The Friends of the Natchitoches Parish Library (FONPL) will be having a mini book sale at the Natchitoches Parish Library (NPL), beginning Monday, May 23rd. Thousands of items will be available for purchase including movies, tv shows, paperbacks, hardbacks, and audiobooks. All proceeds will go to the FONPL to help support future NPL programming.
The FONPL has previously helped sponsor such programs as the NPL’s monthly adult fitness series (which has included line dancing, meditation, Zumba, and a walking club), children’s yoga, the teen anime club, and the annual summer reading program, among others.
Several shelves will be available for browsing in the third-floor meeting room at the NPL, with new items being stocked each day. All items are being offered for 50 cents each. The sale will run during regular business hours, Monday, May 23rd - Saturday, June 4th.
No credit or debit card payments are possible, and change cannot be made by library staff. For more information on joining the FONPL or participating in the library’s no-cost events, you may visit natlib.org, follow the NPL’s Facebook page, or sign up for the newsletter for announcements.
New and On Order
Would you like to share your writing with others? Have a poem, story, review, or an excerpt that you have selected from your writings?
Please contact Alan Niette, NPL Community Outreach Coordinator, at alan@natlib.org. We will gladly share your tales with our readers!
"What's Up" This Month?
Joey Matheson
Right now, there is an event happening in our night skies. Starting in the east, as evenings progress, a long line of planets are coming into view. Venus, to start with, you will see early in the morning, say, 4 AM to sunup. Then, fainter is mars, followed by Saturn, then Jupiter. You will see the last of the moon as a crescent before the month is over.
Thousands of years ago, the Greeks referred to the planets as wanderers, as they were not “stationary” relative to fitted stars. And they noted they seem to follow along a line, which today we know as an elliptic orbit.
Today, we have tools the Greeks would never have dreamed of to help locate these bodies. There are several apps you can download to your phone that act as sky atlases; one of which is Stellarium.
So get yourself rested up and go alookin’ for those planets and have a good time doing it!
-Joey
Digital Hoopla Picks From the Library
Audiobook: The Odyssey (5h 34m, 2022). By Lara Williams, read by Charly Clive.
When Alice Ahmadi discovers a famed emerald necklace while interning at a struggling Parisian magazine, she is plunged into a glittering world of diamonds and emeralds, courtesans and spies, and the long-buried secrets surrounding the necklace and its glamorous former owners. When she realizes the mysterious Honeybee Emeralds could be her chance to save the magazine, she recruits her friends Lily and Daphne to form the "Fellowship of the Necklace." Together, they set out to uncover the romantic history of the gems. Through diaries, letters, and investigations through the winding streets and iconic historic landmarks of Paris, the trio begins to unravel more than just the secrets of the necklace's obsolete past. Along the way, Lily and Daphne's relationships are challenged, tempered, and changed. Lily faces her long-standing attraction to a friend, who has achieved the writing success that eluded her. Daphne confronts her failing relationship with her husband, while also facing simmering problems in her friendship with Lily. And, at last, Alice finds her place in the world - although one mystery still remains: how did the Honeybee Emeralds go from the neck of American singer Josephine Baker during the Roaring Twenties to the basement of a Parisian magazine?
Movie: A Taste of Hunger (1h 43m, 2022, NR).
A power couple within the Danish gourmet scene run the popular restaurant Malus in Copenhagen. The couple is willing to sacrifice everything to achieve their dream - getting the coveted Michelin star.
eBook: The Keeper Of Night (2021).
By Kylie Lee Baker.
A girl of two worlds, accepted by none... A half Reaper, half Shinigami soul collector seeks her destiny in this haunting and compulsively readable dark fantasy set in 1890s Japan. Death is her destiny.
Half British Reaper, half Japanese Shinigami, Ren Scarborough has been collecting souls in the London streets for centuries. Expected to obey the harsh hierarchy of the Reapers who despise her, Ren conceals her emotions and avoids her tormentors as best she can.
When her failure to control her Shinigami abilities drives Ren out of London, she flees to Japan to seek the acceptance she's never gotten from her fellow Reapers. Accompanied by her younger brother, the only being on earth to care for her, Ren enters the Japanese underworld to serve the Goddess of Death...only to learn that here, too, she must prove herself worthy. Determined to earn respect, Ren accepts an impossible task—find and eliminate three dangerous Yokai demons—and learns how far she'll go to claim her place at Death's side.
From the Stacks: Featured Cookbook
641.5 SLA—I Dream of Dinner (so you don't have to), by Ali Slagle.
With minimal ingredients and maximum joy in mind, Ali Slagle's no-nonsense, completely delicious recipes are ideal for dinner tonight—and every single night. Like she does with her instantly beloved recipes in the New York Times, Ali combines readily available, inexpensive ingredients in clever, uncomplicated ways for meals that spark everyday magic. Maybe it’s Fish & Chips Tacos tonight, a bowl of Olive Oil-Braised Chickpeas tomorrow, and Farro Carbonara forever and ever. All come together with fewer than eight ingredients and forty-five minutes, using one or two pots and pans. Half the recipes are plant-based, too.
Organized by main ingredients like eggs, noodles, beans, and chicken, chapters include quick tricks for riffable cooking methods and flavor combinations so that dinner bends to your life, not the other way around (no meal-planning required!). Whether in need of comfort and calm, fire and fun—directions to cling to, or the inspiration to wing it—I Dream of Dinner (so You Don't Have To) is the only phone-a-friend you need. That’s because Ali, a home cook turned recipe developer, guides with a reassuring calm, puckish curiosity, and desire for everyone, everywhere, to make great food—and fast.
Tomatillo Poached Cod (pg.374)
For 4
Ingredients:
1c long grain white rice
1 Jalapeno
1 yellow onion
1.5lbs tomatillos
1/2c cilantro
1/4c neutral oil
1.5c water
1.5lbs cod
1 lime
1 (15oz) can hominy
Instructions:
Cook rice for serving (pg.170 if you need a method)
Meanwhile, halve and remove the seeds from the jalapeno. Coarsely chop, along with the onion. Transfer to a medium bowl.
Remove husks from tomatillos and coarsely chop. Pluck cilantro leaves and thinly slice their stems.
Heat oil in large skillet over medium-high. Add the onion, jalapeno, and cilantro stems, season with S&P, and cook until the onion is soft and charred in spots, 5-7 minutes.
Add the tomatillos and season with S&P. Cook, stirring, until the tomatillos are soft and blistered in spots, 3-5 minutes.
Add the water, bring to a simmer, then reduce the heat to medium and cook, smashing with a spoon or potato masher occasionally, until the tomatillos have broken down, 10-15 minutes.
Meanwhile, pat cod dry. Cut into 4 (6oz) pieces and season all over with S&P. Zest lime over the fish.
Drain and rinse hominy.
When the tomatillo mixture is ready, stir in the hominy. Lay the fish on top, cover, and cook until the fish is opaque and easily flaked with a fork, 7-10 minutes.
Taste the tomatillo mixture and season accordingly with S&P.
Note:
Also good with sour cream, limey cabbage, beans, sliced radishes, or tortilla chips.
