Beastly

There have been several releases of movies based upon books lately. One of these is Beastly by Alex Flinn. This is a modern retelling of the classic fairy tale, Beauty and the Beast. Don't forget that there is always more to the story in a book than can be crammed into 90 minute movie, so come by and check it out for the rest of the story.

If you liked Beastly, you might enjoy Ms. Flinn's other books. Visit her website to see the full list.

December 2010

We only have two more weeks before we are out for the Christmas holidays!That doesn't give us much time to prepare. I'm going to change out the books on the Shelfari shelf so that we can discuss Christmas stories. Please comment and let me know what your favorite story is.

November

The Scholastic Book Fair was a great success and we appreciate everyone's help to make it that way! We received over $1300 in book credits, some of which we took off the carts. Some we will use to order from the Scholastic Resource Catalog. So, there are new books in the library! We also pulled some paperback books to use as incentives at the end of the school year again. Last year we ran a little low, but now we are fully stocked.

Here is the trailer to one of our new books, The Maze Runner:

October

October is one of my favorite months, because I love to read slightly scary stories to students! Some of my favorite stories are "The Ghost-eye Tree" by Bill Martin, Jr., "The Witch's Broom" by Chris Van Allsburg, and "The Graveyard Book" by Neil Gaiman. The last one has a wonderfully creepy book trailer!

The Graveyard Book Trailer Narrated by Neil Gaiman -

MEISD Library

Well, my plan was to post weekly, but as you can tell that has not happened. Ms. Toni and I are working on cleaning up the shelves in the library. We are cleaning books that have gotten grubby over the years and repairing books and labels. Ms. Toni is also busy labeling books for AR.

School has gotten off to a really great start this year and we have already placed an order for new books. Hopefully, they will be in, processed, and on the shelves before Thanksgiving.

Save up your money for the Scholastic Book Fair in the library November 1st through November 5th!

See you soon and keep reading!

New Books!

We have just put out new books! For the elementary level, we have several new picture books, the complete set of "Diary of a Wimpy Kid" books, 6 Goosebumps, and a new series of Martin Bridge books.

For JH/HS, we have a wide variety of fiction and non-fiction including "Sunrise Over Fallujah" by Walter Dean Myers, "Jessica's Guide to Dating on the Dark Side", and the rest of the Leven Thumps series.

There's something for everyone. Come by and check them out!!!

Twilight

Well, I read "Twilight" by Stephanie Meyer earlier this year. The tension between the two main characters and the writing was well-developed. However, I was rather disturbed by Bella's callousness when she joked about locking the doors at the Prom so that her classmates, her friends, could be slaughtered.

Sorry it's been so long since the last post. I have been busy processing lots of new books. We now have all of the Twilight books for you high school students (and teachers), and lots of sports books and a series of Jack Sparrow books for elementary students. Anyone might be interested in the World's Deadliest series or the Most Amazing series. Please post feedback and let me know which books you like and which you don't.

Christmas stories

It is time to bring out Christmas stories. A few of my favorites are Polar Express by Chris Van Allsburg, Santa Calls by William Joyce, and The Gift of the Magi by O. Henry. What are your favorites?

Books, books, books

I am a little behind reviewing latest releases because I have been trying to catch up on some classics. Recently, I've read "Uncle Tom's Cabin", "Fahrenheit 451", and "The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman". They all deserve to be classics.

For fun I recommend "I'd Tell You I Love You, But Then I'd Have to Kill You" for 7th grade up, and for elementary, "Scared Witless". The later is a collection of short scary stories with tips on telling them effectively. "The Stranger" by Chris Van Allsburg, "The Ghost-Eye Tree" by Bill Martin, Jr., and "Diane Goode's Book of Scary Stories and Rhymes" are all favorites for this month (October). - Happy Reading!

Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson

A student recommended Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson the other day, so I took it home to read. WOW! Ms. Anderson has given her main character, Melinda Sordino, a very strong voice even though Melinda speaks very little.

Something happened at an end-of -summer party and Melinda called the cops. Now, she is an outcast at Merryweather High. Her friends won't talk to her, and people she doesn't know glare at her. The lies and hypocrisies of High School push her further into isolation and make her more mute. This makes it more difficult to avoid the painful memories haunting the edges of her consciousness. But, the truth will not be silenced.

Getting started

The hardest part of any new endeavor is getting started. This is my very first blog entry on my very first blog and I am nervous that this blog will appear amateurish (which it is, but I don't want it to look that way!).

The idea here is that our school community can use this platform to share ideas, feelings, concerns about books and other types of media (magazines, news articles, books on tape, websites, etc.). Well, let's get started!