« Previous Entries
» Next Entries

The Archives

Books, Grimm, New
Waiting on Wednesday
28.03.12 | Permalink | Comment?

It’s Wednesday! Here’s a small selection of interesting titles we’ve ordered recently. Reserve them if they take your fancy.

Soonchild, Russell Hoban (illustrated by Alexis Deacon). Russell Hoban, creator of Captain Najork and Aunt Fidget Wonkham-Strong, was once called “the strangest writer in Britain”. Sadly, he is retiring soon, and this is his second to last book! You must read it! In all seriousness, here’s what it’s about:

“Somewhere in the Arctic Circle, Sixteen-Face John, a shaman, learns that his first child, a soonchild, cannot hear the World Songs from her mother’s womb. The World Songs are what inspire all newborns to come out into the world, and John must find them for her. But how? The answer takes him through many lifetimes and many shape-shifts, as well as encounters with beasts, demons and a mysterious benevolent owl spirit, Ukpika, who is linked to John’s past…” (goodreads.com)

The Girl in the Steel Corset, Kady Cross. A steampunk romance! “In 1897 England, sixteen-year-old Finley Jayne has no one… except the ‘thing’ inside her. When a young lord tries to take advantage of Finley, she fights back. And wins. But no normal Victorian girl has a darker side that makes her capable of knocking out a full-grown man with one punch… Only Griffin King sees the magical darkness inside her that says she’s special, says she’s one of them. The orphaned duke takes her in from the gaslit streets against the wishes of his band of misfits: Emily, who has her own special abilities and an unrequited love for Sam, who is part robot; and Jasper, an American cowboy with a shadowy secret. Griffin’s investigating a criminal called The Machinist, the mastermind behind several recent crimes by automatons. Finley thinks she can help – and finally be a part of something, finally fit in. But The Machinist wants to tear Griff’s little company of strays apart, and it isn’t long before trust is tested on all sides. At least Finley knows whose side she’s on – even if it seems no one believes her.” (amazon.com)

Pure, Julianna Baggott. The first in a new dystopian series (the next one will be called Fuse, when it is published). This is the story of Pressia and Partridge. After a nuclear holocaust, people are - for the most part – horribly disfigured, and society corrupt. Pressia is one of the disfigured, Partridge is one of the “pure”. The Pure are the ones who made it to the Dome in time, their bodies unmarked. Inside the Dome Partridge is protected from the people who will burn him, as some type of living sacrifice. Pressia also has problems, since she’s come of age and must join the militia (as a soldier, if she’s physically capable, or as a “live target” if she’s not). When Partridge learns that his mother (who didn’t make it to the Dome) may still be alive, he makes the dangerous decision to venture out in search of her, and “when Pressia meets Partridge, their worlds shatter all over again.”
Books, Library Serf
Hunger Games Readalikes
22.03.12 | Permalink | Comment?

If you’re waiting in the queue for The Hunger Games, or if you’ve read it and want to read something similar, then here are some ideas:

Read your way through our Dystopian, Futuristic and Speculative Fiction booklist. There’s a selection of more than 30 books, including Divergent by Veronica Roth, Legend by Marie Lu, The Maze Runner trilogy by James Dashner, and more!

Keep an eye on the dystopia tag, for new books, and news on the subject.

The goodreads.com Hunger Games page has other suggestions, plus book lists, video clips, trivia and quotes.

Before there was Katniss there was Gregor. Read The Underland Chronicles, by Suzanne Collins!
Grimm, Most Wanted
Most Wanted: March 2012
21.03.12 | Permalink | Comment?

There are now 170 people in the queue for The Hunger Games, but don’t fear! If you really need to read it, there are bestseller copies available at the central library for $5.00 for one week (check on the red shelves on the ground floor the next time you come in – you might strike it lucky). In the mean time, go see the movie! Then write us a review!

1. The Hunger Games, Suzanne Collins [no change]
2. Catching Fire, Suzanne Collins [no change]
3. Mockingjay, Suzanne Collins [no change]
4. City of Lost Souls, Cassandra Clare (on order) [up 2]
5. Inheritance, Christopher Paolini [down 1]
6. Clockwork Prince, Cassandra Clare [down 1]
7. The Prisoner, Robert Muchamore [up 1]
8. People’s Republic, Robert Muchamore [down 1]
9. Mastiff, Tamora Pierce (on order) [no change]
10. The Hunger Games: the Official Illustrated Movie Companion, Kate Egan (on order) [new]
Books, New, Simon
New Books
20.03.12 | Permalink | Comment?

Here are this week’s fortnight’s month’s new books, where I literally judge books by their covers.

Article 5, by Kristen Simmons (364 pages) – It is the near future and things have changed! The US has revoked its Bill of Rights, and replaced it with some ‘Moral Statutes’. Instead of police, law is enforced by soldiers, who don’t hesitate to arrest for bad behaviour. When Ember’s rebellious single mother is arrested for noncompliance with Article 5 of the Moral Statutes, she leaves her previously unassuming and safe life behind and becomes a rebel with a cause. The Handmaid’s Tale for teens maybe!

First lines: ‘Beth and Ryan were holding hands. It was enough to risk a formal citation for indecency, and they knew better, but I didn’t say anything.‘

The Catastrophic History of You and Me, by Jess Rothenberg (375 pages) – Brie is sixteen, and tastes great on crackers with quince. Just kidding! She is an actual human who is sixteen, and when her boyfriend tells her he doesn’t love her, she dies of a broken heart. And now, stuck in limbo, she must watch everyone deal with her death, while she too must go through the five stages of grief. Luckily (to balance the whole unluckily dying situation) she has the ghost of a boy who died in the 80s to help her.

First line: ‘There’s always that one guy who gets a hold on you. Not like your best friend’s brother who gets you in headlock kind of hold.’

What Boys Really Want, by Pete Hautman (297 pages) – Lita and Adam are both sixteen, and have been friends for ages. They try not to interfere with one anothers’ love lives, mistaken though they think the other is, but when Adam steals content from Lita’s anonymous blog for a self-help book he is writing, What Boys Really Want, things get hilariously complex.

First line: ‘The idea for the book came to me as a bunch of us were tubing down the Apple River on a nice, sunny day, the last weekend before school started.‘

The Survival Kit, by Donna Freitas(351 pages) – Sixteen-year-old Rose is popular! But when her mother dies, none of that matters so much. Rose’s late mother has left her a ‘Survival Kit’; an iPod, a picture of peonies, a crystal heart, a paper star, a box of crayons, and a tiny handmade kite. What can they mean? Well you will have to read the book won’t you.

First line: ‘I found it on the day of my mother’s funeral, tucked in a place she knew I would look. There is was, hanging with her favorite dress, the one I’d always wanted to wear.‘

Tiger’s Voyage, by Colleen Houck (543 pages) – This is book three in the Tiger’s Curse series. Books one and two are already in! I don’t recall seeing them, but they’re in the catalogue. And the catalogue never lies. Here’s what it says about this part of the series: ‘After battling the villanous Lokesh, Kelsey and the Indian princes Ren and Kishan return to India, where Kelsey learns that Ren has amnesia, and five cunning dragons try to keep the trio from breaking the curse that binds them.’

First line: ‘Behind the thick glass of his Mumbai penthouse office once again, Lokesh tried to control the incredible rage slowly circling through his veins.‘

Under the Never Sky, by Veronica Rossi (376 pages) – After some kind of ecological apocalypse, humanity splits – some live in the Reverie, a kind of haven from the storms that assault the planet, while others survive on the earth, mutated and living pretty primitive lives. Aria leaves the safety of the Reverie to find her missing mother, and meets Perry, an outsider who is also searching for someone. His mutation seems to be looking like a male model! They fall in love! A forbidden romance. ‘Should appeal to both teen and adult readers far beyond dystopia fans’, says Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc.

First lines: ‘They called the world beyond the walls of the Pod “the Death Shop.” A million ways to die out there. Aria never thought she’d get so close.‘

Where Things Come Back, by John Corey Whaley (228 pages) – Here is what the catalogue says: ‘Seventeen-year-old Cullen’s summer in Lily, Arkansas, is marked by his cousin’s death by overdose, an alleged spotting of a woodpecker thought to be extinct, failed romances, and his younger brother’s sudden disappearance.’ However! There is a lot more to this multi-award winning book than just that short sentence!

First lines: ‘I was seventeen years old when I saw my first dead body It wasn’t my cousin Oslo’s. It was a woman who looked to have been around fifty or at least in her late forties.‘

Someone Else’s Life, by Katie Dale (485 pages) – Another book about a girl coping with her dead mum. Rosie learns that she might have inherited Huntington’s disease, which has recently killed her mother … or she might not, since she also learns that she was actually switched at birth. She discovers a secret that could ’shatter the lives of everyone around her,’ which can’t be much fun for Rosie, or the girl who might actually have inherited Huntington’s. Sounds grim.

First lines: ‘Sunlight dances over the little girl’s dark curls as she toddles clumsily through the dry grass.‘

Immortal Beloved, by Cate Tiernan (389 pages) – From the catalogue! ‘New name, new town, new life. Nastasya has done it too often to count. And there,s no end in sight. Nothing ever really ends . . . when you’re immortal.’ And now, from Youtube!

First line: ‘Last night my whole world came tumbling down. Now I’m running scared.‘

(We also have the sequel, Darkness Falls.)

Advent, by James Treadwell (439 pages) – This is book 1 in the ‘Advent Trilogy’. Gavin, a disenfranchised youth is sent to his eccentric aunt’s place in Cornwall. At the same time magic returns to the world, 500 years after it was locked away. Its return to the modern world is disruptive and not at all benign. And! Some reviews suggest that this could be the new Tolkien, so there you go.

First line: ‘On a wild night in deep winter in the year 1537, the greatest magus in the world gathered together and dismissed his household servants, wrapped himself in his travelling cloak, took his staff in one hand and in the other a small wooden box sealed with pitch and clasped with silver, and stepped out into the whirling sleet, bound for the harbour and - so he expected – immortality.‘

Hollow Pike, by James Dawson (314 pages) – Witchcraft! Horror! Lis London has nightmares that someone is trying to murder her. She dismisses the local legends of witchcraft but … should she? Probably not! This has been enjoyably reviewed on Amazon, where it gets a pretty good rating of 4.5 stars.

First line: ‘Lis knew she was dreaming, although this brought little comfort as the blood ran over her face.’
Internet, Library Serf, Movies
Prepare yourself for the games
07.03.12 | Permalink | Comment?

The 74th Hunger Games are nearly upon us (attendance is mandatory). In the intervening two (!) weeks, you can familiarise yourself with the politics of Panem: visit the official government webpage. It has really cool landscape navigation (fancy scrolling right instead of down!). You can become a citizen (District 4’s population could do with a boost). Or find out if the trackerjackers are particularly bad this season, or keep up to date with Capitol news. Plus more.

(You can also pre-purchase tickets to the film – the first showing as at one minute past midnight on Thursday the 22nd of March.)
Grimm, New
Waiting on Wednesday
22.02.12 | Permalink | Comment?

Here are some interesting titles we’ve ordered recently.

15 Days Without a Head, Dave Cousins. Laurence lives with his six year old brother Jay, and his alcoholic mother. One day his mother doesn’t come home from work, and Laurence is left to care for himself and his brother, fearing that their predicament will be discovered, and they will be separated. Happily, Laurence discovers a friend in Mina, who is keen to help him track down his mum. The author’s blog is here.

Starters, Lissa Price. Years ago (although still in the future) a killer bug (deliberately spread) wiped out anyone who was not vaccinated against it. Those who were were the very old and the very young. Callie and her younger brother have no grandparents to look after them, so they live life by their wits, on the run. Things seem to be looking up when they come across Prime Destinations, a group run by The Old Man: a potential income source. Prime Destinations organises for teenagers rent their bodies out to the older people who’d like to be young again (yes, we know, yuck, can you imagine?), using neurochip technology. When it’s Callie’s turn her neurochip malfunctions and she wakes up in her wealthy renter’s life.

Department 19: The Rising, Will Hill. The sequel to Department 19, which people said some touchingly lovely things about (such as “…plenty of high-octane action, groovy specialized vampire-fighting equipment, buckets of gore, intriguing historical side trips and even a little romance…” (from Amazon) which, let’s face it, if you were an author you’d be happy with).

There is an active Facebook page (Department 19 exists!) with interactive elements. And a book trailer:
Books, New, Simon
New Books!
17.01.12 | Permalink | Comment?

Here are the first batch of new books for the year. Please come and take them so we have some space on our shelves. But return them! And take some more! That is how libraries work.

Assault – Recon Team Angel, by Brian Faulkner (365 pages) – This is the first in a series set in the future (2030!) when we are at war with aliens. Recon Team Angel is an elite multinational group of teens who have been training for years. On X-Boxes, haha. Nah, joke. “Haha.” Their first mission; to sneak behind enemy lines and get into a top-secret alien facility.

First lines: ‘This is not a history book. The achievements of 4th Reconnaisannce Team (designation: Angel) of the Allied Combined Operation Group 1st Reconnaissance Battalion, from November 2030 through to July 2035, during the Great Bzadian War, are well documented by scholars and historians.‘

Equinox – The Rosie Black Chronicles Book Two, by Lara Morgan – It is five centuries into the future, most of Australia is submerged, and ‘Rosie’s dad is locked away, Pip has abandoned her, and Riley isn’t telling her the full story. Bent on revenge, Rosie is still working in secret to try and take down the evil Helios group. But what sacrifices is she prepared to make to destroy Helios?’ SO many names

First line: ‘Rosie took a steadying breath, licked her finger and touched it to her eye. The identification-distorter lens stuck to her skin and she lifted off her iris.‘

Stealing Phoenix, by Joss Stirling (265 pages) – Phoenix is part of a group of thieves with paranormal powers (they are quite cool but I won’t ruin it for you), and she is set to rob Yves Benedict, an American student visiting London. But lo! she discovers that he is ‘her destiny’ and ‘her soulmate’, and as there is no room for love amongst thieves, Phoenix must save herself and Yves. Which is pronounced like ‘Eve’ so you know.

First lines: ‘The boy seemed the perfect target. He stood at the back of a group taking the tour of the London Olympic stadium, attention on the construction vehicles beetling up the huge ramp to the athletes’ entrance, not on the thief watching him.‘

Outlaw, by Stephen Davies (236 pages) – Jake is fifteen and is sent to live with his parents in North Africa after getting into trouble one too many times at his English boarding school. Unfortunately he is kidnapped by Yakuuba Sor, the most wanted outlaw in the Sahara desert. Is he a terrorist or is he more like Robin Hood, without a forest?

First lines: ‘Jake Knight ran along the deserted towpath past Armley Mills and the Industrial Museum. It was two o’clock in the morning and he was so far out of bounds it was not even funny.‘

Good Fortune, by Noni Carter (489 pages) – Ayanna Bahati is brutally taken from her African village and brought to America, as a slave on a plantation. It’s a very dangerous life, but she’s able to secretely teach herself to read and write. Later she risks everything and escapes, heading north where she can be free and get an education; ‘can she shed the chains of her harrowing past to live the life she has longed for?‘

First lines: ‘His hand came down upon my cheek hard and fast. Stunned, I staggered backward.‘

The Statistical Probability of Love at First Sight, by Jennifer E. Smith (236 pages) – Hadley is stuck at JFK airport after missing her flight to London. She meets Oliver, a Brit, who is also on the same flight as her. They talk and he’s pretty perfect, so they fall in love. Love! There when you least expect it, like a northerly gale in summer. Anyway, they lose track of each other once they land – can serendipity bring them back together? Is that the right word? A romantic comedy!

First line: ‘There are so many ways it could have all turned out differently.‘

Bittersweet, by Sarah Ockler (378 pages) – Hudson was a pretty swell ice skater, but when her parents divorced when she was fourteen, she ditches the sport and makes cupcakes for her mother’s upscale diner. But when she starts coaching the boys’ ice hockey team she rethinks her choices re: ice skating and taking chances with her life. Also a cute boy comes along.

First line: ‘It was the biggest competition night of my life, but all I could think about was the cheetah bra.‘

The Song of the Quarkbeast : A Last Dragonslayer Novel, by Jasper Fforde (290 pages) – This is the sequel to The Last Dragonslayer, which I didn’t read but DO know was very good. Fforde’s books are very difficult to put down, and why shouldn’t this be an exception.

First lines: ‘I work in the magic industry. I think you’ll agree it’s pretty glamorous: a life full of spells, potions and whispered enchantments; of levitation, vanishings and alchemy.‘

Anna Dressed in Blood, by Kendare Blake (316 pages) – Cas Lowood kills the dead. He travels the country with his mother, a witch, and their spirit-sniffing cat, listening to local lore and legend. They go to kill a ghost called Anna Dressed in Blood (she’s covered in blood you know), who has killed everyone who has gone to get her. Except Cas, for some reason? Read to find out!

First line: ‘The grease-slicked hair is a dead giveaway – no pun intended.‘

Here is a pretty funny spoof trailer for The Hunger Games. Thanks for reading this far. I appreciate it.

Virtuosity, by Jessica Martinez (294 pages) – ‘Just before the most important violin competition of her career, seventeen-year-old prodigy Carmen faces critical decisions about her anti-anxiety drug addiction, her controlling mother, and a potential romance with her most talented rival,’ says the catalogue. Can’t beat the catalogue for a precise synopsis.

First line: ‘The balcony felt cold under my cheek.’

Paradise, by Joanna Nadin (262 pages) – Billie Paradise inherits her grandmother’s house, which is by the sea, and a definite improvement on the rental flat she lives in with her mum. But living in her mum’s childhood home dredges up secrets that might be best kept undregded. Buried. Underground.

First line: ‘We all have secrets.‘
Great Reads, Jesi, Sci Fi
Great Read: Human.4
13.01.12 | Permalink | Comment?

Human.4, Mike Lancaster

Ever think you’re missing what’s going on between what’s said and what’s not? And what if you did wake up and find the world was a completely different and scary place? Those things that go bump in the night? This book isn’t going to help you with those fears. It’s probably going to make them worse.

This book starts with an introduction, apparently from some unknown point in the future explaining about reading and books. What follows is the transcription of some tapes that have been found that were recorded around our time by someone called Kyle Straker. Kyle was living a normal life in a small town, his parents had a few issues, and he was doing his best to get out of going to the annual talent show. All pretty average stuff really. But during the talent show, he volunteers to be hypnotised. And afterwards he finds that the entire world has changed. People don’t seem the same, phones and computers don’t work anymore. And with only a couple of other “normal” people, finding out what is going on is rather difficult. I thought I knew what was going on about halfway in, then it turned out to be something just slightly, but rather critically different. And that’s about all I can say without giving too much away!

Totally a fantastic book. Dystopia and very much a classic science fiction story going on as well (not too strong though, so don’t worry if you aren’t into serious sci fi!)

Recommended if you liked the Gone series (Michael Grant), creepy dystopia books like Unwind (Neal Shusterman) and Peeps (Scott Westerfeld) or science fiction books like The Adoration of Jenna Fox by Mary Pearson. Also thoroughly recommended if you liked The Matrix as that’s what I kept thinking of when I was reading it!

And if you got an eBook reader for Christmas or like reading on your computer then this is also available on Overdrive, under the title “0.4″.
Books, Library Serf
Blood Red Road Wins an Award
05.01.12 | Permalink | Comment?

Blood Red Road by Moira Young has won this year’s Costa Children’s Book Award. Which is a slightly more exciting bouquet than the librarian’s choice sticker we bestowed upon it, but we do what we can.

The book trailer is here:

Other posts about book awards are here.
New, Simon
New Books
17.12.11 | Permalink | Comment?

Here are some new books! We provide so many ideas for things to read it is just ridiculous. Ridonkulous.

Belle’s Song, by K. M. Grant (298 pages) – Belle’s father can not walk thanks to an accident that she was responsible for. It is the 14th century so it is kind of important that he be mobile! So she heads to Canterbury with Chaucer (YES THAT CHAUCER) and handsome squire, Walter, in the hope that the pilgrimage has a miraculous outcome. However Belle is being blackmailed and Chaucer is up to his neck in politics and politics back then could be torturous, if you know what I mean. Hard times!

First lines: ‘Tragedy and opportunity, conspiracies and compulsions. And love. Unexpected love.‘

Wherever You Go, by Heather Davis (309 pages) – Holly’s boyfriend Rob died in an accident, and she has to spend most of her time caring for her sister and her grandfather, who has Alzheimer’s. Her late boyfriend’s best friend, Jason, steps in to help, and her grandfather says he is communicating with Rob’s ghost (who is in fact narrating the story from beyond the grave), meaning Holly has some tough and unexpected decisions to make.

First lines: ‘You’ve been by her side for six months, but she hasn’t noticed you.‘

Legend, by Marie Lu (295 pages) – The USA is now at war with itself; the Republic on one side, and the Colonies on the other. In this dystopian future some kids – one rich, the other not at all! – join together to fight against the injustice that authority has become. Nonstop action, a little romance, the ‘characters are likeable, the plot moves at a good pace, and the adventure is solid’, writes the Library Journal. The first in a series, and written about by us previously here (+ book trailer).

First lines: ‘My mother thinks I’m dead. Obviously I’m not dead, but it’s safer for her to think so.‘

Clockwork Prince : The Infernal Devices Book 2, by Cassandra Clare (502 pages) – Because this is the second book in the second series and I haven’t read any of it, here is the synopsis from the catalogue. Okay! ‘As the Council attempts to strip Charlotte of her power, sixteen-year-old orphaned shapechanger, Tessa Gray works with the London Shadowhunters to find the Magister and destroy his clockwork army, learning the secret of her own identity while investigating his past.’

First lines: ‘The fog was thick, muffling sound and sight. Where it parted, Will Herondale could see the street rising ahead of him, slick and wet and black with rain, and he could hear the voices of the dead.’

Dearly Departed, by Lia Habel (451 pages) – Nora Dearly encounters a ‘crack unit’ of teen zombies. They are the good guys! The bad guys are monsters hoping to boost their evil, foetid ranks. Nora begins to fall for one of the good zombies, Bram, who is ’surprisingly attractive.’ Not sure if the good guys are decomposing or if they’re somehow frozen in a freshly dead state? Is that still gross? The cover depicts them as a little pale but I can’t see any bones or exposed muscle. Still you have to consider these things. Though not too closely!

First lines: ‘I was buried alive. When the elevator groaned to a stop in the middle of the rocky shaft, I knew that I was buried alive.’

Wildefire, by Karsten Knight (392 pages) – Ashline Wilde is having it harsh at her school – her boyfriend cheated on her and her runaway sister, Eve, has returned to cause trouble. So Ashline starts at a new, private school in California, hoping for a fresh beginning. Buuuuut, Ashline discovers that a group of gods and goddesses have all been summoned to this one particular place. And she is one of them! Soon a war between the gods threatens sunny Blackwood Academy. Don’t know about you but that sounds like just another day for me.

First line: ‘Ashline Wilde was a human mood ring.‘

That’s about it for now! Check back later in the week for some more.