Another YA Title....that every adult should read!

The Boy in the Striped Pajamas by John Boyne - This powerful work of historical fiction about the Holocaust stands out in part because of the unusual perspective: It's told through the eyes of the 9-year-old son of the Commandant at Auschwitz, a boy who has no clue as to what is going on around him. This perspective allows readers to feel a strong sense of foreboding, long before they know the extent of the terror surrounding Bruno's world. Readers will be struck by the contrast between Bruno's normalcy and naivety, and the extreme horrors of the time.

Most readers who know any of the history of WWII, especially of the Holocaust, will catch on to the nightmare of Bruno's plight fairly early on. They'll figure out that the "Fury" refers to the Fuhrer, and what having Hitler to dinner would mean about Bruno's father. They'll also know that the high fence, desolate grounds, smokestacks, and dirty, unhealthy people in striped pajamas that Bruno sees from his window mean that his new room overlooks a concentration camp. Of course, even clued-in readers may not realize that "Out-With" is Bruno's mispronunciation of Auschwitz...until his sister Gretel points it out quite clearly toward the end.

Readers will quickly relate to the 9 year old, who is uprooted from his home and moved somewhere "nasty and cold" where he has no friends. He is lonely, his sister bugs him, and adults treat him as if he's not there. He wants to study art and read fantasy books rather than history and geography. He wants to get outside and explore. Eventutually Bruno befriends a boy on the other side of the fence and meets him for talks every day. He laments that he can't visit his side. It is quite clear that Bruno has no idea of the implications or even the circumstances of just what is going on around him.

Younger readers may not get all of the historical significance of this story, and teens may wonder how anyone could be so clueless about what's going on around them as Bruno appears to be. Even so, readers of any age will be moved by the young boy's story, and the unlikely friendship he forms with a boy he meets at Out-With. Even more so, readers will be stricken by the way the friendship comes to an end and will be left with much to ponder at the conclusion of Bruno's story.

*** I would recommend this book to any student in a heartbeat and feel that it is a "must-read" for adults as well. I was amazed at the language and the perspective the author uses throghout to bring Bruno and Shmuel to life. Although the book is written from a nine-year old's perspective, the impact this book will have on its reader is more than just child's play!

Acceleration by Graham McNamee - This book is the winner of the Edgar Allen Poe Award for Best Young Adult Mystery writing, as well as an Eliot Rosewater Nominee. Rather good billing for any book!

Acceleration is defined as the escalation of increasingly destructive aberrant behavior, or, more pointedly, the stuff of which serial killers are made. Seventeen-year-old Duncan comes faces to face with this "new" term while wasting away his summer by working in the lost and found of the Toronto subway system. That is when he finds it...the diary...made up of the plots and plans of a truly demented man. The Roach, as Duncan dubbs him, plans to "accelerate" his killing ways... graduating from eviscerating animals and setting fires to tracking human prey. When the police refuse to take it seriously, Duncan enlists the aid of his best friends Vinny and Wayne to help him find The Roach on his own...with deadly results.

All in all, a rather good read from the teenage perspective. The plot is rather compelling and all-too real at points. The characters are very real and most teens will be able to relate well to their witty, often crass, language and attitudes about life. My only issue with this book is that it could have been much more developed. The climax comes out of nowhere, really, and the conclusion comes much too soon. McNamee could have done a lot more with this book, but I'll agree that what he did do was done quite well.

Finally, back to the books!


A Great and Terrible Beauty by Libba Bray - After hanging out at Sue's Java House a few weeks ago and talking with several of her avid readers, I decided I really needed to read this book! Plus, Sue was reading it, too, and I never want to miss a chance to actually get to talk about a book with someone else who's also read it :) Anyway, it certainly was deserving of it's position on the NYT Bestseller list. Not only was it well-written with a well-developed plot, but the book kept me in suspense...which almost never happens with a YA title. There were a few things I figured out before the end, but the ones I didn't were the ones that sent me reeling! I seldom read a a sequel or a companion book, but I've already started Rebel Angels, this book's companion title. I may even read the third book as I just found out it's going to be a trilogy!

Now, about the book....



Gemma Doyle lives with her mother and father in India. On her sixteenth birthday she sees her mother's murder in a vision. Shortly after her mother's mysterious death, Gemma is sent to a finishing school in London. While there, she meets several other girls, all of whom fit the popular/unpopular stereotypes of most schools. However, after a while, Gemma finds out that all of them have problems of their own. As was the custom of the Victorian era, most of the girls deal with their own internal pain by not showing it to anyone. Each girl's torment surfaces in it s own way, from Ann's inclination to cut herself to Felicity's cruelty to the weaker girls...especially Ann. The visions revisit Gemma and lead her to a diary that creates a bond between her, Felicity, Pippa, and Ann. The diary tells the story of Sarah Rees-Toome and Mary Dowd, two girls who went to Spence and perished in the mysterious fire of 1871. Both girls practiced magic, a fact which interests Gemma because she experiences visions that she's unable to control, even though a mysterious boy named Kartik tells her that her visions are dangerous and she must stop them. Soon, Gemma and the others learn all about the magic that Sarah and Mary possessed and try to harness it for themselves, despite grave warnings from Gemma's deceased mother. What happens when the girls take the magic from the realms and bring it back to Spence is more than they could have ever imagined.

More NYCPL Pictures

This was a neat quote inscribed in the ornate woodwork. There were lots of unique features throughout the library, including the painting on the right. It was on the ceiling of the second floor gallery. I couldn't imagine working in such a beautiful place!

The stonework was breath-taking as well. There were lots of arches and columns carved throughout the library with beautiful chandeliers. Although I've never been to Europe (hopefully next year!), the library reminded me of the pictures I've seen of cathederals there.

Over fall break, my good friend Sue (a librarian, too!) and I went to New York to visit my best friend Jessa who lives in Manhattan. We did all the usual NYC stuff....Chinatown, Times Square, WTC, shopping, etc. However, we also went to the Mecca for all librarians...yes, we went to the New York City Public Library on Fifth Avenue. We were in awe of the atmosphere, the architecture, and....the quiet (we had forgotten what this is!). Anyhow, I'm sharing some of the pictures of that trip. Enjoy!



The librarian version of "flashing" in the subway station! We wore these shirts and braved the rain in hopes of getting on The Today Show. You'd be surprised how many New Yorkers stopped to talk to us or made a passing comment about reading as we were out and about that day. The response was totally awesome, and we didn't feel like nerdy librarians at all!








We ARE the Library Guardians...at least at our own schools!





(more pics to come soon!)

The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield - By far the best book I've read since Secret Life of Bees, this book was exquisitely written and thought-provoking at the same time. I do not know that I have ever been so enthralled with an author's crafting of sentences and phrases in any other book I've read. Its effect goes beyond enthralling and approaches a sort of mesmerizing of the reader. Honestly, this book could have had no plot and I still would have continued on to the end simply for the pure beauty of the language. However, that is not the case, and, if it were up to me this book would be a classic! Now, for the story....

Margaret Lea, the story's protagonist, is an educated, single woman, still living with her parents in London...a spinster if you will. As a novice biographer, she is dumbfounded when one day she receives a letter from Vida Winter, an extremely popular English author. Ms. Winter has given many reporters different accounts of her life story, however not one of them has ever been true. She is, after all , the consummate storyteller. She has never been willing to divulge her true life story, not even her name. However, now she wishes to tell Margaret the true story of her life as she is quite ill and doesn't want to die with her secrets she's worked so hard to protect.

Although Margaret has always preferred to read authors posthumously, she decides to read Ms. Winter's work to see what she's about. Margaret comes to one book entitled Thirteen Tales of Change and Desperation which she reads with great intrigue. But when Margaret reaches the end of the book, she finds that it contains only twelve tales...leaving her to wonder: what happened to the thirteenth tale?

Margaret is so intriuged by the book that she decides to accept the invitation and travels to Ms. Winter's home to hear her story. Having reservations as to the veracity of the story she's about to hear, she asks three questions she first verifies with credible sources. Feeling assured that Ms. Winter is, this time, ready to tell the truth, Margaret takes on the task of becoming her biographer. However, Ms. Winter insists that she gets to tell her tale her own way...starting with the beginning, continuing to the middle, and ending with the end. No questions asked and no skipping ahead. Once the ground rules are set, Miss Winter begins the tale of a pair of twins, Emmeline and Adeline Angelfield, growing up in a family of complete madness.

And from there you must read for yourself. This is a modern day ghost story wrapped up in a fairy tale, and served with a big dose of reality that you'll be able to relate to. Whether you're a serious reader or a novice looking for a book to help you escape, this is the one!

Reading Update: Life is busy so I'm trudging along 5 minutes here, 5 minutes there. I'm skipping lunches and trying to get lost in the book I'm currently reading...The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield. This book is, hands down, the best piece of writing I have read since The Secret Life of Bees. It's the type of book that you get lost in, one in which the story that's being woven and the combination of words with which it's being done soothes the soul in the most satisfying way. Although I'm upset at the lack of reading time I have right now, I am almost appreciative of it, too, because it's making this wonderful book last and forcing me to appreciate it piece by piece!


New books I want to read....if only I had the time!

• A Tale of Two Sisters by Anna Maxted
• A Spot of Bother by Mark Haddon
• The History of Love by Nicole Krauss
• The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova
• The Kindness of Strangersby Katrina Kittle
• The Overachievers: The Secret Life of Driven Kids by Alexandra Robbins

Holy War Inc.: Inside the Secret World of Osama Bin Laden by Peter L. Bergen - I became really interested in learning more about the Islamic fundamentalist movement, its origins and its modern-day implications, after reading The Kite Runner (set it Afghanistan...I'll write about it later). There were so many books published in the wake of 9/11 that tried to make sense of the tension between America and the Islamic world that it was hard to choose one to read. However, Bergen, who spent 10 years reporting on the Islamic world as a producer for CNN, has written a wonderful book examining Bin Laden's network from the top down.

This book takes a critical look at al-Qaeda, which Bergen compares to a multinational corporation with Osama bin Laden as its CEO. He also does an outstanding job of explaining the radical Islamist movements and their tangled histories. The book includes extensive reporting of previous al-Qaeda plots, from the bombing of the U.S.S. Cole to bin Laden's possible role in the first World Trade Center bombing in 1993 and the U.S. Embassy bombings in 1998. Bergen discusses the September 11 attacks at length, but what makes this a superior book in my view is the history it provides of al-Qaeda, a story most people haven't read in newspapers or magazines. Although it may be impossible to ever fully understand bin Laden, Bergen does a wonderful job of portraying him and his deep-seated beliefs in his cause. I gleaned much from this book, most importantly an understanding of why bin Laden has been successful and how difficult it will be to ever fully dismantle his well-organized and dedicated network of followers.

Quote for the Day: I think of life as a good book. The further you get into it, the more it begins to make sense.— Harold S. Kushner

The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold - This book is Alice Sebold's debut novel, a remarkable story about love and family and letting go. Susie Salmon is 14 when she is raped and murdered by a neighbor, a serial killer of women who moves from town to town after each of his crimes. Susie's death sends her family into total chaos as they each try to deal with the tragedy in their own way. Susie narrates the story from a never-before-seen verison of heaven, watching her friends, family, and the murderer move on with their lives, while trying to subtlely break through and communicate the identity of the killer to members of her family. Alice Sebold does a wonderful job relating the interactions of a family and a community, and I was rather surprised at the strength of her writing in a story about such loss. I highly recommend this book to both my students and friends alike. Also, students who really connect with this story also seem to love Lucky which is the real-life account of the abuse Sebold suffered as a child.

Twilightby Stephanie Meyer - Although I tried to avoid reading this book as long as I could, I was pleasantly surprised by how much I really enjoyed it in the end. I haven't been able to keep it on the shelves this year, so I decided I needed to find out just what made this book so popular with my students. Did I ever!

In Twilight readers discover a pair of lovers who are just as star-crossed as Romeo and Juliet. On Bella's first day at a new school in Forks, Oregon, Bella falls head over heals in love with beautiful Edward Cullen. But, Edward seems to detest Bella from the start. However, Bella comes to realize that Edward has a secret and that instead of hate, he is madly in love with her as well. When Edward saves Bella from being run-over by an out-of-control van, she realizes that there is more to the story than Edward wants to tell. With a little help from an old friend, Bella start to suspect that Edward's secret is much larger than she ever thought. Eventually she presses Edward and he admits her worst fears...Edward and his entire family are vampires. To Edward's surprise, Bella does not run away, and instead embraces his terrible secret as her own. As the book unfolds we see the intensity of true love complicated by the fact that at any moment Edward could turn on Bella. Every moment they are together is an exercise of resistance for Edward, and in the end he must not only protect her from himself, but from another vampire who feels the same.

Hotel Babylon by an anonymous author with the help of Imogen Edwards Jones - A psuedo-fictional book that exposes the eccentric inner workings of the luxury hotel business. Set in a fictional hotel in London, the book unfolds over a 24 hour period in the life of the hotel. From overbooking to up-pricing, to celebrities to the help staff, every element of the hotel is examined in honest and often hilarious detail. The most famous underbelly of the hotel business, prostitution, offers some of the more humorous scenes in the book. An "extra pillow' requested from the concierge most assuredly is no reference to what it may seem, so be careful the next time you find yourself requsting one during your next vacation! (Thanks for the suggestion, Jessa!)


A Northern Light by Jennifer Donnelly - Mattie Gokey promised her dying mother that she would always take care of her father and younger siblings. She is stuck on a farm, living in near poverty, with no way of escaping, even though she has been accepted at Barnard College because she is a very talented writer. Against her true desires, she promises to marry Royal Loomis, the handsome neighbor, even though he doesn't seem to love her in the least. Now, Mattie has promised Grace Brown, a guest at the Adirondack summer resort where she works, to burn two bundles of letters. Then, before she can dispose of the letters, Grace's body is found in the lake, and the young man who was with her disappears, too. This is a thoughtful tale, complex and well-written, wrapped around a true story. The portryal of how women were regarded in the late 1800s was dead-on, and the dedication that Mattie feels for her family and for doing the "right thing" is a refreshing detour from many of today's young adult fiction books.

True Love and Other Lies by Wendy Gaskell - Claire Spencer is a travel writer (Sassy Seniors magazine, thankyouverymuch!) who has little use for those fairy tales about love at first sight. Claire doesn't fit the mold of a typcial beauty, tending more toward Amazon than Cover Girl. On a trip to London to gather fodder for a story, she meets Jack, the heart-breakingly handsome man in the next seat. Ulitmately Jack asks her to dinner, and Claire automatically starts looking for "the catch." Claire accepts, and finds herself head-over-heels for Jack.

On the flip-side, Claire is also in London to see Maddy, her best friend. Maddy is exactly the opposite of Claire...beautifully gorgeous. Cover Girl incarnate. Maddy's life, however, has been turned upside down by a man for the first time, too...one that she wants but doesn't want her. Whodoya think it is? Of course....Jack! How is Claire going to maintain her friendship with Maddy when for the first time she's beginning to believe in the fact that love actually might have found her?

This was a fun, light-hearted read that, honestly, confirmed many of my more covert suspicions about "love". Gaskell uses her wit to make sense of the absurdity of it all.


The Mermaid Chair by Sue Monk Kidd - I waited for this book for ages and couldn't get it read quickly enough. Sue Monk Kidd is one of my most favorite authors, usually quite a feat to achieve, and usually never after only writing one book. However, The Secret Life of Bees was a piece of artful writing and so anything she writes, ever again, will be on my "to-read" list. This book, although a bit slow at the start, picks up with the wonderfully lyrical prose from her previous book.

Jessie Sullivan, a middle-aged Atlanta housewife and part-time artist, has been in a funk since her daughter Dee left for college. When the phone rings one night, she is sure it is Dee, but instead it is a call beckoning her to her mother's side. Her mother, who never recovered from tragically losing her husband years earlier, has purposefully cut off her finger with a cleaver. So Jesse returns to Egret Island, the site of her childhood, to care of her ailing mother and, hopefully in the process, find her lost artistic inspiration and a renewed love for her husband.

The story unfolds as Jessie attempts to care for a mother who doesn't want to be cared for, with the help of her mother's quirky but faithful cast of friends. To complicate matters, Jessie finds herself strangely relieved to be free of a husband she loves-and undeniably attracted to Brother Thomas, a monk at the island's Benedictine monastery. Jessie, who has never understood why her mother is still so affected by her father's death, begins to suspect that she's keeping a terrible secret, and the unfolding of that secret is where this book is at its best.

Generation Me by Jean M. Twenge - This was an incredibly insightful look into how today's generation (aka Generation Me) of teenagers and children differ from those before them. The idea of promoting self-esteem, self-love, and self-appreciation before they've earned it is central to the premise that today's parents are coddling this generation and, thus, handicapping them for their futures in the "real world." What really connected with me was the insistance that teaching SELF-CONTROL instead of SELF-ESTEEM is what must be done to stand this generation in good steed as they prepare to face an ever-changing, largely unforgiving world. From the vantage point of an educator, there were too many examples that rang true for me to dismiss this book as just another attempt to place blame for what is wrong with our youth today. In my opinion, this book hits the mark!


We Are All Welcome Here by Elizabeth Berg - The latest book by one of my most favorite authors! (Corina, I have a copy to pass on to you!)

Berg got the idea for this book from one of her own readers who wrote to her suggesting that she write a fictional story based upon the real-life experiences of her and her mother. In the story, Paige Dunn is stricken by polio while she is pregnant. Usually a death sentence for the unborn child, Paige is able to carry the baby to term and is the first woman to give birth while inside an iron lung. As anticipated, Paige's husband leaves her to care for the child on her own. Left a quadraplegic and needing the assistance of an iron lung to live her life, Paige takes on the harrowing task of raising Diana on her own with the help of a caretaker and, as she grows, Diana herself. The story develops around Diana's struggle to come of age while being tied to her mother, and their quest to learn what loyalty and responsiblity means...not just to one another, but to the world around them.

A few of my favorite book/reading quotes for you to enjoy!

• "I read part of it all the way through." - Sam Goldwyn
• "Books are the bees which carry the quickening pollen from one to another mind." -James Russell Lowell
• "I am looking for a new biography to live in." -from The Last Jew
• "The answers you get from literature depend on the questions you pose." - Margaret Atwood
• "Until I feared I would lose it, I never loved to read. One does not love breathing." - Harper Lee
• "The reading of all good books is like a conversation with all the finest men of past centuries." -Rene Descartes
• "Words are, of course, the most powerful drug used by mankind." - Rudyard Kipling
• "There are a thousand thoughts lying within a man that he does not know until he takes up a pen to write." -William Makepeace Thackery

The Memory Keeper's Daughter by Kim Edwards - This story opens during a snowstorm in 1962, when David's wife, Norah, goes into early labor. There is a terrible snow storm that prevents her doctor from making it in time for the birth, so David and his nurse, Caroline, must handle it themselves. Caroline puts Norah to sleep (apparently what they did in the "olden days") and David unexpectedly delivers his own set of twins. The first baby, a boy, is healthy; the second child, a baby girl, has Down Syndrome. Thinking only of the memory of growing up with a very ill sister, David makes a split-second decision. He asks Caroline to take his infant daughter to an institution where she will be cared for, and when Norah awakes, he tells her that the second child was stillborn. Clearly not the right decision for David to make, yet he believes he's done the right thing for all concerned. However, his decision has a ripple effect, starting with the fact that Caroline doesn't leave the baby at the institution...opting instead to raiser her herself.

This is a rich and well-written page-turner that explores how mysterious ties can hold a family together even through the most dire circumstances, and how love can provide the greatest redemption.

Bitter is the New Black by Jen Lancaster - A snappy, witty memoir about a dotcom princess who loses her job (and, seemingly, her sanity) when the market turned bad. The book is a hilarious and biting account of her transition back into a "normal" person from the self-absorbed, shopaholic, workaholic that she had become trying to make it to the top. From the scene where she steals a handbag from a homeless person to the one where she lives in squalor next to a building being built by Russian immigrants, this book if full of side-splitting laughter.

She Said Yes: The Unlikely Martyrdom of Cassie Bernall by Misty Bernall - The tragedy of the Columbine shootings on April 20, 1999, is brought to life through the story of Cassie Bernall. Cassie was in the library studying on that fateful spring day when two young men, Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, opened fire and killed 13 classmates. The is the inspiring story of a young woman who stood up for her beliefs in the face of danger, and ultimately paid the highest price by sacrificing her life because "she said yes," when asked if she believed in God.

--many of my junior high girls have read this book and loved it, too!


Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America by Barbara Ehrenreich - I love non-fiction of all sorts, and this book was no exception. I remembered hearing about all the welfare reform in the 90s, but never really thought about what happened to all those people who "got up off the couch and went to work." Well, this is a pretty acurate account of what happened to those people. The author was inspired by all the rhetoric surrounding welfare reform and decided to see if these low-wage, poverty-level workers are able to survive, let alone prosper, on these paltry wages. Ehrenreich took jobs in Florida, Maine, and Minnesotra, working as a waitress, a nursing home aide, a house-cleaner, and a Wal-Mart employee in hopes of affording the bare minimum in accomodations, food, and health care. During this harrowing social experiement, she soon discovered that these "bottom-of-the-ladder" jobs require exhausting mental and physical efforts. This book reveals how today's working poor get by, or don't, and really caused me to contemplate the way our country handles the issues they face.

Skipping Christmas by John Grisham - Did you know that Christmas with the Kranks was actually based on a book? And that it was written by award winning novelist John Grisham of all people? Well, it is, and the book is even funnier! The book pretty much outlines the movie as far as characters (Luther and Nora Krank) are concerned, but if you're like me, a funny book beats a funny movie any day. I know it's not December, but this book will still put you in the Christmas spirit. Read it now :)

Devil in the Details by Jennifer Traig - Hysterical account of the childhood of a Jewish girl with OCD. As if OCD isn't restrictive enough, with a multitude of rules and rituals for those afflicted, pair that with the rigid lifestyle of an Orthodox Jew and you have the formula for a knee-slapping memoir. Traig gives the reader a first-hand account of what it's like to be an obsessive-compulsive who is struggling with her religious identity (her mom is Catholic, her dad a wayward Jew). The book only gets funnier as she chooses Judaism and then proceeds (with help from her OCD) to take it MORE seriously than any "real" Jew does. If you are looking for a funny book and like non-fiction, this book is for you.

Mercy by Jodi Picoult - Jodi Picoult is by far one of my favorite authors (My Sister's Keeper, The Pact, et al). Cameron MacDonald has spent his life hemmed-in by duty. As the police chief of a small Massachusetts town that has been home to generations of his Scottish clan, he is bound to the town's residents by blood and honor...and finds that he no longer really wants to be. However, when his cousin Jamie confesses to killing his wife and expects Cam to help him, Cam's loyalties are torn. At the same time, Cam is struggling with his own marriage, and into this confusion comes Mia, a world-traveler stopping over as a florist with Allie, Cam's wife. The book revolves around a few critical questions: What would you do for someone you love? Would you lie? Would you leave? Would you kill? If you like Picoult, you'll like this book!