Programs
Please be aware that the following programs are subject to change as we continually review our safety guidelines regarding Covid-19.
Summer Reading for Adults and Teens
Happening now! 
This summer the Gunn Memorial Library is encouraging readers to read “beyond the beaten path” by exploring new and different adventures through books. The Adult/YA Summer Reading Program “Beyond the Beaten Path” runs from June 2nd through August 30th and is open to young adult and adult patrons.
Patrons can visit the Adult Service desk to receive a “reading passport” with details for a number of unique and interesting reading destinations. Upon completing a reading adventure, they will have their passport stamped and receive a ticket to put towards a chance to win prizes donated by many local businesses. Reading lists will be available to encourage patrons to explore reading journeys outside their comfort zone. There is no limit to the number and type of journeys readers can take. Explore a few or complete as many as you like!
Explore these reading lists to get you started! You can place holds on these titles when you sign into your online library account using your card number and password. Call us if you have any trouble! Click on the links below.
Beach Getaway| Back to Nature| Road Trips | Spiritual Retreat | International Adventures | Take a Walk/Hike| Back in Time| Foodie Paradise| Books set in every State.
Tech Help at the Washington Senior Center
Monday, August 29 @ 10:30 am 
Librarian Jessica Zaccagnini will be at the Washington Senior Center to provide one-on-one assistance with technology issues.
Call the library at 860-868-7586 to book a half hour time slot. We can help with iPhones/iPads, laptops, and more!
Invasive Plants as Food
Thursday, August 11 @ 6:30 pm 
Virtual Program via Zoom
The fact that invasive species of plants are widespread and a major threat to native ecosystems is well known, but a lesser known fact is that some of those plants are edible and delicious! Join The 3 Foragers and Gunn Memorial Library for a virtual presentation on discovering ways of increasing awareness and combating the spread of invasive species by using our appetites as an innovative weapon, attempting to control invasive plants one bite at a time. Identification of edible invasives and preparation for meals will be discussed, as well as recipe suggestions.
The 3 Foragers are a family from southeastern Connecticut and they have worked with over 150 libraries, nature centers, summer camps, garden clubs, land trusts, and private citizens to learn the wild edible plants and fungi of Southern New England since 2016. Their blog, Facebook page, and book all focus on family-friendly, environmentally sustainable harvest of wild plants and fungi, and ways to incorporate these foods into your diet with original recipes.
Movie Matinee- Let Them All Talk
Monday, August 15 @ 1 pm 
With her career and reputation at stake, this world renowned author boards a cruise ship with her friends to reconnect and find some joy. But is friendship too far gone when trust has been broken for the sake of her books? With a young and eager literary agent in her ear, and her nephew on board to keep tabs, this author faces a daunting possibility: the most stressful vacation imaginable. R 1h 53m
Movie Matinee- Lost City
Monday, August 22 @ 1 pm 
An introverted romance author goes on a book promotion tour with her cover model. During the tour, she is kidnapped by an over-the-top billionaire with a chip on his shoulder. Trying to prove he can be a real-life hero, he forces her to lead him on an adventure through the jungle in search of a treasure from her most recent novel. Her cover model, proving he isn’t only a hero in the book, set out to save her. PG-13 1h 52m
Book Club- Apples Never Fall
Thursday, August 25 @ 6:30 pm 
In-person program
At our next book club meeting, we will be discussing Apples Never Fall by Liane Moriarty, author of Nine Perfect Strangers. Moriarty’s 2021 novel follows the Delaney family; they love one another dearly―it’s just that sometimes they want to murder each other . . .
If your mother was missing, would you tell the police? Even if the most obvious suspect was your father? This is the dilemma facing the four grown Delaney siblings. The Delaneys are fixtures in their community. The parents, Stan and Joy, are the envy of all of their friends. They’re killers on the tennis court, and off it their chemistry is palpable. But after fifty years of marriage, they’ve finally sold their famed tennis academy and are ready to start what should be the golden years of their lives. So why are Stan and Joy so miserable?
The four Delaney children―Amy, Logan, Troy, and Brooke―were tennis stars in their own right, yet as their father will tell you, none of them had what it took to go all the way. But that’s okay, now that they’re all successful grown-ups and there is the wonderful possibility of grandchildren on the horizon.
One night a stranger named Savannah knocks on Stan and Joy’s door, bleeding after a fight with her boyfriend. The Delaneys are more than happy to give her the small kindness she sorely needs. If only that was all she wanted.
Later, when Joy goes missing, and Savannah is nowhere to be found, the police question the one person who remains: Stan. But for someone who claims to be innocent, he, like many spouses, seems to have a lot to hide. Two of the Delaney children think their father is innocent, two are not so sure―but as the two sides square off against each other in perhaps their biggest match ever, all of the Delaneys will start to reexamine their shared family history in a very new light.
Copies of this book are available at the circulation desk.
Movie Matinee- The Duke
Monday, August 29 @ 1 pm 
The Duke takes place in the 1960s and follows Kempton Bunton who stole a valuable portrait of the Duke of Wellington from London’s National Gallery. Bunton delivered ransom notes stating that he would return the portrait if the government invested more funds into caring for senior citizens. His decision led to initiatives designed to help those in his community. Bunton is also able to salvage his marriage and restore his relationship with his son in the process of doing good for others. R 1h 36m
Coping with Loss: A Book Discussion with Dr. Marianne Bette
Thursday, September 1 @ 6:30 pm 
In-Person Program
Grief can make you crazy. It can shut you down, but grief can also crack you open and change you like nothing else. You can become your best self. If you let it, it can be the transformation of your lifetime. In ‘Living with a Grieving Heart,’ Dr. Marianne Bette shares stories from her own personal experiences with grief as well as from 40 years in family medicine, to help those who are grieving learn how to embrace life again while living with a grieving heart.
Join Dr. Bette for a discussion of her book Living with a Grieving Heart: Thoughts from a Grief Warrior and offers support on how to cope with loss in a healthy way. “Someday, somewhere — it could be years later — when the wound is not so raw and our lives will not be shattered, the grief or the anger or the overwhelming sadness will come up from wherever it has been hiding and demand to be dealt with. That is the time that the experiences I relate in ‘Living with a Grieving Heart’ will serve you well.”- Dr. Bette
Registration for this event is requested. Copies of Dr. Bette’s book will be available for purchase and signing.
Marianne Bette is a retired family physician from Southbury, Connecticut, the town where she was born and raised and still currently lives. After forty years in family medicine, she’s enjoying her retirement. When Bette was a young doctor, her fiancé died in a small plane accident. Years later, she married and her husband died of lung cancer. Bette put those experiences into a how-to book that will comfort and guide all those who have experienced the loss of a loved one.
Taking the Mystery Out of Trusts with Judge Domenick Calabrese
Thursday, September 8 @ 6:30 pm 
In-person Program
A trust can be the centerpiece of a complete estate plan. However, most people find trusts confusing and intimidating; there is an erroneous belief that trusts should only be used by the wealthy. Join the Gunn Memorial Library for a presentation by Connecticut Probate Judge Domenick Calabrese. He will draw on his 20 years as a Connecticut Probate Judge and 26 years as a trusts and estates attorney to shed light on basic but important trust concepts.
Subjects covered include how a trust works; the use of trusts for incapacity planning; trusts versus wills; trusts in estate plans; the importance of funding trusts (it’s not as difficult as it sounds); asset protection with trusts; preserving family wealth; and avoiding probate. Judge Calabrese will explain trusts in plain English using real-life examples to illustrate trust concepts and will take questions from the audience.
Registration is requested.
Judge Domenick Calabrese has been a Connecticut probate judge since 2003. He is currently judge of the Region 22 Probate District in Southbury encompassing 7 towns and is one of the largest probate courts in Connecticut. He is a founding judge of the Waterbury Regional Children’s Probate Court. He has made hundreds of presentations on probate and estate planning to both the general public and professional audiences, including the Connecticut Society of CPAs, Connecticut Probate Assembly, Connecticut Bar Association, the Registrars of Voters Association of Connecticut, and the University of Connecticut Income Tax School. His articles have been published in the Town Times Newspaper in his hometown of Watertown, Connecticut.
Movie Matinee- Red Rocket
Monday, September 12 @ 1 pm 
Mikey Saber — charismatic con man and washed-up porn star — plots his return to the big time from small-town Texas in this story of an American hustler and a hometown that barely tolerates him. R 2h 8m.
Movie Matinee- Fatherhood
Monday, September 19 @ 1 pm 
Matthew Logelin (Kevin Hart), a brand-new father brings up his baby girl as a single dad after the unexpected death of his wife who died a day after their daughter’s birth. PG-13 1h 49m.
Movie Matinee- The Beatles and India: An Enduring Love Affair
Monday, September 26 @ 1 pm 
A chronological look into the Beatles’ love affair with India that started more than a century ago. Unique and rare photographs, footage, location shoots and eye witness accounts help to bring this story alive. NR 1h 36m.
Author Talk: Soon Wiley in conversation with Joseph Montebello
Thursday, September 29 @ 6:30 pm at GML 
In-person Program
Gunn Memorial Library and the Hickory Stick Bookshop are pleased to welcome author Soon Wiley to the library for a conversation with Litchfield Magazine’s Joseph Montebello on Wiley’s debut novel, When We Fell Apart. Copies of Wiley’s novel will be available for purchase and signing courtesy of the Hickory Stick Bookshop. You can purchase a copy online here.
Wiley’s novel is a profoundly moving and suspenseful drama that untangles the complicated ties that bind families together—or break them apart—as a young Korean American man’s search for answers about his girlfriend’s mysterious death becomes a soul-searching journey into his own bi-cultural identity.
When the Seoul police inform Min that his girlfriend Yu-jin has committed suicide, he’s sure it can’t be true. She was successful, ambitious, happy, just on the cusp of graduating from university and claiming the future she’d always dreamed of. Min, on the other hand, born to an American father and Korean mother, has never felt quite the same certainty as Yu-jin about his life’s path. After growing up in California, where he always felt “too Korean” to fit in, he’s moved to Seoul in the hope that exploring his Korean heritage will help him find a sense of purpose. And when he meets Yu-jin, little does he know that their carefree relationship will set off a chain of events with tragic consequences for them both.
This event is free and open to the public. Registration required.
Soon Wiley is A native of Nyack, New York and received his BA in English & Philosophy from Connecticut College. He holds an MFA in Creative Writing from Wichita State University. His writing has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize and earned him fellowships in Wyoming and France. He resides in Connecticut with his wife and their two cats.
Joseph Montebello is a freelance writer living in Litchfield County. He is a longtime contributor to Litchfield Magazine and has written for The Litchfield County Times, Berkshire Style, Bedford Magazine, Rural Intelligence, Main Street, and AARP Magazine. He writes on many different subjects including design and architecture. He has also written many profiles on people in the arts, including Dani Shapiro, Frank Delaney, Roxanna Robinson, Agnes Gund, Ann Leary, Laurie Simmons, Marsha Mason, Peter Gallagher, and Christine Baranski. He is the former Vice-President & Creative Director at HarperCollins Publishers, where he also had an imprint called HarperStyle. There he published books by Annie Leibovitz, Carolyne Roehm, Fleur Cowles, and Vicente Wolf, among others.
