A Brief History of Montmaray by Michelle Cooper

Her Highness Sophie, princess of the tiny island of Montmaray has a dilemma. Now that she just turned sixteen years old, she wants to go to England and be presented at court. But she doesn't want to go without her cousin Veronica, who would rather spend time working in the library on her book, A Brief History of Montmaray then going to parties and meeting boys.

Not that there's been any chance to do either in Montmaray. The tiny windswept island located in the Atlantic Ocean off the coats of Spain and France has very few people remaining on it, mainly the royal family, King John (Veronica's father who went insane when his wife left him), Veronica, Sophie, and Sophie's little tomboy sister Henry. As well as the housekeeper and a couple of villagers. The island has no electricity, no radio, no stores, the royal family is broke, and the castle is falling to pieces around them.

Although Montmaray used to play a vital role in European politics, the rest of the world has passed them by. But now it's 1936 and things are about to get more interesting, especially after two German Nazi officers arrive.

As Europe prepares to go up in flames, the history of Montmaray is about to change.

Battle of the Books

Well, we are in the last days of our Battle of the Books and the gloves are off! Which title is our school's favorite? The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins or My Sister's Keeper by Jodi Picoult? The two library aides who suggested these books are getting crazier by the minute. I think I may need a lock on the ballot box!

This craziness came about because of my following the School Library Journal's second annual Battle of the Books. When I was looking for a contest for School Library Month, one of my student aides suggested our own battle, with each aide suggesting their favorite books. We started with 12 and had 4 brackets.

Bracket 1: Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, The Hunger Games, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows with The Hunger Games beating out my favorite wizard. I was very worried that the 2 Harrys would split the vote, but HG won fair and square.

Bracket 2: Generation Dead, Catcher in the Rye, and Geektastic. More people knew Catcher in the Rye so it moved on.

Bracket 3: The Host, The Book Thief, and My Sister's Keeper. This one I was not as sure of. The Host would get many of the Twilight votes (no Twilight because my one student aide just wanted it in there to increase his chance of winning, not because it was his actual favorite) but My Sister's Keeper has been extremely popular. And MSK received the most votes to enter the semi-finals.

Bracket 4 - Gone With the Wind, Unwind, and Johnny Got His Gun. Unwind ran away with this round.

The Semi-Finals:
The Hunger Games easily beat Catcher in the Rye.
My Sister's Keeper was ahead of Unwind, though not for lack of trying by my student aides to influence votes. Ahh, politics in action.

The Final Round!
Voting ends tomorrow and my two student aides are actively lobbying for votes, even wanting to take ballots out around the school. This could get interesting! I must say this has been my most popular contest yet with over 150 people voting in at least one of the rounds. All students who vote are entered into a drawing for no library late fees until the end of School Library Month 2011 which is a popular prize.

Hopefully I'll be able to survive the voting madness!

The Compound by S.A. Bodeen

The Compound. For the last 6 years, Eli and his family have been living underground in this huge complex his billionaire father built in case of nuclear war. When war came, the family rushed to the shelter that would protect them. But not everyone made it. After the door closed, Eli realized his twin brother Eddy and his grandmother were still on the outside.

Now 15, Eli has shut himself off from the rest of his family. They all go through the motions, waiting until 15 years are up and they can return to the surface once the radiation has diminshed. Eli's dad has planned for every contingency, food, clothes, even creating a huge library and media room with thousands of books and dvds. But problems occured with the food supply, so that is running out sooner than expected. The alternate plan is too horrendous to even contemplate. Now Eli is beginning to think that his dad is keeping something from them all.

Did anyone survive above in the real world? What is his dad hiding? Eli wants answers, but the only way to get them is to escape the compound and his dad won't let anyone leave.

Eli once had all the time in the world, but now time is running out in the Compound.

Gentlemen by Michael Northrop

Four friends - Micheal, Tommy, Mixer, and Bones. No one seems to care much for them, so they all look out for each other. But then Tommy disappears. He's run off before but not for this long. Meanwhile, the boys' English teacher, Mr. Haberman, is acting very strange. First off there's the matter of the big plastic barrel he had in class. He won't tell what was in it, but it sure seemed like a body. And he's dropping hints in class that he knows what happened to Tommy. The boys are beginning to find it plausible that Haberman murdered Tommy.

But who would believe them and how do they prove it?

Candor by Pam Bachorz

Candor, the perfect town. And Oscar Banks is the perfect son. Or so everyone thinks.

Oscar is class president, straight A student, and Mr. Popular. All the kids in Candor look up to him. He is also the only bad kid in town, not that anyone knows. His dad, the town's founder, controls everyone with subliminal messages, exhorting the residents of Candor to eat healthy, study hard, obey their parents, and "respectful space in every place". Oscar fights the mind control by creating his own messages. He even has his own business helping new teens escape to the real world. And then Nia Silva arrives.

Nia is an artist with a troubled past. She's different from every Candor kid and Oscar falls for her, hard. But as much as she's unconsciously resisting the messages, it won't be long before Nia turns into just another boring Candor clone. And Oscar knows the only way to save her is to lose her.

In Candor, you are what you hear.

Readathon

We had a readathon a while back to raise money for the school library. We held it on the half day at Homecoming, which was both a good and bad choice. About half of the English classes participated and students read approximately 4000 pages, raising $250 (thanks Kyle's dad!). Ms. Tramonte's 3rd period class read the most and received a pizza party from Domino's pizza. Thank you Domino's for supporting our readathon!We may have to have a read-off in the spring as Ms. Tramonte's 7th period class disputed the results.

I'm planning for this to be an annual event and next year we should have more participation. Happy reading!

King of the Screwups by K.L. Going

Liam Geller has screwed up yet again. His dad found him drunk on top of the desk with an almost naked girl. This time, instead of yelling at him or grounding him, Liam's dad throws him out. There's no way he wants to stay with his military grandparents so his mom arranges for him to stay with his gay uncle in a trailer park.

Liam is not happy to see the uncle he barely knows and his uncle seems to be conflicted about his staying there. On his first day of school he gets in trouble and things go downhill from there. No matter what Liam does, he screws everything up. So he decides to change. His dad doesn't like the fact that he's popular, so, he'll be unpopular and maybe even join an academic club or two. But of course he screws even that up.

The one thing Liam is good at is understanding fashion and modeling, a trait he inherited from his mom, a former international supermodel. He even gets a job at the only clothing store in his uncle's small town. But Liam can't be proud of his success as it makes him even more popular than ever and that is the last thing that will impress his dad.

When will Liam realize that he needs to be true to himself and not his dad, instead of being the King of the Screwups?

Twenty Boy Summer by Sarah Ockler

It is supposed to be Anna and Frankie's Absolutely Best Summer Ever. Frankie's parents are taking Anna with them on the annual family vacation for three weeks to Zanzibar, California. Three weeks of sun and sand, and oh yeah, boys. Frankie is determined that Anna is going to lose her virginity this summer, and to make sure, they need to meet a boy a day, so twenty boys. Anna goes along with the idea, never intending to take it seriously. After all, she's already had a boyfriend although Frankie never knew. Matt asked Anna to keep it a secret until he could tell Frankie at the right moment. Matt was Frankie's brother. Was. He died right before he could tell Frankie.

Anna is trying to be there for Frankie but she's still keeping her relationship with Matt a secret. And now in California all she can think about is him. Until Sam comes on the scene. Sam is sweet, gorgeous, and makes Anna feel very special. She's sure she's falling in love with him, but what will happen to her memories of Matt if she does?

Will Anna's secret destroy her Twenty Boy Summer?

Hate List by Jennifer Brown

The Hate List. Valerie started the Hate List as a way to vent, to write down everything and everyone that was annoying her. Algebra, celebrities, homework, parents fighting, and Christy Bruter, the girl who'd been bothering Val since elementary school. When Val met Nick Levil as a freshman, they bonded over the Hate List, adding more and more names of kids in school who annoyed them or bullied them. Val never thought it was anything more than a way of getting frustration out until the day Nick brought a gun to school and targeted those whose names were on the Hate List.

Now people blame Val for creating the infamous list and she no longer knows who she is. Villain for coming up with the list? Victim for being taken in by Nick? Or Hero for saving the life of a girl she didn't even like and getting shot in the process? She can't shake the momories of the day and trying to move on with her life is difficult. It takes all her strength to go back to school and face her old friends who now hate her. And regardless of what people tell her to think, and what he did, she still misses and cares for Nick.

All this started as a simple joke that became so much more. But how can Val move on and create a new life after the Hate List?

Florida Teens Read

We are in the middle of our reading for the Florida Teens Read program, and there are rarely any books left on the shelf! It is a very popular list this year. One student has already read all 15 titles, and several students are getting close.

Here is the list:
The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-time Indian by Sherman Alexie.
The Disreputable History of Frankie Landau-Banks by E. Lockhart
Generation Dead by Daniel Waters
Gym Candy by Carl Deuker
Homeboyz by Alan Sitomer
The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins
The Last Exit to Normal by Michael Harmon
Little Brother by Cory Doctorow
The Market by J.M Steele
Shark Girl by Kelly Bingham
Shift by Jennifer Bradbury
Suck It Up by Brian Meehl
Suite Scarlett by Maureen Johnson
Three Little Words: A Memoir by Ashley Rhodes-Courter
Unwind by Neal Shusterman

My prediction? (So far I've been 3 for 3!) The Hunger Games followed by Unwind. Voting is the month of April so we'll see if I'm right!

Last Exit to Normal by Michael Harmon

It's not my fault my father is gay, but sometimes it seems like it. He realized he was gay when I was fourteen, ruining my life and causing my mom to walk out the door. Now, three years later, we're sitting in a small town in Montana of all places, just becasue I made a teny little mistake that got me arrested. Montana, where my dad's boyfriend was from, the same town he was run out of for being gay. How is a punk skater with his hair in spikes going to fit in in this redneck, backwards town?

Things get worse in a hurry. Our neighbor is extremely homophobic and is mad at us for calling the Sheriff on him because he was beating his eleven year old son. Somehow I've made an enemy of the town bully, and I fell in love with a beautiful girl who has a huge, muscular, over-protective borther. To top it all off, there's not a decent place to skateboard in the entire town!

How am I ever going to fit in and survive in a place like this? Honestly, the Last Exit to Normal is anything but!

A Belated Welcome Back

Welcome back! I've finally made time to sit and blog (the 5 minutes a day I'm not running around). This year will be a difficult year in many areas, finance, time management, assessment and more. I'm working solo this year, but luckily I have many wonderful student aides helping me.

Upcoming events:

• The Florida Association of Media in Education conference next week in Orlando
• Florida Teens Read has some awesome books this year!
• Poetry Out Loud will be starting soon
• Teens Read Week
• Banned Books Week
• Book club starting (first book to read will be Thirteen Reasons Why)

Please be aware that the library will be closed one lunch, alternating each day.

Here's to a great year!

New Books

Our last shipment has arrived for the school year. Hard to believe! We have Breaking Dawn in Spanish, Audacity of Hope and Dreams From My Father by President Obama, Homeboyz, Hip-Hop High School, and the Secret Story of Sonia Rodriguez by Alan Sitomer, the Other Queen by Phillipa Gregory, Psychology Demystified, Unwind by Neal Shusterman, the House of Night series by P.C. Cast, What I Saw and How I Lied by Judy Blundell and many others!

Unfortunately I also had to buy replacement copies of many books due to students leaving the district with books still checked out. I have lost approximately $1000 this way this year (it's been a bad year for that). With only $4300 in my budget, this is a huge chunk. I'll be doing massive fundraising next year!

Come in and check out our new book shelf! There's a book for everyone!

Win No Library Late Fees for a Year!

Hate paying late fees! You only have a few days left to win a free ride on late fees until April 2010! It's easy, just write a book review on our Destiny Library Card Catalog or on our Media Center Web Page. You may enter multiple times by reviewing more than one book. One lucky person will be chosen to have NO late fees until 2010. It could be you!

Superintendent's Awards

The last day of reading for the Superintendent's Ultimate Reading Award is today! Remember that 15 titles is the minimum number of books to read. Books read in class and for reading logs as well as books that you listened to count! If you read more than 15 add them to your list too as I count up how many books we read as a school and put the total number read on your certificate. Your reading list needs to be handed in to me on Mon. Apr. 20.

The award ceremony is on Fri. May 15 in the Media Center and Cafeteria from 8 to 8:30ish.

National Library Week

It is the last day of our fine amnesty week in celebration of National Library Week. We have had many late books returned and the students are very happy to have their fines waived. Several students have even told us that we shouldn't waive the fees as we need the money. True we would have collected more late fees but I'd rather have the books returned. And we have received some that were checked out last school year!

But on Monday it is back to normal so last chance to get your late books in!

Florida Teens Read Voting

It is now time to vote for your favorite Florida Teens Read book! Go here to vote. Voting is open until April 30th. You must have read a minimum of 3 of the following books in order to vote: Avalon High, Boot Camp, The Christopher Killer, City of Bones, Deadline, Firestorm, Incantation, Life As We Knew It, A Long Way Gone, The Nature of Jade, Street Love, Thirteen Reasons Why, A Thousand Splendid Suns, What Happened to Cass McBride, and Wicked Lovely.

Which will be the winner of this coveted award? You decide!

Teen Tech Week

Teen Tech Week was several weeks ago, during the FCAT testing. So instead we celebrated "Press Play @ Your Library" all month long. We had a display of technology, sports, and music books and held our first ever playlist contest. Students made playlists (soundtracks) for their favorite books. Mr. Ellsworth wanted to participate too, just ask him what songs he chose for Of Mice and Men! I must admit I had problems with my Harry Potter playlist, does anyone have any suggestions?

Congrats to Jasmine and Holly for winning $15 iTunes gift certificates for their playlists. Start preparing yours for next year and stay tuned for our School Library Month contest.

Poetry Out Loud update

I am happy to announce that Luana did a wonderful job of representing CSHS at the state Poetry Out Loud final. She competed against representatives of approximately 50 other high schools. Although she did not move on to the final round, we are very proud of her. She says she had fun and learned a lot for next year. So, everyone, brush up on your poetry recitation skills now!

The Secret Between Us by Barbara Delinsky

Secrets. Secrets can create a bond. Secrets can hide the truth. Secrets can destroy a family.

Grace never saw the man she hit with the car in the pouring rain. Her mother, Deborah, sitting in the passenger seat didn't see him either. Worried about her younger son who was alone, Deborah sent Grace home. The police just assume that Deborah was driving, and in an attempt to protect her daughter, Deborah doesn't bother to correct them. She figures if she and Grace stay silent, everything will be okay.

But the man dies and even though the police find there was no way Deborah and Grace could have avoided him, his widow wishes to press charges. Grace feels like her whole life is falling apart, and her mother, normally so strong and capable of taking care of everything, doesn't know how to fix this. But what her mother also doesn't know is that Grace is hiding a small secret of her own about that night.

A secret between a mother and daughter is usually a good thing. But not the Secret Between Us.