
Upcoming Events
Library Peeps Diorama Contest

Celebrate your library lead

Grow your reader at the lib
It's time to play!
Welcome to Play and Explore!
Disclaimer(s)
Library Consent Statement for Photography and Video
Programs, events, and daily happenings sponsored by Handley Regional Library System may be photographed or recorded. Attendance at any sponsored program, event or general library use constitutes the consent of all attendees and the consent of the parents or legal guardians of any minor children in attendance, to the future broadcast, publication, and other use of photography or videos at the sole direction of Handley Regional Library System.
Photography Notification
While we do allow professional photography inside the property of Handley Regional Library System, we do ask that we are notified ahead of time of photoshoots at 540.662.9041 x 25. Photography activities may be limited to specific areas due to reserved use and cannot impede any patron activity using the library.
Come play games, color, and hangout with friends!
Board games, coloring sheets and colored pencils, and LEGO bricks will be available, or bring your own activities!
Ages 6-11.
Disclaimer(s)
Library Consent Statement for Photography and Video
Programs, events, and daily happenings sponsored by Handley Regional Library System may be photographed or recorded. Attendance at any sponsored program, event or general library use constitutes the consent of all attendees and the consent of the parents or legal guardians of any minor children in attendance, to the future broadcast, publication, and other use of photography or videos at the sole direction of Handley Regional Library System.
Join us for our evening Book Club at 6 pm on the first Thursday of the month at Clarke County Library!
Hooks and needles and fiber, oh my!
What's New

Say Cheese! Check out our photograph collection at Archives After Hours
Did you know that Stewart Bell Jr. Archives has over 25,000 photographs housed in its collection? It’s true! These photographs represent a diverse look at our community and its people throughout the years. The oldest photographs date to the early years of mass photographic technology in the 1850s, and the latest photographs date to the 2020s. Within those one hundred and seventy years, a lot of local events, places, and people have been documented through photography.

Finding your Ancestors in the U.S. Federal Census
A key source of information while researching your family history is the U.S. Census. It can provide you with information about where your ancestors lived, when they were born, what they did for employment, and where their families came from. However, the records are not perfect and require some basic understanding of how to read the documents.

Exciting News: We're Launching a Brand!
If you’ve spent much time at the Handley Library branch lately, you’ve likely seen this logo in a few places when you’re on the children’s floor. This is the logo for our new brand that we are launching this spring: Grow a Reader! This brand is something we have been working on for a long time, and we are so excited to bring it to life starting this month.
What to Watch
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Afraid
- Curtis and his family are selected to test a revolutionary new home device: a digital family assistant called AIA. Taking smart home to the next level, once the unit and all its sensors and cameras are installed in their home, AIA seems able to do it all. She learns the family's behaviors and begins to anticipate their needs. And she can make sure nothing - and no one - gets in her family's way.
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The Outrun
- Based on the best-selling memoir by Amy Liptrot, The Outrun is set in the otherworldly Orkney Islands of Scotland. A brutally honest drama about addiction and recovery, strength and survival, mental health and the ability of the sea, the land and of people to restore life and renew hope. After a decade away in London, 29-year-old Rona returns home to the Orkney Islands. Sober but lonely, she tries to suppress her memory of the events which set her on this journey of recovery. Slowly the mystical land enters her inner world and one day at a time Rona finds hope and strength in herself among the heavy gales and the bracingly cold sea.
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Dogfight [blu-ray]
- An ineffably bittersweet portrait of youth in the 1960s, Nancy Savoca's funny, sensitive tale of love and war etches two vividly alive characters: aspiring San Francisco folk singer Rose and hotheaded, Vietnam-bound marine Eddie, who meet on the occasion of a cruelly misogynistic party where men compete to bring the most unattractive dates they can find. But what begins as a night to forget unexpectedly develops into something far more meaningful.
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Anora
- Contemporary cinema's foremost chronicler of American dreamers and schemers hustling on the margins of capitalist promise, Sean Baker, reaches new heights of mastery with this audacious anti Cinderella story a whirlwind neorealist screwball comedy with an aching heart. In an electric, star-is-born performance, Mikey Madison soars as Anora, an enterprising, ferociously foulmouthed Brooklyn erotic dancer and sex worker whose Prince Not-So-Charming comes along in the form of a Russian oligarch's wild-child son.
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The Elephants and the Grass
- Shamira Muhammed and her mother face a life-or-death decision in war-torn South Sudan, opting to trek 100 miles through harsh terrain to reach safety in a Ugandan refugee camp. The doc also recounts the ongoing struggle for peace in a country ravaged by one of the deadliest conflicts since WWII.
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High Noon [blu-ray]
- A Marshall, personally compelled to face a returning deadly enemy, finds that his own town refuses to help him.
- Originally released as a motion picture in 1952.
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September 5
- September 5 unveils the decisive moment that forever changed media coverage and continues to impact live news today. Set during the 1972 Munich Summer Olympics, the film follows an American sports broadcasting team that quickly adapted from sports reporting to live coverage of the Israeli athletes taken hostage. Through this lens, September 5 provides a powerful new perspective on the live broadcast seen globally by an estimated one billion people at the time.
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Long Distance Swimmer : Sara Mardini
- Sara Mardini, once a competitive swimmer in Syria, became Europe's most celebrated refugee after saving 18 people's lives. After working as a rescue volunteer in the Mediterranean, she is accused of people smuggling and faces a 25-year prison sentence. We follow her fight for justice and journey of self-discovery against the backdrop of Europe's refugee 'crisis.'
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The Substance
- Demi Moore gives the career-best performance as Elisabeth Sparkle, a former A-lister fired from her fitness TV show by studio head Harvey. She is drawn to The Substance. All it takes is one injection and she is reborn as the gorgeous Sue.
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Girlfight [blu-ray]
- Bullied by her father at home and feeling adrift at school, Diana Guzman finds refuge in an unexpected pocket of her native Brooklyn, a timeworn boxing gym, where she learns to channel her strength, discovers a sense of community, and falls for a rival fighter. In Karyn Kusama's raw, understated feature debut, Rodriguez commands the screen with both tightly coiled intensity and deep wells of vulnerability as a young woman hitting back at society's expectations and her own personal demons. Capturing the full emotional weight of Diana's journey and the kinetic thrill of bodies in motion, Kusama crafts a singularly uncompromising story of self-realization.
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Sight
- Sight, starring Greg Kinnear and Terry Chen, follows the inspiring true story of Ming Wang, an impoverished Chinese prodigy who flees Communist China to become a pioneering eye surgoen in America. When tasked with restoring the sight of an orphan who was blinded by her step mother, he must confront the trauma of living through a violent uprising in his youth, the Cultural Revolution.
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Transformers One
- The untold origin story of Optimus Prime and Megatron. Known as sworn enemies, once they were friends bonded like brothers who changed the fate of Cybertron forever. The first-ever fully CG-animated Transformers movie.
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Nosferatu
- A gothic tale of obsession between a haunted young woman and the terrifying vampire infatuated with her, causing untold horror in its wake.
- Inspired by the screenplay "Nosferatu" by Henrik Galeen and the novel "Dracula" by Bram Stoker.
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Terraforma
- TerraForma is the story of the remote desert island of Ascension: for a million years entirely devoid of life, but it was engineered by the process of 'terraforming' into a tropical paradise. It is also the story of what that transformation may mean for the fate of our planet, in a future when terraformed landscapes and human-engineered environments may come to warp our understanding of nature itself.
Staff Picks
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Murder runs in the family
- Amber Winslow's life has taken a serious turn for the worse. When an impulsive decision forces her to flee her former life carrying nothing but the clothes on her back, she heads to the sunny state of Arizona...and to the luxury accommodations of her grandmother's retirement community. But as soon as she sneaks her things into Seven Ponds-a place she technically doesn't qualify for and definitely can't afford-she finds that her Grandma Jade is about to be arrested for murder. With the help of the other retirees and her grandma's true crime podcast friends, Amber must work to find the real killer.
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The retirement plan : a novel
- Three middle-aged best friends turn to murder in order to collect on their husbands' life insurance policies...but are unaware that their husbands have a devious plan of their own, in this darkly funny debut perfect for fans of Thursday Murder Club and Everyone in My Family Has Killed Someone.
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The last great heir
- Rival heirs, Merriment and Rue, prepare for a customary duel on their thirteenth birthday to determine the next ruler, but a shared enemy compels them to work together to save their loved ones.
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The close-up : a novel
- A struggling author in Los Angeles discovers the dark side of fame when a stalker begins reenacting violent events from her thriller in this electrifying and twisty novel.
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Bearer of bad news : a novel
- For someone who hates secrets, Las Vegas hairdresser Lucy Rey is about to be faced with a whole bunch of them. After discovering that her fiancé has been cheating on her with someone from his improv class, Lucy finds herself short on funds and desperate for a change of scenery. Enter a most unusual job opportunity: a Bearer of Bad News. Sure, it's a little weird, but Lucy's employer is wealthy beyond compare, so who can blame her for wanting to outsource? Despite the few details, and the fact that the bad news sounds more like a vaguely worded threat, Lucy can't say no to the perks: an-all-expenses-paid trip to the Italian Dolomites plus a generous bonus if she proves she's found her client's sister and delivered the message. Then she learns that her mission is just the tip of the iceberg. Launched into a world of betrayal and greed involving eighty-year-old secrets, stolen jewels, and a World War II-era mystery, Lucy is in way over her head. And she's connected to this story in ways she never could have imagined. For fans of Gail Honeyman's ELEANOR OLIPHANT IS COMPLETELY FINE and Kirstin Chen's COUNTERFEIT, BEARER OF BAD NEWS is an exhilarating romp that deftly explores the weight of secrets, the power of friendship, and how, by healing the wounds of the past, we can build a brighter tomorrow.
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Needy little things
- Seventeen-year-old Sariyah, who can sense people's immediate needs, must use her ability to solve her friend's mysterious disappearance while dealing with family challenges and avoiding the same danger that befell her friend.
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Sweet Fury
- Lila Crayne is America's sweetheart: she's generous and kind, gorgeous and magnetic. She and her fiancé, visionary filmmaker Kurt Royall, have settled into a stunning new West Village apartment and are set to begin filming their feminist adaptation of Fitzgerald's Tender Is the Night. To prepare for the leading role, Lila begins working with charming and accomplished therapist Jonah Gabriel to dig into the trauma of her past. Soon, Lila's impeccably manicured life begins to unravel on the therapy couch--and Jonah is just the man to pick up the pieces. But everyone has a secret, and no one is quite who they seem. A twisty, thought-provoking novel of construction and deconstruction in conversation with the works of F. Scott Fitzgerald and told through the lens of the film industry, Sweet Fury is an incisive and bold critique of America's deep-rooted misogyny. With this novel, Bischoff examines the narratives we tell ourselves, and what happens when we co-opt others into those stories; and she probes the blurred lines between victim and perpetrator and the true meaning of justice.
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The voice we find
- Sophie Wilder needs a way out of a dysfunctional family situation, and August Tate is searching for a way to support his hard-of-hearing sister. As they work together on a series of audiobooks, their initial conflict slowly grows into a romance, but they will both need to listen to the voices of others-and find the strength in their own.
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Dragons of Fate: A Dungeons & Dragons Novel
- A clash of powerful magical forces sets off the Graygem of Gargath, sending Destina Rosethorn and her companions deeper into the past than she intended—to the age of Huma Dragonsbane and the Third Dragon War. Now, with the Device of Time Journeying shattered, they must find another way back to their own era before the Graygem irrevocably alters history and the Third Dragon War ends in defeat for the forces of good.
- A clash of powerful magical forces sets off the Graygem of Gargath, sending Destina Rosethorn and her companions deeper into the past than she intended—to the age of Huma Dragonsbane and the Third Dragon War. Now, with the Device of Time Journeying shattered, they must find another way back to their own era before the Graygem irrevocably alters history and the Third Dragon War ends in defeat for the forces of good.
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I think I was murdered
- A grieving young widow. The AI program that allows her to continue to "talk" to him. And a message she never expected: "I think I was murdered.
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Everything is poison
- Sixteen-year-old Carmela Tofana finally gains access to her mother's apothecary in early 17th-century Rome, where she discovers that alongside healing remedies are dangerous potions that can change women's lives.
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Realm of ice and sky : triumph, tragedy, and history's greatest Arctic rescue
- National Outdoor Book Award-winning author Buddy Levy's thrilling narrative of polar exploration via airship--and the men who sacrificed everything to make history. Arctic explorer and American visionary Walter Wellman pioneered both polar and trans-Atlantic airship aviation, making history's first attempts at each. Wellman has been cast as a self-promoting egomaniac known mostly for his catastrophic failures. Instead he was a courageous innovator who pushed the boundaries of polar exploration and paved the way for the ultimate conquest of the North Pole--which would be achieved not by dogsled or airplane, but by airship. American explorer Dr. Frederick Cook was the first to claim he made it to the North Pole in 1908. A year later, so did American Robert Peary, but both Cook's and Peary's claims had been seriously questioned. There was enough doubt that Norwegian explorer extraordinaire Roald Amundsen--who'd made history and a name for himself by being first to sail through the Northwest Passage and first man to the South Pole-picked up where Walter Wellman left off, attempting to fly to the North Pole by airship. He would go in the Norge, designed by Italian aeronautical engineer Umberto Nobile. The 350-foot Norge flew over the North Pole on May 12, 1926, and Amundsen was able to accurately record and verify their exact location. However, the engineer Nobile felt slighted by Amundsen. Two years later, Nobile returned, this time in the Italia, backed by Prime Minister Benito Mussolini. This was an Italian enterprise, and Nobile intended to win back the global accolades and reputation he believed Amundsen had stripped from him. The journey ended in disaster, death, and accusations of cannibalism, launching one of the great rescue operations the world had ever seen. Realm of Ice and Sky is the thrilling narrative of polar exploration via airship--and the men who sacrificed everything to make history.
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The tainted cup
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King of Envy
- He had everything he could’ve wanted…except her.
- Dangerous. Powerful. Reclusive.
- Vuk Markovic is notorious for shunning human interactions. The scarred billionaire rarely talks, and he has no interest in relationships outside his small but trusted circle.
- His only exception? Her. The beauty to his beast, the object of his obsession.
- He saw her first. He wanted her first. But now, she’s engaged to his oldest friend—and the closer the wedding looms, the more he’s torn between loyalty and desire.
- She should be his…and he might just risk it all to have her.
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The dividing sky
- In 2460, eighteen-year-old Liv Newman dreams of a future beyond her lower-class life in the Metro. As a Proxy, she uses the neurochip in her brain to sell memories to wealthy clients. Maybe a few illegally, but money equals freedom. So when a customer offers her a ludicrous sum to go on an assignment in no-man's-land, Liv accepts. Now she just has to survive. Rookie Forceman Adrian Rao believes in order over all. After discovering that a renegade Proxy s shady dealings are messing with citizens brain chemistry, he vows to extinguish the threat. But when he tracks Liv down, there s one problem: her memories are gone. Can Adrian bring himself to condemn her for crimes she doesn t remember?