Find joy at your local library

Each week in April, the United States celebrates National Library Week, an annual celebration highlighting the irreplaceable role libraries and their workers play in the communities they serve.

This year’s theme is “Find Your Joy,” with Mychal Threets, the new host of the children’s program “Reading Rainbow,” serving as honorary chair.

“Celebrating libraries, thanking library workers, visiting libraries is how I find my joy,” Threets said. “There are so many library kids and library grown-ups who have yet to fully embrace their library joy, and I am so excited for them! When they enter the world of libraries and stories, I am confident they will find not only their library joy but their courage to believe in their own story and maybe even share it with others.”

I’ve previously shared how Johnson Public Library in Darlington, Wisconsin, was a huge part of my childhood. In elementary and middle school, I spent two hours at the library every single day after school and even longer on the weekends. It was one of my main sources of joy.

The library is a place where you can access so much with so little — just a library card! The Gibson Memorial Library in Creston has 5,112 patrons, all able to access thousands of materials with their little green card.

The library has 30,815 materials in circulation, including books, movies, audiobooks and more. Personally, I own a couple hundred books. For that reason, I really didn’t use the library to check out adult books. I use it for my daughter and for the app Libby primarily.

Before familiarizing myself with the Gibson Memorial Library, I really felt that libraries primarily held older titles. If a new hit book came out, you could find it in a few years.

That’s just not true, though! If you follow the library’s Facebook page, it’s crazy how often they post that they have new titles in stock just after the publish date.

If you look at the New York Times Best Sellers list right now, most of these can be found in the stacks of our library. The top book for combined print and e-book fiction, “The Rites of the Starling,” by Devney Perry, just came out April 7. Though it’s currently checked out (rightfully so), it’s a title the library owns.

They also own the next three on the list, “Project Hail Mary” by Andy Weir; “Revenge Prey” by John Sandford and “Theo Of Golden” by Allen Levi. “Yesteryear” by Caro Claire Burke is the current Good Morning America Bookclub selection and also released on April 7. It’s at No. 2 on the hardcover fiction list, and also is available at our library.

In these days where most books are released initially in a $30+ hardcover, reading the novel before committing to the purchase is where I’m heading. While I know I will buy and enjoy “Rites of the Starling,” since it’s a sequel to a book I loved, I’ve never read anything by Allen Levi, and “Yesteryear” is a debut novel for Caro Claire Burke.

I can’t speak for other libraries, but we should be so impressed and excited that over the last year, Gibson Memorial Library has added approximately 2,000 new titles, many of them new releases.

The most popular author checked out is Freida McFadden. In 2025, approximately eight of the top 10 most checked out books were by McFadden.

The top four checkouts over the last three months are “Dear Debbie” by Freida McFadden; “The First Time I Saw Him” by Laura Dave; “The Widow” by John Grisham and “Billion Dollar Ransom” by James Patterson.

For kids, the “DogMan” series and “The Babysitter’s Club” graphic novels are the most popular.

Each day of National Library Week has its own message. Today is Take Action for Libraries Day, a day to rally advocates to support libraries. I’d like to share some ways I support the local library even though I don’t check out a lot of books to read.

First of all, get a library card! Having a library card is a massive, free and easy way to support your local library. I now have a little one on my keys so it’s on me always.

Secondly, visit the library. I’ve started a routine where my daughter Eliza and I go to the library to play on Saturdays. This works well for us because she is used to the hustle and bustle of daycare and often gets bored at home on the weekends.

The library is something we can do rain or shine, gives her new toys to play with, space to crawl and lets her do one of her favorite activities — people watching.

I also check out books for her at the library for us to read at home. This works well during the holidays. Instead of buying a bunch of Valentine’s Day books, we check them out from the library. We can stay on theme without breaking the bank or the bookshelves.

A huge way to support the library is to come to their events. THEY ARE ALL FREE! Whether it’s “Twilight” trivia nigh, a program put together by an expert or a crafting event, come support the library’s programming. They work really hard to get them all set up for the community.

Finally, I’d like to plug the Friends of the Library. We are always looking for new members and volunteers. While city budgets are tight, we are the funding source behind things the city can’t pay for. The Summer Reading Program is entirely funded by the Friends.

Our library and its workers bring so much joy to our community. Stop by today through Saturday to give them an extra thank you!