August 14, 2019
In the beginning, when libraries around the world started buying and circulating ebooks for the very first time, publishers were concerned. Very concerned. Suddenly the old lending models didn’t seem to apply anymore. Why should libraries be allowed to circulate digital titles, books that will never show wear and tear after multiple uses, without needing […]
June 5, 2019
I’m continually fascinated by those people that specialize in specific forms of literature. Let us say, for example, that you wanted the latest, greatest list of children’s books being released. Easy enough, but what if you wanted those books in Spanish? This is a question our public schools and libraries have been trying to tackle. […]
May 8, 2019
How is a library unlike a bookstore? Well, for one thing, we’re free. Sort of an unfair advantage there. For another thing, unlike in a bookstore, our stock keeps coming back. No sooner have I gotten one book off of a shelf than another one’s arrived for reshelving. It can be exhausting, not to mention […]
April 24, 2019
When news breaks, the library is sometimes the first place people go. Take, for example, the recent fire at the Cathedral of Notre Dame. The day it occurred the library created a display of all its books about or set at the Cathedral. Some of these were architectural in nature (and, admittedly, are probably now […]
February 14, 2019
In March, talks about two exciting new books will be held at the Evanston Public Library, with the editors and author discussing and signing their books about complex contemporary issues—Alice and Edward “Buzz” Palmer, editors of The World Is Watching, on March 3; and Angalia Bianca, author of In Deep: How I Survived Gangs, Heroin, […]
December 6, 2018
What criteria should a librarian use to determine how successful a library display truly is? Should you consider how often the books are removed? The quality of the literature displayed? The timeliness of the topic? The inventiveness? Or should we do it the way our forefathers and foremothers intended? That’s right. Twitter hits. Recently one […]
December 5, 2018
The public library is a place for everyone in the community; it’s a third space where, in addition to home and school or work, you are known and welcome. Read-Ability for Adults with Cognitive Disabilities The Evanston Public Library hosts the Read-Ability book group, a group for adults with cognitive disabilities, once a week. Meetings […]
August 16, 2018
Each year the Evanston Public Library produces a killer list of the 101 children’s books that really struck us as the best of the best of the best. Now the number “101” may sound large to you. Allow me to assure you that it is not. It is a miniscule number. A teeny tiny digit. […]
July 17, 2018
Collin R. McCanna is an Evanston artist who is the latest to be featured in our ongoing exhibition series Local Art @ EPL. His exhibit [TERRA SERENA] is currently on display on the 2nd floor of EPL’s Main Library where you can catch it through August 1st. Featuring a dozen large-scale acrylic paintings that “simplify landscapes to their purest […]
February 14, 2018
I get very attached to my adopted homes. Evanston is probably the smallest of the cities I’ve lived in for long periods of time and, for that reason, I find it the most fascinating. Sitting like a little hat on the top of Chicago, it seems to have this odd ability to pull in talent […]
