Knights of the Lunch Table: The Dragon Players

Knights of the Lunch Table: The Dragon Players
     written by Frank Cammuso

Artie King is a 6th grader at middle school just trying to get through the days, one by one. He still likes fantasy play although he now makes it his personal activity, and he flips out when his sister tries to get rid of his super hero toy collection. It's a childhood/growing up thing.

Mrs. Dagger, the evil principal, has a broken windshield from a bowling ball hitting it in the parking lot (long story) and has pinned the blame on one of Artie's friends, Wayne, who must now find a way to get the money and fix the windshield.

The boys decide to enter a schoolwide contest that has a $300. first place prize. They think that they could win.

But so does the Horde, a gang of school bullies who have bullied another friend Percy, into entering the contest for them.

Artie and his crew draft Evo, a mysterious kid who happens to have won the contest last year, and Artie has to now face a choice to "cheat or not cheat" when he is given a chance to shut down all the competition.

Read this graphic novel to find out what happens, there's plenty more mischief, adventure, and humor to go around.

School Library Journal has given this book a starred review...see what you think and let me know.

You'll find it in the graphic novel section of the nonfiction section of our library.
Happy Reading!

ISBN: 978-0439903233

Octavius Grimwood's Graveyard Guide

Octavius Grimwood's Graveyard Guide: 
Vampires, Zombies, and Things You Don't Want to Meet in the Night
     written by Rod Green

 Open the coffin lid of this book if you dare (yes this book is actually in the shape of a coffin!) and you are in for a spooky read!

Octavius Grimwood shares his investigations and personal notes with you about the supernatural, spooky, and weird.



His ghost serves as a guide through the book as you learn about ghosts, skeletons, mummies, zombies, and vampires.

You'll read graveyard tales, find out details about haunted houses, learn about witches through history and literature, how to cast a spell, and so much more.

ISBN: 978-0-7641-6377-7

Dear America: The Diary of Piper Davis

Dear America: The Diary of Piper Davis: The Fences Between Us
     written by Kirby Larson

The Dear America section of our library now takes up 4 full shelves, and the books are regularly checked out every week. Here is the newest in the continuing series and it takes place in 1941 during World War II.

In 1941 Piper is worried about her older brother based in Pearl Harbor on the Arizona, a battleship based there. As most students of history know, On December 7, 1941 the Japanese attacked the United States at Pearl Harbor in a surprise attack. Piper notes it in her diary along with what she hears on the radio. She has neighbors who are Japanese who are members of her church, and she and her family later follow them into the incarceration camps.

I will be giving my mom a copy of this book to read because it is her life too! And I'm curious to compare her first hand experience (primary source) with this historical fiction piece.

You see... my mom was 16 on Pearl Harbor Day in 1941 and she opened her present (a radio, an expensive gift in those days) plugged it in only to hear about the bombing. Many of her friends from high school were in the service, and some of her friends who were Japanese "disappeared" from school. She never knew what had happened to them until later as an adult, her family didn't speak about it at the time. They too were worried because my mom's brother was in the service and faced many dangers. He was in General Patton's army and never spoke of the war after he came home.

It was an important time in history, and to know about it first hand is important. I'm interested to know if my mom feels the book reflects her life at that time, and how accurate the diary entries and events are compared to her personal experience.

Let me know what you think of the book after you read it, and check to see if anyone in your family remembers about World War II and what their thoughts and memories are.

ISBN: 978-0-545-22418-5

101 Freaky Animals

101 Freaky Animals
     written by Melvin and Gilda Berger


REVIEW

Get a head start on your animal reports this year by reading about 101 Freaky Animals. Maybe after sampling animals and facts about them you'll find one that you want to go into depth and research more about it.



 

Did you know?
38. The Great Indian Hornbill males use their casques on their beaks as an inflight weapon.


24. The Fennec Fox's ears are almost 1/2 as long as its body.


51. Komodo Dragons smell with their tongues.

65. Octopuses have a bag of tricks they use to escape their predators: they can flee by squirting water out of their bodies to jet away, they can change their skin color to camoflage themselves, they can spread dark ink in the water to confuse their enemies, and they can squeeze themselves through cracks and rocks to escape quickly.

84. Sphynx Cats have no fur and they are not Egyptian.

88. Star-Nosed Moles use their 22 tentacled noses to "see."

That's just six of the 101 animals featured in the book with interesting information to learn about.

Each page has an animal named and numbered to locate easily. There's an index in the back of the book to check to see which animals are featured.

Included with each animal factoid is a full photo of the animal being discussed and a thumbnail for easy reference and connection to the text.



The facts are interesting, the photos detailed and stimulating...so this book should peak your interest and leave you wanting to find out more!

We'll be building a Wallwisher Wall this Spring with interesting animal facts and Discovery Streaming videos to watch so be sure to keep checking back on our Media Center website. When we launch the wall we will also launch a page to recommend good books to read and you can bet that this one will be on the list!

ISBN: 978-0-545-23758-1


Happy Reading!

A Hero's Guide to Warriors

A Hero's Guide to Warriors
     written by Deborah Murrell

REVIEW

Now you can learn facts about 4 of the major types of warriors through history. Learn about the Greek Warriors, Gladiators, Samurai, and Knights. This is a brand new book just published in September and was a great seller at the Fall BookFair!

Greek Warriors. Learn about Hoplites, training, weapons and armor, war machines used, the War with Persia, Defeating the Spartans, Alexander the Great, battle tactics, and the decline of Greece.

Gladiators. Gladiators defined, Gladiator school, Gladiators of the Empire, Provacatores, Equites, and Velites, the Colosseum, Gladiator Events, Win or Lose, and the end of the Gladiators.

Samurai. When Samurai lived, becoming a Samurai, the Pen and the Sword, weapons used, armor, ninjas, early clans, the Rise of the Samurai, three great men, the last Shoguns, and the dcline of the Samurai.

Knights. Knights defines, when they lived, training, weapons used, armor, horses, battle tactics, battlefields, heraldry, castles under attack, off the battlefield, tournaments, and the decline of Knights.

If you don't like the heavy reading of regular history textbooks we use, then try this book!  If you are interested in weapons, fighting, and war, this is the "history text" for you, right here in our Media Center.

The book has a full table of contents and index, not just for the book, but complete contents for each chapter so you can easily find the information you are most interested in. We'll be using this book to show examples of how using contents and indexes, and glossaries really help you get the most out of content reading, especially when researching for reports! There is also a glossary for the terms used throughout the book.

The information is organized into tidbit paragraphs with stylized text and graphic boxing to offset and separate clusters of information, which makes the information so much easier to locate and read without pages of text you find in a regular textbook.

So if you are interested in warriors throughout history, watch the trailer below, and then find the book in our nonfiction section and check it out soon.

ISBN: 978-1-59566-802-8

A Hero's Guide to Warriors-Trailer from Roxanne Clement on Vimeo.

Warriors: The Lost Warrior

Warriors: The Lost Warrior
     created by Erin Hunter...
     Manga written by Dan Jolley, art by James L. Barry

REVIEW

So Warrior fans know where our stack of books are in the fiction section, but did you know that you can also find them now in the graphic novel section of the library?

Now the nationally best selling series is being created in Manga!

Erin Hunter herself comments in the foreward of this title how the Manga version can show a wide range of emotions and actions of one of her favorite characters in the series, Greystripe. She evaluates the drawings as strong and powerful and loves the crisp dialogue to move the action along!


 Be sure to look for "The Lost Warrior"  and other Manga as we purchase them for our collection.

Right now our first copy is available through the Extremely Popular Binder so sign up today!

ISBN: 978-0-06-124020-1

The Usborne Book of Famous Paintings

The Usborne Book of Famous Paintings
     written by Rosie Dickens

REVIEW.

This book shares 35 of the world's best known paintings with explanations customized for each of the paintings presented giving you, the reader a behind-the-scenes peek at how the painting was accomplished, style and format, technique, and history. It's another "text" for Bay Farm's Media Center Library collection that proves learning something new can be interesting and fun.

It feels like you are on a private art gallery tour with a personal guide! There's even a website set up by Usborne to provide gallery links and art activities to accompany the book. Great idea for our Art Docent program as well as personal reading.  http://www.usborne-quicklinks.com  Choose United States. Then type in the key words "famous paintings." You can tour any number of famous museums and art galleries.

The famous painting "St. George and the Dragon" by Rafael has commentary that explains the technique of clustering major characters into a pyramid, how to create the feeling of distance, additional details that help to tell the story, symbolism used in art in the 16th century and how to add depth to a painting.







"A Sunday on La Grande Jatte" was painted in 1884 by Georges Seurat. Seurat used color according ot the theories of the day in the 19th century. He used 35 million dots, dabs, and dashes of color in his painting because he believed the theory that color mixing actually happened in the eye itself and he wanted his painting color to be brighter and richer. The characters in his painting are staged much like a movie director would do when setting a movie scene. He also painted people from all walks of life to assure us of the "modern people" of the 19th century.

There are so many classic works of art to view, and then the galleries and museums online to keep your artists interests going for hours on end. 



ISBN 978-0-545-24327-8

Math Curse

Math Curse
     written by Jon Scieska and Lane Smith

 A student falls victim to the "Math Curse" when her teacher says "You can think of almost everthing as a math problem."


Suddenly, everything is exactly that...a math problem....until she finds a way to end the curse. Here's a wild and crazy book that addresses math anxiety and numbers in every day life.

The paintings, collage -like artwork, and stylized text add to the tempo and voice of the story and plotline, and help to build momentum as our child-narrator's anxiety and frustrations living with the math curse increases. So do the additions of math symbols, shapes, algorithms, designs, and calculations.

It's a great read aloud and even better book for us to talk about together!


ISBN: 0-679-86194-4

Moses: When Harriet Tubman Led Her People to Freedom

Moses: When Harriet Tubman Led Her People to Freedom
     written by Carole Boston Weatherford and illustrated by Kadir Nelson
REVIEW

This spiritual interpretation of the  story of Harriet Tubman is in three narrative voices, the narrator (events), Harriet (her prayers and faith), and God (sending strength to continue on). 

The story is told in lyrical text, stylized for each of the voices as they contribute on each page to the overall story.

Included in the author's note at the end of the book are details of the historical events and Harriet Tubman's life that also must be shared to fully appreciate this artistic biography.

Who said E-Everybody (also known as picture books) are only for the very young? Everyone at Bay Farm knows that my favorite section of the library is the Everybody section and this book is a beautiful example of why.

One reading is not enough, multiple readings with discussion is essential. If you don't believe me....take a peak at a book trailer I created  with Michael Jackson's "Will You Be There" as a musical accompaniment.

But that's not the whole story....you have to read it to really know the beauty of this book with the haunting oil paintings of my newest favorite artist Kadir Nelson. He views his work in "Moses" as his most emotional work to date. Each page is a two-page illustration with close-ups for dramatic and emotional effect. The illustrations are dark and moody addressing the topic of running away, the journey at night and the desperation of the task. Kadir was concerned about darkness in a picture book, so he worked hard not to sugarcoat the experience but to also be mindful of the range of age of the reader. He won the Caldecott honor and the Coretta Scott King Illustrator award for this book for this book.


Moses from Roxanne Clement on Vimeo.

ISBN: 078685175-9

A is for Amazing Moments

A is for Amazing Moments
 written by Brad Herzog



Sportswriter Brad Herzog shares some of the greatest moments in sports from A-Z as part of an extensive and ever expanding series of ABC books for all ages, but especially for tweens and teens.

Each letter of the alphabet has an oil painting and caption to identify the defining word, event, or person, and in the margin of each page is the running commentary detailing the page in historical perspective.

See how well you really know your sports trivia but I guarantee that you'll walk away after reading this book with something new you didn't know before!

This book is for all sports fans...but don't stop here! We have a growing collection of these books from the alphabet series. Just take a look to see the titles you'll find in our library!

ISBN: 978-1-58536-360-5