If you’re like most library patrons, the next few months probably include some sort of out-of-town travel for the holidays. Eggnog and family and colorful lights are swell, but what if that requested item you’ve been waiting weeks for becomes available while you’re gone?

Don’t fret! There is an option available to prevent this potential scenario: you can suspend a reservation request during the time you are out of town or otherwise unable to pick up items. Suspending a reservation keeps your place in line for the hold when your request is reactivated. This option is only available for item requests that haven’t yet been fulfilled.

To suspend a reservation request go to the Requests page of your online account and click on the box associated with the hold(s) you would like to suspend. Once you have selected the items, scroll down to the bottom of the page and select the “Suspend/Reactivate Selected” button. A new page will load confirming the suspension and requesting a reactivation date. Enter your reactivation date into the field and click on “Submit.”

If you do not have access to your online account you can call the library and staff will place the suspension for you.

Keep in mind that Bookmobiles will not run from December 24 through January 2. During this time any holds tagged for Bookmobile services that become available will be located in the holds pick-up room at the main library. Once the Bookmobiles are back on schedule the holds will return to their regularly scheduled stops. Any Bookmobile holds that become available during the off week will still be held for two weeks worth of Bookmobile stops once service resumes.

For investigative reporter Liam Mulligan the fires are more than just a story. It’s personal since he grew up there and knows the people of the neighborhood. With no one really looking into the case, it becomes Mulligan’s obsession though it makes him a target as well. In Rogue Island by Bruce DeSilva the death toll mounts, especially as Mulligan gets closer to the truth.

Hundreds of years before, Nairn failed to pass the test of the Three Trials of Bone Plain leaving him cursed and immortal. Enough time has passed that Nairn’s story is like a fairy tale. Phelan thinks the story is only an allegory, and he doesn’t believe there was the Bone Plain or any magic in the words that the bard sang much less true immortality. Though when the bard Kelda arrives, Phelan begins to question his own belief.

Kelda is wonderful at his song and music even able to bring his audience to tears, but there is something very ominous about the bard as well. The position of Royal Bard has suddenly opened up and it seems that Kelda should be able to win the competition hands down, but Phelan wants to know the truth behind the menacing Kelda and the legends in The Bards of Bone Plain by Patricia A. McKillip. The two stories intertwine between Nairn’s failure and Phelan’s riddles in this descriptive, gentle fantasy.

A lot has happened in ten years, but perhaps the greatest change was in Alice herself. She was more relaxed, innocent, and even naïve, while the 39 year old Alice seems to be the complete opposite. In What Alice Forgot by Liane Moriarty, Alice is determined to rewrite the present to fit the past. It isn’t going to be easy especially since she has no idea who her children are or why she is getting a divorce. An entertaining novel that brings back memories and forces the questions of who we were, where we have gone, and where we are going.

Inspector Harry Hole of the Oslo Police begins the investigation of the missing woman whose scarf adorned the snowman. It’s treated as a missing person’s case but Harry thinks it is something much bigger. Though he is accused of seeking the limelight, he ignores the accusations and begins to investigate the possibility that the missing woman might be the victim of a serial killer.

A serial killer may have escaped notice until now in Jo Nesbø’s The Snowman. A thrilling mystery with both action and a trail of clues that leads to an explosive conclusion. This is the seventh book in the series and some of the previous cases are mentioned in this book, though this book can be read alone. The first book in the series available in English is The Redbreast followed by Nemesis, and The Devil’s Star.