Last year, the Monroe County Library’s Florida History Department was the beneficiary of an amazing donation of materials from the Heritage House — home to generations of the Porter family and their descendants. It’s not surprising that so much incredible material was preserved — Jessie Porter Newton was the godmother of the preservation movement in Key West. When many people saw little value in old wooden homes and crumbling brick structures, she saw the history and beauty that has made Key West one of the nation’s premiere historic towns today. …

Meeting May 23 3:30 pm to 4:30 pm
     The Key West Department of Transportation (KWDoT) provides many services to the community, visitors and our internal customers, which consist of over 400 city associates. The  service areas or functions that KWDoT is responsible to provide are public transportation and municipal parking lot operations.
      Anyone seeking information regarding bus schedules, route information or real time arrival / departure updates is encouraged to call the city’s automated information system at (305) 600-1455, for public transit services, or visit the map access functions on-line at …

FLORIDA KEYS QUILTERS
10 AM – 5 PM

JOIN US FOR STORIES, SONGS, CRAFTS, AND FUN!
10:30 AM

MEETING
5:00 PM

This is a delight on every level.  The prose is beautiful and well crafted. The story is original and wondrous! It takes you into the time of a golden era and the world of a very unique circus… a love story simmers underneath a world both dark and dazzling. Some would call it magical realism but it truly defies genre.  One of the best books I’ve read all year.

The last few months have brought us two new books about Catherine the Great, the 18th century ruler of Russia considered the epitome of the enlightened despot.
One is nonfiction: Robert K. Massie’s magisterial biography, Catherine the Great: Portrait of a Woman. The other is a work of historical fiction, The Winter Palace by Eva Stachniak. Both are in the library’s collection and, read together, offer an interesting new perspective on the legendary ruler.
I didn’t know much at all about Catherine beyond the notorious (and apparently untrue) rumors about her love …

 
Come and see our newly renovated and updated easy reader section!  There is a new puppet theatre, slider rocking chair, child size sofa, new game cube, new tables and wonderful low shelving so the kids can see to choose books!!!  It is all brand new!!!!

Our Movie Night for May will feature The Thing, a 2011 science fiction horror film based on the novella Who Goes There by John W. Campbell. It’s a prequel to John Carpenter’s 1982 film of the same name.
At an Antarctica research site, the discovery of an alien craft leads to a confrontation between graduate student Kate Lloyd and scientist Dr. Sander Halvorson. The film stars Mary Elizabeth Winstead, Joel Edgerton and Ulrich Thomsen.

Due to scheduling conflicts, the February 28th Library Advisory Board meeting has been cancelled.