Awful war, good books.

The National World War I Museum and the Kansas City Public Library are encouraging people to mark the centennial of the Great War by reading, or rereading, the novel “All Quiet on the Western Front” by Erich Remarque and the nonfiction work “The Guns of August” by Barbara W. Tuchman.

The collaboration, titled Great War/Great Read, features a series of public programs that will continue through October. It begins at 1 p.m. Sunday at the museum at Liberty Memorial with library director Crosby Kemper III and Linda Trout of the museum.

For more program information, go to theworldwar.org or kclibrary.org.