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Teen Blog

Reading, Wellington, and whatever else – teenblog@wcl.govt.nz

Month: November 2008

Flash 3

It will probably be sunny all weekend, but that’s no reason not to stay indoors and play these great online flash games.

Fold – you’re an ant with the ability to create gravity wells so as to avoid … well, death. It’s a bit tricky to get the hang of it, but not too difficult.
99 Bricks – It’s the opposite of Tetris. Frustrating!
QWOP – I was terrible at this incredibly difficult racing game.
Run – Great fun! And addictive too, in the good way that some games are.
Amorphous Plus – Kill the gloobies with a big sword! (Not as violent as that sounds.) We liked this one – it’s very satisfying.
Physics Invader – Old-school Invader, but with physics!
Wooden Paths – Build wooden bridges across rivers – curiously engaging and relaxing.
Aether – once you’re sorted (it’s quite hard to get off the planet) this game is kind of serene.

See these earlier posts (here and here) for more games!

A Hundred Million Suns

CD CoverHey, if you want to listen to the new Snow Patrol CD (A Hundred Million Suns) before buying/downloading (legitimately) it, then you can reserve it now and listen to your heart’s content. One of the back room elves has just this minute finished its catalogue entry.

Vanity Fair photo shoot for *that* movie

Okay, here’s a link to an entertaining article about the Twilight movie from the December issue of Vanity Fair (we’ve also got the magazine in the library).

Roger Ebert, film reviewer extraordinaire, had this to say about the movie. Note he’s about as far away from a 16 year old girl as a person can get, but I thought his review was a good read (“Why do girls always prefer the distant, aloof, handsome, dangerous dudes instead of cheerful chaps like me?”).

For more photos from the VF photo session session check out the outtakes.

(YouTube clip of shoot)

Databases: Fiction Connection

Wellington City Libraries has access to a whole range of databases (located in mygateway) that don’t get used nearly enough, so we thought we’d highlight some for you so you can have a go. First up I thought I’d find something not too study related: Fiction Connection. This one’s at the top of the Books & Authors list in My Gateway (you need to use your library card number and last name as username and password).

Fiction Connection is a stupidly easy to use tool (it’s also got a quick tour, just in case). You search for an author or book title and get a list, as per your average library database (in fact it uses Aquabrowser, like our Easyfind search), then you can hit the “find similar” button to (as the name suggests) find similar titles. For example, I was told if I enjoyed Nation by Terry Pratchett then I might like to try Mortal Engines by Philip Reeve or Apocalypse by Tim Bowler (which we don’t have, oops) or, or…

You can get fancy and refine your search, for example by location, setting, time frame, topic, or you could just use it like a slightly rigged lucky dip.

You’ll never run out of things to read this summer.

my gateway

Top 10: Movie Books Part 2

Here are ten twelve popular books that are being turned into movies, which you may or may not know about. Let me know if you know of any others.

  1. The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas, John Boyne. I’m not as excited as other people, but that’s okay. Here’s the trailer (YouTube).
  2. book coverNick & Norah’s Infinite Playlist, Rachel Cohn & David Levithan. Two teens meet at a punk rock club and fall in love. This is coming out in February next year. Plenty of time to read the book, if you haven’t already (we’re getting more copies and a reliable source has told me that it’s good).
  3. Inkheart, Cornelia Funke. The story of a girl whose father brings book characters to life by reading out loud. Visit YouTube to see the official trailer, and IMDB. It’s supposed to be around in February next year.
  4. book coverCoraline, Neil Gaiman. Some very cool graphics in here (including buttons). You can check out teasers and featurettes on his website.
  5. House of Night, P C Cast. Because vampires are so hot right now they’re turning this series by P C Cast into a movie and riding the wave.
  6. Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (July 2009). It will have been ages since the last one by that time. Meanwhile, you can amuse yourselves by viewing Robert Pattinson smoulder in Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire and check for any sparkling skin.
  7. X-Men Origins: Wolverine. More Hugh Jackman.
  8. New Moon, Stephenie Meyer. They say that this is definitely going ahead (2010) because Twilight has opened so well.
  9. book coverFantastic Mr Fox, Roald Dahl. Cool, eh? George Clooney is Mr Fox and Cate Blanchett is Mrs Fox. This should be around at the end of next year.
  10. The Book Thief, Markus Zusak. This is supposed to be coming out in 2010 but it’s quite hard to find some actual information about it (and it’s also quite hard to imagine how they can turn this into a movie!).
  11. Brave New World, Aldous Huxley. They’ve had a couple of goes at this as a TV series. Trivia: apparently the 1980 version was nominated for a couple of primetime Emmys. IMDB tells me I need to have IMDBPro if I want to find out anything about it. Huh!
  12. book coverWonder Woman. Children of the eighties will be particularly excited (she was the coolest thing on TV). An estimated release date for this is 2011.

 So there you go.

New DVDs (and a new CD)

New CDs and new DVDs – can there be no greater thrill? There are a few blockbuster films included in today’s line-up. And only one CD.

Doll Domination – Pussycat Dolls. Incredibly, this is only their second studio album. This copy comes with a “bonus” CD containing one solo track from each member of the group.

And the DVDs are:

The Simpsons : Around The World in 80 D’ohs
The Simpsons : Treehouse of Horror
(V, VI, VII, and XII)

Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of The Crystal Skull
– This is the fourth Indiana Jones film. It was co-written by George Lucas, who reportedly wanted it to have more aliens. 
Drillbit Taylor : Budget Bodyguard – Three kids hire a cheap soldier-of-fortune, played by the very funny Owen Wilson, to take revenge on their two bullies.
Doctor Who : Series 4 Volume 3 – This has three episodes; ‘Silence in the Library’, ‘Forest of the Dead’, and ‘Midnight’.
The Incredible Hulk – This is the 2008 film, which gets a Metacritic score of 61 – as opposed to the 2003 film, which only gets 54.

Ye Olde Vampire Shoppe

Good news, everyone! If you’re ever passing through Forks, Washington, in the U.S.A., the ‘logging capital of the world’ and the city where the Twilight books are set (and consequently is becoming quite a tourist attraction), you may want to pop into Dazzled by Twilight, a store that sells nothing but Twilight merchandise. (Their website isn’t quite ready yet, unfortunately. Hopefully they will ship overseas. Until then, Amazon has a Twilight store )

Zinefest ’08

The library has a massive collection of local and international zines*. Check out the library’s zine page for more information. The annual Zinefest is tomorrow; here are the details!

Independently and inexpensively produced magazines, usually with a fairly limited circulation.

The 2nd annual Wellington Zinefest is returning this Saturday November the 15th. The Wellington City Libraries’ Zine Collection will be there, along with your favourite zine librarians, so even if you have empty pockets, you can still come along and browse our diverse range of zines. There will also be heaps of other ziney stalls, workshops and talks to get you into the DIY spirit. Oh and food, there will be tasty treats too!

Be there!

Wellington Zinefest 2008
Wesley Church Hall (map)
11am – 3pm, 15th November
More info on the Zinefest MySpace page.

And if you’re keen on zines, look for this book in the library: Whatcha Mean, What’s a Zine? : The Art of Making Zines and Mini Comics, by Mark Todd. A great place to start, especially if you can’t make it to the Zinefest.

Finn’s Quest

Finn’s Quest is a series by Eirlys Hunter about a boy named Finn who, in book 1, gets a Quest on his computer. He only gets 1 life during his 3 quests and he meets lots of friends during them.

In book 1, The Queen-Seekers, Finn is playing on a computer and sees a new game which gives him a quest to find the lost queen.

In book 2, Coldkeep Castle, Finn’s dad gets the quest and Finn has to go and save him. Finn is in the same country of book 1 but many years earlier in the events that caused the events in book 1.

In book 3, The Slave-Stealers, Finn gets his last and final quest to release slaves and “find Finn”, years after book 1.

Overall Finn’s Quest are good books though there are some errors in the books, but it is a good read and lots of people will enjoy this series.

New CDs? Yes!

Here are some new YA CDs. Click on the title if you want to reserve them or check their availability. They’re free to borrow if you’re a young adult; if you’re an adult then they will cost $1 (plus another $2 if you reserved it). Sorry, adults.

» Rhombus – Rhombus. One of Wellington’s best-known groups. Check out their website.
» As Cruel As School Children – Gym Class Heroes. This came out in 2006, but it’s new to the library and that’s what counts. ‘Alternative hip-hop’. Their lead singer is Kate Perry’s boyfriend.
» Raw Materials EP – Hangman. An Auckland group; their Myspace page is here.
» Through The Looking Glass – Falsestart. An Auckland powerpop/gothic group. This is their second studio album.
» Everything is Borrowed – The Streets. British rap. Britrap?
» One of the Boys – Kate Perry. She released a fairly popular song recently that I somehow have never heard. I know, weird!
» Melodies, Moshpits & Mullets : 20 Years of Smokefreerockquest – Various. The Smokefreerockquest (that’s one long word) has seen many of NZ’s favourite bands start long and successful careers. This compilation includes Minuit, Steriogram, Fur Patrol, and many others.
» Free Yourself – Cornerstone Roots. A reggae group from the Waikato. This is their fourth album, released last year.
» Slime & Reason – Roots Manuva. More British rap, or ‘Britrap’ as no-one but me calls it.
» Face Off – Bow Wow and Omarion. This is a collaborative album that was released late last year in the US. Reviews were mixed.

Your own little Library Elf

Library Elf is a free service that will email you when a reserve has come in, or if any items are overdue or – and this is especially handy! – a few days before something is due, so that you may return it before we start charging our reasonable overdue fees. There is a demo here. All you need to do is to sign up; it requires your library card number and surname to access the library’s database and your email address to mail out reminders.

Be aware, however, that it’s not connected to Wellington City Libraries (it is based in Canada), and you ought to check their privacy policy first.

FIFA Under 17 Women’s World Cup

Heads up: two of the quarter finals of the Under 17 Women’s World Cup are at Westpac Stadium this Saturday (being tomorrow, the 8th of November) at 1pm and 4pm. For just $7 (if you’re under 17 – it’s a whole $10 if you’re not) you get to watch the might of Denmark take on the best the Korea Republic has to offer, closely followed by football powerhouse Germany up against Canada (who beat New Zealand in pool play). Sounds like a good time. Visit the stadium website for time and ticket info. For all the news, views and statistics go to FIFA.com.