The Noio Library is located in the lobby of the James & Abigail Campbell Library
Free for the taking:
- “LaRose,” winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award for Fiction.
- “Star Light, Star Bright,” by Katherine Stone, author of 21 novels
- “Victoria,” a historical fiction best-seller by Daisy Goodwin
- “The Diamond Age,” by science fiction writer Neal Stephenson
- “Caring for Our Children,” 2nd edition.
These are books on offer currently in the James & Abigail Campbell Library in a repurposed newspaper stand that has been rendered into a work of art by artist Zoe Liu. Sitting in the library’s lobby, the former newspaper dispenser offers up books for free.
Known as the Noio Library, the dispenser debuted in January with simple instructions: “Take a Book. Leave a Book.” The free offerings have been noticed, with a book on Franklin Delano Roosevelt, “A Nameless Witch” by A. Lee Martinez, “A Pattern of Islands by Arthur Grimble, and “50 Things That Really Matter,” disappearing in the recent days.
Library patrons are encouraged to drop off books directly to the stand, or bring them to the Reference Desk.
This is the first creation in what will become a series of Noio Libraries. The goal of the Noio Library project is to gift repurposed newspaper stands to schools, companies, and other interested parties in our West O‘ahu community.
A noio is a black noddy bird and is is found in the Hawaiian Islands and across the Pacific. Used by fishermen and navigators to signal land or schools of fish, the bird represents a spatial transition since it tends to frequent the area in between land and the deep sea.
“He noio ʻaʻe ʻale no ke kai loa” (A noio that treads over the billows of the distant sea) is used as an expression to describe someone who has outstanding wisdom and skill. Noticing that UH West O’ahu students represent the characteristics of the noio, the James & Abigail Campbell library’s motto is, “He wahi e ulu pono ai ka noio ʻaʻe ʻale kai,” or, a place where the sea-faring noio thrives.