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So B. It was the best book I have ever read in my life. I encourage 9-to Adults should read the book. It's about a girl whose mother is mentally ill and she has to do everything for her mom. She goes to a lot of places to find more about her relatives because her mom's brain isn't so well at remembering things. This book ends sad but it is still an awesome book. READ IT!

 

 Thank you Jesse

Posted by Gayle at 09:28 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

For seven years the alternative school, Hope Street Academy, has helped teens complete their education. Many students, who have difficulties in a regular classroom, have applied to this alternative school but not all are accepted. Most of the students at Hope Academy said they would have dropped out of their regular high school. The object of the school is to anticipate every objection a student might have about attending school. If the student has a problem with a classroom setting, courses are available on a CD-ROM. If the routine school schedule is a problem the student can come to class from 3-8 pm. Christina Garcia regularly skipped class at Topeka West and had a grade point average of 1.8. She now has a GPA of 3.8 and has a dual enrollment at Hope and Kaw Area Technical School. Read more.

Posted by Gayle at 11:28 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

for teens, by teens
Auel Y., age 15, thinks you should:

Read this!  Essence, Seventeen (read both in the library’s magazine room)
Watch this! BET, MTV, VH1, Girlfriends, Hair Show
Click this! www.myspace.com, www.yahoo.com
Listen to this! “Come with me” by Sammie; “This is why I’m hot” by Mims; “Zoom, zoom” by Booskie; “Good luck Charm” by Jagged Edge

Posted by Lissa at 06:31 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

for teens, by teens
Katielynn H., age 13, thinks you should

Read this!  Art geeks & prom queens, books by Kate Brian or Lurlene McDaniel, Seventeen magazine, Fahrenheit 451, Brave New World.
Watch this! Freedom Writers, Walk the Line
Click this! www.tscpl.org (ha) 
Listen to this! Jet, Maroon 5, The Fray, Kelly Clarkson, Red Hot Chili Peppers

Posted by Lissa at 09:19 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

for teens, by teens
Tasha, age 15, thinks

Read this!  The Notebook, Judy Blume
Watch this! Crossover, Norbit, ATL, Stomp the Yard
Click this! www.myspace.com, www.youtube.com, www.bebo.com, www.urbanchat.com 
Listen to this! T-Pain, Pretty Ricky, Huey, Lax Boys, Lloyde, Chris Brown, Bow Wow, Lil Wayne

Posted by Lissa at 09:39 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The CW is making big changes on their network. Two of their best shows: Gilmore Girls and Veronica Mars have been cancelled. In fact, Veronica Mars was one of my favorite TV shows and I’m more than a little disappointed that they cancelled it. The creator and writer, Rob Thomas, writes such funny, witty dialogue. I really hope that he either gets a new series or he goes back to writing young adult (YA) novels like the Rats Saw God.

In CW’s new line up, YA novelist Cecily Von Ziegesar, is getting a series based on the Gossip Girl books. I know those books are wildly popular so hopefully the show will be successful. Do you read the Gossip Girls books? What do you like about them? Post a comment below or lament the departure of Gilmore Girls and/or Veronica Mars.

Posted by Michelle at 02:22 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

How to Get Suspended and Influence People: A Novel
by Adam Selzer 

“You don’t have to be smart to be a smart-ass.

But it helps.”

 The front of this book made me pick it up and the quote on the back made me check it out and take it home. Read my review to find out if this is a book you might enjoy!

Leon is your typical thirteen year old boy. He’s into heavy metal, he’s kind of a loner, he has a crush on a girl in his homeroom, he thinks his parents are weird, he finds schoolwork monotonous and his teachers are oppressive. Of course, he’s only into heavy metal because it makes him just acceptable enough to avoid the school bullies. And the only thing he has in common with his other school friends is that they are all in the gifted pool, a student enrichment class that gets them out of 6^th period once a week. The gifted teacher is uptight, serious and very moral, so the students always spend the class trying to annoy her. And Leon’s parents are truly strange. His dad hates Thomas Edison and is always trying (and failing) to invent things. His mom is a food disaster hobbyist, which means she buys strange old cookbooks and makes the worst recipes to serve the family for dinner – just for fun!

Since they are in eighth grade this year at middle school, and the school has a new multimedia library, Leon and his gifted friends are assigned to make health and safety videos that will be shown to the sixth and seventh graders. Some people choose topics like seat belts or drug use, but Leon chooses sex ed, and he decided to make an avant-garde film (even though he just learned what that meant a few days earlier) for his project. Soon everyone has an opinion about Leon’s film project, and – you guessed it – Leon is quickly gaining the valuable experience that allows him to tell this story, so that just like the title says, you can learn “How to Get Suspended and Influence People.”

Leon is just one of the great characters in this book that will make you want to hang out with the fringes of eighth grade society just to see what is going on in their brilliant, warped minds. Even though school just got out for the summer, and the classrooms and assignments are the farthest thing from  your mind, you won't regret reading this funny (and sometimes serious) book.

Posted by Lissa at 02:11 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

for teens, by teens

Toya, age 15, thinks you should:

Read this!  Word Up (magazine)
Watch this! ATL, Stomp the Yard
Click this! www.myspace.com, www.youtube.com
Listen to this! T-Pain, Pretty Ricky, Huey, Lax Boys, Lloyde, Chris Brown, Bow Wow, Lil Wayne

Posted by Lissa at 12:45 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Coincidence or cosmic sign? This comic promoting the John Green novel An Abundance of Katherines was published the very same day that I finished reading the book! Click on the comic to read it, or click on the book cover to request the book from out library.

I actually listened to the audiobook, which is read by Jeff Woodman, and I think that the romantic parts are even better when he is reading them out loud than if I was reading them on the pages myself. Not that there are that many romantic parts, since the narrator, Colin, is miserable for most of the book as he mopes and moans about how he has dated NINETEEN girls named Katherine and they have all dumped him. That right there should be enough to make you want to read the book, but then there is his best friend Hassan, and a road trip, and the town of Gutshot, Tennessee, and the grave of the Archduke Franz Ferdinand, and that's when things start to get really interesting. Colin is a slightly neurotic child prodigy with language and facts and numbers, who is hoping to grow up into a bona-fide genius, but is worried that he will turn out {gasp} normal and not unique and that he won't matter. Although I read the book to find out more about the nineteen Katherines, I ended up enjoying Colin's struggle to "matter" more than I anticipated.

I'm certainly not the first person to love this book -- read the other enthusiastic graffiti posts about John Green here. Have you read the book? Tell us what you think by posting a comment!

Posted by Lissa at 09:18 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

for teens, by teens
Jamie V., age 15, thinks you should:

Read this!  First Part Last, Flipped

Watch this! Blood and Chocolate, Too Young to be a Dad

Click this! www.myspace.com, www.facebook.com

Listen to this! Usher, Bow Wow, Tupac, Chamillionaire

Posted by Lissa at 03:27 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

From the May 15th, 2007 Topeka Capital Journal:

"Devin Ramsey is sixteen, a sophomore at Santa Fe Trail High School, and loves to quilt. She started quilting when she was 7 years old and has created more than 10 colorful quilts. Devin said, “All my quilts are bright. I love bright things.” So her quilts are easy to spot. She spends about two hours a day on the weekends and during the summer on her hobby. Devin won a spot in the American Quilters’ Society’s annual Quilt Show in Padukah, Ky."  Read more at cjonline.com .

Posted by Gayle at 04:16 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

According to a news article published this week, kids’ discussion groups about books are thriving—at home, at school, online, on TV.

“May 11, 2007 - Twelve-year-old Joanna Krupp loves her monthly book-club meetings. She and her fellow bookworms tackle titles like Gloria Whelan's National Book Award winner “Homeless Bird,” about a 13-year-old girl in India whose parents arrange a marriage to a boy who is gravely ill. To go with the stories, they eat matching snacks, such as Indian food. Joanna's brother, Ben, 13, likes his father-son group, too. “It's just good to talk about the books, and I really understand them better,” he says.”

Read more of this article at Newsweek’s Web Exclusive article by Karen Springen.
Thanks to Kim Sain for suggesting this article!

Tell us what you think! If you are a kid or teen who uses our library, what kind of book group would you be interested in joining?

Do you want to meet in person? Do you want to chat online? How important are snacks? Should everyone read the same book, or just come talk about what good books they have read lately? Should there be an age limit? What about a mother-daughter book group?

Post your comments and ideas below!

Posted by Lissa at 12:17 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

David J's Senior Advisory Board's President, Aaron Hunter, earns his Eagle Scout Award. On April 29, 2007 Aaron became an official Eagle Scout with a ceremony at the West Side Baptist Church. His Eagle project was converting a storage space into an office for an after school program at the West Side Baptist Church. Aaron is a senior at Topeka West High School and works as a part-time employee at the Topeka & Shawnee County Public Library. Read more.

Posted by Gayle at 12:22 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Monster Book Review By: Walter Dean Myers To begin with, this story is about how one guy Steve's life was turned around by a few events and how he might spend the rest of his life behind bars. This book is very interesting! It may interest those whom like reading about real life stories and experiences. This book helps most teens that get into trouble, understand what the consequences can be for just making the wrong choices, or simply hanging with the wrong people. Steve and a group of his friends were up to no good one afternoon, when they had planned to rob a drugstore. They had already planned on what positions each would take. Steve, the boy who gets locked up, was set to be a lookout outside of the store. So they committed the crime, and ended up going too far and into some serious trouble. So then he has to face the judge and stay behind bars until they decide if he's guilty or not. The most exciting part is at the very end, when the judge gives him the answer. My personal opinion about this book is that it really did catch my interest! I really enjoy reading stories based on real life experiences, and this was one of the best books that I have read so far. I like the way they set up every character and what they said, although it was somewhat confusing in the very beginning when you just start to read it, but as soon as you get the hang of it, next thing you know, youre done with the book! I really recommend this book to those who have been in some kind of situation as Steve did. You should take a second to check this book out. Who knows, you might just be looking at your next favorite book!

Thank you Lizette

Posted by Gayle at 09:59 AM | Permalink | Comments (4)

Laini Taylor, young adult fantasy author, visits TSCPL. On Tuesday, May 1, Laini Taylor gave teen readers insights to her new book, Faeries of Dreamdark: Blackbringer. Her book isn’t scheduled to be released until June 21, 2007, but those fantasy readers who attended her talk were able to purchase, from Hastings Book Store, her first copies. Faeries of Dreamdark is the first in a series of faeries, crows, imps, devils and a strange creature named Batch.

 

Posted by Gayle at 09:29 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Last weekend, I was lucky enough to get to attend the Planet Comicon comic book convention in Overland Park, Kansas. I have read about comic book conventions in books like The Astonishing Adventures of Fanboy and Goth Girl, and heard about them on television shows like The OC, but I had never been to one myself.

And yes, before you even have a chance to ask, let me tell you that there were Stormtroopers. And Jedi Knights. In costume. And it was soooooo cool!
Mostly it was like one big shopping trip -- booths with cardboard bins full of comic books from the Golden Age,  Silver Age and Bronze Age of Comics, of course plenty of current issues from the Modern Age.

I bought a few issues of Catwoman (Barbara Gordon was a librarian, you know, when she wasn't saving the world), and some issues of Fray by Joss Whedon. I also found some weirder stuff that I loved, like Veronica Mars trading cards and a 1998 Starting Lineup Ray Lankford figurine (my all-time favorite Cardinals player!)

One of the biggest draws at any comic book convention is the special guest line-up. I saw David Prowse, the original Darth Vadar from Star Wars fame, and Richard Hatch from Battlestar Galactica. And I saw comic book artist Jim Lee (see his picture below!)

So, the comic book convention wasn't quite what I expected, but it was very fun. If you haven't been to one before, I highly recommend the experience!

Posted by Lissa at 01:42 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

One of the fastest growing online hangouts for teens is Gaia Online. Derek Liu launched the original site, Go-Gaia, in 2003 as a forum based website with an anime link list. (For more information, read the Big Boards’ interview.)

But now the site is so much more and it’s still FREE. Gaians start out by choosing a basic avatar and receiving a small wardrobe of clothes to pick and choose from. The avatars can then visit shops for additional clothing, change their hair at a salon, write in a journal, create a public profile, visit villages and to chat with other users, participate in roleplaying fiction forums, play games, discuss issues and anime on forums, post artwork and view other people’s artwork, and more! The money system in Gaia is very unique. Users earn coins for interacting with the website, whether it’s just surfing, playing a game or voting on the best artwork. It doesn’t require special software like Second Life, so you can visit Gaia from home or the library. And if you’ve put a lot of work into your avatar, you can export it to use as a photo on other forums or social networking sites.

So whether you love anime and manga, or you are looking for a new online hangout, Gaia might just be the place for you. Click on over and let me know what you think. Are there other new online sites you enjoy, besides the ever popular myspace and facebook sites?

Thanks Anne for letting us know about this site!

Posted by Michelle at 10:40 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Posted by Meghan at 03:49 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Spiderman 3 opened and broke all kinds of records, including an opening weekend total of $148 million.  That completely smashes the previous record of $135.6 million, held by Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest.  Just to get an idea of how impressive that total is, Disturbia (the movie that led the box office the past 3 weeks), came in second place with a whopping $5.7 million.

Read the entire article here on eonline.com.

Did any of you guys see Spiderman 3 this weekend?  If you did, let us know what you thought of it in the comments below.  Please don’t post any spoilers, though.  Are you saving your hard-earned dollars for another summer release?  Let us know that, too.

Posted by Katie at 12:59 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)