Blaine County Library

Join us Thursday November 21st at 6:30 p.m. at the Blaine County Library for the next book club meeting. We will be discussing the book “Waltzing Montana” by Mary Clearman Blew. We have copies available for checkout if you are interested in participating in the discussion. The museum also has copies for purchase. You can call or stop into the museum or the library or send us a message on Facebook and let us know that you are interested in participating or if you have any questions.

We have one non-fiction book ready for checkout. In “The Message” by Ta-Nehishi Coates, he journeys to three resonant sites of conflict to explore how the stories we tell—and the ones we don’t—shape our realities. Ta-Nehisi Coates originally set out to write a book about writing, in the tradition of Orwell’s classic “Politics and the English Language,” but found himself grappling with deeper questions about how our stories—our reporting and imaginative narratives and mythmaking—expose and distort our realities.

In the first of the book’s three intertwining essays, on his first trip to Africa, finds himself in two places at once: in Dakar, a modern city in Senegal, and in a mythic kingdom in his mind. Then he takes readers along with him to Columbia, South Carolina, where he reports on his own book’s banning, but also explores the larger backlash to the nation’s recent reckoning with history and the deeply rooted American mythology so visible in that city—a capital of the Confederacy with statues of segregationists looming over its public squares. Finally, in the book’s longest section, Coates travels to Palestine, where he sees with devastating clarity how easily we are misled by nationalist narratives, and the tragedy that lies in the clash between the stories we tell and the reality of life on the ground.

Written at a dramatic moment in American and global life, this work from one of the country’s most important writers is about the urgent need to untangle ourselves from the destructive myths that shape our world—and our own souls—and embrace the liberating power of even the most difficult truths.

“Never Whistle at Night” is an Indigenous dark fiction anthology, edited by Shane Hawk. “The Inmate” by Freida McFadden is a thriller about how we define guilt, and who has to pay for it. “The Grey Wolf” by Louise Penny is the 19th mystery in the Inspector Armand Gamache series. “The Blue Hour” is a new thriller from Paula Hawkins, the author of “The Girl on the Train.”

All youth programs have officially resumed. Teen Scene, for grades 7 through 12, will be on Mondays from 5:30 to 6:30 p.m. There will be karaoke, Wii, board games and other activities. Story Time for preschool children is Tuesday at 10:30 a.m. Kids’ Zone is on Tuesday for grades 3 through 6 from 3:45-4:45 p.m. There will be crafts, coloring and other activities available. We are planning to continue having Homeschool Hour. The purpose of this program is to provide a place where home school families gather and learn from each other. We have a sign-up sheet for families to host future programs. If we have a week with no host family, we won’t have a program that week. Thursdays will be LEGO Club from 3:45-4:45. On Fridays we will show a family-friendly movie from 1:00 to 2:30 p.m. Children under five may attend LEGO Club and movies, but they must be accompanied by an adult. We look forward to seeing everyone.