New books for October ~ Part 4

Hello, Goodbye, and Everything in Between by Jennifer Smith

Contemporary Fiction 

High school sweethearts Clare and Aidan spend the night before they leave for college reminiscing about their relationship and deciding whether they should stay together or break up.

The Hired Girl by Laura Amy Schlitz

Historical Fiction 

Fourteen-year-old Joan Skraggs, just like the heroines in her beloved novels, yearns for real life and true love. But what hope is there for adventure, beauty, or art on a hardscrabble farm in Pennsylvania where the work never ends? Over the summer of 1911, Joan pours her heart out into her diary as she seeks a new, better life for herself--because maybe, just maybe, a hired girl cleaning and cooking for six dollars a week can become what a farm girl could only dream of--a woman with a future.

How to be Richer, Smarter, and Better Looking Than Your Parents by Zac Bissonnette

Nonfiction 

Striking out on your own for the first time is exhilarating. But in a culture full of bad advice, predatory banks, and splurge-now-pay-later temptations, it can also be extremely dangerous--leading you to make financial decisions that could hurt you for years to come. Combine this with a slumped economy, mounds of student loans, and dubious examples from reality TV stars to politicians to your own parents, and it’s no wonder so many twenty-somethings are struggling.

Twenty-three-year-old Zac Bissonnette--the author of Debt-Free U--knows exactly what you’re going through. He demystifies the many traps young people fall victim to in their post-college years. He offers fresh insights on everything from job hunting to buying a car to saving for retirement that will give you a foundation for a secure, stable, and happy life. In the process, he reveals why FICO scores are overrated, online job applications are a waste of time, car loans are for suckers, and credit card rewards are a scam.

With detours to discuss wine connoisseurs, Really Broke Housewives, and Lenny Dykstra, Zac shows you how to make better choices today so you can be richer, smarter (and better-looking!) for years to come.

Hunter by Mercedes Lackey

Fantasy 

Long ago, the barriers between our world and the Otherworld were ripped open, and it's taken centuries to bring back civilization in the wake. Now, the luckiest Cits live in enclosed communities, behind walls that keep them safe from the hideous monsters fighting to break through. Others are not so lucky. To Joyeaux Charmand, who has been a Hunter in her tight-knit mountain community since she was a child, every Cit without magic deserves her protection from dangerous Othersiders, whatever that might cost her.

The Keeper by David Baldacci

Fantasy 

Vega Jane and her friend Delph have taken the map that Quentin Harris left them and set out from the town of Wormwood, determined to brave the Quag and find freedom on the other side--but the Quag was designed to keep the town people in, and it is filled with bloodthirsty creatures and sinister magic, and it is not going to let them escape unscathed.

New Books for February (part 5)

Contemporary Fiction

 Jude and her twin brother, Noah, are incredibly close. At thirteen, isolated Noah draws constantly and is falling in love with the charismatic boy next door, while daredevil Jude cliff-dives and wears red-red lipstick and does the talking for both of them. But three years later, Jude and Noah are barely speaking. Something has happened to wreck the twins in different and dramatic ways . . . until Jude meets a cocky, broken, beautiful boy, as well as someone else; an even more unpredictable new force in her life. The early years are Noah's story to tell. The later years are Jude's. What the twins don't realize is that they each have only half the story, and if they could just find their way back to one another, they'd have a chance to remake their world. 

Action/Adventure 

Cassie Hobbes and the other members of the Naturals program of the FBI work to solve a string of serial murders carried out by a copycat killer.

Contemporary Fiction

Seventeen-year-old Kevin tries to reinvent himself when he runs away from home and the father he hates, but living with a mysterious uncle and befriending two homeless girls just adds more complications.

Historical Fiction

Inspired by a true story, this relates the tale of siblings Sosi, Shahen, and Mariam who survive the Armenian genocide of 1915 by escaping from Turkey alone over the mountains.

Nonfiction - Biography

When fifteen-year-old Malala Yousafzai spoke out against the Taliban's policy of forbidding education for girls, an attempt was made on her life. This is her story, which also includes information on other hardships faced by young women in Pakistan.

Teen Book Club - June - Distant Waves

The Teen Book Club met last night to discuss...

In the early twentieth century, four sisters and their widowed mother, a famed spiritualist, travel from New York to London, and as the Titanic conveys them and their acquaintances, journalist W.T. Stead, scientist Nikola Tesla, and industrialist John Jacob Astor, home, Tesla's inventions will either doom or save them all.

Here are the discussion questions we used~




1. What did you think of the book? General thoughts?

2. Did you have a favorite character in the book? Least favorite? Favorite scene or part?

3. Why do you think Jane was chosen to be the narrator in the book? How would the book be different if it was Mimi, or the twins?

4. What kind of relationships did the sisters have with each other? Did their relationships change after the revelation about Mimi?

5. Do you believe in psychics and premonitions? Do you think the dead can be contacted?

6. Why did Mimi want to leave home? Why didn’t she want to tell Victor about her heritage?

7. What did you think of the writing style in the book?

8. Do you believe time travel is possible? What time/place in the past would you visit?

9. If you were casting the actors and actresses for the movie version of this book who would you cast for: Jane, Mimi, Emma & Amelie, Blythe, Thad, Tesla, Ninette, and anyone else you want to cast?

10. Ratings and final thoughts!


Melanie gave it a 7.5 out of 10 and said "It is an interesting plot line with a smooth blending of history with fiction and the characters are well developed."

Miss G gave it an 8 out of 10 and said "The Spiritualism and relationships between the sisters drew me in, and then I couldn't stop reading, I had to find out what would happen to them on the Titanic!" 

If you are interested in learning more about the Titanic:

· 910.9163 DAV – Voyagers of the Titanic: Passengers, Sailors, Shipbuilders, Aristocrats, and the Worlds They Came From by R. P. T. Davenport-Hines

· 910.916 WEL – Titanic: Legacy of the World’s Greatest Ocean Liner by Susan Wels

If you want more Titanic Fiction:

· YA ACT PAU – Deck Z: The Titanic: Unsinkable, Undead by Chris Pauls - Imagine being trapped aboard the doomed Titanic on an icy Atlantic. . . with the walking dead.

· YA PAR GRA – Fateful by Claudia Gray - When seventeen-year-old Tess Davies, a ladies' maid, meets handsome Alec Marlow aboard the RMS Titanic, she quickly becomes entangled in the dark secrets of his past, but her growing love puts her in mortal peril even before fate steps in.

· YA HIS WOL – The Watch That Ends the Night: Voices from the Titanic by Allan Wolf - Recreates the 1912 sinking of the Titanic as observed by millionaire John Jacob Astor, a beautiful young Lebanese refugee finding first love, "Unsinkable" Molly Brown, Captain Smith, and others including the iceberg itself.

If you are interested in learning more about Nikola Tesla:

· 621.3 MY – My Inventions: The Autobiography of Nikola Tesla by Nikola Tesla


Our next book is Ashfall by Mike Mullin and we will meet on TUESDAY, July 29th at 6:00pm. We will skype live with the author! 

After the eruption of the Yellowstone supervolcano destroys his city and its surroundings, fifteen-year-old Alex must journey from Cedar Falls, Iowa, to Illinois to find his parents and sister, trying to survive in a transformed landscape and a new society in which all the old rules of living have vanished.

MAY I have some New Books Please? (Part 4)

Danny Blackgoat, a sixteen-year-old Navajo, is labeled a troublemaker during the Long Walk of 1864 and sent to a prisoner outpost in Texas, where fellow captive Jim Davis saves him from a bully and starts him on the road to literacy--and freedom.

Wonder Woman must travel to Hell to rescue her friend Zola from Hades, a vengeful god who wants more from Wonder Woman than just her soul.

When 100 juvenile delinquents are sent on a mission to recolonize Earth, they get a second chance at freedom, friendship, and love, as they fight to survive in a dangerous new world.

 Seventeen-year-old Harper Price's charmed life is turned upside down when she discovers she's been given magical powers in order to protect her school nemesis David Stark, who's an Oracle

When the Spanish influenza epidemic reaches Portland, Oregon, in 1918, seventeen-year-old Cleo leaves behind the comfort of her boarding school to work for the Red Cross.