Mountain Views News          Saturday, July 25, 2015

Mountain Views-News Saturday, July 25, 2015 
3 
FRIENDS OF THE SIERRA MADRE LIBRARY 
“BEST USED BOOK SALE” 
Mountain Views-News Saturday, July 25, 2015 
3 
FRIENDS OF THE SIERRA MADRE LIBRARY 
“BEST USED BOOK SALE” 
Walking Sierra Madre…The Social Side

by Deanne Davis 

The Friends of the Sierra Madre Libraryannounces that the August Best Used BookSale will be held on Friday, August 7, from 3:00


7:00 p.m. and on Saturday, August 8 from 10:00a.m.-2:00 p.m. at the library located at 440 WestSierra Madre Blvd in Sierra Madre. 
Featured will be a variety of Back-to-Schoolitems, including reference volumes and teacherresources and materials. In addition, there will 
be a huge collection of nearly new children’sbooks from 25 cents - $3.00. We also have a 
large collection of recently donated pristinequilting and craft books.

For the first time ever, SATURDAY ONLY, 
we will be having a HALF-PRICE SALE on theshelves in the Basement (Not on the Table Books,
sorry!) We are overloaded with contemporary 

novels, mysteries, biographies and cookbooks.
This will be a great opportunity to add to yourcollections in every genre. Look at our DVDs 
and Audio Books, too. They will also be HALFPRICE 
on Saturday.

The parking lot will have our ever-popularBargain Books for only $1.00 each, togetherwith small paperbacks for 25 cents each or5/$1.00.

Come early for the best selection on Friday.
Come back Saturday for even more bargains!

The Friends of the Sierra Madre Library isa non-profit organization and all proceedsbenefit the Sierra Madre Library. For 
more information visit our website at www. 
sierramadrelibraryfriends.org, or call the 
library at 626 355-7186. 

SIERRA MADRE POLICE BLOTTER 


During the week of Sunday, July 13th, to Sunday,
July 19th, the Sierra Madre Police Departmentresponded to approximately 288 calls for service. 

Wednesday, July 15th

 At 7:08 am, Sierra Madre Police responded tothe 2000 block of Santa Anita Avenue regardinga stolen vehicle. Upon arrival, Officers wereinformed by the victim that the night beforeat around 7:00 pm, he parked and securedhis vehicle in his driveway. The followingmorning while his wife was leaving to work, shediscovered the vehicle was missing. The victimwas in possession of all the vehicle keys and didnot give any one permission to drive his vehicle.
Officers investigated the area and did not seeany signs of broken glass. This case has beenforwarded to the Detective Bureau. 

At 6:21 pm, Sierra Madre Police respondedto the station lobby regarding a fraud report.
Officers were informed by the victim that she 

had noticed unauthorized charges on her debitcard. One charge was placed in Granada Hillsat a grocery store, while another charge wasplaced at a clothing store in Camarillo totalingover $1,000. This case has been forwarded to 
the Detective Bureau. 

Sunday, July 19th

At 11:58 am, Sierra Madre Police respondedto the 1900 block of Liliano Drive regardinga theft report. Officers were informed by thevictim that the night before, she had left herbicycle in front of her house unlocked. Thefollowing morning she discovered her bike wasmissing. Officers searched the area and wereunable to locate any clues as to when or how thebike was stolen. This case has been forwarded 
to the Detective Bureau. 


“I like zombie movies. I like “The Walking Dead,” I 
like the metaphor of it, simply because if we go with 
the zombie concept – if you’re bitten by a zombie, you 
don’t transform into something else like a vampire or 
a werewolf or whatever. You become something that’s 
not you.” 
Marilyn Manson (Huh?) 

I met the coolest guy today, a prominent figure around 
Sierra Madre on Halloween, being the go-to guy for 
the Halloween shows at the Sierra Madre Playhouse. 
He introduced himself as Val Lewton, head of 
Vanity Productions – Zombie Players Associated. 
He confessed he’s not really Val Lewton, my guy is 
channeling the original Val. Who’s Val Lewton? Only 
the best B horror movie producer ever! The original 
(the real) Val Lewton lived from1904 to 1951. Born 
in what is now the Ukraine, Val and his mother 
immigrated to the United States in 1909. Starting 
his career as a journalist, Val lost his job as society 
reporter for the Darien-Stamford Review at age 16 
(16? Seriously?) when he decided that a nifty little 
story, right out of his imagination, about a truckload 
of kosher chickens dying in a New York heat wave, 
was way more interesting than society in Darien. I’d 
be going with the chicken story, too, as opposed to 
who wore what to the ball! The real Val went on to 
write the best-selling pulp novel No Bed of Her Own, 
in 1932 which was later used for the film No Man of 
Her Own, with Clark Gable and Carole Lombard! 

My Val Lewton, intriguing and mysterious 
entrepreneur that he is, waxed eloquent about his 
borrowed persona’s film career which unleashed upon 
an unsuspecting world such gems as Cat People, I 
Walked With a Zombie, The Leopard Man, The Curse 
of the Cat People, The Body Snatcher, Isle of the 
Dead, Bedlam – the last three featuring, believe it or 
not, Boris Karloff! My new BF, had tears in his eyes as 
he spoke of the highlight of the original Val Lewton’s 
career, when he was named head of the Horror Unit 
at RKO studios in 1942, with two ironclad rules: 
Each film had to come in under a budget of $150,000, 
each was to run 75 minutes. A master of nuanced 
(translate: incredibly cheap) effects, Lewton never 
received the accolades and recognition he deserved. 
Speaking of one effect from The Leopard Man, a 
simple trail of blood seeping under a door reduced 
my Val to silence. The original Val Lewton was one of 
the early Film Noir pioneers, using black and white to 
stunning effect. 

How did I meet the mysterious pseudo-Val 
Lewton? A few weeks ago, before the July 4th parade, 
I saw an ad in the Pasadena Star News stating simply, 
“Zombies Needed To March in the Sierra Madre 4th 
of July Parade – Make-up Artists Needed.” Realizing 
that an urgent need existed for enough zombies to 
make our parade interesting, I mentioned it a couple 
of times in Walking Sierra Madre. Would-be zombies 
galore showed up and we ended up with about 30 of 
them in the parade, looking as ghoulish as possible, 
walking with the classic arms outstretched, one leg 
dragging zombie gait. With that triumph behind 
him, my new friend, Val, who is the genius behind 
the scenes at the Sierra Madre Playhouse Halloween 
shows for the past four or five years, really wanted to 
talk about his plans for Halloween 2015, which will 
be bigger, better, more amazing, more awesome than 
ever before. And, yes, it’s all FREE 

Remember the Time Machine you sawin the parade? You’ll be able to sit in it and have 
your picture taken as you plan your trip back intothe Jurassic Period! Remember War of the Worlds? 
The 1938 radio broadcast by Orson Welles whichproduced mass hysteria throughout the Nation? Ofcourse you don’t remember the original broadcast,
but War of the Worlds is coming back and it will bescarier than ever. Remember Abbott And Costello 
Meet The Zombie? “Costello said to Abbott, I think 
we should beware! Look behind you quickly, there’s azombie over there!” It’s coming back as “Abbott andConsuelo Meet the Zombies!” I realize it’s months till 
Halloween, but when you meet the ultimate zombieexpert, you want to talk about it! For instance, didyou know that zombies have very sensitive digestivesystems? They can’t eat Twinkies without saltwaterand bubblegum. However, Zombie nutritionist,
Dr. Albert Rossum, highly recommended a diet 
of human brains. Val Lewton (currently alive andwell and planning Halloween horrors) declined to 
comment. 

My book page: Amazon.com: Deanne Davis 
Blog: www.authordeanne.com

 “Tablespoon of Love, Tablespoon of Laughter” is 
available there… 
An excellent wedding gift, by the way! 


Mountain Views News 80 W Sierra Madre Blvd. No. 327 Sierra Madre, Ca. 91024 Office: 626.355.2737 Fax: 626.609.3285 Email: editor@mtnviewsnews.com Website: www.mtnviewsnews.com