Richfield Branch Library Podcast

Pirate Enlightment by David Graeber, Dawn of Everything by David Graeber and David Wengrow

The Relevant Library: Essays on Adapting to Changing Needs by Vera Gubnitskaia

Libraries as Dysfunctional Organizations and Workplaces by Spencer Acadia

How To Think Like A UX Researcher by David Travis and Philip Hodgson

Brookings Institute Webinar “Innovations in Hyperlocal Governance”

Co-cities: Innovative Transitions Toward Just and Self-Sustaining Communities by Sheila Foster and Christian Iaione

Sideways: The City Google Couldn’t Buy by Josh O’Kane

You’re Invited by Amanda Jayatissa

We’ll Never Tell by Wendy Heard

The Mountain in the Sea by Ray Nayler

Singer Distance by Ethan Chatagnier

Pure Colour by Sheila Heti

How The World Thinks: A Global History of Philosophy by Julian Baggini

The Wandering Mind: What Medieval Monks Tell Us About Distraction by Jaime Kreiner

Look: How to Pay Attention in a Distracted World by Christian Madsbjerg

Non-Obvious: How to Think Different, Curate Ideas, and Predict the Future by Rohit Bhargava

Luxury Retail and Digital Management: Developing Customer Experience in a Digital World by Michel Chevalier and Michel Gutsatz

Buildings for Books: Contemporary Library Architecture by Chris van Uffelen

Interaction Design: From Concept to Completion by Jamie Steane and Joyce Yee

Making Dinosaurs Dance: A Toolkit for Digital Design in Museums by Barry Joseph

Family Spaces in Art Museums: Creating Curiosity, Wonder, and Play by Julia Forbes

The Brothers Hawthorne (The Inheritance Games, 4) by Jennifer Lynn Barnes

A Tiny Upward Shove by Melissa Chadburn

Thank you all so much for listening!

Christina's shares work from one of her favorite authors: Get In Trouble by Kelly Link, and White Cat, Black Dog by Kelly Link. Plus, check out this amazing feature in Vulture: https://www.vulture.com/article/kelly-link-white-cat-black-dog-profile.html

Jen recommends Garden Spells by Sarah Addison Allen, and Klara and the Sun by Kazuo Ishiguro. For her professional reading, she explores Working in Style by Chris van Uffelen, and Inspired & Inspiring: Labs, Studios and Workshops for Creative Minds by Markus Sebastian Braun.

And in Kat's final episode, she shares Feed by M. T. Anderson, and The Last Heir to Blackwood Library by Hester Fox.

*Note: At time of posting, our online catalog is down. So all links to materials are from bookshop.org or each book's website (when available.) Ask us to order these titles for you next time you visit!

This week Jen's reading Range: Why Generalists Triumph in a Specialized World by David Epstein and The Trend Forecaster's Handbook by Martin Raymond. 

Christina's working through Stanford's Human-centered AI Reading List (view the full list here!) starting with Other Minds: The Octopus, the Sea, and the Deep Origins of Consciousness by Peter Godfrey-Smith, and she's enjoying Song of the Cell: An Exploration of Medicine and the New Human by Siddhartha Mukherjee.

Kat shares adventures closer to home from Little Ohio: Small-Town Destinations by Jane Simon Ammeson and Ohio Magazine. Plus, a cameo from Jackie, the manager at our Springfield-Lakemore branch!

*Note: At time of posting, our online catalog is down. So all links to materials are from bookshop.org or each book's website (when available.) Ask us to order these titles for you next time you visit!

Connect with your inner sleuth with Kat’s take on Long Bright River by Liz Moore, Transcription by Kate Atkinson, The Witch Elm by Tana French, Velvet Was the Night by Silvia Moreno-Garcia and Recursion by Blake Crouch. The mystery continues with Jen’s take on Mary Kubica’s Just the Nicest Couple, which sends her running to “In the Hall with the Knife” by Diana Peterfreund, the first the Teen book series based on Clue. She winds down with Philippa Stanton’s Conscious Creativity: Look, Connect, Create. Christina considers new possibilities with John Lorinc’s Dream States: Smart Cities, Technology, and the Pursuit of Urban Utopias, Poverty, by America by Matthew Desmond and Don’t Trust Your Gut: Using Data to Get What You Really Want in Life by Seth Stephens-Davidowitz.

Christina is on a film roll with Sarah Polley’s memoir Run Towards the Danger: Confrontations with a Body of Memory. Discover a magical mixture of magazines and gothic mystery with Kat’s talk on Orion Magazine and Paraic O’Donnell’s The House on Vesper Sands. Jen talks workplace philosophy with The Burnout Challenge: Managing People’s Relationships with Their Jobs by Christina Maslach and Michael P. Leiter and The Strategy Book by Max Mckeown.

Christina explores the weight of social expectations and gender dynamics with My Nemesis by Charmaine Craig before taking an introspective stroll through The Perfectionist’s Guide to Losing Control by Katherine Morgan Schafler.

Jen continues to treasure hunt (with a side of murder) with Maureen Johnson’s truly devious series: Truly Devious. Richfield’s manager also shares selections from her wayfinding presentation, including Wayfinding: From Here to There: The Art and Science of Finding and Losing Our Way” by Michael Bond, You Are Here: Why We Can Find Our Way to the Moon, but Get Lost in the Mall” by Colin Ellard, and Wayfinding: The Science and Mystery of How Humans Navigate the World” by M.R. O’Connor.

Kat invites you to explore our magazine collection and the world, starting with The New York Review of Books, followed by Two Years on a Bike: From Vancouver to Patagonia” by Martijn Doolaard.

Christina walks the halls of dark academia with Donna Tartt’s The Secret History, continues her foray into the world of Alex Stern with Hell Bent by Leigh Bardugo and signs off with runaway bestseller Babel: Or the Necessity of Violence: An Arcane History of the Oxford Translators' Revolution by R.F. Kuang.

Jen reviews The Writing Retreat by Julia Bartz, a convoluted work of suspense that failed to enthrall. But no fear—Jen’s faith in the world of spine-tingling mystery is restored by Maureen Johnson’s The Box in the Woods.

Kat trudges through a blizzard of material starting with The Beautiful Snow: The Ingalls Family, the Railroads, and the Hard Winter of 1880-1881 by Cindy Wilson. Heard of SearchOhio and OhioLink? Learn about ASCPL’s partnership with public libraries and university libraries. Unwind with Paper Poetry: Creative Papercutting Projects by Simone Bendix & Helene Bendix and Send Something Beautiful: Fold, Pull, Print, Cut, and Turn Paper into Collectible Keepsakes and Memorable Mail by Emily Hogarth.

Christina picked up Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow by Gabriele Zevin again, and liked it better this time around.  She also shares Strangers to Ourselves by Rachel Aviv, and I’m Glad My Mom Died by Jeanette McCurdy.

Next up: Metamorphoses by Ovid, translated by Stephanie McCarter.

Jen discovered Slow Looking by Shari Tishman, and the Art of Creative Thinking by Rod Judkins.

Next up: Saving Main Street by Gary Rivlin, and Secluded Cabin Sleeps Six by Lisa Unger.

Kat poured over I Used To Live Here Once by Miranda Seymour, and recommends Wide Sargasso Sea by Jean Rhys.  She also fell for Madly, Deeply by Alan Rickman.

Next up: Life After Life by Kate Atkinson, and Outlander by Diana Gabaldon.

And be sure to stop by our New Poetry display next time you're in the branch, on the endcap of Aisle 9/10! (Including Zoetrope: Poems by Cleveland poet Kevin Latimer.)

This week we tackle books from all the fun genres we pulled out of a hat in our episode "You Have My Full Attention" (Nov 1st, 2022.)

Jen didn't like Fake Memoir; she tried Dept. of Speculation by Jenny Offill & A Hell Called Ohio by John M. Hamilton.  But she loved Nordic Noir! She read Winterkill by Ragnar Jónasson & The Golden Cage by Camilla Läckberg is next up on her TBR pile.

Christina didn't like Cat-Themed Murder, but she made it all the way through Purr M For Murder by T. C. LoTempio.  She found a great Book About Monsters; Tender Is The Flesh by Agustina Bazterrica.

Kat found great a great database of Canadiana: www.canadiana.ca.  And she explored a few Amish Romances, including Wife on His Doorstep by Patricia Johns, The Amish Quiltmaker’s Unconventional Niece by Jennifer Beckstrand, & Murder Tightly Knit by Vannetta Chapman.

Christina cleans her palate with Graphic Novels, especially those from Canadian publisher Drawn and Quarterly.  Check out their recent anthology Drawn and Quarterly: Twenty-five Years of Contemporary Cartooning, Comics, and Graphic Novels edited by Tom Devlin, or Wendy, Master of Art by Walter Scott, and Rave by Jessica Campbell.

Jen frees herself from her rut with Messy: The Power of Disorder to Transform Our Lives by Tim Harford, Design for the Mind: Seven Psychological Principles of Persuasive Design by Victor Yocco, and Nike: Better Is Temporary by Sam Grawe.

Kat celebrates existence with Mocktail Party: 75 Plant-Based, Non-Alcoholic Mocktail Recipes for Every Occasion by Diana Licalzi Maldonado and Kerry Benson, and explores the spectrum of scenarios in The Book of the Moon: A Guide to Our Closest Neighbor by Dr. Maggie Aderin-Pocock, Galaxies: Inside the Universe's Star Cities by David J. Eicher, Fire in the Sky: Cosmic Collisions, Killer Asteroids, and the Race to Defend Earth by Gordon L. Dillow, and The Brilliant Abyss: Exploring the Majestic Hidden Life of the Deep Ocean, and the Looming Threat That Imperils It by Helen Scales.

Christina's enjoying Everyday Information Architecture by Lisa Maria Martin, and one of the books she references, Women, Fire, and Dangerous Things by George Lakoff.

Jen's exploring Creative Bug, and found a great artist who goes by e bond.  She's also pouring over Damn Good Advice by George Lois, Nike: Better Is Temporary by Sam Grawe, Authentic: A Memoir by the Founder of Vans by Paul Van Doren, and Us & Our Planet by Phaidon & IKEA.

Kat recommends Epic Bike Rides of the World by Lonely Planet, Soundings: Journeys in the Company of Whales by Doreen Cunningham, and Phosphorescence: A Memoir of Finding Joy When Your World Goes Dark by Julia Baird.

This week we also talk about "vocational awe," a big topic in librarianship.  Here are some great posts we recommend if you're interested in this conversation:

https://www.inthelibrarywiththeleadpipe.org/2018/vocational-awe/

https://annehelen.substack.com/p/vocational-awe

https://soundcloud.com/fixmylibrary

Christina examines the line between beauty and terror in When We Cease To Understand the World by Benjamin Labatut.

Jen's looking for insights in Navigating Ambiguity Andrea Small and Kelly Schmutte, and The Library as Playground by Dale Leorke and Danielle Wyatt (And check out MuseumNext’s Museums, Games, and Play Summit.)

Kat's finding inspiration in the Witches of Moonshyne Manor by Bianca Marais, hanging out at beloved local bookshop the Learned Owl Bookshop, and in the glorious arrangements in On Flowers by Amy Merrick.

Christina discusses two memoirs: Crying In H-Mart by Michelle Zauner, and The Man Who Could Move Clouds by Ingrid Rojas Contreras.

Jen shares The Third Teacher by Cannon Design, VS Furniture, and Bruce Mau Design (Check out their website thethirdteacher.com for cool resources.)

And Kat explores not letting limitations slow you down in Thursday Murder Club, and The Man Who Died Twice by Richard Osman, and The Dead Romantics by Ashley Poston.

Christina's interested in How To Be Perfect by Michael Schur, How To Fail Successfully: Finding Your Creative Potential Through Mistakes and Challenges by Brandon Stosuy, Private Virtues, Public Vices by Emma Saunders-Hastings, Atlas of AI by Kate Crawford, How To Read Now: Essays by Elaine Castillo, and Venomous Lumpsucker by Ned Beauman.  And a special shout-out to the Friends of the Richfield Library for generously providing BookPage Magazine - ask about it next time you visit!

Kat's just finished Malice and Misrule by Heather Walter, and is hoping to devour Properties of Thirst by Marianne Wiggins, Shady Hollow by Juneau Black, and Drunk On Your Strange New Words by Eddie Robson.

Jen's top picks from her notoriously long Goodreads "To Be Read" shelf include The Library of Misremembered Books by Marina Luz, Cabin Tripping by JJ Eggers, Bubbletecture by Sharon Francis, Imagination and Participation by Rob Bruijnzeels and Joyce Sternheim, Bullshit Jobs by David Graeber, Big Magic by Elizabeth Gilbert, Seeds of Innovation by Elaine Dundon (recommended by Chris Weigand of Neon Carrot https://www.neon-carrot.com/about), and Beyond Happiness by Jenn Lim.

The NYT article on Employee Surveillance and Productivity that Kat mentions can be found here. 

Rachel's reading Last Chance Library by Freya Sampson, and The Dilemma by B. A. Paris.  (The book she mentions about a prison librarian is Running the Books by Avi Steinberg.)

Megan's exploring how Things Fall Together: A Guide to the New Materials Revolution by Skyler Tibbits (Check out the book trailer for some footage of jamming: https://vimeo.com/555434363.)  And she's enjoying the full cast recording (!) of A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder by Holly Jackson.

Christina's trudging through Things We Could Design For More Than Human-Centered Worlds by Ron Wakkary, and flying through Everything I Need I Get From You by Kaitlin Tiffany.

Jen has some picks for Megan & Rachel! The Dysfunctional Library by Jo Henry, Joe Eshleman, and Richard Moniz, and Urban Code: 100 Lessons for Understanding the City by Anne Mikoleit and Moritz Pürckhauer.  She's also enjoying Fuzz by Mary Roach.

You can tell it’s our last episode of Season 3, because we have a small tangent festival discussing art critiques and browsing discarded magazines in public places. This really is what it’s like to pull up a chair behind the desk! (PS - The book we discuss about formal art critique is What Art Is by Arthur C. Danto, the conference Jen attended was the Ohio X Conference, and the essay collection Kat discusses is The Most of Nora Ephron.)

Christina shares her favorite culture magazines: New Yorker (check out their Britney coverage by Jia Tolentino and Ronan Farrow, as well as Tolentino's essay collection Trick Mirror,) Gawker, and N+1 (Check out On Fire from their publishing imprint Paper Monument.) and her favorite art magazines: Frieze, Juxtapoz, Hi Fructose, and Nobrow.  And she celebrates the self-publishability of magazines, including some great zines to look up by local artists: Free Period Press' Collage Kit Magazine, Kate Atherton's zines, University Heights Library's Zine Collection, and the zines of Justin Michael Will.

Jen brings some of her favorite décor magazines, including Mountain Living, Atomic Ranch, American Farmhouse Style, lifestyle magazines including Mingle, Foxfire, and Good Magazine, travel magazines including Wanderlust, National Parks Magazine, and Flaneur Magazine, and design magazines including Alliance of American Museums' Museum Magazine, Exhibition Magazine – “Public Spaces and Potential Places” , and Print. Right now she's reading Harvard Business Review's May 2022 issue, about "Designing Work That People Love," and she misses Lucky Magazine, & How.

Kat wraps up our grand cultural tour with Black+White Photography Magazine, the beautiful magazine-as-art-object Kinfolk, and Womankind.

Jen's reading and recommending MANY books this week: Storytelling with Data & Storytelling with Data: Let’s Practice by Cole Nussbaumer Knaflic. Also books about museums, including Come, Stay, Learn, Play: A Guide to Making the Museum Experience by Andrea Gallagher Nalls, The Engaging Museum: Developing Museums for Visitor Involvement by Graham Black, Museum Gallery Activities: A Handbook by Sharon Vatsky, and Activity-Based Teaching in the Art Museum: Movement, Embodiment, Emotion by Elliott Kai-Kee, Lilit Sadoyan, and Lissa Latina.

Jen's also reading some great Juvenile Fiction, including Winterhouse & Greenglass House by Ben Guterson, and The Boundless by Kenneth Oppel. And finally, Do Nothing: How to Break Away from Overworking, Overdoing, and Underliving by Celeste Headlee.

Kat's freaking herself out with The Death of Jane Lawrence by Caitlin Starling, The Animals at Lockwood Manor by Jane Healey, and Mexican Gothic by Silvia Moreno-Garcia.

Christina's taking a class online: Domestika's Creative Coding: Making Visuals with JavaScript, and she's reading The Little House by Virginia Burton, and The Books of Jacob by Olga Tokarczuk.

Christina shares books that have collected meaningful ephemera before she found them, including Uses of Enchantment, and The Folded Clock by Heidi Julavits, Less by Andrew Sean Greer, The Intuitionist, and Colossus of New York by Colson Whitehead. And she shares the comedically iconic time capsule that is Absolut Book by Richard W Lewis.

Jen discusses some tiny gems she's found over the years, including the Legendary Unicorn, and an assortment of Little Little Golden Books. She also shares what she's learned from retro masterworks like the New Joys of Jello, and Entertaining Is Fun! By Dorothy Draper.

And Kat waxes poetic about the strong female protagonists she's met in boxes of donations, like Prosecco-soaked detective Auntie Poldi, and the eco-feminist explorer in The Word For Woman Is Wilderness by Abi Andrews, published by Two Dollar Radio Publishing (based in Columbus, OH!) Plus, we discuss the promotional value of an honest review, like the Guardian's review of Andrew's Wilderness by Sarah Moss. 

Christina discusses The Design of Everyday Things by Don Norman, as well as Fight Night and Women Talking by Miriam Toews.

Kat shares Dear Paris and A Paris Year by Janice MacLeod, The Red Notebook by Antoine Laurain, and The Girl Who Reads on the Metro by Christine Féret-Fleury.

Jen delves into Dear Fahrenheit 451: Love and Heartbreak in the Stacks by Annie Spence.

Some of our childhood favorites include Frog and Toad by Arnold Lobel, Cam Jansen by David A. Adler, Nancy Drew by Caroline Keene, Boxcar Children by Gertrude Chandler Warner, Three Investigators by Robert Alfred Jr., From The Mixed Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler by E. L. Konigsburg, and I Capture The Castle by Dodie Smith.

Christina shares insights from Tarot For Change by Jessica Dore.

Kat explores Four Lost Cities by Annalee Newitz, and why people move (or don't) in This Is Where You Belong by Melody Warnick.

Jen discusses some of her selections for a presentation she gave at Akron's World IA Day, including the Power of Little Ideas by David Robertson and Kent Lineback, Art of Gathering: How We Meet And Why It Matters by Priya Parker, On The Roof: New York In Quarantine by Josh Katz, The Front Steps Project by Cara Soulia and Kristen Collins (Check out the quarantine series, "Portraits of a Pandemic" by local artist Autumn Bland here!), and Atlas of the Heart by Brene Brown.

April is National Poetry Month (Check out Poets.org for 30 ways to celebrate at home!) and we've been having so many discussions about what poetry means to us, what is and isn't poetry, and what is and isn't meaningful. (**Please note: in this episode we discuss some poems with mature themes, including sexual assault. If you’re looking to avoid that content, you can skip to from 13:45 to 17 minutes into this episode.)

Christina shares maybe her favorite essay on art, The Hatred of Poetry by Ben Lerner, as well as three of her favorite collections: Night Sky With Exit Wounds by Ocean Vuong, Motherland Fatherland Homelandsexuals by Patricia Lockwood, and There Are More Beautiful Things Than Beyonce by Morgan Parker.

Kat gets into the weeds of what defines a person and a poet with Red Comet: The Short Life and Blazing Art of Sylvia Plath by Heather Clark, and Poetry Will Save Your Life by Jill Bialosky.

And Jen shares meaningful poetry experiences she's had with teens, the anthology A Poem For Every Day of The Year edited by Allie Esiri, and For Every One by Jason Reynolds, a poem about never giving up your dreams.

It's our favorite week here in Richfield: National Library Week!

Kat discusses 10,000 Doors of January by Alix E. Harrow, The Card Catalog by The Library of Congress and Carla Hayden, The Starless Sea by Erin Morgenstern, and, of course, The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society by Mary Ann Shaffer and Annie Barrows.

Christina shares Living In Data by LOC's first Innovator-In-Residence Jer Thorp, her conflicted feelings about Haruki Murakami's Hard-Boiled Wonderland and The End of the World, and The Strange Library, and her love of Ain’t Burned All the Bright, a collaborative visual poem by Jason Reynolds & Jason Griffin.

Kat mentions a great conversation between Mieko Kawakami and Murakami, which can be found here: https://lithub.com/a-feminist-critique-of-murakami-novels-with-murakami-himself/

And Jen explores Atlas of the Heart by Brene Brown, The Lonely Century: How To Restore Human Connection in a World That's Pulling Apart by Noreena Hertz, Between the Lines: Stories From the Underground by Uli Beutter Cohen, Bold Minds: Library Leadership in a Time of Disruption by Margaret Weaver and Leo Appleton.

Looking for more great library-tastic reads? Check out our April Book Discussion pick: Reading Behind Bars by Jill Grunenwald, and Running the Books by Avi Steinberg.

Christina read so many great books over the break. But she also read Crossroads by Jonathan Franzen.

Kat makes the case for letter writing with To The Letter: A Celebration of the Lost Art of Letter Writing by Simon Garfield, and shares one of her favorite memoirs, The Princess Diarist by Carrie Fisher.

Jen takes some of the pressure off the urge to radically innovate with the Power of Little Ideas by David Robertson, but leans into the pressure to upskill with Career Moves by Caitlin Williams and Annabelle Reitman.

It's great to be back!

Lila by Marilynne Robinson

Fight Night by Miriam Toews

The City Is A Rising Tide by Rebecca Lee

Crossroads by Jonathan Franzen

The Buried Giant by Kazuo Ishiguro

Hard-boiled Wonderland and the End of the World by Haruki Murakami

Up to Heaven and Down to Hell by Colin Jerolmack (NYT Sept 21, 2021: They Couldn’t Drink Their Water, and Still They Stayed Quiet)

Gentrifier by Anne Elizabeth Moore

Women, Race, and Class by Angela Y. Davis

Time Travel by James Gleick

Jen's planning to read:

Deepfake by Sarah Darer Littman

Inheritance Games by Jennifer Lynn Barnes

A Mind Forever Voyaging: A History of Storytelling in Videogames by Dylan Holmes

Patience and Fortitude: Power, Real Estate, and the Fight to Save a Public Library by Scott Sherman

Observe to Unmask: 100 Small Things to Know People Better by Pushpendra Mehta

Sleights of Mind: What the Neuroscience of Magic Reveals about Our Everyday Deceptions by Stephen Macknik and Susana Martinez-Conde

Stories of Elders: What The Greatest Generation Knows About Technology That You Don't by Veronica Kirin

The Other Side of the Story: How Other Countries View Conflicts With the United States by Kyle Ward

One Of Us Is Lying by Karen M. McManus (The TV show is, in fact, streaming now on Peacock)

We'll be back for Season 3 in Spring of 2022!  In the meantime, check out our Richfield Branch Goodreads page, or stop in to grab a copy of the books we discuss from our What We're Reading display.

Looking for some great book inspiration as we head into the holiday season? Christina, Jen, and special guest @ray_whin, creator of @everydayakron, share books they'd give and books they'd love to receive.

Ray shares Women On Food by Charlotte Druckman (And hear her great interview with David Chang on his podcast here.) and dreams up some great gift pairings for Neil Gaiman books, like Stardust (would pair nicely with a bath bomb or candle), Ocean at the End of the Lane, or Fragile Things.

Christina recommends Savory Bites by Hollis Wilder (pairs with a muffin tin!), Step Aside, Pops! By Kate Beaton, Fungarium by Ester Gaya (from the Welcome To The Museum series by London's Kew Gardens) (pairs with Poster series from illustrator Katie Scott, or a Mushroom Growing Kit, like this one,) and On Fire by Jonathan Griffin (Paper Monument/n+1.)

And Jen shares highlights from her wish list, including Creative Acts For Curious People by Sarah Stein Greenberg, Kelli Anderson's Existential Calculator: Should I Take That Job? paper calculator, This Book Is A Planetarium by Kelli Anderson, and Knock Knock's Personal Library Kit, so you can stamp and catalogue your collection!

Christina and Jen get hyperlocal with Rachel & Scott Luther, half of the duo behind The South Richfield Podcast.  Scott and Rachel share local wisdom and lore (Why does the Post Office sign look off-center? How do you get a cow out of the street? What happened to the beloved old Minutemen band uniforms? Where is the best place in Richfield for your vacation home?) and a good laugh or two.

Rachel talks about the incredible journey in Lost Pianos of Siberia by Sophy Roberts and Michael Turek: Siberia, as well as lessons in endurance from What I Talk About When I Talk About Running by Haruki Murakami.

Scott shares the incredible history of The Cloudbuster Nine by Anne R. Keene, as well as the shared history of our species in Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind by Yuval Noah Harari.

Christina savors the equally mundane and divine vision of Matrix by Lauren Groff, and experiences many great stories from StoryCorp's collection of work tales in Callings: The Purpose and Passion of Work by Dave Isay.

Jen gets cozy with the chilling universe of some not so Good Neighbors by Sarah Langan, and shares some insights from When Strangers Meet: How People You Don’t Know Can Transform You by Kio Stark.

Mike is retiring, and we're sad to see him go. But before he does, he shares his favorite novels of all time: Catch-22 by Joseph Heller, and The Pickwick Papers by Charles Dickens.

Christina discusses the quiet power of Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants by Robin Wall Kimmerer.

And Jen is wowed by a patron recommendation (shoutout to Megan!) that's full of layers of surprises: S: [Ship of Theseus] by J. J. Abrams. (If you love the book, be sure to check out sfiles22.blogspot.com, an online community that examines clues from the book.)

Plus some final wisdom from Mike!

Mike is haunted by The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins, and The Turn of the Key by Ruth Ware.

Christina rereads the Book of Strange New Things by Michel Faber in a new light, and talks about finding and searching for How to Build A Time Machine by Paul Davies

Jen gets deep in the feels with The Notebook by Nicholas Sparks, connects to Death personified in The Book Thief by Markus Zusak, and recalls many times the work of Dale Carnegie has spoken to her in profound ways.

Mike drops some massive history lessons on us all in this edition of the Richfield Branch Library Podcast.  Our favorite know-it-all highly recommends Erik Larson's Devil In The White City and Dead Wake, Bruce Catton's A Stillness at Appomattox, Barbara W. Tuchman's The Guns of August and A Distant Mirror, AND William Manchester's The Glory and the Dream.

Christina travels up, down, and far out with Michael Pollan's This Is Your Mind On Plants.

And Jen takes us through a painful break-up told inventively by Leanne Shapton's fictional auction catalogue Important Artifacts and Personal Property from the Collection of Lenore Doolan and Harold Morris, Including Books, Street Fashion, and Jewelry.

Special guests Mac & Allyse Love of Akron-based creative agency ArtxLove join Christina & Jen to talk about the power of stories!

We talk about our new neighbor The Pint & Pie Works.

Mac shares about their unique card deck project Akron On Deck, and how they structured the profits to benefit area artists and local businesses during the pandemic and beyond.

Allyse shares some amazing stories they've collected for The Rubber Worker sculpture in downtown Akron.  You can listen to the stories and submit your own at akronstories.com.

Allyse shares some of her favorite reads from the Torchbearers Book Club: Cuyahoga by Pete Beatty, Winter’s Bone by Daniel Woodrell, and The Final Revival of Opal and Nev by Dawnie Walton.

Mac reaches for a collection he's been meaning to read for years, Island by Alistair MacLeod, and recommends Understanding Comics by Scott McCloud, as well as The Sandman series by Neil Gaiman.

Jen's ready for Last Call by Brad Thomas Parsons.

And Christina examines our deepest truths with Exhalation by Ted Chiang.

Christina discusses visions of nature and our future within it from Under A White Sky by Elizabeth Kolbert.

Mike compares thrillers that draw you in, from Maine's a series by Mike Doiron to Britain's A Rising Man by Abir Mukherjee.

Jen finds out her Enneatype (3 wing 2) and it leads the group on a journey through our experiences with personality and career tests, including P2PU's Science of Happiness course. Mike talks about how he had always wanted to be a librarian. (Christina took the Enneagram test after recording, and found she's now a 1 wing 9.)

Did you take the test? Let us know your type on Twitter @richfieldbranch, or leave us a voice message on anchor.fm/richfieldbranch

The gang assigns themselves titles from Modern Library's 100 Greatest Novels List to read over the summer.

Mike read Sons and Lovers by DH Lawrence, and Midnight's Children by Salman Rushdie.

Christina read Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison.

Jen read And Then There Were None by Agatha Christie.

The Clearing

The Dropout

Serial Season 3

Midnight Gospel

The Experiment

La Brega

Jen-

The Librarian Is In

IDEO Creative Confidence

Science Talks: National Parks Nature Walks

Getting To Yes, And

Curious Minds At Work

Results May Vary

Jen explores The Look of the Book by Peter Mendelsund and David J. Alworth.

Mike discusses the crazy circumstances both within and that led to the creation of The Last Green Valley by Mark T. Sullivan.

And Christina shares the visionary Black Futures by Kimberly Drew and Jenna Wortham (Check out this great feature about Kimberly Drew in Essence.) and the sparklingly accessible Big Macs and Burgundy by Vanessa Price and Adam Laukhuf, based on Price's Wine Pairing of the Week column in NY Mag’s Grub Street food blog, and featuring delightful illustrations by The Ellaphant in the Room.)

We'll be back for Season 2 in the Fall, but in the meantime, leave us a message! anchor.fm/richfieldbranch and click "Message."

Special thanks to Scanglobe https://freemusicarchive.org/music/Scanglobe/Telegraph/Robot_Cowboy_1850 for making our theme song, and to their label Nul Tiel Records https://nultielrecords.blogspot.com/ for making it available.

Mike discusses divergence and longing for convergence in Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi.

Christina fangirls about all of Leigh Bardugo's canon, from Ninth House to the Grishaverse, including Shadow and Bone & The Language of Thorns.

And Jen shares her research on metaphorical swans and rhinos with the blog post When Black Swans Happen by Colleen Dilenschneider and the book The Gray Rhino by Michele Wucker.

Mike talks about roads not traveled in Midnight Library by Matt Haig.

Christina talks about two books that examine race in a way that you could totally enjoy on the beach, The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennet and The Office of Historical Corrections by Danielle Evans.

And Jen discusses traveling to the ends of the earth for some solitude in Outpost by Dan Richards.

Jen, Mike, and Christina talk Batgirl-inspired library services, fully integrated library-makerspaces, and some of Virginia Woolf's best advice in this installment of the Richfield Branch Library Podcast.  

Mike recommends two full series': Cuckoo’s Calling (The Strike Series #1) by Robert Gailbraith, and Open Season (Joe Pickett Series #1) by C. J. Box.

Christina pours over the fascinating lives of those who kept Remarkable Diaries by DK Publishing.

And Jen plunges fearlessly into The Virginia Woolf Reader edited by Mitchell A Leaska, picking up some great tidbits like "Read What You Want."

And in local news, Richfield is getting a watertower!

...

Drop us a line at anchor.fm/richfieldbranch and click "Message."  Your voicemail comment or question could be featured on a future episode!

Jen discusses I Find Your Lack of Faith Disturbing by A. D. Jameson.

Christina finally gets around to reading Wishful Drinking by Carrie Fisher.

Mike takes us on a journey to another universe in Seveneves by Neal Stephenson.

And Jen brings us back with a trip down memory lane, assisted by Beckett Star Wars Collectibles.

This episode's special theme music is the movement “Mars” from the orchestral suite “The Planets” by Gustav Holst, made available on Wikimedia by musopen.org.

Hear more about this 103 year old piece and the subsequent work it inspired https://www.npr.org/sections/deceptivecadence/2018/09/28/652700640/the-planets-at-100-a-listener-s-guide-to-holst-s-solar-system

Mike talks about Before We Were Yours by Lisa Wingate, and A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles.

Christina discusses Homeland Elegies by Ayad Ahktar (with gorgeous cover design by Lucy Kim.)

And Jen SPOILS Girls with Sharp Sticks by Suzanne Young (just a little bit,) and shares some favorite moments from The 99% Invisible City by Kurt Kohlstedt and Roman Mars. Check out their podcast 99% Invisible.

Plus, the Richfield Library is featured in March’s Richfield Times!

Mike discusses The Library Book by Susan Orlean and Bad-Ass Librarians of Timbuktu by Joshua Hammer, the true story of how a group of librarians smuggled hundreds of thousands of rare volumes to safety in 2012.

Christina reminisces about the neighborhood library of her childhood, and discusses the freeing argument at the heart the essay “Northwest London Blues” from Feel Free by Zadie Smith.

Jen talks about Freedom Libraries by Mike Selby (Hear more about this title on NYPL’s The Librarian Is In Podcast, Episode 162 “How Y’all Doin’?”) Palaces for the People by Eric Klinenberg (Check out Brooklyn Public Library’s Borrowed Podcast, Season 3 Episode 1 “Reopening, Reimagining.”) and Encoding Space by Brian Mathews and Leigh Ann Soistmann, a book about what library spaces could be that she comes back to time and again for inspiration.

The American Library Association's National Library Week runs April 4th-10th, 2021. Learn more at ala.org.

Mike discusses The Splendid and the Vile by Erik Larson, and the journaling project in Britain that captured the stories of everyday Britons during the war.  You can access the Mass Observation Project's archives here.

Christina discusses the process of researching art, the beauty of stained glass windows, and The Art of Looking Up by Catherine McCormack.

Jen discusses seeking new ways to think about staging socially distanced events, and Seeing the Better City by Charles R. Wolfe and The Walk Book by Janet Cardiff.

This week, Christina discusses Lathe of Heaven by Ursula K. Le Guin, which very much lives up to its reputation as a classic.

Mike discusses Miracle Creek by Angie Kim. 

And Jen shares two recent disappointments: Rural Voices edited by Nora Shalaway Carpenter and Rust by Eliese Colette Goldbach.

Mike discusses Born A Crime by Trevor Noah and Maisie Dobbs by Jacqueline Winspear.

Christina discusses Red Pill by Hari Kunzru.

Jen discusses Notes From A Public Typewriter edited by Michael Gustafson and Oliver Uberti.