LibWorm.com provides a librarian RSS filtering service. Over 1500 RSS librarian sources are combined and output via different filters. This feed contains the latest headlines from journals and sites in the Young Adults interest group. http://www.libworm.com/rss/librarianqueries.php Fri, 03 Sep 2010 02:55:31 +0100 FeedCreator 1.7.2 http://hhsmedia.blogspot.com/2010/02/read-all-about-it.html Loooking for something to read today? Teen Tribune features articles and stories written for teens, by teens. Be sure to check out this insightful article published by one of our Hurricane writers! (Source: Huntingtown High School Library Media Center) Thu, 17 Feb 2011 05:00:00 +0100 819508 http://hhsmedia.blogspot.com/2009/12/make-reading-resolution.html I’m posting this entry just in time for the New Year-- reflecting on my favorite books of 2009 while resolving to read many more in 2010.As the year draws to a close, top picks emerge in annual “best of” lists everywhere. The Young Adult Library Services Association (YALSA) encourages teens to nominate and select their favorite books annually. In 2009, Paper Towns by John Green won the “teen’s choice” award with the most votes.Have you read it yet?Whether you're a fan of books that are romantic or realistic, fantasy-based or futuristic; be sure to check out YALSA's entire list of 2009 Teens’ Top Ten . You can also see Maryland's 2009 Black Eyed Susan nominees for great suggestions. Most of these titles are available to borrow in our HHS media center. Happy New Year! (Source: Huntingtown High School Library Media Center) Thu, 30 Dec 2010 05:00:00 +0100 804433 http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2010/sep/02/theresa-breslin-bringing-past-life In the fourth in our series of interviews with authors longlisted for the Guardian children's fiction prize, Michelle Pauli talks Theresa Breslin about writing historical fiction for a modern audienceHistorical fiction for teens may not be as in vogue as vampires right now, but for Theresa Breslin, the stories the past inspires can seem just as fantastical. The Carnegie-winning Scottish author has written more than 30 children's books, many of them tackling serious contemporary subjects such as bullying – but, recently it has been characters from centuries gone that have caught her imagination.Her latest novel, Prisoner of the Inquisition, which has been longlisted for the Guardian children's fiction prize, is set in 15th-century Spain. It was a time of tumult for the country: the throne was divided between two monarchs, Isabella of Castile and Ferdinand of Aragon; Tomás de Torquemada, the architect of the Spanish Inquisition, was at the height of his powers; and Christopher Columbus was about to set sail across the Atlantic."It was almost too good to be true," says Breslin, laughing down the phone from her home in Scotland. "If you had orchestrated this as a fiction story and gone to an editor saying, I've got a magnificent queen who was intent on reunifying the country, endless religious upheaval and an explorer, they would have said it was a bit much. But, of course, it's all fact."Prisoner of the Inquisition is narrated alternately by two teenagers, Zarita and Saulo, whose lives first connect when privileged, naive Zarita, daughter of a wealthy town magistrate, accuses Saulo's father, a beggar, of touching her in a church. He is killed and Saulo escapes, secretly pledging to take his revenge on Zarita and her family. His side of the story encompasses slavery at sea, an encounter with pirates and a burgeoning friendship with Christopher Columbus. ... Thu, 02 Sep 2010 15:44:02 +0100 868549 http://lisnews.org/eat_director039s_brain_zombies_attack_collingswood_public_library “Eat the Director’s Brain”: The Second Annual Collingswood Book Festival 5K Race to Raise Money for the Collingswood Public Library’s Teen Area (Source: LISNews.org) Thu, 02 Sep 2010 14:55:42 +0100 868650 http://www.lisnews.org/eat_director039s_brain_zombies_attack_collingswood_public_library “Eat the Director’s Brain”: The Second Annual Collingswood Book Festival 5K Race to Raise Money for the Collingswood Public Library’s Teen Area (Source: LISNews - Librarian And Information Science News) Thu, 02 Sep 2010 14:55:42 +0100 868591 http://meadvillelibrary.org/old-news/make-waves-mpls-young-adult-summer-reading-club.html Make this summer cool by joining us for our Young Adult Summer Reading Club! July 28, 2010 – YA Drawing August 2, 2010 – Yarn Octopus/Jellyfish Mobile – 2:00 P.M. August 6, 2010 – Party at 2:00 P.M. with Food, Fun, Games, and Activities & Prizes to celebrate the last day of SRC. (Source: Meadville Public Library) Thu, 02 Sep 2010 04:20:02 +0100 868386 http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/SellersLibraryTeens/~3/N3XTsMTc7oQ/august-anime-club-meeting.html Today was the August meeting of the Anime Club, right on the eve of everyone returning to school. Tim showed us some clips from the Sonic the Hedgehog anime movie, clips from the Japanese video game it was based on, and some bonus Japanese Sonic commercials! Our manga drawing theme for the meeting was back-to-school, so we also watched some school-themed anime clips. I had super-cute school supplies--piggy pencil sharpeners and panda/frog erasers--for the four winners. (I got them at the dollar store by H-Mart, if you want to track down some for yourself.) Here are all of the drawings: Actual school supplies! Kelliann had the most beautiful shading in her picture of a schoolgirl. It was my first choice for a winner.A schoolgirlAnother schoolgirlYet another schoolgirlFor a change of pace...a schoolboy! OK, he's looking at a schoolgirl, but it's a start. Max won a prize for being the only person to draw a schoolboy. A schoolgirl with talking school supplies Kathy drew a really cute comic about a school of fish! I gave it a prize for originality. Still another schoolgirl Out of all the schoolgirls, I deemed this one the cutest, so Lynn won a prize. The last schoolgirl (Source: Sellers Library Teens) Thu, 02 Sep 2010 02:12:05 +0100 868457 http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/SellersLibraryTeens/~3/cv1tYwhkMAk/craft-closet-cleanout.html Today, 17 teens dropped in to cleanout the craft closet! It was pretty busy, but everyone got to make a variety of stuff. I emptied at least six boxes of leftover projects, so I say it was a success! Several people did extra projects from this summer, including Relief-Painted Bottle Vases, Decoupaged Boxes, Fingerpainting, and Painted Picture Frames. There were also many other crafts hanging around from the past year, such as Message in a Bottle, Jean Leg Autograph Pillows, Scratch-Painted CD Magnets, and Vampire Glitter Gel. Check out the pictures: Fingerpainting!Relief-Painted Bottle Vases Jean Leg Autograph Pillows Decoupaged Boxes Look what we made! (Source: Sellers Library Teens) Thu, 02 Sep 2010 01:05:09 +0100 868458 http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2010/sep/01/terry-pratchett-alzheimers-assisted-suicide Discworld's creator on his new novel, living with Alzheimer's – and why he should be allowed to decide when to end it allWhen, not very long ago, Terry Pratchett's father was given a year to live, Pratchett père took it, on the whole, philosophically. Father and son had plenty of time to "have those conversations that you have with a dying parent", and to reminisce about his father's time in India during the war. At one point, said Pratchett, in last year's Dimbleby lecture, his father suddenly said, "'I can feel the sun of India on my face,' and his face did light up rather magically, brighter and happier than I had seen it at any time in the previous year. If there had been any justice or even narrative sensibility in the universe, he would have died there and then, shading his eyes from the sun of Karachi."If the universe refused to display narrative sensibility, then Pratchett Jr would: that moment returns early in his new novel, I Shall Wear Midnight, in which a gruff, essentially kindly old man is vouchsafed a vision of youth and sunlight (though, instead of Karachi, the sunbeams glint off a leaping hare) and expires as he describes it. Even Pratchett knows this is a tad too neat, however, so, this being Discworld, his fantasy kingdom on a flat planet sailing through space on the backs of four elephants who in turn stand on a giant turtle, Death makes a lugubrious wisecrack about it: "WASN'T THAT APPROPRIATE?"Pratchett, when he arrives at his idyllic local pub in Wiltshire, turns out to be full of this type of humour – deliberate, slightly coercive, very self-aware. ... Wed, 01 Sep 2010 19:30:09 +0100 868194 http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2010/sep/01/tony-blair-journey-digested-read-crace WMDs, George Bush, Cherie and Gordo: Tony Blair's memoir in just 818 words!Title A JourneyAuthor Tony BlairPublisher HutchinsonPrice £25I wanted this book to be different from the traditional political memoir. Most, I have found, are rather easy to put down. So what you will read here is not a conventional account of whom I met. There are events and politicians who are absent, not because they don't matter, but because they are part of a different story to the self-serving one I want to tell!No, seriously guys, this is going to be well different. How many other world leaders use so many exclamation marks! And it is as a world leader that I'm writing for you about my journey. And what a journey! When I started in politics I was just an ordinary kind of guy. And you know what? I'm still an ordinary kind of guy – albeit one who has become a multi-millionaire and completely destabilised the Middle East!You know, I had a tear in my eye when I entered No10 for the first time in 1997, though it wasn't, as the Daily Mail tried to claim, because I was choked with emotion at how far I had come since I was a young, ordinary boy standing on the terraces of St James' Park, watching Jackie Milburn play for Newcastle. It was because Gordon had hit me. Ah, Gordon! He meant well, I suppose, in his funny little emotionally inarticulate way.I guess some of you will find it hard to believe, but I never really wanted to be a politician. But sometimes courage is about taking the difficult decisions and when Cherie said, "God is calling you to fulfil your destiny", I knew I had to listen. So it was with a heavy heart that I outmanoeuvred Gordon over the leadership of the party after John's death – and whatever Gordo says there was never a deal struck at Granita where he could take definitely take over after my second term. Because I had my fingers crossed!The first year in office was pretty exciting and it was great fun having my old mates like Anji in the office. ... Wed, 01 Sep 2010 17:49:18 +0100 868198 http://media.libsyn.com/media/oclspodcast/teen_mysteriousmessages.mp3 Listen to Lorena and Olivia explain how you can learn all about codes and ciphers at the library. (1:07) (Source: OCLS Podcast (OCLS Teen Podcast)) Wed, 01 Sep 2010 12:33:00 +0100 868148 http://www.guardian.co.uk/culture/charlottehigginsblog/2010/sep/01/classics-janeausten Widmerpool, Anthony Powell's ghastly creation in The Dance To The Music of Time, is a spectre to haunt the middle agedA treat turned up on my doorstep yesterday: a new book called The Midlife Manual, by John O'Connell and Jessica Cargill Thompson. I say treat: with my birthday coming next week, it's all a bit close to the bone. I particularly enjoyed their notion of the midlife literary anti-hero. O'Connell (who reviews thrillers for our Review) and Cargill Thompson picked out Widmerpool, the character from Anthony Powell's 12-novel sequence A Dance To The Music of Time. They describe him thus:A classic type: the cowardly and mediocre yet ambitious idiot whom no one liked at school but who has, thanks to a combination of luck and opportunism, eclipsed you and all your contemporaries to become unthinkably powerful in his chosen sphere – often politics or the media. Every group has a Widmerpool somewhere on its periphery. He's the person you bitch about with your oldest friends after a long, long night out when you're too exhausted to hide the anger and disappointment that's eating you up. Because your Widmerpool never goes away. Indeed,. the degrees of separation between you and him may decrease alarmingly: your paths may cross at a wedding or reunion. When they do, he will patronise you to death. And you will always hate him.I especially enjoyed the reference as I am slowly (with great enjoyment but many deflections) working my way through the Powell. I am now on volume eight, The Soldier's Art. Widmerpool, back in volume one a faintly laughable, essentially friendless schoolboy famous only for his funny overcoat, is now Major Widmerpool. It is the second world war, and our narrator Nick, a mere second lieutenant, has been attached to Widmerpool's office as an assistant, in order to be, as O'Connell and Cargill Thompson have it "patronised to death" by his old school-fellow. ... Wed, 01 Sep 2010 09:33:30 +0100 868204 http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2010/sep/01/headteachers-literature-children-education-training Roald Dahl's Miss Trunchbull or Gillian Cross's Demon Headmaster demonstrate the exercise of power, study findsThey may be sadistic figures who hate children, but a study suggests that the savage portrayal of headteachers in children's literature possesses a grain of truth and may even be helpful when it comes to training teachers who aspire to lead schools.Characters like Miss Agatha Trunchbull, from Roald Dahl's Matilda, or the Demon Headmaster, from the sequence by Gillian Cross, can teach children to think about power and how it can be used for malign purposes, Professor Pat Thomson, director of the centre for research in schools and communities at Nottingham University school of education, has found.The study of 19 fictional headteachers found that nine are portrayed as evil or authoritarian, a further six are remote figures of power, and just one - JK Rowling's Professor Albus Dumbledore - is a positive role model.The study traces the origins of school stories to 19th century British fiction which – in stories aimed at boys – focused on the muscular discipline and militarism required for empire building.The books in the study were published between 1975 and 2009, and included Robert Cormier's The Chocolate War and Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events as well as Matilda and Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone.Many of the books show power can be used corruptly, according to Prof Thomson.Sometimes this can have a contemporary, political twist: in The Inflatable School by Peter Wynne-Willson, the "evil, messianic" Mr Stemple plans to turn his school into an academy sponsored by a business with whom his family has a profitable relationship.Miss Trunchbull is one of only two female heads in the books studied and is described, as "formidable and repulsive". ... Wed, 01 Sep 2010 06:00:10 +0100 868029 http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/LansingLibraryTeenNewsBlog/~3/lL0i-FS-78U/september-book-of-month.html Fat Kid Rules the WorldBy K.L. GoingTroy Billings isn’t just a fat kid. Troy is the fat kid. He is the fat kid that huffs and puffs when he breathes. He’s the fat kid that trips over everything. He’s the fat kid that jiggles when he runs. Worst of all, Troy is the fat kids that will always make people laugh, especially when it’s at his expense and would not be funny if a skinny person was involved. One day, Troy was standing on the edge of a subway platform, carefully considering how humorous it would be if he propelled his almost 300 pounds into the subway tunnel and splattered against a speeding train. Apparently, Troy found the scenario very amusing and started laughing. Troy’s fit of giggles was interrupted by a voice crammed in a tiny corner belonging to the dirtiest, skinniest boy Troy had ever seen. This was the day Troy met the infamous high school legend, Curt MacCrae.At first, Troy is in awe that the Curt MacCrae, the most amazing guitar player ever, is sitting in front of him. The astonishment continues as Curt demands Troy buy him dinner. He did, after all, save Troy’s life. It’s from there that Curt reveals his twisted brainchild; Curt and Troy are going to be a band. The biggest problem, other than his weight issue, is that Troy doesn’t know how to play the drums. But Curt has decreed it and now it is so. Troy takes Curt home with him where there is a run-in with Troy’s ex-military father and jock brother. Curt wiggles his way into their home and becomes a staple in the Billings home in the hopes that Troy and his family can help him get clean, while Troy is introduced firsthand to the world of underground punk rock and wonders if he could ultimately rule the world.While the plot of Fat Kid Rules the World may be a bit slow or non-existent at times, Going thrusts the story forward purely by relationships and self-actualization. ... Wed, 01 Sep 2010 04:00:00 +0100 868332 http://blog.njla.org/archives/2010/09/#000947 http;//www.pressofatlanticcity.com By CAITLIN DINEEN, Staff Writer | Posted: Wednesday, September 1, 2010 The Upper Township Branch of the Cape May County Library system is open again after it was closed for seven months for renovations and improvements. The upgrades - which cost a total of $980,000 - may not be noticeable from the outside, but library patrons visiting the newly renovated site will notice all the big changes once they get inside. "It was really a gloomy, dark building," said Deborah Poillon, adding that new lighting was among several changes made to the interior of the library. The Upper Township branch of the library system has been in operation since 1985 and is located on Tuckahoe Road in Petersburg. It reopened in July. A ribbon-cutting event will be held 2 p.m. Sept. 8 at the library. Other changes at the library include a new teen center, glass around the reference room, and making the building more energy efficient. The building will convert to gas heat from electric when a gas line is brought down the street, Poillon said. New furniture also has been brought into the updated space, as well as new counters. System officials said the updates were necessary. Library staff said public response to the improvements has been positive. "They love it," said Deanna Petitt, who has worked at the library for 25 years, adding patrons have commented on the brightness of the library and the new counters. "They love the counters." Petitt said that although the library's upgrades mainly serve patrons, library staff also appreciate the result. "We love it, it's awesome," she said. "What's not to like about it? It's all brand new." Poillon said changes are necessary because local libraries are a central hub for residents. She said the Upper Township library's patronage has increased 18 percent from 2007 to 2009. ... Wed, 01 Sep 2010 04:00:00 +0100 868152 http://mcpldteens.blogspot.com/2010/08/book-review.html Wildwingby Emily WhitmanDo you believe in time travel? Addy couldn't even fathom the thought before she was accidentally swept away in a mysterious time machine to medieval England. She wasn't necessarily sad about the change in scenery because back home, in the 1940s, Addy was a servant. However in medieval England, Addy has been mistaken for the Lady Matilda. She quickly embraces the new name, time period, and lifestyle. Despite the comforts of her station, Addy realizes that even this life isn't completely perfect. This forces her to make a hard decision...stay and enjoy her life as a lady or follow her heart and go home. Definitely check this book out if you enjoy fantasy and romance!Book trailer below:Shanna~Teen Librarian (Source: Teen Stuff @ Mesa County Libraries) Tue, 31 Aug 2010 04:00:00 +0100 868377 http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/SellersLibraryTeens/~3/249gWzYx2mI/teens-top-ten.html It's time to make your selections for this year's edition of the Teens' Top Ten! Have your say about the most popular books of the year. The winners will be announced during Teen Read Week in October. You only get to vote for three, but there are lots of great choices on the list, including:Wintergirls by Laurie Halse AndersonHeist Society by Ally CarterCity of Glass by Cassandra ClareCatching Fire by Suzanne CollinsAlong for the Ride by Sarah DessenIncarceron by Catherine FisherIf I Stay by Gale FormanWitch and Wizard by James PattersonLeviathan by Scott Westerfeld (Source: Sellers Library Teens) Mon, 30 Aug 2010 15:41:55 +0100 867616 http://www.madisonpubliclibrary.org/madreads/index.php/2010/08/30/whats-in-a-name/ Two young men with the same name were featured in the Baltimore Sun in December 2000.  One was named a Rhodes Scholar and the other was wanted for allegedly killing a police offi­cer in an armed rob­bery.  These two young men started out on very similar paths - how did their lives turn out so differently? The full story of what happened is told by Wes Moore, the Rhodes Scholar, veteran, White House Fellow and successful businessman in The Other Wes Moore: One Name, Two Fates. This book should be required reading for all middle school students.  That’s around the age things really started to fall apart for the other Wes Moore. Both boys grew up with loving mothers who wanted their sons to succeed and tried their very best to protect them from a tough environment.  Both boys had other family members looking out for them.  Both boys were bright but had issues with school.  Both boys rebelled at about the same age.  One got sent to military school and the other started dealing drugs.  By the time they were teenagers, their futures were set.  One was on his way to becoming an officer in the military and the other had been arrested multiple times and was headed toward life in prison. Man, is this a sobering book.  I can’t say that I enjoyed it, but I’m so glad that I read it.  Even though the subject matter is heavy, it’s very readable.  Author Wes Moore is even-handed with details and was able to obtain in-depth background information from the other Wes Moore and his family, as well as family photos.  I imagine this title will also be popular with book groups.  There’s much to discuss. (Source: MADreads) Mon, 30 Aug 2010 14:04:30 +0100 867556 http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/booksblog/2010/aug/30/poetry Filled with vitality and physical exuberance, this week's bank holiday choice is that rare thing: a happy poemThis week's choice, "Pier", by one of today's most interesting younger Irish poets, Vona Groarke, seems to be that comparatively rare thing: a happy poem. It centres on the thrill, in the author's words, of "jumping into the sea from a high fishing pier."It might stir your own nostalgia for childhood and teenage derring-do, but if you're lucky - and wise - you won't have outgrown such experiences, nor save them only for bank holidays. "Pier" isn't designed to deliver a message, but it nevertheless says something about the nature of the good and happy life. Our muscles, extensions of our minds, have "a need for joy". Fascism exploits that fact, as regretted in the Auden sonnet which provides the poem's epigraph. But the "sport" here has a different goal. It's private and it's fun; an act not of conformity but rebellion.Vona Groarke was born in Edgeworthstown in the Irish Midlands, but, as she says in this too-brief interview, she thinks of the west of Ireland as her home. "Pier", from her 2009 collection, Spindrift, is set in Spiddal in County Galway. Initially, what's noticeable is that there's no direct first-person narrative. This emphasis on active verbs turns out to be an excellent device, recreating how it feels to be fully absorbed in physical activity, the mind, that often unwieldy "organ", streamlined into unity with the body. The body of the poem – its rhythms and syntax – is not a container, but a sinewy consciousness.The poem begins with a series of signposts or instructions. The abbreviated style helps focus process and movement. The speaker seems to be doing something she's done before - remembering, as well as reporting, a familiar sequence as she moves steadily to her goal. Each point of the landscape has its associated physical accompaniment. ... Mon, 30 Aug 2010 10:24:00 +0100 867424 http://www.slis.indiana.edu/careers/view_job_specific.php?job_id=7752 State: Illinois Full-time position available. The Youth Outreach Coordinator is responsible for recommending, developing, and implementing outreach programs such as family literacy nights, Spanish storytime, and teen parenting events. Bachelor's degree. Experience with children required. Spanish language skills required. Experience working with diverse or underserved populations a plus. Schedule: 37.5 hours per week includes every Thursday evening, one weekend per month, and one Friday night every other month. Additional evening and weekend hours may be required for programs and meetings. Benefits. Annual pay: $29,562 See: www.mppl.org for detailed job description and how to apply Submitted on 2010-08-24 (Source: SLIS Careers Feed) Mon, 30 Aug 2010 09:20:04 +0100 867338 http://lisnews.org/audio/download/37501/LISTen-118.mp3 This week's episode is a quick look at last week's zeitgeist, highlights of the "slushpile", and an editorial from Mike Kellat, the owner of Erie Looking Productions. A related commentary released online by Ontario public broadcaster TVO from commentator Jesse Brown connected to the editorial can be found here directly as an M4V video file. Due to communications complications the audio payload was originally uploaded over GPRS via a Nokia E71x. Cable broadband is having issues locally apparently relative to throughput. Related links: Matt Welch on FTC regulating online reviews The Ohio News Network on teen texting Nielsen on mobile phone usage stats Keith Cowing at NASA Watch about the reach of nasa.gov The results of the tool Cowing referenced concerning nasa.gov turned to oclc.org instead Gnash Release Leo Laporte versus Social Media Leo Laporte on the Google Buzz bug (Source: LISNews.org) Mon, 30 Aug 2010 04:45:04 +0100 867284 http://bclyaknow.blogspot.com/2010/08/closing-blog.html My friends, all good things must come to an end.This will be the final post on the YA Know @ BCL blog. We have enjoyed sharing events and books with you over the past few years, but as the whirlwind of technology moves on, we are shifting our focus to other venues!Teens: Follow us on Facebook! We update our wall 3-4 times a week with new book releases, hot programs, author news, etc. Our location is the "Beaverton City Library Teen Divison" page.Teachers/Parents: Follow us at Teendom, Tweendom! We update this blog on a weekly basis with good homework resources, college prep and scholarships, book news, etc. Add us to your RSS feed or request periodic reminders to check the blog. (Source: YA KNOW @ BCL) Mon, 30 Aug 2010 04:00:00 +0100 867945 http://santafelibrary.blogspot.com/2010/08/youth-artists-wanted.html LITERACY VOLUNTEERS OF SANTA FESEEKING YOUTH ARTISTSTO ASSIST WITH BUS MURAL Literacy Volunteers are looking for teen and young adult artists to help paint a literacy mural on the side and back of a Santa Fe Trails bus on September 16 and 17.Muralist and literacy advocate Phil Yeh will be in Santa Fe on September 16-18 as part of Literacy Volunteers 25th celebration. Phil is an exciting person who has done over 1800 murals around the world and written books over the past 25 years.If you are interested, please contact Meredith Machen, President, Literacy Volunteers of Santa Fe, 988-4523 or 577-6337, mermachen@cybermesa.com.Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle co-creator and Phil Yeh.For more on Phil Yeh, please see Cartoonists Across the World and America. For more on Literacy Volunteers of Santa Fe, check out their website or call 428-1353. (Source: ICARUS... the Santa Fe Public Library Blog) Mon, 30 Aug 2010 04:00:00 +0100 867300 http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2010/aug/29/teenagers-language-music-world Writing 11 novels for teenagers gives you a special insight on their world, from their use of language to their taste in fashion1Teen rebellions involving clothes dyed black with Dylon, sausages rejected as "meat is murder" or hair backcombed into a landmass don't shock parents now. The most shocking act of rebellion a little caucasian agnostic girl from Penrith could pull is a flash conversion to Islam, before swishing down to Londis wearing full niqab. Inshallah, you are so grounded.2Scores of inner-city kids live their lives on what must feel like a giant Pac-Man grid, being chased by enemies whenever they leave home. As adults we underestimate how stressful this is. I began writing comedy for teens as there's no bigger demographic who need a laugh. A joke about how many Rimmel nail colours one can fit in a thong and still run from Superdrug security guards goes a long way.3The idea that teens today have a looser sense of morals is rubbish. For every 15-year-old smashing up the swings in the park, there's another sat piously at home writing complaints to the BBC about bad language and posting my novel back to the publishers, incensed over the word "fartface" on page 34.4Teens don't want adults speaking their language, but a basic working knowledge goes a million miles when writing for them. Many adults are pompous, lazy sorts who write teen fiction in which the kids speak like mini-Michael Goves and never MSN or BBM as this would involve the author researching it. Words you should know but never use include: Wa'gwan? Tonk. Choong. Brap. Brare. Slippin. Wack. Bruv. Blad. Emosh. Par. Wasteman. Allow it. Buff. Peng. Owned. Merked. Shottin'. Beef. Giving me jokes. Airing. Bedrin. Blates. Totes. Bless. Diss. Boi. Ufff. KMT. Bustin. Chirps. Va-jay-jay. Cotch. Fam. Crunk. Cuzz. Dark. Deep. Endz and, of course, the delightful Clunge. (Need a translation? See below. ... Sun, 29 Aug 2010 19:29:54 +0100 867264 http://liszen.com/trends/story.php?title=Texas_Teen_Lit_Festival_Will_Be_Minus_Several_Authors UPDATE According to the Houston Observer, the scheduled festival has BEEN CANCELLED in its entirely, due to the number of participants who have chose (Source: pligg - all) Sun, 29 Aug 2010 07:00:11 +0100 867014 http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2010/aug/29/deborah-feldman-hasidic-once-upon-a-life Brought up in a strict Hasidic community in New York, Deborah Feldman could only dream of lipstick and jeans, cigarettes and playing the piano. So what happened when, in her twenties, she renounced her religion?I grew up in the black-and-white section of Brooklyn, New York. The men in my family wore black hats, black coats and white shirts, they studied black-and-white books and said bright colours were the work of the devil.I read books, too, but they were in English, not Hebrew, and they came from the forbidden public library, and in their black-and-white pages I was introduced to a foreign, exciting world. The spicy redhead in Anne of Green Gables charmed me; the genders in Little Women kept getting mixed up, but I fell in love with the androgynous Jo regardless; and although Dickensian English did not read easy, I muddled through its glorious convolutions nonetheless.Because I read books in English I knew I was a bad girl. In a black-and-white world you can either be bad or good. A Jew or not a Jew. There is no in-between. Maybe I didn't wear red nail polish like a shiksa gentile, but I was peeking into an evil world, living vicariously in it through fictional characters. Break a rule and you're automatically on God's blacklist. My grandfather used to say English was an impure language and to employ it in any way would mean employing Satan himself as commander of my heart. There was no doubt that my heart was already thoroughly blackened by the time I was 10 years old.I doubt it came as a surprise to anyone that I left the Hasidic community. Like my zeidy predicted, I became seduced by the devil. It started with the small things: clear nail polish, subtle eyeliner, a ride on the subway. But then I wanted to see the world, wear jeans, drive a car, learn how to play the piano – all of which were impossible dreams for a woman of my circumstances. Obviously the books worked. ... Sat, 28 Aug 2010 23:09:48 +0100 866786 http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2010/aug/29/new-york-stories-elizabeth-hardwick Over a range of troubling themes – the uncertainty of belonging, the inscrutibility of men – Elizabeth Hardwick's fiction shines with wisdom and craft, writes Tim AdamsThere is a gap of 20 years in this selection of Elizabeth Hardwick's short stories, between the late 1950s when she and her husband, the poet Robert Lowell, moved from New York to Boston, and 1980, when, after their divorce and Lowell's death (in a taxi on the way to her apartment), she seemed to discover her fictional voice once more. Hardwick was not idle in between times. She helped to found the New York Review of Books in 1963 and illuminated its pages with her essays until her death in 2007, each sentence weighted with sifted wisdom and delicious humanity – Derek Walcott called her the "best prose writer in America". And throughout the 1960s she devoted herself with legendary dignity to the almost overwhelming work of shoring up her famous, and famously manic, husband, as he migrated between his study, the outpatient ward or various mental institutions, and the bedrooms of women younger than herself.A southerner, from Kentucky, Hardwick had set out, though, when she came to New York in 1939, to write fiction, from a somewhat liberated woman's view (her first act on getting off the Greyhound bus in Times Square was to buy a new-minted American edition of Finnegans Wake). She was quickly cornered and hemmed in in this enterprise by the dazzle and success of her friend Mary McCarthy, and sometimes lost heart. ... Sat, 28 Aug 2010 23:05:48 +0100 866784 http://rabid-librarian.blogspot.com/2010/08/but-first-bit-of-blogging.html I admit it. Until the other day, I could not tell you who Ken Mehlman was. Although I am probably more political (being on the progressive left) than many people, I don't keep up with the Republicans as much as I ought, especially the chairs of their national committee. But the other day I subscribe to Joe. My. God. And then Mehlman came out as gay, after denying it for years and working against gays in so many ways for years. And Joe Jervis has been extremely educational. The good news is that, finally having come to terms with himself, apparently, he has come out as an advocate for gay marriage. The bad news, of course, is that given his past, it will be an uphill road in getting gay activists to forgive, and they're certainly not going to forget--nor should they. Here's a quote that Joe put up by Pam Spaulding, as quoted in the New York Times: "While it’s nice that Ken has finally come out of the closet as an advocate, it’s really hard to forgive him for the damage he did to the community by working actively against it for pay for years. That he can coast on the gains for our community by supporting AFER’s stellar work on Prop 8 on the backs of many during his tenure at the RNC who bore the brunt of homophobia, those who died as a result of hate crimes, the activists who were assailed professionally is unbelievable. Yet here we are in 2010 watching it unfold. As a human being Mehlman owes the community a serious apology for fomenting homophobia for political gain.” I wish we lived in a world where gay people would not feel like they had to keep their orientation--a basic aspect of their lives--secret. I also wish that they would not channel their self-loathing--bred by an intolerant society--into activities into hypocrisy and activities that hurt other gay people. ... Sat, 28 Aug 2010 04:00:00 +0100 868375 http://www.guardian.co.uk/culture/2010/aug/28/posy-simmonds-tamara-drewe-interview 'A graphic novel is like a film. There are close-ups and long-shots. You choose the location and the props. You do the make-up and the lighting and you get the characters to act.'A couple of months ago Posy Simmonds found herself ensconced in a French hotel suite for 48 hours being interviewed, almost continuously, by TV and radio stations. She was talking about the film version of her graphic novel Tamara Drewe, which was then about to premiere at Cannes and is now about to open in London. Her French is very good, but she still brushed up on her vocabulary to anticipate a few likely questions. "I thought they'd ask what was my favourite scene and so I prepared two answers: the attempt to get the goats to mate – 'couplement des chèvres' – which in fact didn't make the final cut, and the 'lulling the spouse' scene – 'endormir l'épouse' – which did.""Lulling the spouse" was a tactic devised by the detective novelist and inveterate philanderer Nicholas Hardiman, who, along with his long suffering wife Beth, runs the rural writers' colony at the heart of Tamara Drewe. "Behind it is the idea that to avoid suspicion, you must first arouse it," Simmonds laughs. "So you tell the spouse, rather unconvincingly, that, unexpectedly, you're going to be very late this evening and you'll be at mutual friend X's house. And then you actually are at X's house when the anxious spouse rings up, which rather puts them off checking up on you again for a while."No wonder Simmonds's astute facility in anatomising the foibles of her characters has led Tamara Drewe to be described as The Archers on Viagra. It's a neat line, but in fact her story's literary antecedent is grander than Ambridge. And as her career has progressed her work has become progressively richer and more serious, if no less entertaining, than even the most convincingly sophisticated soap opera. ... Fri, 27 Aug 2010 23:05:36 +0100 866291 http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2010/aug/28/lights-out-wonderland-dbc-pierre Alan Warner is impressed by DBC Pierre's fast and furious satire on contemporary decadenceIn a perfect inversion of plain truth, the Royal Bank of Scotland recently assured from billboards that it is "Here For You". In reality the exact contrary is true: We Are Here For It. Capitalism without pesky democracy is our future. If any novelist can collate the killing irony of what is happening around us it is DBC Pierre, who has boiled it down to a culinary emulsion of Hunter S Thompson and Ludwig Bemelmans.Gabriel Brockwell is an anti-globalisation activist whose daddy never loved him, a booze- and cocaine-partial sybarite in his 20s. His sanctimonious rehab guru, "Spread, creased, and folded by culture into a clever likeness of a man", insists: "Gabriel . . . I don't know whether to treat you or publish you!"Like Herman Hesse's Harry Haller, from Steppenwolf, Gabriel is liberated from the contradictions raging within by a pledge to commit suicide after one final blowout. Torching his rehab establishment, he flees England with a stash of cocaine and the embezzled funds from an anti-capitalist action group. He heads for Tokyo, where his childhood comrade – Nelson Smuts – works. An implosive neophyte chef – "the epicurian underworld pulled him into its rarest bowel" – Smuts is bound for the blessing of a Michelin star. Smuts's promise has been sponsored by a sinister party organiser and international playboy, Didier Laxalt, "the godfather of high-octane catering".And it is wine lore that sets up this brilliant satire: Marius is a vine so precious it grows with the assistance of virgins' pheromones and transports the imbiber with visions of its Cote d'Azur slope; the grape is "an ovary inseminated with dreams". It is accompanied by highly toxic blowfish, cut "so thin you could watch porn through it". Gabriel enters a night of gangsters, a teenage girl, a vast fish tank and an octopus. ... Fri, 27 Aug 2010 23:05:20 +0100 866305 http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2010/aug/28/alexei-sayle-family-values The comedian and writer talks about his familyMy family always knew we were different. It was something we revelled in, and it was accepted. We were communists, we were part of this bigger thing. Generally, we were happy with that difference. It made us feel good about ourselves.In many ways, we were ordinary, working-class people, but communism was always there – for instance, in the choices we made about what was seen on television, which was anything by the Unity Theatre, or anything from the Soviet Union. I was allowed to buy British comics, but not American ones. But it wasn't like being Amish.Molly, my mother, is 95 this year. We are friends. It's a complicated relationship, but we're very close. She's difficult, particularly with me – she gets too wound up and invests an awful lot in me. But I love her – she's my mother. She's adored by people – the ones that adore her really think she's wonderful.Was she a good mother? In some ways, yes. She was very good about nutrition, putting money aside for me and making sure I got an education. And I was adored, always told I was special. But there was also the shouting and screaming; it could be unsettling. And sometimes, the fact that she wasn't like anyone made you want to swap her for someone else. When I was a teenager, it used to really shock people when they'd see Molly and me in the pub, telling each other to fuck off.Joe, my father, was very genial, and people loved him. He started to get ill when I was young, and in a way, he's a mystery to me. His life before Molly is mysterious because he was quite old when he met her. Later, it was either Alzheimer's disease or a series of strokes, and it was spread over a long time. Seeing him disintegrate was never discussed, but it was very traumatic, and I do very much regret that I didn't know him. I was very confused – from about 14, I was never in the house because it was too painful. He died in 1983. He used to come to see me in shows. ... Fri, 27 Aug 2010 23:05:19 +0100 866306 http://www.resourceshelf.com/2010/08/27/new-report-from-pew-internet-big-time-growth-for-older-adults-and-social-media/ Released today by Pew Internet. The report was written by Mary Madden. Overview Page While social media use has grown dramatically across all age groups, older users have been especially enthusiastic over the past year about embracing new networking tools. Social networking use among internet users ages 50 and older nearly doubled—from 22% in April 2009 to 42% in May 2010. + Between April 2009 and May 2010, social networking use among internet users ages 50-64 grew by 88%–from 25% to 47%. + During the same period, use among those ages 65 and older grew 100%–from 13% to 26%. + By comparison, social networking use among users ages 18-29 grew by 13%—from 76% to 86% “Young adults continue to be the heaviest users of social media, but their growth pales in comparison with recent gains made by older users,” explains Mary Madden, Senior Research Specialist and author of the report. “Email is still the primary way that older users maintain contact with friends, families and colleagues, but many older users now rely on social network platforms to help manage their daily communications.” + One in five (20%) online adults ages 50-64 say they use social networking sites on a typical day, up from 10% one year ago. + Among adults ages 65 and older, 13% log on to social networking sites on a typical day, compared with just 4% who did so in 2009. At the same time, the use of status update services like Twitter has also grown—particularly among those ages 50-64. One in ten internet users ages 50 and older now say they use Twitter or another service to share updates about themselves or see updates about others. E-Mail Still Leads By a Lot and News Gathering While email may be falling out of favor with today’s teenagers, older adults still rely on it heavily as an essential tool for their daily communications. ... Fri, 27 Aug 2010 16:12:59 +0100 866418 http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/TechsourceBlog/~3/Px_704zx3Kc/asking-why.html Anyone who has spent time with small children knows that "why?" is one of the best and most vexing questions people can ask. "Why?" probes for motivations, explanations, understanding. It demands reflection and clear communication, and I think it's safe to say that most people have a complex relationship with this tiny word. Library techies can leverage "why?" to change how their organizations operate by questioning a ibrary procedure. Discussing workflow with coworkers and asking "why?" a lot, while offering ways to automate procedures, can offer value to your colleagues and your organization (and maybe wreak a little havoc). But "why?" is also a question library techs sometimes dread. "Why did it work before but not this time?" "Why is it broken?" "Why am I getting this error message?" Often the answer is straightforward: a setting has been changed, or a network problem is creating the error. But sometimes, getting to why would require an electrical engineering background and a path of inquiry beyond simply fixing the problem. Nothing is quite so frustrating as resolving a persistent error only to have your techjoy smashed to bits by a coworker disappointed because you're not quite sure why the computer stopped recognizing the printer, you only know that they're now friends again. Before you all send me angry email: yes, most of the time, knowing why something isn't working is the key to fixing it. Computer not connecting to the Internet? Well, that frayed Ethernet cable might be the culprit. This is the third time in a year that's happened? Well, maybe we should move the cable out of the path of the vacuum. Why did your computer's Ethernet port stop working? No idea. It's dead, I installed a network card, now you're online again. If it dies again, that's a different story. ... Fri, 27 Aug 2010 14:47:19 +0100 867912 http://mcpldteens.blogspot.com/2010/08/some-many-good-books.html I have read so many good books lately that I have decided to describe each book in only five words:Mockingjayby Suzanne CollinsWar * Love * Loss * Best * EverTwo Moon Princessby Carmen Ferreiro-EstebanTravel * Castles * Fantasy * Medieval * EngrossingClockwork Angelby Cassandra ClareFantastic * Victorian * Supernatural * Passion * PrequelCraveby Laura Burns and Melinda MetzIllness * Blood * Danger * Duplicity * CliffhangerDead Beautifulby Yvonne WoonTradition * Superstition * Burial * Romance * UnforgettableThe Remarkable Life and Times of Eliza Roseby Mary HooperAdventure * Independence * Legacy * Orphan * HistoricLeaving Paradiseby Simone ElkelesScarred * Imprisoned * Anger * Forgiveness * AttractionFireby Kristin CashoreMonsters * Beauty * Allegiances * Family * MagicalIncarceronby Catherine FisherDark * Destiny * Corruption * Loyalty * HopeAlso check out these Youtube videos related to the books above...This video features the song from Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins:Book trailer for Clockwork Angel by Cassandra Clare:Book trailer for Fire by Kristin Cashore:Book trailer for Incarceron by Catherine Fisher:Enjoy!Shanna~Teen Librarian (Source: Teen Stuff @ Mesa County Libraries) Fri, 27 Aug 2010 04:00:00 +0100 868378 http://aidlibrary.blogspot.com/2010/08/library-news-08272010.html Hurrah for cooler weather, everyone seemed in a better mood.  We continue to get more and more new stuff, DVDs, databases etc.  DatabasesYou can use both of these off campus if you have the log-in and password brochure available in the library when you show your valid student ID.   It is amazing to me how many students get home and decide they need to use the databases and call the library to ask for them.  WE WILL NOT GIVE THE PASSWORDS OVER THE PHONE OR IN EMAIL!!  We really, really mean it!Encyclopedia Britannica Online Academic Edition provides the Encyclopaedia Britannica, plus statistics, magazine articles, biographies, evaluated web sites, timelines, country information, educational videos and Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary and Thesaurus, quotes, an atlas and news feeds from The New York Times.   Wikipedia wants to be Britannica when it grows up.  CQ Researcher is noted for its in-depth, unbiased coverage of health, social trends, criminal justice, international affairs, education, the environment, technology, and the economy. Each issue has an introductory overview; background and chronology on the topic; an assessment of the current situation; tables and maps; pro/con statements from representatives of opposing positions; and bibliographies of key sources. Updated online 44 times a year. MediaFirstcom is a production music and sound effects service with 140,000 tracks and 6,000+ new track releases every year. Searching is by keyword, styles, eras, tempos, instruments, moods, countries and dances. Sign in using the log-in and password available in the library when you show your valid AiDallas ID for on and off-campus access.   Please set up your own folder for your projects. Turn off your pop-up blocker. This site will not function properly with your pop-up blocker on.VideosBusiness90 minutes to killer presentation skills. ... Fri, 27 Aug 2010 04:00:00 +0100 866720 http://mblc.state.ma.us/jobs/find_jobs/rss.php?job_id=6358 Performs a variety of routine and complex professional library and administrative work in the operation of the library system. Exercises supervision over library assistants, pages and other support staff and volunteers. As a generalist, this position may be assigned anywhere in the library. Most frequently, the selected candidate will work in Adult Reference and Young Adult service areas. The ideal candidate will be customer service oriented, familiar with both online and print reference sources, able to troubleshoot and assist patrons with technology, enjoy working with young adults and be creative in developing and implementing programming for teens and adults within available resources. Will be required to work one evening per week and Saturdays. EOE/AA (Source: MBLC Job Listings) Thu, 26 Aug 2010 22:20:05 +0100 865556 http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/SellersLibraryTeens/~3/u1oUhd7sbdQ/playaways-books-for-your-ears.html We have purchased a growing number of Playaways for the teen and J sections this year, but you may not even know what they are! Playaways are audio books that come pre-loaded on mp3 players. You just plug in your headphones and go! They are way more portable than books on tape or CD. Some libraries charge to borrow Playaways, but the Upper Darby Libraries do not. You can borrow them for three weeks and renew them twice, just like books.Here are the Playaways that we own in the teen section:The Six Rules of Maybe by Deb CalettiAl Capone Does My Shirts by Gennifer CholdenkoCatching Fire by Suzanne CollinsThe Hunger Games by Suzanne CollinsMockingjay by Suzanne Collins (NEW!)The City of Ember by Jeanne DuPrau (NEW!)Walk Two Moons by Sharon CreechBeautiful Creatures by Kami Garcia and Margaret StohlAn Abundance of Katherines by John Green (NEW!)The Outsiders by S. E. HintonThe Giver by Lois LowryDunk by David LubarSleeping Freshmen Never Lie by David LubarBloody Jack by L. A. Meyer (NEW!)Flocabulary: The Hip-Hop Approach to SAT-Level Vocabulary Building by Blake Harrison (Source: Sellers Library Teens) Thu, 26 Aug 2010 21:59:53 +0100 865524 http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2010/aug/26/world-fantasy-awards China Miéville's The City and the City and James Enge's Blood of Ambrose among those shortlisted for best novel prizeIs it crime? Is it science fiction? Is it fantasy? China Miéville's bizarre tale of a murder investigation, The City and the City, has already won both of the UK's top science-fiction prizes, and is now lined up for battle in the fantasy arena.The novel, winner of the Arthur C Clarke and British Science Fiction Association awards, is competing with Blood of Ambrose, a classic sword-and-sorcery fantasy from James Enge, and Kit Whitfield's tale of the uneasy alliance between humans and mermaids, In Great Waters, on the shortlist for this year's World Fantasy awards.Also in contention are Jeff VanderMeer's Finch, which concerns detective's attempt to solve two murders in the rotten city of Ambergris, and Caitlín R Kiernan's The Red Tree, about a writer who discovers a dead man's unpublished manuscript and starts to investigate centuries-old secrets.Enge expressed shock and pleasure at his nomination for a book that he says was "deliberately designed not to be award-bait". "I think the odds are very long indeed against Blood of Ambrose taking the 'best novel' award," he said. "It's an attempt to carry on some old pulpy traditions into the 21st century – sword and sorcery, in fact."Although sword-and-sorcery writers have won the World Fantasy award in the past – Enge pointed to Fritz Leiber and Michael Moorcock – "they didn't win for sword-and-sorcery novels, and they were already legends when they were nominated. I'm not a legend, merely somewhat imaginary, or so it feels this morning," he said.Whitfield, whose acclaimed debut novel, Bareback, subverted the werewolf myth, was "astonished" to be shortlisted for In Great Waters. ... Thu, 26 Aug 2010 13:31:23 +0100 865455 http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/teleread/ezFR/~3/zRb-ncyWhiA/ I just had to reprint this comment by Clytie Siddall. The comment was in response to Joanna’s article Publishers, rejoice!: Today I spent some time hunting down in ebook the next few volumes of a series my teenage daughter had started. I’d bought the first volume (The Colour of Magic, by Terry Pratchett) from Fictionwise in the halcyon international e-reading days before geolimitations were imposed. She read it this week, and was happily anticipating the next volume in the series. I found the ebooks at Borders Australia, and bought them. The ensuing conversation: Her: OK, so I just get this from your Bookshelf and open it in eReader. Me: Unfortunately, no. I can’t get it from Fictionwise, and I can’t get it in that format. Her: Why not? Me: That’s a good question. I’ve been looking for the answer for several months now. You know I’ve got a dozen different readers on my iPhone? Her: Yes, but… I thought I wouldn’t have to go through all that cr*p. Me: You and the rest of the reading public. Borders have it in ePub– Her: So I can open it in Stanza! Me: Um, no. Her: Why not? Stanza does ePub. Me: Yes, but these books have DRM. She gives me a disgusted, iTunes-generation look Me: It is doable, sorta. You need to download the desktop reader, and the iPhone reader, and log in to my account at Borders… After half an hour of setup, we’re still waiting for the books to download Her: If it were my money, there’s no way I’d put up with this cr*p. (She gives up and starts playing video games) There you are, publishers: one keen reader and customer of the future. Digg us. Slashdot us. Facebook us. Twitter us. Share the news. (Source: TeleRead: Bring the E-Books Home) Thu, 26 Aug 2010 13:26:08 +0100 865835 http://engagedpatrons.org/Blogs.cfm?SiteID=4725&BlogID=41&BlogPostID=7466 Written in a realistic format, this book presents issues of growing up in the foster care system and the issue of abandonment.  In this story, Min, only age 11, has been in several foster homes.  She is cared for but does not sense she is a part of a real family.  Her current foster mother decides to have Min leave the family.  It is right before Christmas.  Fortunately, Jess, a recently widowed lady and physician in the town, takes Min into her home.  There is a connection made between Jess and Min.  Min finds what she needs in her life.  Even though this story seems a little "too perfect," the subject matter is serious and sensitively portrayed in Min, as a young girl with a sense of hope just wanting to be loved and part of a family.  Most suitable for readers in grades 6-12. (Source: Teen Scene from Wright Memorial Public Library) Thu, 26 Aug 2010 13:20:01 +0100 864911 http://engagedpatrons.org/Blogs.cfm?SiteID=4725&BlogID=41&BlogPostID=7467 This book is the American translated version by Arnold J. Pomerans.  It is a unique edition regarding Anne Frank, her family and the times in which they lived.  Direct quotes are from Anne's diary.  Supplemental information puts the reader in the situation of this family's plight. As you read this account of Anne Frank's life, you almost have a sense of being in an Anne Frank museum.  Difficult as it is to read with the dreaded outcome we all know, the book is a worthy biography and well written with many actual photographs from Otto Frank's collection of his family.  Just when we thought another book could not be written about this girl, a fresh approach to the topic with family photos makes a statement regarding the importance of young and old to remember these events.  This book is most suitable for readers in grades 5-12. (Source: Teen Scene from Wright Memorial Public Library) Thu, 26 Aug 2010 13:20:01 +0100 864910 http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/2010/aug/26/scott-pilgrim-vs-the-world-review Michael Cera is the star of the graphic novel series in Edgar Wright's witty and stylish big-screen transfer. By Peter BradshawEdgar Wright takes the ache out of "achingly cool" with his entertaining, hyperactive gamer-geek comedy Scott Pilgrim Vs the World, set in freezing cold Toronto and based on the graphic novel series by Bryan Lee O'Malley. Despite riffing on some apparently emotional themes – male romantic status-anxiety is brought interestingly into parallel with Canada's cultural cringe to the United States – Wright insists on nothing more than comedy and the spectacle of pastiche, an entertainment of Seinfeldian inconsequence. The movie has been attacked in some quarters for lack of heart, and for an alleged lack of box office nous in pitching to a demographic that favours illegal downloads over ticket-buying. I can only say that where some see shallowness, I saw a witty interplay of surfaces and style.Our hero is Scott Pilgrim, bassist in the crashingly loud local band Sex Bob-omb and keen player of video games, activities that encompass the sum total of his cultural life. An interest in literature surfaces briefly when he realises that the love of his life has a job making special deliveries for Amazon, and so orders a book – the title of which is irrelevant and unmentioned. Scott is played by Michael Cera, perhaps the most sexually unthreatening male in the history of cinema, with a gentle, moonish face that makes him look like an early-60s Beatle. Scott and his band are not slackers, exactly: Wright shows them industriously rehearsing and worrying about their romantic and musical careers, but they are so utterly unworried about earning a living that they could as well be in college or even high school.Scott has a love life that, though notionally filled with angst, is actually beyond the wildest dreams of most real-life saddos and geeks. ... Thu, 26 Aug 2010 10:52:31 +0100 865462 http://cmrlslibrarynews.blogspot.com/2010/08/new-forest-public-library-opens.html The NEW Forest Public Library will OPEN to the public for the first time Friday, August 27, 9:00 a.m.! This long awaited project has culminated in a beautiful and spacious building that will be enjoyed by all. Forest Public Library houses approximately 30,000 items and has a friendly and knowledgeable staff to assist with homework needs, personal and business information needs, life-long learning, or help to find that “good book” to read. The Library is the Scott County center of CMRLS for genealogical research; housing approximately 350 local and state titles, and many microfilm records, searchable CDs, and printed family histories. Regular preschool programming is held for the “read to me” age group, as well as various year-round programming for kids, teens, adults, and seniors!You are invited to attend the Opening Reception tonight, Thursday, August 26, 5:00 p.m. to view the NEW Library with Friends, patrons, and supporters. (Source: CMRLS News) Thu, 26 Aug 2010 04:00:00 +0100 868259 http://bhplnjbookgroup.blogspot.com/2010/08/belong-to-me-by-marisa-de-los-santos.html Do not dismiss Belong to Me by Marisa de los Santos just because ita) was a New York Times bestsellerb) has a cute photograph on its cover (see?)It is really good. Occasionally I'd have to stop reading just because I felt overloaded by ideas, as if I were having a in-depth conversation with a large group of friends. Bookreporter explains the premise of Belong To Me than I can:Cornelia and her husband Teo have just moved from New York to a sleepy, upper-class Philadelphia suburb, and she’s having a bit of trouble fitting in. She misses the pace, creativity and intellectual stimulation of the city and finds little in common with the other women, wives of professional men, she comes into contact with. She’s particularly put off by her snotty neighbor, Piper Truitt. But when she meets the eccentric Lake, a single mom also new to town, she has hope that a solid friendship is developing. But the reasons why the characters are thrown together were secondary to my enjoyment; I just liked to hear them talk.This is an excerpt of one of my favorite parts, a conversation between teen genius Dev, and Cornelia, who occasionally narrates Belong To Me:Dev: "So, I guess that the word 'sonnet' comes from sonnetto, which means 'little song' in Italian? But I don't think a sonnet's that much like a song. It's so short, and it just doesn't feel like a song . . ." Cornelia: "So what do you think a better name would be?" ...Dev: "I've been thinking 'little box,' . . . Like with 'Design,' Frost is worried that there is no design, no shape to what happens, so he does what he knows how to do: he puts the worry into a poem that has a small, really definite shape. Fourteen lines. . . "Cornelia: "... So you're thinking that a sonnet is a way of distilling a big idea or emotion until it fits in a tiny box."Cornelia made her debut in Love Walks In, but I didn't think reading that first was at all necessary (and haven't read it yet, actually). ... Thu, 26 Aug 2010 04:00:00 +0100 868227 http://lovealibrarian.blogspot.com/2010/08/initial-thoughts-on-mockingjay.html The Hunger Games enthralled me back to reading Young Adult literature. After my disappointment on the Twilight Saga, I lost appetite reading YA novels until I discovered Suzanne Collins' riveting book. Of course, when Catching Fire was released in October 2009, I scraped whatever was left of my personal budget just to get a copy. Yes, both are satisfying and exciting reads. It offered me (Source: School Librarian in Action) Thu, 26 Aug 2010 04:00:00 +0100 866313 http://librarychronicles.blogspot.com/2010_08_01_archive.html#2721796138262092923 T-P: Congressional party primary turnout may end up 'in the teens' on Saturday Perhaps if there had been more substantive reporting on the candidates in the mainstream press, we wouldn't have this problem. It isn't like there hasn't been any information out there to talk about, only that no local media outlet has deemed it newsworthy for some reason. Instead, we get bland summaries of the candidates' fund raising efforts which tell us next to nothing about who is backing these candidates and why. Reporting on political campaign fund raising this way leaves the impression that we are comparing some innate physical talent of the candidates to draw money toward themselves. And, naturally, the one who demonstrates an ability to suck the most money in is the most innately qualified for office. Then we wonder why we tend to elect such profoundly sucky candidates.I suppose if you ask the the purveyors of this bland uninformative reporting, they'll tell you it's how they maintain an assurance that they are being fair to every candidate. But pretending that fund raising numbers don't convey information beyond just comparative numbers really isn't being fair to their readers or, for that matter, to anyone but the most well-financed candidate as Clay points out in a comment to a below post. The MSM will find AZ's posts... Right after Richmond has the Demo nomination all locked up and he faces Cao. $Bill Jr. (after expose) vs. Cao will push Cao back to DC.And that just sucks all around. (Source: Library Chronicles) Thu, 26 Aug 2010 04:00:00 +0100 866014 http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/aug/26/response-spirit-level-bad-social-science There is no rightwing conspiracy – this research on inequality is undeniably flawedIn a report you describe two "low-profile North Yorkshire social scientists" who wrote a book about the evils of income inequality, only to find themselves subject to "a wave of brutal attacks" by a "posse of rightwing institutes" staffed by "professional wreckers of ideas" (Spirited defence: how 'ideas wreckers' turned bestseller into political punchbag, 14 August). The victims of the "attacks" are Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett, their book is The Spirit Level, and we, apparently, are the "posse".This depiction of Wilkinson and Pickett as hapless victims of a rightwing conspiracy is absurd. They are well-resourced academics with their own propagandising thinktank (The Equality Trust). We are two self-employed researchers who got interested in testing their claims.We maintain that The Spirit Level is flawed, but we are not the only ones saying so. Although the authors repeatedly claim an academic consensus supports their book, they have been criticised by leading economists and social scientists, many of them on the left (Christopher Jencks, Andrew Leigh, Angus Deaton, John Kay, John Goldthorpe).In their book, Wilkinson and Pickett are selective in their choice of countries, excluding unequal countries such as South Korea with strong social profiles that would have undermined their argument. They switch sources, dates and measures of inequality across different graphs to maximise the trends they want to find.Furthermore, they are selective in their choice of indicators. Imprisonment gets in, but not crime (except homicides). Drugs are in, alcoholism is out. Murder is included, suicide excluded. Government aid is analysed, but charitable donations by individuals are not. Infant mortality is included, HIV infection rates are not. Teenage births are analysed, divorce rates are left out. ... Wed, 25 Aug 2010 23:05:55 +0100 865467 http://www.cla-net.org/weblog/2010/08/finding_a_voice.php They started out as a group of teens who liked poetry. They wanted and used the Cesar Chavez Public Library as a place to meet, write, explore, and perform, but little did they know that from their own words and voices they would inspire and create a city wide movement to build a brighter future for its youth. The group Teen Salinas Speaks (TSS) has created a whirlwind of publicity and gained a devoted following, and from their free poetry workshops to Operation Oprah film campaign, have gathered an entire community to not only explore the power of their words and voices, but combat and face violation and gang activity head on. In 2009 Salinas saw 29 gang related homicides, coming 4th in the entire state of California for highest per capita murder rate. TSS Member Mya Perez said, "I first joined because it was a way to express myself without getting judged for it, a place where I can perfect my poetry, but now that we have expanded I continue to go because I wanna help rid off gang violence before I see another friend in a coffin..." The members of TSS recognize that combating gang violence and offering realistic alternatives is no easy journey, and the road ahead will be long, paved with plenty of bumps along the way. They hold weekly meetings and broadcast a weekly radio show called, "The Peace Hour," with PK McCary where they address and discuss issues affecting teens. From injustice to racism the teens tackle each and every piece of life that changes and influences how we see and interact with those around us hoping to raise awareness and create an open dialogue in the community. With the series of nine podcasts, they've begun to soothe the fears and uncertainties of our teens simply by recognizing they exist, and talking them through. ... Wed, 25 Aug 2010 18:16:00 +0100 867937 http://www.lisnews.org/got_mockingjay Iowa City, IA — The hold shelves Tuesday at the Iowa City Public Library were peppered with the pale blue spine of "Mockingjay," the third and supposedly final installment in "The Hunger Games" blockbuster trilogy of young-adult novels by Suzanne Collins. Katniss Everdeen, 16, is the protagonist in a dystopian future version of North America known as Panem. It's a harsh dictatorship, where children from 12 blighted districts battle each other to the death in an annual reality-TV game show, to the delight of the pampered citizens. I spent part of my summer reading the first two installments in the series, 2008's "The Hunger Games" and last year's "Catching Fire." I think I'm OK revealing that, because I've learned I'm hardly alone among allegedly mature readers. Jason Paulios, 32, the librarian in the young adults' corner here in the Iowa City library, tallied a "mind-boggling" 93 holds for "Mockingjay," released Tuesday. Glen Rock, NJ - on Monday the library hosted its first-ever sleepover party, in conjunction with the release of "Mockingjay," Suzanne Collins' newest book in the "Hunger Games" series. Nancy Pearl's twitter feed: Mockingjay: triumphant finale: painfully sad,many deaths,hard decisions;same courageous Katniss. Made me want to reread 1&2 in the series. (Source: LISNews - Librarian And Information Science News) Wed, 25 Aug 2010 15:05:43 +0100 865580 http://lisnews.org/got_mockingjay Iowa City, IA — The hold shelves Tuesday at the Iowa City Public Library were peppered with the pale blue spine of "Mockingjay," the third and supposedly final installment in "The Hunger Games" blockbuster trilogy of young-adult novels by Suzanne Collins. Katniss Everdeen, 16, is the protagonist in a dystopian future version of North America known as Panem. It's a harsh dictatorship, where children from 12 blighted districts battle each other to the death in an annual reality-TV game show, to the delight of the pampered citizens. I spent part of my summer reading the first two installments in the series, 2008's "The Hunger Games" and last year's "Catching Fire." I think I'm OK revealing that, because I've learned I'm hardly alone among allegedly mature readers. Jason Paulios, 32, the librarian in the young adults' corner here in the Iowa City library, tallied a "mind-boggling" 93 holds for "Mockingjay," released Tuesday. Glen Rock, NJ - on Monday the library hosted its first-ever sleepover party, in conjunction with the release of "Mockingjay," Suzanne Collins' newest book in the "Hunger Games" series. Nancy Pearl's twitter feed: Mockingjay: triumphant finale: painfully sad,many deaths,hard decisions;same courageous Katniss. Made me want to reread 1&2 in the series. (Source: LISNews.org) Wed, 25 Aug 2010 15:05:43 +0100 865297 http://blog.ocls.info/Teens/2010/08/need_homwork_help.html Visit Tutor.com for your very own FREE tutor! Tutor.com provides online, interactive help from qualified tutors for students in grades K through 12. The 20-minute sessions are in English or Spanish and offer expert help in math, science, social studies, English and writing assistance. A live person is there to help you with Homework between 2:00 PM - 1:00 AM! Be sure to check this out and stay updated on all the awesomeness provided to you from the Orange County Library System! (Source: Techno Teens LIVE) Wed, 25 Aug 2010 14:47:51 +0100 867169 http://www2.worthingtonlibraries.org/teen/blog/index.cfm?CommentID=469 Hello teens of Worthington! My name is Ellie and I’m super excited to be doing my... (Source: Worthingteens) Wed, 25 Aug 2010 14:23:29 +0100 867137 http://theshiftedlibrarian.com/archives/2010/08/24/august-24th-stream-2.html Shared 3 photos. tonight Ella got a mani-pedi and an oatmeal bath before her mani-pedi & trim after her mani-pedi & trim great post but not just teens; adults @ work, too RT @zephoria: “Social Steganography: Learning to Hide in Plain Sight” http://bit.ly/bbADzA [shifted] RT @GraphJam: Help Desk: You’re Doing it Wrong — http://dbl.chzb.gr/18HCGs [shifted] Posted msauers: A Fondness for Antiques: The Future of Books According to Science Fiction http://ow.ly/2tXjK #ebooks. Share: No tags for this post. (Source: The Shifted Librarian) Wed, 25 Aug 2010 04:00:12 +0100 865908 http://www.madisonpubliclibrary.org/madreads/index.php/2010/08/24/book-group-reports-7/ For our August discussion book, the South Madison Branch Library read Women of the Silk by Gail Tsukiyama.  Set in China in the 1920’s and 30’s, it’s a story of girls who go off to work in the silk factories in order to support their families.  The story follows Pei, born to a poor farm family in rural China, who is sent to the factory by her father at age 9.  The book details the silk industry, and more intriguingly, the communities and bonds formed among the women who do the silk work.  In the background of Pei’s story is the growing unrest between Japan and China, culminating in the outbreak of war. Our group was small, but there was a great deal of discussion.  The group unanimously loved the book and several voiced their hope to find out the rest of Pei’s story in Tsukiyama’s sequel, The Language of Threads.  The writing was simple, gentle and quiet yet didn’t always seem to express the depth of the hardships that the women were experiencing.  While most liked the writing – one member loved that it was pragmatic instead of flowery – at times it seemed incongruous with what was going on in the story.  One member noted that we are generally used to more graphic descriptions of violence and suffering in contemporary writing, so the difference was noticeable. Everyone agreed that they genuinely liked and cared about the characters.  They were surprised by the degree of autonomy and independence the women had during this era, and the kindness they were treated to in the girls’ house where the workers lived.  All agreed that although the working conditions were difficult, their treatment at the hands of the house mothers where they lived could have been just as harsh.  All of the readers were thrilled to have read about a world they didn’t know existed.  One member of the group talked about her travels to poorer areas of the world, where she has observed similar bonding and cooperation among groups of women. ... Wed, 25 Aug 2010 00:08:08 +0100 864812 http://www.countyteens.com/?p=567 I’m very excited to announce the results from the 2010 Liam Garrett Memorial Teen Art Show. (back row) Liz Zylstra (Youth Services) with First Prize winning piece, Colleen Green, Judge Niall Eccles, Library CEO Barbara Sweet. (front row) Artist Marlyana Church with People’s Choice Winning Piece, artist Charlotte Lacey, artist Svenya Scherer with honourable mention piece, and artist Sarah Renaud Wilkinson. Our judge, Niall Eccles, chose the following pieces: 1. “Untitled” – Ruby Paugh 2. “Untitled” – Sarah Renaud Wilkinson Honourable Mentions: Marlayna Church, Svenya Scherer, Heather McCorquodale People’s Choice Award: Marlyana Church, “Homage to the Scream” Draw Prize Heather McCorquodale Thanks to Niall for the thorough and thoughtful judging, and 7 Elements Artist Materials and Studio for donating First Prize and agreeing to display some of the work in the store. If you missed the show, you can stop by the store at 230 Main Street to see some of the pieces. Thanks to Colleen Green for donating the People’s Choice Prize and the Draw Prize. (Source: What's happening for teens at the library?) Tue, 24 Aug 2010 16:34:21 +0100 867150 http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/DepravedLibrarian/~3/12iHb7abhmk/ Social Steganography: Learning to Hide in Plain Sight | DMLcentral Social steganography is one privacy tactic teens take when engaging in semi-public forums like Facebook. While adults have worked diligently to exclude people through privacy settings, many teenagers have been unable to exclude certain classes of adults – namely their parents – for quite some time. For this reason, they've had to develop new techniques to speak to their friends fully aware that their parents are overhearing. Social steganography is one of the most common techniques that teens employ. They do this because they care about privacy, they care about misinterpretation, they care about segmented communications strategies. And they know that technical tools for restricting access don't trump parental demands to gain access. So they find new ways of getting around limitations. And, in doing so, reconstruct age-old practices. (tags: youth identity privacy socialmedia) (Source: Depraved Librarian) Tue, 24 Aug 2010 12:04:58 +0100 866589 http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/DepravedLibrarian/~3/rlKqThppUGo/glee Social Steganography: Learning to Hide in Plain Sight | DMLcentral Social steganography is one privacy tactic teens take when engaging in semi-public forums like Facebook. While adults have worked diligently to exclude people through privacy settings, many teenagers have been unable to exclude certain classes of adults - namely their parents - for quite some time. For this reason, they've had to develop new techniques to speak to their friends fully aware that their parents are overhearing. Social steganography is one of the most common techniques that teens employ. They do this because they care about privacy, they care about misinterpretation, they care about segmented communications strategies. And they know that technical tools for restricting access don't trump parental demands to gain access. So they find new ways of getting around limitations. And, in doing so, reconstruct age-old practices. (Source: Depraved Librarian) Tue, 24 Aug 2010 07:00:00 +0100 866590 http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/SellersLibraryTeens/~3/xuqZkHDoSk4/summer-reading-winners-end-of-summer.html Because the teen summer reading grand prize was coming directly from Delaware County library system this year, I did not hold a teen prize party as I have the past two summers. However, I had a bunch of stuff to give away for the end of summer, so here's a big list!Cindy, grade 6, won two free games of bowling at Wynnewood Lanes.Tobi, grade 7, won a basket with two books, a water balloon kit, a toilet-shaped puzzle book, candy, and a water bottle.Christina, grade 11, won a hardcover book and a $5 gift card to Panera Bread.Laurel, grade 9, won a UDHS book bag with two hardcover books, locker magnets, a water bottle, tie-dyed shoelaces, and candy.Peris, grade 9, won a hardcover book and candy.Tim, grade 8, won five free games of bowling at Sproul Lanes.Tarzan, grade 7, won a hardcover book and a $5 gift card to Dollar Tree.Tanpreet, grade 8, won a hardcover book and candy.Anureet, grade 11, won two passes to visit the Eastern State Penitentiary.Anas, grade 11, won a hardcover book and a $5 gift card to Borders.Laura, grade 9, won a beach bag with two hardcover books, candy, flip flops, and a water bottle.Hannah, grade 6, won a hardcover book and a $5 gift card to Wawa.John, grade 10, won two passes to visit the Eastern State Penitentiary.Shannon, grade 6, won a hardcover book and candy.Samantha, grade 6, won two free games of bowling at Wynnewood Lanes.Shariah, grade 7, won a basket with two hardcover books, candy, a water bottle, a toilet-shaped puzzle book, and a water ballook kit.Anne, grade 7, won a hardcover book and a $5 gift card to Panera Bread.Mohammad, grade 11, won two passes to visit the Eastern State Penitentiary.Melvin, grade 7, won a hardcover book and a $5 gift card to GameStop. (Source: Sellers Library Teens) Mon, 23 Aug 2010 16:36:00 +0100 865525 http://www.madisonpubliclibrary.org/madreads/index.php/2010/08/23/gen-x-lite/ I found Cecily Von Ziegesar’s new novel Cum Laude nearly as entertaining as her Gossip Girl Series, but I’m not sure who the target audience is.  It’s marketed as a novel for adults, but is written more like a YA novel, with a plot and setting that I can’t imagine would be all that appealing to fans of the CW show or YA readers graduating from the book series looking for something new to read. Set in 1992 at a private college in Maine, it’s more of an homage to the grunge-era.  Will young adult readers who love the stylish Upper East Side New York girls with their society parties and scandals be captivated by the granola-y Dexter College campus and college freshman with their J. Crew sweaters and flannel L.L. Bean dorm sheets?  I don’t know.  Adults who read the GG series and are curious about this foray into adult fiction might be interested, but the writing is just so-so. There is some recreational drug use and sexual activity, but no more than in any GG novel, in my opinion.  I’m thinking the book got marketed as adult fiction because the characters are starting college, but the book does not feel like an adult novel to me.  It feels more like an episode of Felicity, again minus the NYC setting. According to the author bio, Von Ziegesar is forty and attended Colby College in the late 80s/early 90s.  So I guess she is probably marketing the book to me, an adult fan of Gossip Girl who also attended college around that time, loves J. Crew and is looking for something easy and fun to read.  That sounds kind of lame, though, doesn’t it?  So, I will end this review encouraging everyone to read Cum Laude!  It’s full of sex and drugs and Pearl Jam! (Source: MADreads) Mon, 23 Aug 2010 15:59:00 +0100 864813 http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/SellersLibraryTeens/~3/pb3jMDp06oA/summer-reading-winners-week-nine.html Here are the last of our weekly winners for the summer:Andrea, grade 9, won a beach bag with two hardcover books, a water bottle, candy, and flip-flops.Gabe, grade 9, won a hardcover book and a $5 gift card to GameStop.Sarah, grade 11, won a t-shirt that says "The Book Was Better" along with a popcorn bucket and copies of five books that have been made into movies.Christine, grade 6, won a hardcover book and $5 gift card to Borders.Congratulations! Thanks for participating. (Source: Sellers Library Teens) Mon, 23 Aug 2010 14:00:09 +0100 865526 http://www.lisnews.org/texas_teen_lit_festival_will_be_minus_several_authors UPDATE According to the Houston Observer, the scheduled festival has BEEN CANCELLED in its entirely, due to the number of participants who have chosen not to attend. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The Teen Lit Fest in Humble is a huge deal for renowned writers of young adult fiction and the kids they're writing for. Which is why it's a huge deal that half of the authors have dropped out of the January 2011 festival. It all started when an Humble ISD librarian complained to some influential parents about New York Times bestselling author Ellen Hopkins, who was scheduled to appear at the festival. (Hopkins writes about cheery subjects like drug addiction, suicide, and religious intolerance.) Houston Press reports. Those parents then allegedly bent the ear of Superintendent Guy Sconzo, who ordered another librarian to uninvite Hopkins -- even though she had already appeared at two of the festivals Humble-area high schools, without causing any of the teenagers to slit their wrists, become pregnant, or turn to prostitution to subsidize chronic substance-abuse problems. When fellow writer and invitee Pete Hautman heard about it, he decided to drop out of the festival, and, according to his blog three more writers have dropped out -- Melissa de la Cruz, Tara Lynn Childs and Matt de la Pena. More on this story from Galley Cat and entries from author Ellen Hopkins Live Journal. The Lit Festival's Facebook page appears to have been pulled. (Source: LISNews - Librarian And Information Science News) Mon, 23 Aug 2010 13:12:44 +0100 865590 http://lisnews.org/texas_teen_lit_festival_will_be_minus_several_authors UPDATE According to the Houston Observer, the scheduled festival has BEEN CANCELLED in its entirely, due to the number of participants who have chosen not to attend. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The Teen Lit Fest in Humble is a huge deal for renowned writers of young adult fiction and the kids they're writing for. Which is why it's a huge deal that half of the authors have dropped out of the January 2011 festival. It all started when an Humble ISD librarian complained to some influential parents about New York Times bestselling author Ellen Hopkins, who was scheduled to appear at the festival. (Hopkins writes about cheery subjects like drug addiction, suicide, and religious intolerance.) Houston Press reports. Those parents then allegedly bent the ear of Superintendent Guy Sconzo, who ordered another librarian to uninvite Hopkins -- even though she had already appeared at two of the festivals Humble-area high schools, without causing any of the teenagers to slit their wrists, become pregnant, or turn to prostitution to subsidize chronic substance-abuse problems. When fellow writer and invitee Pete Hautman heard about it, he decided to drop out of the festival, and, according to his blog three more writers have dropped out -- Melissa de la Cruz, Tara Lynn Childs and Matt de la Pena. More on this story from Galley Cat and entries from author Ellen Hopkins Live Journal. The Lit Festival's Facebook page appears to have been pulled. (Source: LISNews.org) Mon, 23 Aug 2010 13:12:44 +0100 865307 http://www.guardian.co.uk/theobserver/2010/aug/22/observer-profile-james-ellroy The author of LA Confidential and The Black Dahlia, whose latest book, Blood's a Rover, is now out in paperback, is still driven by his tragic pastAuthors who write about dark or disturbing subjects invariably draw the question: where does that come from? But no one who knows anything about him asks it of American crime writer James Ellroy. For the answer is as glaring and particular as one of his brutally staccato sentences.Ellroy's parents divorced when he was young and in 1958, when he was 10, his mother was murdered. The killer was never identified and the only arrest was Ellroy's emotional development.The following year, he became fixated with the murder of a young, wannabe actress named Elizabeth Short, a viciously sadistic sex assault known as the Black Dahlia case, which became the surrogate crime upon which he could let loose his damaged emotions and forbidden curiosity.He spent his teens and twenties drunk, drugged and delinquent. He joined the army, was discharged, and became a homeless petty criminal, which led to prison. During his down-and-out years, he developed pneumonia and was hospitalised with a severe lung abscess. Eventually, in 1977, he joined Alcoholics Anonymous, became a golf caddy and began writing in earnest.In an obvious sense, the whole of his subsequent career as a writer, which has produced such hard-boiled crime classics as The Black Dahlia, LA Confidential and American Tabloid, has been a protracted excursion into the recesses of an imagination forever contorted by the trauma of his childhood.Ellroy's novels are about America, Los Angeles, crime, corruption, vanity, voyeurism, the misleading allure of celebrity, the strained relationships between the sexes and many other matters, large and small.But most of all they are about himself and his unending attempts to describe the enormous psychic hole left by the slaying of his mother. ... Sat, 21 Aug 2010 23:06:30 +0100 865448 http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2010/aug/21/anne-frank-francine-prose Another year, another book about the second world war's best-known diarist. But is there any more to say? By Anne KarpfDoes the world need another book about Anne Frank? Almost every moment in the German diarist's 15-year life, which ended in 1944 in Bergen-Belsen, has already been copiously chronicled; each person with even a passing connection to her story has told their own. And the uses to which her diary has been put have also been well critiqued, most notably by the American critic Cynthia Ozick, who, in an article for the New Yorker in 1997, argued: "The diary has been bowdlerised, distorted, transmuted, reduced; it has been infantilised, Americanised, sentimentalised, falsified." Ian Buruma, writing in the New York Review of Books the following year, put it more bluntly: Anne Frank has become a Dutch Joan of Arc.In the absence of new material, those who write about her must either endlessly rehearse what's already known, reconstitute her for a modern audience or analyse those "new" Anne Franks. Francine Prose tries to do all three and fails much of the time. For, if Anne Frank has in some sense become a sign, then the task of analysing her book's afterlife requires the skills of a semiotician rather than a novelist.Prose's chief argument is that, by viewing the diary as a historical document, we have overlooked its qualities as a "work of literary genius", although from the spring of 1944 onwards Anne rewrote her diary as she updated it, to turn it into a more eloquent piece of writing. After the war her father, Otto Frank, drew on versions A (the original) and B (Anne's revision) to produce C – the standard edition, until both the critical edition (1989) and the definitive edition (1995) supplemented C with hitherto omitted passages from A and B.Yet none of this is new: indeed most of Prose's material is based on already published work, written by people who knew how the Anne Frank story ended. ... Fri, 20 Aug 2010 23:03:45 +0100 865449 http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/TameTheWeb/~3/M6x27UYf6Eo/ Last night, we held the first Teen After Hours event at the Portland Public Library.  This program was a collaboration between the library and Officer Ray Ruby of the Portland Police Department. All in all, it was a great success.  We played video games, ate pizza, had a massive hide and seek game, and just enjoyed life.  It’s the best example of what I’m calling the teen “un-program”.  With the teen un-program, you have a program with lots of different stuff, you open it up to teens, and…well, just watch the video to see what happens. I can’t wait until we have the next one. (Many thanks to Portland Public Library Teen David Chu for filming/editing this video.  David takes awesome photos and videos and shares them with the world at his website) *PS* At the end, the teens are very politely telling me to stop tweeting!  Ha! -Post by Justin Hoenke, Tame the Web Contributor (Source: Tame The Web: Libraries and Technology) Fri, 20 Aug 2010 18:57:24 +0100 864752 http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/SellersLibraryTeens/~3/tV_ioywRzMo/mockingjay-tidbits.html OK, so we are ravenously awaiting the final volume in The Hunger Games trilogy! Called Mockingjay, it is under strict embargo until next Tuesday, August 24. (I have six copies sitting here at the library that I'm not allowed to look at. It's torture!) So what's a fan to do? Read ABOUT the book!!Interviews with the Author:The Last Battle: With ‘Mockingjay’ on its way, Suzanne Collins weighs in on Katniss and the Capitol Suzanne Collins on the books she lovesHunger Games Movie:Basic movie informationSpeculation: Who should play Katniss?YouTube fan videosHunger Games Fansites:http://www.hungergamestrilogy.net/http://www.hungergamestrilogy.com/fansite/http://mockingjay.net/http://jabberjays.com/Hunger Games Fanfic: Check out one of these communities! (Source: Sellers Library Teens) Fri, 20 Aug 2010 17:41:59 +0100 865527 http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/SellersLibraryTeens/~3/qhNClZ9o7lc/pirate-party.html Yo-ho-ho! Last Friday (the 13th!) we had our end-of-summer teen pirate party, and 39 people showed up. It was insane!! Everyone made fill-in-the-blank pirate nametags and we watched a clip of Pirates of the Caribbean to get started. After that, I judged the costume contest because I wanted to get it done before we went outside, while they still looked good. Thanks to everyone who dressed up...you made the party more festive!Then, we made our pirate weapons: marshmallow shooters! It was so easy: just cut the bottom out of a cup, tie off a balloon and cut the end off, and stretch the balloon over the cut-out botttom. Then, put a marshmallow down in the cup, pull the knot back, and let it fly! All 39 of us trooped outside and lined up to take three shots. We did a distance competition (sorry, everyone, I don't trust you enough to let you shoot them AT each other...), and Monet won with a marshmallow that flew for 70 feet! It wasn't even helped much by the wind.We came back in to watch a clip from a documentary about real pirates, plus laugh at the antics of Captian Feathersword and the Wiggles. Then everyone lined up for rations of cupcakes and pirate snack mix. The last thing we did was work in groups of four to translate the final battle from Harry Potter #7 into pirate language, with hilarious results. The group with the best story won treasure...aka candy necklaces! At the end, everyone took home a squirty shark, pirate ducky, or pirate flag keychain, as well as a pirate pencil. Hope you all had a great time! Thanks to Judy, Christine, and Kathy for decorating help before the event, and to the Teen Advisory Board for helping with the expenses. What a bunch of scurvy sea dogs! Our winners: a tech pirate, a vampirate (Team Edwarrrrrd), and a more realistic entry Avast, me hearties! Ye shall surely slay the enemy with such fearsome weapons! (Source: Sellers Library Teens) Fri, 20 Aug 2010 16:52:24 +0100 865529 http://www.hsdl.org/hslog/?q=node/5719 The National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University recently released National Survey of American Attitudes on Substance Abuse XV: Teens and Parents . From the Accompanying Statement by Joseph A. Califano, Jr., "This 15th annual 'back-to-school survey' continues the unique effort of The National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse (CASA) at Columbia University to track attitudes of teens and those, like parents, who influence them. Over a decade and a half, through this survey we have identified factors that increase or decrease the likelihood of teen substance abuse. read more (Source: HSDL Weblog - On the HomeFront) Fri, 20 Aug 2010 16:39:00 +0100 865443 http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/SellersLibraryTeens/~3/ud-QLJbAhlc/family-water-fun-day.html Last Wednesday, Mrs. Ryan and I put together our first-ever summer fundraiser, called Family Water Fun Day. We were assisted by library staff and a small army of teen volunteers, and it was definitely a success! Since the summer reading theme was Make a Splash, it wasn't hard to come up with a lot of creative and inexpensive water-themed stations for families to enjoy. We had all kinds of activities: water science, a fish pond, crafts, face painting, games, and (of course) snacks. But the best station was obviously Soak the Librarian! Mrs. Ryan and I were drenched from head to toe 292 times, according to the number of tickets collected. Altogether, we raised over $400 to help with our fall programs for kids and teens. Some of the signs for the stations. Fish Pong Face PaintingMrs. Ryan takes one for the team! Water Science (Source: Sellers Library Teens) Fri, 20 Aug 2010 15:52:47 +0100 865530 http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/SellersLibraryTeens/~3/2_cuMY_tMEk/check-these-out.html Here's what we just put on the shelf in the teen section:FICTIONConfessions of a First Daughter by Cassidy CallowayThe Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins (second copy)The Not-So-Great Depression by Amy Goldman KossOne Fat Summer by Robert LipsyteDeception by Lee Nichols (Hauting Emma series)My Perfect Life by Dyan Sheldon (replacement copy)Poser by Sue Wyshynski (Source: Sellers Library Teens) Fri, 20 Aug 2010 15:51:43 +0100 865528 http://www.lisnews.org/banned_book_be_read_show_new_jersey Critics of a decision to pull a gay-themed book from two local libraries will stage a protest this weekend -- by reading aloud from the controversial work. Sunday's free show at a Cinnaminson theater marks the South Jersey debut of a theater group that supports the book, "Revolutionary Voices" an anthology of first-person pieces by gay youths. Brandon Monokian, a 23-year-old actor-director from Passaic County, formed the group after the book was ordered removed in May from the library at Rancocas Valley Regional High School in Mount Holly. That decision followed a citizen's complaint over the book's sexual content. "Revolutionary Voices," which won an award when it was published in 1990, also was removed this spring from the Burlington County Library. "This book is a valuable resource to youths who might have questions about their lives, and the fact that a small group of people could have it banned is upsetting," said Monokian, a Lumberton native and a 2005 graduate of Rancocas Valley. Here's an editorial from the South Brunswick Post in response to the book having been removed from both school and public libraries. (Source: LISNews - Librarian And Information Science News) Fri, 20 Aug 2010 13:54:41 +0100 865598 http://lisnews.org/banned_book_be_read_show_new_jersey Critics of a decision to pull a gay-themed book from two local libraries will stage a protest this weekend -- by reading aloud from the controversial work. Sunday's free show at a Cinnaminson theater marks the South Jersey debut of a theater group that supports the book, "Revolutionary Voices" an anthology of first-person pieces by gay youths. Brandon Monokian, a 23-year-old actor-director from Passaic County, formed the group after the book was ordered removed in May from the library at Rancocas Valley Regional High School in Mount Holly. That decision followed a citizen's complaint over the book's sexual content. "Revolutionary Voices," which won an award when it was published in 1990, also was removed this spring from the Burlington County Library. "This book is a valuable resource to youths who might have questions about their lives, and the fact that a small group of people could have it banned is upsetting," said Monokian, a Lumberton native and a 2005 graduate of Rancocas Valley. Here's an editorial from the South Brunswick Post in response to the book having been removed from both school and public libraries. (Source: LISNews.org) Fri, 20 Aug 2010 13:54:41 +0100 865315 http://lib.wmrc.uiuc.edu/enb/2010/08/19/ways-to-help/ WaysToHelp.org invites teens in the United States to apply for grants to fund their community service ideas across any one of 16 issue areas, including clean water, land preservation, global warming and recycling. Grant requests are reviewed and responded to on a monthly basis. Hat tip to EEWeek for the link. (Source: Environmental News Bits) Thu, 19 Aug 2010 15:58:09 +0100 865087 http://kidslit.menashalibrary.org/2010/08/19/yummy/ Yummy: the Last Days of a Southside Shorty by G. Neri, illustrated by Randy DuBurke This graphic novel tells the true story of Robert “Yummy” Sandifer.  In 1994, Yummy, called that because of his sweet tooth, fired a gun into a crowd of rival gang members.  He ended up killing a bystander, a teen girl.  Yummy was just 11 years old when this happened.   The story is told from the point of view of Roger, another boy who knew Yummy from school and the neighborhood.  Roger tries to make sense of Yummy and how he became a gang member and killer.  This is made even more tangible to Roger because his own brother is in the same gang as Yummy.  Throughout this book, deep questions are asked and explored. Neri’s text creates a great platform to understand the gang wars of the 1990s and the dynamic of southside Chicago.  Though the bulk of the book is from Roger’s point of view, the reader also gets to see what Yummy is going through as he hides from police and is eventually killed by his own gang.  There is a real restraint in the writing that allows the drama of the tale itself to take center stage.  DuBurke’s illustrations done in black and white are a study in light and dark.  Faces change as the light changes on them, becoming sinister and strange.  The images are dynamic and underline the youth of Yummy and the transition from bully to killer.  A beautifully crafted graphic novel dealing in brutal subjects, this book is an important exploration of gang warfare.  It is also an even more important look at childhood.  Appropriate for ages 12-14. Reviewed from copy received from Lee & Low Books. Also reviewed by: TheHappyNappyBookseller Linus’s Blanket A Patchwork of Books Reading in Color (Source: Kids Lit) Thu, 19 Aug 2010 04:00:00 +0100 868353 http://santafelibrary.blogspot.com/2010/08/anime-at-main-library.html Are you interested in Anime and want to hang out with other fans? Check out the Main Library Anime Club! It meets the 1st & 2nd Thursday of each month, from 4:15-5:15 pm. Each month features a different film and tasty snacks. The next film, Tenchi Muyo GXP, will be shown on September 3rd and 10th.Anime is a style of Japanese animation. It's similar to the popular manga comics. Whether you've been an Anime fan for years or just getting started, you're welcome to just drop by, watch some anime, and help choose the movie for the following months!Anime Club is free, open to teens ages 13-18, and no registration is required.The Main Library is located at 145 Washington Avenue.For more information, call 955-6783. (Source: ICARUS... the Santa Fe Public Library Blog) Thu, 19 Aug 2010 04:00:00 +0100 864780 http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/infoisland/~3/AvbmLXHPhyY/ Community Virtual Library August 25th – CVL Book Fair Publishing Discussion http://slurl.com/secondlife/Info%20Island%20International/205/50/33 Esther Grassian (SL: Alexandria Knight) and Diane Nahl (SL: Adra Letov) on professional publishing for librarians and educators. August 26th – Community Virtual Library’s Coexist Discussion 6 PM SLT http://slurl.com/secondlife/Info%20Island/160/167/33 To vent or not to vent? What is healthier? To vent, rant, rave and get it out of your system? Or to look on the bright side, give second and third chances, and keep smiling? CVL Book Fair Exhibits: The Book Path Info Island http://slurl.com/secondlife/Info%20Island/110/105/33 Throughout Info Island on the paths that interlace the sim you will find “book linkers” (objects made to look like books that link you to complete text versions of the book on the Internet) on the paths. Right click on a book that interests you and click on “Buy.” You can buy as many books as you like for Zero Lindens. You can also modify (reshape) the books you buy to make them smaller (more like a book). Each book is one prim and all have been decorated nicely by volunteers A Look at the Book Info Island http://slurl.com/secondlife/Info%20Island/68/91/33 Displays on selected topics in the history of the book Sacred Texts Peace Park, Info Island http://slurl.com/secondlife/Info%20Island/147/166/33 Find the sacred texts linked to books placed around Peace Park, CVL’s religious resource area. These books will link you to the sacred texts of many world religions: Judaism, Confucianism, Christian, Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, Taosim, and more The Flying Book Tour Imagination Island http://slurl.com/secondlife/Imagination%20Island/118/180/25 (op aboard the Flying Book on Imagination Island and take a tour up in the clouds learning about some classic children’s books and authors. ... Wed, 18 Aug 2010 23:41:18 +0100 867258 http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/booksquare/~3/lWncWgYARpw/ Today’s links of interest: The 1% Windfall: Why Publishers Need to Implement “Dynamic Pricing”While we don’t doubt the need for more dynamic pricing in the world of publishing, we doubt experts who misstate how Amazon was selling books. Yes, they were selling *some* ebooks at a loss, but not all ebooks. It seems this distinction makes a huge difference. Books and Books Arrives and Sides Are TakenDoes this have to be ugly? No. Is it ugly? Yes. Dents in my Desk: Ellen Hopkins Disinvited to Teen Lit FestSometimes, there are no words. Publishers Behaving Badly–AgainMacmillan is sending letters to authors — not their agents or attorneys! — asking them to sign amendments to agreements for digital rights. Agent Kristin Nelson has the story and some good advice. (Source: Booksquare) Wed, 18 Aug 2010 04:15:05 +0100 864901 http://blog.njla.org/archives/2010/08/#000940 Wednesday, August 18, 2010 http://www.c-n.com By Hank Kalet, Managing Editor South Brunswick Post Library shelves should be open to all books. It’s a simple statement, but it offers us our best chance of safeguarding intellectual freedom. I bring this up because of the recent controversy surrounding a rare, out-of-print queer-themed anthology. The book, “Revolutionary Voices: A Multicultural Queer Youth Anthology,” was pulled from library shelves in the Rancocas Valley Regional High School in Burlington County at the Burlington County library system after complaints from a conservative activist that the book was “vulgar.” Vulgar, in this case, is code for homosexuality. The book, edited by Amy Sonnie, was called the “first creative resource by and for queer and questioning youth of every color, class, religion, gender and ability,” by the national Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network. The book, the organization says on its website, “presents a collection of experiences, ideas, dreams and fantasies expressed through prose, poetry, artwork, letters, diaries and performance pieces.” Randy Meyer, writing for Book World, said the writers “all embrace a queer youth culture that is about gender, race and class as much as it is about sexuality.” ”The voices are raw and sometimes unpolished, and the language is passionate, powerful and only occasionally graphic. What holds these selections together is the writers’ urgent need to define themselves in their own terms.” That rawness and passion apparently was too much for the book’s critics in Burlington County (the book is not in the catalogue of libraries in Middlesex and Mercer counties). ”It’s pervasively vulgar,” Beverly Marinelli told Packet Group reporter Geoffrey Wertime, who covered the story for the Register-News. She told Mr. Wertime she was upset by an image of two men who appeared to be having sex and other vulgar themes. ... Wed, 18 Aug 2010 04:00:00 +0100 868159 http://newpagesblog.blogspot.com/2010/08/ellen-hopkins-uninvited.html After being asked (a second time) to speak at the Teen Lit conference in Humble, TX - Ellen Hopkins (author of seven young adult novels) was "uninvited" to present. Numerous fellow authors (Pete Hautman, Melissa de la Cruz, Matt de la Peña, and Tera Lynn Childs) then declined to attend, standing united against censorship. (Source: NewPages Blog) Wed, 18 Aug 2010 04:00:00 +0100 866570 http://itinerantlibrarian.blogspot.com/2010/08/here-we-go-again-another-instance-of.html When I first saw the title of this post at Bookshelves of Doom-- "There is BIG trouble a'brewing in Humble, Texas"-- I knew I had to look it over. I pretty much had the reaction of "now what are the locals making a fuss about?" When I went over, and I read some of the links provided, I was able to say, "no big surprise." This is Texas, known for its intolerance when it comes to literacy and reading. The Bookninja, who mentioned the story simply had this comment to say: "People, it’s Texas… Why do you think?" I think that little snarky remark says it all. Now some Texans may want to say that not all their brethren behave that way, but overall the state is developing quite the reputation for being anti-education and anti-reading among other things. That a school librarian was instrumental in mobilizing three or four parents who think their will has to be imposed on everybody else did not surprise me that much either. I've had to deal with librarians who are, to put it politely, less than enlightened. The point I am trying to make is that when something like what is happening in Humble, TX comes out, I am not really surprised anymore. If anything, it does make me just a bit more ashamed that I live in Texas, a state that supposedly prides itself on its hospitality, friendliness, the fact that people are independent and self-reliant, not to mention its scenery. That the state has become yet another right wing sanctuary does create some concern.So, what is the issue? According to School Library Journal, which is linked in BoD above, "A handful of YA authors who were scheduled to attend the Humble ISD Libraries' Teen Lit Festival in Texas this January won't be going after all. Organizers uninvited writer Ellen Hopkins--and most of her fellow presenters withdrew to protest the censorship. ... Wed, 18 Aug 2010 04:00:00 +0100 866060 http://ricklibrarian.blogspot.com/2010/08/hunger-games-by-suzanne-collins.html Our copies have been out all summer. The requests keep coming. One of the local schools assigned The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins for summer reading. Some of the young readers have even liked it well enough to ask for the sequel Catching Fire. I felt that I should read the teen novel, too, to learn what it was all about. So I got the audiobook and listened while doing yard work and household chores.Within the first half hour, the caution flag was waving high. I sensed Lord of the Flies in the background. I was wondering whether I should continue. Brave reader that I am, knowing that all those teens were having to read it, I did. The results of my decision are mixed.The Hunger Games is a pretty well told story. With fifty years of reading behind me, I was able to predict the outcome of each characters' roles, but some of the details of the story were surprisingly clever. (I almost typed "cleaver" which would fit this gruesome story, too.) The mixing of action and thought worked well, and I wanted to know what came next.But I was unhappy at the end. Nothing was resolved. Some characters had temporarily escaped peril with their lives, but the unexplained evil that brought about the games was still in place. The stage was just set for sequels that I do not want to read.I am not opposed to sequels, but there has to be some glimmer of hope at the end of the first book. We are given no reward for making it to the end. There is just a promise of more dreariness.Still, I would rather continue The Hunger Games than The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. I suspect both will be popular for years to come, but I'd prefer to read something less dismal.Maybe the schools can free their students from assigned readings next summer.Collins, Suzanne. The Hunger Games. Scholastic Press, 2008. ISBN 9780439023481 (Source: ricklibrarian) Wed, 18 Aug 2010 04:00:00 +0100 865192 http://blog.ocls.info/Teens/2010/08/teen_voices_meeting_notes.html July 22, 2010 I. Business: Teens discussed ideas for recruiting new Teen Voices members to replace members who have recently graduated. Members were asked to come up with ideas for promoting teen services and programs using the display case in Club Central. Ideas will be shared at the August meeting. A photo shoot is scheduled for all Teen Voices, pARTz, and TLC volunteers wishing to have their pictures taken for promotional and teen marketing materials. Meet in the Children's Workroom on August 4th at 11 a.m. II. Upcoming Events: Upcoming events and contests were discussed. All members were encouraged to attend programs and take part in the contests. Ideas were gathered for the upcoming End of Summer Beach Blast. Some ideas were: • Play Rockband on the stage using the big screen • Music and dancing • Beachball Volleyball • Food • Fun!! Next meeting is scheduled for August 26, 6 p.m. in Club Central. (Source: Techno Teens LIVE) Tue, 17 Aug 2010 14:39:10 +0100 867170 http://kidslit.menashalibrary.org/2010/08/17/wicked-girls/ Wicked Girls: a Novel of the Salem Witch Trials by Stephanie Hemphill Through gripping verse, the story of the Salem Witch Trials is told from the point of view of several of the accusers themselves.  A fictionalized account, the book captures the lies and hysteria of Salem in 1692, embracing the theory that the girls were deliberately telling lies.  There is Ann Putnam, Jr. who leads the group of girls despite the fact she is 12 and others in the group are 17.  She is the daughter of a prominent man in Salem.  Her servant, Mercy Lewis, is also an accuser.  Beautiful and tempting to many, she finds a haven in accusing others of witchcraft.  Ann’s cousin, Margaret Walcott, is a girl in love and struggling to hold onto the boy.  Her beloved will not stand for the accusations, so she is torn between her friends and her heart.  These three girls form the center of the novel, each making accusations for different reasons, each lie leading to another, until nineteen people are killed in the name of piety. Hemphill’s poems are beautifully constructed, they lend depth to the book at the same time they manage to move the story forward.  Each girl has a distinct personality and perspective that comes through in the poems.  The author weaves symbolism of the time into the poems, always making sure that these are girls of that period who have the concerns and sensibilities of that time.  Yet at the same time, modern girls will understand the aches of love, the power of lies, and the group dynamics that are inherent here.  Hemphill tells the story from the girls’ points of view, allowing readers to see into their thought patterns and what drove them to do it.  This perspective makes the book particularly gripping and powerful.  She also frames the poems with the seasons, capturing each turn of the season in a poem. ... Tue, 17 Aug 2010 04:00:00 +0100 868355 http://gnomicutterance.livejournal.com/49031.html I subjected the poor subscribers to the Diana Wynne Jones mailing list to my rant on poor representation of both authors and characters of color in the YA Fantasy Showdown, but I didn't want to subject you all to it. For one thing, it's clear the creator of the showdown tried; I just think she did a fairly poor job.Anyway, in the current round of voting, I noticed several comments that made me exceedingly happy. Right now Ai Ling (Cindy Pon, Silver Phoenix) is up versus Jace (Cassandra Clare, Mortal Instruments trilogy). Jace is predictably if annoyingly beating Ai Ling simply because, as several of the comments say, jace gets my vote because he is hot. But one of the other commenters on this round of voting says, Never heard of Ai Ling but sounds like she's gona win. Also, is she chinese? Because I'm chinese, and you don't get many cool chinese characters so I feel like I need to show her some support...even if Jace is hot! Another says I've never read Silver Pheonix before, but I totally want to now.In other words, Silver Phoenix isn't less popular because it's less good. It's less popular because nobody has heard of it. If readers haven't seen it, they can't make their own judgments about whether it equally good or not. (I acknowledge that even if readers had read it, Mortal Instruments certainly appeals more to contemporary young adult tastes in twisted paranormal romances. But the point is, readers aren't being given the opportunity to make that judgment for themselves. And in the meantime, participants in this showdown, both those who identify as Chinese and those who don't, are really excited by learning about the existence of the book.)This is it is so important for we in the children's and young adult mediating business -- and these days that includes not just booksellers, teachers, librarians, and parents but also bloggers -- to care about representation. ... Mon, 16 Aug 2010 15:34:13 +0100 866000 http://www2.worthingtonlibraries.org/teen/blog/index.cfm?CommentID=466 Tomorrow your teen librarian Ann P. is heading out to parts unknown. For all the regular blog... (Source: Worthingteens) Mon, 16 Aug 2010 14:34:00 +0100 867140 http://www.lisjobs.com/jobs/item.asp?ID=43184 Teen Services/Reference Librarian (Source: Combined Library Job Postings - Lisjobs.com and Library Job Postings on the Internet) Mon, 16 Aug 2010 06:01:00 +0100 866867 http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/LibrariansMatter/~3/H9WmcD1eviQ/ Are you Australian and want to read Tim Winton or John Marsden or Peter Carey using Kindle reader? Dream on. Last night I had a friend in the US take a screenshot of the Amazon.com Kindle Books Store at the same time as I took a screenshot in Australia. I wanted to compare the number of items available to people in the US with the number of items available to people in Australia. I created a set of screenshots at Flickr , Kindle Store: Australia vs USA if you want to see the screenshots below more clearly. In Australia – you have access to 129, 393 works. But look at the New Releases – 3901 in the last 60 days. In the USA, you have access to 197, 947 works … but  6361 New Releases in the last 60 days. This means that while Australians have access to only aboout 65% of the Kindle ebook stock available to people in the US, when you look at recently published items, that drops to about 61%. When I logged out of Amazon.com, I noticed that the sidebar now let me change my country or region (at the top right hand side). I did a few comparative searches. Tim Winton – no ebooks available in Australia, 4 ebooks available from the US. Peter Carey? One ebook for Australians (The Tax Inspector) with about 10 US ebooks. Can someone please explain to me how these restrictions on getting Australian content in Australia helps Australian writers, readers or publishers? I’m a little slow at understanding how. My favourite, though was with Australian Young Adult writer, John Marsden. 8 results for readers in the US. If you are a teen in Australia searching for your favourite author? You get this: (Source: Librarians matter) Mon, 16 Aug 2010 00:51:01 +0100 866141 http://lovetheliberry.blogspot.com/2010/08/refgrunt-sunday-sunday-sunday.html Guy calls wanting a car manual we don’t haveDo we have a landline for public use? No.They want to download audiobooks to their ZuneGuy with purple hat, plaid shirt and giant beard wants books on yogaDo we have a trade journal for lawyers? He wants to hire an expert witness.Lady brings her shiny new red laptop up to the desk—can I help her connect to the wireless? Yep. [Why don’t they make shiny red MacBooks??]Guy says: When I requested those books from another branch, the status changed and now they’re showing as belonging to your branch! That must be the floating process you were talking about! (Yes!) Wow, you guys really were right about that after all! (Yep)Do you have any of the old-fashioned machines where you put money in and you can Xerox?Sharp-dressed man wants a library card“I got a question for ya. Where do you keep the books on investing? Like, investing money.”Sharp-dressed man wants to know where the DVDs areHow do you use the microfilm machine?Man with very long hair and very long beard points to catalog: “is this where I go to look up books?”Nice older gentleman wants a book about Gordon of Khartoum. He tells me the battle he was in was the last charge by mounted horsemen against regulars with repeating rifles. Not one horseman made it across.Sequel to Wicked by Gregory MaguireWants the Lucy & Desi book, but doesn’t want to request it. Will check back, even though I tell her it probably won’t be here unless she requests it.Money origami: everything is checked out and she needs it by Wednesday for her mom’s b-day present so we print out something from this site. ... Sun, 15 Aug 2010 04:00:00 +0100 867583 http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/SellersLibraryTeens/~3/EZZgw-kBswk/summer-reading-winners-week-eight.html I chose four more winners in a computerized random drawing today, so here they are: Tarzan, grade 6, won a bumper stickers, pin, and magnet from the Philadelphia Union soccer team, plus a team England soccer ball.Tisa, grade 11, won a hardcover book and a $5 gift card to Panera Bread.Ciera, grade 9, won two free bowling games at Wynnewood Lanes.Stephen, grade 6, won a hardcover book and candy.Congratulations to these winners! And remember, teen summer reading ends next Saturday, August 21, so get your slips in before then!! I will be doing a drawing for week 9, as well as an end-of-summer prize blowout, so get ready to win. (Source: Sellers Library Teens) Sat, 14 Aug 2010 15:54:00 +0100 865531 http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/SellersLibraryTeens/~3/zhKEmCV5Mvo/book-review-dreams-of-dead.html Dreams of the Dead by Thomas Randall(Click on the cover to find a library copy, or ask me for a free one!)SUMMARY: Sixteen-year-old Kara Harper is an outsider in Japan, but is doing her best to fit at the private school where her father is teaching English for the year. Fortunately she’s befriended by Sakura, a fellow outsider struggling to make sense of her sister’s unsolved murder some months ago. No one seems to care about the beautiful girl who was so brutally murdered, and the other students go on as if nothing has happened. Unfortunately, the calm doesn’t last for long. Kara begins to have nightmares, and soon other students in the school turn up dead, viciously attacked by someone . . . or something. Is Sakura getting back at those she thinks are responsible for her sister’s death? Or has her dead sister come back to take revenge for herself? (from the back cover)OPINION: This book combines Japanese culture with horror and suspense, all from an American perspective. Even though she has spent years studying Japanese language and customs, Kara is still gaijin, a foreigner, to the other students at her private school. Kara's outsider status is a challenge, particularly after the nightmares and killing begin. As the story progresses, there is a shift from realism as a supernatural element is introduced. This shift is a little rough at times, and the story looses some of its momentum. However, because the supernatural element was culturally authentic, I remained intrigued. The ending felt a bit rushed after all of the explanation, but it was a thrilling ride and the final scenes with Sakura were particularly intense. If you are a Japan-obsessed manga reader, this is a novel for you! I also think older teen readers of horror, suspense, mystery, or supernatural books would be interested in this title. There are two more books in the series, called Spirits of the Noh and A Winter of Ghosts, so be sure look for those if you like Dreams of the Dead. ... Fri, 13 Aug 2010 19:53:19 +0100 865533 http://mcpldteens.blogspot.com/2010/08/winner-is.html Congrats to Ashley (Grand Juction), Nathan (Fruita), and Hanna (Collbran). They were the winners of the Summer Library Program's IPods. Thank you everyone for reading and participating! (Source: Teen Stuff @ Mesa County Libraries) Fri, 13 Aug 2010 04:00:00 +0100 868379 http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/booksquare/~3/7Gi1DdtCqlA/ It thrills me that the book community is actively participating in the South by Southwest Interactive festival. For some, it’s an opportunity to explore the latest and greatest in technologies and trends; for others, it’s a chance to discover how others fit into the publishing ecosystem; and, for all, it’s a chance to connect with a wider community, expanding points of view. Not only is the bookish world attending SXSWi, but they are also actively participating as speakers. Which means, yes, once again I bring you a listing of book-related panels with brief descriptions. Part of the panel selection process is a bit of a popularity contest, and your vote for these panels helps get book programming on the schedule. Check out the panels, take a moment to go through the (painless) registration process, then please vote. My panels, ahem, are listed first, and every vote is appreciated by me and each of the great people who put together great proposals! (And if I’ve missed something, shout out in the comments, please!) Note: I’ve shortened some of the descriptions. Click through for full descriptions and comments on proposals. 21st Century Publishing Models: Turning Tradition Upside-Down: This panel features me, Angela James of Carina Press, Pablo Defendini of Open Road Media, and Kirk Biglione of Oxford Media Works. It will be awesome. New publishers are building thriving businesses with digital first/print maybe and books-as-apps approaches. With industry giants crowding the bestseller lists and the number of titles published each year growing, how do these independent digital publishers compete in the book marketplace? Veterans of this constantly evolving business model explain how they are building twenty-first century publishing houses, combining the strengths of traditional publishing with cutting-edge technology. Beyond the Book: New Publishing Models That Work: Simon St. Laurent, O’Reilly Media. ... Fri, 13 Aug 2010 03:30:37 +0100 864903 http://splat.lili.org/files/splat/text.jpg Want to let people text reference questions to your library? Now is a great time! Wow, there are now so many services you can use for text message reference, and so many reasons to do it, I wonder why people are not doing it! First of all, almost everybody texts. Secondly almost all younger people text. Thirdly, some texting options are free or super close to free.Oh, but you also need to know that SMS stands for "short message service" and it also means texting. Texting=SMS. Yup. Why do it? Librarians can provide more value added answers than ChaCha Librarians provide more value added answers, and cost less, than KGB Google's texting an answer service only really provides crappy answers 88% of all teens are texters (Pew Internet) 65% of all adults send or receive text messages (US Census/LA Times) Go where your users are! Check out some of the libraries offering a text message service: http://www.libsuccess.org/index.php?title=Libraries_Offering_SMS_Reference_Services Things to think about: Who is your audience? Teens? Public? Students? How can you market it to them? Can you market this service on a regular basis (it helps)? How much money can you spend? some are free, some have minimal costs with perks! decide on a service: use InfoQuest - a consortium or Google Voice or Springshare's product or  something else Determine staffing: will reference desk people staff it? Staff in their offices? Determine the hours available: one cool thing about the Springshare product is that it offers after hours auto replies to say that the library will get to the question in the morning! Will this service replace an existing service? Keep in mind that some research shows that offering many virtual reference services can cause competition among them, and not compliment one another. Phew. Got all that? What do you think? Let's talk! Post a comment below!   AttachmentSize text.jpg60. ... Fri, 13 Aug 2010 00:38:00 +0100 866151 http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/SellersLibraryTeens/~3/dtfFDWLEsT0/this-weeks-new-items.html Come check out the newest of the new in the teen section:FICTIONPlayer's Ruse by Hilari BellPretty Dead by Francesca Lia BlockGood Fortune by Noni CarterThe Demon King by Cinda Williams ChimaVery LeFreak by Rachel CohnSalt by Maruice GeeNONFICTIONProfiles in Black by Marvin A. McMickleGRAPHIC NOVELSRistorante Paradiso by Natsume Ono (Source: Sellers Library Teens) Thu, 12 Aug 2010 23:14:02 +0100 865532 http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/talis/panlibus/~3/n8w9X6ao-7U/libraries-and-the-big-society.php This is a preview of an article written for the upcoming issue of Panlibus Magazine. Libraries and the Big Society Towards the end of July in Liverpool, the UK’s new Prime Minister, David Cameron, finally set out his plans for his vision of the Big Society. The initiative is based on the devolution of power from Westminster to local communities, and the empowerment of citizens to run local public services (including, of course, public libraries). Cutting costs or empowering communities In announcing the Big Society, David Cameron focused on the pivotal role of people and communities saying it is a “big advance for people power” and that his “great passion is building the Big Society”. Much of the discourse around the Big Society is underpinned by the need for the government to reduce the budget deficit. The Opposition has certainly made this point, and certain individuals, notably Tessa Jowell, are also enraged about the lack of originality. What does this mean to our public library service? Public libraries are going through tough times, and this announcement raises broad questions about the public library mission. The DCMS review earlier in the year attempted to answer these questions and set out a framework, but the new government has tried to distance itself from this review, only acknowledging the relevance of a small number of points (library membership from birth, free internet access, co-location). Ed Vaizey, Culture Minister, has scrapped his election promise of setting up a Library Development Agency, and has instead set up a “support programme”. This will go ahead in conjunction with the Museums, Libraries and Archives Council (MLA) and the Local Government Association (LGA), despite the DCMS announcement that the MLA is to be abolished within two years. So, this announcement only raises more questions about how important the government really feels libraries are. ... Thu, 12 Aug 2010 10:34:35 +0100 865324 http://www.countyteens.com/?p=564 According to Peggy Dymond Leavey’s blog http://peggydymondleavey.blogspot.com/ , the fictional town of Larkin, Ontario, where much of the action takes place in her new book “Growing Up Ivy”, is loosely based on Prince Edward County. Maybe that’s why I felt so “at home” reading it. Or maybe it was the engaging and creative main character, Ivy Chalmers. The girl lives in the 1930s, when economic times are hard – to say the least – but she makes do despite moving from place to place with her mom and leaving a string of angry landlords behind. Things go off the rails though the day Ivy discovers that her mother has abandoned her in favour of a search for fame and fortune as an actress in New York City. The only advice to her daughter comes in the form of a note telling her to go out and find the paternal grandfather she’s never met. (Source: What's happening for teens at the library?) Wed, 11 Aug 2010 20:25:40 +0100 867151 http://www.tangognat.com/2010/08/11/new-ya-book-post-on-thebureauchiefs-com/ I review an ARC of Personal Demons on The Bureau Chiefs website. Click on over if you are interested in books about teenage girls who are the lust objects of angels and demons. (Source: TangognaT) Wed, 11 Aug 2010 18:03:49 +0100 865339 http://blog.ocls.info/Teens/2010/08/summer_leftovers.html Come chill out at the Orlando Public Library in Club Central on Wednesday August 18 at 3:30 p.m. We will be digging into summer leftovers with fun crafts and activities. Ages 13-18. (Source: Techno Teens LIVE) Wed, 11 Aug 2010 16:39:11 +0100 867171 http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/lansinglibraryteen/podcast/~3/-BsW7yomcsc/and-survivors-are.html You read and voted all summer long and now there are only three books remaining in the Book Survivor Program. If you haven't read these three books yet, be sure to pick them up. You and your fellow teens voted them the most popular books of the summer!#1 - Airhead by Meg CabotSixteen-year-old Emerson Watts, an advanced placement student with a disdain for fashion, is the recipient of a "whole body transplant" and finds herself transformed into one of the world's most famous teen supermodels.#2 - Hidden Talents by David LubarWhen thirteen-year-old Martin arrives at an alternative school for misfits and problem students, he falls in with a group of boys with psychic powers and discovers something surprising about himself.#3 - The Summer I Turned Pretty by Jenny HanBelly spends the summer she turns sixteen at the beach just like every other summer of her life, but this time things are different as she finds herself falling for a boy she has known since childhood. (Source: Lansing Library Teen Dept. Podcast) Tue, 10 Aug 2010 19:28:41 +0100 867826 http://www.geistweg.com/blog/?p=1035 Liz and I are planning a trip to New Orleans in the spring. It will be the first time I’ve been back since Katrina, which is the longest I’ve been away since I was a teenager. Aside from seeing how … Continue reading → (Source: geistweg) Tue, 10 Aug 2010 17:28:02 +0100 865113