Upcoming Events

This event is in the "Children" group

Preschool Pals

1:00pm–1:30pm
Children
Registration Required
Library Branch: Thomas Ford Memorial Library
Room: Storytime Room
Age Group: Children
Program Type: Storytimes
Registration Required
Event Details:

Hear stories, sing songs, and have fun with friends! This storytime highlights early literacy skills that prepare children for reading independently. Children attend this storytime without adults so they can practice being independent. 

Disclaimer(s)

Storytime without Adults

Children attend this storytime without their grown-ups so that they can practice independence.

This event is in the "Children" group
This event is in the "Families" group

Goodnight, Library

6:00pm–6:30pm
Children, Families
Registration Required
Library Branch: Thomas Ford Memorial Library
Room: Storytime Room
Age Group: Children, Families
Program Type: Storytimes
Registration Required
Event Details:

What’s a better way to end the day than with a story? Join us for a calming evening story read-aloud where the dress code is PJs and comfy clothes.

This event is in the "Children" group

Lapsit Storytime

10:00am–10:30am
Children
Registration Required
Library Branch: Thomas Ford Memorial Library
Room: Storytime Room
Age Group: Children
Program Type: Storytimes
Registration Required
Event Details:

Help your baby grow up to love books! Caregivers and little ones share stories, songs, and rhymes in this lapsit program. Introduce them to a lifetime of reading and language enjoyment.

Disclaimer(s)

Storytime Accompanying Adults

This storytime works best if there is one child to one adult. Participation of caregivers with their child is important in order to help them learn while they are having fun.

This event is in the "Children" group
This event is in the "Families" group

Little Miss Ann Music Concert

4:00pm–4:45pm
Children, Families
Registration Required
Library Branch: Thomas Ford Memorial Library
Room: Program Room
Age Group: Children, Families
Program Type: Music, Performers
Registration Required
Event Details:

Little Miss Ann is a nationally touring, award-winning family music artist. She is also a former Chicago Public School Teacher, an instructor at the Old Town School of Folk Music, a first-generation Filipina American and a social rights activist.

This event is in the "Children" group

Lapsit Storytime

10:00am–10:30am
Children
Registration Required
Library Branch: Thomas Ford Memorial Library
Room: Storytime Room
Age Group: Children
Program Type: Storytimes
Registration Required
Event Details:

Help your baby grow up to love books! Caregivers and little ones share stories, songs, and rhymes in this lapsit program. Introduce them to a lifetime of reading and language enjoyment.

Disclaimer(s)

Storytime Accompanying Adults

This storytime works best if there is one child to one adult. Participation of caregivers with their child is important in order to help them learn while they are having fun.

This event is in the "Teen & Tween" group
This event is in the "Adult" group

Never Forget: A Holocaust Survivor Shares His Story

7:00pm–8:30pm
Teen & Tween, Adult
Registration Required
Library Branch: Thomas Ford Memorial Library
Room: Program Room
Age Group: Teen & Tween, Adult
Program Type: Presentations
Registration Required
Event Details:

Hear the powerful story of Holocaust survivor Steen Metz, whose family was deported from Denmark to the Theresienstadt concentration camp when he was just eight years old.

New & Noteworthy

Staff Picks

Image for "You, Me, and Infinity"

You, Me, and Infinity

What happens when a girl who keeps her heart underground meets a boy with his head in the stars? In this swoony and heart-rending romance, the award-winning author of A Heart in a Body in the World and Honey, Baby, Sweetheart beautifully captures the kind of love—and loss—that changes you forever.

“Fans of Caletti’s other works or the heady romances of Becky Albertalli and Adam Silvera will find exactly what they’re looking for here.” —The Bulletin for the Center for Children's Books

When Margaret sees Mars for the first time, it doesn’t feel like love at first sight so much as future at first sight—she just knows right away that he will loom large in her life.

When her job delivering pizzas brings Margaret right to Mars’s doorstep, she can’t deny their connection, even as the anxious voice in her head warns her about everything that could go wrong. Soon they’re giving in to fate as their romance deepens over stargazing and moments under the endless night sky, where Mars shares his passionate interest in the Voyager’s Golden Record—a time capsule of humanity preserved indefinitely in space. Together, they are absorbed by the unknowable questions we all face: How will we be remembered? What will we leave behind? And can anything truly be infinite?

But even for someone who can’t help but anticipate the worst, when the worst actually happens, Margaret is shattered. How can she move forward from tragedy when it feels like the world has stopped spinning? Somehow, she has to let go of the gravity of grief pulling her down and find her way back to the stars. But only if she can let the whole of the universe in—all the beauty and all the pain.

Image for "The Ivory City"

The Ivory City

A USA TODAY National Bestseller

The Devil in the White City meets Pride and Prejudice in this romantic historical murder mystery set at the 1904 World's Fair.

The St. Louis World's Fair, 1904:

A miniature city of palaces and pavilions that becomes a backdrop for romance, betrayal--and murder.

Cousins Grace and Lillie have been best friends since birth, despite Grace's vastly inferior social status ever since her mother married for love instead of wealth. When Lillie invites Grace to the biggest event of the century--the legendary World's Fair, also known as "The Ivory City"--Grace hopes her fortunes might be about to change.

But when a member of their party is brutally killed at the fair, and suspicion falls on Lillie's brother Oliver, Grace must prove Oliver's innocence before her beloved cousins' family is ruined forever.

Along the way, she'll discover that the city's wealthy elite--including Oliver's handsome but irritable friend Theodore--aren't quite who they appear to be. And amidst the glitz, glamor, and magic of the Ivory City lurks a danger that just may claim her life.

"Grace Covington is the perfect amateur detective mixing charm and ingenuity in this richly detailed murder mystery." --Julia Kelly, international bestselling author of A Traitor in Whitehall"Vividly drawn with rich historical detail, The Ivory City is a sizzling mystery filled with intrigue, glamour and good old-fashioned romance that brilliantly ignites against the backdrop of the St. Louis World's Fair. Emily Bain Murphy's latest novel is a sheer delight!" ―Alyson Richman, USA and International Bestselling author of The Time Keepers and The Missing Pages

Cover with an illustration of a bird among berries and leaves

The Serviceberry

An Instant New York Times Bestseller

From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Braiding Sweetgrass, a bold and inspiring vision for how to orient our lives around gratitude, reciprocity, and community, based on the lessons of the natural world.

As Indigenous scientist and author of Braiding Sweetgrass Robin Wall Kimmerer harvests serviceberries alongside the birds, she considers the ethic of reciprocity that lies at the heart of the gift economy. How, she asks, can we learn from Indigenous wisdom and the plant world to reimagine what we value most? Our economy is rooted in scarcity, competition, and the hoarding of resources, and we have surrendered our values to a system that actively harms what we love. Meanwhile, the serviceberry’s relationship with the natural world is an embodiment of reciprocity, interconnectedness, and gratitude. The tree distributes its wealth—its abundance of sweet, juicy berries—to meet the needs of its natural community. And this distribution ensures its own survival. As Kimmerer explains, “Serviceberries show us another model, one based upon reciprocity, where wealth comes from the quality of your relationships, not from the illusion of self-sufficiency.”

As Elizabeth Gilbert writes, Robin Wall Kimmerer is “a great teacher, and her words are a hymn of love to the world.” The Serviceberry is an antidote to the broken relationships and misguided goals of our times, and a reminder that “hoarding won’t save us, all flourishing is mutual.”

Robin Wall Kimmerer is donating her advance payments from this book as a reciprocal gift, back to the land, for land protection, restoration, and justice.