A Makeshift Durbin Library

Next week, library staff, board members, and volunteers will start carrying books across the street from the Durbin Library to a Main Street storefront rented and occupied by the Upper Pocahontas Community Club. It’s a temporary solution, meant to keep some library services available in Durbin, and to keep community support mobilized around building a new library.

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Blue Grass Book Bank, a home away from home

The book bank is housed in a building that once served as a post office and a bank. The original teller window is still there with antique woodwork and iron bars. A carport in the back was enclosed to hold the adult section and the arts and crafts area, while the kids section is housed in the old bank vault.

In the community of Blue Grass, in Highland County, the book bank offers more than just books. It’s a home away from home for area kids.

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From Berlin to Back Mountain: The Lilac Tree transplanted

Nicollette Maleckar has always loved to write, and she doesn’t like sad stories.

As one of the last children carried out of Nazi Germany before the Holocaust, Maleckar returned to Berlin years later to find sadness everywhere.

In her novel The Lilac Tree, she writes about that time. But the story is really a portrait of all the people she knew then.

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