I ♥ Books

In honor of Valentine’s Day, I’m looking at books in our collection that are about the human heart—whether it’s literal or metaphorical.

The Little Heart Book by Douglas Wetherill and illustrated by Laura L. Seeley (ISBN 1892807017, call number RC681 .L55 1998) is little indeed, but it serves as a good introduction to learning about the title organ, including its anatomy and risk factors and prevention.

You can find other books on the heart by using the online catalog (http://ihelib.blogspot.com/2012/01/how-do-i-use-our-online-catalog-to-find.html) or by browsing the bookshelves.  You can find books on internal medicine in the RC section of the bookshelves; books on the cardiovascular system have call numbers between RC666 and RC701.  For titles about electrocardiographs, which you will need to know about if you are in the Medical Assisting or EKG program, look at the many books by the call number RC683.5.E5, especially if you’d like to use a book other than your textbook to help you understand what you are learning about in class.  For books on arrhythmias and disrhythmias, browse the library shelves by the nearby call number RC685.A65.  You may even be in a situation when you’ll have to give immediate urgent care to someone having heart problems, so consider looking for books between RC86 and RC88.9—the range for books about medical emergencies.

Of course, when some people say they want to read about the heart, they mean something else entirely.  We have some romantic books in our library as well, from classics like William Shakespeare’s Antony and Cleopatra (PR2802.A2 B73 1999) to contemporary novels like A. S. Bryant’s Possession:  A Romance (PR6052.Y2 P6 1991).  Try different terms in our catalog such as love, heart, romance, or anything else.  If you don’t want romance, try other searching for other genres, such as science fiction, fantasy, horror, historical fiction, or humor.

Of course, if you’re tired of cupids and valentines, there’s always a very different story about the cardiac organ, Edgar Allen Poe’s “The Telltale Heart.”  You can find this classic psychological horror in our copies of Anthology of American Literature (PS507 .M24 1980) and Complete Stories and Poems of Edgar Allen Poe (PS2600 .F66 1966) and online at http://www.literature.org/authors/poe-edgar-allan/tell-tale-heart.html, courtesy of Literature.org, the Online Literature Library (http://www.literature.org/), or at http://www.gutenberg.org/files/2148/2148-h/2148-h.htm#2H_4_0019, courtesy of Project Gutenberg (http://www.gutenberg.org/wiki/Main_Page).