CTC Faculty & Staff Book Picks

Looking for a good book to read! We will be posting book recommendations by fellow CTC faculty and staff. Reading is an enjoyable pastime and can be a great way to unwind, relax or escape! With the end of Spring Quarter and the beginning of summer fast approaching, finding a great book may be the last thing on your mind.

Well, how about we just give you a list to pick from! Stay tuned for more book recommendations next week!

Reference and Instruction Librarian, Zachary Grant, recommends The Thrilling Adventures of Lovelace and Babbage by Sydney Padua.

“Do you like to read about the Victorian time period? Are you curious about who Ada Lovelace and Charles Babbage are and what place they have in history? Do you ever wonder what might have happened if Charles Babbage’s dream of creating his Analytical engine had come true and if it had, what sort of programs Ada Lovelace would have written for it? If you answer yes, or even if you answer with a “maybe?” to any of these questions, then this brilliant book by Sydney Padua is definitely for you. Ms. Padua takes the correspondence between Lovelace and Babbage, along with other items they wrote, to put together a “what if?” story that takes place in a pocket universe, (or alternate reality), in which the Analytical engine is constructed. Ms. Padua’s excellent imagination not only shows us how the Analytical engine might have affected Lovelace and Baggage, but the people and the world around them. This book is chock-a-block with wonderful artwork, foot notes, end notes, not one, but two appendices and an epilogue. Whether you are looking to be educated or entertained, (or both?!), you’ll love this book from beginning to end.”

Library Intern, Rachel Fellman, recommends The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson.

“Eleanor is an isolated, uncanny young woman. When a paranormal investigator asks her for help uncovering the secrets of ghostly Hill House, she leaps at the chance to escape her own haunted life. But the house is more than she can handle, and her fellow investigators – reasonable people who underestimate both the ghosts and Eleanor — are even worse.”

“Without Jackson’s careful attention to detail, this would only have been a fantastically creepy little book. Instead it’s a masterpiece. The characters are richly drawn and charismatic. Hill House is full of unnerving angles, doors that close by themselves, and interior decoration so matchy-matchy that it actively drives people mad. If you love to read about poltergeists and paranoia, then this is the story for you.”

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