2014 Teen Tech Month Video Contest

I'm delighted to announce our 7th Annual Teen Tech Month Video Contest!  This year we are doing things slightly different.  We are still offering Best Buy gift cards to the video best loved by viewers ($150) and for the Librarian's Choice prize ($75), but we have an all new category this year for Best Group Project.   If your class, library advisory board, school video team submit a video and enter it in this category, you have a chance to win a pizza party!

The basics:

1. Create a video promoting the library or your favorite book.
2. Video length must be 30 seconds to 3 minutes, including credits.
3. Include credits in the video indicating you produced the video for the Sno-Isle Libraries Video Contest.
4. Post your video to YouTube with the tag "snoisleteens."
5. Submit your YouTube URL through our online entry located here by March 31, 2014.
6. Online voting and winners announced in April.

Rules and guidelines can also be found on our Video Contest page. Here is last year's winner:



This really is one of my favorite things we do each year. I can't wait to see all the creative things you, our talented teens, come up with!

Trailer Tuesday: Cruel Beauty by Rosamund Hodge

I generally look forward to a good fairy tale re-telling. Especially one where the girl sounds as kick-butt as Nyx does in Cruel Beauty.

From the publisher: "Betrothed to the demon who rules her country and trained all her life to kill him, seventeen-year-old Nyx Triskelion must now fulfill her destiny and move to the castle to be his wife."

Weekend Book Giveaway: Curtsies & Conspiracies

I'm really excited about this week's book, the second in the Finishing School series by Gail Carriger.  I loved Etiquette & Espionage, and Curtsies & Conspiracies is every bit as fun.

In her alternate England of 1851, fifteen-year-old Sophronia tries to uncover who is behind a plot to control a prototype that has the potential to alter human and supernatural travel, and to learn what role Mademoiselle Geraldine's academy for young spies plays in the affair. Sophronia must rely on her training to discover who is behind the dangerous plot-and survive the London Season with a full dance card.

Utterly delightful!  With 16 holds, this could take a while to get your hands on, but you have a chance to win a copy you'll get next week if you either tell me your favorite conspiracy theory, or make one up for me!

Winner will be selected by Random Number Generator on Tuesday, February 11, 2014. 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. 

Trailer Tuesday: Ketchup Clouds by Annabel Pitcher

What if you killed someone - and got away with it? Would it eat you up inside? Would you find yourself writing a letter to a death row inmate to ease your conscious? That's what Zoe finds herself doing three months after the death (or murder?) of a boy she'd fallen in love with. How did she get there? Find out in the unusually named Ketchup Clouds by Annabel Pitcher.

From the publisher: "Zoe, a teenager in Bath, England, writes letters to a death-row inmate in Texas, hoping to find comfort in sharing her guilty secret over the death of a friend with someone who can never tell her family."

Weekend Book Giveaway: Ketchup Clouds

This week's book is Ketchup Clouds by Annabel Pitcher:

Zoe has an unconventional pen pal-Mr. Stuart Harris, a Texas Death Row inmate and convicted murderer. But then again, Zoe has an unconventional story to tell. A story about how she fell for two boys, betrayed one of them, and killed the other. Hidden away in her backyard shed in the middle of the night with a jam sandwich in one hand and a pen in the other, Zoe gives a voice to her heart and her fears after months of silence. Mr. Harris may never respond to Zoe's letters, but at least somebody will know her story-somebody who knows what it's like to kill a person you love. Only through her unusual confession can Zoe hope to atone for her mistakes that have torn lives apart, and work to put her own life back together again.

For a chance to win this Advanced Readers Copy of Ketchup Clouds, tell me about something you did that you regretted, and how you atoned for it.

Winner will be selected by Dawn on Tuesday, February 4, 2014. 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. 

Weekend Book Giveaway: These Broken Stars

This week we have another exciting science fiction book you might already be waiting for,  These Broken Stars by Amie Kaufman and Meagan Spooner:

It's a night like any other on board the Icarus. Then, catastrophe strikes: the massive luxury spaceliner is yanked out of hyperspace and plummets into the nearest planet. Lilac LaRoux and Tarver Merendsen survive. And they seem to be alone. Lilac is the daughter of the richest man in the universe. Tarver comes from nothing, a young war hero who learned long ago that girls like Lilac are more trouble than they're worth. But with only each other to rely on, Lilac and Tarver must work together, making a tortuous journey across the eerie, deserted terrain to seek help. Then, against all odds, Lilac and Tarver find a strange blessing in the tragedy that has thrown them into each other's arms. Without the hope of a future together in their own world, they begin to wonder--would they be better off staying here forever? Everything changes when they uncover the truth behind the chilling whispers that haunt their every step.


This is the first in a new trilogy (of course), and as I type this there are 17 people to read this.  For a chance to win your own Advanced Readers Copy, tell me the top five qualities you would like in a crash landing companion.

Winner will be selected by Random Number Generator on Monday February 3, 2014. 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.  

Trailer Tuesday: Not a Drop to Drink

So... that's a disturbing opening...

From the publisher: Regret was for people with nothing to defend, people who had no water. Lynn knows every threat to her pond: drought, a snowless winter, coyotes, and, most important, people looking for a drink. She makes sure anyone who comes near the pond leaves thirsty or doesn't leave at all. Confident in her own abilities, Lynn has no use for the world beyond the nearby fields and forest. Having a life means dedicating it to survival and the constant work of gathering wood and water. Having a pond requires the fortitude to protect it, something Mother taught her well during their quiet hours on the rooftop, rifles in hand. But wisps of smoke on the horizon mean one thing: strangers. The mysterious footprints by the pond, the nighttime threats, and the gunshots make it all too clear Lynn has exactly what they want, and they won't stop until they get it. . . . With evocative, spare language and incredible drama, danger, and romance, debut author Mindy McGinnis depicts one girl's journey in a barren world not so different from our own.