Monthly Archives: November 2017

Reading Advent Calendar

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Start a new tradition this year and read a different holiday book every night this December until Christmas. Here are some suggestions from our children’s librarians.

  1. Dream Snow by Eric Carle
  2. Willowby’s Christmas Tree by Robert Barry
  3. The Nutcracker by Susan Jeffers
  4. Bear Stays Up for Christmas by Karma Wilson
  5. How the Grinch Stole Christmas by Dr. Seuss
  6. Frosty the Snowman by Steve Nelson
  7. Are You Grumpy, Santa? By Greg Spiridellis
  8. A Charlie Brown Christmas by Charles Schulz
  9. Christmas in the Barn by Margaret Wise Brown
  10. Who Will Guide My Sleigh Tonight? By Jarry Pallotta
  11. Christmas Time by Gail Gibbons
  12. The Polar Express by Chris Van Allsburg
  13. Christmas Cookies by Amy Rosenthal
  14. Splendiferous Christmas by Jane O’Connor
  15. Santa is Coming to Indiana by Steve Smallman
  16. Where’s Is Baby’s Christmas Present? by Karen Katz
  17. A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens and Brett Helquist
  18. The Little Match Girl by Jerry Pinkney
  19. Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer by Robert L. May
  20. 12 Days of Christmas by Rachel Isadora
  21. Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus by Francis Church
  22. I Spy Christmas: a Book of Christmas Riddles by Jean Marzollo
  23. But What if There’s No Chimney? By Emily Thompson
  24. The Night Before Christmas by Clement Moore

Books on the Big Screen

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Summer is known for blockbuster movies, but it’s the holiday season that makes me the most excited.  November and December have brought us Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, Les Miserables, and this year’s Murder on the Orient Express.  The holidays always seem to bring some great books to life on the big screen.  If you love reading the books that inspired the movies, then check out this list of titles that have recently been (or soon will be) given the star treatment.  Do you have a favorite movie adaptation?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Review: Orhan’s Inheritance

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Orhan’s Inheritance
by Aline Ohanesian
4 stars

In her debut novel, Aline Ohanesian magnificently draws us a story that is brutal and heartbreaking, yet is a story of courage, love and family secrets. The story begins in 1990, set in Anatolia, a region of Turkey, when Orhan’s grandfather Kemal is found dead, submerged in a vat of dye. Kemal is the owner of a successful business making kilim rugs. Orhan inherits the business, but his beloved grandfather has left the family home to a 90-year-old women named Seda in an Armenian nursing home in Los Angeles. Orhan goes to Los Angeles to learn why his grandfather did this and hopefully what her relationship was with his grandfather. Orhan slowly gets Seda to tell him her story about the Armenian Genocide that took place in 1915 when the Armenian Christians were forced from their homes and massacred by the Turks in which Seda survived. Ohanesian navigates the reader through the past and future until each character is unveiled. I had no knowledge of the Armenian Genocide during WWI until I read this book and was surprised that this was not covered in any of my history classes. I highly recommend this book, although it does have some violence and sexual content and is hard to read at times.

 

Read-alikes

The Gendarme by Mark Mustian

The Sandcastle Girls by Chris Bohjalian

The Storyteller by Jodi Picoult

Teen Fall Reads

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Despite working at the library and being a lover of books and reading, I often find myself in reading slumps.  Nothing sounds good, interesting, or worth my time.  That’s when I usually turn to my friends and colleagues for book recommendations – or I take a look at one of our library lists!

If you’re a teen looking for your next favorite read, or an adult interested in dipping your toe in teen literature, TeenHQ definitely has suggestions including a new display wall currently featuring “Fall Reads 2017.”  Our guide includes 18 new or highly recommended books to add to your to-be-read list including:

 

Roar by Cora Carmack

As the sole heir of Pavan, Aurora’s groomed to be the perfect queen.  She’s intelligent and brave and honorable.  But she’s yet to show any trace of the magic she’ll need to protect her people.  To keep her secret and save her crown, Aurora’s mother arranges for her to marry a dark and brooding Stormling prince from another kingdom.

 

 

Waste of Space by Gina Damico

Cram ten hormonal teens into a spaceship and blast off: that’s the premise for the ill-conceived reality show Waste of Space.  The cast knows everything about drama – and nothing about the fact that the production is fake.

 

 

Defy the Stars by Claudia Gray

Teenaged soldier Noemi and an enemy robot, Abel, who is programmed to obey her commands, set out on an interstellar quest to save her home planet, Earthy colony Genesis.

 

 

Front Lines by Michael Grant

1942, World War II.  The most terrible war in human history.. Millions are dead; millions more are still to die.  The green, untested American army is going up against eh greatest fighting force ever assembled – the armed forces of Nazi, Germany.  But something has changed.  A court decision makes females subject to the draft and eligible for service.  So in this World War II, women and girls fight, too.

 

My Lady Jane by Cynthia Hand

On the eve of her marriage to a stranger, sixteen-year-old Lady Jane Grey is swept up in a conspiracy to usurp the throne from her cousin.

 

 

 

Hearts & Other Body Parts by Ira Bloom

Esme, Katy, and Ronnie Silver hail from a long line of witches, but their sisterly bond is broken when two very different boys enter their lives.

 

Happy reading!

 

Podcast: Books to Movies

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There is a new #GPLtalk podcast for your listening pleasure!

Reading enthusiasts tend to have a love/hate relationship with book to movie adaptations. While there is a place in our hearts that desires greatly to see our favorite stories played out before us on the silver screen, there is always the chance that our expectations, our hopes and dreams, will be unfilled or defiled.

This month, your friendly neighborhood librarians are discussing (for better or worse) what books they would love to see adapted for film – along with a short discussion about Harry Potter which was inevitable.

 

 

And as promised in the cast, here are a list of the books not included because of time.

 

Emily’s List:

Highly Illogical Behavior by John Corey Whaley

Vengeance Road by Erin Bowman

Heartless by Marissa Meyer

 

Aubrey’s List:

Winner’s Trilogy by Marie Rutkoski

The Eyre Affair by Jasper Fforde

The Witch of Blackbird Pond by Elizabeth George Speare

 

Jessica’s List:

Shadow and Bone by Leigh Bardugo

Scorpio Races by Maggie Stiefvater

Hearts & Other Body Parts by Ira Bloom

 

Valerie’s List:

Nevernight by Jay Kristoff

A Great and Terrible Beauty by Libba Bray

A Discovery of Witches by Deborah Harkness