Published in 1976, One Potato, Two Potato contains a wealth of information on children's folklore, songs and chants. The authors, Mary and Herbert Knapp, have researched rituals and games passed along in schoolyards and street corners. Some are offensive, some are disgusting, and all are interesting. Chapters include "The Games Children Play," "Prestige and Power" and "Coping with the Here and Now." Each section is devoted to different subject matter. There are telephone jokes (such as the well-known "Prince Albert in a can" inquiry), riddles, clapping games, and parodies of vintage advertising jingles. This is a useful sociological work, but it's also a delight to browse.

Sam Keen's Faces of the Enemy  presents illustrations of the opposing side during wartime. Readers can browse posters, cartoons, and advertisements to find the different ways in which the enemy has been portrayed for the past century or so. Color plates show propaganda posters from WWI, WWII, and beyond. One such image portrays a 1940s-era German Poster of the British Empire as Lady Macbeth, scrubbing blood off of her hands. A section on "The Enemy as Beast Reptile or Insect" pictures Hitler as a rat, cornered by a Soviet soldier with a bayonet. A German poster shows the Nazi party as a snake, threatening innocent looking civilians. The book is fascinating to peruse, and deserves to keep its place in the ROPL collection. Place a hold on it today!

According to the American Library Association, "Banned Books Week (BBW) is an annual event celebrating the freedom to read and the importance of the First Amendment" (source). Which means that we want you to read a banned (or challenged) book (or two).

You live in District 12, you’re a teenager and you’ve managed to avoid being picked to participate in the horrific Hunger Games – until now. What happens next? This is, in essence, the beginning of Suzanne Collins’ YA novel, The Hunger Games.