Category: Uncategorized

Posted in Science Fiction, Teen, Uncategorized, Young Adult/New Adult

Caragh M. O’Brien’s The Vault of Dreamers is an unsettling YA thriller

Posted on by Rosemary Kiladitis

cover46937-mediumThe Vault of Dreamers, by Caragh M. O’Brien, (Roaring Brook Press, Sept. 2014). $17.99, ISBN: 9781596439382

Recommended for ages 14+

In a not-too distant future, environmental upheaval and economic collapse have left many Americans in poverty. For creative teens who want a way out, the Forge School is the answer. A school for the most creative minds, and a reality show all at once, The Forge School/The Forge Show accepts students and keeps 50 out of 100 based on their “blip rate” – how many viewers watch their feed. After making it past the first cut, students’ popularity allows them banner ad income that they can receive, upon graduation, along with opportunities for success. Rosie Sinclair, aspiring filmmaker, is a student at the Forge School, and has discovered that the school has some big secrets. What is going on while the students sleep?

Vault of Dreamers is one of those books that takes a few chapters to build as O’Brien builds a solid story. We learn about Rosie’s background and the backgrounds of other students; we see family dynamics come into play, and we understand the motivation for many of these students to take part in a reality show that not only films you everywhere but the bathroom and shower, but a school that distributes sleeping pills to the student body on a nightly basis to assure that they will have a full 12 hours of sleep for maximum creativity. By the time the story kicks into high gear, we see what Rosie risks in order to learn Forge’s secrets: she’s putting her future and the future of her family on the line.

By the time we understand all of this, the story goes white-knuckle, non-stop. Is Rosie an unreliable narrator? Who can we trust? The reader is just as thrown off as Rosie is, and the need to know what was going on consumed me. The reality show setting will click with teens who have grown up with reality TV and popularity based on “likes” and approval ratings.

The ending nicely sets up a sequel, and even as a standalone work, offers a conclusion that will fuel some great discussions. You may howl in frustration, but you’ll be waiting for the next installment of this series.

The Vault of Dreamers will be published on September 16, but you can pre-order it from Amazon now.

Posted in Graphic Novels, Teen, Tween Reads, Uncategorized

Pride and Prejudice goes manga!

Posted on by Rosemary Kiladitis

pride and prejudice mangaPride and Prejudice, Manga Classics, by Jane Austen (adapted by Stacy King)/illustrated by Po Tse. (Udon Entertainment/Myrick Marketing & Media, LLC, Aug. 2014). $19.99 ISBN: 9781927925188

Recommended for ages 12+

I’ll admit it – I’ve never been a huge Austen fan. My taste in classics runs more toward the Bronte sisters, filled with more angst, rage, crazy wives locked away, that whole gothic thing with the moors. Lately, I’ve been bound and determined to re-read Austen, though, and decided to start with Stacy King’s manga adaptation of Pride and Prejudice.

I loved this retelling! Po Tse’s manga style art is lush and sophisticated, with sweeping panels and beautiful attention to detail. There are great little winks to the manga style I’m more familiar with (I have three sons, therefore I have watched much Pokémon), like the cartoony, wild expressions of absolute joy or despair, meant to encourage a reaction from the reader, that enhanced my enjoyment of this story.

The basic story is all here – the five Bennett daughters, the overbearing mother trying to marry them off, the headstrong Lizzie and the prideful Mr. Darcy – all here, with all the supporting players. The manga style allows for exaggerated facial expressions, adding a relatable dimension to the more restrained drawing room drama.

The book reads in manga style: that is, from right to left, and a note to readers at the end of the book explains this. There’s a letter to the reader from Stacy King, discussing the appeal of Pride and Prejudice to modern audiences, particularly teenagers.

This is a great introduction to the classics for tweens and teens, especially those who may find the classics “boring”. I’d love to get a few copies of these manga classics on my library shelves and get kids reading them in preparation for the real thing – it lays a great groundwork and adds faces to put to the names, so when they do pick up the book, they’ll be more familiar with the characters and the world where the story takes place.

And heck, I’m going to sit down and read Pride and Prejudice again, myself.

Posted in Fantasy, Tween Reads, Uncategorized

Frostborn – Family Intrigue, Frost Giants, and Dragons!

Posted on by Rosemary Kiladitis

frostbornFrostborn, by Lou Anders, (Aug. 2014, Random House Children’s). $16.99, ISBN: 978-0385387781

Recommended for ages 10-13

Take one firstborn son, heir to a large, multi-generational family farm. Add one half frost giant-half human girl, whose mother’s past is shrouded in mystery. Place in a backdrop of a Norse mythological world, and add dragons, and you have the potential for a fantastic adventure. This is the world of Lou Anders’ Frostborn.

Karn is the son of a landowner, expected to take over the family farm one day. He’d rather just play Thrones and Bones, a board game of strategy. Thianna is a half-human frost giant, an outcast of sorts, never quite belonging to their world; her human mother’s origins lay wreathed in mystery. When the frost giants and the humans in Karn’s father’s tribe gather for their annual trading meeting, Karn’s traitorous uncle sets plans into motion that send Karn and Thianna on the run for their lives.

I thoroughly enjoyed this book; fans of mythology-based fantasy will, too. Anders is a Hugo Award-winning editor; this is his first book, and kicks off a promising fantasy series that will appeal to boys and girls alike. I love that Karn is a “gamer” – and so are other characters in the book, which will appeal to gamer boys and girls out there, who try to explain to their disapproving parents that games help sharpen their mental acuity. The characters have rich backgrounds, with the promise of more to be revealed in future books, and Anders’ description of various terrain is so vivid, I could feel the chill of the frozen land of the frost giants.

If you’ve got middle graders looking for a fantasy series along the lines of Kelley Armstrong’s Blackwell Pages, this is a great place to steer them. The book hits stores today – go get your copy!

Posted in Fiction, Humor, Middle Grade, Tween Reads, Uncategorized

Frank Einstein and the Antimatter Motor – Jon Scieszka makes science awesome.

Posted on by Rosemary Kiladitis

anitmatter motorFrank Einstein and the Antimatter Motor, by Jon Scieszka (2014), $13.95, ISBN: 9781419712180

Recommended for ages 8-12

In his neverending quest to get boys – and guys! – to read, Jon Sciezska has taken on alternative history (The Time Warp Trio), fractured fairy tales (so very many), and anthology genres (his Guys Read series). He’s got a website devoted to getting men and boys to love books, and understands that there are biological and sociological factors tied into the recent decline in boys’ reading; he’s determined to find the best books and the best subject matter to write about.

Frank Einstein and the Antimatter Motor is Sciezka’s foray into science, and it is fantastic. Frank Einstein is a kid who loves science. While his parents are away, scoping out travel locations for his dad’s job, he’s with his grandfather, working on experiments in his quest to win the science fair. He’s up against his archenemy, the bratty T. Edison, who is not above stealing others’ ideas to further his own fame – and buy up Einstein’s grandpa’s shop.

Frank finds that one of his experiments wasn’t a bust after all – his attempt to create robots worked, with some lighting providing electricity! Klink and Klank are a hilarious duo who work to help Frank create an antimatter machine – until T. Edison starts to make trouble.

Scieszka loads his novel up with legit science backup, and it is amazing to read. I learned about antimatter and robotics in a way that no science textbook ever taught me as a kid. Teachers and librarians should be all over this book for its nonfiction elements that will enhance their Common Core curriculum, but mainly because it’s fun, it’s hard science made readable and understandable, and Scieszka never, ever talks down to his audience. Brian Biggs’ illustrations will empower every kid to make their own antimatter machines at home – trust and believe it. And while they’re at it, kids will be breaking down states of matter so that we parents can finally figure it out.

The book releases on August 19th. Pre-order yours from Amazon today.

Posted in Graphic Novels, Non-fiction, Teen, Tween Reads, Uncategorized

Raina Telgemeier’s Sisters – A Companion Tale to Smile

Posted on by Rosemary Kiladitis

sistersSisters, by Raina Telgemeier, (Aug. 2014, Scholastic Graphix). $10.99, ISBN: 9780545540605

Recommended for ages 10+

A companion to her Eisner Award-winning graphic novel, Smile, Sisters examines Raina Telgemeier’s relationship with her sister, Amara. The autobiographical novel takes place mainly during a road trip to visit her mother’s family that Telgemeier took when she was 14, with flashbacks that spotlight key points in Raina and Amara’s relationship, leading up to the road trip.

Sisters is about relationships, and emotions that come into play in those relationships. The primary relationship is the one between Raina and Amara, but there are other important relationships here – relationships that, for the purposes of this book, orbit Raina and Amara, but will strike a chord with any reader – the relationship between the sisters and their younger brother, Will; their relationship between their parents; the relationships between their mother and her siblings (and how it mirrors theirs) and the relationship between Raina and her cousins.

Sisters examines family tension on many levels – it’s not a dark novel, but it does inject realism and humor into situations many of us know all too well, and Ms. Telgemeier’s soft cartoon art is like comfort food for my psyche.

Smile still continues to be one of the most popular graphic novels in my library. I’m positive that Sisters will join it.

Posted in Uncategorized

Benny and Penny in Lost and Found – A WhatchaReading Review!

Posted on by Rosemary Kiladitis

If you’ve got kids, I hope by now you’ve introduced them to comic books. When I was a kid, kids’ comics meant Richie Rich, Casper, and Archie. Now? There are virtually hundreds of titles to get kids started on a love of graphic, sequential storytelling.

Toon Books is a great resource for parents and educators that want to get more graphic novels into their little ones’ lives. I have a pretty nice collection of Toon Books in my library, including Jeff Smith’s Little Mouse Gets Ready. You read that right – Bone’s Jeff Smith does comics for Toon. Quality creators making quality comics.

Today, though, I’m talking Benny and Penny, the brother and sister mouse series also published by Toon and written by Geoffrey Hayes, who also won a Theodor Seuss Geisel Award for the series back in 2010. The siblings’ newest adventure, Benny and Penny in Lost and Found, hits shelves on August 5th, and is an adorable addition to the series.

Read more of my review over at WhatchaReading and pre-order your copy of Benny and Penny in Lost and Found here!

benny and penny

Posted in Middle School, Realistic Fiction, Tween Reads, Uncategorized

Somebody on This Bus is Going to Be Famous – but why?

Posted on by Rosemary Kiladitis

busSomebody on This Bus is Going to Be Famous, by J.B. Cheaney (Sept. 2014, Sourcebooks Jabberwocky), $16.99, ISBN: 9781402292972

Recommended for ages 9-13

The bus picks the kids up every day, and heads to school. Someone, someday soon, is going to be famous. But why?

The story takes a deeper look into the lives of nine people on that bus – eight kids, one adult (the bus driver, Ms. B), twining their narratives, as their lives intersect, and leading to a taut climax. There’s Shelley, the wannabe pop star; Miranda, so desperate to have popular kids be her friend that she’ll let them walk all over her; Spencer, the nerd who’s having a crisis of faith in himself; Igor, whose dad is a big mystery that he wants to unravel; Jay, the jock whose grandfather – his biggest fan – is slipping away; Bender, the son who can’t get out of his brother’s shadow, Matthew, who’s just… average – at first; and Alice, who has some secrets of her own. Tied into these stories is the story of the high school graduation of 1985, where a prank was carried out, with tragic circumstances.

I had a rough time with this book. I didn’t like most of the characters, who just didn’t seem to be like good people. As I thought more about them, though, I realized that it’s not that they’re good or bad, they’re kids. They’re largely elementary and middle school students, and the depictions are pretty realistic-adolescence can be a hard time, and sometimes, tweens and teens and adults just don’t speak one another’s language. The narratives are largely depressing – there is some humor in the book, but most of these kids have some pretty awful stuff happening in their lives.

The ending was satisfying, and the overall story will draw readers in with the different narratives. The book can be used in a book group discussion on different personalities working together.

Posted in Uncategorized

Batman Turns 75! Let’s Celebrate!

Posted on by Rosemary Kiladitis

Today is Batman’s 75th Anniversary, and libraries, bookstores and comic stores all over the country are getting in on the party. I’ve got a birthday party planned today at Queens Library (Pomonok) at 4 p.m., which will feature Bat-Goody bags courtesy of DC and Random House, some Justice League animated series, and of course, birthday cupcakes.

batman masks

Check out my article on WhatchaReading to find out what other giveaways are going on for Batman Day – make sure to visit your local comic book stores, libraries, and bookstores to celebrate!

Posted in Fantasy, Fiction, Teen, Tween Reads, Uncategorized

Egg and Spoon – Gregory Maguire spins a rich Russian fairytale

Posted on by Rosemary Kiladitis

egg and spoonEgg and Spoon, by Gregory Maguire (Candlewick, Sept. 2014). $17.99, ISBN: 9780763672201

Recommended for ages 12+

Gregory Maguire is renowned for creating his alternate versions of fairy tales, most notably, Wicked. In Egg and Spoon, he creates a sweeping Russian fairy tale, encompassing historical figures such as Tsar Nikolai Romanov and Rasputin, and fantasy favorites like Baba Yaga, the Phoenix/Firebird, and the Slavic Dragon, to create a sweeping tale that goes from the impoverished Russian countryside all the way to Saint Petersburg and beyond.

At its heart is a tale reminiscent of The Prince and the Pauper: a young peasant girl named Elena meets a spoiled rich girl named Ekaterina, when Ekaterina’s train breaks down in Elena’s village. Elena’s mother is dying, her brothers have been called off either to military service or employment, and her father is dead. She wants to go to St. Petersburg to ask the tsar to send her brother home to help care for their mother. Fate intervenes, and the two girls swap places, where each learns about the other girl’s life by living her life. Baba Yaga shows up, because the chaotic seasons are causing her distress, and she ends up becoming Ekaterina’s guardian as they proceed to St. Petersburg to ask the tsar what’s going on in the world.

The tale, narrated by a prisoner in the tsar’s tower, looks at magic in the everyday world, and what a stabilizing force it is. There are themes of family, friendship, and morality all at play, with a lot of humor – Baba Yaga is hilarious here – and conflict.

My only concern here is that at almost 500 pages, middle graders may balk at reading this. Teens will enjoy the story, and it’s a book that really should be on every library shelf. This one will win awards, there’s no question. The writing is beautiful and there are some incredible themes explored. A semester-long unit on fairy tales for older students would really be enhanced by using this book, and book groups for all ages will never run out of material to talk about.