http://abbylibrarian.blogspot.com/2009/12/book-review-emma-jean-lazarus-fell-in.html

Emma Jean Lazarus Fell in Love by Lauren Tarshis. Grades 4-7. Dial, 2009. Review copy provided by my local library.

We first met Emma Jean when she fell out of a tree. Now, the inimitable Emma Jean is back in a sequel that I actually maybe liked even more than the first book.

Emma Jean is quite fascinated by her classmates who all seem to have caught "Spring Fever". The Spring Fling is coming up and all Emma Jean's new friends seem to be obsessed with who they should ask to the dance. When an anonymous note appears in Colleen's locker, Emma Jean is tasked with figuring out who wrote it. With her powers of observation and her logical mind, it should be no problem, but everything gets a little more complicated when Emma Jean discovers she's got spring fever, too!

What I like so much about the Emma Jean books is the unique voice of the narrator. Emma Jean is certainly unlike any other main character I've read. She's unflinchingly logical and the behavior of her classmates sometimes mystifies her. And, when she starts feeling fluttery every time Will Keeler gets near, Emma Jean's mystified by herself as well.

The reader gets Emma Jean's perspective as well as Emma Jean's friend Colleen's, which rounds out the story nicely.

Colleen thinks no boy would ever like her, which is why she's so happy to get a note in her locker telling her it's not true. She asks Emma Jean to find out who wrote it, but she also immediately begins feeling better about herself. She describes it as feeling "Colleen-er". Now that she knows there's at least one boy out there who's noticed her, she feels better about herself and is able to relax around people and let her wonderful personality and humor show through.

Not only has Lauren Tarshis created an unforgettable, unique character in Emma Jean, her portrayal of the self-conscious, shy Colleen is spot on. Girls who may find themselves in a similar situation will be rooting for Colleen as she begins to come out of her shell.

Read more reviews at Welcome to my Tweendom, Book Nut, A Chair, A Fireplace, & A Tea Cozy, and Shelf Elf.

This is a Cybils nominee and this review reflects only my opinion, not necessarily the opinion of the panel!

http://abbylibrarian.blogspot.com/2009/12/let-it-snow-for-storytime.html

One morning last week I had a visit from a local Montessori school. They brought kids in grades 1-3 and they asked for a winter storytime. Here's what I put together for them. (Also see 'Tis the Season: Winter for a preschool winter storytime.)

I started out with Snow by Uri Shulevitz. This is a perfect, quiet book to express the anticipation you feel when you're wishing and hoping for snow. One snowflake falls and the little boy cries out, "It's snowing!" Though all the adults, radio, and television say it's not going to snow, the snowflakes have a way of piling up until the entire city is covered in a blanket of white.

So, we had our snow on the ground and next I read a poem from Jane Yolen's book Snow, Snow: Winter Poems for Children. I read the poem "Snow on the Trees" and talked to the kids about how I think this poem makes me feel that hushed, quiet feeling like when the whole world is covered with snow and everything is silent and white.

Since we had snow covering everything, I decided we'd better make snowmen and I read Snowmen at Night by Caralyn Buehner. The fun, rhyming text and exhuberant illustrations make this one of my favorite winter stories.

After sharing that book, I asked the kids to help me make a snowman and as they acted out the gathering of snow, rolling of snowballs, etc. I "built" a snowman from our story prop. It was constructed with styrofoam balls and some odds and ends. Very easy and cheap to make and the kids absolutely loved it! If you have a small enough crowd (or enough pieces - you could add arms and front buttons to what we have here), you can have the kids place the objects to make the snowman.

I shared a big book version of The Snowy Day by Ezra Jack Keats. This is a classic and one of my favorites for kids of all ages.

And I read parts of Under the Snow by Melissa Stewart. This non-fiction picture book talks about different animals in the forests, fields, and ponds and what they do when the weather gets cold. Frogs and turtles hide under the mud and barely breathe. Ladybugs bunch together in crevices. Voles burrow under the snow and eat the bark off trees. To read the entire book might be a little much for storytime, so I paper-clipped some of the pages together.

I had a great bunch of kids for my storytime and a good time was had by all! Here's hoping this helps you with your winter story requests this year!

http://abbylibrarian.blogspot.com/2009/12/book-review-story-of-snow.html

The Story of Snow: The Science of Winter's Wonder by Mark Cassino with Jon Nelson, Ph.D. (Grades 1-5.) Chronicle Books, October 2009. Copy provided by my local library.

For the past several winters, I lived in northern Illinois. Where we, y'know, actually got snow. Now I'm back in Kentucky where we occasionally get snow, but not very often. I'm jonesing.

So, I turned to The Story of Snow: The Science of Winter's Wonder and I found it to be beautiful and interesting. You'll want to pick this up for your units and programs on winter and snow, most definitely.

Snow falls from the sky and it covers the ground. And it's cold and it's made up of snowflakes, which are made up of snow crystals. But how exactly does it happen? And what does a snow crystal actually look like?

The Story of Snow answers both these questions. There is information about how snow crystals are formed and why they make the shapes they do. The real strength of the book, though, is the gorgeous snowtography (er... the pretty, pretty photos of snow crystals). Mark Cassino is a nature photographer by trade and he displays beautiful images in the pages of this book. Kids and adults alike will be fascinated by the up-close photographs and inspired to take a closer look at the snow falling this winter. The authors even include step-by-step instructions for how to get a good look at snow crystals yourself.

Pair The Story of Snow with Snowflake Bentley by Jacqueline Briggs Martin and make a date to study the crystals the next time it snows.

Check out more of Mark's fascinating photography on the book's blog: www.storyofsnow.com, look at a preview of The Story of Snow on Scribd, and read Amanda's review at A Patchwork of Books.

Happy Nonfiction Monday! Head on over to Simply Science for the roundup!

http://abbylibrarian.blogspot.com/2009/12/heres-librarian-question.html

Last night I watched The Day After Tomorrow (since Louisville didn't get any snow, I figured I'd watch a movie that had LOTS of snow). And here's what I'm wondering:

If you were trapped in the New York Public Library and had to burn books to stay alive, what sections would you start with?

Myself, I'd probably start with phone directories (since they'll be all out of date when everyone dies and/or moves south anyway), followed by the 551s (weather) since that would obviously need updating.

What do you think?

http://abbylibrarian.blogspot.com/2009/12/in-my-mailbox.html

In My Mailbox is a weekly meme hosted by The Story Siren!

This was a small mailbox week, but an exciting one. I got two books:

Calamity Jack by Shannon and Dean Hale, illustrated by Nathan Hale. Bloomsbury, January 2010.

This is the sequel to Rapunzel's Revenge, which I loooved. I'll be reviewing this title for a Kidz Book Buzz Tour in January, so watch out for that!



Conspiracy 365: January by Gabrielle Lord. Kane/Miller, January 2010.

On New Year's Eve, Cal is confronted by a strange man who tells him to go into hiding. They will come after him, he says, because of the Ormund Singularity. These people killed his father and now they'll come after him. Cal finds it unsettling, but decides it's probably just the ravings of a mad man... until he's almost killed that night. Now Cal's on a wild hunt to decipher the clues his father left behind before he died. What is the Ormund Singularity? Who are these people who are after him? A...more On New Year's Eve, Cal is confronted by a strange man who tells him to go into hiding. They will come after him, he says, because of the Ormund Singularity. These people killed his father and now they'll come after him. Cal finds it unsettling, but decides it's probably just the ravings of a mad man... until he's almost killed that night. Now Cal's on a wild hunt to decipher the clues his father left behind before he died. What is the Ormund Singularity? Who are these people who are after him? And can Cal get things figured out before his family and friends get hurt?

This is the start of a new teen/tween series, so I'll be interested to see what the kids think of it.

And that was my mailbox this week... What was in yours?

http://teenfictioncafe.blogspot.com/2009/12/top-news-of-decade.html

This week at TFC, we're talking about what's in the news. There's the Climate Change Summit in Copenhagen, the ongoing Olympic torch relay toward the Vancouver Olympic stadium, and for those of us in the US, the winter storm on the east coast and the weekend Senate vote on the health care bill.

And there are lists. Lots of lists.

Since we're reaching the end of the decade, all sorts of lists have popped up in the news. The best of this, the worst of that. Top news stories, most watched you-tube videos, worst celebrity moments. My personal favorites are the book lists. Here's a list from Good Reads of readers' favorites. I pulled the top picks from this decade (including more than the top ten because Stephanie Meyer and J.K. Rowling take up half that list!) Here we go...

The Best YA Books of the Decade

Twilight - Stephanie Meyer (2005)
The Graveyard Book - Neil Gaiman (2008)
Harry Potter and The Deathly Hallows - J.K. Rowling (2006)
Holes - Louis Sachar (2000)
Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (2003)
Eclipse - Stephanie Meyer (2007)
Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire - J.K. Rowling (2000)
The Book Thief - Markus Zusak (2005)
Uglies - Scott Westerfield (2005)
The Hunger Games - Suzanne Collins (2008)
Eragon - Christopher Paolini (2005)
City of Ember - Jeanne DuPrau (2004)
Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants - Ann Brashares (2001)
Great and Terrible Beauty - Libba Bray (2003)
Looking for Alaska - John Green (2005)

How many of these books have you read? Which ones did you love? What would you add to the list?

http://abbylibrarian.blogspot.com/2009/12/book-review-boys-girls-and-other.html

Boys, Girls and Other Hazardous Materials by Rosalind Wiseman. GP Putnam's Sons, January 2010. Reviewed from ARC provided by publisher.

Charlie couldn't wait to be done with eighth grade. After discovering that her best friends were actually frenemies, mean girls of the highest order, and after what they did... well, Charlie's ready for the fresh start that Harmony Falls High School offers. Starting her freshman year is exciting and nerve-wracking, but Charlie's soon plunged into the thick of it. She meets cute boys, joins the newspaper staff, and makes some real girl friends. But when the athletic boys she's crushing on start to behave badly, Charlie will find that it's not only girls who can be mean.

I mean, this book was okay. I finished it. My main complaint is that I don't see that it offers anything new to the YA shelves and it wasn't compelling or enjoyable enough to get away with it.

I did like the interesting supporting cast of characters - namely Charlie's best friends Sydney and Nidhi. But the dangerous thing about that is that Charlie seemed boring in comparison. I think either Sydney's or Nidhi's story would have been more interesting. I wanted to know more about them!

I also liked the angle of having Charlie and Nidhi on the newspaper staff and I think if that had been a bigger focus, the story might have been a little more unusual.

So, for me, this one was a miss. I'd skip it and recommend Elizabeth Scott's Something Maybe (if you're looking for boy-meets-girl) or Alyson Noel's Cruel Summer (if you're looking for queen bees).

But what do I know? Kelly over at Stacked loved it. And check out another review at Pirate Penguin's Reads.

(And for the record, the picture at top is the ARC cover and the picture at bottom is the cover being published on the actual book. I prefer the ARC cover [which is why I included it]. Which one do you like??)

http://abbylibrarian.blogspot.com/2009/12/around-interwebs_18.html

What blog post could tempt me to log into B&T Title Source to add titles to our order carts when I'm not at work? Well, honestly, several blog posts have done that, but today I'm talking about Betsy's librarian preview posts. If you haven't read them, keep an eye out for them! Lucky Betsy, being one of New York's finest librarians, gets to actually attend such shindigs. But lucky us, she writes them up so we can experience vicariously. Check out the spring 2010 previews from Simon and Schuster, Macmillan, Harper Collins, Lerner Publishing Group, Penguin Young Readers' Group, Little, Brown & Co, National Geographic, Albert Whitman and Co, Chronicle Books, and Chicken House. They are great posts to help you keep up on when books are coming out. Seriously, when does Betsy have time to sleep???

Publisher's Weekly had a cover. It sparked a controversy. PW senior news editor Calvin Reid had this to say.

I'm always up for a list of recommended nonfiction. Check out Colleen Mundor's column at Bookslut: Nonfiction Books for Curious Readers. And, of course, check out the Allen County Public Library's Mock Sibert lists.

Speaking of the Allen County Public Library, there is still time to register for their mock discussions. Indiana librarians can earn an LEU for participating in the Mock Newbery or Mock Caldecott. You can be sure I'd be there if Allen County wasn't, like, four hours away. They've also got a Mock Printz, a Mock Geisel, and a Mock Coretta Scott King. These are great collection development lists even if you can't attend the discussions!

And on that note, I'm out. It's been an exhausting week, but the end draws near! After Saturday, my department is done with programming for the year!

http://www.hbook.com/blog/2009/12/check-for-lint.html

Andrew sent me this op-ed re Kirkus and consumer reviewing whose sentiments I much appreciate, especially this gem: "Too often, the pretense of sharing advice devolves into oversharing the contours of one's navel."

Meghan Daum is here talking primarily about consumer boards like Yelp and Amazon reviews, and I noticed yesterday while looking something up on Yelp that what caught my attention were reviews and ratings that confirmed my opinions about stores and restaurants I had already patronized. I don't read children's book blogs the same way--the bloggers feel like peers; the Yelpers more like neighbors. I'm still working on what that difference means.

http://abbylibrarian.blogspot.com/2009/12/book-review-all-broken-pieces.html

All the Broken Pieces by Ann Burg. Grades 6-8. Scholastic, April 2009. Copy provided by my local library. This is a Cybils nominee and my review reflects only my own opinion, not necessarily that of the panel.

Matt was airlifted out of his home country of Vietnam as the war went on around him. He left his mother and his brother behind. He never told anyone the whole truth about his life in Vietnam, not even his adoptive parents. The secrets he keeps haunt him still.

When Matt discovers a love for music and for baseball, both hobbies help him deal with his new life. But Matt will have to open up about what happened in Vietnam before he can ever truly be healed.

This verse novel is one that sticks with me. I just can't seem to get it out of my mind. And that's the mark of a good story.

It's a credit to her writing that Ann Burg is able to create such a sense of place and time and characters while writing in verse. She knows all the right words to put the reader right where she needs to be.

Right from the beginning, you know that Matt's got a lot to deal with. When he wakes from a nightmare, his adoptive mother is there to comfort him:

"You are safe, my precious child.
You are safe now, you are home.
We have found you and we love you.
You will never be alone.

There are no mines here,
no flames, no screams,
no sounds of helicopters
or shouting guns.

I am safe.

How can I
be home?"

For, even though Vietnam is war-torn and dangerous, Matt still misses it. His home. And people in America have mixed feelings about him being there. Scenes where Matt visits a veteran support group show the tension and misconceptions among Americans about the war.

It's a haunting story and starkly beautiful. I'd pair it with Home of the Brave by Katherine Applegate to start a discussion on war and refugees.

Read more reviews at The Reading Zone, Stacked, Oops...Wrong Cookie, and Literate Lives.