Ms. Dickinson's Purple & Gold Pick of the Week: Page by Paige by Laura Lee Gulledge

If you've ever started at new school or moved to a new town--or a new country, you know how difficult it can be to start over and find your place in unfamiliar surrounding. Moving from rural Virginia to New York City is an especially big change—particularly for shy artist Paige. However, change doesn't have to be a completely negative event.  Sometime a dramatic change--in location, in habit, or in relationships--can be the push we need to make a fresh start or try out a new interest.  For Paige, her sudden shift from comfortable small town life to the the overwhelming but thrilling city pushes her to break out of her shell and start bringing her secret doodling habit out into the open.  While she always sketched in the corners of notebooks, Paige hasn't fully embraced her interest in drawing--until now. With her sketchbook in hand, Paige explores her new home and experiments with her new identity as an artist. As her confidence grows, she builds fresh friendships, defies her family’s expectations, and slowly discovers a new way of seeing.  However, even the brave new Paige isn't sure if she can live life as the bold and creative girl she's created in the safe pages of her sketchbook.  Will she share her new vision with the world or will she allow her self-doubt to win?

If you are looking for a fresh story about self-discovery and the creative process, Page by Paige is an absolute must read! Told through gorgeous drawings and fluid prose, Paige's story will ring true with anyone whose ever been "the new kid" or any artist trying to discover and embrace her creative identity.  Combining a more traditional coming of age motifs (new city, new friends, family conflict, tentative romance) with a specific exploration of the mind of a young artist, Laura Lee Gulledge crafts an enjoyable and unique story.  The graphic novel format suits this story particularly well; the illustrations are beautiful and highly expressive.  The images are used to tell the regular action of Paige's outer life as well as the emotional narrative of her internal life--her dreams, her fears, and her highly visual imagination.

For all artists and dreamers--and anyone in search of a good read--

check out Laura Lee Gulledge's debut

Page by Paige,

currently on display in the library's fiction section!  

Ms. Dickinson's Purple & Gold Pick of the Week: The Lucy Variations by Sara Zarr

At the age of fourteen, Lucy Becks-Moreau was a rising superstar in the elite world of concert pianists. She was the talk of the concert circuit; everyone whispered that she was bound for great things. Then she just walked away, giving up her status as a musical prodigy--and losing the approval of her demanding grandfather and mother. Now, two years later, Lucy is readjusting to a normal high school life where she spends her time in classes and doing homework rather than practicing for hours with occasion breaks with hired tutors. She hasn't touched a piano since her dramatic exit from the concert circuit. Then her grandfather hires a new piano teacher for her younger brother. A former piano prodigy, Will is passionate and kind; Lucy's brother immediately adores him. And when Will recognizes Lucy's tentative interest in returning to the keys, he offers to help her begin playing again--while keeping her re-entrance to music hidden from her family. 

Sara Zarr strikes again with a rich, thoughtful, and compelling piece of realistic fiction. In this elegantly constructed novel, Zarr demonstrates her clear insight on creativity, passion, and growing up. Her characters, especially Lucy, are incredibly human--dynamic, flawed, and simultaneously sympathetic & frustrating. I especially appreciate Zarr's ability to reveal Lucy's growth without judgement; Lucy's emotions, choices, and actions are presented honestly and thoroughly--we understand Lucy's choices and are empathetic, even when we might be irritated or frustrated with them. Additionally, the relationships are so complex. There are no simple relationships here; as the characters note, "people are complicated" and so are their interactions & connections. From Lucy's conflicted relationship with her family, full of anger, misunderstanding, and love to her confusing friendship with Will, each relationship is fleshed out with realistic details.

The novel is also structured beautifully; the primary storyline is interspersed with very strategic vignettes of moment's in Lucy's past and these flashbacks fit into the narrative smoothly, each shedding light on current events in Lucy's journey.

While Lucy's journey to self-knowledge will be relatable to nearly any reader, her particular relationship with performance and creativity will hold special resonance for some readers. Anyone with a passion--whether it be artistic, athletic, or academic--will connect with Lucy's intense connection and love for her piano and will understand the conflict built into pursuing such a passion seriously without losing your purely personal enjoyment of it. 

So whether you're a fan of Sara Zarr's novels (including Sweethearts or How To Save A Life) or you're just looking for a fresh read with compelling characters and a great story, check out 

The Lucy Variations by Sara Zarr

on display in the library's fiction section now! 

Need Some Help Finding Fun Reads This Summer Vacation?

image from Teo's photo's flickr

While the recent stormy weather and the looming shadow of exams sometimes make it easy to forget, summer vacation is almost here!  And whether you'll be spending your summer lying on a beach, traveling on a variety of planes, trains, and cars, leading adventures at camp, working a cash register, visiting family, or just lounging around, there's one summer activity we can all share: reading for pure, unadulterated personal enjoyment!

But with so many new novels, nonfiction books, magazines, and daily news publications, how can we figure out what to read this summer?  Sometimes the sudden freedom from assigned reading and the busy schedules of the school year can make choosing some fun reading material overwhelming!  Happily, your NCS librarians are here to help you deal with the sudden abundance of reading options.

First, check out our grade-level fun summer reading lists available for download on our website, http://www.ncslibrary.org.  They can be found on the right side of the page, listed and labeled by grade level under the title Summer Reading Lists.  Just click on a grade level and a PDF of the list will open for you!  Next, check out some of our other book recommendation lists and tools, including the Purple & Gold Picks of the Week (which exist on this blog as well as in the library as mini-posters on Ms. Dickinson's desk), our Thanksgiving, winter, and spring break book lists and some of our genre or theme-specific book lists (all available around the library). 



image from aafromaa's flickr

You can also get good reading ideas from lists or reviews created by your local public library, your local independent bookstore (like Politics and Prose, for example), or publications like the New York Times Book Review. You might also want to track down lists like The 2012 National Book Award winners or the "Best of 2012" lists created by publications like The New York Times, Publisher's Weekly, Library Journal, or School Library Journal; any of these lists are easily found with a simple Google search.

Want to find out what your friends or favorite authors are reading? Look into joining GoodReads, a social networking site for readers.   If you're looking to get a bunch of ideas based on your last awesome read, you might want to test out book recommendation sites like YourNextRead or What Should I Read Next?

Finally, even though we're now collecting all our NCS library books, your NCS librarians are never too busy to help you find a good book!  Please feel free to come by the library and chat with a librarian about reading recommendations!  We're happy to help put together a little personalized list of summer reading ideas for you to take along on your next trip to the public library, local bookstore, or Kindle shopping spree!

Ms. Dickinson's Purple & Gold Pick of the Week: Flygirl by Sherri L. Smith

Ida Mae Jones is living with her head in the clouds. Ever since her daddy taught her to fly his beloved plane, the memories of darting among the clouds and soaring high above farms and fields fill Ida's mind. But now that Daddy is gone—killed in an accident on the farm—Ida absolutely must keep her feet firmly planted on the ground. She’s got to help her mother keep the farm going while her older brother is away studying medicine, make extra money cleaning houses, and help take care of her younger brother. Besides it’s 1940 in Louisiana and being black and a woman are two big strikes against Ida’s chances of becoming a real pilot. 

Then the U.S. enters into war with Germany and Japan and the army announces that the government is forming a special group called the WASP: Women Airforce Service Pilots. However, while the WASP might finally offer Ida the chance to get back in the air and join the war effort, there’s still one big problem. The WASP is only for white women. Yet Ida’s determined and, with her light skin, she might be able to pass as a white woman--if she's very careful. But, can Ida truly fulfill her dreams while pretending to be someone she’s not? Will she even last long enough to leave the runway?

For full disclosure, I should share that I'm huge fan of historical fiction--especially stories that focus on frequently forgotten events or people in history.  However, while some historical fiction might only appeal to those of us who confess to be hardcore history fans, Flygirl is a great read for nearly anyone looking for an exciting adventure with sympathetic characters and a suspenseful plot!   Ida is frustrated by her seemingly limited life as the daughter of a farmer, as a black girl in the segregated South, and as a light-skinned girl in her own community.  Ida always felt a little out of place and dreams of escape--both from her repetative life and from the physical bonds of gravity itself.    Being a pilot offers her the opportuntity to see new places, learn new things, and find a purpose. 

The suspenseful ramifications of Ida's choice to pass as white in order to join the WASP shed light on a variety of tensions surrounding skin color, identity, and insider/outsider status in the black and white communities of 1940 America--tensions that continue to surface even today.  Additionally, the story finally brings the long underappreciated but critical efforts of military women like the WASP into the mainstream; for example, I was fascinated to learn that while women didn't fly into combat, they did test out new plane models--a very dangerous feat that male pilots refused to do.  The author's descriptions bring the adrenaline-soaked joy and fear of flying to life vividly;  you'll be tempted to look into flying lessons after you finish!

 

For a high flying adventure rich in fascinating characters and forgotten pockets of history, check out Flygirl by Sherri L. Smith, on display in the library's fiction section now!

Celebrate National Poetry Month & Become A Book Spine Poet!

image from http://www.flickr.com/photos/davidyuweb

April is a month absolutely bursting with celebrations! We frequently associate April with events like April Fools' Day, Earth Day, and the beginning of spring.  However, April also happens to be National Humor Month, International Guitar Month, & National Welding Month! 
Here at NCS, we are especially excited that April is also National Poetry Month! 


To acknowledge this month-long celebration of verse, the NCS Library is challenging everyone in our community to become book spine poets!

What in the world is book spine poetry?

 

Book spine poetry appeared in pop culture back in 1993 through American artist Nina Katchadourian’s 'Sorted Books' project in which she grouped books from various collections into clusters so that the titles on their spines could be read in from top to bottom as a sentence. The concept was further adapted by critic and writer Maria Popova who featured the idea of creating short poems from the spines of arranged book piles on her blog ‘Brain Pickings.’ 

Check out these examples of book spine poetry!

 

'Akron Stacks'-Sorted Books project by Nina Katchadourian

 

'The Spark of Love'-- BrainPickings.org by Maria Popova

If you'd like to look at further examples, check out this article on BookRiot.org or the galleries of book sprine poetry on Travis Jonker's blog 100 Scope Notes. 

 Interested in becoming a book spine poet? 

• Find some books!  You can use books from home, from a friend's home, from a public library, from the NCS Library, etc.
• Arrange the books into a stack so that the titles on the spines can be read from top to bottom as a short poetic sequence.  Arrange and rearrange books until you create YOUR poem!
• Snap a photo of your poem and email it to ncs.bkspinepoems@gmail.com.  Please include your name and your poem's title (if you wish to title it) in the email.
• Watch for your poem here on the blog and on the display screen in the NCS Library's display area!
• In May, students will vote for their favorite poems from the entries and the winners will receive exciting prizes!

We look forward to seeing your poetic book spine creations! 

Ms. Dickinson's Purple & Gold Pick of the Week: How To Say Goodbye In Robot by Natalie Standiford

Sometimes amid a flood of fantastic fantasy novels featuring dragons and superhuman abilities and heart-racing dystopian adventures full of thought-provoking doom & gloom, I crave a story grounded in our so-called 'real world.'  At the right moment, there's really nothing better than a solid piece of contemporary realistic fiction.  Natalie Standiford's lovely novel How To Say Goodbye In Robot goes beyond solid realistic fiction into the realm of brilliant stories.  Behind its quirky title and deceptively pink cover hides a raw and emotionally resonant story of two people searching for connection during that bizarre period bridging the end of high school and beginning of real life. 

When Beatrice started her senior year at a new school, she assumed she’d find friends among the many average, cheerful, and friendly girls she met on her first day. But alphabetic destiny pairs Beatrice up with the class loner Jonah—AKA Ghost Boy.  At first being assigned a locker and a seat beside the guy whose name has apparently become synonymous with 'weirdo' seems like a simple bit of bad luck.  But Bea soon discovers that she and Jonah have more in common than their ajoining positions in the class roster.

Bea & Jonah are destined to be friends. But their relationship is not going to be an average friendship, bound by shared gossip, parties, and hobbies. Bea & Jonah forge an intense connection based on secret truths, daring adventures, and late-night calls to the same old-time radio show.  As unconventional and undefined as their relationship might be, their connection is painfully, powerfully real.  It’s not quite romance—but it’s definitely love. The kind of love you never forget.

This lovely novel is both heart-warming and heart-wrenching and it stands out as one of few book that explores the tangled, consuming, wonderful, and painful realities of friendship.  I would especially recommend this novel to fans of The Perks of Being A Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky and John Green's novels (especially Looking For Alaska). 

Check out Natalie Standiford's  How To Say Goodbye In Robot,  on display now in the library's fiction section! 

 

Ms. Dickinson's Purple and Gold Pick of the Week: The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie

Arnold "Junior" Spirit has always been something of an outcast.  Born with various medical conditions, Junior has been made fun of by nearly every other kid on the Spokane Indian Reservation.  With his glasses, abnormally big head and serious lack of muscles, Junior is an easy target.  But while Junior might be goofy-looking and scrawny, he has plenty of good things going for him.  He's got a decent jump shot, a powerful talent for cartooning, a best friend, and a loving (if imperfect) family.  And most of all, Junior has dreams.  He dreams of getting an actual education--from a school where the textbooks aren't the same ones his mom used a couple decades ago.  Even more importantly, Junior dreams of demanding more from life than mere survival.  He dreams about getting off the "rez" and escaping the cycle of unhappiness and disappointment that seems to trap all the adults in his life. 

So when his teacher suggests that he look into attending the all-white, public school in the nearby farming town, Junior decides to take the plunge and give his dreams a shot--even though he's sure the attempt will end in disaster.  Now, Junior must learn to navigate a whole new world where the only other Indian is the school mascot--while everyone on the rez (except his parents & grandmother) have decided that he's a traitor.  Even his best friend refuses to speak to him.  How can Junior escape the bad parts of life on the rez without leaving behind his heritage or his family?  How can he make all the pieces of his identity fit into his divided life?

Brilliant author, poet, and screenwriter Sherman Alexie blew the literary world away when he published his first novel for young adults in 2007.  The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian has gone on earn a National Book Award, a place on many must-read book lists of teens & adults alike, and space in many middle and high school English curriculums across the country.  But what's the best thing about Diary? It actually lives up to the hype--and it has yet to lose its emotional power or relevance.

Told through Junior's alternatively hilarious and heartbreaking words and cartoons, The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian is an engrossing coming of age story that explores identity, family, friendship, and love with unmatched humor and honesty.  Jumping from basketball and girls to racism and alcoholism, the story doesn't back down from taking on tricky topics--but it never becomes melodramatic and the reader never stops cheering for Junior.  While Diary deals most directly and extensively with Native American and male identities, Junior's struggle to sort his own multfaceted identity amidst stereotypes and others' negative (and positive) expectations will resonsate with everyone. 

The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian will make you laugh, cry, smile, and sigh.  Junior's story is one that sticks will you long after you've closed the book.  And it's a perfect book to read as we close November--Native American Heritage Month. 

Run over to the library today to grab our copy of Sherman Alexie's National Book Award winning novel, The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian, on display in the fiction section!

 

 

To learn even more about Native Americans--both in the past and the present--check out the National Museum of the American Indian, right here in DC!  The museum's website alone has amazing resources, including outside links, online collections, and multimedia presentations about Native American history and perspectives from a huge variety of modern Native Americans.