Holiday Gift Giving Ideas

Looking for a gift idea? Teen Librarians from libraries across Connecticut have put together their annual list of the best books to give teens as a holiday gift. Once again The Hunger Games trilogy has made the list. One of this year's gift suggestions is the final installment, Mockingjay, by Suzanne Collins. Let us know if you've read any of these books or have any suggestions for other books which would make a great gift!

Teen Read Week

October 17th through 23rd is Teen Read Week. This year's theme is Books With Beat @ your Library. Stop by Teen Space this week to see books and audiobooks about poetry, music and more at our Books With Beat display. The Teens Top Ten books were announced this morning to kick off Teen Read Week. This year's winners are:

1. Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins
2. City of Glass by Cassandra Clare
3. Heist Society by Ally Carter
4. Shiver by Maggie Stiefvater
5. Hush, Hush by Becca Fitzpatrick
6. Beautiful Creatures by Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl
7. Along for the Ride by Sarah Dessen
8. If I Stay by Gayle Forman
9. Fire by Kristin Cashore
10. Wintergirls by Laurie Halse Anderson

Teens' Top Ten Voting

Teens' Top Ten is a "teen choice" list, where teens nominate and choose their favorite books of the previous year! Vote now for the 2010 Teens' Top Ten! Voting takes place through September 17. You can vote online here . Winners will be announced during Teen Read Week, Oct. 17-23.

The Lightning Thief by Rick Riordan

Percy Jackson has been kicked out of the school every single year. He is now in sixth grade. It is the end of the school year and he hasn't been kicked out. Weird things start happening in his life and then his mom takes him to a summer camp, but this one is different. People are training for battles, there are creatures that aren't human there and they play games that campers could die in for fun. Percy has always known that something about him was different, but he is only just beginning to understand.

I liked this book because it was full of thrilling adventure and you are learning, but you don't realize it until you are done with the book.

The Lightning Thief is the first book in the Percy Jackson and the Olympians Series.

Reviewed by Madalyn

Summer Reading Book Review - Queen of Babble by Meg Cabot

This book is about a 22 year old girl. She goes to London to visit a friend she only met once! After things don't work out between them, she is stuck in London with no place to go. Luckily, she decides to take the Chunnel and stay with her friend in France. Now the only thing she has to worry about is staying out of reach from her friend in London and of course keeping her big mouth shut!
This is a great book. The author does a great job of making the characters believable. This book also lets you learn a little about European countries. I had a great time learning about other places around the world.

Submitted by Sophia Fagan

Summer Reading Book Review - Ice Drift by Theodore Taylor

Ice Drift is a story about two adolescent Inuit brothers and their dog who were seal hunting on an ice floe attached to their island when an iceberg hit the floe and it broke off from the island. For six long, hard months the boys suffer with hunger, sickness, and a douse in the frigid ocean. The author's descriptive words painted a vivid picture, holding my attention from cover to cover.

Submitted by Timothy Vander Have

Summer Reading Book Review - The Sweetheart of Prosper County by Jill S. Alexander

This book is about a ninth grader named Austin. Her biggest dream is to be a what is called a sweetheart in the Christmas parade. She has gone to the extremes to do things that would allow her to be a friend to other sweethearts. She has also gone to the extremes to get a good reputation so she could be one. Some of the wild things she has done was buy a rooster for Christmas, for herself, and have her arm bitten by a huge fish.
This is a great book. It was so funny to see all of the wild and crazy things that Austin put herself up to. She was always ready for a challenge. It was also suspenseful at times such as seeing whether Austin would win the poultry contest.

Submitted by Sophia Fagan

Summer Reading Review: The Knife of Never Letting Go, by Patrick Ness

Summer Reading Book Review-Every Soul a Star by Wendy Mass

This book is about three kids who all gather at a camp for one exciting reason, to see a solar eclipse. All three kids don’t want the eclipse to end because, once it’s over, their worlds will be turned upside down. Bree is moving into the wilderness, Ally is moving into the city, and Jack has learned to make great friends. Their lives as they knew them are definitely going to change dramatically.

This was a great book. One of the things I liked about it was that it was told from different characters’ points of view. It made it interesting to find out what different characters thought about each situation.

Reviewed by Sophia Fagan

Summer Reading Book Review-Jeremy Fink and the Meaning of Life by Wendy Mass

This book is about a boy who is about to turn thirteen. He doesn’t want to turn thirteen until he opens the box from his father. All he needs to do is find the keys then he will be able to find the meaning of life from the box.

This is a great book. It was very suspenseful for me to see if the keys would fit into the locks. This book is also very descriptive. One example is when it said that Jeremy’s couch was covered in patches.

Reviewed by Sophia Fagan

Summer Reading Book Review- Syren (Septimus Heap, Book 5) by Angie Sage

Septimus Heap sets out for Jenna, Beetle, Nicko, Snorri and Ullr on Spit Fyre. On the back he ends up on a strange island full of surprises. Meanwhile, Wolf Boy is sent to do the Task by Aunt Zelda and meets up with Lucy, but gets stuck on the worst boat possible, the Marauder, with men who want to throw them overboard so that there is no interference with their dangerous mission.



I liked this book because it kept me captivated and was full of action. It is a wonderful tale full of mystery, excitement, and suspense.


Reviewed by Madalyn

Summer Reading Book Review - New Moon, by Stephenie Meyer

This adventurous book takes place in the small town of Forks, Washington. Bella Swan's vampire boyfriend Edward leaves her, taking his family with him. Bella becomes devastated and barely leaves her room. In the meantime, her dad Charlie thinks it will be better for her to spend more time with his best friend's son, Jacob. Bella tries to risk her life so Edward will come back to saver her, so she gets Jacob to build her a motorcycle.

Bella spends more and more time with Jaob and soon her heart is healing. Just when her heart is almost fully healed, Jacob won't answer her phone calls and everything seems weirder. When Bella goes over to Jake's house, he is outside with his shirt off, with a weird looking tattoo on his shoulder and his hair is cut off. Jake is hiding something; something big.

This is an excellent book written by Stephenie Meyer and is perfect for readers who love adventure and are Twilight fans. I thought that this book was the best out of all of the books from the Twilight Saga.

Reviewed by Hannah Lee

Summer Reading Review: Better Late Than Never (Gifted series), by Marilyn Kaye

This book is about a group of children who have powers which they call gifts. The children know they have to keep their gifts a secret. One of the children trusts someone so much she shows the person her gift. Will the person end up betraying her gift and using it for evil?

This is a great book. It is really suspenseful to see what will happen. Also, it is descriptive.

Reviewed by Sophia Fagan

Summer Reading Book Review - Unwind by Neal Shusterman

The book Unwind is about kids who are supposed to be unwould but escape. Unwinding is when surgeons take apart children's body parts and sell them to people who need the body parts. The kids have to stay hidden, so they don't get unwound, but when their friend needs to be taken to the hospital they have no choice but to expose themselves and be in danger of getting unwound. Will the kids end up getting unwound after all their hard work trying to stay hidden? Read to find out.

This was a great book. It was really scary and I would recommend it to teens who want to have a scare. It is also suspenseful to see if the kids in the book will end up getting unwound.

Reviewed by Sophia Fagan

Summer Reading Book Review - Serpent Tide by K.L. Fogg

Wesley Vandergrift is a 12-year-old boy who is the son of Imogene Vandergrift, a billionaire. He can't unerstand why he seems different than the other children or why he and his mom have nothing in common. While exploring in an attic he finds something that leads him to belive that Imogene is not his real mother. He journeys off to find his real parents, but Imogene is always after him.

I liked this book. It was an easy read, but very well-written.

Reviewed by Maddlyn

Summer Reading Book Review: Bad Girls Don't Die, by Katie Alender

The book I read was Bad Girls Don't Die. This book is very interesting if you like books that can creep you out. It's about two girls named Alexis and Kasey. They live in an old house and the history of the house has been in the newspaper before. One time, there was a suicide and the victim is caught haunting the house. One hundred years before that accident occurred, an 11 year old died in the house and is roaming the house too. One of these girls has to get rid of these ghosts and help the other girl.

Reviewed by Peyton Northrop

Summer Reading Book Review- When You Reach Me by Rebecca Stead

This excellent book, written by Rebecca Stead, takes place in New York, NY. Miranda, a 12-year-old middle school girl's mom, is going to be on the game show The Million Dollar Pyramid. Miranda's best friend, Sal, gets punched by a kid named Marcus and, for some reason, doesn't want to be her friend anymore. As Miranda struggles through friendship she starts getting mysterious notes and things start getting stolen from her apartment. The notes say that something bad is going to happen to someone she cares about. Clearly the writer of the notes knows something she doesn't.

This book is perfect for teens who love mysteries and adventure. I loved this book very much because something exciting happens around every corner. I mostly enjoyed the ending to the story. Will you?

Reviewed by Hannah Lee

Summer Reading Book Review - Schooled by Gordon Korman

The book Schooled is about a young boy who has lived separate from modern days in a community that only consists of two people, him and his grandmother. When his grandmother gets hurt and has to stay in the hospital, the young boy, Cap, is forced to live in a modern neighborhood and go to a public school. Having been homeschooled his whole life the only thing that will be a result of this is a disaster. He has no idea what to expect when he is forced to be around other people and live in the real world.

I thought this was a very good book. The author did a great job of making the characters believable. For example, since Cap was new, he thought everyone should be nice to on another so he did kind things for everyone.

Reviewed by Sophia Fagan

Summer Reading Program

This year's teen summer reading program is "Make Waves at Your Library." Programs will kick off with the 2nd annual "Chalk It Up" sidewalk drawing event on Saturday, June 19th from 10:00 AM until 4:00 PM at the library. There will be other events going on as well on Saturday and throughout the summer. Check our website for more information. Come to the library to register for the summer reading program anytime from June 19th on. We even have a display of books set up in Teen Space if you want to read something with a watery theme!

New sequel out!

This year's Teen Nutmeg Award winner, Life As We Knew It by Susan Beth Pfeffer has a brand new sequel. It's called This World We Live In and the library now has it. So if you want to find out what happens to Miranda and the rest of her family as life continues in the post-meteor world read this sequel. Check here to see if it's in. Once you read it post a comment and let us all know how you liked it.

Great New Teen Nutmeg Nominee

The London Eye Mystery by Siobhan Dowd is one of those books that is hard to put down. The mystery is introduced right away and, as the reader, you can't wait to see how it turns out. A brother and sister team, Ted and Kat, are the sleuths of this mystery. It's written from Ted's point of view which is very interesting because he has Asperger's syndrome. I haven't yet finished the book but I have my own theories, just like Ted, about what happened. If you like this book, try Marcelo in the Real World by Francisco X. Stork another great book about a teen with Asperger's syndrome.

This Year's Teen Nutmeg Book Award Winner

Life As We Knew It, by Susan Beth Pfeffer won the 2010 Teen Nutmeg Book Awards with 1309 votes. Total teen votes 7101; total schools and libraries 111.

Nominees for 2011 have been announced. Check out the Nutmeg Book Award website to see the new list. Copies of nominees are now available on the library's Nutmeg shelf in the Teen Space.

Check out this sequel

Did you read Drums, Girls & Dangerous Pie, the 2010 Nutmeg nominee written by Jordan Sonnenblick? It was a favorite among Teen Nutmeg readers here in Monroe. For those who read it and want to know what happens to Jeffrey Alper, the adorable younger brother who is diagnosed with leukemia, check out the sequel. It's called After Ever After and we'll have it here at the library soon thanks to the generous donations of some of our patrons. Click here to reserve a copy.

Last Days to Vote

Saturday January 30th is the last day to come in to the library to cast your vote for the best Nutmeg book. Here are the nominees. Winner will be announced February 14th. Come in and cast your vote!

Printz Award Goes To "Going Bovine"

Each year a teen book is selected by the American Library Association as the best young adult book from the previous year. This award, called the Printz award, is similar to the Newbery medal given to children's books. This year the Printz award went to the book Going Bovine by Libba Bray. Bray, the author of the Gemma Boyle series: A Great and Terrible Beauty, The Sweet Far Thing, and Rebel Angels, takes a real departure from historical fantasy in this new book. School Library Journal says, "In this ambitious novel, Cameron, a 16-year-old slacker whose somewhat dysfunctional family has just about given up on him, as perhaps he himself has, when his diagnosis of Creutzfeldt-Jacob, "mad cow" disease, reunites them, if too late. The heart of the story, though, is a hallucinatory-or is it?-quest with many parallels to the hopeless but inspirational efforts of Don Quixote, about whom Cameron had been reading before his illness."

Find out if it's checked in at the library, then tell us what you thought of this book. We'd love to hear your review!

Teen Nutmeg Book Award Voting

Come in to Teen Space at the library and cast you vote for the 2010 Teen Nutmeg Book Award winner. Anyone in grade 5 through 9 who has read at least one of these Teen Nutmeg Book nominees can vote. Fill out a ballot and drop it in the box by the Nutmeg Books. Voting ends January 31, 2010. We'll announce the winner here and at the library on February 14, 2010.