Ester Village Library

Open hours
2025-02-22 13:00 - 16:00, 2025-02-27 16:00 - 19:00, 2025-04-22 16:00 - 19:00, 2025-05-01 16:00 - 19:00, 2025-05-08 16:00 - 19:00, 2025-05-10 13:00 - 16:00, 2025-06-04 17:00 - 19:00 (America/Anchorage)

Book Club
2025-03-01 15:00 - 16:30 | Clausen Cabin, 3629 Main Street, Ester, 99725
Siddhartha, by Herman Hesse
When Herman Hesse visited India in the early days of the 20th century, he was captivated by the people, their customs, their culture, and their religion. On returning to Germany, he wrote a masterpiece on a young man’s search for identity and meaning in a civilization that has lost its way. Loosely based on the early life of the Buddha, the book documents the journey of self-discovery and spiritual awakening of a character called Siddhartha.
The name Siddhartha was the one the Buddha was known by before his renunciation. Siddhartha in Sanskrit is translated as “Siddha” (achieved) and “artha” (what was searched for). The novel follows Siddhartha from a life of comfort of privilege to his quest for truth in a world plagued by sorrow and suffering.
The themes of Siddhartha are universal in that they are an account of a young person’s search for meaning — one that all readers can relate to. As Hesse skillfully takes us on a journey, he uses his poetic prose to challenge our preconceived notions of what a spiritual life and meaningful self-enrichment entail. Blind adherence to all systems of belief is shunned in favor of living in the moment and appreciating its ever-changing nature. Generations of readers have and will continue to find wisdom in the pages of Siddhartha.

Board of Directors Meeting
2025-04-23 18:30 - 20:00
Planning meeting for Spring Fundraiser

Writing Circle
2025-04-27 16:00 - 18:00 | Clausen Cabin, 3629 Main Street, Ester, 99725
Join us for some quiet time.

Board of Directors Meeting
2025-04-28 18:30 - 20:30

Knit Night and Open Hours
2025-04-29 15:00 - 19:00 | Clausen Cabin, 3629 Main Street, Ester, 99725

Adult Book Club
2025-05-03 15:00 - 16:30
We’ll be discussing James, by Percival Everett.
When the enslaved Jim overhears that he is about to be sold to a man in New Orleans, separated from his wife and daughter forever, he decides to hide on nearby Jackson Island until he can formulate a plan. Meanwhile, Huck Finn has faked his own death to escape his violent father, recently returned to town. As all readers of American literature know, thus begins the dangerous and transcendent journey by raft down the Mississippi River toward the elusive and too-often-unreliable promise of the Free States and beyond.
While many narrative set pieces of Adventures of Huckleberry Finn remain in place (floods and storms, stumbling across both unexpected death and unexpected treasure in the myriad stopping points along the river’s banks, encountering the scam artists posing as the Duke and Dauphin…), Jim’s agency, intelligence and compassion are shown in a radically new light.
Brimming with the electrifying humor and lacerating observations that have made Everett a “literary icon” (Oprah Daily), and one of the most decorated writers of our lifetime, James is destined to be a cornerstone of twenty-first century American literature.

Spring FUNdRAISER
2025-05-03 19:00 - 23:00 | Golden Eagle Saloon, 3530 Main Steet, Fairbanks, 99709, United States
Come on out to the Library’s annual Spring FUNdRAISER! 7:00 PM-11:00 PM, Saturday May 3, 2025 at the Golden Eagle Saloon.
We’ll have a live band, lots of things to auction off (silent auction), such as a round trip fly and drive tour to the Arctic Circle, a Stan Stephens cruise to Meares Glacier, Alaska Railroad tickets, restaurants, and much, much more!

Writing Circle/Open hours
2025-05-04 16:00 - 18:00 | Clausen Cabin, 3629 Main Street, Ester, 99725

Knit Night/Open Hours
2025-05-06 15:00 - 19:00, 2025-08-05 16:00 - 19:00

Children's Book Club
2025-05-10 14:30 - 16:00, 2025-05-24 14:30 - 16:00

Adult Book Club
2025-06-07 15:00 - 16:30
Title to be announced!

Adult Book Club
2025-08-02 15:00 - 16:30 | Clausen Cabin, 3629 Main Street, Ester, 99725
This month’s selection: Half the Sky: Turning Oppression into Opportunity for Women Worldwide, by Nicholas D. Kristof
From Amazon: With Pulitzer Prize winners Nicholas D. Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn as our guides, we undertake an odyssey through Africa and Asia to meet the extraordinary women struggling there, among them a Cambodian teenager sold into sex slavery and an Ethiopian woman who suffered devastating injuries in childbirth. Drawing on the breadth of their combined reporting experience, Kristof and WuDunn depict our world with anger, sadness, clarity, and, ultimately, hope.
They show how a little help can transform the lives of women and girls abroad. That Cambodian girl eventually escaped from her brothel and, with assistance from an aid group, built a thriving retail business that supports her family. The Ethiopian woman had her injuries repaired and in time became a surgeon. A Zimbabwean mother of five, counseled to return to school, earned her doctorate and became an expert on AIDS.
Through these stories, Kristof and WuDunn help us see that the key to economic progress lies in unleashing women’s potential. They make clear how so many people have helped to do just that, and how we can each do our part. Throughout much of the world, the greatest unexploited economic resource is the female half of the population. Countries such as China have prospered precisely because they emancipated women and brought them into the formal economy. Unleashing that process globally is not only the right thing to do; it’s also the best strategy for fighting poverty.
Deeply felt, pragmatic, and inspirational, Half the Sky is essential reading for every global citizen.

Paint-in
2025-08-07 18:00 - 20:00 | Clausen Cabin, 3629 Main Street, Ester, 99725
Come join us for an adult paint workshop!

Monthly Board Meeting
2025-08-25 18:30 - 20:30 | Clausen Cabin, 3629 Main Street, Ester, 99725

Adult paint workshop
2025-09-04 18:00 - 20:00 | Clausen Cabin, 3629 Main Street, Ester, 99725
Join us for some fun times painting whatever your heart desires!

Adult Book Club
2025-09-06 15:00 - 16:00 | Clausen Cabin, 3629 Main Street, Ester, 99725
The Sisters Brothers, by Patrick deWitt
From Amazon:
Hermann Kermit Warm is going to die. The enigmatic and powerful man known only as the Commodore has ordered it, and his henchmen, Eli and Charlie Sisters, will make sure of it. Though Eli doesn’t share his brother’s appetite for whiskey and killing, he’s never known anything else. But their prey isn’t an easy mark, and on the road from Oregon City to Warm’s gold-mining claim outside Sacramento, Eli begins to question what he does for a living-and whom he does it for.
With The Sisters Brothers, Patrick deWitt pays homage to the classic Western, transforming it into an unforgettable comic tour de force. Filled with a remarkable cast of characters-losers, cheaters, and ne’er-do-wells from all stripes of life-and told by a complex and compelling narrator, it is a violent, lustful odyssey through the underworld of the 1850s frontier that beautifully captures the humor, melancholy, and grit of the Old West and two brothers bound by blood, violence, and love.

Lynda Sather, local author, presentation
2025-09-06 16:00 - 17:00
Join us to hear local author Lynda Sather talk about her latest book,” A Smack of Jellyfish: Fear, Fish and Finding Yourself in Alaska”, a coming-of-age story about a young woman experiencing Petersburg, Alaska for the first time in 1973.
This will be a 20-minute talk about her book, and the process of writing fiction versus memoir, followed by a Q & A session afterwards.
Here is more of a description of the book:
A Smack of Jellyfish

Back to School Ice Cream Social
2025-09-08 15:00 - 18:00 | Clausen Cabin, 3629 Main Street, Ester, 99725
Join us this week for ice cream!

Annual Fall Garlic Sale
2025-09-13 12:00 - 14:00 | Clausen Cabin, 3629 Main Street, Ester, 99725

Kid's art and crafts
2025-09-15 15:00 - 18:00

LiBerry Pie and Music Festival
2025-09-27 14:00 - 22:00 | Golden Eagle Saloon, 3530 Main Steet, Fairbanks, 99709, United States
Join us for our annual Fall fundraiser and pie throwdown!
Pie competition begins with entries being brought to the Clausen Cabin at 2:00PM, with pies being judged at 4:00 PM. There are 2 categories: sweet and savory, with a winner being crowned in each category and a grand prize champion.
Pies for sale ($5/slice) can be brought over to the Golden Eagle beginning at 5:00, with the pie sales and music beginning at 6:00PM. Non-winning pies will also be sold for $5/slice.
The three winning pies will be live auctioned off at 8:00PM.
Join us for a night of pie eating and fun!
