Home and other big fat lies

Home and other big fat lies by Jill Wolfson

Another great read from the weekend.

Whitney is trading in buildings for trees. She is headed from the city to Northern California, and foster home #12. #12 because of the top five complaints about Whitney from foster parents...
1. Big, sassy mouth
2. Too hyper
3. Doesn't always stick to the truth
4. Thinks she knows everything
5. Climbs everything (p.19)

Whitney soon learns that she's not the only "foster" new in Forest Glen, in fact theirs a lot of them. She also learns that the reason there are so many off them, is that these families need the financial income that comes along with having foster child in the house. Forest Glen is and always will be a logging town so when a closure of the timber cutting areas closes the effect is felt in just about every family. Whitney (aka - Termite) begins to love the outdoors, the forest and most of all a ginormous redwood tree she's nicknamed Big Momma. She leads her fellow fosters in starting a nature and ecology club. And that's just the beginning the adventure.

Termite is one of those great characters- she's full of action, bounce, energy and and her own creative way with language. It's no wonder she finds herself leading an environmental cause and winning hearts along the way.

Read on

The Missing Girl

The Missing Girl by Norma Fox Mazer

Haunting, chilling, creepy, tense. This is how I describe this book.

Told in alternating voices. The story of five sisters from a poor family, each going about their own lives in differing ways, full of chatter, laughing, bickering typical of any family.

The oldest Beauty (ironically rather plain) is planning for the day she'll turn eighteen and be away from all this. Mim quiet and responsible holding a personal secret that she has yet to share with anyone. Stevie always temperamental, on the attack and demanding attention. Fancy is always doted on by her sisters as she is "special" and loves to tell the others of her special teacher and special class. And Autumn the tag along, lagging behind, wanting attention from the others.

Meanwhile a man secretly covets watching the girls, deciding which one he likes best, which one he'll take home and keep.

Definitely a page turner.

Read on

What's your savvy?

From the cover.

For generations, the Beaumont family has harbored a magical secret. They each possess a "savvy" — a special supernatural power that strikes when they turn thirteen. Grandpa Bomba moves mountains, her older brothers create hurricanes and spark electricity... and now it's the eve of Mibs's big day.
As if waiting weren't hard enough, the family gets scary news two days before Mibs's birthday: Poppa has been in a terrible accident. Mibs develops the singular mission to get to the hospital and prove that her new power can save her dad. So she sneaks onto a salesman's bus... only to find the bus heading in the opposite direction. Suddenly Mibs finds herself on an unforgettable odyssey that will force her to make sense of growing up — and of other people, who might also have a few secrets hidden just beneath the skin.

I soooo enjoyed this, the well crafted if somewhat wacky characters, the tall tale adventure, the wonderful savvy Mibs is given and how it presents itself are all unforgettable (it made me kind of glad I don't have a tattoo ;-). I felt part of the team on that bumpy pink bus ride, wondering what my savvy was and if I could guess what yours might be.

"But as I grew up, I began to understand that a savvy is just a know-how of a different sort."

"In most ways, Mibs, we Beaumonts are just like other people, we get born, and sometime later we die. And in between, we're happy and sad, we feel love and we feel fear, we eat and we sleep and we hurt like everyone else."

Wonderfully odd, no wonder this book (the authors first - wow!) has already been optioned for a movie. Check out the book trailer on youtube or visit the authors website http://www.ingridlaw.com/ for more about this great book.

Don't miss this one!!

Read on

Rapunzel's Revenge

I love new takes on fairy-tales, and this one is terrific!! Rapunzel's Revenge by Shannon and Dean Hale ; illustrated by Nathan Hale. An old-west, tall tale version of the classic fairytale Rapunzel with loads of giddy-up told in the graphic novel format. Yahoo!

Rapunzel has grown up in a beautiful villa, surrounded by wonderful blooming gardens under the watchful eye of Mother Gothel. As Rapunzel grows up she begins to question what lies on the other side of the gigantic wall that surrounds the villa. Being bored and a bit adventurous Rapunzel scales the clock to see for the first time the very puzzling landscape that stretches almost as far as the eye can see. When Rapunzel questions Mother Gothel on this and other issues concerning her past, Mother Gothel banishes her to a towering tree. The years slide by, and Rapunzel's determination has grown with each day. When she escapes her lonely tower, the adventures and a lesson to be taught to one Mother Gothel get underway. Her long braids come in handy and a friend named Jack joins in on settin' things right.

I loved the independent, honest and daring nature of this wildwest Rapunzel. The illustrations capture the action, excitement and western feel admirably. Yahoo!

Should I let you in on a secret?

I don't know, this is a big undertaking. Trusting you with what could potentially harm you. I could get in a lot of trouble. Dare I tell you of such a mysterious, puzzling phenomena all contained between a set of hard covers?

Well, okay but just this one time.

The name of this book is secret by Pseudonymous Bosch. I read it early in the summer and have managed to keep it a secret so far, but people keep asking. Making it harder and harder for me to keep such a good book safely on the shelves of the library and not in the hands of readers.

Alas I cannot keep it under wraps any longer. I'm gonna spill. It is an alarming account of two extraordinary adventurers, a missing magician’s diary, a symphony of smells and a deadly secret…

For those of you who are fans of Lemony Snicket, mysteries, codes and hidden clues, you might want to give this a try - but beware, it could be detrimental to your health.

PS - don't forget to check out the website: http://www.thenameofthisbookissecret.com/ for more fun stuff.

Oh yeah, I'm currently reading If you're reading this, it's too late also by the same author (but don't tell anyone, I could get in big trouble- as this book was snuck out of the publishing house just for me.)

Read on

Click, one book - ten authors

Click - one book -ten authors. Such an interesting concept, it reminds me of a writing assignment given at a workshop where we were given the starting sentence "It was a dark and stormy night..." and then each person created the next sentence, building this crazy mismash (or terrific) story.

The ten authors of Click each contribute a chapter building the story centred around the character of George "Gee" Keane - renowned photojournalist.

As I read the book, I thought up a bunch of book report ideas, some clever, some straight-forward, some artsy and some just plain out-there, which I guess relates back to how I viewed the book. Some chapters I loved, I thought the writing and tone to be smooth and deliberate, others I thought- where is this going? and a few I had a harder time seeing how it would fit with the overall story. Which I susppose is what you get when you give a novel over to ten authors - endless possibilities.

Read on

Graphic novel weekend

Robert Louis Stevenson's Treasure Island retold by Wim Coleman and Pat Perrin illustrated by Greg Rebis

I love Treasure Island, it's one of those books I end up reading every year, I love the characters, I love the pirates, i love the mystery of the treasure map, and i imagine myself as a bit of a young Jim Hawkins too.

So I was happy to see a graphic novel version of one of my favourites, especially as this version was in colour and appropriate for younger readers (there's a lot more to the pirate language than ARRRR). I thought this version did a great job of summarizing this classic story - I even felt my usual love/hate feelings for Long John Silver. This book even has a glossary for some of those words only used by pirates, a bit about Robert Louis Stevenson, and questions to ponder.

This is a great option for young readers interested in a pirate adventure story.

Read on

Graphic novel weekend

The Regifters by Mike Carey, Sonny Liew and Marc Hempel





"... action, romance and introspection combine in an enjoyable and realistically muliethnic whole"


Booklist, starred review





Regifters is the story of rebellion, crushes and recycled gifts. Jen Dik Seong -or Dixie as she's known to her friends is a gifted hapkido (Korean martial arts) athlete, in fact she could win the up coming nation wide tournament, if only she could focus. Her instructor carefully points out to her that -" you are a good student Jen, perhaps the best I have ever taught, you know that hapkido is much more than a fighting style. You know the importance of Ki. The universal energy that some call spirit. This is not strength of body or mind, but it underlies all strength, and makes strength strong. Where is your Ki Jen? What has become of it?"


Jen unfortunately can only seem to focus on one thing - Adam (a fellow hapkido student) and how to win over her crush. Enter the gift, a sculpture of a Hwarang warrior which Jen decides will win over Adam but also costs her entery fee to the national tournament. As the story develops so does the idea of regifting.

(Re-gift - verb - 1. to give an unwanted gift to someone else; to give as a gift something one previously received as a gift.)

Jen gives the gift to Adam, who gives the gift to Megan, who when she finds out she has been regifted gives it to her brother, who uses it to repay the debt he owes Dillinger, who doesn't know it all started with Jen but for some reason it reminds him of her and she is a true warrior and therefore deserves to have this kind of reminder of who she is. And if that confused you, well check the book out because it won't disappoint.

Thumbs up from me!

Read on

How to Steal a Dog

How to Steal a Dog by Barbara O'Connor

"Half of me was thinking, Georgina, don't do this. Stealing a dog is just plain wrong. The other half of me was thinking, Georgina, you're in a bad fix and you got to do whatever it takes to get yourself out of it."

Georgina is pretty mad. Mad at her Dad (for having taken off from the family). Mad at her Mom (who's temporary solution to their housing crisis is to live in the family car). And mad at her little brother who just isn't much help in understanding all this. What Georgina needs is are solutions. There begins Georgina's idea of stealing a dog and then posting reward signs thus getting the reward money, so that her family can find a home again.

There's a few problems with Georgina's plan - unfortunately she acts before she's thought this through. A couple of minor things like, where will she keep the dog (it's not like she can take it back to the car - her Mom can't find out about any of this), what will she feed the dog?, how will she find time to walk the dog?.

I hope you'll check this one out - I loved it :-)

Read on

Shelley Tanaka / Author talk

Last night I went to hear author Shelley Tanaka speak. Tanaka is a non-fiction author and editor. Some of her books include: Amelia Earhart: the legend of the lost aviator, Climate Change, Mummies: the newest, coolest & creepiest, Earthquake, Gettysburg, D-Day, The Alamo, new Dinos, Attack on Pearl Harbor, Footnotes: dancing the world's best loved ballets, In the time of knights, Secrets of the Mummies.

What I found most interesting, was hearing Tanaka speak of her thirty year career in book industry and the changes she has seen and dealt with first hand in the publishing of non-fiction materials. Some of Shelley's earlier works were creative non-fiction (meaning creative narrative was added to enrich the facts). I think young readers enjoy a story that accompanies the factual material but I do understand the argument that they also need to be told which parts of the book might be fictionalized and which parts are factual. The publishing industry has moved away from this creative non-fiction style and seem to be embracing non-fiction books that every fact is thoroughly researched and cited.

I also enjoyed the fact that Tanaka has worn many hats within the book publishing realm. As an author she has argued with editors and publishers to keep certain pieces in a book. Likewise she has probably argued with authors to whittle down words when wearing her editors hat. I think we often forget how many changes a book sees before it ever reaches our hands and that readers sensibilities vary across the country, across our continent and across the world.

Thank you to the Lethbridge Children's Roundtable for bringing authors like Shelley Tanaka in to speak. I am reminded once again how incredible an authors role is to young people and how my role as a librarian can help bring them closer to understanding and appreciating great books.
Read on.