Authors and Scientists @ the Library

The very first week of the spring semester will be a busy one for visitors and celebrations. On February 10th, Minnesota writer William Kent Krueger will be on campus to speak about his books and discuss the writing process. He is the author of the Cork O'Connor mystery series set in northern Minnesota in the borderlands of Anishinaabe/Anglo culture. Join us February 10th at 2:30 in the Courtyard Cafe to talk with this four-time winner of the Minnesota Book Award. The library is one of the sponsors of his visit; he will also make a public presentation at Trinity Lutheran Church at 7:30 pm as part of the ongoing St. Peter Reads program.

Then on Thursday, February 12th come to the library between 2 and 4 p.m. to celebrate Charles Darwin's birthday. It's the 200th anniversary of his birth, and the 150th anniversary of the publication of On the Origin of Species. More information will follow . . . but mark your calendars. The new semester will be here before you know it!

Get Ready to Celebrate Creative Inquiry

Planning has begun for the second annual Celebration of Creative Inquiry, an event that highlights the creative and scholarly work done by Gustavus students. So mark your calendar for May 1st, from 7 to 9 pm. See a slide show or read the abstracts from last year's event.

Students can apply to present their projects at the event by using an online submission form. Each application must have a faculty sponsor. The deadline for applications is March 18th.

Not sure how to make a poster of your research? No worries. There will be a workshop for putting posters together in mid-April.

Celebrate Responsible Scientific Inquiry...

...with cake! Mark your calendars - on February 12, the library will be hosting an event in recognition of Darwin Day.

Marking the anniversary of Darwin's birth "expresses gratitude for the enormous benefits that scientific knowledge, acquired through human curiosity and ingenuity, has contributed to the advancement of humanity," at least according to the Darwin Day website.

Watch for more details coming soon!

Curl Up With a Good Book

Maybe you have a little extra time on your hands during January - but no desire to clean out your drawers or go out into the frigid air. Now's your chance to catch up on reading, just for fun.

In case you aren't sure what to read, the library has some selections on display in the new seating area (where the Interlibrary Loan office used to be). Students enrolled in the "Books and Culture" course have made some selections of books they recommend. And we have a section for the armchair traveler - books set in foreign locales for those of us who didn't get to go abroad this J-term.

You can also browse our displays of books for diversity and on China as part of the Global Insight program. And if you still haven't found the book that grabs you, try one of these tools.

• Fiction Finder (on campus only) - this database groups books by similarity. Choose it from the right-hand side options of Books in Print.
• Gnooks - try either Gnod's suggestions or the literature map to find writers whose work is like other writers
• LibraryThing - a site where over half a million people have cataloged their books - 32 million of them. You can search by "tags" - user-generated subject terms - to find books you might be interested in.
• Lit Lists - links to "best of" lists of all kinds.
• Novelist (on campus or use your barcode and last name to access) - includes recommended reading and author read-alikes.
• OCLC Fiction Finder - an experimental catalog of fiction that you can search or browse by topic.
• Whichbook - put in your preferences on sliding scales, get lists of books to match.
• Writers Read - a blog where writers recommend books they're reading.