Kate Messner Lesson on Building Fantasy Worlds

“Why is J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings trilogy so compelling? How about The Matrix or Harry Potter? What makes these disparate worlds come alive are clear, consistent rules for how people, societies — and even the laws of physics — function in these fictional universes. Author Kate Messner offers a few tricks for you, too, to create a world worth exploring in your own words.”

Full Lesson: How to Build a Fictional World by Kate Messner
Via Open Culture: How to Build a Fictional World

Pam Sandlian Smith on What to Expect from Libraries in the 21st Century

Blind Lawyer Shares the Role of Technology in his Reading Life

More about Ron McCallum

A Spacy Book Trailer

An Astronaut’s Guide to Life on Earth by Chris Hadfield
Description and readers’ reviews at Goodreads

“…most of Hadfield’s memoir is a page-turner, especially when he describes the smaller and stranger parts of space travel. Such as, when returning to Earth’s pull after six months in zero gravity, he can “feel the heaviness of the skin on my face.” That’s poetry, dammit.” …read Peter Scowen’s review at The Globe & Mail

“If you start thinking that only your biggest and shiniest moments count, you’re setting yourself up to feel like a failure most of the time. Personally, I’d rather feel good most of the time, so to me, everything counts: the small moments, the medium ones, the successes that make the papers and also the ones that no one knows about but me.”…see the other 5 Stellar Life Lessons from Chris Hadfield (with pictures) at the CBC Q Blog.

An Achiever: “Raised on a corn farm in southern Ontario, Chris Hadfield became interested in flying from a young age. As an Air Cadet, he won a glider pilot scholarship at age 15 and a powered pilot scholarship at age 16. He also taught skiing and ski racing part- and full-time for 10 years.” …from Chris Hadfield’s biography at the Canadian Space Agency.

Monty Python and Unpronouncable Figures of Speech

“Ah, the ancient art of rhetoric. There’s no escaping it. Variously defined as “the art of argumentation and discourse” or, by Aristotle in his fragmented treatise, as “the means of persuasion [that] could be found in the matter itself; and then stylistic arrangement,” rhetoric is complicated.” …more at Open Culture

Lisa Bu: How Books Can Open Your Mind

Nothing to Do With Shelving Books

Sarah McIntyre is offering this poster free for downloading.
Click on the image to go the post.

Warning: Short Rant…
There’s that ‘trained’ part again. I’m busting my butt as basically an Experienced library clerk because I know what could be done but I’m shooting in the dark; wishing there was someone I could turn to, someone truly trained. (And then /or at least, someone to do the clerk stuff so I could do/learn more…help students more.) Read About Survival above if you’re into the topic.

Watch this…We Need This!