TOLLAND – Author and journalist Denis Horgan returns to the Tolland Public Library on Sept. 12 to discuss his latest book, “The Bangkok World.”
His free talk will be held at 7 p.m. at the library at 21 Tolland Green as part of the Tolland Public Library Foundation’s popular Eaton-Dimock-King Authors Series.
Horgan’s book is a memoir recounting his days as a U.S. Army officer during the Vietnam War and his time as editor of “The Bangkok World” newspaper in Thailand. The book is a love letter to a beautiful country that Horgan, a native of Dorchester, Mass., describes in vivid detail.
Faith Middleton, host of WNPR’s Book Show, has called Horgan “a master storyteller.” With Horgan, she said, “words do not separate you from the story. You are in it with Denis Horgan and you just don’t want to stop reading.”
“The Bangkok World” is Horgan’s fourth book. He came to Tolland as an Eaton-Dimock-King author in 2011 to discuss his collection of short stories, “Ninety-Eight Point Six…and other stories.”
A West Hartford resident, Horgan was a popular longtime columnist at The Hartford Courant and previously worked at newspapers in Boston, Dublin and
Washington, D.C.
Registration is required for the talk. To register, call the library at 860-871-3620.
The series, funded by the Phoebe Dimock King and Elizabeth C. King Eaton
Endowment, has previously brought writers Susan Schoenberger, Jeff Goldberg,
Lucy Anne Hurston, Jane Haddam, P.W. Catanese, Dan Barry and Dawn Metcalf to the Tolland library.

A young Denis Horgan during his Thailand reporting days

           TOLLAND – Attention gearheads: the Tolland Public Library is now offering you access to a do-it-yourself online repair guide to fixing and maintaining your cars and trucks.
Thanks to a $1,935 grant from the Tolland Public Library Foundation, library patrons can now access the Auto Repair Reference Center for free at the library or from home using their library cards.
The database features repair instructions for more than 37,000 vehicle makes made from 1945 to the present. It includes many drawings and photos as well as wiring diagrams for many vehicles.
The database also includes more than 110,000 technical bulletins and recall notices.
Library director Barbara Pettijohn thanked the Foundation for the grant, which has brought a valuable tool to the hands of local home mechanics.
“Anyone trying to save money by doing their own car maintenance will find the auto repair database easy to understand and helpful,’’ she said.
To use the database from home, visit http://www.tolland.org/library/ and click on the auto repair icon. Patrons must have a Tolland library card to login to the database from there.
For more information on the Auto Repair Reference Center, call the library at 860-871-3620.

Get help with your job search thanks to the Tolland Public Library Foundation!

     TOLLAND – Need help polishing your resume or practicing for a job interview? Job seekers can now access a useful resource called JobNow thanks to the Tolland Public Library Foundation.
With a $250 grant from the Foundation, the Tolland Public Library now offers this free job service to patrons at the library or from home using their library cards.
JobNow provides online career assistance, including one-on-one mock interviews, lists of common interview questions, tips to answer the questions and other job resources.
Users can also submit a resume or cover letter for a professional critique. Constructive comments are guaranteed within 24 hours.
Library director Barbara Pettijohn said Tolland residents will find the service to be valuable if they are looking to improve their skills, find work or seek a better job.
“I want to thank the Foundation for funding this terrific resource for our patrons,’’ she said. “Anyone looking for a job will find JobNow to be extremely helpful.”
There is no limit to how often library patrons can use the service. To use the database from home, visit http://www.tolland.org/library/ and click on the JobNow icon. Users must have a Tolland library card to login from there.
For more information on JobNow, call the library at 860-871-3620.

Award-winning author and journalist Denis Horgan will return to the library Sept. 12 to discuss his new memoir, “The Bangkok World.”
Horgan will return to the Eaton-Dimock-King Authors Series when he speaks at 7 p.m. that night.
He spent the early years of his journalism career at The Bangkok World in Thailand before going on to be a columnist and editor at The Hartford Courant. Horgan will sell and sign copies of his memoir during his visit to the Tolland library.
The event is free but registration is required. To sign up, call the library at 860-871-3620.

A young Denis Horgan during his Thailand reporting days

     Using a $300 grant from the Tolland Public Library Foundation, the library will have copies on hand this summer of most of the books recommended or required by Tolland’s middle and high schools.
Seventeen copies of books have already been ordered, including “Twelve Angry Men” by Reginald Rose and “The Alchemist” by Paulo Coelho for high school honors classes  and “Wonder” by R.J. Palacio for middle school classes.
Ginny Brousseau, the children’s librarian at the Tolland Public Library, said that without the Foundation grant, she would have been unable to order any extra copies of the schools’ summer reading choices due to budget constraints.
“This grant allows the library to have more copies of required and recommended summer reading titles for grades 6 to 12 available for students earlier in the summer than would otherwise have been possible,’’ Brousseau said.
The books should be on the library shelves within the next few weeks. Parents and students with library cards can check out the books for free. The library can also provide an interlibrary loan service for free for any books that have a waiting list.