Thursday, October 26, 2017

A Celebration of Authors 2017

A Celebration of Authors 2017 
The signature fundraising event of the Worcester Public Library Foundation Please join us for an extraordinary evening of cocktails, food and conversation with five celebrated authors to benefit the programs and services of the Worcester Public Library. 
 Thursday, October 26, 2017 - 5:30-9:00 p.m. 
The White Room @ Crompton Collective 138 Green Street Worcester, MA

Andre Dubus III 
A
ndre Dubus III grew up in mill towns on the Merrimack River along the Massachusetts-New Hampshire border. He is the author of six books including three New York Times bestsellers. House of Sand and Fog was a #1 New York Times bestseller, a fiction finalist for the National Book Award, the Los Angeles Times Book Prize, and Booksense Book of the Year. It was also an Oprah Book Club Selection, and was adapted into an Academy Award-nominated motion picture starring Ben Kingsley and Jennifer Connelly. The Garden of Last Days is soon to be a major motion picture. His memoir, Townie, was a #4 New York Times bestseller and a New York Times Editors Choice. Dirty Love was chosen as a Notable Book and Editors’ Choice from the New York Times, a Notable Fiction from The Washington Post, and a Kirkus Starred Best Book of 2013. Mr. Dubus has been awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship, The National Magazine Award for Fiction, Two Pushcart Prizes, and an American Academy of Arts and Letters Award in Literature. His books are published in over twenty-five languages.

John Dufresne

John Dufresne is the author of two short story collections, The Way That Water Enters Stone and
Johnny Too Bad, and the novels Louisiana Power & Light, and Love Warps the Mind a Little, both New York Times Notable Books of the Year. He is also the author of Deep in the Shade of Paradise; Requiem, Mass; No Regrets, Coyote; and I Don’t Like Where This is Going. He has written two books on writing fiction, The Lie That Tells a Truth and Is Life Like This? He is the editor of the anthologies Blue Christmas, Everything is Broken, and Everything is Broken, Too. His short stories have twice been named Best American Mystery Stories, in 2007 and 2010. He is a 2013 Guggenheim Fellow in Fiction.

Margot Livesey

Margot Livesey was born and grew up on the edge of the Scottish Highlands. She has taught in numerous writing programs including Emerson College, Boston University, Bowdoin College and the Warren Wilson low residency MFA program, and is the author of a collection of stories and eight novels, including Eva Moves the Furniture, and The Flight of Gemma Hardy, which won the New England Independent Booksellers’ Award in fiction for 2012. She lives in Cambridge, MA and is on the faculty of the Iowa Writers’ Workshop. Her novel, Mercury, was published in September 2016. In July 2017, Tin House will publish The Hidden Machinery: Essays on Writing.



Elizabeth Searle
Elizabeth Searle is the author of five books of fiction, most recently her novel We Got Him (2016),
which is set on the night of the Boston Marathon bombing manhunt. Her previous books are Girl Held in Home; A Four-Sided Bed, now in development as a feature film; Celebrities in Disgrace, produced as a short film, and My Body to You, winner of the Iowa Short Fiction Prize. Elizabeth's original stage work, Tonya & Nancy: The Rock Opera has been produced in Boston, LA, Chicago, NYC and has drawn national media attention. Elizabeth's work has appeared in over a dozen anthologies; she is the co-editor of a new anthology: Soap Opera Confidential: Writers and Soap Insiders on Why We'll Tune in Tomorrow as the World Turns Restlessly by the Guiding Light of Our Lives.

Annie Weatherwax

Winner of the Robert Olen Butler Prize for Fiction, Annie Weatherwax’s short stories have appeared in The Sun Magazine, The Southern Review, and elsewhere. A graduate of Rhode Island School of Design, for years, she earned a living sculpting superheroes and cartoon characters for Nickelodeon, DC Comics, Pixar and others. She has written extensively on the link between visual art and language including for Publishers Weekly, The New York Times and regularly for Ploughshares magazine. Her debut novel, All We Had, now a major motion picture, was published by Scribner and was a finalist for the Massachusetts Book Award




Joe Cox, Moderator, is President of the EcoTarium, New England's leading science and nature
center.

Thursday, October 12, 2017

New Urban Fiction in Fall 2017



Have you seen our expanded Urban Fiction collection? We’ve been hard at work getting the latest titles with that steamy, gritty drama you love! We have books from your favorite authors, like the latest in The Cartel series by Ashley and Jaquavis, or Hoodlum 2 by K’wan, but also lots of up-and-coming authors like Tyrone Bentley, Aija Monique, and Amir Sanchez. Stop into our fiction section and browse our special urban fiction display, highlighting all the juicy reads that keep this genre so hot! 


Thursday, October 5, 2017

October is Health Literacy Month!

If you have ever left the doctor’s office confused or tried to research a health topic but did not quite understand the information, you are not alone.  


Medical information, prescription instructions, and the health system as a whole are complex notions for the layperson and especially for those with learning disabilities and English as a second language. A patient’s ability to process health information is affected by literacy skills, age, disability, cultural competency, and emotional responses.


Health Literacy Month highlights the need for plain language, easy-to-access, and reliable health information understood by all.    


At Worcester Public Library we strive to provide jargon-free health information for our patrons. In our Consumer Health Reference area, we offer health reference books that are easy to read and understand. We also provide pamphlets, brochures, and community information.


IMG_1388.JPG
Health Reference Center
On our website, we have selected a list of health websites with reliable information. One website in particular, Healthfinder.gov, specializes in plain language medical information. This site offers easy-to-read health information in both English and Spanish on topics ranging from health conditions and diseases to doctors visits to parenting.  Medlineplus.gov, also in English and Spanish, is another reliable website to research health needs.


When researching health information on the internet:


  • be sure to verify the information is current; most health articles will have a “last updated” date somewhere on the page
  • if the website ends in .com, be wary; if it ends in .gov, .edu, or .org you can expect the information to be reliable
  • always ensure the information is accurate by checking other reliable websites and health books to verify the information
  • websites full of advertisements may indicate the website is in the business of selling ads and not in the business of providing reliable health information


If English is your second language you have the right to language help at no cost to; talk with doctors, nurses, and other staff members; talk about bills and insurance; and to make appointments.


Misunderstanding medical information can have costly and unnecessary consequences. Ask questions to clarify, do your research using reliable health resources, and ask for an interpreter when needed, to make sure your health needs are met.  


Review our Health Literacy Reading List and visit the Health Literacy Display on the 2nd floor of the Main Library for more information today.
IMG_1392.JPG
Health Literacy display; up for the month of October