April is Autism Acceptance Month, and the Whatcom County Library System is taking part by rolling out sensory kits at all county library locations. The kits include essential items to support the sensory needs of autistic children and adults during library visits. Items in the sensory kits are recommended by the University of Washington iSchool … Read more
No Two Persons by Port Townsend, Wash.-based author Erica Bauermeister is the Whatcom READS 2025 book selection. Sasha taqʷšəblu Lapointe, author of the 2024 featured title, Red Paint: The Ancestral Autobiography of a Coast Salish Punk, made the announcement at the close of the March 15 Whatcom READS author event at the Mount Baker Theatre. Liane Moriarty, … Read more
Whatcom County Library System (WCLS) is partnering with the Washington State Department of Health to provide free naloxone kits to community members in need. The kits are available at WCLS’s 10 branch locations and the bookmobile. Supplies are limited but will be refilled periodically as long as WCLS can obtain additional doses. “We are thrilled … Read more
By WCLS Executive Director Christine Perkins I was talking to a library patron recently and asked how her week was going. “Terrible,” she reported, and went on to explain that her computer had been “hacked” while shopping online and she had been on the phone with someone who insisted she send him thousands of dollars. … Read more
Library staff and booksellers who organize and present Whatcom READS have announced the literary program’s 2024 schedule of community and author events, celebrating Red Paint: The Ancestral Autobiography of a Coast Salish Punk by Sasha taqʷšəblu LaPointe. Winner of the Washington State Book Award for creative nonfiction, Red Paint traces LaPointe’s personal story of trauma, healing and the search … Read more
Following successful outreach by Friends of the Birch Bay Library volunteers, the Whatcom County Council has allocated $315,000 to support construction of the Birch Bay Vogt Library Express. The funding was included in County Executive Satpal Sidhu’s recommendations for the county’s American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) expenditures and agreed to by the council. The ARPA … Read more
“Working Boats: An Inside Look at Ten Amazing Watercraft” by Tom Crestodina For many of us, the working vessels that ply local waters and the people who work aboard are a bit of a mystery. We board ferries. We watch sturdy tugs push heavy barges. And we may eat the catch the mariners bring to … Read more
It may seem strange for a public library system to publish an annual gift guide, but hear us out: All of the books mentioned in the 2023 roundup are gifts, whether you check them out from Whatcom County Library System (WCLS) as a treat for yourself, or purchase them for friends and family. Our … Read more
The Wok: Recipes and Techniques by J. Kenji López-Alt The 2023 winner of the Washington State Book Award for General Nonfiction, J. Kenji López-Alt, is not a flash-in-the-pan. His first book, “The Food Lab: Better Home Cooking Through Science,” was a New York Times bestseller and won a 2016 James Beard Foundation Award. In 2020, … Read more
Where the Language Lives by Janet Yoder Vi taqʷšɘblu Hilbert was 49 years old when she got a phone call that changed the course of her life. Thom Hess, a linguist at the University of Washington, called Hilbert and asked her to review an audio recording of one of her mother’s traditional Coast Salish stories … Read more