Asphalt, The Edukators, Wings of Desire, Aimee and Jaguar…

Whetted your appetite? Borrow a travel guide and plan your trip!

The top 100 books of all time… or are they?

In 2002 the Editors of the Norwegian Book Clubs Association invited 54 authors to nominate the ten best books of all time . The resulting nominations were distilled into this list of 100 titles   (the books are on display this month in the Central Lending Library )

…Agree? 

Disagree? 

This is your opportunity!

We would like to compile our own list of nominations for the best 100 reads ever so please post your nominations here or email (maximum of five titles per person) to CentralLibrary.Lending@edinburgh.gov.uk So, what do think is the best book of all time?

Callum, evil space pigs and….(you decide)?

Moredun Library are extending an invitation to you (yes, you) to help us write our own book to celebrate NaNoWriMo’s national novel writing month.  We reckon if everyone who uses the branch writes a sentence, a paragraph, or even a page, we’ll easily have a novel by the end of November!  In the first three days we reached 600 words and in the story so far, seven year old Callum has gone to Turkey for an international book festival, where he and his new friend (a talking light sabre) were kidnapped by evil space pigs!  It’s dramatic stuff, and will undoubtedly only get more exciting as the month progresses.  If you want to add a bit, feel free to email us at: moredun.library@edinburgh.gov.uk

At the same time, Multimedia Group are challenging anyone under 17 to join in with 22,000 young people across the world and rise to the NaNoWriMo challenge of writing a novel in November!  Come along on Wednesdays from 6pm to find out more!

Also, every Wednesday this month from 6-7.30pm the Health Opportunities Team are visiting Moredun Library to give young people aged 10+ a chance to get information and have a chat about sexual health, relationships issues, and the importance of good emotional and mental health to make healthy choices.  Lyn Patterson and Caroline Fraser have been working with young people in schools and local communities for ten years and we hope young people who use the library will benefit from this opportunity to chat informally about issues affecting them.  As always library staff are on hand supporting these events on the 11^th, 18^th and 25^th of November.

There’s loads more going on in Moredun Library this month: loads! Visit our web site to find out more!

A Model of Order : Concrete Poetry

An exhibition examining this influential international movement featuring prints, posters, cards, sound poems and installed works. Includes the work of:

Augusto and Haraldo de Campos • Bob Cobbing • Ian Hamilton Finlay • Eugen Gomringer • Edwin Morgan • Mary Ellen Solt • and many others.

Edinburgh Central Library: 4 Nov – 27 Nov 2009 

There will also be a one off Concrete poetry reading group session – a special chance to look at some examples of concrete poetry with Julie Johnstone, Librarian at the Scottish Poetry Library. Monday 23rd November from 5.30-7pm, in the Board Room, Central Library (Free, non-ticketed)

Remember, remember…

We all know the significance of today’s date, but how many of us know which year the Gunpowder plot took place?

And yes, we’ve heard of Guy Fawkes, but what about Robert Catesby, who masterminded the plot? And why, when this is only one of several attempts to bring explosives into the Houses of Parliament (and a miserable failure at that) has the plot survived so strongly in the popular consciousness?

Mark Nicholls, in an entertaining and informative essay in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography Online, argues that it is the force of the personalities involved in the plot, the drama of the plot itself, and the enduring mysteries surrounding the tale that ensure it is still remembered to this day.

Library members can log on to the Dictionary of National Biography and read the essay for themselves. You can also find biographies of all the main conspirators, with images from the National Portrait Gallery.

More about the gunpowder plot (click on the title to reserve a book for collection form your nearest library):

Gunpowder : the players behind the plot by James Travers

The gunpowder plot: terror and faith in 1605 by Antonia Fraser

God’s secret agents: Queen Elizabeth’s hidden priests and the hatching of the gunpowder plot by Alice Hogge

England under the Stuarts by G.M.Trevelyan

Or if you’re more interested in contemporary Parliamentary controversies, Martin Bell’s new book, A very British revolution: the expenses scandal and how to save our democracy, is now available to order from your local library.

 

Skinny Music Quiz: November

Another month, another quiz in association with The Skinny magazine (now available in all of our libraries). This month’s theme is Music movies: to win 10 complimentary tickets for the Vue Cinema at the Edinburgh Omni Centre  e-mail your answers and contact details to central.music.library@edinburgh.gov.uk by 24 November. 

Click on the question to reveal the answer (and request a copy of the film or soundtrack from your nearest library)

1 Infamous documentary, capturing the savage murder of a Stones fan.

2 THE classic spoof heavy metal film.

3 A bogus music teacher transforms his music class into rockers.

4 Young William Miller goes on a tour with the rock band Stillwater.

5 Beyonce features in this musical based on a Tamla Motown girl group.

As the largest music library in Scotland, we hold a massive collection of soundtracks, scores, dvds and books on film-related music. Pop in, e-mail or call 0131 242 8050 to speak to our specialist staff about anything musical.

Michel Faber and Jamie Byng in conversation

6:30pm Tuesday 17 November 2009

Reference Library Reading Room

Edinburgh Central Library, George IV Bridge

A new series of literary events at Edinburgh Central Library focusing on the important relationship between writer and publisher: the series kicks off with prize-winning, celebrated author Michel Faber and Jamie Byng, his publisher at Edinburgh-based independent, Canongate Books.

Faber’s first book Some Rain Must Fall and Other Stories was published in 1998 by Canongate, who has published all his subsequent  seven works –  Under the Skin, The Hundred and Ninety-Nine Steps, The Courage Consort, The Fahrenheit Twins and Other Stories, The Apple, The Crimson Petal and the White and most recently The Fire Gospel, which was published  last year. This session will explore this successful, ongoing relationship and examine, amongst other things, the influence that author and publisher can have on one another.

There will be a reading from Faber, an audience Q&A session and a book signing. The event will be chaired by Jenny Brown, director of Jenny Brown Associates, Scotland’s largest and most influential literary agency and one of the most admired in the UK.

The event is FREE and complimentary drinks will be served. To book, email helen@bridgereadings.net.