 Hi, I'm Pam from the Billie Jean King Main Library and I'm Jeanine from the Mark Twain Library. Welcome to Chapter Chat, our monthly conversation highlighting new books from our elementary and middle school collections, airing the second Wednesday of every month. We will each talk about four new books that have been published within the last six months. So let's begin and we will start with you Pam, take it away. All right, thanks Jeanine. This is my first book. It's called Benny McGee and the Shark, The Shark Report. And this is the beginning chapter book. It's pretty short, you can tell by that. But this is the story of Benny who's afraid of the ocean because of sharks. But then one day a great white follows him home and he finds out that Mr. Chompers might be a friend, although he really can't play catch because he eats the balls. But Benny has a report to do on ocean creatures and he thinks it would be a great idea to take Mr. Chompers to school so kids can see a real life shark. Well, of course, things don't work out the way Benny planned. But if you want to know what happens, oh, you got to read the rest of the book. I don't want to spoil it for you. So that is The Shark Report and it's written by Derek Anderson. It's a really funny little story. And that's that. Seems really funny. I like this. I like his name. I know. Mr. Chompers. Yeah, there's a great scene where he's brushing all of his teeth and he uses a whole tube of toothpaste. Oh my gosh. They do have a lot of teeth. Yeah. How cute. How funny. Yeah. Very cool. Very cool. Okay, so my first book is this one, Grasping Mystery. Oh, yeah. Yeah, Girls Who Loved Math by Jean Atkins. This book is in verse, so it's definitely worth it for any reluctant reader. This book has seven chapters, meaning that this book actually highlights seven different female figures in the past. And it actually starts all the way from the 18th century to 2016. So each chapter, it actually goes in chronological order. So it covers major female icons like Florence Nightingale and Marie Tharp. Yeah. Each verse lightly touches on each significant figure's life. Basically like a mini bio. It definitely highlights their achievements and major struggles. And I'm sure you can imagine how, you know, tough it was and kind of still is for women, for these women to reach the goals during their points in time. So I highly recommend young readers to pick this one up. It's a really good light read and you also get to learn something new about each female historical figure. So this one is in our children's fiction section. So it's around grades between, I'd say around fourth, fifth. Yeah. Does it have pictures of the real, real ladies? No, they kind of have illustrations in here, just like small little ones at the beginning of each one. Oh, okay. But as you can see, that one. Here's the Mark's airtune. Pretty cool. Yeah. Right. Yay. So, all right. Well, this is The Lost Fairy Tales. This is the second book in a series called Pages and Company. And this is the story of Tilly, who in book one finds out that she is a book wanderer. Her mom was and her grandparents are. And she discovers that she can do that also, which means she can wander into books and characters from her favorite books can come visit her. So in this story, she and her best friend, Oscar, who's also a book wanderer, they go to Paris, they live in London, they pop over to Paris to visit his dad and his grandmother. And when they get there, they find out that his grandmother is a book wanderer. And that's how he got his ability. So they decide that they're really told not to book wander because there's some dangerous things going on. But of course, they can't resist. And so they wander into some fairy tales, and they discover that the stories are being changed. Jack and the Beanstalk, Red Riding Hood, characters are disappearing, stories are changing, and there's something not so good happening in fairy tale land. And they discover what it is, but we have to wait for book three to find that out. And in the meantime, there's a new librarian. And the librarian wants to bind the books so people can't wander in and out just when they want to. So there's something, as I said, something not quite right. And hopefully, it'll all get resolved in book three. So this is Lost Fairy Tales. And it's written by Anna James. And it's, you know, you, you think about what books would you want to wander into if you could. Very cool. Very cool. It kind of reminds me of the one that I think his last name is Kofur. He did Land of Stories. Oh, yes. Yeah. It kind of reminds me of that. And I find it funny how a librarian is trying to bind the books together. Is there an evil librarian? Yeah, there is. Are we good people? I don't know. Are we good librarians? Oh, okay. Very cool. Very cool. So my next one is War is Over by David Almond. This one is also in our children's fiction section. But it is on the lighter side of reading. Like, it's a little bit more spaced out. I think it might be more of a beginning chapter book, but it's still a pretty interesting read regardless. So the story is set in England in 1918. And our main character, John, it's him, J. O. H. N., is a little boy who has a mother working at a munitions factory. And she's basically working overtime, double time is what he would call it. And his father, he barely remembers what his father even looks like, has been fighting in the front lines in France. So every day he's reminded that the war, that this war, even these children are a war with the enemy children in Germany. But John just really, he just really wants this war to be over. He wants peace in his country. He wants peace basically in general because he sees the ramifications of this war, especially when he happens to witness a public beating of a pacifist for protesting against the war and to also promote the safety of the German children in Germany. He kind of noticed that they aren't at war, if anything, they're suffering. Try not to be more sympathetic towards them and don't feed these children, these English children, the lies saying that they're at war against these kids. So it's very interesting. And John happens to come across a photo of a German boy with his name, with the boy's name Jan on it. And it's spelled J-A-N. Of course in German, they pronounce it Jan, like with a Y. And I feel like in a way they might be parallels because if you think about it, the names are very similar. If like, I think in German, if they saw J-O-H-N, they probably would pronounce it Jan as well. So in a way it's kind of like, it's interesting. Maybe they might be very, very similar kids if they were to ever meet. But turns out that he actually thinks that he might have actually found or seen this boy in his country. Is he a runaway? We don't know. Are they going to meet for sure? Who knows. But yeah, so maybe these two characters happen to be parallels. Maybe they'll meet. Maybe they'll figure out that maybe John will figure out that he's not the only boy that wants peace. So it's pretty cool. I definitely recommend it. If you want a quick read, as you can see, it's pretty thin. Not a bad read, but all the illustrations are black and white and they're kind of interesting. There's one that I thought was kind of cool. This is a missile in the middle. This is what his mother draws him to show him what exactly that she does and she fills shrapnel in each missile. Wow. Eat it in there. Yeah. Sounds kind of dangerous. Yeah, I know. That's interesting. But it's a pretty good read. I would highly recommend it. Yeah, he always writes very serious, very thoughtful books and a lot of times they're kind of long. So it's nice to have a short one that's, yeah, I think I'd like to read that one. Yeah, it's like light, but also deep. I think when it comes to a topic like this, we kind of need something on the light side of when you're reading it. Yeah. Well, my last two books are about kids who live in zoos, which sounds like would be kind of a cool thing and neat thing to be able to do. The first one is called Elephant's Girl and it's written by Celeste Remington and this is the story of Lexi Willow. Lexi's not her real name. She doesn't know her name. She doesn't know her parents because when she was five years old, Tornado hit the area of Lexington, Nebraska and they found Lexi in the zoo being guarded by a young elephant named Naya and so she's adopted by one of the men at, who works at the zoo, his name is Roger and he's a very kind man and they have a full-sized train that goes around the zoo so it must be pretty big and so he's adopted Lexi and she's very happy living there. She doesn't go to school because the kids made fun of her because they call her the elephant girl and she's very sensitive about that but her best friend lives at the zoo too so he's a baseball player and they just really enjoy a great friendship but Lexi always wonders you know what who are my real parents? Where did I come from? I don't know. I love my name. I don't know. I'm named after the town so I don't know but she also has, she thinks she's an ordinary person but she has some unusual things that happen to her. She can talk to the wind. She's always mad at the wind because the wind brought her there and the wind can be her friend but it can also be her enemy. She also gets mind pictures from Naya and they they show other elephants possibly Naya's mother and so she wants to help Naya find her mother too and she also makes friends with Amanda Holtz and Amanda used to run the gift shop at the zoo and she took care of the zoo's accounts also but Amanda was killed in the tornado so now she's a ghost or as she likes to call herself a misplaced spirit and so she wants to help Lexi find the truth about her parents and how she came to be at the zoo also so Amanda really helps her points her toward things that will help her solve that mystery and so this is a great it's a very emotional story but it's a story of chosen families it has Lexi and Roger and her zoo family and also Lexi and Naya being friends and elephant and the girl and it's just a very wonderful a different a very different story with all the way everyone just accepts that oh yes Amanda the ghost yes she's here we've seen her and ghosts and different things are just a part of everyday life at the zoo in Lexington Nebraska so I really really recommend this one it's very cool I didn't realize how much of a fantasy type paranormal aspect there is to that book for some reason I thought it was more like you know just more like realistic fiction I guess you can say or drama yeah and then they but then they just throw in ghosts and yeah she meets her in the forest behind the zoo and the first meeting they have a they have a tea party and she's living in the trailer and she's all dressed up and interesting yeah how cute how cute okay all right I'll just grab my other book very cool all right so the next one that I wanted to showcase was this one what lane and this one you can find in our middle school section here so as you can see by the cover this is our main character here and he is two friends one is black one is white and our main character this is sixth grader Steven and he is actually biracial he is half white and half black so he's like any other sixth grader you know who enjoys video games sci-fi and lots of superheroes he especially the one Miles Morales the new spider-man I think the spider-verse is what it's called and Steven has started to become a little more self-aware now though he's starting to see people see him differently so before when he was younger he didn't notice anything like no prejudice or any mistreatment for whatever reason but now his eyes are being opened in each passing day like when he's the one getting in trouble when his white friend Dan isn't receiving the same treatment even though they're caught doing the same exact thing wow yeah and it's also when Dan's cousin comes around he notices that his cousin Chad doesn't really like doesn't really like Steven doesn't treat him that great and he's you know he's a troublemaker usually but um he also notices that he has a tendency to have it out with Steven and makes comments like you know they should have kept Spider-Man white things like that um as you can tell Steven is going through an interesting awakening especially when his black friend Wes introduces him to the Black Lives Matter movement Steven at this at this time had no idea what it is and his his friend is telling him you know what you should probably look it up and see read up about it think about what it is that is going on in the world and how it's going to affect him so you know with all this in mind Steven must make some careful decisions and think about basically what lane to choose so that's this one and it's also not that hefty of a read um it's a little bit on the thinner side but the writing is really good um Tori Maldonado he did a bunch of uh he did a few books I think at least he's known for light I think is the book what it's called and um he he kind of writes and creates dialogue that really um that kids are able to really connect with middle schoolers or upper middle grades they can definitely relate um to you know how he talks and everything like that a lot of the kids really how they talk so yeah a lot of bad read wow and very very current to you yeah well you've given me another one to add to my list good I know my books are book stack is growing growing growing I know it never ends it never ends I know lots of good books coming out too so we will now run out of books to talk about yeah my last book is Tyrannosaurus Rex by Stuart Gibbs this is part of the fun jungle series and this has the other titles are belly up and poached and pandemonium and this is the story of teddy who lives at the zoo with his parents his parents both worked for the zoo and teddy uh and his best friend summer who's also his girlfriend summer is the daughter of the owner of the zoo and teddy is known for being able to solve mysteries such as who killed that hippo in belly up and who poached the koala and different different mysteries that the security and the police they just can't figure it out but somehow teddy and summer and their friends can well they think that they're they're in for a treat because his friends say who lives on a ranch next to the zoo they've actually found the skeleton of a tyrannosaurus there and they think wow a tyrannosaurus in texas they used to go wow that's pretty rare so they're they're heading over there but when they get there there's been a huge storm and when they get there the skull of the tyrannosaurus is missing and it's not really much good without the skull but they're trying to figure out how in the world could someone move a 500 pound skull without leaving any trace so that's another mystery for teddy to solve but on the other hand there's a lot of laughter and funny funny things in this book their friends summer and and teddy's classmates who are not the brightest bulbs in the in the world they've somehow managed to purchase on the black market a 15 foot anaconda snake and it's got loose in their house and it has swallowed their cat so they call teddy and summer because teddy and summer have experienced at the zoo and they figure they can help them figure out this whole snake problem before their parents get home and if you've under wondered what a 15 foot anaconda would look like i found this picture and this is a boy in cambodia his name is sandbath and the snake's name is cameroon which means lucky and cameroon has been sandbath's pet since he was a baby the snake just kind of slithered into the village and now it's grown to 15 foot long and they put this picture on the internet of course and everyone who saw was just horrified that someone would think of this snake as a pet but this is what this is what uh jim and tim have in their house with a cat-sized lump in the middle so they have that to deal with and they have to find out how in the world or or where that skull has got to so as i said there's a lot of laugh out scenes especially when large marge who's one of the security guards at the zoo whenever she appears on the scene it's just hysterical but the mystery is a good one it's not easily solved and it's teddy and his friends there's a serious side also because they learn about the trafficking of exotic animals such as snakes and certain monkeys like those cute little capuchin monkeys and birds and even fish there's a note from the author in the back about how this has become a billion dollar industry so it's a mystery with a lot of fun and laughs and serious side also so this is tyrannosaurus rex by steward gifts very cool i know that's a series that i really really want to i really want to start especially belly up it seems yeah poor hippo but it's a funny title it is it is yeah very cool very cool okay so my last book is uh rick by alex gino this one you can find in our middle school section and as you can see we have the lgbtq or lgb yeah lgbtq label here so you can kind of tell based on uh the cover and our labeling what it might be about so this book is a it's it's a standalone companion novel to george by alex gino alex gino's first book um in a way it's also like a sequel to george as well so we have rick here he's in sixth grade and not only is he dealing with the new school year he's also dealing with discovering what his self-orientation is not only is he trying to figure out who he really is his best friend jeff is a homophobic bully i know it's pretty tough this becomes a challenge for rick when he actually wants to join the rainbow spectrum club and after school club for lgbtq iap plus rights it becomes even more of a challenge when he finally realizes there is new self-orientation which he he later finds out is asexual a romantic it a sexual a romantic a romantic it's a tongue twister um so he finally realizes his new um you know self-orientation and it's going to be hard to have to tell his best friend jeff about it um in addition to that things get kind of dicey when rick finds jeff actually bullying some of his new friends in the rainbow spectrum club so will rick be able to stand up to his best friend will he find the courage to reveal his self-orientation to his best friend he knows you'll have to find out and pick it up and read it wow yeah it's um it's an interesting read i started listening to it and the author uh is uh is the one that narrates it and yeah they do a really good job so it's pretty good okay yeah well those are all of our books for this month and we hope you've enjoyed them and if you want to find out how to get them to read them for yourself we've got this information on the back here you can go to our website lbpl.org and find our book catalog and then you just type in the words chapter chat 1120 and those books will be there and our emails are here also in case you want to ask us a question um yeah we just hope that you enjoy them and that you'll let us know what you thought of the books um and thanks for joining us we'll see you next month so bye till then janine okay bye