10591 WILLIAM STREET, P.O. BOX 585 MENDOCINO, CA 95460
707 / 937-5773
(A community library in Mendocino village, not affiliated with the county libraries.)
OPEN HOURS: Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday & Saturday 10AM - 2PM
707 / 937-5773
(A community library in Mendocino village, not affiliated with the county libraries.)
OPEN HOURS: Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday & Saturday 10AM - 2PM
Find Any Book in the library using the catalog.
Check out our newly donated puzzles, games, books, DVDs, audio books and more!
Check out our newly donated puzzles, games, books, DVDs, audio books and more!
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Community Library Notes - July 2025
Stravinsky in Mendocino by Barbara Barkovitch This year, the Mendocino Music Festival has chosen Igor Stravinsky as the featured composer. At the festival, which runs from July 12th to the 26th, many of his works will be performed, some well-known and others less so. If you don’t know much about Stravinsky, or want to learn more, Susan Waterall’s film, “Why We Love Igor,” will be premiered in Preston Hall on July 6th at 2:30 pm. The Mendocino Community Library has a copy of Stephen Walsh’s authoritative biography, “Stravinsky: The Second Exile, France and America 1934-1971,” and, for the younger set, a DVD of “Fantasia,” the 1940 Disney animation featuring some of Stravinsky’s music. Stravinsky was probably the most important composer of the 20th Century. While most people associate him with orchestrations of his ballet music from the early part of the century, they represent only one part of his long and varied career. He re-invented his style numerous times, perhaps because he was influenced by what was going on in the musical world around him, but Stravinsky always followed his own creative path. Of Polish heritage, Stravinsky was born in 1882 in St. Petersburg, Russia, where the atmosphere was filled with late-19th Century nationalistic music. He began composing for the piano when he was in his teens, studying with Nicolai Rimsky-Korsakov. His early compositions were first heard in Paris as part of an effort by the impresario Sergei Diaghilev to introduce Russian music there. Diaghilev then invited him to write ballet music with a Russian flavor for his Ballet Russes. Stravinsky produced the famous “Firebird” and “Petrushka” scores. He then conceived of a more pagan form, including complex meters and atonality, and wrote “The Rite of Spring,” the initial performance of which caused a near riot in Paris. After the Russian Revolution in 1914 he moved his family to Switzerland. In 1920 they relocated to the home of Coco Chanel in Paris. The music he wrote in the early ‘20s incorporated aspects of popular music like jazz, although he continued to use Russian traditions as an inspiration. Gradually, Stravinsky entered a “neoclassical” period in which he turned to more traditional classical forms: octets, concertos, concertante. He began receiving commissions from organizations in the United States, and he moved to the United States in 1939, after the beginning of WW II, settling first in Boston and then Los Angeles. In the early 1950s, Stravinsky was drawn into the serial, twelve-tone music of Anton Webern and Arnold Schoenberg. Unlike some European composers who wrote American film music in the 1930s and 1940s, Stravinsky did not. A precarious financial situation and his own dyanmism compelled him to take on composing and conducting assignments wherever he could for the rest of his life, resulting in a grinding travel schedule. Stravinsky became a U.S. citizen in 1945, but debated returning to Europe for the rest of his life. His final composition was the “Requiem Canticles” in 1966. He moved to New York in 1968 for medical care, and he died there in 1971. Stravinsky was buried on the cemetery island of San Michele in Venice, near the grave of Diaghilev. For more information about performances of Stravinsky’s music during the Music Festival, and to buy tickets, go to the festival’s web page: mendocinomusic.org. The Mendocino Community Library is open Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Saturday from 10:00 am until 2:00 pm. It has an extensive collection of fiction and nonfiction books for grownups and children, books on CD, movie and TV DVDs, magazines, and jigsaw puzzles for all ages. Visit the web page (https://www.mendocinocommunitylibrary.org/) to learn more about becoming a member or to find any item in the collection. Community Library Notes - June 2025 Salt in the Air, Sand in Your Hair by Sarah Nathe And a book in your hands! Back when I was a parochial school kid, the good sisters there at St. Philip’s sent us home every summer with a list of age-appropriate books to occupy our minds during those lazy, hazy days. I suppose they were concerned we would devolve into feral creatures while not under their watchful eyes, but more compelling was their certainty that an idle mind is the devil’s workshop. These days there are many more paths to perdition open to children, so the Mendocino Community Library recently laid in a new supply of books to get them, and their parents and grands, through the summer unscathed. For kids between 7 and 10, we have a couple of classics. “Dragonbreath” #1, by Ursula Vernon, introduces us to Danny Dragonbreath, the sole mythical creature in a school for reptiles and amphibians. It’s hard for him because he can't breathe fire like other dragons (as the school bully loves to remind him). But his sea-serpent cousin takes Danny and his best iguana friend on a mindboggling underwater tour. Using a hybrid of comic-book panels and text, Ursula Vernon introduces an irresistible set of characters. The books in this series are perfect for fans of the “Wimpy Kid” and “Bad Kitty” books. In “Max Meow Book 1: Cat Crusader,” by John Gallagher, we meet a superhero with lots of catitude. Max is just a regular cat in Kittyopolis until he accidentally takes a bite of a radioactive space meatball at his best friend Mindy's secret lab. Then, before you can say MEOWZA, Max becomes the only feline who can save his city from the evil Agent M and Big Boss. This graphic novel is the first in a funny series that will keep young readers on the path of righteousness. For the slighter younger set, ages 4-8, we have some inspirational, transformational, and motivational volumes. “Kamala Raised Her Hand,” by Raakhee Mirchandani, follows Vice President Kamala Harris from her childhood to her run for president. Ever since she was a child, she has been raising her hand, taking a stand. This beautifully illustrated book shows children that they can find their voices and the courage to stand up for what they believe in. For pre-readers, we have some gorgeously illustrated picture books. From Regina Linke comes “Big Enough,” about a little boy who learns size is a matter of perspective. When the day comes for Ah-Fu to bring the huge family ox home from the woods, he worries that he’s not big enough to do the job. Will fear and self-doubt drive Ah-Fu home empty-handed? Or can he rely on his wits to become the Oxherd Boy his family needs. Exquisite art work carries this empowering story inspired by traditional Chinese philosophy. Gilbert the Goblin’s beachside vacation gets invaded by mermaids and their games in “Mermaids are the Worst!” by Alex Willan. This latest installment in The Worst! picture book series finds Gilbert trying to soak up some sun and float in the ocean, but a bevy of mermaids shows up and their fin-flapping hijinks quickly threaten to ruin the seaside retreat. Can goblins and mermaids get along? It's lonely being a monster, but having other mythical creatures as pen pals helps. When Bigfoot loses the Valentine's Day cards he so tenderly made for his friends around the world, a troop of scouts offers to help. But they will have to get creative to find every ogre in time! In “Bigfoot’s Big Heart” Sarah Glenn Marsh and illustrator Ishaa Lobo team up for a tale about the value of friends, both new and old. “Little Bear,” the first in an award-winning series by Else Holmelund Minarik, primarily involves Little Bear, an anthropomorphic bear cub, his mother, and his best friends: Cat, Duck, and Hen. Their summers are filled with good, clean fun! This volume and four subsequent Little Bear books were illustrated by the incomparable Maurice Sendak. The Mendocino Community Library is open all summer on Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Saturday from 10:00 am until 2:00 pm. Besides children’s books, there are fiction and nonfiction books for grownups, books on CD, movie and TV DVDs, magazines, and jigsaw puzzles for all ages. Visit the web page (https://www.mendocinocommunitylibrary.org/) to learn more about becoming a member or to find any item in the collection. Community Library Notes - May 2025 The Fog of War by Linda Garrett The Vietnam War ended on April 30, 1975, and the Mendocino Community Library is paying tribute to the 50th anniversary of that conflict’s termination with a display of fiction and nonfiction books, DVDs, and audio books to jog our historic memories. The war is rarely mentioned any longer in our public lives or in our schools, but it had a profound impact on our culture and our self-perception as a good and moral society. Statistics challenge the inclination to forget: 2.7 million American service members did tours of duty in Vietnam from 1961-1973; 58,220 died; and an estimated 3 million Vietnamese civilians and soldiers had died by the final American pullout. Fifty years after the end of the war, unexploded ordnance and Agent Orange still ravage Vietnamese children, adults, and the environment. Hundreds of thousands of U.S. veterans were also exposed to the toxic chemical agent. I happened to be in Hanoi on April 30, 1975, having arrived fortuitously a week earlier as a representative of the Indochina Peace Campaign. The North Vietnamese offensive had been pushing through South Vietnam, meeting very little resistance, but the end of the war was uncertain until the final American helicopters took off from the embassy in Saigon at 10:00 am that morning. The scenes from that day are still sharp in my memory. We rely on our creative communities—journalists, novelists, filmmakers—to tell our story as a nation, the good, bad, and ugly. Sometimes we agree with the narratives, and often we don’t. But every story adds to the complete picture. My favorite film about the war is “Good Morning Vietnam,” the Robin Williams drama that presents the tragedy with humor and pathos, and is perhaps the only Hollywood movie that acknowledges its Vietnamese characters with humanity and respect. The 1974 Academy Award-winning documentary “Hearts and Minds” presents the tragic consequences of the war at home and in Vietnam. It is still a consequential film and is available on Amazon Prime. “The Fog of War,” the movie that won Errol Morris the best documentary Oscar in 2003, is also available online. Morris interviews Robert McNamara, Secretary of Defense in the Kennedy and Johnson administrations, to probe the reasons behind the U.S. commitment to the Vietnam War, and finds a depressingly inconsistent policy. Three books I always recommend tell the story of the war from beginning to end: “The Quiet American” is a 1955 novel by British author Graham Greene that depicts the breakdown of French colonialism in Vietnam and early American involvement in the Vietnam War. It is uncannily prescient about all the troubles that would cause. “The Village of Ben Suc,” by journalist Jonathan Schell, reports on the 1967 relocation of a group of farmers and families so that their village, which the U.S. and Republic of Vietnam military experts thought was a hideout for Viet Cong, could be destroyed. This classic is a cautionary tale about the unintended and devastating consequences of military occupation. Bao Ninh’s “The Sorrow of War” is a 1991 novel that grew out of Ninh's graduation project at the Nguyen Du Writing School in Hanoi. It tells the story of a soldier who is collecting the bones of the dead after the war and then begins to think about his past. He moves backwards and forwards in time, in and out of despair, through his private hell in the highlands of Central Vietnam. It is a compelling war novel. Recent notable novels by Vietnamese-American and American writers include "The Sympathizer,” a Pulitzer Prize winner by Viet Thang Nguyen; “On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous” by Ocean Vuong; “Absolution” by Alice McDermott; and “The Women” by Kristin Hannah. “The Mountains Sing,” by Vietnamese novelist and poet Nguyen Phan Que Mai, is a multigenerational tale of the Trần family set against the backdrop of French occupation and the Viet Nam War. These are available at the library now, and can also be ordered through Gallery Books. The library is open Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Saturday from 10:00 am until 2:00 pm. We have fiction and nonfiction books, jigsaw puzzles, magazines, books on CD, and movie DVDs. On our web page (https://www.mendocinocommunitylibrary.org/) you can find any item in our collection. |
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After more than half a century of community support, the Mendocino Community Library now holds 13,000+ books, puzzles, audio books, and movies - including those filmed in Mendocino.
Library is staffed by volunteers and supported by donations. We welcome donated books.
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10591 WILLIAM STREET, P.O. BOX 585 MENDOCINO, CA 95460