Berthoud Community Library District

"In August of 1966, Jim Grimsley entered the sixth grade in the same public school he had attended for the five previous years in his small eastern North Carolina hometown. But he knew that the first day of this school year was going to be different: for the first time he'd be in a classroom with black children ... Now, over forty years later, Grimsley ... revisits that school and those times, remembering his personal reaction to his first real exposure...

"On a cold day in March of 1911, officials marched twelve Black men into the heart of a forest in Maryland. Under the supervision of a doctor, the men were forced to clear the land, pour cement, lay bricks, and harvest tobacco. When construction finished, they became the first twelve patients of the state's Hospital for the Negro Insane. For centuries, Black patients have been absent from our history books. Madness transports readers behind the brick...

"Life is waiting to happen to Hubert Bird. But first he has to open his front door and let it in. In weekly phone calls to his daughter in Australia, widower Hubert Bird paints a picture of the perfect retirement, packed with fun, friendship, and fulfilment. But he's lying. The truth is day after day drags by without him seeing a single soul. Until he receives some good news - good news that in one way turns out to be the worst news ever, news that...

It's August of 1974, a summer "hot and serious and full of death and betrayal," and Watergate and the Vietnam War make the world feel precarious. A stunned hush pauses the cacophonous universe of New York City as a man on a cable walks (repeatedly) between World Trade Center towers. This extraordinary, real-life feat by French funambulist Philippe Petit becomes the touchstone for stories that briefly submerge you in ten varied and intense lives--a...

"Queer black girls team up to overthrow the patriarchy in the former kingdom of Cinderella"--