News

NaShantá Fletcher of Hanover Park always liked to draw, but it was hard to find time for it with her full-time job at WGN News. 

It's been 30 years since Wayne's World launched the catchphrase, "Party time! Excellent!" into the pop culture lexicon and we're still not worthy! We're commemorating three decades of this classic with some of our favorite books and movies about best buds.

Party on, Wayne!

Congratulations to the winners of the 2022 Flash Fiction contest, a creative writing contest where stories are limited to 1,000 words or less. We loved reading through all the amazing entries and listening to your stories — and now everyone can read the winning entries!

February is Black History Month, so we asked our staff to recommend some books and movies featuring Black voices. While Black stories are often the focus this month, we challenge everyone to elevate them anytime of year with our Diverse Reads program. It encourages you to read something new, whether that’s a different genre or a book by an author whose background is different from your own.

Universal Letter Writing Week begins Jan. 9 and we're celebrating by sharing some of our favorite epistolary novels (and a movie based on book!). Epistolary novels are written in the form of letters or other documents, like diaries or newspaper clippings. Mary Shelley's Frankenstein is a more famous example, while Maria Semple's Where'd You Go, Bernadette is a more modern take.

Fiction definitely took center stage when it came to the top 10 eBook checkouts in 2021!

Let’s kick off 2022 with 22 facts (both big and small) about our Library. We hope you learn something new. And please take advantage of all these fantastic services we offer – they're here for you to use! Be sure to read all the way to the end for a reminder about three best-selling authors who will be paying us visits soon. 

Hoopla now offers Binge Passes for immediate unlimited access to eMagazines and the Great Courses. No holds, no waiting!

If you need a little inspiration to close out the year, we've got a list of some staff favorites from 2021. There are mostly books, but some movies in there, too. We hope we point you in the direction of your new favorite!

The National Book Awards were established in 1950 to celebrate the best writing in America, including fiction, nonfiction, poetry, translated literature and young people's literature. With names like Toni Morrison, John Updike, Alice Walker and Ta-Nehisi Coates, there's a good chance that you've read at least one of he past winners!

You can look up all the winners year-by-year, but we're here to narrow it down a bit if you find the list a bit daunting! Check out some of our favorite National Book Award winners.

Did Mrs. O'Leary's cow really start one of the most devastating fires in American history, the Great Chicago Fire? Did you know that the deadliest fire took place about 250 miles north on the very same day in Peshtigo, Wisconsin? It's been 150 years since that dry fall day and we've compiled a list of some books about these tragedies (including some fictional accounts).