Northside Elementary Library

Hey kids, we just got some new books in, including The Throne of Fire by Rick Riordan and Scorpia Rising by Anthony Horowitz.  The Throne of Fire is the latest in the Kane Chronicles.  It’s the sequel to The Red Pyramid.  In this book, Carter and Sadie have to revive the sun god Ra to battle the Forces of Chaos before the world comes to an end.  If you like Egyptian mythology, you’ll love this series.  Scorpia Rising is the newest book in the series about 14 year-old secret agent Alex Rider.

 We also got some more graphic novels (comic books).  We got several more in the Bone series  (Crown of Horns, Old Man’s Cave, Ghost Circles, and Treasure Hunters), and the newest Amulet book (Last Council).   Put them on hold today, because I think they’re already checked out!

     We’re starting the Mother-Daughter Book Club back up for this year.   This club is for 4th and 5th grade girls and their moms (or any special adult female, such as an aunt, grandmother, or family friend).  We read one book each month or so, then meet to discuss it.
     Our first book will be Wild Girl by Patricia Reilly Giff.  Twelve year-old Lidie has to leave her home in Brazil for a new life in New York.  Her father and older brother train horses in America, and Lidie begins to make a connection with a horse they call “Wild Girl.”  Together they face the challenge of finding their place in a new home.
     You can check it out from our library or get a copy on your own, but you need to have it read by Thursday, November 3rd for our first meeting.  I’ll have a pot of chili and some hot dogs to eat.  It’ll be fun!  See you there!
  

Girls, I think our next book will be Walk Two Moons by Sharon Creech.  It won the 1995 Newbery Medal and is about a 13 year old girl named Salamanca Tree Hiddle who lives on a farm in Kentucky.  Sal’s mother has recently left her father.  While on a cross-country car trip to Idaho with her grandparents, Sal entertains them with the story of a girl whose mother disappeared and who received secret messages after she left. One of the messages is “Don’t judge a man until you have walked two moons in his mocassins.”  Who’s interested?

 I just finished The Red Pyramid last week,   and I realllllly liked it.  It’s the first book in a new series by Rick Riordan (who wrote the Percy Jackson and the Olympians series about a boy who finds out he is the son of Poseidon and that the Greek Gods are real.  If you haven’t read this series, starting with The Lightning Thief, I highly recommend it!)  Anyway, this new series (called The Kane Chronicles) is similar except that brother and sister Carter and Sadie Kane find out that they are descended from Egyptian pharaohs.  I love Egyptian history, especially since I went to Egypt a couple of years ago.  The book starts out with plenty of action and adventure and never lets up.  Carter and Sadie’s dad, a famous Egyptologist, accidentally releases the Egyptian God Set, who wants to destroy the world.  Here’s a cool website that tells you more:  http://disney.go.com/disneybooks/kanechronicles/

Have any of you read any of Rick Riordan’s books?   How about Lost Hero, the new one that is like a sequel series to the Percy Jackson series?  What do you think about his books?

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part 1 is coming to theaters on Nov. 19th!  The seventh and last book in the series will be told in two parts, with the second part coming out next year.  Part 1 begins with Harry, Ron and Hermione setting off to track down and destroy the horcruxes that are the secret to Voldemort’s immortality and destruction.  They are on their own, without the guidance or protection of their professors or Dumbledore.  

 I personally can’t wait!!  You can find more information about the movie here: http://harrypotter.warnerbros.com/harrypotterandthedeathlyhallows/mainsite/index.html#/synopsis

For those of you who have read the Guardians of Ga’hoole series (or who want to), a new movie based on the books is coming out on Sept. 24, 2010.  It’s a computer animated film based on the first three installments of the book series: The Capture, The Journey, and The Rescue.^  

In the first book, Soren, a young barn owl, is captured and taken to the St. Aegolius Academy for Orphaned Owls, but Soren finds out that it’s something far worse. The rest of the series is about Soren and his friends, who are fighting a great evil in the owl world.  There are 15 books in the series, and we have most of them in our library at Northside.

You can watch the movie trailer by clicking on this link:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x_lMihSKkgA

Be watching for the movie to be in theaters next week!

Hey guys!  I love that some of you are commenting about books you like, but I was hoping some of you would answer my question:  what book character would you invite over for lunch?  And why?

Dear students,

If you could invite any book character over to your house for lunch, who would you invite and why?  One character that I think I might invite is Dustfinger from the “Inkworld” series (Inkheart, Inkspell, and Inkdeath) by Cornelia Funke.  He’s a fire-dancer who can control fire and do tricks with it.  I’d love to see him perform, wouldn’t you?  Click on “comments” and tell me who you would choose!

The Mother-Daughter Book Club went to the movies on Saturday!  It was really too pretty a day to be inside, but 4 girls and 3 moms (and a brother) went to see “Coraline” with me.  We all pretty much agreed that while we liked some things about the movie, we wished that they hadn’t changed parts of the plot and added the character of Wybie.  I later read on Wikipedia that Wybie was introduced for the film adaptation so that the viewer “wouldn’t have a girl walking around, occasionally talking to herself.”  I thought the addition of his character just added unnecessary complications to the plot.  I also didn’t like the ending, with Wybie “saving” Coraline.  A main theme of the book is that Coraline was able to handle things on her own, despite being afraid.  We also felt that the parents in the book were fairly typical British parents who were distracted by their work, whereas the parents (especially the mother) in the movie were downright mean.  Ah well.  Once again, we find that for the most part, the book is better than the movie! 

Our first meeting was on a very cold January night, but 7 girls and their mothers braved the weather to attend. We read The Agony of Alice as our first book, and met again on Feb. 5 with a chili supper in the library to discuss it.  This time 8 girls and their mothers attended.  We had a great time!

     Our next book will be The White Giraffe by Lauren St. John.  This book is about a girl named Martine who, after the loss of her parents, must move to a wildlife park in South Africa.  The story focuses on a mysterious and magical white giraffe.  If you did not attend the last meeting but would like to join our club and read this book, just let me know.

    We plan to meet about every 3 weeks to read a new book, so our next meeting will be on Feb. 26th.  Happy reading!