Children's author Mitchell Hyde had Navy (yellow), Peter and Ella (pink) dancing in the aisles of the theatre at Medicine Hat Public Library when he brought his guitar out to play the song that accompanies his book Where Do I Find My Home.--NEWS PHOTO SAMANTHA JOHNSON
reporter@medicinehatnews.com
Medicine Hat Public Library’s successful meet-and-greet event on Saturday came about because so many local authors ask to speak at the library and it made sense to set aside a specific day for a group to gather and share their work at the same time.
Adult and community librarian Miranda Leduc asked to take on the project because she felt it was important to support local authors. Those presenting were selected because they were either authors who’d reached out to the library or who MHPL had heard about from someone in the community.
Leduc explained there’s never any certainty what the turnout will be for new programs and she was pleased this one was so well received. The morning session was quite popular, with four children’s authors and one teen author presenting, and a large crowd gathered outside the doors when the library opened. It was also a busy crowd, with many young children and toddlers in the audience, and Leduc had everyone up and doing movement exercises between authors.
“The afternoon was a smaller group, but I thought it worked nicely because they got to ask questions of the authors, whereas with a bigger group I don’t know if there would have been time for questions. I’m really happy with how it went,” stated Leduc.
MHPL always welcomes community input and the 2023 Satisfaction Survey was recently released.
Chris Brown, head of marketing and community engagement said, “We’re extremely proud of the services, programs and resources that we offer at the Medicine Hat Public Library and of the staff who delivers them. But we’re always looking for ways to improve the library experience for the patrons and visitors we already have and ways to bring even more people into the library community. This satisfaction survey will help guide us toward that goal.”
The survey can be found at https://tinyurl.com/MHPL-2023-Satisfaction-Survey.
