Author: Stephanie

Everything I Never Told You by Celeste Ng

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everything i never told youI love book lists. Give me a list of award books or a list of books you absolutely adored, and I will slowly make my way through the list until I have read them all. Today’s book is one I discovered on an award list. The title is Everything I Never Told You and is Celeste Ng’s debut novel. I first heard of Everything I Never Told You when I was tuned in to watch the Alex Awards online. The Alex Awards are an award given out by the American Library Association (ALA) to the 10 best adult books that have special appeal to teens. (This book has also been on numerous other lists and won another award. Check out Celeste Ng’s website for more information.)

Everything I Never Told You begins, “Lydia is dead. But they don’t know this yet. 1977, May 3, six thirty in the morning, no one knows anything but this innocuous fact: Lydia is late for breakfast.” After those simple, yet devastating, few sentences, Ng weaves together the story of a Chinese-American family growing up in 1970s Ohio. Each family member is outlined: the professor father James, stay-at-home mother Marilyn, older brother Nathan who is desperate to leave home, younger sister Hannah who seems to blend into the background, and the middle golden-child Lydia whose mother and father have placed all of their hopes on her shoulders, as well as several other members of the community. When Lydia’s body is found in the lake right down the street from their house, the entire family falls apart.

This book delves into the complex nature of the Lees: family, history, home, and the struggles we all make on a daily basis to understand each other and to find ourselves.

 

no one else can have youIf that description caught your interest, check out No One Else Can Have You by Kathleen Hale. This book deals with similar concepts of love, loss, and the tragic and upheaving nature of death. This book takes place in the small town of Friendship, Wisconsin, where residents have been shocked by the discovery of high school student Ruth Fried’s body in a cornfield. Her best friend, 16-year-old Kippy Bushamn, finds herself trying to solve her best friend’s murder. Ruth’s mother has given Ruth’s diary to Kippy with the express instruction to redact the sexy parts. Kippy sets out to find out who murdered her best friend and discovers that in her small Midwestern town, everyone seems to have secrets.

This quirky murder mystery will have you following Kippy around as she emulates her idol, Diane Sawyer, to figure out who her best friend really was and what really happened when she died.

Falling Skies

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I’m a sucker for television shows that cross genres and formats. One of my most recent finds was the television show, Falling Skies, which also has a videogame and a graphic novel out at this time.

falling skies tvThe library currently has multiple seasons of Falling Skies available for check-out. If you have never heard of this show, Falling Skies is a science fiction, post-apocalyptic drama that runs on TNT with its final season premiering on June 28th at 9pm. Falling Skies takes place after an alien attack has happened on planet Earth, forcing citizens to gather together and attempt to fight back. Boston professor of history, Tom Mason, played by Noah Wyle, is struggling to deal with the fact that his wife has died and his son has been captured by the aliens. Groups of people are being held captive, the number of dead is rising, and in order to rescue the captives, militia groups are forming to protect the survivors. What seems like a straight and easy plan becomes increasingly complicated as the survivors realize that the aliens are more intelligent and crafty than they initially believed. Mason and his group must band together and come up with new ideas to outsmart the aliens.

 

falling skies gn

If the television show interests you, check out Paul Tobin’s graphic novel Falling Skies with artwork by Juan Ferreyra. Tobin’s graphic novel serves as a prequel to the television show. Here, you follow the life of Professor Tom Mason and his three sons who are forced to come to terms with the fact that Mason’s wife has died. Mason believes that in order to survive, they must all hide, which ultimately backfires when one of his sons is captured by the aliens. The artwork in this novel draws from the likeness of the television characters with viewers of the show easily able to recognize their favorite characters. Tobin draws a tale for readers about the months after the alien attack and Mason’s decision to join a militia group to rescue his son. Fans of the television show will not be disappointed in the graphic novel.

falling skies gameThe final part of Falling Skies’ transition across genres in the videogame available on PlayStation 3 called Falling Skies: The Game. This game expands upon the tactical warfare element of the television show and by extension, Tom Mason’s vast knowledge of historical warfare and battle strategy. In the videogame, players have the option to customize and maneuver their squad in order to outsmart the enemy. In addition to the over 90 tactical warfare missions, players are also given the option to undertake an infinite number of side quests. This turn-based style of gameplay allows you to complete missions and finish objectives as you command a squad made up of anywhere from 1-6 units.

Check out any of the Falling Skies materials available at the library and let us know if there are other materials for which you are looking!

Carnival Games

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carnival gaemsSummer is my favorite time of year. School is out, the weather is getting warmer, summer reading programs begin, and the best part of summer starts: carnival time! Fairs, carnivals, and rodeos are my favorite way to spend a hot summer night with friends. Confession: I am not very good at carnival games. My hand-eye coordination is, to put it politely, lacking. This does not lessen my desire to play and actually makes me strive to become better every year. My newest way to practice, besides going to the arcade or setting up a mini-carnival with the kids in my neighborhood, is to play Carnival Games, a videogame available at the Davenport Public Library for the Wii.

You may be wondering how playing a videogame actually prepares you to play real carnival games. The use of the Wii remote, instead of a regular game controller, allows players to practice the motion as they are throwing the sledgehammer to test their strength, as they are throwing the ball in Skee Ball, or even as they are trying to dunk someone at the dunk tank. One major bonus to this game is that it allows up to four players to play at a time, which makes each carnival game more of a competition, just like a real carnival! Carnival Games offers over 25 different games of chance and skill that can be found at carnivals across the nation. In addition to allowing players to customize and accessorize their own character, this game revels in the carnival spirit: with bright lights, patterns, and people of all kinds milling around the game.

Check out this game today and play games like Balloon Darts, Ring Toss, Hole in One, Shooting Gallery, Meter-O-Love, and many more. And if you’re lucky, you will beat the rest of the people you are playing against and win one of the over 250 virtual prizes available.

The Real Thing: Lessons on Love and Life From a Wedding Reporter’s Notebook by Ellen McCarthy

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the real thingEllen McCarthy has written a charming set of lessons about living and enjoying love in her book, The Real Thing: Lessons on Love and Life From a Wedding Reporter’s Notebook. What intrigued me the most about this book was that McCarthy was a skeptic about the whole wedding business and love when she first began reporting about weddings and even after she married. She sometimes is still skeptical, but feels that working as a wedding reporter has allowed her to find a set of resources, whether those resources are married couples, the notes she’s scribbled down, or the books she has read, that she can utilize to keep her marriage strong and alive. This book serves as a collection of the lessons she believes everyone should be aware of regarding love and life.

McCarthy writes throughout this book that she took her job as a wedding reporter because she wanted to write about people. Sure, she would love to have a Saturday night off to go and hangout with her friends, but once she is sitting and waiting for the ceremony begin, she is immediately thrown into a new beautiful love story and the beginning of a new life together. McCarthy tackles the questions of “How do you know this person is the one?”, “Should we live together before marriage?”, and even “Should I call the wedding off?” McCarthy admits to being far from a marriage and love expert and that is why she augments her written beliefs within this book with multiple interviews from experts, as well as interviews and snapshots into the weddings and lives of the people she has interviewed for her job.

McCarthy has gathered together a multitude of information about how people go about finding love and the life they want. This book is eye-opening for people in all stages of relationships, from single to happily married for years to divorced, and provides help for those who may need a little push to understand the life they are living now.

Spend-A-Little Save-A-Lot Home Improvements: Money-Saving Projects Anyone Can Do By Brad Staggs

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Spend-A-Little Sspend a littleave-A-Lot Home Improvements by Brad Staggs walks homeowners through a list of preventative and money-saving improvements that can be done for little amounts of money throughout the home. The tips and tricks he offers throughout the book range from fixing a sticky door to checking and replacing air filters to wrapping a water heater.

Staggs recognizes that being a homeowner can turn costly quickly especially when the cost of hiring a repairman or even the cost of buying the materials and doing the home repairs by yourself keeps rising. Doing the preventative maintenance that he outlines will help you in the long run and will make your home more energy efficient and sufficient. Staggs provides step-by-step instructions paired with pictures highlighting each to help you do the repair yourself.

Check out this book to learn many money-saving and energy-efficient ways to help you get the most of the home you already enjoy.

Pet Pals: Animal Doctor

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pet pals animal doctorAll throughout college, my teachers told me that the best way to entice a child to learn was to make learning fun. You’d also get bonus points as a teacher if you could trick kids into learning without them even knowing it. One of the best ways that I have found to do this is to slip that learning to them in the form of a video game or even a classic novel that has been re-done as an illustrated graphic novel.

As I was searching for new titles to intrigue the kids I know, I stumbled upon Pet Pals: Animal Doctor, a game available for the Wii. It allows players to pretend they are a veterinarian and perform surgeries using the Wii remote. What I found most interesting about this game is that the level of learning is high. More than thirty medical cases, that are based on real events, are presented within this game with mini- and micro-games that allow players to play, feed, and clean the animals and to also perform some specialized procedures. Players will be able to operate and interact with a variety of animals that range from the familiar to the exotic. This game won the Editor’s Choice Award of Excellence from the Children’s Technology Review and also the Parents’ Choice Silver Award.

Green Metropolis: Why Living Smaller, Living Close, and Driving Less Are the Keys to Sustainability by David Owen

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green metropolis Green Metropolis: Why Living Smaller, Living Closer, and Driving Less Are the Keys to Sustainability makes a compelling argument against the anti-urban rhetoric of leaving the city and moving to the country to live a more sustainable, environmentally conscious life. The author, David Owen, outlines for readers why the ideas of living smaller, living closer, and driving less will lead to a more energy efficient and a better human/lifestyle environmental footprint than escaping to the country for open space.

To help solidify his argument, Owen discusses in detail how the current thinking of crowded cities, like New York and Chicago, as nightmares from an ecological standpoint actually misses the entire point of an urban setting. Since people who live an urban lifestyle are essentially living on top of and right next to other people, they are forced to live in smaller spaces and actually consume and use far less than the people who move to the country to spread out. Their per-capita greenhouse gas emissions are overall less than a third of the average Americans. Owen argues that the greenest community in the country is Manhattan and I must admit his argument is very compelling. Urban settings encourage people to rely less heavily on automobiles and more on their own feet, bicycles, or public transportation to get from point A to point B or else they are forced to sit through horribly backed up and congested traffic. It becomes simpler to utilize the public transit system and even walk to work. Owen argues that people spreading throughout the countryside are actually having a greater impact on the environment as they are effectively using up more of the world’s resources than people who live in urban settings.

Pick up David Owen’s Green Metropolis and decide for yourself whether or not living in an urban setting vs. living in a rural setting is a more environmentally stable principle. Owen’s clearly thought out and expressively written arguments must be read in full to understand why he believes living in an asphalt jungle is a greener way to live than leaving the city and spreading your life into the countryside.

What Was I Thinking?: 58 Bad Boyfriend Stories Edited by Barbara Davilman and Liz Dubelman

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 What Was I Thinking?: 58 Bad Boyfriend Storieswhat was i thinking was edited by Barbara Davilman and Liz Dubelman as a way for people to talk about the point in their relationship where they realized that their dealings with that person were doomed and over. Sometimes the relationship may not actually end for weeks or even years later, but there is usually that one defining moment where it suddenly hits you that you don’t like that person as much as you thought you did. Out of the hundreds of submissions that Davilman and Dubelman received, they were only able to pick out 58 to put together into this collection.

As I was reading this book, I came across many themes: 1) sometimes the reasons for our break-ups may seem like nothing at all to other people(he plucked his uni-brow, I dyed my hair, he didn’t like to read), but they can be deal-breakers to the person who ultimately calls it quits, 2) that A-HA relationship-ending moment may not be so obvious to us right when it happens, but in hindsight, we definitely recognize that moment as the “start of impending doom”, 3) that blast of clarity when we know that the relationship was over was sometimes more vivid and easier to remember than the entire relationship itself, and 4) no matter how many times our friends tell us our significant other may be just a little too weird, we will not actually break-up with that person ourselves until we burst out of the happiness bubble and honeymoon phase of the new relationship and see the person for who they really are.

Check out this book to commiserate with these women about the moments when they knew their relationships were just over and it became clear that that relationship was not going to work out. Be prepared to look back out your own relationships as you read this book because the women sharing their personal stories are not afraid to dig deep into their pasts to talk about their moments of clarity, no matter how foggy those moments have been right in the midst of the happiness.

Disney Universe

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disney universeDisney Universe is a family-friendly video game that allows players to work together to solve the different puzzles and levels. There are six different worlds that you can choose to play in: Monsters, Inc., Wall-E, Aladdin, Lion King, Alice in Wonderland, and Pirates of the Caribbean. Each world has three different levels within it with the objective of each being to collect coins, solve puzzles, and defeat your enemies. One of the biggest draws of this game is the fact that players can cash in those coins to dress up as different characters, with a total of 40 different characters to choose from. Disney Universe also gives you objectives to complete within each level.

While other videogames may leave you to fend for yourself, this game instead offers pop-up hints to help you finish your objectives. The addition of hints allows younger players to play this on their own without help from older players. Each level also offers a mini-game that allows you to compete with the other players. One to four players can take a spin at this game and have the opportunity to pretend like they are their favorite Disney and Pixar characters.

Interested in playing this game, but you don’t have an XBox360? If that’s the case, the library also offers this game for the Wii and for PlayStation 3.