 Good morning and welcome to this week's edition of Encompass Live. I am your host, Krista Burns, here at the Nebraska Library Commission. Encompass Live is the Commission's weekly online event or a webinar, a webcast, a web show, whatever you want to call us. We are here every Wednesday morning at 10 a.m. Central Time Live and we do record our shows. So if you're unable to join us on Wednesday mornings, that's fine. All of our recordings are on our website and you can go back and watch them there at a later date when it's convenient for you. The show and the recordings is free and open to anyone to watch, so please do go to our website and check out what we've got coming up in all of our previous recordings. We cover anything library related here on Encompass Live. We do presentations, interviews, mini book reviews, mini training sessions, basically anything related to libraries. We are happy to have it on the show. We bring in guest speakers sometimes here to the Nebraska Library Commission and sometimes of the Nebraska Library Commission staff. And this morning, I have one of our staff people here next to me. Sally Snyder is our coordinator of children and young adult library services. Hi, Sally. Hello. Good morning. Good morning. And every year she does an update for us on best new youth books of the year, a redoing of a session that she's done at our state annual library conference in the fall. We did this in October. And now we're bringing it to you live online so you can see what are the cool new books that have came out this year. So I'm just going to hand over to Sally to, and I should give you the mouse so you can navigate where you need to here on the website. Thank you. And before we get started on, I have a slide show so you can see the covers of the books I'm going to talk about. I want to show you where you can find the handout. So if you go to our web page, Nebraska Library Commission, which is nlc.nabrasca.gov, and then in the search box, you type in handouts, and then search. The top item that usually almost always comes up, and I'm so happy it did today because usually when I'm doing a demonstration it doesn't, it just says library commission handouts. And you click on that. Whoops. I'm hiding. And here's, so far I'm the only one using this. And I always say anybody can put their handouts up here, but so far this is all me. So there you go. And these are all the different sessions from conference. The thing that you might want to look for is either just the book list. Here's the best children's books of 2014. And there you can see a list with ordering information. And that's my whole list that we'll be talking about today. Or sorry, you can go to the list with descriptions. This has my descriptions of the book, and you'll hear me say some of these word for word today. So don't take that one today till later, just kidding. So that's the children's books, and then you'll see best new teen books or best new teen books with descriptions. I do have the summer reading program ones that I did at the conference too, but we won't be doing it. We'll do that in the spring usually. We'll do a summer one specifically to the books for the upcoming summer reading program. So look forward to that. It'll be on our schedule soon. So the one thing I wanted you to know where these are so that if you're going to be jotting things down, you might just want to run and make a quick copy now so you don't have to write down all the author title information. Just listen now and get some ideas, and you'll be able to plan out the full handouts afterwards with all the full titles and authors. Now try and scribble it all down right now and catch it because you'll be able to get it there later. Exactly. Thank you. So I'm going to go over to the power now. Maybe you need to do something. Actually just minimize the browser. Oh, the one here. Okay. Take over. That was great. Well, that minimized. Oh, that minimized. It should be able to come up. It should be good. Our point to advance it. Okay. And a couple more. Hello. Okay, we are now. Before we get really into the books, the Library Commission receives review books here from a number of publishers but not from every publisher. So I do go look in bookstores and I look at the library here in town and find other titles that I'm not receiving here once that I think will be of interest to Nebraska librarians and I hope to other librarians across the country because I see lots of different places people are attending. So if your favorite publisher isn't very well represented, that's why and I do try to get to contact publishers and let them know that these are the kinds of things I'm doing with their books. So hopefully some people will send some things soon. The other thing I wanted you to know is I do have this list with my descriptions on it and when I'm doing a presentation like this, I generally basically read from my list because otherwise we'll be here until five o'clock because I will talk about these books all day and you're all going to leave and say I'll tune in later. So I'm going to try and be a little bit ad liby but not too much or it'll go too long and that's why I'm really thinking of you when I go this way. So we'll start with the picture books, A Pet for Fly Guy by Ted Arnold. This is the first picture book format Fly Guy story I've seen because usually they're in that I can read four man book and it's fun because Fly Guy decides he needs a pet and so a variety of possible pets are suggested but there's a problem with each of them until Fly Guy realizes the best answer and he's right. The monsters from Monsters Love Colors are back and they are now all looking forward to school except for Blue, he's a little worried but Little Gray assures him and soon Blue is enjoying school and learning so that's a good positive starting school book. My Bus by Brian Barton is a simple story about a bus driver who takes dogs and cats to other different conveyances around town, a ship, a train, and a plane. There's a little math implied in this in that there's addition as the cats and the dogs board the bus and there's subtraction as they get off the bus and the whole time you're reading the story which is very brief but fun. You can see all of the creatures in the bus so you can count how many are in there right now or how many cats. So there's lots of different things you can do with this book. It's a great toddler time story. Knock Knock, My Dad's Dream for Me by Daniel Beatty is the 2014 Greta Scott King Illustrator Award book. And now I'm going to interrupt myself and say some of these books are published in the year before 2013 but that's because our conference is in October and I get books like Late September, Early October, and then on in through the rest of the year that then goes on the next list because it was too late. So that's why that happens. This is a wonderful book. In this story the boy and his father have a beloved routine. The father would knock on the bedroom door and the boy would pretend to be asleep. When the father was right next to the bed the boy would jump up into his arms and they'd laugh. But one day Papa doesn't knock. He is gone. The boy writes him a letter with questions he needs answers to and one day a letter with answers is on the boy's desk. It is never told in the story why the father is gone and that the back of the book the author explains that he has encountered children whose parents are incarcerated or are gone to Iraq or somewhere on a long term thing. So he didn't want to specify in the book. He wanted every child to be able to understand. I didn't decide what your father might be gone. And it's very well done. It's a wonderful book. Digger Dog has spotted a bone or he's hoping to spot a bone and he first starts with a shovel then he gets a digger, then a bigger digger and so on until he can really get digging. This is Digger Dog by William B. There are two fold out pages at the very back of the book and listeners will love the big reveal when they see something Digger Dog does not that this biggest bone he's found is only a small part of a huge dinosaur skeleton. And he thinks he's got the biggest bone. My teacher is a monster. No I am not by Peter Brown. Bobby's teacher is a monster in his eyes. You can see her there. Mrs. Kirby catches him misbehaving and keeps him in for recess. Saturday morning he runs into her in the park and neither of them look too happy about it. Slowly as they talk and explore Mrs. Kirby changes from a monster into a woman. This is a great look at how people can be different from what we think and expect or have experienced. And the next day at school, yeah she's still tough. A Dance Like Starlight by Kristi Dempsey, a young girl in the 1950s dreams of becoming a ballerina but realizes the opportunities for an African American or NIL. Her mother works for the ballet school stitching and cleaning costumes all day but one night they both go to the ballet to see Janet Collins who was the first African American woman who danced at the Metropolitan Opera House and the girl realizes she should not give up. Abuelo by Arthur Doros. A boy remembers the adventures he went on with his grandfather who taught him many things and these memories help him when he and his family move to the city. He stands strong for a day when a bully jumps him like he and his grandfather did against a mountain lion. This is a wonderful family story with a strong and loving grandfather and it of course does include occasional Spanish words and phrases that are defined in the text. Chew's First Day of School by Neil Gaiman and Adam Rex. This is the second book about Chew. He is nervous about his first day of kindergarten. In school his teacher has the students tell all the others about one special thing they can do but Chew thinks he doesn't have anything to talk about. But as the circles talks the chalk dust in the air brings about Chew's specialty, sneezing. This is again reassuring for children getting ready for kindergarten and the illustrations are fun and can they choose growing interest in his classmates. It's an Orange Art Mark by Michael Hall. This book is really fun. A crew of carpenter aunts is working in a stump when one drills a hole for the outside to see if there's anything dangerous out there. There is one aunt who is a worry ward I guess I would say and he sees a color out there and he says oh no it's an Orange Art Mark. Because art barks of course eat ants. Well all they see is something orange they don't really know what it is. So throughout this story there are holes in the book so the kids that are reading the story can see the orange out there. So another aunt drills a different hole and then there's a purple something or a blue something. And this worry ward aunt continues to concoct his story about it's an Orange Art Mark carrying a purple lollipop with a green hat or something like that until you get to the end of the story where nobody else is really too worried about it and they all leave. So the kicker is at the very end the worry ward aunt peeks out. The other aunts have left and an Orange Art Mark carrying a purple lollipop with a green hat or whatever it was does come along. So he was right. Betty Bunny wants a goal by Michael B. Kaplan. Betty predicts making 10 goals for her first soccer game. When she makes zero she decides to quit. Her siblings talk her into trying again and ultimately her older brother helps her practice after he makes a smart remark. This is funny and true for her preschool age group and on the last page Betty shows that she has learned her lesson too well. This is the fourth book about Betty Bunny and it's the first one I've read but it was I thought very well done for how preschoolers are soon distracted by something they really thought they wanted to do and they need to stick with it a little bit. Bats in the Band by Brian Lies is another, I didn't count how many there are, it's another book about our friends, the bats. I have the library one of course. Oh, that's a library. Bats in the library. After a winter of huddling together in hibernation, the bats are hungry for sound. A celebration of all kinds of music and instruments as the bats gather in the theater and play their music. Clever illustrations add to the fun and our old friend, the youngster wearing water wings from the first book is here too and I think kids will always look for him. Following Papa's song by Gianna Marino, little blue was worried about the migration he and his father will be going on soon and he is curious about the deep sea below him. His father's reassurance that if he listens, little blue will always hear Papa, gives him the courage to explore the deep and find his way back and that's another thing that preschool and early school children learn about and deal with is how far away to get and when to come back to their families. Lovely story. Any tool lover will need this book. Tools rule by Aaron Michon. Tools are scattered across the yard and when T-square calls them together, he wants them to build the toolsheds so they'll have a place to rest. It includes colorful illustrations, some clever word play and one two-page spread labeling each tool and showing where they are in the yard before they gather to work so that'll be the favorite page I think. Tool fans will of course be enthralled. This is a moose by Richard T. Morris. A movie director has his hands full as he tries to film a moose doing what moose do. This moose however wants to be an astronaut. His grandmother, dad, mom and other animals invade the film each not doing what a viewer would expect. This is silly fun and listeners will love the director's solution to his whole problem. Under the Same Sun by Sharon Robinson. The children of Jackie Robinson and his wife Rachel are the main characters in this story. This second story tells of Sharon's brother David who moved to Tanzania and has a family there. Sharon and her mother Rachel, whom the children call, the grandchildren call Beebe, often travel to Tanzania to visit. This story is a fictionalized telling of their trip for Beebe's 85th birthday. When they part again, Beebe says, we may be separated by land and sea but we are always under the same sun. Beautiful family story. The only Alex Adelston in all these mountains by James Solheim. Imagine Alex Adelston surprised when on his first day of kindergarten, a girl walks into the room, sees her name on his name tag and sits with him on the one chair. They find out they both have exactly the same name and they both love Captain Moonbeam and sharing adventures. Using secret code, they devise a special phrase that means best friends no matter what. Well, one day the girl, Alex, leaves with her family to move to Africa and the piece of paper that she'd written her address on was accidentally lost so there's no way for them to contact each other. They both spend time thinking and remembering each other and then six years later, they run into each other again. And this author lives in Omaha. Construction by Sally Sutton. This is the third book. The first two were Roadwork and Demolition and now this crew was working on building something. They are using saws, hammers, big machinery to complete a new library. The rhyming text in Automata P.O. will capture the storytime crew's attention in this book. Rules of Summer by Sean Tan. Boy shares with a smaller boy the rules he learned last summer. One rule per page each with an illustration that's rather out of this world. The rules are simple and expected, things like know the way home. But the illustration is pretty outrageous and it's a great plan to hear this simple rule and see, as you can tell from the cover, all kinds of things are going on. Help, we need a title by Harry Toulay. The characters for a book are surprised by the reader's presence because they're not ready yet and they try to get the story going but they really don't have a story yet. When they call the author, he gives them a very short story and they call it so, so. The sometimes scribbly artwork and the scrambling for a story may inspire listeners to create a story too. It also gives them some idea of what is needed to put together a picture book. Surprised by Niece Van Hout, brightly colored illustrations on black backgrounds combined with one word per two page spread to explore apparent birds anticipating, caring for and letting go of his or her baby bird. This could be used with older readers to challenge them to find a series of one words that could convey another story as well as this one does. And it's also a good opportunity to talk about the words selected. Why that particular word for that scene? The Treehouse that Jack built by Bonnie Verberg, rhyming text tells of Jack's animal friends and as we watch them chase each other, we also see different aspects of the magnificent treehouse. Imaginative fun and listeners are likely to design their own treehouse because I sure wanted one when I was a kid. Yeah, I had a tree but not a treehouse. Sophie's Terrible Two is by Rosemary Wells. Getting up on the wrong side of the crib sets the mood for Sophie's second birthday. Nothing is right. But Granny knows what to do. She takes Sophie outside and pushes her stroller cycle very fast. Granny then buys her a saber-toothed tiger suit to scare people. Home again in time for a happy birthday. Listeners will love the scary suit and relate to Sophie's bad mood even though Granny knows what to do about that. We'll talk about some beginning readers and early picture books that kind of started combining these together because it's getting harder to tell when is a beginning reader turned into an early chapter book. So you'll see that there's some different page lengths in here in this batch. Doreen Cronin has written The Chicken Squad, the first misadventure. Large size type and illustrations on almost every two page spread will invite readers new to chapter books. The chicks from The Trouble with Chickens, the JJ Tully mystery are ready to solve mysteries on their own. In this one, they believe a UFO was in the yard to take their mother away as a pet. It's fun and silly with plenty of illustrations and the readers will have a great time. And look for the next one. Pete the Cat is pretty popular. This is Too Cool for School by Kimberly and James Dean. Pete tries to decide what to wear to school. He asks his mom, his brother and others, his friends. By the time he is done following everyone's advice he looks silly. So what does he do? He thinks for himself. Leroy Ninker sounds up by Kate DeCamillo. Mercy Watts on the pig of Deckelwood Drive encountered Leroy when he tried to burglarize their house. Now we visit a reformed Leroy who is still hoping to be a cowboy. And he has found a way to get a horse. Benny and Penny in Lost and Found by Jeffrey Hayes. Benny cannot find his pirate hat and he is in a bad mood. Penny offers to help him look for it even though the fog is fooling around outside. Benny says he's already looked inside so they're going outside. It's a bit scary and before they know it they are lost. But they both remember what their mother had told them if they ever became lost and they're able to find their way back home to the back step where Benny's hat waits for him. This series continues to maintain this quality and the story is one children can relate to told in graphic novel format as all of these stories are about Benny and Penny. This is a new series. Look that. Jessica Finch in Pig Trouble by Megan McDonald. This is Judy Moody and Friends Book One and it's a new early chapter book series that focuses on the friends of Judy Moody. Jessica is hoping for a baby potbellying pig for her birthday and she asked Judy to snoop to see if she might be getting one. But Judy isn't very helpful and Jessica thinks maybe they aren't such good friends. All is well on her birthday when Jessica receives her fondest wish and Judy hands it to her. And there are now two or three more books in this series. I haven't seen just this first one. I think it will be popular with early chapter book readers. Monkey and Elephant Go Gatting by Carol Alexa Schaefer. This is book three in the series and this is a beginning reader. Monkey explains what gatting is. He calls it walking along, looking around, finding something fun, stopping a while, then moving on. I think kids will love having a new word that they probably haven't heard before. Elephant hopes their gating will include a surprise and it does. More silly fun in this book. Some picture book, nonfiction that we'll talk about today. Thomas Jefferson, Life and Liberty and The Pursuit of Everything by Mark Merrick Coleman is a biography and a celebration of the man and all he accomplished. Aside from he was born in 1743 on a plantation, a very large farm in Virginia, his childhood is ignored. Using both text and handwriting, the book conveys his interests, everything, his contributions and a bit about his shortcomings, just a bit. It's a great starting place and readers will need to look further for more detailed information. And there are some notes included at the back of the book. Brad Meltzer has a new series. This is one of the first one. I am Abraham Lincoln. It's short and simple biography of our 16th president geared to kindergarten and first grade level. At first, the adult had on a child's body even when he was a kid with the beard and the hat kind of bugged me. But then I realized kids don't care about that. That's their way they're going to identify. This is Abraham Lincoln. They're gonna recognize him. Yeah, they'll say, oh, there he is over there. So that's an adult thinking process and kids don't care. It's well done and it has some good basic information as well as the Amelia Earhart one also well done. And I think there's about four more books in this series that are out now. Rosa Parks, I know for sure and a couple of others. The Secret Life of the Woolly Bear Caterpillar by Lawrence Pringle is a look at the habitat and lifestyle of the Woolly Bear Caterpillar and it's told to us as a story. The details are in there, but it's not told in the drier format of a nonfiction book but as a story. The caterpillar changes into an Isabella tiger moth and then again, there are more details at the back of the book, more information. Ben Franklin's Big Splash, the mostly true story of its first invention by Barb Rosenstock. Ben was an active boy and he loved to swim and this was during a time when people thought swimming was not healthy and lots of people did not know how to swim but Ben loved it. At age 11 he came up with what is probably his first invention, swim paddles. This is a look at his trial and error work on his invention and a look at his young life. Fiction for grades two to five or so, I put things in categories because it's easier that way but we all know that kids read on different levels and have different interests so we don't limit them to one batch or another. Say It Ain't So by Josh Burke is the second book in the Lenny and the Mike's series and this mystery involves the Schwenkenfelder middle school baseball team. Lenny is kind of an amateur sleuth and his two best friends are both named Mike so that's why it's Lenny and the Mike's. Now they are in seventh grade and Mike who can no longer pitch due to an injury has made catcher on the team. After a great start their star pitcher is no longer fooling the batters. Lenny suspects someone has stolen the catcher signals and he is now on the case. This is a good sports mystery with humor along with the issues that come with middle school. This is the second book in the Jinx series. This is Jinx's Magic by Sage Blackwood. In order to save his wizard master and the ear wall forest with which he has some kind of a connection, Jinx must spend time in an alternate desert world, Samara, hoping to find some answers. His skills and knowledge and his concern for Simon, his mentor continue to grow during this time. Shipwreck Island by S.A. Bodine is the first book in a new series. Sarah 12 is furious that her father has remarried six years after her mother's death. Her stepmom, Ivana, brings two boys to the family, Marco who is also 12 and Nacho who's 10. They are now embarking on a family honeymoon on a private sailboat for five days. After a terrible storm, the skipper has died. The boat has hit rocks just off an island and the family prepares to live on that island until rescue. But this island is different and strange. They'll need to work together to survive. And I heard S.A. Bodine talk about this new series and she called it, Swiss family Robinson meets lost and I think she's pretty much got a good description of that. I think kids will really grab this and go with it. The Odd Squad, Zero Tolerance by Michael Fry is the second book in the Odd Squad series. The safety patrol is back and they have issues. New girl Simone seems to be stealing Molly away from the team. Nick decides the only way to get her back is to stage a bullying incident. So he figures out a way to bully himself. But it backfires and Nick is suspended from bullying. He doesn't really recognize what he's done at first. This is humorous and silly and it does hit some good points about bullying, school rules and tolerance. There are line drawings on each page that both carry the story forward and illustrate the action. So that's of course very popular with the Wimpy Kid group of readers. I had to leave this in here. Neil Gaiman, fortunately the milk is a wacky story of a father's quick trip to the store to buy some milk for his children's breakfast. Upon his return he recounts an incredible story of what happened while he was out. Aliens, a stegosaurus flying a hot air balloon, pirates, the space time continuum and so much more were involved but fortunately the milk was mostly okay. Lots of black and white illustrations are included throughout. And now I have to interrupt myself again and mention that people who have a copy of the list in front of them have noticed I've skipped over some titles and that's the only way I can get through this in a reasonable amount of time. But I want you to know that everything on the lists have been recommended by me and also by Jill Anas who helps me with the team books. So just because I skipped over it doesn't mean it's no good, it just means I had to cut something to fit the timeframe. So if you're, so we could say that this session is just a taste of what's, part of what's in the list, you'll get even more books of recommendations when you get the full handout. Right. So for example, I cut the, because this is actually two separate sessions at conference, right? Right. That you do this in so two 50 minute sessions and we're cram it into one, one hour. For the picture books, I have 32 books on the list but I talked about 23, so that gives you a sense of, I didn't cut quite as many from this list but there we are. Just so you know, the Order of the Owls by Elissa Porelcelli, no, Curie's celli, Gira. Sorry, it's the first book in the Minerva Mint series. Minerva was found in a traveling bag in the waiting room at Victoria Station in London. She now lives in Cornwall with Mrs. Flotz, who is a good guardian and they live in lizard manner, which is wonderful even if it does need more repairs than they can handle. Now that she is turning 10, she has determined to find her missing parents. Newtown Robbie, who with his mother moved to Pembroke's from Mumbai and local girl Tomasina, who I love this, she is a rich blonde girl who is usually the standard mean girl in Snotty. No, she's not mean, she's friendly, she enjoys climbing and exercise. She's very nice, I love that. They are both eager to help Minerva solve this mystery. So there's going to be, I'm not sure how many books in this series but it's gonna take some work. The Mesmer Mess by Kirsten Hamilton is the first book in the gadgets and gears series. Wally Kennewickett, 11, an inventor like his parents and his docks and noodles are hard pressed to stop the mesmer's attempt to achieve world domination while staying at Wally's family's amazing automated inn. Narrated by the dog, we follow them as they work with the inn's automaton workers. Frequent illustrations along the edges of the pages and larger size type, along with gadgets and evil plots will really appeal to reluctant readers. The Show Must Go On by Kate Cleese is the first book in the three ring rascal series and this book, Sir Sidney loves the circus and the performing animals but he is tired and he wants to take a week's rest on his peanut farm. So he hires Barnabas Bramble to run the circus for that week. But Barnabas is rude to the animals and his only interest is profit. By the end of the week, things are looking pretty bad. There are plenty of line drawings to add to the story and the second book in the series, The Greatest Show on Earth is also on the list. Though I won't talk about it right now. Lost in Bermuda by Mike Litwin is the first book in the Welcome to Bermuda series. A tropical island with talking cows, greatly feared humans is a risky place for castaway Dakota to land. Fortunately, the first person he encounters is Chuck. He's about Dakota's age. Chuck disguises Dakota as a cow and takes him home where a warm welcome is offered. Soon Dakota and Chuck are working together to foil Wilhelm Wellington's plan to be made ruler of the island. There are occasional illustrations and the themes of survival or being an orphan, adoption and working together are all rolled up in this new series. A Snicker of Magic by Natalie Lloyd, Felicity's 12, her sister Franny Jo is six and they have moved frequently with their wandering mother. Now they have returned to their mother's hometown which used to have magic, but now that magic is all gone. Or is it Felicity thinks there may still be a Snicker of Magic there and maybe that town can be their permanent home, something she longs for. Family, home, friendship all combined in this magical book. Half a Chance by Cynthia Lord, Lucy 12, her mom and dad moved to their new home on a lake in New Hampshire and then her father leaves the next day on a photography assignment. Soon Lucy is immersed in life at the lake, spending time with the neighbors and going on moon patrol to keep track of the family of wounds. When she decides to enter the photo contest her dad will judge. She incorporates suggestions that he has made to her over the years. But still in the back of her mind she really thinks maybe she shouldn't enter, maybe that's not right. This has more than one family story in it, making France ethics, protecting endangered wildlife, finding your own way is here in a flowing narrative. Wanderville by Wendy McClure is the first book in another series, headed to Kansas on an orphan train. France says 11, her brother Harold who's seven are convinced by Jack who's also 11 to jump off with him before the train arrives in the next town. There they encounter another boy Alexander who was an orphan train rider taken in by the awful Pratt shirt family who makes the children work on their sugar beet farm. Wanderville is the name of Alexander's town where children can be free. When Harold is caught by the sheriff and turned over to the Pratt shirts the other children plot away to rescue him and maybe some others. The sequel on track for treasure came out in October but I haven't seen that one yet. Cal Ripken Jr. and Kevin Cowherd have written Squeeze Play. This is from Cal Ripken Jr.'s All Star series. This is book four. It's the first book I've seen in the series. This title focuses on center fielder Corey Maduro. He's 12. He is in a hitting slump and Caitlyn the right fielder keeps dogging him and insulting him. I thought she got a little too pushy but that's me. His biggest problem though is his dad. His father gets too excited yelling at players at coaches at umpires. And Corey has tried to talk to him but has gone nowhere. It's good baseball action with the coach who expects the players to try their best to follow the rules and to have some fun. This fills a niche and Horne book calls this says it follows the Matt Christopher series formula. So you kind of get your sense if you're familiar with Matt Christopher how these books go. It was a good sports action book. The Junction of Sunshine and Lucky by Holly Schindler. August Augie Jones who is in fifth grade and enjoys accompanying her grandpa to the dump to find things that can either be fixed or repurposed. They live in the poorer part of town and soon the city's house beautification committee is sending letters to the neighborhood noting things that must be improved. Augie's idea of beauty is different from the committees and they keep falling deeper into trouble. Augie continues to stand up for her viewpoint and that of her neighbors even while beginning to despair that anything can really meet the beautification committee's standards. It is a scrap metal sculptures that Augie and her grandpa create that may make all the difference. And it's called this because their house is at the intersection of the street called Sunshine and another street called Lucky. So that's where their house is. Bookmarks are People Too by Henry Winkler and Lynn Oliver. This is a new series about Pink Zipser. And in this one he's younger. He's in second grade. So with the prequel to the first series. But to me one of the most fast and this is a fun book but one of the most fascinating things is there's a note in the front of the book that states this series is using the font dyslexy designed by Christian Bohr. It is designed to make letters more distinct from one another and less likely to flip in reader's minds. Which I hadn't heard about that font before. In this book Hanks class is going to give a play and he's worried about reading and remembering his part but things turn out better than expected even with a boldie on the case, on his case. There are numerous illustrations to help break up the text and book two came out at the same time as book one and the book two is a short tale about a long dog. The blossoming universe of Violet Diamond by Brenda Woods. A biracial child Violet 11 knows all of her mother's family grandparents, cousins and so on but she has never met her father's family. He died before she was born. When she first meets her paternal grandmother everything is awkward. But a visit to spend a week with her African-American side results in some wonderful relationship building and self-discovery. This is a positive look at family with some ups and downs as we all have. Nonfiction for grades two to five or so. Mr. Ferris and His Wheel by Catherine Gibbs Davis gives basic information on the desire of the US to outdo the Eiffel Tower from the previous World's Fair in Paris at the 1893 Chicago World's Fair. And the man whose imagination brought it the monster wheel soon renamed the Ferris wheel for its inventor George Ferris Jr. who worked on it with his partner William Grunow. Snippets and Facts are also included in a different font on almost every two page spread. It's told kind of as a story but also with definite facts in there. You have to buy this book. Iqyak'u, Our Roast American History by Lois Minor Huey. Oh, they will, it's hard to read though. A look at the living conditions in a city in the American colonies of 1770. Animals and plenty of poop in the streets, bugs all over, the medicine of the time and the grooming habits of the people are all shared. And she explains what people lived with and why, why were things like that then. The author's note contains the statement that she did not write this book to make fun of early Americans but rather to let today's readers understand the conditions in which they lived and understand the science and medicine of that time. But they'll love the gross stuff. A home from Mr. Emerson by Barbara Curley focuses on his adult life, his generosity to others, his love of books, writing and friends. Not much is said of his essay writing though his personal appearances are mentioned. His community's affection for him comes through when the author tells of his home burning down and how it was rebuilt for him while he was away. It's a good introduction to an American original and then again it has information at the back of the book, more information. Hello, I'm Johnny Cash by J, G, sorry, G Neary. It's told in free verse poems. This picture book biography contains stories of his childhood and that his efforts to become a recording star. Neary gives us a sense of the man in black with a look at the hardships and accomplishments of his life and not very much about any of his shortcomings, which, if anybody writes a book about me, avoid the shortcomings, I'm just kidding. Hey, Charleston, the true story of the Jenkins Orphanage Band by Ann Rockwell. This subtitle tells it all, Jenkins Orphanage Band was formed by Reverend Daniel Joseph Jenkins in the late 1800s to earn money to support the orphans. And this is how the Charleston dance and the music called Rag originated, paving the way for more musical changes to come. And I didn't realize that. Did you learn something new all the time? Mumba's Declaration of Independence by Gretchen Wolfle. Mumba was a slave in Berkshire County, Massachusetts. She overheard her owner and the other men talking and writing for the Massachusetts Constitution of 1780, which stated, all men are born free and equal. And she thought about that and thought, that should include me, so she used it to gain her own freedom in 1781, she hired a lawyer. And two years later, the court declared slavery to be unconstitutional in Massachusetts. And that's something also that I didn't know, hadn't paid attention to my history, that Massachusetts got rid of slavery so early. Well, we have to get this one. You wouldn't want to live without books by Alex Wolf. This is a new title for the series. You wouldn't want to series is very popular. And this one follows the history of the written words starting with cave drawings, so how can you go wrong? Now, the rest of the list that you might be looking at, says new titles in popular series, and I'm not going to talk about that, but I do include just listing ones that you might want to know about. If you have readers who are very fond of a series, they might learn before you that a new title is out. But you're going to want to get the next one if you have strong readers. So we'll move on to the best new team books of 2012. And the list, my partner in crime as a reader, Jill Annis from Elkhorn Grandview Middle School, she read a number of these books. I read the other part, and I meant to say earlier that we have read all these books, unless I say otherwise, we've read the whole book. So we don't talk about books unless we've read them, except there's a couple of nonfiction ones you're going to find out. I didn't read the whole thing, but I'll tell you. So I will, again, we're not going to talk about every single book on this list, but we're going to give you a pretty good sense of the titles that we recommend. Everything, again, is recommended. So we'll start with fiction for younger teens. That's my nebulous term for middle school, and lots of them are also perfectly fine for older readers who may be interested in them. The first book is The Crossover by Kwame Alexander. Josh Bell 12 and his twin brother, Jordan, were destined to follow in the footsteps of their professional basketball playing father. The twins are separated inseparable until Jordan finds a girlfriend which leaves Josh without him. After an altercation with his brother, Josh is benched from the basketball team and forced to watch from the sidelines. During this time, he finds out his father is in bad health but he refuses to go to the doctor. The brothers must learn to reconnect when their father lands in the hospital. This is a verse novel that portrays themes of teamwork, family, love, and loss, and this is one that Jill read. The Night Gardener by Jonathan Oxier, orphans Molly 12 and Kip 10, this is in Victorian times, arrived in an isolated, creepy mansion with a huge tree growing into the home or into the side of the house. Strange goings on prompt Molly to stay up one night to investigate, and that is the first time she sees the being. They come to call the Night Gardener. This is a wonderfully spooky situation with deadly outcomes. Why does the Night Gardener walk through the house and what is this connection of any to the tree? It's sure to be popular with ghost story fans and it contains also some great thinking points such as the difference between stories and lies. The finisher by David Baldacci, Vega Jane is 14 and she questions everything about her walled city, Wormwood. One day she witnesses her co-worker escape into the dangerous quag and later she finds a map he left. Strange and magical things begin to happen as she begins to uncover the truth about Wormwood. Will this adventure cost Vega her life? Fast-paced re-blending, kind of blending the unwanted series with the Maze Runner series. Turn Left at the Cow by Lisa Bullard. This has a mystery, a son searching to learn about the father he never knew, friendship, possible treasure, a hesitant first romance and trying to do the right thing. The author handles this myriad of topics well and the readers will care about Travis, who's 13 and the other characters. In this Travis travels from California to Minnesota on his own without telling his mom to meet up with his grandmother who didn't know he was coming because he wants to learn about his father and he's mystified by the state of Minnesota and how do you get anywhere? Do people tell you? Yeah, just go up there and turn left at the cow which is how the title got there. I just love that idea. Under the Egg by Laura Marks Fitzgerald. Theo was 13 and he has just suffered the loss of, she, sorry, she has just suffered the loss of her grandfather who held the family together. In his last living breath he told Theo to look under the egg and she and her mother would be fine but she doesn't know what that means. While looking at her grandpa's art studio, she accidentally spills rubbing up alcohol on a painting which uncovers a mysterious artwork underneath that her grandpa had been hiding. Theo and her new friend embark on a journey to find out if that painting had been stolen. It's a mystery filled with World War II and art history facts. Half Bad by Sally Green. Nathan 16 lives in an English world where white or good witches and black or evil witches exist alongside of humans. Nathan has a white witch mother and a black witch father which makes him a unique half code. Nathan's mother has died and his father is the most wanted black witch alive. Nathan has been ostracized and tormented his entire life. He is finally captured by white witches and must escape before his 17th birthday so he can receive three gifts in order to become a fully developed witch. Without these gifts he will die. It's an interesting plot told in flashbacks. Dangerous by Shannon Hale. Maisie Brown is lucky to go to astronaut camp thanks for her knowledge of math. She is missing her right hand but she functions just fine with her artificial one. While at camp she and four others are exposed to alien materials which end up being absorbed by their bodies. They begin to, each begins to develop a different superpower and they learn that they could be the only defense against an alien invasion. But some of her companions are not handling the change as well. Rebel Bell by Rachel Hawkins. Harper Price is 17, is a fashionably popular class president who is involved in all aspects of her school. She is expected to win homecoming queen but right before the crowning she needs to reapply her lip gloss. This choice of heading to the restroom instead of the auditorium changes her life because she is passed a superhero type of ability by an individual who was about to die. With Harper's new abilities she must learn to protect David, 17, her biggest rival. It's action packed and filled with magic and girl drama. It's kind of a mixture of Septimus Heap and the Bells series if you've read the Bells. The Body in the Woods by April Henry is the first book in a new series. Alexis, Nick and Ruby are new members of the Portland County search and rescue team. On their first search for a missing man with autism instead they find a dead girl in the woods. Ruby has some theories about the dead girl and soon the three have formed a loose team working to solve the mystery after the police reject Ruby's input. Always in the third person the viewpoint rotates between the three teens and the murderer. The reality of the girl's death and the fear that another will die soon keep the teens on the case and the sense of danger throughout the book ends with a frightening encounter of confrontation with the killer. The Great Green Heist by Faryon Johnson. Jackson Green 13 has promised to stop breaking the rules. This after he lost the girl he cared about, Gabby. He runs an amazing scheme however when he learns Gabby's opponent for school president Keith Sinclair has been promised a win by the principal. As Bookless said this reminds me of Oceans 11 for middle school. Great fun and the reader hopes for a come up and for those who need one. It's fast paced with likable characters. Pieces of Me by Amber Kaiser. Having her long hair cut off and stolen in school so the cheerleaders can win a trophy for their hair donation since Jessica down a road she never planned to follow. A horrible car accident and then Jessica finds her parents have donated her body to help others. Jessica in spirit form finds herself with one or another of the four teens who received organs or tissue from her and she wonders if they also have received any part of her soul. Each of the recipients has issues to deal with from worrying about the hospital bills to deciding to accept the still limited life that one has been given and dropping them. Why do I get to live question that goes around and around? Good individual characters the reader will care about and some information about various illnesses and conditions that fit in and add to the story. Grandmaster by David Kloss. Daniel Pretzer high school freshman is new to the chess team and a low ranking beginner. He is puzzled when the two senior co-captains invite him and his father and accountants to a father sent competition. Daniel is surprised to learn his father was a grandmaster 30 years ago but gave up chest to retain his sanity. Together they go to the tournament and Daniel sees and experiences what pressure, stress and competitiveness can do to a person. Well written fast paced intense with demons from the past appearing once again. It touches on the secrets people keep and why and facing things we are not proud of and understanding decisions made in the past. Guardian by Alex London is a sequel to proxy. In this book, Sid must figure out a future that Knox would be proud of. Worship by some and loath by others. Sid is a symbol for the Rebooter's new society. Peace doesn't last long as guardians fall sick with a mysterious illness that seems to be spreading to the elites and others. Sid and his bodyguard Liam try to find a cure before it's too late. Action packed and the plot keeps you guessing. And I haven't read proxy or guardian so this really intrigues me. And I read this description thinking I don't know what she's talking about but doesn't that sound exciting? So great. The Boundless by Kenneth Oppel. Will a young man a year away from college has an adventure traveling on the longest train being pulled across Canada by an incredibly large and strong engine with dastardly people aboard. This is an alternate world, mostly like our world but slightly different. Sasquatch are real and they're dangerous. This huge train is real and a treasure is reputed to be on board. It's apparently said in the same world as his Silver Wing series, which I haven't read. But this is a standalone title but you know, there could be a sequel. Tesla's Attic by Neil Schusterman and Eric Elfman. This is the first book of a new trilogy. Nick is 14 and his family, he and his family have moved to Colorado Springs from Florida after the death of his mother in a house fire. As Nick enters the Attic thinking it would be a good room for him, he is hit on the head by a toaster. The Attic is full of weird old stuff so the first thing he does is he has a yard sale. Then some strange things begin to happen. Nick and his new friends begin to realize he needs to reclaim the items and return them to the Attic. Tesla had designed them and left them there and there also seem to be some not so pleasant people trying to get their hands on these items too. The Riverman by Aaron Starmer. Alastair Cleary is a trustworthy 12 year old in whom people like to confide their secrets. Next door neighbor Fiona decides one day that Alastair should write her biography before it's too late. Fiona tells him an outrageous tale of the land of Aquavania and of the Riverman who steals the souls of children. Alastair finds Fiona interesting but he vows to sort out the truth from the make-believe. Told in journal form this story keeps you guessing until the puzzling end. Sisters by Reina Telgemeier is a companion book to Smile. This book tells of a car trip Reina and her mom, sister and brother took from California to Colorado Springs to meet up with their father at a family reunion. Flashbacks tell of Reina's relationship with her younger sister Amara along with the ups and downs of puberty, the downsides of road trips and visiting extended families. It's a full-color graphic novel. Tim Tingle, How I Became a Ghost, a Choctaw Trail of Tears stories. While the main character is Tim, this is a story from the Trail of Tears and some action is rather grim, some burning of houses with people in them, giving the Choctaw blankets with smallpox. School library journal says grade seven and up so I put it on this list. Isaac begins the trail with his family but along the way he dies and becomes a ghost. A ghost, like many other Choctaw ghosts, who continues to help his family and this people on the trail. This is the first book in a proposed series as well written and engrossing. I haven't seen a sign of the second book coming yet but I'm keeping an eye out for that. Screaming at the aunt by Audrey Vernick, Casey Snowden, 12, dreams of becoming a sports writer when he grows up. Everyone expects him to follow in his dad's and grandpa's footsteps and become an umpire. Casey and his best friends do enjoy assisting at his dad's umpire school and this year they are in charge of you suck umpire day. Where the town is invited to the baseball fields in order to yell at the students in training so they can get a sense of what they might be facing. They get prepared for it, yeah. The umpire school may have a former major league player as a student this year. Can Casey be an impartial journalist and uncover the story and will he be able to help his dad succeed with fewer students this year? It's an interesting middle level sports book with a good theme and message. In the Shadows by Kirsten White is told in alternating chapters of color illustrations by artist Jim Bartolo and words by Kirsten White. Quora and Minnie live with their mother in a boarding house after their father's mysterious death. Brothers Thomas and Charles arrive there after Thomas overhears his father talking to a strange lady about Charles' medical condition. Arthur arrives with a box full of his father's secrets that he buried in the middle of the night. The teens pre-friend each other and figure out the town is full of dark forces. The artwork tells the story of a sinister adult secret society while the words explain how the five teenagers are connected to them. It's great for students interesting in graphic novels and others who want to figure out the link between the artwork and the words. It's excellent, excellent for middle school on stream. Yeah, and I haven't read that one either, but man, oops, got excited. Some non-fiction, The Story of Buildings by Patrick Dillon. This has beautiful illustrations, including cross sections of well-known buildings. It's a look at architecture through the ages and words can't describe it. You really need to take a look at this book. It's gorgeous. This star won't, oh, that was the, sorry, that was The Story of Buildings by Patrick Dillon. This star won't go out, The Life and Words of Esther Grace Earl by Esther Grace Earl. In her own writings, Esther tells of her life through diary entries, letters, and drawings, telling her hopes and aspirations while she fights thyroid cancer. It's an amazing autobiography with an introduction by John Green, and she did pass away. Schools of Hope, How Julius Rosenwald Help Change African American Education by Norman H. Finkelstein. Well-told history of Julius Rosenwald, CEO of Sears and Roebuck at the time, who used his personal funds to set up a program to build schools for black students in the South during the years of 1911 to 1932. This was after he formed a friendship with Booker T. Washington and figured out that the best thing he could do to help black children was to build the schools. A total of 5,357 schools were constructed. Numerous photos from the time highlight the need and the results of this program. Angel Island, Gateway to Gold Mountain by Russell Friedman called the Ellis Island of the West. Angel Island in San Francisco was where immigrants mostly from China, Japan, a few from Russia and other countries stayed from 1910 to 1940 while hoping to enter the United States. Weeks would often go by before individuals learned their fate and poetic carvings on the walls of the building tells of their misery and despondency while there. It is now a state park and museum. Red Madness, How a Medical Mystery Changed What We Eat by Gail Jaro. As told in narrative style, the author follows the early 1900s investigations and attempts at solving the causes of polegra, a disease that afflicted many and killed at least 10% of those who suffered from it. It was blamed on spoiled corn, on insects, personal contact, all of those were wrong. This is a look at the scientific process of gathering information, developing a hypothesis and then testing it, then trying again. It's interspersed in the narrative are insets, each focusing on one individual, their suffering and often their death due to polegra. And I couldn't wait to finish this book to find out what was it really? Let's see answer, yeah. Because it's told that way, it's told, just like you're trying to figure this out. It was just amazing, very well done. Beyond Vagenta, transgender teens speak out by Susan Cucklin. This tells the personal stories of five different teens struggling with their identities and sexualities. It's well written, all but one has photos that give an insight to their circumstances and their hopes, very well done. Fourth down in inches, concussions and football's make or break moment by Carla Killog McClafferty. This book made my head hurt. The author starts with the history of football and how in 1905 to 1906 there was a decision to change the rules to better protect the players. And she asserts that we might be at that place again. Basic information on the science of concussion and brain injuries shows the danger faced by all who play. Not only football, but other context sports such as hockey and rugby as well. This is presented in a straightforward, informative way and it's a little scary. Well, it's pretty scary. Hidden, like Anne Frank, 14 true stories of survival by Marcel Prinz and Peter Hinck Steinhus. This tells 14 stories, including one of the author's mothers of Jewish children who were hidden from the Germans during World War II. While events take place in the Netherlands, readers will fill the hope and despair of the hidden. One main map is at the front of the book and each story opens with an outline map marking the places where the child was hidden. Each story is told by the person who was hidden so you know that they all survived. And the book closes with one photo of each of the hidden as they are today. It's a very well put together book. Fiction for Older Teens, look at us go. We're zooming right along. Yep, before I just want to say it is 11 o'clock, which is normally when we would officially stop around 11. But as usual with Sally's shows on this, we do go along, so just to warn you, we're gonna go until we're done with all the books that are on the list that we're gonna talk about today. So if you do need to leave because you only walked out an hour of time, go ahead, we're recording you'll be able to watch the rest of the show on recording after we're gonna catch all the rest of the books. And this is our last category, Fiction for Older Teens. We're almost at the end, by the time I let everybody know since we had hit 11 o'clock. But there are 33 books in this category and I'm going to talk about 25, so FYI. The Impossible Knife of Memory by Lori Hulse Anderson. Haley, 17, and her father, Andy, have just returned to her child at home in order for her to finish high school. Andy has been suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder after multiple tours in Iraq and Afghanistan. Haley hopes to have a normal life and connects with Finn, who is also hiding some family secrets of its own, compelling and heartbreaking look at PTSD and how it affects teenagers and their families. Torn away by Jennifer Brown, Jersey 16 had no idea her life was about to drastically change when the tornado sirens began to sound. Home alone, she wasn't taking them seriously until the power went out and the wind crashed against her house. She took cover in the basement and couldn't believe the aftermath of the tornado that tore through the town of Elizabeth, Missouri. Reality set in when Jersey was torn from her roots and sent to live with relatives she had never met. Powerful story of love, loss, grief, forgiveness, and learning to live again. The testing, I'm sorry, you can't see much from this picture. It comes through. Oh, does it come through better? Yeah, our view on our wall is not as good as it is. I'm glad to know that. The testing by Joelle Charbonneau. In the dystopian future of the former United States, high school graduate Cia Vale is hoping she will be chosen for the testing. If she passes, she will go on to the university. But once she is selected, she begins to learn the testing. It's not what she expected and is actually dangerous and fatal to some. What we'll see it and our friends have to do to survive. And the next two books on the list, Independence Study and Graduation Day, are the final two books in the trilogy. So you have the whole set there. The Killing Woods by Lucy Christopher. Emily Shepherd's dad is accused of the hideous crime of killing teenager Ashley Parker. A retired soldier with PTSD, Mr. Shepherd carries a dead body from the woods outside his home one night. Emily is the only one who believes in her father's innocence even after he pleads guilty. Told an alternating chapters of Emily and Damon Hillary, Ashley's boyfriend. What games were Ashley, Damon and their friends really playing in the woods? Can Emily unlock the secrets of the woods and prove her father's innocence? Christopher brings to light the choking game that teenagers play to get a high. The Murder Complex by Lindsey Cummings, narrated in dual perspectives of Meadow 15, a trained survivor and Zephyr, a government assassin. The setting is an overpopulated world in which people are cataloged and all diseases are cured, but the murder rate exceeds the birth rate. Meadow lives in a small houseboat on the sea with her father, brother and younger sister. Her father's motto is kill or be killed and Meadow follows that in order to provide for her family. Zephyr is a ward of the state with no family and his job is to clean up the corpses in the streets every morning. But what he does during the dark time can be pretty fuzzy. When Meadow and Zephyr's worlds collide, the relationship turns into one of love and hate, action packed book that keeps the reader guessing. The Living by Matt DeLaPena, his book one in what will be a trilogy, Shy Espinosa in high school is spending his summer working on a huge cruise ship. They're on the way to Hawaii when word comes that California has been hit by a series of devastating earthquakes. Then Shy realizes that the ship is positioning itself to face several huge tsunamis. All the drills they ran are no guarantee of survival. This contains elements of social class separation, survival, conspiracy and a possible pandemic. And all of that together does not overwhelm the story because Matt DeLaPena, he can write. I can't wait for book two. Love Letters to the Dead by Ava DeLair. Laura 15 is struggling with the start of high school after the mysterious death of her older sister, May. Her English teacher gives the class an assignment to write a letter to a dead person. Laurel uses this as a way to cope with the loss of her sister, her mother moving away and the search for her first love. She writes to Kurt Cobain, Janice Joplin, Heath Ledger, Amelia Earhart and Amy Winehouse to name a few. The reader learns about these people and how their past mistakes can soothe Laurel's pain. This is a great realistic fiction book told completely in letters. It is for fans of the tragedy paper and 13 reasons why. Two girls staring at the ceiling by Lucy Frank. Chess, the narrator is sick with a mysterious illness and is admitted to the hospital. She must share a hospital room with loud and obnoxious Shannon. Chess slowly improves after her diagnosis but Shannon's needs to be going downhill. The girl's relationship begins rocky but it develops through the book as Chess learns about Crohn's disease from Shannon. It's an interesting verse novel with a line down the middle of the page to signify the curtain that's closed between them and which side of the page the text is on is who's talking. Girls Like Us by Gail Giles. Biddy and Quincy have never been friends but now just after graduation from their high school special ed program they will be roommates in an apartment over the garage of an older lady, Elizabeth. Quincy has a job at the nearby grocery store and Biddy will cook and clean from Miss Lizzie. They have very different personalities and they clash at times that they slowly begin to find their commonalities and friendship. This does include some discussion of two rapes and their effect on the roommates during the story. Reality Boy by A.S. King. Gerald Faust was a child star on Network Nanny Reality TV show when he was five and six years old and many people around town only know him for his famous nickname. What most don't understand is that the show was no reality and Gerald was crying for help. Now he must meet with an anger management coach discussing his triggers and is placed in the special education classroom at school. Things begin to change when he officially meets Hannah at his part time job. Can running away solve problems for both Hannah and Gerald? It's an interesting voice narrated through Gerald's perspective with flashbacks from his time on the reality show. We Were Liars by E. Lockhart. Cadence 18 has suffered a traumatic event the 17th summer she spent with her family on a private island owned by her granddad. The mystery is figuring out what happened that summer as Katie is suffering migraines and has amnesia. Maybe with the help of her cousins she can piece together the facts nearly two years after the accident. And this Jill says, my mind was racing when I got to the end, it completely blew me away. A Death Struck Year by Maika Lusier. Cleo Berry 17 believes Portland is safe distance from the Spanish influenza pandemic during World War I. When cases start popping up close to home and her boarding school becomes quarantined she carelessly decides to go home. After hearing the pleading calls of the Red Cross she decides to volunteer. Cleo begins going door to door to find anyone in need of medical attention. Slowly she gains a friend and falls for Edmund, a cute medical student. Can Cleo stay healthy while caring for the very sick or will her good luck run out? Teased by Amanda Nacell, Sarah Portin 16, her best friend Brielle and three other classmates are accused of bullying and harassing Emma Putnam which led to her untimely death. Inspired by the South Hadley High School tragedy in January of 2010 this novel is a fictional account told to the perspective of one of the bullies. Chapters alternate between the time of the bullying to the present day consequences of their actions. Nacell portrays the thoughts, actions and the results of high school bullying. A must read for teenage girls and parents of high school students. Wicked Games by Sean Olin. Carter and Lila 17 have been a couple since freshman year when Carter etched their names on and the word forever on a park bench. Now they are seniors and the relationship has turned rocky with Lila depending upon medication and Carter's full attention. One night after a fight at a party Lila returns home but Carter hooks up with Jules. After Lila finds out about the betrayal Carter and Jules' lives are never the same. Scenes of bullying, obsession and stalking occur along with a twisted ending recommended to upper high school students only. And Jill read that one again. Panic by Lauren Oliver. Panic is a dangerous game graduating seniors from the small town of Carp secretly participate in each year. Each player pays a large sum of money for the chance to win thousands but the losers could pay a higher price. Told and dual perspectives of Heather and Dodge both participants of Panic and both with secrets of their own. This novel will open discussions of small town life, relationships and life goals. The next book is also here in the Facebook. Lila, let's look at that. They're in the face hard going. Ask Me by Kimberly Pauley is wonderful. Haria is 17. She wears an MP3 player while at school when her teacher's letter in order to avoid hearing the many unimportant questions bandied about each day. She actually is an oracle and she must answer truthfully any questions she hears. So if someone next to her says, I wonder why Bob didn't ask me out. She has to say because you're not a nasty person then that's not a good way to be a friend. And it's a good way to be on everyone's weird list. But when a popular girl who had always been nice to Haria is found murdered questions grow more intense and Haria is drawn to finding the killer. It's an interesting unusual premise and the mystery will perhaps be solved by the readers before the end of the book but they'll really follow the story I think. Divided We Fall by Trent Reedy is book one of a trilogy. Danny Wright enlisted in the Idaho National Guard at age 17. His duties are minimal until he graduates high school. They were until the Idaho governor refused to comply with the new federal mandate he believes is unconstitutional even though the Supreme Court approved it. The National Guard is called out to deal with protesters. Things get out of hand and it isn't long before Danny has to decide whether to follow the governor or the president. It's a good look at the media and how they assume or purposefully turn things to make a better story and how the truth can be sobering no one will ever believe it. Book Two Burning Nation will come out on January 27th. The Winner's Curse by Marie Rukowski, sorry. General's daughter Kestrel 17 lives in a war torn empire that makes slaves out of the people they conquer. Deep down Kestrel doesn't believe in this tradition and she doesn't want to enlist in the military because music lives deep in her veins. One day she ends up at a slave auction with Aaron who's 19 up for bid. After hearing that he was a blacksmith and possibly a singer, she makes a hefty purchase. Kestrel begins honoring that this Winner's Curse could unravel the only world she's ever known. Center by Maggie C. Potter, ex rock star Cole St. Clair has returned to LH overnight with Isabelle Colpepper. However, Cole must first survive six weeks of recording a new album on a reality TV show without the temptations of alcohol, drugs or shifting into a wolf. Can Cole keep his head above water and his wolf side a secret from the cameras? Will Isabelle be convinced that Cole is her soulmate? Told in alternating perspectives of Cole and Isabelle, this companion novel to the worlds of Mercyfall Trilogy is geared for an upper age audience, upper high school. House of Purple Cedar by Tim Tingle. With several side stories, the main thread is a story of an elderly Choctaw man, Amafo, after the town marshal clearly hit him in the face with a board. Amafo has a quiet Gandhi-like approach to dealing with the man. He is going to visit the town every day and quietly say hello to the marshal to let him know he is not afraid of him. This is wonderfully told. It was published as an adult book, but there still is plenty here for teens as the story is mostly told by Amafo's teen granddaughter. Juby by Steve Watkins. Sadie 17, the one who is never in trouble, takes the blame to get her older sister Carla, who has two strikes out of trouble. Carla has a three-year-old daughter and the sentence for staging will probably be probation, except that's not what happened. And Sadie finds herself in Juby for six months, learning who to talk to, who to leave alone, and dealing with her feelings are tough beginnings to what may seem along six months. Split Second by Cassie West. It's a sequel to Pivot Point. Addy 17 can search two paths when offered a decision or a choice and she can see what will happen if I do this, what will happen if I do that. After her parents split up, she chose to stay with her mom. The outcome wasn't a good one, but Addy doesn't remember the other path because her best friend, Layla, erased her memories. She decides to get away and visit her father in the normal world over winter break and she meets Trevor and instantly feels a connection with him. At the same time, Layla is trying to advance her powers in order to help Addy regain her memories. This is a book for fans of Hex Hall and the Paranormal C-Series. Noggin by John Coriway Wally. Travis Ray Coates is 16. He was dying one day and then five years later he's alive again. The problem is the only part of him still left is his head attached to a donor body. His girlfriend and best friend are now 21 and Travis is still 16. How can he go back to his old life when everyone around him has changed but he just feels like he's taken a long nap. To make matters worse, he can't drive and he must start his sophomore year again in a few days. This is funny and sad at times but one a reader cannot put down. Perfect Lives by Kirsten White is the sequel to Mind Games. Narrated in dual voices, twins Fia and Annie are fighting back against an organization that takes girls with powers away from their families. Annie, blind and presumed dead, has the power to see the future. Her visions of Fia still looking for the enemy are not bright. Annie must learn to trust the people around her in order to save her sister's life before it's too late. The Infinite Sea by Ricky Ansey is book two in the fifth wave series. It picks up right after the end of the fifth wave. Cassie, her brother and a few others are hiding in an abandoned hotel, hoping Evan will find them. Ring her a girl and zombie a guy, take over more of the story as the war with the aliens takes a gruesome turn. The third and final book will come out in 2015. And that's it, thank you. I was pretty close. If you have questions or anything you want to talk with me about any of the titles, you're welcome to send an email. I'll be gone the rest of this week, but I will answer your emails, I promise. Did we get any questions on the page? No, no, but everybody was just listening intently, I think. Okay, good. Check out what you had to say, all the new books, great. Well, thank you, thank you very much, Sally. I always say this every year. I get, and this is good timing to do this one after the NLR conference, but right before Christmas, because I always get ideas for books to give to my cousin's kids and other kids that I know. That's perfect. So, yeah, I definitely got some ideas and some shopping to do. But we do have a question. Actually, we do have the answer to that question. Someone wanted to know that we weren't here at the very beginning, how to get a copy of the list. Okay. And here, yeah, Sally, you can talk about that again, just a reminder. I'll just go to the Library Commission webpage. This is our main page, nlc.nebraska.gov, and up here where it says search this site, type in handouts, and click on search. And almost always the very first thing that comes up says Library Commission handouts. Just click on that, and that takes you to this page where you can see Nebraska Library Association, Nebraska School of Barrens Association, conference handouts, and then you'll see children's books with descriptions, teen books with descriptions. You can go with just the list or the list with the descriptions, and they're all in PDF format. So you're welcome to go there and read them or print them, whatever you want to do. Yeah, and we did mention, I'm not sure if you were here at the time, we mentioned this, that there's actually more titles on the handouts than were mentioned during the show today, because this says that it's from our state conference and at the conference, this is in two sessions, each about 50 minutes long that Sally does, and we try and cram it all as much as we can into our one hour or a little more, whatever it takes here on Encompass Live, so. And all the titles are recommended, just because I didn't talk about them, they're all still recommended. So they'll even find more when you get to those handouts there than what we're in the show today. So great, thank you very much, Sally. Thank you everyone for attending then. That will wrap it up for today's show. The show has been recorded, so we will be processing that later today and how it's available for you. And it will be on our website here, this is our Encompass Live website where we have our upcoming shows and right below the list of upcoming shows is where our archive shows are. We'll put the recording here, which just goes to our YouTube channel and then the PowerPoint slides will be there and I'll link also right from this here as well over to that handouts page too. So you can have a click link there if you happen to come up to the recording here instead, you don't have to go looking for it for yourself. So that will be wrapped up for today. I'll hope you'll join us next week when our topic is Nebraska Memories. Nebraska Memories is our digitization project here at the Nebraska Library Commission, historical, cultural materials, anything. We scan, put them into this database and we have an update on what's been going on. We've got a new interface. I'm always adding new collections to it. So sign up for that for next week to see what's up with the Nebraska Memories and maybe see if you have some sort of collection from your library you might be able to include. After that, we have one we just put on the calendar yesterday so I wanted to bring it to your attention. We just got this added. December 24th, the day before Christmas, we will have a show. Installing and using the Overdrive app, a day before Christmas refresher. Overdrive app on the iPad is what this will be about but it works similarly on Android devices as it says here. So to the day before Christmas and all through the land, librarians braced for the upcoming influx of patrons with new tablets wanting to know how to access Overdrive. Yes, we know that's all coming. So Susan Nisley who does our Overdrive group and training here at the library commission will be here the day before Christmas during the show on how to use the new Overdrive app to get just up to speed on that for any of your new users that are coming in to do that. So that will wrap it up for today. Thank you very much for attending. Oh, one of the, yes, Encompass Live is on Facebook. So if you're a Facebook user, go ahead and click there. We haven't linked in all our pages. Like us there, we post when the recordings are ready, when new shows are coming. I have a reminder here when, this is actually last week's, of when a show is starting up. So definitely like us on Facebook if you are a good big Facebook user. You can keep track of what we're doing there. There we go, okay. Other than that, thank you very much for attending and we'll see you next time. Great, thank you, bye, thank you, bye.