Teen Takeover: NEW Guest Blogger Feature

Though I wish I could, I can't read or review everything. Also, hearing myself speak about books gets lonesome sometimes, and so I introduce you to a new feature: Guest Teen Blogger!

This week, Victoria, otherwise known as "teen blogger extraordinaire", reviews The Gemma Doyle Trilogy by one of my all-time favorite YA authors, Libba Bray. Take it away, Victoria:

Get all three books at the library! Click HERE.

"Libba Bray wrote this thrilling historical fiction trilogy. It starts with A Great and Terrible Beauty, next comes Rebel Angels, and finally the last book is A Sweet Far Thing. It follows sixteen year old Gemma Doyle. Gemma has just lost her mother, is gaining strange powers, moving from India to England for boarding school, being watched by a mysterious stranger that she may or may not be attracted to, and creates friendships with three very unique girls. The four girls stumble upon The Realms, a magical land where the dead come to crossover the river to go beyond. Only select women from The Order have this power that Gemma possesses, and, whether she wants it or not, Gemma is now the one holding this power and must decide who to trust, who to fight, and, most importantly, what to do.

The first book, I felt, got off to a slow start. Once its momentum got going, though, I was hooked and couldn't put the book down. I found the second book extremely hard to work through. It didn't seem up to par with the first book [Insert from Kelley the Librarian: I TOTALLY AGREE!]. It started off in another person’s point-of-view without anyone knowing before just switching to Gemma’s with no warning. It made me very confused. I was hesitant to pick up the third book after the second, but I did anyway. Best choice ever! The third book blew me away. I think I liked it better than the first one. There is tons of action and the book never seems to slow its pace. The ending was a love-hate one. I loved it, but I still wanted it to be different--if that makes any sense to anyone.

I believe there is at least one character in the books that everyone will like. It may not be the same person, but they are all so unique and different that I think it’s only a matter of personality preference. The characters certainly have personality and are well developed into the story line. I highly recommend these books even though I didn't like the second one. The trilogy is a great read. I’d skip dessert to read them!"

~Victoria, Guest Blogger Extraordinaire!!! 

Do YOU want to be a guest teen blogger? It's as simple as sending me an email: kblue@pls-net.org. (Guest teen bloggers must live in Canandaigua or Ontario County-abouts, and they must be teens, obvs)

Book Report: Shadow and Bone (The Grisha)

Shadow and Bone by Leigh Bardugo

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Why is writing a review of a book you love so much harder than writing about one you... loved not so much?

I indulged myself by reading Shadow and Bone and its sequel, Siege and Storm, back-to-back. What a luxury it was! Things started a bit slow for me... I even doubted for a few chapters whether I would dig this series. But then! Oh my! I was swept off my feet. How? Why? Because Alina Starkov's life goes from 0 to 120 in a matter of pages, and the pace, the magic and the sensuality don't really slow from there.

The best type of heroine, Alina starts from nothing and must quickly come to grips with a tremendous power she never knew she had. This is an archetype I never really get tired of, especially when it's done as well as Bardugo does it. When we first meet Alina, she's a orphaned teen apprenticing cartography in the First Army of Ravka (peep a map at the front of both books for a geography lesson; #yeahbookmaps). An important thing you need to know about Ravka is that it has literally been torn in two by a swath of physical darkness known as the Shadow Fold (it's just "the Fold" for short, ya'll). The Fold is full of some really nasty creatures that will eat you, and the Fold may be growing. It's, like, a huge problem and plays a central role in the politics of the book. But now, back to our heroine:

By her own accounts (and she may be a tiny bit hard on herself), Alina's not much more than average in all departments, until one day a life-and-death situation while crossing the Fold forces her dormant powers to the surface, and she is thrust into the world of the Grisha.

The Grisha are people born with special abilities like summoning and controlling wind or squeezing the life out of a person's heart. In neighboring countries, they're hunted down and burned as witches, but in Ravka they are enlisted into the powerful Second Army, led by a dead-sexy character known as the Darkling.

When Alina's power is discovered, she is "taken under the wing" of the Darkling more or less by force, whisked off to the royal capital in the hopes that her powers can be harnessed and used to fight the Fold. Alina is also separated from her one and only friend/childhood companion, Mal, who she has serious unexplored romantic feelings for. Remember when I said the book swept me off my feet? This is about where it happened.

While the adventure moves along quickly, we also get some wonderful character development and growth, especially moving into book 2. I read a lot of YA, and I read a lot of YA series, but this series is at the top of my list right now, alongside Marissa Meyer's Lunar Chronicles. I will eagerly await the third book in both of these series, and gush about the first two books to anyone who will listen until then.

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Hot Off the Presses! Middle School Summer Reads

I am very excited to officially release this list of suggested summer reads for my middle school students out there. I know you guys in the Canandaigua area have to read 2 books this summer (at least!), so we're here to help with hand-picked books, just for you. 

Who's "we"? This list was a collaborative effort of Yours Truly and Melanie Dyroff, School Library Media Specialist at Canandaigua Middle School. And, you know, double the librarian equals double the awesome. 

Click here for the full list

Technical details: Stop by Wood Library and browse a print copy of the list in the Teen Scene or at the Reference Desk. All of these titles are available for check-out this summer at Wood Library and through the Pioneer Library System. Many of the titles are also available as eBooks or audiobooks in OWWL2Go. -Kelley, (Your) Teen Services Librarian

Book Report: How to Lead a Life of Crime

How to Lead a Life of Crime by Kirsten Miller

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Like, wow. I'm not much a "true crime" reader, but I do have a bit of a thing for secret schools and societies, so reviews of this book hooked me. And I'm so glad they did.

The deal: our narrator, Flick, seems awfully young to be so hardened by life, but this is a book where we see on many levels how awful life can be to even the very young. That's right: life-suckieness does not discriminate here.

It just so happens that hardened youth such as Flick are exactly what the prestigious Mandel Academy is looking for. This elite New York preparatory school has a reputation for turning hopeless lives around... but not by any of the educational means you're most likely familiar with.

Some things about Flick's very troubled past we learn right away; he tells us. Other facts are skillfully and gradually teased out through his interactions with the novel's other characters (all fascinating and meaty... Bravo, Kristin Miller!) Most of these characters are living, but we also get to know Flick through his interactions with the apparition of his dead younger brother, Jude, who comes in and out of Flick's alone time dressed in full Peter Pan regalia. I know: but it so works.

Flick's been living on the streets of New York by choice. He's an excellent pick-pocket and one heck of a thug. But underneath the tough exterior, he also has a tender relationship smoldering with Joi, a young woman who runs a make shift orphanage for runaways in an abandoned building on the Lower East Side. Flick's criminal activities and severed family ties attract the attention of the Mandel Academy's headmaster, Lucian Mandel. He offers Flick a place at the school, but, more importantly, he offers Flick the chance to avenge Jude's death. Flick convinces himself that revenge is the only thing that matters to him, and so he accepts. Fortunately for us readers, Flick has only an inkling of what he's getting himself into. And when Joi gets pulled into the hornet's nest as well, Flick discovers that he does care about something else other than revenge.

What lengths is Flick willing to go to for what matters most to him? What will or won't he do in order to survive Mandel? That question is at the heart of both the narrative and the themes of this page-turning novel. So good!

I see that other reviewers have pointed out the violence. Yes: the explicit is shocking, and the implicit is haunting. That said, I don't think that any of the violence was unnecessary or unexpected; I think it was artfully woven in and always within character. (Is it so wrong that I was appalled and delighted by the way in which a certain character's head is dispatched from his body?) Plus, this book is never anything but up-front about what's contained in its pages: "A meth dealer. A prostitute. A serial killer.... Anywhere else, they’d be vermin. At the Mandel Academy, they’re called prodigies." You get the picture.

As a librarian, I would for sure steer this into the hands of my older high-school readers. It's just not the right book for a younger crowd, not just because of the violence, but for the complex themes and questions this book grapples with as well.

All in all, this book is awesome. I've never read Miller's Kiki Strike series, but now I certainly will.

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SYNC YA Listening Summer 2013 Launches Today!

May 30-August 15, 2013

YOU GUYS this truly is really cool. Each week this summer, starting today, you can download two free audiobooks to listen to on your computer or mobile device. I'll keep you posted throughout the summer on the weekly titles. There will always be one contemporary YA title and one related YA "classic".

Bonus factors:

1. If you already use OWWL2Go to download library eBooks, you should already have the OverDrive app needed to download these audiobooks;
2. Unlike library eBooks, these title don't need to be "returned". That's right: you can keep them. What?

Download the 1st free YA Novel & Summer Reading Classic pair from SYNC here. Or, you could just keep reading for a sneak preview of this week's titles, followed by some easy to follow instructions. Your choice.

This Week's Audiobooks: 

Available to download free May 30 – June 5, 2013

Of Poseidon By Anna Banks

Read by Rebecca Gibel

Published by AudioGO

Galen, prince of the Syrena, is sent to land to find a girl he's heard can communicate with fish and after several encounters with her Galen becomes convinced Emma holds the key to his kingdom.

The Tempest By William Shakespeare

Performed by a Full Cast

Published by AudioGO/ BBC Radio

A storm rages. Prospero and his daughter watch from their desert island as a ship carrying the royal family is wrecked. Miraculously, all on board survive. Plotting, mistaken identities, and bewitching love follow as the travelers explore the strange place of spirits and monsters.

Thank you to AudioGO for generously providing this week's titles.

Available for a Limited Time:

Remember--grab these titles before they are replaced by a new pairing on June 6! While the title availability is time-limited, your listening time is not. Once you have downloaded the MP3 files, the audiobook is yours to listen to at your leisure.

Downloading Tips:

The OverDrive Media Console will deliver SYNC summer audiobooks to you via Overdrive Media Software installed on your computer (compatible with Windows and Mac) or through an Overdrive App on your mobile device (compatible with iOS, Android, BlackBerry, Windows Phone 7). Visit the OverDrive website to download the App or Software.

Don't miss the remaining summer season of SYNC audiobook downloads! Click here for the full schedule.

Book Report: How I Live Now

How I Live Now by Meg Rosoff

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I will try to say as little about this book as possible, because I get speechless about things that affect me this much. I love it and I don't want to spoil it with my stupid words! I will say that it's breathtakingly beautiful; that I read it cover to cover; and that I sobbed during the last 10 pages. Maybe you don't like sobbing over a well told tale, but I do, so I consider this an achievement on the author's part.

I ordered this for my library by chance when I saw it on a Novelist read-a-like list for The Hunger Games. I read the description and reviews and thought, "we should own this!" It won the Printz award in 2006, which in the world of YA librarians is a big deal. P.S. apparently the movie adaptation is in post production. And it looks achingly lovely. Bonus, and fingers crossed.

The deal: Upper West Side teen Daisy is packed-off to relatives in the English countryside by her Dad's new-ish trophy wife. Through the cracks in her narrative armor, we learn that: her mother died in childbirth; she's no stranger to trouble; and she gains a sort of peace or power from not eating. She's NYC-Tough with an attitude to match, which makes her cousins' idyllic life-style completely foreign and overwhelming to her. It's as if she's walked into a fairy tale, and she gives herself over to it almost completely.

When alarming yet vague news of "the war" comes, Daisy and her cousins at first have the luxury of ignoring it. Through circumstance, they are left on their own with no adult supervision, and their fairy tale days reaches a dizzying height. But they can't stay that way.

If I found any flaw in How I Live Now, it was the style of Daisy's narration being a bit much, with her lack of quotations and trains of thought. But when I got near the end of the book I realized why, and I realized it was perfect. So, scratch that.

This is a slim little volume that packs a wallop of emotions and sensations. Rosoff gives us a terrifying present that could very easily be our own, and a narrator that could very easily be the teen you. Highly recommended, a personal classic, though not for the faint of heart. Loved. --Kelley, (Your) Teen Librarian

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Book Report: The Hunt

The Hunt by Andrew Fukuda

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Pre-Review Note: Andrew Fukuda is one of 33 awesome authors appearing at the Rochester Teen Book Festival on May 18!!! Pick up this book and its sequel from the Wood Library Teen Scene.

I was mucho excited for this book. Dang, the premise of this book still thrills me! How cool is this (?): Our narrator is truly a one-of-a-kind guy. He's the only human he knows in a world populated by blood drinking, flesh eating, upside-down sleeping "normal people". Gene once had a family, but now he's on his own, using all the tricks his father taught him to blend in and survive. But his charade, already life consuming, becomes increasingly difficult when he is randomly selected to participate in a government sponsored hunt for his own kind.

I devoured the first part of this book, fascinated by the methods Gene uses to hide his true nature, as well as by the traits of the "people" (how they laugh, eat, or even make-out is particularly unsettling). And there's a really interesting question at the center of the novel: what makes a civilized person, and what makes a savage animal? Is it just majority rule that decides? If "people" somehow evolved to hunt and eat flesh, and humans are now near extinct, are the flesh eaters the more evolved/sophisticated species? Was it evolution at all?

And so, I really wanted to love this all the way through. But there were just too many instances of implausible plot twists and character developments. I get it that you have the wonderful right to create a completely fictional world, but that world has to behave in a logical way for me to go along with it. Especially irksome to me is when a character acts out of character, does something that even under the most difficult circumstances is not in the nature the author has thus far created for them. 

I always want to give a full disclaimer that I listened to the audiobook version of The Hunt, and format can make a huge difference. My biggest complaint? Gene is supposed to be a smoking hot teen loner, but the narrator came off as a whiny and strained. I get that Gene's life is beyond stressful, but his voice shouldn't sound like he's passing kidney stones AND chewing on marshmallows for 300 pages straight. So, maybe I need to give the print version a quick re-visit.

Still, this was a thrilling and at times horrifying read (in a good way). The set-up and world building are truly fascinating and unique. The sequel, Prey, is out - will I pick it up? 50/50. If you enjoy survival tales and vampires that are scary, not sexy, then you should give this a shot.

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