Learn more about…

Lists

• 

  Holiday Cookbooks
  

  Our curated collection of holiday cookbooks offers a delightful array of culinary inspirations, allowing you to create mouthwatering dishes, sweet treats, and unforgettable feasts that will leave a lasting impression on your festive gatherings.

• 

  2023 Holiday
  

  Join us in celebrating this special time of year by exploring our library catalog's holiday collection. This list features books, DVDs, music, and more that capture the essence of the holidays for all ages.

Reviews

• 

  John Wick Chapter 3: Parabellum by Chad Stahelski

  ★ ★ ★ ★ ★

  This review contains spoilers! Click to reveal...

  "Se vis pacem, para bellum."

  The third installment in the unexpectedly popular John Wick franchise takes the series in a more existential direction. At the start of the film, John Wick has dispatched with his enemies and satisfied his desire for revenge in what can only be described as Phyrric victory in which John has lost his dog, his car, and his house - all of the remaining material links to the memory of his late wife - and he has only a pile of the bodies of everyone responsible for his dispossession to show for it. Moreover, to achieve a decisive victory in his struggle for power over the High Table, John is forced to break the cardinal rule of the shadowy world of assassins he's been thrust back into, turning the entire global network of assassins against him and expanding the scope of his conflict with the powers that be. His use of violence inside the Continental Hotel renders him "excommunicado" and he must fight for mere survival as his bounty increases by the minute and the international conglomerate of assassins he's angered converges on his location.

  John's enemies are formidable, but far from unified in their interests, and as Wick's adversaries hunt him across the globe, he is able to flip some key actors into allies. John Wick 3, like the rest of the films in the franchise is the distilled essence of every seventh grade boy's daydream in Spanish class about saving the entire room from armed assassins using only kung fu. But John Wick 3 also explores some more thought-provoking themes surrounding John's motivation to live, even when fighting against impossible odds. "I want to live to remember her," Wick says about his late wife. Throughout the series the violence inherent in his work has led to the destruction of every physical trace of her existence that John has held onto, right down to the wedding ring on his finger, which he must sacrifice to earn forgiveness for the transgressions he committed while attempting to preserve other aspects of her legacy. In this regard, the film engages with the desperation and futility that often accompanies grief. At the same time, the script can be read as Stahelski's ruminations on the nature of war: all encompassing with constantly shifting alliances which spare no one forever. For John Wick - whose fights are always maximally necessary and just but whose victories always seem to expose him to greater danger and harm as chaos proliferates and each power vacuum he creates is filled again - the question is not just whether he can win his battles decisively, but whether the destruction he has wrought leaves anything for him to gain besides a desert called peace.

  Reviewed by Dan D on Nov 30, 2023

  Check out this item

• 

  Joan of Arc : a history by Castor, Helen

  ★ ★ ★ ★ ★

  In contrast to more biographical accounts, Helen Castor's history situates Joan of Arc's life firmly within the historical context of the Lancastrian War (1415-1453) - the third and final phase of the Hundred Years' War between England and France. The first several chapters of Castor's book focus on the political intrigue in the fractured Kingdom of France, reeling from its devastating loss at the Battle of Agincourt in the years leading up to Joan's birth. Had George R.R. Martin not chosen the subsequent War of the Roses (1455-1487) as the inspiration for his novels, the events in France which preceded that war would have been just as good an option. Any fan of Game of Thrones will likely enjoy reading an account of the civil war between the Burgundian and Armagnac cadet branches of the French royal family - A war which brought France to a point of crisis where a peasant woman from a border town who claimed to have spoken to God was able to command armies and bring the French monarchy back from the brink of capitulation to the English crown which was so ascendant at this stage in the war.

  Castor largely treats the civil war in France and the ensuing war between France and England as a discrete conflict with connections to the historical era more broadly. She does not explain to the reader every detail of the historiography of the Western European Late Middle Ages, partially to avoid confusing lay readers and partially because she likely expects her audience to be somewhat historically inclined and familiar with the foundational history of Western European nation states. From her perspective as a London-based historian of Medieval and Tudor England, this is somewhat reasonable. But American readers may wish to consult a few outside sources in order to brush up on the full historical context of the book's events.

  Castor's analysis in the second half of the books brings her unique perspective on the life and subjectivity of Joan of Arc the living woman to print. Where other histories and biographies of Joan have focused on her role as a religious icon, military strategist and proto-feminist, Castor's history weaves those threads together and presents the reader with a picture of a woman who, as a person living in the middle ages, had beliefs and a perspective on the world which is as alien to the modern reader as an entirely different culture would be. Castor is a responsible historian who is so steeped in the facts on the period she writes about that she is able to make educated conjectures that make her story come to life, while still distinguishing fact from speculation. This analysis makes the book, and especially her characterization of Joan, richer.

  Castor generally rejects the idea that Joan had any kind of feminist consciousness about her actions. The evidence points to Joan seeing her mission on Earth as a religious one, firmly embedded within the political imaginary of the time and limited in its objective to the ongoing struggle between kings. This does not mean, however, that Castor's history is devoid of an analysis about what it meant for Joan of Arc to be a woman, both for herself and to her friends and foes. Castor's Joan of Arc is a woman who found herself at the command of an army and an integral part of French politics between the ages of seventeen and nineteen, with no formal experience in statecraft, military strategy or politics. She is a woman who may have worn a fastened leather tunic in the fashion of a man as her only form of protection from sexual violence as a woman traveling alone in a low-trust society with no effective rule of law. She may have been inspected for chastity by female members of the royal court, to verify her claims of piousness. She may have agonized when hearing church bells, which were said to have been a trigger for her religious visions. All these details and more await the reader in the pages of Helen Castor's Joan of Arc.

  Reviewed by Dan D on Nov 30, 2023

  Check out this item

• 

  Ethnic renewal in Philadelphia's Chinatown :… by Wilson, Kathryn E.

  ★ ★ ★ ★ ★

  Kathryn Wilson's 2015 study is one of the only full length, academic studies of Philadelphia's Chinatown available in paperback. It is an essential companion to anyone seeking to understand the neighborhood's rich history and tradition of resistance. As Chinatown once again finds itself at the center of a debate over downtown development, Ethnic Renewal is likely to become an important and sought-after resource for those seeking to understand how one of Philadelphia's most iconic neighborhoods became what it is today, how its people managed to adapt to changing circumstances by mobilizing unique community institutions, and how in spite of the renewed threats Chinatown faces today, it continues to thrive, defying the expectations of those who doubt its worth and potential.

  Reviewed by Dan D on Nov 29, 2023

  Check out this item

• 

  Coming to America by Eddie Murphy David Sheffield and Barry W Blaustein

  ★ ★ ★ ★ ★

  Hilarious film starring Eddy Murphy as "Prince Akeem"; a lost in new york wealthy man escaping an arranged marraige. Eddie Murphy is also is the creator of the story. Co-authored by Eddie Murphy David Sheffield and Barry W. Blaustein. Directed by John Landis. #comedy

  Reviewed by Ellen C on Nov 29, 2023

  Check out this item

• 

  Big hero 6 by Roberts, Baird, and Gerson

  ★ ★ ★ ★ ★

  If you are looking for an all ages film based on a comic book the characters and robots of Big Hero Six will win your heart. Everything from the science, to the script, to the emotional scenes are well illustrated/animated. Part of the fictional cityscape seems to be based directly off SanFrancisco and Alcatraz Island. #superhero #juvenile #animation
   

  Reviewed by Ellen C on Nov 29, 2023

  Check out this item

• 

  Stephen Girard : America's first tycoon by Wilson, George,

  ★ ★ ★ ★ ☆

  George Wilson's Stephen Girard: The Life and Times of America's First Tycoon is probably the Free Library's best print resource for a comprehensive overview of the life and legacy of Stephen Girard. Girard's name is ubiquitous in Philadelphia, but despite his impact common knowledge of his role in history is surprisingly scarce, even locally. Of course, the institutions and locations which bear Girard's name would be in many ways unrecognizable to him today, so it makes sense that his legacy is not apparent in everyday city life.

  Wilson's account of Girard's life in Philadelphia more than 200 years ago provided me with the missing link that I needed to bridge my understanding between the City of Philadelphia's early past and some of its oldest still-standing institutions. Wilson does a good job situating Girard's life within the broader historical context of early America in a way which captures the dynamic mood among the propertied elite of the early republic - a milleu in which Girard was an influential force. Though times have changed and Girard is hardly a relatable figure to modern sensibilities, Wilson writes in a way that makes the reader appreciate Stephen Girard's exceptional talent and eccentric, reclusive, dynamic nature. As a man who came from relative obscurity and rose to hold many of the strings of Trans-Atlantic commerce and finance in his hands while bankrolling a republican turn in the Americas in the years before democratic pressure from the new propertied classes would rock the aristocracies of Europe, Girard embodies the dynamism and political influence of the late 18th and early 19th century bourgeiosie. He is worth learning about for that reason alone.

  Most interesting to me however was the way that Girard's legacy would go on to shape Philadelphia in ways he could not have imagined. Life and his own legacy have moved on without Stephen Girard the man, from the property still owned by his estate on 11th St from Market to Chestnut which turned out to be one of the best real estate investments of the 20th century, to Girard College, a boarding school which fought bitterly against racial integration in the name of Girard's will, but is now more or less a part of the fabric of North Philly, complete with a mural of its once-adversary Cecil B. Moore on its northern wall.

  For all its detail and fascinating prose, this is ultimately a favorable biography of someone who history has recognized as a classic Great Man, with a great deal of personal influence on Early America and Philadelphia up to the present day. It shys away from any controversy or speculation about the two most contested parts of his personal life: his direct and indirect ownership of enslaved people and his incarceration of his wife, Mary Lum Girard, in the asylum at Pennsylvania Hospital. Wilson takes a no-conjecture approach on these issues and refuses to lay out a range of possibilities for Girard's attitudes and behavior based on the historical context that surrounded him, instead preferring to assume that Girard did not do or think anything for which there is no direct historical evidence. This is not entirely Wilson's Fault: Girard's papers are held by his estate and by Girard College, who have long used their powers as private institutions to gatekeep access to Girard's legacy. Wilson would not have been able to write such a well sourced, thorough biography if he were hoping to write a scathing critique of Girard's life, and unwilling to play ball with the Girard Estate. Nonetheless, The presumption of innocence with which Wilson presents the more controversial aspects of Girard's legacy is the book's greatest weakness, and will strike a well-informed reader steeped in the historical context of the times Girard lived in as naive.

  Reviewed by Dan D on Nov 29, 2023

  Check out this item

All Topics