New to Always Available Audio

The library has added more than 40 new audiobooks to our collection of Always Available titles. We’ve highlighted some below, but be sure to check out the latest additions to the collection!

Nonfiction.
In 101 Essays That Will Change the Way You Think, Brianna Wiest presents short but provocative essays that guide readers towards seeking wisdom in the everyday in all aspects of life. Readers looking for philosophical insight mixed with self-care rituals will be as inspired as Wiest’s legion of fans. If you are stuck inside your own head and obsessively ruminate with negative thoughts, then Can’t Stop Thinking by Nancy Colier will help you break the loop and start living.

For history buffs, check out Nicole Eustace’s Covered with Night, where she explores an attack by two white fur traders against an Indigenous hunter in 1722 that, while practically forgotten today, set the stage for what was considered justice in colonial America. In The Bookseller of Florence, Ross King tells the story of Vespasiano da Bisticci, whose books chronicled a thousand years of ancient knowledge and helped set the stage for the Enlightenment.

MeatEater: Your Link to the Food Chain

Steven Rinella grew up in Twin Lake, Michigan and learned to hunt and fish at an early age. This love of hunting and the outdoors has now become quite a career as an author, television personality, podcaster, and conservationist. He breaks the stereotype we have of the “American hunter” – when he explores a subject, he nerds out so spectacularly that I have come to appreciate his level of intellect and extensive research.

The Scavenger’s Guide to Haute Cuisine (2006) – The first book in the Steven Rinella canon. Steven sets out to recreate the recipes from master chef Escoffier’s classic 1903 Le Guide Culinaire to get back to where the history of modern food got its start.

New Year Resolutions: Exercise in the Time of Covid

Coming to you from the cyberpunk dystopia that will not end, a series of New Year’s Resolution-themed posts, because the only way out is through.

My fellow apocalypse-sters, you and I both know the importance of exercise. It keeps your meat sack in working condition, helps you sleep better, gives you energy, and can even boost your mood, which we all need these days, so desperately.

Remember when we used to go walking at the mall with friends? Or logging an hour on the elliptical at Planet Fitness? When we could learn Tai Chi in the park? Or maybe you’re like me and never did any of that?? Because exercise is hard to make yourself do under the best of circumstances and these are not even mildly okay circumstances. I don’t know about you, but my body is trying to become one with my couch these days, so I’m willing to try something.

If you, like myself, have hit rock bottom fitness-wise, you’ll be glad to know that SPL has a lot of online exercise videos through Kanopy, Hoopla, and the lesser known Access Video. Exercise videos are great – you just follow whatever the people on your screen are doing until you collapse into a sweaty heap, zero brain work involved. You can do Pilates Essentials, Bollywood Burn, or Dance and Be Fit. Find out what Jeanette is blasting next, may her body rest in pieces. You could even transform your entire actual life with yoga, according to Dashama Konah Gordon. This last one isn’t exactly an exercise video, but I couldn’t sleep at night unless I shared this Super Swordfighting Series for how to do cool movie sword fights. I think that would transform my life.

Read Magazines for Free with Flipster

One of the downsides to grocery delivery, if you’re a magazine reader, is lack of access to impulse-buy reading material in the checkout line.  Those cover recipes on cooking magazines are a great way to get inspired in the kitchen. Celebrity gossip is an effective distraction on a rough day and can be a good conversation starter.

Don’t worry, you can fill this void through The Seattle Public Library with free, digital magazine access!

Introducing: FLIPSTER

This digital periodical collection offers access to 60 very popular magazines, always available, no need to place holds. Subjects include cooking, sports, politics, entertainment, history, science, health and more. Issues are always available and can be read on any web browser, or by downloading an app to your Android phone, iPhone, or Kindle Fire. Newsweek magazine is available in Spanish and English, and People en Español is also available!

To get started:

Short Stories on a Theme

There are times when it may be hard to focus on a long novel, so a short story might be a better choice. You can pick up a book of short stories and read one or all. Many compilations feature different authors coming together to focus on one theme and giving you a selection of stories in varying styles and genres to choose from. Short stories can be a fun break from your normal reading or a long thoughtful pause about the meaning hidden inside the story. I’ve provided a list of different types of short stories you can find as an eBook. Hopefully one will strike your fancy!

Echoes: The Saga Anthology of Ghost Stories, edited by Ellen Datlow

A short story collection can never be complete for me without one edited by Ellen Datlow. I’ve read anothologies by Datlow since junior high. This anthology collects ghost stories together for a deliciously creepy time. Either read it now or wait until closer to Halloween; it’ll be a treat either way.