Fablehaven by Brandon Mull

Believe it or not, I'm really not much of a fantasy reader. Yes, I love Harry Potter, but I tend to stick more to real science fiction, and maybe vampire/monster which are really more horror than fantasy. However, I got this book free from the bookstore. We had an Educator's event and had several copies of this book with a teacher's guide in the back. Our CRM told me I should take a copy since they were free since I am a teacher. So I did, and I read it at school during my lunch breaks. It actually was pretty good.

Basically the main characters are Kendra and her younger brother Seth. One of their grandparents dies and leaves money for all the children to go on a cruise. So Kendra and Seth are sent to their other side's grandparents to stay while they are on the cruise. At first it seems like a really beautiful estate with lots of pretty butterflies and lots of weird rules and people. Their grandmother is supposedly off visiting other family so they are left with their grandfather. Soon it turns out that Fablehaven is not what it seems. There is an old witch tied up in the forest where they are not supposed to go. There's a beautiful pool hidden away also in an area they're not supposed to go. Also, turns out those butterflies are fairies. And you can see them when you drink a special type of milk. Of course Seth just can't seem to follow rules, and this soon lets evil things appear on this special sanctuary for the supernatural.

Obama Zombies by Jason Mattera

Now, you might think with all the books like Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, that this is a zombie horror story. You might also think that based on the other books that I read. But no, this is a nonfiction book. I am conservative, and vote mostly Republican, and the full title of this book caught my attention right away: Obama Zombies: How the Liberal Machine Brainwashed my Generation. And what got me was how many of the Obama supporters did seem brainwashed. They couldn't tell me what really about him they liked. In fact, some seemed to overlook the facts of what he didn't support that applied to them personally.

When I picked this book up, it sucked me right in. Had my jaw dropping open as I read of some of the craziness the liberals were promoting, (not flushing the toilet when you only go "number 1"). How disgusted have you personally been when you've walked into a public restroom only to find the person there before you didn't bother to flush. At the time I just assumed they were disgusting pigs, now I know they must be liberals fighting for the environment. But is it just me, or does that just scream filth and disease? Aren't we trying to help countries who don't have running water to help them with their disease prevention? There were parts where I was just nodding my head along with what he pointed out as the behavior of an Obama Zombie as I remembered all the people I knew who had acted just that way. And yes, there were times I thought, good point, but I don't agree completely. And that, right there, is the difference between an Obama zombie, and someone trying to say I'm just blindly following the "right". I choose to question and think about and do my own research on anything someone says unless I already know based on past experience/research what they are saying is true. In fact, I dare any liberal person who reads this blog to go and read this book and then come back to me and refute whatever they don't agree with in this book, and not just argue based on their feelings and emotions as a liberal does, but back up their opinion with facts.

I did mark a few sections in the book I'd like to point out specifically, so here they are:

On p. 47 there is a pledge from Anthony Kiedis of the Red Hot Chili Peppers that says he pledges to be a servant to our president. A servant? This isn't a king, this is a politician who is supposed to be OUR servant, serving US in office. But then, socialism/liberalism does lead back to the days where government regulates us and tells us how to live and how to spend our money, so I guess this does work for them.

Another point made is that it is a good thing when terrorist states don't like what you're doing. This point is made on p. 72, and I can't explain it as well as Mattera does, so go read it yourself.

On p. 76 he brings up a saying that we use in my Weight Watchers meetings almost every week, if you fail to plan, you plan to fail. If we're not prepared for those people who want to destroy our countries, we are destined for more attacks.

Next on talking about global warming and the environment on p. 91, it is discussed about how 6000 "experts" were flown in from around the country to lobby Congress about how much American rely on CO2 in our daily lives. Yet they all flew in on planes. So basically as Mattera says, It's okay for them to fly around the country to engage in activites that they believe in, but they are the first to condemn your own buying choices and lifestyle habits. I guess they were only following Obama's example of burning through 9,100 gallons of fuel to parachute into Iowa to give a speech on Earth day about energy conservation.

Next is the whole thing about redistribution of wealth. One college student made up a petition to put this in another way to think about it. What if we redistributed grades. Some people at the very top of the GPA don't need the extra points, so in the name of fairness and equality, lets allocate those points down the GPA ladder to those people who aren't currently meeting the GPA requirements to graduate. Of course the students didn't agree with that, it isn't fair to take points away from people who earned it. However according to those same people it is okay to take money away from the people who worked hard to earn it? Huh?

There was a quote that was a huge eye opener to me, on p. 146 it is postulated that the total cost of all miliary wars in our nation's history is $6.4 trillion. The war on poverty however, started in 1964 by Lyndon Johnson has cost $16 trillion. And nothing has changed! In fact more people are needing help from the government because of the welfare cycle this started. Read Ruby Payne's book on Poverty and see how this works first hand. The numbers say that in 2007 it would have taken for all households in poverty in America to get out of poverty, $148 billion. That would eliminate poverty entirely. In 2007, do you know how much was spent to try to do this? $550 billion. Shouldn't everyone be out of poverty now? Welfare spending has grown 300% in the past decade, where defense spending has only grown 126%. Obama says the war in Iraq is costing each household about $100 per month. Well, social services across the nation cost each household about $638 a month for 2010!! And actually, go back and look, while Obama says Bush slashed programs to combat poverty, he actually increased welfare programs by 68%, with 2008 spending over $700 billion. So guess in a sense I have a gripe with Bush as well.

And the last thing I marked to make a note of is kind of a trivial thing. But did you know that Jon Stewart is actually Jon Leibowitz? Why go by a stage name? Are you ashamed of your heritage? Yet aren't liberals supposed to be more accepting of everyone? I won't even go into the sections about how people who didn't vote for Obama are called racist, although aren't those people who voted for him because he was black kind of doing the same thing? And all the people who were being sexist against Palin, why is that okay? How does that fit in with Obama making all people equal? And not looking at race or sex or sexual preference? Which by the way, those websites I looked at when I was first thinking about all the candidates showed that Obama did not support gay marriage. So, hmm.

I haven't really gone into what the chapter on global warming talked about, because as someone with a degree in earth science, who has talked to many geologists on this point, I pretty much agreed with all he said. While I feel we should still do things to take care of the Earth, I believe that we are spending a lot of money to do it in a way that hurts us. Also, didn't realize that in 1974 (I was only 2 at the time) that Time magazine ran a story about the big environmental crisis that we were going into an ice age!! How funny!

Anyway, just finished this about 2 hours ago and had to get it blogged so I could pass the book onto my brother who is really eager to read it. And my brother isn't much of a reader. I remember he read Bo Knows Bo for many a book report in middle school, because it was the only book he really ever read enough to talk about.

Rhett Butler's People by Donald McCaig

I can pinpoint the teachers who led me to some of my quirky favorites in movies. First, my grandpa. No, he wasn't ever a "teacher" per se, but I do feel that he taught me in many different ways, and shaped a lot of who I am. He was an engineer, and I know it is from him that I developed my interest in astronomy, and probably other science. But whever we visited my Grandpa and Grandma Moritz's house, there was a big yellow book called Why a Duck with a cartoon picture of Groucho Marx's head. It is from my Grandpa that I got my love of all things Marx Brothers. I can even remember him laughing at certain parts of the movies when we'd watch them at his house when we went into the air conditioning during the annual family garage sales.

Second is my 8th grade science teacher/principal. I went to a private school, and so the principal was also a teacher, Mr. Riedl. In fact, he was a science teacher, my current occupation. But I remember watching Court Jester, with Danny Kaye one day at school when I was in 7th or 8th grade. Again, I can remember him laughing loudly at the "Flaggon with the Dragon" part of the movie. From this I became a Danny Kaye fan.

Third was my freshman year, my Citizenship class teacher, Mr. Jarvis. In class he showed us the movie The Gods Must Be Crazy. I remember watching the beginning and thinking, wow, another boring school movie, but still being glad we were watching a movie instead of doing work. But if you've seen this movie, you know it is not a boring movie at all. It is a hilarious look at modern day technology, a coke bottle, and how it can corrupt very simple cultures in ways we can't even imagine.

And the last teacher, leads into this book, my junior year American History teacher, Coach Durham. He showed us Gone With the Wind. I fell in love with it. I wanted to be Scarlett and have all the beaus after me. In a way, I have always felt like Scarlett, in that I never quite wanted what was right for me, and often didn't realize the good thing until it was gone. Of course, the reader that I am had to go out and read the book. And then in the early 90's a sequel called Scarlett was published. And I loved that too, even though the critics weren't huge fans. It made me cry, and I felt so much for Scarlett and all the bad choices she made, again, relating to her in that way at least.

When Rhett Butler's People came out in 2007, I ordered it from the book club I belonged to at the time. It has sat in my bookshelf of books to be read since that time. I couldn't quite bring myself to pick it up. Not sure why, just couldn't. But now, once I picked it up, I couldn't put it down. I fell right back in love the with the story. And I loved all the way we got to see into everyone's thoughts in this story. I worried as it started that it would only go up to the time when Rhett got married to Scarlett. Needless to say it followed right on through the end of Gone With the Wind and past. Totally didn't go with Scarlett, and while yes, I do love that story, I do like how this one ended a bit better. I cried, I smiled, I just loved this book. I can't gush enough about how much I liked it. Again, not sure the critics were big fans of this one either, but I loved it. I think I need to get the movie out again and watch it. I loved seeing Rhett's side of the story and his family, and Melanie Wilkes's side, etc.

Drumroll please, and the 100th post is: Your Big Break by Johanna Edwards

Kinda wish I had a more spectacular book that I just loved and could gush over for my 100th post, but oh well.

Your Big Break was my latest chick lit book. It was pretty good, but not the best. The main character is Dani, she works for a company called Your Big Break, Inc. This company offers services such as breaking up with a loved one, or even helping you quit a job. Of course a lot of the guys Dani has to break up with seem to be pretty nice guys, one in particular. However, as you can imagine, one of the main rules is that you can't get personally involved. Dani always seems to get personally involved in some way or other, and tends to kind of be a matchmaker.

The bad thing is that a new client comes in, and wants to dump her married boyfriend, who turns out to be Dani's dad. So Dani is now learning her parents' marriage isn't quite what she'd always thought.

It was a pretty predictable book, and a quick read. I think the other book by this author, How to Be Cool, was better. But it was one that I did want to finish, unlike the one I currently have sitting to read, called the Dating Game. Not sure I'm going to read much more of that. I have finally decided that if it's not good in the first few chapters, then pass it on, because I have so many "to-read" books, shouldn't waste time on it.

This World We Live In by Susan Beth Pfeffer

First, I have to say how disappointed I am right now that due to my current financial situation I'm unable to attend the MASL spring conference where the author of this book, Susan Beth Pfeffer will be. I thought about asking our librarian to take my books to get autographed, but then decided it's just not the same as getting it done myself and then having a picture with the author to show off. I wish when I'd gotten Stephenie Meyer's autograph I'd gotten a picture, and don't remember why I didn't. I didn't get Ellen Hopkins autograph my first year at MASL, I'm not too disappointed about that now that I'm not as impressed with her after listening to her bash on Stephenie Meyer over and over. I have no respect for someone who treats someone else in their field that way just because they don't like their work.

Anyway, back to the book. This is the 3rd in the series that started with Life as We Knew It. In the first book, an asteroid slams into the moon and knocks it out of its orbit, closer to Earth. Of course this causes all kinds of problems, earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, and all this soon causes clouds to block out the sun. Which leads to cold and electricity soon goes out and plants and people die. In the first book the main character is Miranda, it is her diary we're reading. The 2nd book is The Dead and The Gone, and it is set in New York city with Alex Morales and his sisters being our main characters. This books is in Miranda's hometown again, and we see how life is almost a year later. And soon her father and step-mom and new baby brother show up. Along with them are Alex and his sister Julie.

This was a good book, I didn't want to put it down because I just wanted to know, do things get better now that they're all reunited. But alas, spoiler alert, things don't get better. Some things are worse, some are a little better, but we aren't left in a wonderful feel good mood. But I still think it was a good book.

I didn't know there was going to be a 3rd in the series, so hoping that maybe there'll be a fourth so I can see what happens next?

Reincarnation by Suzanne Weyn

Funny story, I took this when it was a stripped cover book at the store. Then bought it later at a school bookfair. So I was able to conveniently keep one copy at school to read at lunch, and then, when it turned out to be such a good read, I was able to read it at home as well.

This is the story of two, you might call them star-crossed lovers, people who keep meeting over time as they are reincarnated as different people in different times, and always something keeps them apart, or ends one of their lives right as things are about to start happening for them. It begins with the boy as a Neanderthal I'm guessing, and the girl as a Cro-Magnon. Then they are an Egyptian and a Nubian, then they come back in ancient Greece, and so on and so forth. Almost all the times we see them also seem to be either big historical times, or else very charged with some kind of racial tension. At one point the girl is even reincarnated as a guy, and the guy is reincarnated as a girl.

Fun story, and in the end, modern times, it seems as if they may actually get a chance to be together, although the story leaves off before we could possibly know for sure. But we are left with hope.

Velvet Rope Diaries by Daniella Brodsky

The latest in my chick lit books kept in my bedroom bathroom so I could read during bubble baths. This was a fun read. Anna is the main character, she is working as a secretary/assistant for a horrible boss that she calls Miss Nasty Jackson. She gets fired when she creates a power point talking about all the plastic surgery her boss has had and the gossip column reporter at the paper gets ahold of it, and publishes a lot of the info from it. You think, who cares about a reporter for a gossip column, but it turns out she's dating a big star. But, when she gets fired, she also gets rehired writing a column about New York City nightlife.

AT first she can't seem to get a lead on where to start to find the "new" unfound hip spots. She gets a tip from a woman at a spa, who becomes a friend. But when she goes to this spot, she isn't let in because she has on last year's Marc Jacobs sandals. She gets upset because she gets humiliated by the bouncer about this, and ends up sneaking around and finding a back door to go in. The dark room she ends up in has another occupant, a sexy stranger, who soon becomes her boyfriend, and turns out to be the brother of her new friend who gave her this tip.

Now of course, she has back issues. When she was a young girl, her father died in a house fire, and she feels like she is guilty, that she could have saved him. So we see her going through therapy for this. She also lives with a guy who is her best friend, Ray. It soon becomes evident, that he might think of her more than a friend, and so now she has this great guy she's just met, and must choose between him, and possibly ruining a friendship to try dating her best friend.

There were some pages I marked in the book that I want to share, and here they are:

When she talks about how it's been a long time since she's kissed a guy, she talks about wondering if she'll remember how to do it. I feel this way, only it's been MUCH longer for me.

There's a part where they're talking about Weight Watchers magazine, and it is really irritating to me, because her boss, Miss Nasty talks about how it is overweight women who love to sit at home and read, because they're too humiliated to go out looking like that. HOW RUDE!@!

And finally, this book makes me really want a perm. I hate my straight/frizzy hair, and really wish I could get a perm, a loose one that is available these days. Not one of those godawful ones I had back in grade school and high school.

What I Saw and How I Lied by Judy Blundell

So I have to admit that in the case of this book, I didn't look farther than the cover, and wasn't actually quite aware of what this book was about. I assumed being a teen book and with this title it was about a teen issue. But no, it was a bit deeper than that. It is set after World War II is over. Evie's stepfather, the only father she's ever known, returns from the war, and he is immediately getting back into the swing of things and opens up two appliance stores and seems to be doing well. Soon Joe starts getting weird phone calls, and acting weird, and decides to take the family on a vacation right before school is supposed to start, down to Florida. In Florida, they meet a nice couple, the Graysons, that Joe talks about going into business with. Also, a guy named Peter Coleridge shows up. He is an ex-GI who served with Joe. And Evie falls for him. Her mother is beautiful, and Evie feels like an ugly duckling, especially when her mother won't even let her start looking like a teen, and growing up.

One day the Graysons get kicked out of the hotel. It turns out that they are Jewish, and in the part of Florida they're in, they don't allow Jewish people. Evie also finds out from Peter, that he and Joe stole belongings that were found near concentration camps that had no one left alive to claim them. And it is that money he used to start his appliance stores, and he was supposed to have shared it with Peter.

As you can guess Joe is not happy with Peter showing up. So Joe, and Peter, and Evie's mom go out on a boat, right as a hurricane is coming. And, when they come back, one of them isn't there. So that is what was seen, and what gets lied about.

Not too bad a book. I like that it had more substance than I originally thought. It was a quick read though, which is nice as it was my "at school-lunch" read.

Generation Dead by Daniel Waters

This is the book I kept at school to read during my lunch breaks. I got it at the enemy store because they had it in their bargain books for $3.99. It was an interesting story. Kind of my first "zombie" story, other than Pride and Prejudice and Zombies.

So, the premise is that teenagers are coming back from the dead. They don't know why, and not all teenagers, and no adults, are coming back. The town our story is set in seems to be somewhat more accepting than other towns, so they have begun to flock to this town. The sad thing is they don't come back just normal, they come back like you'd kind of think of zombies. Slow, trouble moving and speaking. Some come back to families that don't want them, and they have to find out where to live. Some come back though in better condition than others. The main character is Phoebe, who is a goth. Her best friend Adam, is on the football team. One of her best friends from when she was younger, Colette, is a zombie who has come back. Zombie is considered a derogatory term, and so it is like a brand new "race" if you will that is trying to fit in and find out what rights they have.

Now I remember commenting on another teen book a while back about how it is kind of annoying that all books these days must be series. Why aren't there just stand alone books? I can see that this one could be, although it ends with some questions. There is a sequel to this I guess, not sure whether I need to read it or not, we'll see. Anyway, a pretty interesting read. I'll put it on my shelves at school in my classroom for my students to read.

Black House by Stephen King and Peter Straub

Well, I struggled through this book at first. We start out from the viewpoint of a bird, and it kind of stays like that for what I feel is too long a time. I always wonder how does more than one person write a book. In this case, I almost wonder if the parts that I enjoyed and got into were actually the parts written by Stephen King, and the parts that dragged and bored me written by Peter Straub. No offense to Straub, but I am a big King fan, and have rarely if ever had one of his books I couldn't get into. I went ahead and read this, even though it is kind of a sequal to a book I hadn't read, called The Talisman, by these same authors. A friend from the bookstore, Chad, told me I would be okay and not lost. I don't remember him telling me though that it related to King's Gunslinger series. I do have to say that I am not a huge fan of the Gunslinger series. I did have trouble reading those. I have the last 3? that he wrote sitting on my "to-read" shelf, and I haven't yet felt the impulse or interest to pick them up.

So was this a good book? Yeah, the story was good once you got into it. But it doesn't really make me want to go back and read the book before it, or continue in the Gunslinger series. So who knows.

Real Women Don't Wear Size 2 by Kelley St. John

So this was basically just a trashy romance novel, not quite what I consider chick lit, it was strip cover, not something I bought at least. It wasn't bad, just by the end I was a little tired of it. I definitely love the title, as I've never worn a size 2 in my life, not even at my very skinniest time after taking phen-fen. The smallest I've ever worn, was a size 4 pair of shorts from that time period that I still have, just to prove I once wore that size. Although, I'm pretty sure they must have been marked wrong, as I never fit any other size 4's. As the main character in this book, I've just always been endowed with curves, hips and boobs. I inherited from my mom as well as the women on my dad's side also have them. So I was "doomed" from the start. And unfortunately, I've yet to meet the guy who actually feels the way the guy in this book does.

About the only other thing I have to say is that the main character's name was Clarise, which every time I read her name made me think of Silence of the Lambs, which kind of ruined the romance mood a bit.

2010 Warrensburg Children's Literature Festival

This is a break from my usual book review blogs, yet in a way, I will review an author and her book. First I want to put the link to the webpage that tells about this event:

http://guides.library.ucmo.edu/clf

I have heard about this for the past few years, but not at my school. This is actually more for kids at the elementary grade level, up to about 6th grade. I actually learned about this from the bookstore I work at. It actually seems as if the Park Hill School district goes to this more often than I would guess the NKC school district does, although I could just be unaware since I don't contact our elementary schools much. It takes place during University of Central Missouri's (UCM)spring break, which coincided with NKC's spring break this year. So when an email came on the Missouri Association of School Librarians (MASL) Listserv asking for volunteers, I thought about how I'd like to experience this. As soon as the schedule for this week was up at the bookstore, I emailed to volunteer for the last day of the festival. My confirmation email told me that I would be hosting author Marie Smith for the day.

At first I wasn't sure who my author was. Then one night at the bookstore last week, I was putting away a Roland Smith book, and I realized that Marie was his wife. I met Roland Smith at my school about 8 or 9 years ago when he came to speak at several schools in my district. From that time on I was hooked on his books: Jaguar, Thunder Cave, Zach's Lie, Jack's Run, Cryptid Hunters, etc. Roland and his wife Marie have written several ABC books together: B is for Beaver an Oregon alphabet, Z is for Zookeeper a zoo alphabet, W is for Waves an ocean alphabet, S is for Smithsonian America's Museum Alphabet, E is for Evergreen a Washington State Alphabet, and N is for our Nations's Capital a Washington D.C. Alphabet, the book I purchased and had autographed.

Meeting Marie I was instantly impressed. She was very collected, and knew exactly what she wanted to do. And when I listened to her speak and saw her slides at the first session today, I was even more interested in her. Marie Smith's grandmother was an eskimo. And she comes from a big family, and even has family from Missouri! She loves to bake pies, and fell into writing when her husband asked her to help him write the first alphabet book, B is for Beaver. She was very nice, and interacted with the kids wonderfully.

The last thing I want to say is that I am now inspired to write my own alphabet book. I won't give away what my topic is, but I got tips on how to write it, and already have a lot of my letters figured out. She talked about her publisher, Sleeping Bear Press, and I will try to send them my finished manuscript. I'm hoping I can work and get it done this summer. So I'll be researching and working as I can starting now. She did say the hardest letter was X, and that publishers will completely reject a book if they don't like what you have for that, so I'll be working on finding the perfect word for that.

See Jane Date by Melissa Senate

This is another strip cover book I picked up a long time ago. I grabbed it because of a made for tv movie on either lifetime or some other women's tv channel by the same title, that starred Charisma Carpenter, who played Cordelia on Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Never actually watched the whole movie. And never could quite get into the book.

But, with my goal to get through all these books I have before I buy any new ones, I went ahead and chose this as my latest chick lit book. And once I gave it a chance, it was a REALLY good read. I should have done more page marking for ALL the good stuff in it, but didn't. So I won't leave you with any quotes. One main thing I didn't like is that the main character smoked, and lost guys because of it. So right there I had a non-connection, probably part of what kept me from getting into it right away. But I do highly recommend the book. Doubt I'll read it again, so since it is a strip cover, I'll go ahead and toss it for now. But I may add Melissa Senate to my list of authors to check for other books by when I have time at the store.

The 4400: The Vesuvius Prophecy by Greg Cox

A tv series that I enjoyed at the start, but at the end it was going downhill, too much conspiracy stuff. The 4400 was a USA network show about 4400 people who disappeared throughout history, and were all returned one day near Seattle Washington. It was assumed at first they were kidnapped by aliens, but we soon learned it was the future who took them. The future took them, and gave them each some kind of ability that was supposed to help save the world. Abilities of all sorts, telekinesis, future telling, and in this case, the ability to cause the ground to shake, volcanoes to erupt. Maia can see the future, she's one of the main characters, an 11 year old girl. She hasn't aged since she was taking many years ago. She sees her new adoptive mother, Diana, on top of Mount Ranier with a man and the volcano starting to erupt. So now Diana and her partner Tom Baldwin, both of NTAC, must find and stop this man. I won't go into all the backstory of the show. Just want to say that if you enjoyed the show, you'll enjoy this visit back with the characters.

Distant Waves: A Novel of the Titanic by Suzanne Weyn

I am a fan of Suzanne Weyn from her other books that I've read. I did as I always do and looked for any new books she might have coming out and then put them on reservation. So I bought this when it came out, even though it was in hardcover because I had money at time.

It took me a bit to get into this, but once I did, I couldn't put it down. Yes, it is a novel about the Titanic. Which made me wonder, why in the world are we so obsessed with Titanic stories? We know how they're going to end, and yet, I personally, can't seem to get enough of them. But, besides that, there was a TON of history, soooooooo interesting. The author even goes into a bit of detail at the end about all the history research she did.

The really interesting history included Nikola Tesla, Harry Houdini, Lily Dale - which they called Spirit Vale, Astor and Guggenheim, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, and that is just to name a few. I will highly recommend this book, although as far as I know, we shipped any we got back shortly after they arrived, and I haven't seen any paperback copies. If I was a librarian, I would definitely have a copy of this in my library to share. You know, I tried to donate a book to my school library the other day, a hardcover book, but because they already had a copy that wasn't checked out that much, they said they didn't want it. Well, if it was my library, it would be a book I would totally talk up. If I was a middle school librarian, I would try to go into CA teachers' classes and do book talks often. In fact, one CA teacher I did summer school with when I was my first summer library experience asked me to do that with her classes once a week. I wonder if the librarian at her current school does that now? I'll bet she does, I know that librarian and she is really awesome, I've asked her for advice a lot.

Anyway, such a great book.

Mutant by Peter Clement

While I have one book posted as what I'm reading right now, I'm actually usually reading 2-3 books at any one time. I picked up Mutant, a stripped cover book to read yesterday. It is a medical thriller. But I'm going to take a (web)page from my friend Charlotte, and not read books that I just can't get into or decide not to read for whatever reason, because I have too many sitting in my office, as well as so many others I want to read, and life is short.

I chose to toss this book out as its main theme is genetically engineered food as the "evil" and I'm not a real fan of this. People don't quite understand that we have been genetically engineering food since we first selected the best of a crop to take the seeds from. And when we choose the best animals to breed. And there are good things done by science. Yes, there are bad things, but I just don't agree with setting up big scares over things constantly. So, I choose not to waste my time on this book.

I picked up Black House by Stephen King and Peter Straub, another stripped cover book. While I could never get into the Talisman, a friend said this was really good and I could read it without having read the other. And I am a huge Stephen King fan, so I'm trying it. I have to say so far, it's not grabbing my attention. I'll give it another day, then it may go the way of Mutant.

White Sands, Red Menace by Ellen Klages

This is the sequel to a book I reviewed a week or so ago called the Green Glass Sea. This picks up after the bomb has been dropped and the war is "over". The German scientists, Von Braun and others are now here in America helping us with our rocket program. Our main characters, Dewey and Suze are back. They mostly live with Suze's mom, Terry Gordon, because Suze's father, Dr. Gordon is busy working on the rocket. Mrs. Gordon is protesting the war, she's very upset at having helped create something that killed so many people. Suze and Dewey have created a whole carnival of Rube Goldberg type machines with Suze's artistic representations of people. Suze isn't happy with how her mom and Dewey seem to be best friends, and soon finds a friend in town called Ynez. From Ynez Suze learns about prejudice in the town, as well as Mexican culture. Dewey meets a boy named Owen, and a friendship turns into a young love type relationship, but never does the story get too gushy for a kid's book. And towards the end a mysterious woman on a motorcycle shows up, and things get to be interesting. Mrs. Gordon and Dr. Gordon are fighting, and of course they also have an issue showing up to mess with their relationship besides their disagreement on the science research.

This book had some great history in it. I know it was considered as a possible Truman nominee, but guess it didn't make it since I don't see it on the list this year. I feel they made a mistake. This book was really good, as was the one that came before it. Oh well, I will definitely recommend it to kids at school as well as at the bookstore. That is if I ever get to work in the kids department again.

Movie Review: Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The Lightning Thief

Wow, I was sooooooooooo disappointed in this movie. And anyone who knows me knows that it takes a lot to really disappoint me. As someone who has almost always read the book before I see the movie, I know that the movies never, or almost never live up to the book. One exception I can think of right now is the Green Mile, which I think they did an awesome job with! But anyway, back to my point. So much was left out of Twilight, I mean if you hadn't read the books, the movie doesn't really let you see how Edward and Bella fall in love. But I still was able to really enjoy seeing Twilight brought to the movie screen.

The Lightning Thief had too much changed and too many important things left out. Maybe it's because I've read this book so many times, because I've read it to like 3 different groups of students. And we answered questions and discussed it, so I know it detail by minute detail. But I feel they left out such important characters, such as Mr. D. (Dionysius), Ares, and Clarisse. Plus, they went to Nashville Tennessee instead of to St. Louis like in the book. And then, Annabeth is supposed to be blonde, not dark haired. And there was no mention of Kronos, the whole "voldemort" bad guy who goes throughout the whole series. (I threw the Voldemort reference in for those critics who called it a cheap copy of Harry Potter, which it SOOOOO is not). And then, Annabeth is supposed to have a crush on Luke, and not believe in Luke as a bad guy so quickly. Plus, there's the whole thing where we're not supposed to know who Percy's dad is right away. Plus, I feel like Percy is supposed to be 12 years old, yet the characters in the movie are all high school age.

If you haven't read the books, go see the movie, it's probably really good in that situation. But if you've read it, and love the books like I do, you might skip it. I'm not even sure how they can do a sequel with all the stuff they left out.

Deep Storm by Lincoln Child

I've been a fan of Lincoln Child since I borrowed the book The Relic from one of my high school students my first year of teaching. I've since read through all the books in that series that he co-wrote with Douglas Preston, and I've moved on to the books each of them has authored on their own. In fact, I think I'm a book or two behind in the Relic or Pendergast series.

Deep Storm is a science thriller. The US goverment has found something buried under the Earth's crust in the middle of the ocean near an oil rig. Peter Crane is our main character, a former Navy medical doctor called in to this top secret mission because of his past experience in a high stress situation. People in this amazing facility are getting sick, but their symptoms don't match, and there is no sign of what could be the cause.

Turns out there is more to what they're looking for, it's an alien artifact, and one they come to find should probably be left alone. And of course, as often happens in this type of book, there is one military person who is not seeing the bad things, and plans to continue for his country at all costs. Good read.

The Guinea Pig Diaries by A.J. Jacobs

I've seen A.J. Jacobs' books around the store, The Year of Living Biblically and The Know-it All. They always sounded really funny, but I just never picked it up to read. The Guinea Pig Diaries is new enough that we had it in hard cover so that I could check it out. And it was definitely worth it. This was hilarious! From outsourcing his life to people in India, to living by George Washington's 110 rules of life, and it begins with his online dating experience as a beautiful young woman. The things he does are crazy. He even lets his wife be the boss of him for like a whole month! Wow, I can't recommend this book highly enough. I also can't wait to read his other 2 books. It is interesting to know that he is an Entertainment Weekly writer, which is the one magazine I subscribe to because I HAVE to read it every week.

I've also decided I need to get my reading journal set back up so that every 10 books I read a classic, or every 15 I read a nonfiction, etc. That way I can get through the 300 books sitting in my 2nd bedroom waiting to be read.