Monday, August 31, 2009

A Great and Terrible Beauty


A Great and Terrible Beauty (First in the Gemma Doyle Trilogy) by Libba Bray
High school students who enjoy fantacy fiction will delight in the way the girls escape their ordinary lives in Victorian London, for the majical, and occassionalyy dangerous world of the "realms". A Great and Terrible Beauty will especially appeal to teenage girls who are stuggling to create an identity that lets them be comfortable in their own skin. whenyellowleaves
School Library Journal An interesting combination of fantasy, light horror, and historical fiction, with a dash of romance thrown in for good measure. On her 16th birthday, Gemma Doyle fights with her mother. She wants to leave India where her family is living, runs off when her mother refuses to send her to London to school, has a dreadful vision and witnesses her mother's death. Two months later, Gemma is enrolled in London's Spence School, still troubled by visions, and unable to share her grief and guilt over her loss. She gradually learns to control her vision and enter the "realms" where magical powers can make anything happen and where her mother waits to instruct her. Gradually she and her new friends learn about the Order, an ancient group of women who maintained the realms and regulated their power, and how two students unleashed an evil creature from the realms by killing a Gypsy girl. Gemma uncovers her mother's connection to those events and learns what she now must do. The fantasy element is obvious, and the boarding-school setting gives a glimpse into a time when girls were taught gentility and the importance of appearances. The author also makes a point about the position of women in Victorian society. Bray's characters are types--Felicity, clever and powerful; Ann, plain and timid; Pippa, beautiful and occasionally thoughtless; Gemma, spirited and chafing under society's rules. --Lisa Prolman, Greenfield Public Library, MA Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

Rebel Angels


Rebel Angels (The Gemma Doyle Trilogy Book #2)
by Libba Bray
Even if fantacy fiction isn't your genre, you'll enjoy this story about young girls who dare to venture into the unknown for a cuase larger than themselves.
whenyellowleaves
From School Library Journal– At the end of A Great and Terrible Beauty (Delacorte, 2003), Gemma Doyle was determined to rebuild the Order and find and destroy Circe. Now the teen finds that she must do one more thing–find the Temple and bind the magic she released into the realms when she destroyed the runes. Her task will not be easy; Kartik and the Rakshana have their own plans, which threaten her; a mysterious new teacher may be Circe; and Christmas in London challenges the careful facades that Gemma and her friends Ann and Felicity have built. Dark things are stirring within the realms, including a possibly corrupted Pippa, and the only guides are Gemma's horrifying visions of three girls and the gibberish of a girl confined to Bedlam. Like the first volume, this is a remarkable fantasy steeped in Victorian sensibility; even as the girls fight to bind the magic, they are seduced by London society and the temptation to be proper young ladies. Gemma and her friends are pitch perfect as young women in a world poised for change, uncertain of their places. In many ways, this volume surpasses the first. The writing never falters, and the revelations (such as Felicity's childhood of abuse, discreetly revealed) only strengthen the characters. Clever foreshadowing abounds, and clues to the mystery of Circe may have readers thinking they have figured everything out; they will still be surprised. This volume does not stand alone; however, any collection that doesn't already have the first should just get both volumes.–Karyn N. Silverman, Elizabeth Irwin High School, New York City Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Three Cups of Tea

Three Cups of Tea: One Man's Mission to Promote Peace . . . One School at a Time
by Greg Mortenson and David Oliver Relin
Three Cups of Tea makes you want to leap out of your chair and discover how you can change the world. It begins slowly but ends with a very enthusiastic...YES! Everyone who cares about this earth should read this book.
whenyellowleaves


From BooklistOn a 1993 expedition to climb K2 in honor of his sister Christa, who had died of epilepsy at 23, Mortenson stumbled upon a remote mountain village in Pakistan. Out of gratitude for the villagers' assistance when he was lost and near death, he vowed to build a school for the children who were scratching lessons in the dirt. Raised by his missionary parents in Tanzania, Mortenson was used to dealing with exotic cultures and developing nations. Still, he faced daunting challenges of raising funds, death threats from enraged mullahs, separation from his family, and a kidnapping to eventually build 55 schools in Taliban territory. Award-winning journalist Relin recounts the slow and arduous task Mortenson set for himself, a one-man mission aimed particularly at bringing education to young girls in Pakistan and Afghanistan. Readers interested in a fresh perspective on the cultures and development efforts of Central Asia will love this incredible story of a humanitarian endeavor. Vanessa BushCopyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.


Reviews:

An inspiring chronicle . . . this is one protagonist who clearly deserves to be called a hero. -- People Magazine Greg Mortenson’s dangerous and difficult quest . . . is not only a thrilling read, it’s proof that one ordinary person, with the right combination of character and determination, really can change the world. -- Tom Brokaw Mortenson’s mission is admirable, his conviction unassailable, his territory exotic. -- The Washington Post

Monday, August 24, 2009

No Choirboy by Susan Kuklin

No Choirboy: Murder, Violence and Teenagers on Death Row Book Trailer

by Susan Kuklin

Leaving Paradise by Simone Elkeles


Leaving Paradise by Simone Elkeles

Caleb Becker just got released from Juvenile Detention, after doing time for driving drunk, hitting a pedestrian and leaving the scene of a crime. He's hoping to return to his life and be a normal teen. Maggie Armstrong is trying to leave Paradise, after being maimed by Caleb and spending a year in rehab. She would like to be anonymous and pretend that she is normal. They are thrust together in a strange turn of events. Told in alternating chapters, can these two get back some level of normal or will they need to leave Paradise?
An Abraham Lincoln Nominee 2010.

The Heretic's Daugther-by Kathleen Kent



I thought this book was a nice companion piece to The Scarlet Letter. It was interesting and paints a vivid picture of Salem, Mass. in 1692.--J.Asmus



School Library Journal
Adult/High School-Told from the point of view of young Sarah, the daughter of one of the first women to be accused, tried, and hanged as a witch in Salem, this novel paints a vivid and disturbing picture of Puritan New England life. Based on fact and the author's family history, the story portrays Martha, Sarah's mother, as a strong-willed nonconformist who knows she is a target of the zealots who pit family members against one another with their false accusations. All but one of the siblings end up imprisoned with their mother, and much of the story is told from the inhumane and corruptly run jail. When Martha is finally executed, her husband "would stand for all of us so that when she closed her eyes for the last time, there would be a counterweight of love against the overflowing presence of vengeance and fear." History is brought to life as readers learn of the strength of Martha's convictions and the value she places on her conscience. They will also appreciate the themes of family love, repression, intolerance, and persecution in this beautifully written and compelling first novel.-Jane Ritter, Mill Valley School District, CA

Sunday, August 23, 2009


Leaving Paradise
By Simone Elkeles




"Please sit down Caleb," orders a woman wearing glasses and a stern look on her face..."I swear the scene is out of a bad movie. Seven people sitting behind six foot long tables in front of one lone metal chair. "Meeting with is parole officer Damon, he is instructed to not contact his victim. Wasn't he a victim too? Of course he bumps into Maggie, now "crippled" by the hit and run accident where he was found guilty of driving under the influence, hand-cuffed and incarcerated as a juvie for one year.
From Maggie's perspective, since the accident she has a limp, she no longer is an athlete and loses a scholarship to go to Spain where she wanted to "get away" from Paradise. She used to eat lunch with the popular girls and now she is a loner. She no longer is friends with Leah, Caleb's sister, who has turned Goth since the accident. She and Leah used to be friends. They used to see each other every day. But Leah is Caleb's sister---Caleb who hit her, Caleb who was once her secret crush is now the one she hates!
Everything has changed since the accident and now the tension of Caleb being released from jail after only one year is mounting in her and in the community of Paradise. Will things get back to normal?
Can Maggie and can Caleb every hope for things to get back to normal in Paradise? Will he have to leave Paradise? Will she? How can it when he is forbidden to contact her but circumstances by chance bring these two together despite their efforts to avoid one another? When Caleb's community service and Maggie's after-school "job" happen to bring them together under Mrs. Richards roof they begin a journed to heal through Mrs. Richards guidance. She has a different outlook from others. A book about forgiveness and its ability to help individuals restore their lives and hope.


Something extra: Want to chat about the book? Go to the author's website--its awesome! Go to the "Official Simone Elkeles Discussion Group", create a log in and participate in a discussion with the author----couldn't be better!

Genre: Fiction-Realistic Fiction, Romance-Fiction, Alcohol-Fiction, Handicap-Fiction, High School-Fiction, Self-esteem-fiction, even includes some sports, elderly characters and family relationships.
The Boy Who Dared:A Novel Based on a True Story
By Susan Campbel Bartoletti


"Bartoletti included a portrait of Helmuth Hübener, a German teenager executed for his resistance to the Nazis. In this fictionalized biography, she imagines his story as he sits in prison awaiting execution in 1942 and remembers his childhood in Hamburg during Hitler’s rise to power. Beaten and tortured to name his friends, he remembers how he started off an ardent Nazi follower and then began to question his patriotism, secretly listened to BBC radio broadcasts, and finally dared to write and distribute pamphlets calling for resistance. The teen’s perspective makes this a particularly gripping way to personalize the history, and even those unfamiliar with the background Bartoletti weaves in–the German bitterness after World War I, the burning of the books, the raging anti-Semitism––will be enthralled by the story of one boy’s heroic resistance in the worst of times. A lengthy author’s note distinguishes fact from fiction, and Bartoletti provides a detailed chronology, a bibliography, and many black-and-white photos of Helmuth with friends, family, and members of his Mormon church. This is an important title for the Holocaust curriculum. See the Booklist interview with Bartoletti, in which she discusses how this teen’s story moved her." (A review by Hazel Rochman in Booklist)

Main Character: Helmuth
Setting: Germany during World War II era Pages: 202 pgs (Hardcover version)

Reading List: Read for a Lifetime 2009-2010
Sources:Book cover: "The Boy Who Dared". Junior Library Guild.

The Book Thief by Marcus Zusak



2010 Lincoln Award Winner Nominee

This darkly humorous, compassionate story is set in World War II during the horrors of the Holocaust. Death himself narrates the tale of young Liesel Meminger. Death has come to claim her younger brother, and he watches as Liesel steals her first book, a gravedigger's manual, though she does not yet know how to read. Despite himself, Death becomes somewhat enamored of the young girl and follows her life. Liesel becomes obsessed with words - and stealing books as she begins a new life when she is placed in a foster home in Molching, Germany. It's her love of words, reading and writing that sustain her throughout her experiences in Nazi Germany. As Death follows Liesel's obsession with words, he ponders their power. He surmises that Hitler's rise was attributed partly to the power of his words. A senstive, beautifully crafted novel that would appeal to a sophisticated reader.
ZEITOUN
By Dave Eggers
Non-Fiction

"When Hurricane Katrina struck New Orleans, Abdulrahman Zeitoun, a prosperous Syrian-American and father of four, chose to stay through the storm to protect his house and contracting business. In the days after the storm, he traveled the flooded streets in a secondhand canoe, passing on supplies and helping those he could. A week later, on September 6, 2005, Zeitoun abruptly disappeared. Eggers’s riveting nonfiction book, three years in the making, explores Zeitoun’s roots in Syria, his marriage to Kathy — an American who converted to Islam — and their children, and the surreal atmosphere (in New Orleans and the United States generally) in which what happened to Abdulrahman Zeitoun was possible. Like What Is the What , Zeitoun was written in close collaboration with its subjects and involved vast research — in this case, in the United States, Spain, and Syria." (Shelfari Review)

I'd Tell You I Love You, But Then I'd Have to Kill You by Ally Carter





2010 Abraham Lincoln Award Winner Nominee

Cammie Morgan, 15, is a student at the Gallagher Academy for Exceptional Young Women. Everyone thinks it's a snooty school for wealthy, smart girls - but it's really a school for spies! Cammie speaks 14 languages fluently, is educated in covert operations, has martial arts instead of P.E., and chemical warfare in place of traditional science class. She can kill a man seven different ways with her bare hands. Her mom, a retired CIA operative, is even the headmistress. It might sound like an exciting life until she meets Josh, while on a class surveillance mission. Josh is a normal boy and Cammie pretends to be a normal girl. That's when the real fun begins! You will enjoy the antics of Cammie and the rest of the Gallagher girls as they try to pull one over on both Josh and their teachers.
Aftershock by Kelly Easton
A story of survival, grief and loss and recovering memory.

Adam survives an automobile accident that claims the life of both of his parents on a return trip from West Coast activist rally they had attended. There were no witnesses to rescue them on a deserted road and Adam is thrown to the side of the road trying to gain enough strength to get help. Homeless, wounded and with loss of memory and speech he stumbles upon a Wicca gathering in the woods thinking he is seeing angels. One of the members, Stacy, takes him home like a lost puppy to care and nurse him to health. Through flashbacks he remembers his parents but cannot recall phone numbers or names. As he recovers he begins to work in Stacy's restaurant for awhile. Overstaying his welcome he begins his homeless, wandering treak in search self, home and memories while surving being beat up, working among migrants and taking any odd jobs he can get. Unable to speak he finally recalls a number and dials, the voice on the other end recognizes him! He remembers her, an aunt, an autistic cousin, he begins to remember a bookstore--more about his parents and with that he begins his journey home, clue by clue, back to Rhode Island, restoring memories of his peace loving parents---back to their bookstore, his aunt, and his old girlfriend---back home!

"People don't die. That isn't how it happens. They float inside you. Like leaves on water. They drift away sometimes, pulled under by the current, tugged toward the shore. But then they resurface, defining you as much by their absence as they did when they were there. (Aftershock 165)

Friday, August 21, 2009

Wednesday, August 19, 2009

A Long Way Gone

A Long Way Gone by Ishmael Beah

2010 Abraham Lincoln Award Nominee

Monday, August 17, 2009

The Spectacular Now by Tim Tharp


I thought this book was well written and one a sophisticated teen would enjoy.--J. Asmus


Booklist (November 15, 2008)
Grades 8-12. All the seniors in Sutter Keely’s high school are planning for the future, except for him. The Sutterman is the original party boy, with a perpetual 7-Up and whiskey in his hand and a story to entertain all who will listen. He is a ladies’ man, but he loses interest when the ladies demand that he pay attention to them, instead of himself, or make other unreasonable requests, such as remember dates or call when he promises. But it is Aimee, a social outsider, who gets under his skin and loves him in spite of his flaws. Tharp offers a poignant, funny book about a teen who sees his life as livable only when his senses are dulled by drink and only as fodder for the next joke or story. Lulled into believing he is happy in spite of his father’s abandonment and his mother’s emotional neglect, Sutter is an authentic character, and his unsteady sense of himself, as well as his relationships with his friends, will strike a chord with teen readers.

Thursday, August 13, 2009

The Wednesday Wars by Gary Schmidt


This was the best book I read this summer! I really enjoyed it. ~J. Asmus

Entering seventh grade, Holling Hoodhood knows all about teachers. They're "born behind their desks, fully grown, with a red pen in their hand and ready to grade." And the worst of them hate your guts, which is precisely the way he believes Mrs. Baker feels about him. Every Wednesday afternoon, when the rest of his class leaves early to attend Hebrew school or catechism class, Holling, the lone Presbyterian, stays behind with Mrs. Baker. As Holling sees it, she uses the extra time for special torture, ranging from cleaning out rat cages to diagramming impossibly convoluted sentences to reading Shakespeare. That the two will grow to respect each other is a predictable trope, but the alliance nevertheless becomes convincing and winning. Insistently in the background is the Vietnam War: Mrs. Baker's husband is missing in action at Khesanh; the school's cook loses her husband in the conflict; the presence of a Vietnamese refugee in the class triggers hatred and bigotry. At home, Holling's sister supports the peace movement and women's rights; his father puts his architectural business above all; and his mother passively acquiesces to Mr. Hoodhood. Ultimately, Mrs. Baker steps out from behind her desk as a multilayered individual who helps Holling (often through their discussions of Shakespeare's plays) to dare to choose his own ending rather than follow the dictates of others. Schmidt rises above the novel's conventions to create memorable and believable characters. --Horn Book

Wednesday, August 12, 2009

Book Trailer for Biography of Mark Twain

Read this book because it's interesting and fun.

Tuesday, August 4, 2009

The Middle Place by Kelly Corrigan

I loved this book! This is a great book that speaks to a variety of audiences.--J. Asmus

A cancer survivor's memoir with a welcome twist: a laughter-filled celebration of family. Newspaper columnist Corrigan was 36 when she discovered a lump in her left breast. Happily married and the mother of two young daughters, she was also still very much the adoring daughter of demonstrative, exuberant George Corrigan. Being upbeat and funny was de rigueur with her optimistic father, so the author's reaction to her breast-cancer diagnosis was to send an e-mail to about 100 people inviting them to a party one year hence to celebrate her recovery. But when George was diagnosed with bladder cancer and seemed too casual about his treatment, she became exasperated. Living in the Bay Area, she hounded his East Coast doctors by e-mail and took over the central role of information gatherer and advice dispenser. Only her own upcoming surgery kept her from heading to Philadelphia to take charge. At the same time that she was coping with her own cancer and trying to micromanage her father's, she was busy mothering two little girls too young to understand what was happening. Tender scenes with her daughters and some frustrating ones with her strong-willed mother give context to Corrigan's account of two battles against cancer. She also tosses into the mix funny, often self-deprecating tales of growing up in a boisterous Irish Catholic family, her adventures abroad in her 20s and her marriage to the comparatively subdued Edward. The author is, in her words, living in 'the middle place--that sliver of time when childhood and parenthood overlap.' Attachments to both the family she grew up in and the family she created remain strong, but as her husband reminds her, their daughters, not her parents, are the future. Warm, funny and a touch bittersweet."