Have you heard?

A Film and Lit is forming at MPL for high school students! We will meet every other month to discuss a selected adult or higher level YA book, and then we will watch its movie adaptation. Pick up a permission slip at the library. Our first meeting is Thursday, September 19!

Quiz Time!

 

Do you like to read?

Do you like games?

Do you like food?

 

 

If you answered “YES” to the above questions, I have one more for you….

 

WHY AREN’T YOU IN BOOK CLUB?!?!?!

 

 

We are gearing up for another year of Nook Book Club at Maryville Public Library, and we want YOU to join! The club is open to sixth through eighth graders, and we meet once a month in the community room of MPL.

This isn’t like school—no homework, no tests—just fun discussion and games about popular YA books that span all types of genres! (And let’s not forget food and prizes! YAY!)

 

Pick up a permission slip at the library and return it by

Wednesday, September 4 to join the Nook!

 

Happy Reading!

Case Closed!

MPL's summer reading program has drawn to a close, and the TSI (Teen Scene Investigation) was a HUGE success! We had a record breaking number of 43 teen readers participating this year! For every 500 pages of YA or adult books the teens read, they received an "evidence tag" that could be redeemed for prizes or thrown into one of our awesome raffle drawings. They could also earn bonus green evidence tags by reading from our special Most Wanted TSI Mystery Reads Lists or by attending our Sherlock Holmes movie night or our CSI Game Night. Thirty-six books from the Most Wanted List were read while and additional ninety-one white tags were handed out. That's over 45,000 pages read! WOW!

The following people were the winners of our raffle prizes.

Leticia Tate, Winner of Dinner and a Movie Combo #1 (2 Hangar Tickets and 2 Taco John's meals)

Ashley Riley, Winner of Dinner and Movie Combo #2

Miriam Butler, Winner of the Dinner and a Movie Combo #3

Kylee Dougan, Winner of the Divergent book and t-shirt gift pack

Andy Schmidt, Winner of the Beautiful Creatures book set

Chad Sullivan, Winner of the Hunger Games t-shirt and 2 folder gift set

Not pictured: Jessie Mahoney, Winner of The Great Gatsby movie soundtrack

 

 

 

Thanks to everyone who made this summer a great success!

Notes from the Midnight Driver

Our June book was another of one our favorite author's, Jordan Sonnenblick's, novels. Notes from the Midnight Driver was about a teen who decided to raid his parents' liquor cabinet one night and go for a joy ride. His adventure ended in his neighbor's lawn with a garden gnome fatality. The rest of the book is about him "serving his time" as a mandatory volunteer (that's quite contradictory, isn't it?) at a retirement home. This book was a nice step back into reality. No futuristic dystopian society, no vampires, werewolves, etc. Just normal kids making mistakes like many normal kids unfortunately make. While the group enjoyed the book, we all agreed that Sonnenblick played it a little safe by having no real dire consequences for the teen drunk driver. Not that we wanted to read a tragic book, but it probably would have made more of a lasting impact. That is why I attempted to further the lesson to not drink and drive by setting up an obstacle course in the basement, the first time done with no "handicaps," the second time done while wearing drunk goggles borrowed from South Nodaway High School. Tasks as simple as walking a straight line were suddenly difficult, and for several of us, nauseating. Hopefully our drunk goggles obstacle course left a lasting impression with our Nooksters, and they'll make smart decisions in the future!

Luck of the Draw

Our February read, Dark Life by Kat Falls, didn't provide much Valentine's romance, but we did see some hearts while playing a game of Card Sharks about the book. Nooksters had to prove their Dark Life Trivia knowledge in order to get a chance to "play the cards." In case you don't remember the old game show (and none of the Nooksters didn't because, well, they weren't alive yet), Card Sharks consists of working your way across a row of cards by correctly guessing if the next card will be higher or lower than the previous. (Sounds simple, right? Tell any of the Varsity Nooksters that and they would most likely disagree! The cards were not on their side that night!) Whenever participants didn't know the answer to a trivia question, they got the privilege of wearing a picture on their foreheads of one of the not-so-pretty deep sea creatures featured in the book.  Yuck.

Fortunately, the kids did not say "yuck" in connection to the story itself. In fact, the overwhelming majority loved Dark Life. We found that although this was yet another futuristic, somewhat dystopian novel, it was a world unlike any we'd seen before as the setting was a deep sea civilization that has come into existence after global warming and earthquakes have caused the oceans to rise so high that US citizens are crammed into the "stack" cities that exist on the limited amount of land that remains where high areas such as mountains once were. Pioneers have learned to farm and build homesteads at the bottom of the ocean. One of the most intriguing, and we found questionable, elements of the book was the fact that children who have spent several years subsea have started to develop "dark gifts" that can make them both special and dangerous.

Several of the Nooksters have already started the sequel, Riptide, and are already looking forward to the third book.

Congrats to Hope, our Varsity Card Sharks champion!

What is... the Girl of Fire and Thorns?

January's meeting on the book The Girl of Fire and Thorns by Rae Carsen was highlighted by a friendly game combo of Jeopardy meets Scene-It meets Press Your Luck meets Whatever Other Twist Mrs. Emerson Decided To Throw In. Unlike Jeopardy, behind the dollar amounts of each square seen above were game changers such as All Plays where everyone could win the question, Invierno Whammies (read the book and you'll get it) where teams lost their turns and/or their points, bonus points, steal the other team's points,  and even an eating contest. The teams did an outstanding job remembering trivia from The Girl of Fire and Thorns, most likely because they all enjoyed the book so much! (Mrs. Emerson admits she LOVED the book.) This book inspired one of the best discussions we've ever had as it had elements we haven't seen in any of our prior selections such as religion and a medieval times-inspired setting. Several of the Nooksters have already read the sequel, The Crown of Embers, and many of the rest are anxiously awaiting their turn to read it. We highly recommend this book to both teens and adults!