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SCHENECTADY
Residents to vote on which book county will read
BY MICHAEL LAMENDOLA Gazette Reporter

    Five titles will vie for the chance to become Schenectady County’s one book next year.
    County residents have until Nov. 8 to cast a vote for a title as part of the fourth annual “One County, One Book” program. Vote online at http://www.scpl.org, or through a ballot available at a county library branch, the Open Door Bookstore or the Whitney Book Corner.
    The winning title will be announced Nov. 17 in the Central Library’s McChesney Room. Starting in early 2009, the Schenectady County Public Library will start theme-related programs for the winning book.
    A selection committee consisting of residents, library staff and library board members picked candidates from among titles nominated by the community over the past three years, said program chairman and library trustee Edwin D. Reilly Jr.
    This year’s candidates are:
    “Atonement” by Ian McEwan. The novel traces the lives of three children who lose their innocence in England in World War II.
    “The Island at the Center of the World” by Russell Shorto. Shorto provides a new view of America’s beginning in a non-fi ction narrative history of Manhattan’s founding.
    “The Omnivore’s Dilemma” by Michael Pollan. This nonfiction book discusses how food is grown and its composition, industrial farming, organic food and what it is like to hunt and gather food.
    “Water for Elephants” by Sara Gruen. A nursing home resident in his 90s looks back on his Depression-era days as a member of a second-rate circus.
    “When the Emperor Was Divine” by Julie Otsuka. The novel describes how a Japanese-American family puts its life together after internment in a camp in Utah during World War II.