Friday, March 30, 2012

Weekend Book Give-Away: The Dead of Winter

I don't know about you, but I am SO ready for spring. I'm tired of winter, cold, cloudy skies, rain, and waking up with frost on things. But...I just got this awesome sounding book called The Dead of Winter by Chris Priestly that takes place during Christmas, and I guess I could bear just a little bit more winter:

In Victorian England an orphaned boy goes to stay with his strange guardian in a desolate, moated manor house during a cold and snowy Christmas, where he soon realizes that the house and its grounds harbor many secrets, dead and alive. 

Sounds a bit like The Woman in Black, no?

To win this gorgeous brand new hardbound ghost story, tell me about any hauntings you might have encountered, or ones you have heard rumors of in your community.  If you can't think of one of those, just tell me what your favorite ghost story/book is.

Winner will be selected by my buddy Random Number Generator on Tuesday April 17, 2012, as Dawn is going on her own Spring Break. Be sure to leave a name with your entry, and check back to see if you won. To win you must be a teen (6th-12th grade, or 12-18) who uses a Sno-Isle Library.  

Wednesday, March 28, 2012

Video Contest - First Five Entries

Time is almost running out for you to get your Teen Tech Month Video Contest entry in!  You can submit until 11:59pm on Saturday March 31st.  Just be sure not to used copyrighted music without permission!  Find more details here on free sources for music you can use.

Here are our first five entries:

Ginger May's Trip To The Library


My Entry


Peace


The Magic of Reading


Sno-Isle Teen Tech Month Video Contest Entry



Think you can do better?  You have 3 days...

Earth Hour is March 31st at 8:30PM

If you are unfamiliar with Earth Hour, it is a global event organized by the WWF (World Wildlife Fund) that began in Australia in 2007. It has grown into a worldwide phenomenon with the goal of raising awareness towards the need to action on climate change. To learn more about Earth Hour, click on the WWF's 2012 Earth Hour webpage.
 
The library also has several great Teen Non-fiction books you can check out to learn more about the issues surrounding climate change.  Here are three good ones:



Sno-Isle's Science databases page is also an excellent place to begin researching this topic.  And don't forget that your local librarian is always eager to help you learn about any topic you may be interested in as well!

Tuesday, March 27, 2012

Trailer Tuesday: The Replacement


I've always been intrigued by the idea of changelings, and I'm surprised that there aren't more books using that trope. Obviously, Brenna Yovanoff's The Replacement does.

And the trailer is super creepy. Especially that hand. yikes.



You have mere days until the deadline for our annual video contest! Don't forget to submit, before it's too late!

Monday, March 26, 2012

Fantasy Fiction

Librarians are all about putting the right book in the right person’s hands.
Sometimes this goal makes it hard for us to decide where to shelve a book in the library.
Should The Hunger Games be shelved in Teen or Science Fiction?
Ender’s Game by Orson Scott Card is one of my favorite Teen books of all time. It is officially shelved in the Science Fiction section but you can also find it in Teen paperback collections all around Sno-Isle.  I recently read two books that were found in the Fantasy section even though the main characters were distinctly youths.

In The Left Hand of God, Thomas is a 16 year old who has been raised in a massive monastery, under deprived and strict conditions, to be a religious warrior. Not alone, he is a part of a vast army of children being raised to fight in the name of faith.
However, throughout Thomas' "education" he has repeatedly been selected for especially rigorous and brutal treatment. It is not until he escapes that Thomas finds out the destiny he was being groomed for.


Prince of Thorns is a book that will really surprise you…and not necessarily in a good way. Jorg, the main character, is not a likeable kid. In fact, he is a cold blooded killer, a sociopath born from witnessing the horrible murder of his mother and brother.
The book is fast paced, gritty, violent, and disturbing as it follows Jorg and his gang of killers around a bleak sword and sorcery landscape. It takes a quick turn when Jorg reveals to his followers that he is a prince and that the time has come to reclaim his birthright.
The supernatural or magical elements of this book have a unique and distinct flavor to them. It was something I couldn’t quite figure out until about half way through the book when there is a significant and surprising reveal about their world. I really enjoyed both of these books but Prince of Thorns was ultimately the better book.

Friday, March 23, 2012

Weekend Book Give-Away: Pure

Hey everyone!  How is your Teen Tech Month going? When you think about technology and the future, are you excited by the endless possibilities and mind-blowing technology we will see in our lifetime? Or do you dread the weird, dark, and creepy things people will do with it?  Normally I am a bit of an optimist, but this book description starts to tip me into the other catagory a bit:

In a post-apocalyptic world, Pressia, a sixteen-year-old survivor with a doll's head fused onto her left hand meets Partridge, a "Pure" dome-dweller who is searching for his mother, sure that she has survived the cataclysm.   

WHAT?  There are many terrible things I have read it dystopian novels, but the idea of having a dolls head fused on my hand freaks me out more than I should admit.  If that is exactly the sort of crazy plot-line that makes your ears perk up, Pure by Julianna Baggott may be just the book for you.

Here is the book trailer:



Want to win this book?  Tell me the most disturbing thing you have encountered in a book this year (but no graphic details, please!)


Winner will be selected by my buddy Random Number Generator on Tuesday March 27, 2012. Be sure to leave a name with your entry, and check back to see if you won. To win you must be a teen (6th-12th grade, or 12-18) who uses a Sno-Isle Library.  

Tuesday, March 20, 2012

Trailer Tuesday: The Statistical Probability of Love at First Sight

The Statistical Probability of Love at First Sight by Jennifer E. Smith looks utterly adorable. In fact, I already have it on hold for myself. I'd even check it out, if I could remember to return my overdue books (yes, even librarians get blocked when they don't bring back that which they checked out. le sigh.)

Have you read it yet? Or anything by JES? I keep meaning to read The Comeback Season.



Don't forget that March is Teen Tech Month, and that means our annual video contest! The last day to enter is March 31st.

Monday, March 19, 2012

Hunger Games parties this week!

Is there anyone reading this blog who isn't excited about The Hunger Games movie coming out this week???

I'm super psyched and can't wait to share the excitement with local teens.  Marysville had an awesome HG event Saturday, and there are two more Hunger Game parties this week...on opposite sides of our library system!

For those of you on the island, or up North, Oak Harbor Library is hosting an Hunger Games Party this Thursday the 22nd from 3-5pm.

For those of you down South, you are invited to come to my pre-movie watching (for those of you not hitting a midnight show) party at the Mountlake Terrace Library Friday the 23rd from 1-4pm.  We will be having Hunger Games Jeopardy, a Peeta's Cupcake Decorating Contest, and a costume contest...plus time to play lots of games, too.  Prizes include a Hunger Games poster, a HG string bag, and HG earbuds!

What are your plans?  When are you going to the movie?  Will you dress up?

Friday, March 16, 2012

Teen Book Brunch: Meet the Authors

If you are into cyborgs, plagues, and dystopian trilogies, you'll want to check these books out.

Come meet authors Lissa Price, author of Starters, and Marissa Meyer, author of Cinder, Saturday, March 17th at 11 a.m. Share what you've been reading and get recommendations from other book lovers. Enjoy Top Pot donuts and free copies of soon to be released books!

In Cinder: Lunar Chronicles (Book One) humans and androids crowd the raucous streets of New Beijing. A deadly plague ravages the population. From space, a ruthless lunar people watch, waiting to make their move. No one knows that Earth’s fate hinges on one girl. . . .

Cinder, a gifted mechanic, is a cyborg. She’s a second-class citizen with a mysterious past, reviled by her stepmother and blamed for her stepsister’s illness. But when her life becomes intertwined with the handsome Prince Kai’s, she suddenly finds herself at the center of an intergalactic struggle, and a forbidden attraction. Caught between duty and freedom, loyalty and betrayal, she must uncover secrets about her past in order to protect her world’s future.



Starters is a cross between Hunger Games and Meg Cabot's Airhead series. In the future, teens rent their bodies to seniors who want to be young again. One girl discovers her renter plans to do more than party--her body will commit murder, if her mind can't stop it. Sixteen-year-old Callie lost her parents when the genocide spore wiped out everyone except those who were vaccinated first--the very young and very old. With no grandparents to claim Callie and her little brother, they go on the run, living as squatters, and fighting off unclaimed renegades who would kill for a cookie. Hope comes via Prime Destinations, run by a mysterious figure known only as The Old Man. He hires teens to rent their bodies to seniors, known as enders, who get to be young again. Callie's neurochip malfunctions and she wakes up in the life of her rich renter, living in her mansion, driving her cars, even dating Blake, the grandson of a senator. It's a fairy-tale new life . . . until she uncovers the Body Bank's horrible plan.


Looking ahead to Saturday, May 5th at 11 a.m., the Teen Book Brunch will feature three authors:
Tahereh Mafi, author of Shatter Me, Veronica Rossi, author of Under the Never Sky, and Anna Carey, author of Eve.


Teen Book Brunch meets at the University Book Store in Mill Creek Town Center.

Thursday, March 15, 2012

Awesome First Teen Novel Wins TWO Awards

I don't know if you heard the news, but for the first time in the history of the William C. Morris YA Debut Award and the Michael L. Printz Award for Excellence in Young Adult Literature, one author was chosen to receive both awards!

The 2012 Morris and Printz awards recognize John Corey Whaley’s first novel, Where Things Come Back, for excellence in young adult fiction and as an impressive new voice in young adult literature.

Seventeen-year-old Cullen's summer in Lily, Arkansas, is marked by his cousin's death by overdose, an alleged spotting of a woodpecker thought to be extinct, failed romances, and his younger brother's sudden disappearance.   

Don’t miss this unusual story of kidnapping, discovery and angst in a small town. Check out this year’s Morris and Printz winners and honorable mentions at: http://www.ala.org/yalsa/morris and http://www.ala.org/yalsa/printz.

Wednesday, March 14, 2012

It's time for Battle of the Books

Are you ready to see Brian Selznick duke it out with Gary Schmidt? Or Kadir Nelson rumble with Thanhha Lai? It’s time for School Library Journal’s Battle of the Kids’ Books (BOB) again, and there's another impressive lineup of titles and judges that is sure to get your heart pumping as 16 of 2011’s best books for young people are pitted against one another in a competition to determine the biggest, bestest, baddest of them all.

BOB is the brainchild of three educators: Monica Edinger and Roxanne Feldman of the Dalton School in New York City, and Jonathan Hunt, a school librarian in Modesto, CA, and was inspired by the Morning News’s Tournament of Books, a similar competition featuring the previous year’s best novels for adults.


How exactly does it work, you ask? Think of a smackdown of books, where fiction competes against nonfiction, fantasy with historical fiction, and dystopias with romance in a winner-take-all battle. Over the course of three intense weeks, a panel of 15 judges—including Lauren Myracle, Matt Phelan, and Maggie Stiefvater—each read two books, consider them carefully, then decide which deserve to advance to the next round. Match-ups for Round Two will begin on March 23rd and Round Three on March 29th. Jonathan Stroud, last year’s Battle of the Books winner for The Ring of Solomon, is the final judge. He’ll choose the grand prizewinner April 2.

In case you were wondering, the first winner in 2009 was none other than Hunger Games by Suzzane Collins.

Check back each day to see the winner.

The Match-ups for Round One:

 

Match 3 (March 15, Judge Sy Montgomery)
The Cheshire Cheese Cat vs Chime
Match 4 (March 16, Judge Sara Zarr)
Daughter of Smoke and Bone vs Dead End in Norvelt
Match 5 (March 19, Judge Barbara O'Connor)
Drawing from Memory vs The Grand Plan to Fix Everything
Match 6 (March 20, Judge Sarah Weeks)
Heart and Soul vs Inside Out and Back Again
Match 7 (March 21, Judge Lauren Myracle)
Life: An Exploded Diagram vs A Monster Calls
Match 8 (March 22, Judge Jeff Kinney)
Okay for Now vs Wonderstruck


What books would you pit against each other?

Tuesday, March 13, 2012

Trailer Tuesday: Tempest by Julie Cross

Kathleen at Mukilteo and I have decided that this cover makes this look like another angel book. It's not.

It's TIME TRAVEL.

Which is a really hard genre to pull off. Read it. Let us know how well you think Cross managed it. Will you want to read the sequel?



Don't forget that you can always submit reviews here, that March is Teen Tech Month and with it comes our annual video contest!

Monday, March 12, 2012

Post Those Videos

Have you been working on an entry for the Teen Tech Month Video Contest?  Are you already done?

Well, it looks like we were having some technical difficulties, and if you entered before today...I never got your email.  So please please please, be sure to post your entry from this site.  Then once it has been approved, it will show up here.

Videos will not be approved until they meet the rules of the contest.

Sorry if there was any confusion!  Can't wait to watch your videos :)

Friday, March 9, 2012

Weekend Book Give-Away: Cinder

Teen Tech Month always gets me thinking about not just new technology (iPad HD?!), but where we are going with it.  If you want to really get a good idea of where technology might be headed, I think reading science fiction is a great way to explore the possibilities.  Such as this week's book...a sweet brand-new hard-back copy of Cinder by Marissa Meyer.

As plague ravages the overcrowded Earth, observed by a ruthless lunar people, Cinder, a gifted mechanic and cyborg, becomes involved with handsome Prince Kai and must uncover secrets about her past in order to protect the world in this futuristic take on the Cinderella story.    

Ok...I love that the Cinderella character isn't just some maid to her step-family, but is a cyborg mechanic!  How kick-butt is that? There are 81 people waiting for this book right now, but you could get your very own copy to keep, for free, for good!

To get entered in the drawing to win this great new book, tell me what your favorite fairy tale is, and how you would like to see it reinvented as a science fiction blockbuster!


Winner will be selected by my buddy Random Number Generator on Tuesday March 20, 2012 (as I will be off in Philadelphia for the Public Library Association conference!). Be sure to leave a name with your entry, and check back to see if you won. To win you must be a teen (6th-12th grade, or 12-18) who uses a Sno-Isle Library.  

Tuesday, March 6, 2012

Trailer Tuesday: Catch & Release

Hey! It's Teen Tech Month! That means it's also time for our annual video contest! We'll keep showing you trailers every Tuesday, so use those as inspiration for your own entry.

Blythe Woolston's first effort netted (heh) her the Morris Award. Catch & Release is her next book. I love how tantalizing this trailer is. I will have to read it.

Catch and Release from Blythe Woolston on Vimeo.

Saturday, March 3, 2012

Are you working on your book trailer?


I hope you're thinking about entering our Teen Tech Month video contest--it's a great way to be creative, express your love of books and libraries (and I know you feel that love!) and possibly win a Best Buy gift certificate. Need a little inspiration? Take a look at the totally wonderful Oscar-winning short film The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore. It is a true love letter to books and reading and a beautiful film--but it might make you cry. Really.
Sno-Isle book trailer today, Oscar in your future? It might happen--get filming!

Friday, March 2, 2012

Weekend Book Give-Away: The Edumacation of Jay Baker

Hello everyone, and welcome to Teen Tech Month!   This month's theme is Geek Out @ Your Library (which some people love, and some people despise).  Me, I like it.  Geeking out to me, is fearlessly showing passion for the things you are nerdily fascinated with, and that is a good thing!  Me, I LOVE to geek out about books.

This week's book is The Edumacation of Jay Baker by Jay Clark (hmmm...thinly veiled embarrassing autobiography perhaps?

In small-town Ohio, fifteen-year-old Jay Baker's popular new blog helps him navigate high school as he faces off against his mortal enemy, meets the girl of his dreams, and watches his parents' relationship implode.    

Blogging, while frequently an awesome way to express yourself and connect with others, is perceived by some folks as a rather geeky activity.  Of course, I think it is pretty awesome ;)

To get entered in the drawing to win this great new hardback book, tell me what your favorite blogs are that you like to read, and what is special about them.


Winner will be selected by my buddy Random Number Generator on Thursday March 8, 2012. Be sure to leave a name with your entry, and check back to see if you won. To win you must be a teen (6th-12th grade, or 12-18) who uses a Sno-Isle Library.