Terry Gladin, our Program Chairperson, would like to know what  speakers and subjects would be of interest to you.  We hope to be adding OASIS programs to our future selections.  We would like to increase the attendance at our programs and your input to the selection process would be most welcome.  If you have a specific speaker or topic to suggest,  please drop a note to Terry at the library or e-mail her at programs@sancarlosfriendsofthelibrary.org.

All of our speakers present their programs on the 4th Wednesday of the month at 7 pm, in the Community Room of the San Carlos Library. An extended article about each speaker and his/her presentation appears on this page below the schedule of dates.

Our current Speaker selections for your enjoyment, entertainment and education are as follows:

July 28th:  Arlette Gaffrey, has written 4 books, two of which are authentic historical novels set in New Orleans in the 1800s.  Her titles include, BEHIND THE COLUMNS  and A WORLD OF HIS OWN.   She will speak to us about how prospective authors can get their works published, but feel free to ask any questions about New Orleans, too.  These books are MUST summer reads while holding your mint julep.

August 25th:  Anya Delacruz is an Elder Help Care Manager.  She will discuss with us what Elder Help of San Diego can do for the seniors in our area.  This talk is a MUST all who care for an aging loved one or who themselves are in need of additional services.

September 22nd: Charles Elster is a nationally recognized authority on language and the author of the new book, THE ACCIDENTS OF STYLE, Good Advice on How Not to Write Badly.  It will be available on July 20, 2010.  A MUST for all writers and logophiles.

October 27th:  Mike Tatar and a four-piece Blue Grass Band.

January 26, 2011:  Andrea Schneider Author of You Are Not Alone: Life After a Breast Cancer Diagnosis, will be speaking about her breast cancer experience.

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  Arlette Gaffrey was born and raised in New Orleans.  Her ancestors are French and Spanish Creole dating to 1834 when they emigrated from Europe.  She loves her home town, finding it both an unique and enchanting city. In her youth, it was ”oh, soooo French….”.  How romantic!  With her beloved home town as the backdrop, Arlette has written several historically accurate romance novels.

  In her second novel Behind the Columns,  set in 1846 New Orleans,  Arlette’s heroine, Desiree, finds herself wooed by two men.  One is rich and famous, another cruel, but her broken heart belongs to her best friend’s brother who married a French woman.  The plot is complicated by her grandfather’s debts.  His death may cause the family’s beautiful plantation home, Chene Vue, to be put on the auction block.

  A World of His Own is Arlette’s first historically based romantic novel set in New Orleans in 1809.   It tells the tale of a young man who, as a child, was sent out of France during the French Revolution.  As an adult, he ends up in New Orleans and there begins to re-build his life.  Of course, the book is filled with romance and the turmoil it brings. These are MUST summer beach reads.

Arlette’s own life is a fascinating one, rich with varied interests.  Her career as a high fashion model began when she was 18 year old and continued until she was 55.  Interspersed with her career, she married a Naval Officer (a pilot), and raised two sons and a daughter who have given her six grandchildren.  She loved modeling, moving from place to place with her Naval career husband, being a mother, old movies (she has a collection of 1300), the “Big Band” era sound, reading and writing.  Come and meet this eclectic lady on Wednesday, July 28th, at 7:00 pm in the Community Room of the San Carlos Library.  Bring your questions about New Orleans.  She would like to talk to you about her unique home town, and about how you might get started writing…and get published…a novel of your own.  Check out her website, www.arlettegaffrey.com.

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 ANYA DELACRUZ is a Care Manager with ElderHelp of San Diego.  Responding to the needs of San Diego seniors in failing health, poverty, and isolation, in 1973, a small group organized a community based agency named Mid City Senior Enterprises.  They worked from a church basement for the next 12 year, offering over two dozen programs.  In 1995, ElderHelp took several critical steps forward to meet the challenge of serving a rapidly growing segment of our population.  They formed a multi-agency collaboration called Senior Neighborhood Network.  Partner agencies include Bayside Settlement House, Chicano Federation, Family Services Association, ElderHelp, and Jewish Family Services.  The SNN was designed to offer a uniform set of basic case management services to seniors throughout San Diego. 

Today, ElderHelp is an integral part of the spectrum of government, health care and community based providers that is focused on providing long-term care to seniors within the community.  It is one of the only agencies that is solely focused on providing affordable services and programs to seniors within their own homes. 

If you or a family member or friend is a senior and is in need of at home services, come and hear this informative talk.

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     Have you ever known someone who just seems to have “a way with words“?  Well, we do!  CHARLES HARRINGTON ELSTER is a writer, a broadcaster, a voice talent, and a nationally recognized authority on language.  He has been talking about language on the radio since 1985.  You have heard him on his A Way With Words KPBS broadcasts.  Mr. Elster will be the guest speaker of SCFOL on Wednesday, September 22, at 7:00 pm in the Community Room of the San Carlos Library, 7265 Jackson Drive, San Diego, 92119.

    His articles and reviews have appeared in the Boston Globe, the Wall Street Journal, and The New York Times Magazine.  He has published ten books, most recently The Accidents of Style: Good Advice on How Not to Write Badly.  Other well known works by Mr. Elster are two books written to assist students improve their ACT or SAT language scores: Tooth and Nail, A Novel Approach to the SAT, and Test of Time.  Other titles by Mr. Elster include the book and audio vocabulary-building program Verbal Advantage; There’s a Word for it,  a fun look at finding unusual and useful words;  The Big Book of Beastly Mispronunciations; and What in the Word? “a salmagundi of word lore and wordplay in a question-and-answer format”.  Ultimate Verbal Fitness, a companion to Verbal Advantage, will be published in 2011.

      Mr. Elster is a longtime lexicomane (lover of dictionaries), and his resume now includes being the orthoepist (pronunciation expert) for the online dictionary project Wordnik.com. He has been interviewed on NPR’s Talk of the Nation, Weekend Edition, and All Things Considered and been a guest on hundreds of radio shows in the United States and Canada.  Born in New York City in 1957, he earned his B.A. cum laude from Yale in 1981.  He lives in San Diego with his wife and two daughters.  Please come and enjoy the evening with us.  Mr. Elster’s presentation is a MUST for all writers and logophiles.  We are most fortunate to have him as our guest speaker.  For additional information check out his website: http://members.authorsguild.net/chelster/.

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