EBL eBooks Now Available for Newcastle Region Library Members

EBL eBooks are now available for members to use. You can download to an eReader, tablet or smart phone; to a computer; or simply read online.

What books are included, for example?

Over 100 non-fiction titles covering Australian history,cooking, phonics, leadership, marketing and more.
100 fiction titles including Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries, The Slap, The Grimstones, Mice, Me and Earl and the Dying Girl and The Mr Badger books (Leigh Hobbs).

Going by title alone, I think my new favourite book is going to be Apocalyse Cakes : New Recipes for the End, featuring Fallen Angel Food Cake.

How do I find EBL?

Links and help sheets are currently located on our main eResources page.
The direct link is: http://library.ncc.nsw.gov.au:2048/login?url=http://nccnsw.eblib.com.au

How do I get into EBL?

Once you reach the login page, you will need to enter an active Newcastle Region library card number and your PIN.

How long can I keep the books for?

You can choose from a 1 to 14 day loan period.
When loan period expires the book will no longer be on your device or computer.
You may download the same book again if you want to.
The same book may be downloaded by several borrowers at the same time – no waiting lists.

Compatible Devices

You can find a list of compatible devices, applications and eBook readers here.
EBL books can also be downloaded onto the Kindle Fire. For more information see the EBL blog.

Other Requirements

You will need to download Adobe Digital Editions to your personal computer (this requires you to create an Adobe account).  For iOS, Android and Kindle Fire you will also need the Bluefire Reader App (this needs to be registered to the same Adobe account) to download and read eBooks directly.
For more information about system requirements visit this link.

Need more help?

Once you are in the EBL portal there is a help link – I have found these very useful. If you can’t find the answers you need, please give library staff a call on 4974 5340, or send a query via our ASK a Librarian link. Use these contacts also to suggest eBook titles or subjects for purchase.

Visit Newcastle Region Library's Catalogue and Website.

On Love

Author: Alain de Botton

Publication Date: © 1993, 2006

Category: Fiction, although there is a lot of philosophy and other stuff thrown in!

Who'll want to read it? Fans of Alain de Botton, arm chair philosophers, people in a relationship, people  no longer in a relationship.

Point of no return: For me, there was no real 'point of no return'. I was drawn slowly into the fictional  romance between Alain and Chloe, but really fascinated by his interpretations of why we do things, drawing quite a few parallels with my own experiences.

A word of warning: this book is not a light read. It has a lot of philosophical content, some mathematics (for example, the probability calculation on pages 8-9, of two random people sitting next to each other on a particular flight), and is basically a non-fiction book in a fictional setting.

Classic lines: "Chloe took off one of the offensive shoes, supposedly so as to let me look at it, but more realistically, to murder me with it; I chose to duck the incoming projectile; and it crashed through the window behind me and fell down to the street, where it impaled itself in the remains of a neighbor's leftover chicken Madras." - pages 60-61

"Dr . Saavedra had diagnosed a case of anhedonia, a disease defined by the British Medical Association as a reaction remarkably close to mountain sickness resulting from the sudden terror brought on by the threat of happiness."- page 123

"We spend our time loving like utilitarians; in the bedroom we are followers of Hobbes and Bentham, not Plato and Kant. We make moral judgements on the basis of preference, not transcendental values." - pages 158-159

"To have killed myself would have been to forget that I would be too dead to derive any pleasure from the melodrama of my extinction." - page 172

To read an extract on Alain de Botton's website, click here.

What's it all about? Written in the first person, Alain meets Chloe by sitting next to her on a flight back to England. He falls in love with her during the flight, and they agree to meet again. The book chronicles the relationship from the beginning, through the difficult first date, beyond the comfortable familiarity of the seemingly solid relationship, and out the other side - the breakup, and recovery from breakup.

Everything is analysed in great detail, which makes it a little slow going. I commented to a friend that it would be exhausting to over-think everything in that manner, and to have a relationship with someone who thought in that depth would be a bit annoying. It did shine a light on some things that have happened in my own relationships, and made me grateful that I have never swallowed a handful of effervescent vitamin C tablets.
Publisher: Grove Press

Visit Newcastle Region Library's Catalogue and Website.

eBooks for High School Science Students

Newcastle Region Library members can now access a new collection of science eBooks via our website.

Series available include:

Periodic Table of the Elements

Science Foundations

Experimenting with Everyday Science

Cells: the Building Blocks of Life

Conservation Heroes

To try it out, have your library card ready and type "science experiment" in the search box below. Once you get to our website you will be asked to enter your library card number. You will then have unlimited access to the Infobase eBook collection.

Search Full TextSearch Title & Description

Visit Newcastle Region Library's Catalogue and Website.

White Elephants : Yard Sales, Relationships and Finding What Was Missing

Author: Katie Haegele

Publication Date: 2012

Who'll want to read it?
Anyone who loves garage sales, op shopping and buying things that have lived many lives before they came to you. People who are interested in how discovering these 'things' with their own pasts can transport us and delight us in the most unimaginable ways. Oh and also those who are interested in zines.

What's it all about?
Katie is a writer of zines and many other things, from Philadelphia. She loves going to yard sales, rummage sales and the like. So, in a captain planet "with our powers combined" kind of fashion, she has melded these two things into a series of zines titled 'White Elephants' which were then compiled into this wonderful, wonderful book!

However, this book is not just some list of things bought and people waxing lyrical about the "oh so fabulous and super awesome vintage stuff i found!!", it is a lovely and sometimes hilarious memoir about Katie's life, her relationship with her mother, dealing with the loss of her father and the beautiful and powerful connection things can give us to our memories, how they are a bridge into another way of thinking, living and breathing.

I loved this book. I loved reading about 'Dream Phone' a toy for girls who could pretend they were trying to ring their latest "crush", the phone has weird and creepy recorded clues about who your crush might be and what he likes. Just the kind of crazy, creepiness that you just couldn't make up if you tried. Katie's descriptions of the layout and people that staff the sales are fantastic, all the classic characters from the grumpy garage sale people who overprice everything to the lovely almost over helpful old ladies in church rummage sales who suprise you with their personal and sometimes inappropriate comments.

I also loved the panic, depression, unbridled joy, love, sadness and excitement that Katie described as part of her life. It was refreshing and honest, life is not always wonderful, sometimes you find nothing that catches your eye, that captures your heart, your imagination, but then suddenly, just as you think all is lost, there they are.....a pair of gravestone salt and pepper shakers "Here lies salt" and "Here lies pepper" and well, you can't help but smile*.

*If you aren't smiling then you might not enjoy this book but thanks for reading this far!

Publisher: Microcosm Publishing

If you would like to know more about Katie you can visit her website here

Visit Newcastle Region Library's Catalogue and Website.

Wrap With Love

Wallsend District Library is continuing their charity work, as a collection centre for knitted squares or completed blankets for the Wrap With Love project.

We collect knitted squares and finished blankets here all year round, and have given a couple of thousand squares in the last three years to this wonderful charity.

On Friday 10th August 2012, Wrap With Love Inc. will host a Knit In at Lake Macquarie Art Gallery, where they sew all the squares into blankets for the charity. Details can be found here.

Each of the Newcastle Region Libraries should soon have a poster and some Knit In brochures, which have the knitting instructions on the back. Alternatively, the instructions can be found here, or printed. Click on the links for printer friendly instructions for squares or completed wraps.

Plain squares are perfectly acceptable, from beginners to experts, but if you want to get fancy, feel free. Have a look at the Wrap Gallery here.

If anyone would like to contribute, please bring any squares or completed blankets to your local branch, who will forward them to Wallsend District Library for collection.

Visit Newcastle Region Library's Catalogue and Website.