The library will be closed at all locations on Friday, July 4th in observance of Independence Day. Operations will resume on Saturday, July 5th.
The library's temporary locations are at the Beech Street Center and the E.C. Benton Library. For more information, including hours of operation, please click here.

Book Review: Hooky

Hooky by Miriam Bonastre Tur

Hooky is a 3-book fantasy series written and illustrated by Miriam Bonastre Tur. It follows the story of 2 young witch siblings, Dani and Dorian, in a world with magic and witches. Beware, there is budding romance in it. This is also only a review of the first book.
The series starts off with Dani and Dorian missing the bus to magic school and deciding that they will stay with a tutor for the next 9 months. But very early on, the story kind of strays from that topic because the twins then proceed to accidentally steal a dragon egg and make enemies of powerful witches in the first few chapters. What’s even weirder is that they don’t seem to be that bothered by it in the next few chapters. They also get into interesting, but dangerous situations like for example almost getting burned at the stake and making friends with princess Monica of one of the non-magic kingdoms opposed to magic. But besides that fact, things are doing okay for them for the most part as they had made a few more friends like Nico, a town troublemaker and former apprentice of the Soothsayer (a.k.a Master Pendragon who they have been staying with) and Mark, a waiter at a local cafe who has a history with Nico.
Throughout the story they have a lot of hijinks which strain the group relationship at times. Oh! And there is a prophecy that one of the siblings will become the ruler of the witches. Overall, it’s a good story with very interesting characters and their dynamics with other characters. It has a few moments which really pulled at my heartstrings and made me almost want to cry because of how sad they are.

Reviewed by Teen Volunteer, 6/26/2025.

New Mobile App is Live!

Check out the new library app with new features – Minuteman Mobile!

The new app is streamlined, easy to use, and incorporates lots of user experience improvements. Now you can search the catalog, manage your account, place holds, and access eBooks and audiobooks more easily than ever before – all from your mobile device. The Minuteman Mobile app is available now in both the Apple App Store and Google Play Store and is replacing the previous Minuteman Library Network app by June 1st.

Python Programming Returns!

Join us on Thursday, May 22nd for Introducing Computer Graphics to the Blind Viewer, One Pixel at a Time. 

Instructor and Python guru Charles (Ray) Smith will describe and demonstrate methods available to aid the completely visually impaired in discovering the world of simple computer graphics. While initial interest and work was concerned with the teaching of computer programming to the visually impaired, the results may be useful to a larger community. The presentation will demonstrate several simple figures created by simple python programs plus the extensions we produced to give the visually impaired a view of these figures.

Registration is required. Please register by visiting this link.

Join the Sunflower Challenge!

The 3rd annual Belmont Public Library Sunflower Challenge, inspired by legendary local gardener Elvira Repetti, is back! For over 65 years Elvira planted sunflower seeds locally each spring – and you can do the same!

Once your sunflowers start to bloom, send us pictures of them and we’ll share them far and wide. Send pictures to [email protected] or tag @belmontlibma on Facebook or Instagram on your own post to share the love.

Book Review: Delicious in Dungeon

Delicious in Dungeon by Ryoko Kui

Request It!

Delicious in Dungeon finally answers the question that has plagued fantasy genre lovers for so many years. Can you eat the monsters? Delicious in Dungeon answers yes, you can. Delicious in Dungeon (shortened after this point to D in D) is a fantasy Manga series illustrated and written by Ryoko Kui. In it, a group of adventurers has to make their way through a massive dungeon that takes days to finish to save one of their teammates. Because they don’t have any food, they must kill and cook the monsters that attack them to survive.

This review will be specifically only for the first volume, which is the first three chapters plus some bonus content. I have not read the other volumes, so I can’t comment on the manga as a whole, just this volume. This is also not a review of the anime adaptation. Warning: There will be some very minor spoilers beyond this point. 

The main hook of D in D is the main character, Liaos, and his group of adventurers fighting a dragon. During the fight, Liaos’ sister is eaten by the dragon, and the rest of the group is teleported out of the dungeon by a spell. Weirdly, the group seems to care little about actually saving Liaos’ sister. They get sidetracked often, even though they are on a time-sensitive mission. Even Liaos himself seems more invested in trying to kill monsters to eat than trying to save his sister. But despite that, the group doesn’t come across as uncaring or unlikable. Liaos is wonderfully weird. His first thought when fighting a monster is “Can I eat this?”?. He uses his encyclopedic knowledge of monsters’ anatomy to strike at their weak spots and exploit their behaviors, but despite all of his weirdness, he has a heart of gold. He is supportive of his teammates and is empathetic enough to know when they need help. Even though his obsession with monsters is borderline deranged, he is a good team leader. Senshi, the dwarf, also brings a lot to the team. He is skilled in cooking dead monsters, and through the manga, he cooks a variety of delicious meals using monster parts. Dwarfs in fantasy often can trend into stereotypes, but Senshi cooking makes him distinct from your average dwarf character. 

By contrast, Chilchuck the rogue and Marcille the wizard don’t have much to do; Liaos and Senshi’s knowledge of killing and eating monsters is much more useful than Marcille’s magic or Chilchuck’s lockpicking skills. Even when it feels like Marcille’s magic should be useful, it backfires on her. On top of Marcille’s magic, there are multiple jokes about how her trying to do something only for it not to work, to the point it feels kind of mean. Chilcuck is good at disarming traps, but that happens only once. Overpowered characters aren’t fun, but underpowered characters aren’t fun either. My favorite teams in stories are ones where every character brings something to the team, but Chilcuck and Marcille are mostly useless.

Overall, the jokes in D in D are decent but not great. Mostly, it’s jokes about Liaos’ weird obsessions with monsters and how cooking monsters is a funny idea. While the jokes do get a bit repetitive, the delivery is good enough for me to laugh out loud a few times.  But the real highlight of D in D is the cooking.  It delivers on its monster-eating concept wonderfully with dishes that look both tasty and gross. The monster cooking is enhanced by weirdly in-depth drawings of the anatomy of the monsters. There was a lot of thought put into how to make different monsters’ scientifically plausible biology. For example, instead of being magic, living armor in D in D is animated by a hive of hermit crab-like slugs that use armor as shelter. The thought put into the monsters’ biology sets the monsters in D in D apart from monsters in other stories and breathes new life into tired tropes.  

Overall, I liked D in D. It was funny and is different from anything else I have read so far. It’s worth a read if you’re into comedy or if you’re looking for a story that brings a few new twists to the fantasy genre. The first book is available at the Belmont Public Library. The television adaption is also available on Netflix at time of writing.

Reviewed by Teen Volunteer, 5/4/2025.

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