Oregon Book Award Finalists Announced

Oregon has so many great writers and the Oregon Book Awards are a great way to discover new writers and new works. The Oregon Book Awards are presented annually for the finest accomplishments by Oregon writers who work in genres of poetry, fiction, literary nonfiction, drama and young readers literature. The 2011 list of finalists has been announced and you can click http://www.literary-arts.org/index.php?article=963 to see the full list for each genre. The library owns most of these titles and you can click http://wccls.org to search the catalog.

FactCheck

With the November elections fast approaching, you may want to check out a website from the Annenberg Public Policy Center of the University of Pennsylvania. Referred to as the Annenberg Political FactCheck, this site "monitors the factual accuracy of what is said by major U.S. political players in the form of TV ads, debates, speeches, interviews, and news releases". Politicians' claims and statements are analyzed and individuals can browse by date or search by keyword to access the last four years of the archives. An analysis of whether the stimulus legislation actually created new jobs was recently published. The Republican "Pledge to America" was also dissected last month. Interesting reading!!

Financial Crisis

The Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis has put together a TIMELINE of events and policy actions involved in the current Financial Crisis starting in February 2007. Click here to view timeline.

Other websites of interest include:

A series published in the New York Times. (last updated July 12, 2010). Click here to view NYT coverage.

PBS also offers information on the global perspective. Click here to view PBS article.

World Bank and the International Monetary Fund also provide information on their respective websites.

Facts on File World News Digest

This resource is often overlooked but contains a wealth of information. The introduction states that it is "a detailed, objective and timely weekly distillation of the news and current information as reported in dozens of major newspapers and news magazines from the U.S., Canada, Britain, Australia and elsewhere around the world. Other materials, such as government reports and online databases, fill in the gaps and provide additional verification. The full source list is a long one and is constantly evolving. From this flow of information, the editors seek to record all those events that might be of lasting interest or significance, and to anticipate the needs of researchers in the future. The emphasis throughout is on the factual content rather than opinion or analysis. The News Digest provides a complete, concise, accurate, and permanent record of politics, foreign affairs, business and the economy, finance, government, crime, the environment, science and medicine, arts and entertainment, personalities and sports, with statistics, background boxes, chronologies, key events, text excerpts, maps, tables and photographs."

Of interest to students, writers and the general reader, this resource provides the user with a distinctive "snapshot in time" of what was happening during a particular week of the year. It can answer specific questions, or provide a springboard for more extensive research in books or newspapers. The collection of Facts on File at BCL goes back to 1976.

Money and U.S. Culture

With the economy in such a state of turmoil, our business librarian has compiled a list of new titles that BCL has purchased concerning our current economic situation. The list includes books on Warren Buffett, the credit crisis and the financial markets. These titles are sure to be both informative and thought-provoking. Check them out!