Sunday, April 8, 2012

New Webb Kids Story Hour For Children 6-8. Starting Monday, April 16th, Laura will present a weekly program each Monday from 3:30 to 4:30 for children 6-8 with their caregivers. The youngsters will explore reading through early chapter books, literacy activities, and simple crafts.

Read the blog @ http://thewebblibrary.com/. Beginning with the March 25, 2012 issue all blog posts will be posted on the new website. The blog is found in the right hand column of the homepage or click “Blog” from the top menu. We would like your feedback on the new website and any comments you may have about the blog.


CC Lego Club will meet Saturday, April 14.

New Materials

Adult
Sonoma Rose by Jennifer Chiaverini
Book Description
As the nation grapples with the strictures of Prohibition, Rosa Barclay lives on a Southern California rye farm with her volatile husband, John, who has lately found another source of income far outside the federal purview.
Mother to eight children, Rosa mourns the loss of four who succumbed to the mysterious
wasting disease that is now afflicting young Ana and Miguel. Two daughters born of another father are in perfect health. When an act of violence shatters Rosa's resolve to maintain her increasingly dangerous existence, she flees with the children and her precious heirloom quilts to the mesa where she last saw her beloved mother alive.
As a flash flood traps them in a treacherous canyon, only one man is brave-or foolhardy-enough to come to their rescue: Lars Jorgenson, Rosa's first love and the father of her healthy daughters. Together they escape to Berkeley, where a leading specialist offers their only hope of saving Ana and Miguel. Here in northern California, they create new identities to protect themselves from Rosa's vengeful husband, the police who seek her for questioning, and the gangsters Lars reported to Prohibition agents-officers representing a department often as corrupt as the Mob itself. Ever mindful that his youthful alcoholism provoked Rosa to spurn him, Lars nevertheless supports Rosa's daring plan to stake their futures on a struggling Sonoma Valley vineyard-despite the recent hardships of local winemakers whose honest labors at viticulture have, through no fault of their own, become illegal.

Forgotten Country by Catherine Chung Book Description
On the night Janie waits for her sister, Hannah, to be born, her grandmother tells her a story: Since the Japanese occupation of Korea, their family has lost a daughter in every generation, so Janie is charged with keeping Hannah safe. As time passes, Janie hears more stories, while facts remain unspoken. Her father tells tales about numbers, and in his stories everything works out. In her mother's stories, deer explode in fields, frogs bury their loved ones in the ocean, and girls jump from cliffs and fall like flowers into the sea. Within all these stories are warnings.
Years later, when Hannah inexplicably cuts all ties and disappears, Janie embarks on a mission to find her sister and finally uncover the truth beneath her family's silence. To do so, she must confront their history, the reason for her parents' sudden move to America twenty years earlier, and ultimately her conflicted feelings toward her sister and her own role in the betrayal behind their estrangement.
Weaving Korean folklore within a modern narrative of immigration and identity, Forgotten Country is a fierce exploration of the inevitability of loss, the conflict between obligation and freedom, and a family struggling to find its way out of silence and back to one another. 


The New Republic by Lionel ShriverBook Description Book Description On the night Janie waits for her sister, Hannah, to be born, her grandmother tells her a story: Since the Japanese occupation of Korea, their family has lost a daughter in every generation, so Janie is charged with keeping Hannah safe. As time passes, Janie hears more stories, while facts remain unspoken. Her father tells tales about numbers, and in his stories everything works out. In her mother's stories, deer explode in fields, frogs bury their loved ones in the ocean, and girls jump from cliffs and fall like flowers into the sea. Within all these stories are warnings.

The New Republic: A Novel  by Lionel Shriver
Book Description
Ostracized as a kid, Edgar Kellogg has always yearned to be popular. A disgruntled New York corporate lawyer, he's more than ready to leave his lucrative career for the excitement and uncertainty of journalism. When he's offered the post of foreign correspondent in a
Portuguese backwater that has sprouted a homegrown terrorist movement, Edgar recognizes the disappeared larger-than-life reporter he's been sent to replace, Barrington Saddler, as exactly the outsize character he longs to emulate. Infuriatingly, all his fellow journalists cannot stop talking about their beloved "Bear," who is no longer lighting up their work lives.
Yet all is not as it appears. Os Soldados Ousados de Barba—"The Daring Soldiers of Barba"—have been blowing up the rest of the world for years in order to win independence for a province so dismal, backward, and windblown that you couldn't give the rat hole away. So why, with Barrington vanished, do terrorist incidents claimed by the "SOB" suddenly dry up?
A droll, playful novel, The New Republic addresses weighty issues like terrorism with the deft, tongue-in-cheek touch that is vintage Shriver. It also presses the more intimate question: What makes particular people so magnetic, while the rest of us inspire a shrug? What's their secret? And in the end, who has the better life—the admired, or the admirer?

The Underside of Joy by Sere Prince Halverson
Book Description
To Ella Beene, happiness means living in the northern California river town of Elbow with her husband, Joe, and his two young children. Yet one summer day Joe breaks his own rule-never turn your back on the ocean-and a sleeper wave strikes him down, drowning not
only the man but his many secrets.
For three years, Ella has been the only mother the kids have known and has believed that their biological mother, Paige, abandoned them. But when Paige shows up at the funeral, intent on reclaiming the children, Ella soon realizes there may be more to Paige and Joe's story. "Ella's the best thing that's happened to this family," say her close-knit Italian-American in-laws, for generations the proprietors of a local market. But their devotion quickly falters when the custody fight between mother and stepmother urgently and powerfully collides with Ella's quest for truth.
The Underside of Joy is not a fairy-tale version of stepmotherhood pitting good Ella against evil Paige, but an exploration of the complex relationship of two mothers. Their conflict uncovers a map of scars-both physical and emotional-to the families' deeply buried tragedies, including Italian internment camps during World War II and postpartum psychosis.

Sunday, April 1, 2012

New Webb Kids Story Hour For Children 6-8. Starting Monday, April 16th, Laura will present a weekly program each Monday from 3:30 to 4:30 for children 6-8 with their caregivers. The youngsters will explore reading through early chapter books, literacy activities, and simple crafts.
Adult Book Discussion Group will meet Wednesday, April 4 at 2 pm to discuss the book "Georgia Bottoms" by Mark Childress. You are invited to come and participate in the discussion.

Closed for Easter on Friday, April 6 and Saturday, April 7. We will reopen on Monday, April on our regular 10 to 8 schedule.

Adult
Agent 6  by Tom Rob Smith Book Description
TWO MURDERS.
ONE CONSPIRACY. 
WHO IS AGENT 6?
Tom Rob Smith's debut, Child 44, was an immediate publishing sensation and marked the arrival of a major new talent in contemporary fiction. Named one of top 100 thrillers of all time by NPR, it hit bestseller lists around the world, won the CWA Ian Fleming Steel Dagger Award and the ITW Thriller Award for Best First Novel, and was longlisted for the Man Booker Prize.
In this spellbinding new novel, Tom Rob Smith probes the tenuous border between love and obsession as Leo Demidov struggles to untangle the threads of a devastating conspiracy that shatters everything he holds dear. Deftly capturing the claustrophobic intensity of the Cold War-era Soviet Union, it's at once a heart-pounding thriller and a richly atmospheric novel of extraordinary depth.... 
AGENT 6
Leo Demidov is no longer a member of Moscow's secret police. But when his wife, Raisa, and daughters Zoya and Elena are invited on a "Peace Tour" to New York City, he is immediately suspicious.Forbidden to travel with his family and trapped on the other side of the world, Leo watches helplessly as events in New York unfold and those closest to his heart are pulled into a web of political conspiracy and betrayal-one that will end in tragedy.
In the horrible aftermath, Leo demands only one thing: to investigate the killer who destroyed his family. His request is summarily denied. Crippled by grief and haunted by the need to find out exactly what happened on that night in New York, Leo takes matters into his own hands. It is a quest that will span decades, and take Leo around the world--from Moscow, to the mountains of Soviet-controlled Afghanistan, to the backstreets of New York--in pursuit of the one man who knows the truth: Agent 6.

77 Shadow Street  by Dean Koontz
Book Description  
I am the One, the all and the only. I live in the Pendleton as surely as I live everywhere. I am the Pendleton's history and its destiny. The building is my place of conception, my monument, my killing ground. . . .
The Pendleton stands on the summit of Shadow Hill at the highest point of an old heartland city, a Gilded Age palace built in the late 1800s as a tycoon’s dream home. Almost from the beginning, its grandeur has been scarred by episodes of  madness, suicide, mass murder, and whispers of things far worse. But since its rechristening in the 1970s as a luxury apartment building, the Pendleton has been at peace. For its fortunate residents—among them a successful songwriter and her young son, a disgraced ex-senator, a widowed attorney, and a driven money manager—the Pendleton’s magnificent quarters are a sanctuary, its dark past all but forgotten.
But now inexplicable shadows caper across walls, security cameras relay impossible images, phantom voices mutter in strange tongues, not-quite-human figures lurk in the basement, elevators plunge  into unknown depths. With each passing hour, a terrifying certainty grows: Whatever drove the Pendleton’s past occupants to their unspeakable fates is at work again. Soon, all those within its boundaries will be engulfed by a dark tide from which few have escaped.
Dean Koontz transcends all expectations as he takes readers on a gripping journey to a place where nightmare visions become real—and where a group of singular individuals hold the key to humanity’s destiny. Welcome to 77 Shadow Street.

Bond Girl  by Erin Duffy
Book Description
When other little girls were dreaming about becoming doctors or lawyers, Alex Garrett set her sights on conquering the high-powered world of Wall Street. And though she's prepared to fight her way into an elitist boys' club, or duck the occasional errant football, she quickly realizes she's in over her head when she's
relegated to a kiddie-size folding chair with her new moniker—Girlie—inscribed in Wite-Out across the back.
No matter. She's determined to make it in bond sales at Cromwell Pierce, one of the Street's most esteemed brokerage firms. Keeping her eyes on the prize, the low Girlie on the totem pole will endure whatever comes her way—whether trekking to the Bronx for a $1,000 wheel of Parmesan cheese; discovering a secretary's secret Friday night slumber/dance party in the conference room; fielding a constant barrage of "friendly"
practical jokes; learning the ropes from Chick, her unpredictable, slightly scary, loyalty-demanding boss;
babysitting a colleague while he consumes the contents of a vending machine on a $28,000 bet; or eluding the
advances of a corporate stalker who's also one of the firm's biggest clients.
Ignoring her friends' pleas to quit, Alex excels (while learning how to roll with the punches and laugh at
herself) and soon advances from lowly analyst to slightly-less-lowly associate. Suddenly, she's addressed by
her real name, and the impenetrable boys' club has transformed into forty older brothers and one possible boyfriend. Then the apocalypse hits, and Alex is forced to choose between sticking with Cromwell Pierce as it teeters on the brink of disaster or kicking off her Jimmy Choos and running for higher ground.
Fast-paced, funny, and thoroughly addictive, Bond Girl will leave you cheering for Alex: a feisty, ambitious woman with the spirit to stand up to the best (and worst) of the boys on the Street—and ultimately rise above them all.

Young Adult
The Girl Of Fire And Thorns  by Rae Carson
Book Description  
Reading level: Ages 13 and up
Once a century, one person is chosen for greatness.
Elisa is the chosen one.
But she is also the younger of two princesses. The one who has never done anything remarkable, and can’t see how she ever will.
Now, on her sixteenth birthday, she has become the secret wife of a handsome and worldly king—a king whose country is in turmoil. A king who needs her to be the chosen one, not a failure of a princess.
And he’s not the only one who seeks her. Savage enemies, seething with dark magic, are hunting her. A daring, determined revolutionary thinks she could be his people’s savior, and he looks at her in a way that no man has ever looked at her before. Soon it is not just her life, but her very heart that is at stake.
Elisa could be everything to those who need her most. If the prophecy is fulfilled. If she finds the power deep within herself. If she doesn’t die young.
Most of the chosen do.


Picture Books
I'm A Big Sister  by Ronne Randall
Book Description
Good book to help prepare a daughter for the birth of a new sibling. The artwork is only okay but the story is pretty cute. Helps explain why baby get bottles, diapers, etc while big sister gets big girl things ... helps encourage your older daughter to want to be a big girl and start to do big girl things like use the potty. The little girl's name in the book is Ellie and they refer to the baby as baby to keep him/her sexless so it will work if you're having a boy or girl.



Otto: The Book Bear  by Katie Cleminson
Book Description
Reading level: Ages 3 and up
Otto lives in a book and is happiest when his story is being read. Otto is no ordinary storybook character: when no one is looking, he comes to life! Otto loves to walk off of his book’s pages, but when his book is taken away while Otto is off exploring, the book bear sets off on a grand adventure to find a new home.
Except...it's an awfully big world for such a small bear and Otto misses his warm book. Will Otto ever find the perfect home?
With sweet, timeless illustrations and a story that will have young readers watching their bookshelves in hopes of spotting wandering book creatures, this charming story is sure to delight book lovers everywhere.  

And Then It's Spring  by Julie Fogliano
Book Description  
Reading level: Ages 4 and up
Following a snow-filled winter, a young boy and his dog decide that they've had enough of all that brown and resolve to plant a garden. They dig, they plant, they play, they wait . . . and wait . . . until at last, the brown becomes a more hopeful shade of brown, a sign that spring may finally be on its way.
Julie Fogliano's tender story of anticipation is brought to life by the distinctive illustrations Erin E. Stead, recipient of the 2011 Caldecott Medal.

Sunday, March 25, 2012

Read the blog @ http://thewebblibrary.com/ . Beginning with the March 25, 2012 issue, all blog posts will be posted on the new website. The blog is found in the right hand column of the homepage or click "Blog" from the top menu. We would like your feedback on the new website and any comments you may have about the blog.

New Materials:
Poison, Your Grace  by Peg Herring
Book 2 of the Five Star Mystery Series
Book Description
As England's young king struggles with illness, one of his advisors is poisoned. Elizabeth Tudor, fearing her brother was the target, asks her old friend Simon Maldon to investigate the crime.
With the help of his fiancee, Hannah, Simon, now an apothecary's apprentice, braves the corridors of power to protect the king. In the days after the first murder, a knight, a baron, and a serving girl also die in mysterious circumstances, but it is unclear how their deaths benefit any of the possible suspects.
In order to find out, Simon employs various (sometimes embarrassing) disguises, and Hannah uses her position as Elizabeth s newest chambermaid. As the crimes multiply, the danger they face grows. In the end, Elizabeth herself is accused of the murders. To save the princess he admires, Simon faces a fight for his life against a wickedly clever adversary who will not be caught.
This fast-paced historical will delight mystery lovers, Tudor admirers, and all who love a whodunit with (to quote one critic) "panache."

Tides of War  by Stella Tillyard
Book Description

A Library Journal Top Ten Best Books of 2011

An epic novel about love and war, set in Regency England and Spain during the Peninsular War (1812-15), by the acclaimed historian and bestselling author of Aristocrats 
Tides of War opens in England with the recently married, charmingly unconventional Harriet preparing to say goodbye to her husband, James, as he leaves to join the Duke of Wellington's troops in Spain.
Harriet and James's interwoven stories of love and betrayal propel this sweeping and dramatic novel as it moves between Regency London on the cusp of modernity—a city in love with science, the machine, money—and the shocking violence of war in Spain. With dazzling skill Stella Tillyard explores not only the effects of war on the men at the front but also the freedoms it offers the women left behind. As Harriet befriends the older and protective Kitty, Lady Wellington, her life begins to change in unexpected ways. Meanwhile, James is seduced by the violence of battle, and then by love in Seville.
As the novel moves between war and peace, Spain and London, its large cast of characters includes the serial adulterer and war hero the Duke of Wellington, and the émigrés Nathan Rothschild and Frederic Winsor who will usher in the future, creating a world brightly lit by gaslight where credit and financial speculation rule. Whether describing the daily lives and desires of strong female characters or the horror of battle, Tides of War is set to be the fiction debut of the year.

Juvenile
Witches! The Absolutely True Tale of Disaster In Salem  by Rosalyn Schanzer
Reading level: Ages 10 and up
Book Description
The invisible world surrounds us. It's everywhere. Things happen that are unseen. We can feel their presence but we can't see that unknown entity that lurks in the shadows. Is it demons or witches that are causing the hot
flashes or cold sweats that we occasionally feel? What about violent fits? Do you know anyone whose had any of those? If so, you can be sure that witches are nearby, casing spells upon you with a single touch.
In the mid 1600's Puritans were experiencing all sorts of pain, visions, fits and bizarre contortions, to name a few. The Puritans felt the natural world had been infiltrated by the Invisible world. These fears of the witch created new laws that made witchcraft punishable by death. Three women who were accused of casting spells were placed on trial. Hordes of crowds gathered to watch and witness the occasion. Midwives and homeless beggars were the first to be tried.
Schanzer takes readers on a trip back to early Salem where history set the stage for the infamous Salem Witch Trials. Bible thumpers wreaked havoc accusing everyone and anyone who was pointed out. So many were pointing a finger to save themselves from accusation. It was so out of control that the King of England sent Governor Phips, who then established a Court of Oyer and Terminer. The new trials had begun.
Black, white and red scratch board illustrations will have readers flipping and examining the pages and reading all of the researched facts that created such mass hysteria and death. 

The Mighty Miss Malone  by Christopher Paul Curtis
Reading level: Ages 9 and up
Book Descriptionn"
We are a family on a journey to a place called wonderful" is the motto of Deza Malone's family. Deza is the smartest girl in her class in Gary, Indiana, singled out by teachers for a special path in life. But the Great Depression hit Gary hard, and there are no jobs for black men. When her beloved father leaves to find work, Deza, Mother, and her older brother Jimmie go in search of him, and end up in a Hooverville outside Flint, Michigan. Jimmie's beautiful voice inspires him to leave the camp to be a performer, while Deza and Mother find a new home, and cling to the hope that they will find Father. The twists and turns of their story reveal the devastation of the Depression and prove that Deza truly is the Mighty Miss Malone.

Picture Books
That's When I'm Happy  by Beth Soshan
Recomended tfor children ages 0-7
Book Description
Yep, a great short story (with adorable illustrations) of a bear family doing meaningful activities together. Kind of radical in its wholesome simplicity. Those really ARE the activities that are meaningful to kids (and parents) and what we all need to make time for. Personally, I don't think twice about the one illustration of a family bed scene at the end, our kids seem to understand that how the bear family sleeps might not be how we sleep (same deal with photos of litters of baby animals, you name it). No peril and not over sentimental, just warm fuzzy story. Well worth it.


If Big Can... ...I Can  by Beth Shoshan
There Are No Reviews. Would You Like to Write One?

Sunday, March 18, 2012

Check Out Our New Website. Visit http://thewebblibrary.com/ and then tell us what you think. You can post a comment at the bottom of this column where it reads " 0 comments"
   

Our new artist on display is Jim Storholt. His medium is acrylic on canvas and the titles for some of his works include: “Harbor Showers”, “Summer Winds”, “Not Long Ago”, and “Lobster Bake”.

Adult 
Oath Of Office  by Michael Palmer
Book Description
Michael Palmer, the New York Times bestselling author of A Heartbeat Away and The Last Surgeon brings us a shocking new thriller at the crossroads of politics and medicine. 
What if a well respected doctor inexplicably goes on a murderous rampage?
When Dr. John Meacham goes on a shooting spree the office, his business partner, staff, and two patients are killed in the bloodbath.  Then Meacham turns the gun on himself.
The blame falls on Dr. Lou Welcome.  Welcome worked with Meacham years before as a counselor after John's medical license had been revoked for drug addiction.  Lou knew that John was an excellent doctor and deserved to be practicing medicine and fought hard for his license to be restored.  After hearing the news of the violent outburst, Lou is in shock like everyone else, but mostly he's incredulous.  And when he begins to look into it further, the terrifying evidence he finds takes him down a path to an unspeakable conspiracy that seems to lead directly to the White House and those in the highest positions of power. 

Defending Jacob  by William Landay 
Book Description 
Andy Barber has been an assistant district attorney in his suburban Massachusetts county for more than twenty years. He is respected in his community, tenacious in the courtroom, and happy at home with his wife,
Laurie, and son, Jacob. But when a shocking crime shatters their New England town, Andy is blindsided by what happens next: His fourteen-year-old son is charged with the murder of a fellow student.
Every parental instinct Andy has rallies to protect his boy. Jacob insists that he is innocent, and Andy believes him. Andy must. He’s his father. But as damning facts and shocking revelations surface, as a marriage threatens to crumble and the trial intensifies, as the crisis reveals how little a father knows about his son, Andy will face a trial of his own—between loyalty and justice, between truth and allegation, between a past he’s tried to bury and a future he cannot conceive.
Award-winning author William Landay has written the consummate novel of an embattled family in crisis—a suspenseful, character-driven mystery that is also a spellbinding tale of guilt, betrayal, and the terrifying speed at which our lives can spin out of control.

Young Adult
Big Girl Small  by Rachel De Woskin 
Book Description
Judy Lohden is your above-average sixteen-year-old—sarcastic and vulnerable, talented and uncertain, full of big dreams for a big future. With a singing voice that can shake an auditorium, she should be the star of Darcy
Academy, the local performing arts high school. So why is a girl this promising hiding out in a seedy motel room on the edge of town?
The fact that the national media is on her trail after a controversy that might bring down the whole school could have something to do with it. And that scandal has something—but not everything—to do with the fact that Judy is three feet nine inches tall.
Rachel DeWoskin remembers everything about high school: the auditions (painful), the parents (hovering), the dissection projects (compelling), the friends (outcasts), the boys (crushable), and the girls (complicated), and she lays it all out with a wit and wistfulness that is half Holden Caulfield, half Lee Fiora, Prep’s ironic heroine. Big Girl Small is a scathingly funny and moving book about dreams and reality, at once light on its feet and unwaveringly serious.

GirlChild  by Tupelo Hassman  
Book Description
Rory Hendrix is the least likely of Girl Scouts. She hasn’t got a troop or even a badge to call her own. But she’s checked the Handbook out from the elementary school library so many times that her name fills all the
lines on the card, and she pores over its surreal advice (Uniforms, disposing of outgrown; The Right Use of Your Body; Finding Your Way When Lost) for tips to get off the Calle: that is, the Calle de las Flores, the Reno trailer park where she lives with her mother, Jo, the sweet-faced, hard-luck bartender at the Truck Stop.
Rory’s been told that she is one of the “third-generation bastards surely on the road to whoredom.” But she’s determined to prove the county and her own family wrong. Brash, sassy, vulnerable, wise, and terrified, she struggles with her mother’s habit of trusting the wrong men, and the mixed blessing of being too smart for her own good. From diary entries, social workers’ reports, half-recalled memories, arrest records, family lore, Supreme Court opinions, and her grandmother’s letters, Rory crafts a devastating collage that shows us her world even as she searches for the way out of it.

Juvenile
Black and White  by Larry Dan Brimner
Book Description 
Bombed, beaten, banned, and imprisoned, the Reverend Fred J. Shuttlesworth led the civil rights struggle for equality in Birmingham, Alabama, using nonviolent actions to protest segregation in schools, stores, buses, and the hiring of police officers. He pressed his congregation to register to vote and to cast their ballots for civil
rights supports. Eugene "Bull" Conner, backed by the Ku Klux Klan, became a symbol of racist hatred and violence as he organized the Southern segregationists to rally against Shuttlesworth. With a spacious design that includes archival pictures and primary source documents on almost every page, this accessible photo-essay recounts the events in three sections that focus first on the Preacher ("Fred"), then on the Commissioner ("Bull"), and finally, on their confrontation. For readers new to the subject, the biographies will be a vivid, informative introduction, but even those who have some familiarity with the landmark events will learn much more here. Thorough source notes document the sometimes harrowing details and provide opportunities for further research, as does a list of suggested readings. Never simplistic, Brimner shows the viewpoints from all sources: some middle-class blacks resented "Fred's" heavy-handed style - fiery, confrontational, dictatorial - even if they agreed with the goals; some whites in Birmingham did not wish to see an end to segregation, though their voices were drowned out. A penetrating look at elemental national history.

Bootleg: Murder, Moonshine, and the Lawless Years of Prohibition by Karen Blumenthal 
Book Description 
Reading level: Ages 12 and up
It began with the best of intentions. Worried about the effects of alcohol on American families, mothers and civic leaders started a movement to outlaw drinking in public places. Over time, their protests, petitions, and activism paid off—when a Constitional Amendment banning the sale and consumption of alcohol was ratified, it was hailed as the end of public drunkenness, alcoholism, and a host of other social ills related to booze. Instead, it began a decade of lawlessness, when children smuggled (and drank) illegal alcohol, the most upright citizens casually broke the law, and a host of notorious gangsters entered the public eye. Filled with period art and photographs, anecdotes, and portraits of unique characters from the era, this fascinating book looks at the rise and fall of the disastrous social experiment known as Prohibition.

Picture Books 
Extra Yarn by Mac Barnett  
Amazon.com Review
Reading level: Ages 4 and up
A monochrome town gets a change of color and attitude with the help of a box of yarn and a girl named Annabelle. From the seemingly endless box of Extra Yarn Annabelle knits clothing for everyone around her, tempering the ill-tempered, and creating beautifully patterned warmth for people, animals, and objects, alike. When a greedy clothes-loving archduke tries to buy--then steal--the box for himself, he discovers that ill-gotten gains bear no fruit--or in this case, yarn. Mac Barnett’s elegant and clever story is complemented by Jon Klassen’s illustrations, and fans of I Want My Hat Back will enjoy the familiar faces that show up in this picture book about the magical properties of kindness and generosity.

The Great Migration: Journey To The North  by Eloise Greenfield
From Booklist
Grades 2-4.
 Between 1915 and 1930, more than a million African Americans left their homes in the South and moved to the North, says Greenfield in an introduction to this stirring collection of poems that honors those who took
part in the Great Migration, including the poet herself. Each spread looks at a different stage in the journey, beginning with the uprooting: Saying goodbye to the land / puts a pain on my heart, says a farmer. The beat in Greenfield's free-verse poetry amplifies the feeling of momentum, from the way news travels -They thought about it, talked about it, / spread the word - to the rhythm of the train that is felt even in the northbound passengers questions, Will I make a good life / for my family, / for myself? / The wheels are singing, / Yes, you will, / you will, you will! / I hope they're right. / I think they're right. / I know they're right. Greatly enhancing the impact of the words, Gilchrist's moving mixed-media collages layer drawings, maps, and color-washed archival images that have the slightly distorted look of photocopies, giving some of the figures an almost ghostly, translucent appearance. Together, the immediate words, striking images, and Greenfield's personal story create a powerful, haunting view of a pivotal moment in U.S. history even as they show the universal challenges of leaving home behind and starting a new life. A bibliography concludes.

Underpants Thunderpants  by Peter Bently
Book Description
Underpants, thunderpants, look at them fly! Over the ocean, the jungle, and town - where will those undies come fluttering down?"" When Dog leaves his underpants on the line during a thunderstorm, they take off on quite the adventure in this light-hearted book by Peter Bently. Great for early readers, this picture book features engaging and easy-to-read rhymes. The whole family will love to read along with this story of a lovable dog and his missing underpants, featuring bright, colorful illustrations by Deborah Melmon.

Sunday, March 11, 2012

IPL2 (http://www.ipl.org/div/news/) provides an online database linking newspapers from the U.S. and around the world along with magazines, and resources for kids and teens. 

If you are a fan of Lee Child's books, try these titles and authors:
The General's Daughter by Nelson DeMille.
West Point graduate and daughter of legendary General "Fighting Joe" Campbell, Ann Campbell is the pride of Fort Hadley, until one morning when her lifeless body is found naked and bound on the firing range. Paul Brenner is a member of the army's elite undercover investigative unit and the man in charge of this politically explosive case. Teamed with rape specialist Cynthia Sunhill, Brenner is about to learn just how many people were sexually, emotionally, and dangerously involved with the Army's "golden girl".
Separation of Power by Vince Flynn
Newly appointed CIA Director Dr. Irene Kennedy is the target of an inside plot to destroy her and end the American President's term. Even worse, Israel uncovers an Iraqi plan to enter the nuclear arms race. Now, Rapp has two weeks to beat the clock--or watch the world go up in flames.
Scarecrow by Matthew Reilly.
It is the greatest bounty hunt in history. The targets are the finest warriors in the world-commandos, spies, terrorists. And they must all be dead by 12 noon, today. The price on their heads: almost $20 million each. Among the names, one stands out. The enigmatic Marine, Shane Schofield, who goes by the call-sign "Scarecrow." Schofield is plunged into a race around the world, pursued by a fearsome collection of international bounty hunters. The race is on and the pace is frantic as he fights for survival, in the process unveiling a vast international conspiracy and the terrible reason why he cannot, under any circumstances, be allowed to live! He led his men into hell in Ice Station. He protected the President against all odds in Area 7. But this time it's different, because he is the target.
Dead Watch by John Sandford
"Late afternoon, Virginia, and a woman is on the run. Her husband, a former U.S. senator named Lincoln Bowe, has been missing for days. Kidnapped? Murdered? She doesn't know, but she thinks she knows who's involved, and why. And that she may be next. Hours later, a phone rings in the pocket of Jacob Winter. An Army Intelligence veteran, Winter specializes in what he thinks of as forensic bureaucracy. Congress, the Pentagon, the FBI, CIA, Homeland Security - when something goes wrong, Winter kicks over rocks until he finds out what really happened. The White House is his main client, and the chief of staff is on the phone now. If Bowe isn't located soon, he is told, all hell will break loose.
What Winter doesn't realize is - all hell will break loose anyway. And he will be right in the middle of it. Large forces are at work, men determined to do whatever it takes to achieve unprecedented ends. Before the next few days are out, Winter will discover he has to use every one of his resources not only to prevail...but just to survive. And so will the nation. 
The Kill Artist by Daniel Silva
A former Mossad agent, now an art restorer, is tapped to help thwart a Palestinian plot to halt peace talks by assassinating Yasir Arafat.

NEW MATERIALS

Adult
Heft  by Liz Moore
Book Description  
A heartwarming novel about larger-than-life characters and second chances.
Former academic Arthur Opp weighs 550 pounds and hasn't left his rambling Brooklyn
home in a decade. Twenty miles away, in Yonkers, seventeen-year-old Kel Keller navigates life as the poor kid in a rich school and pins his hopes on what seems like a promising baseball career—if he can untangle himself from his family drama. The link between this unlikely pair is Kel’s mother, Charlene, a former student of Arthur’s. After nearly two decades of silence, it is Charlene’s unexpected phone call to Arthur—a plea for help—that jostles them into action. Through Arthur and Kel’s own quirky and lovable voices, Heft tells the winning story of two improbable heroes whose sudden connection transforms both their lives. Like Elizabeth McCracken’s The Giant’s House, Heft is a novel about love and family found in the most unexpected places.

Gathering of Waters by Bernice L. McFadden 
Book Description
This is a deeply engrossing tale narrated by the town of Money, Mississippi--a site both significant and infamous in our collective story as a nation. Money is personified in this haunting story, which chronicles its troubled history following the arrival of the Hilson and Bryant families.
Tass Hilson and Emmett Till were young and in love when Emmett was brutally murdered in 1955. Anxious to escape the town, Tass marries Maximillian May and relocates to Detroit.
Forty years later, after the death of her husband, Tass returns to Money and fantasy takes flesh when Emmett Till's spirit is finally released from the dank, dark waters of the Tallahatchie River. The two lovers are reunited, bringing the story to an enchanting and profound conclusion.


The Night Swimmer by Matt Bondurant
Book Description
An utterly riveting modern gothic novel of marriage and belonging, confirms his gift for storytelling that transports and enthralls.
In a small town on the southern coast of Ireland, an isolated place only frequented by fishermen and the occasional group of bird-watchers, Fred and Elly Bulkington, newly
arrived from Vermont having won a pub in a contest, encounter a wild, strange land shaped by the pounding storms of the North Atlantic, as well as the native resistance to strangers. As Fred revels in the life of a new pubowner, Elly takes the ferry out to a nearby island where anyone not born there is called a “blow-in.” To the disbelief of the locals, Elly devotes herself to open-water swimming, pushing herself to the limit and crossing unseen boundaries that drive her into the heart of the island’s troubles—the mysterious tragedy that shrouds its inhabitants and the dangerous feud between an enigmatic farmer and a powerful clan that has no use for outsiders. The poignant unraveling of a marriage, the fierce beauty of the natural world, the mysterious power of Irish lore, and the gripping story of strangers in a strange land rife with intrigue and violence—The Night Swimmer is a novel of myriad enchantments by a writer of extraordinary talent.

Defending Jacob by William Landay Book Description Andy Barber has been an assistant district attorney in his suburban Massachusetts county for more than twenty years. He is respected in his community, tenacious in the courtroom, and happy at home with his wife, Laurie, and son, Jacob. But when a shocking crime shatters their New England town, Andy is blindsided by what happens next: His fourteen-year-old son is charged with the murder of a fellow student.
Every parental instinct Andy has rallies to protect his boy. Jacob insists that he is innocent, and Andy believes him. Andy must. He’s his father. But as damning facts and shocking revelations surface, as a marriage threatens to crumble and the trial intensifies, as the crisis reveals how little a father knows about his son, Andy will face a trial of his own—between loyalty and justice, between truth and allegation, between a past he’s tried to bury and a future he cannot conceive.
Award-winning author William Landay has written the consummate novel of an embattled family in crisis—a suspenseful, character-driven mystery that is also a spellbinding tale of guilt, betrayal, and the terrifying speed at which our lives can spin out of control.

Juvenile
M. C. Higgins  by Virginia Hamilton
Book Description
Reading level: Ages 8 and up
From a perch on his 40-foot pole (a gift from his father for swimming across the Ohio River), M.C. likes to slide his hand over the rolling mountains, smooth out the sky, and
fluff up the trees to the south of Sarah's Mountain. To the north, though, no amount of pretending can make the whine of bulldozers and deep gashes in the mountain disappear. Ever since M.C.'s great-grandmother Sarah came here as a runaway slave, Sarah's Mountain has been home to the Higgins family. But now their home is threatened by the strip-mining that has left a giant slag heap perched precariously above their house. Will the two strangers who appear in the hills help M.C. save his family? Reissued in celebration of its 25th anniversary, M.C. Higgins the Great has a power that runs deeper than the coal seam snaking through M.C.'s mountain. The intensity of family bonds, the depth of rural superstition, and the grim tragedy of environmental destruction weave together in a story that is as complex as it is beautiful. Not surprisingly, Virginia Hamilton, who has won every major award given to authors, received the Newbery Medal, the National Book Award, and the Boston Globe/Horn Book Award for this excellent novel. (Ages 13 and older)


The Egypt Game by Zilpha Keatley Snyder
Book Description
Reading level: Ages 8 and up
The first time Melanie Ross meets April Hall, she’s not sure they have anything in common. But she soon discovers that they both love anything to do with ancient Egypt. When they stumble upon a deserted storage yard, Melanie and April decide it’s the perfect spot for the Egypt Game. Before long there are six Egyptians, and they all meet to wear costumes, hold ceremonies, and work on their secret code. Everyone thinks it’s just a game until strange things start happening. Has the Egypt Game gone too far?

Sunday, March 4, 2012

The Entry Display is wearing Green. Browse a selection of books wearing green covers and take one home to read.

The Adult Book Discussion Group will meet at 2 pm Wed. to discuss the book "Dexter Is Delicious" by Jeff Lindsay. Plan to join the discussion.

NEW MATERIALS
Adult
Left For Dead  by Nevada Barr
Book Description
Ali Reynolds investigates two shocking cases of victims brutally left for dead in New York Times bestselling J.A. Jance’s latest mystery-thriller. When Santa Cruz County deputy sheriff Jose Reyes, Ali’s classmate from the Arizona Police Academy, is gunned down and left to die, he is at first assumed to be an innocent victim of
the drug wars escalating across the border. But the crime scene investigation shows there’s much more to it than that, and soon he and his pregnant wife, Teresa, both fall under suspicion of wrongdoing.Ali owes Reyes a debt of gratitude for the help he gave her years earlier when she was dealing with a troubled friend. When she’s summoned to his bedside at Physicians Medical Center in Tucson, it’s impossible for her to turn away. And knowing Reyes as well as she does, Ali finds it hard to believe that he’s become mixed up in the drug trade, despite evidence to the contrary. Upon arriving at the hospital, Ali finds that her good friend, Sister Anselm, is there, too—working as a patient advocate on behalf of another seriously injured victim, an unidentified young woman presumed to be an illegal border crosser, who was raped and savagely beaten.Ali becomes determined to seek justice in both cases and secure safety for both victims. Together with Sister Anselm and a conscientious officer who won’t let the case drop despite pressure from above, Ali digs for clues to find the true culprits. Fast-paced, tension-filled, and intriguingly complex, Left for Dead is J.A. Jance at her riveting best.

The Rope: An Anna Pigeon Mystery  by Nevada Barr
Book Description
Anna Pigeon's first case—this is the story her fans have been clamoring for...this is where it all starts.
In The Rope, the latest in Nevada Barr’s bestselling novels featuring Anna Pigeon, Nevada Barr gathers
together the many strings of Anna’s past and finally reveals the story that her many fans have been long asking for. In 1995 and 35 years old, fresh off the bus from New York City and nursing a broken heart, Anna Pigeon takes a decidedly unglamorous job as a seasonal employee of the Glen Canyon National Recreational Area. On her day off, Anna goes hiking into the park never to return. Her co-workers think she’s simply moved on—her cabin is cleaned out and her things gone. But Anna herself wakes up, trapped at the bottom of a dry natural well, naked, without supplies and no clear memory of how she found herself in this situation.
As she slowly pieces together her memory, it soon becomes clear that someone has trapped her there, in an inescapable prison, and no one knows that she is even missing. Plunged into a landscape and a plot she is unfit and untrained to handle, Anna Pigeon must muster the courage, determination and will to live that she didn’t even know she still possessed to survive, outwit and triumph.

For those legions of readers who have been entranced over the years by Park Ranger Anna Pigeon’s strength and determination and those who are new to Nevada Barr’s captivating, compelling novels, this is where it all starts.

Young Adult
Ghetto Cowboy  by G. Neri
Book Description

Cole's been in trouble plenty of times before, but this is different. This is worse. After getting caught after
skipping school for large swaths of time, Cole's mother has had all that she can take. Next thing he knows
they're barreling out of Detroit, the only home he's ever had, straight for Philadelphia. There, Cole's father, a guy he's never met before a day of his life, lives a peculiar life. Cole's heard of cowboys, sure, but whoever heard of cowboys in Philly? Turns out that his dad helps run an urban stable where he works to get
neighborhood kids interested in helping care for and ride the local horse population. But with a city intent on carting the horses away, it's going to take more than good intentions to keep these modern day cowboys up and running. It's going to take Cole's help.

Juvenile
Scary Creatures Of The Deep  by Jim Pipe
Book Description
Reading level: Ages 8 and up
Gaping mouths and groping tentacles? Predators that glow in the dark? Gigantic sea monsters? Discover the real truth: How do deep-sea creatures find their food? Can they ever come to the surface.





Scary Creatures of the Soil  by Gerard Cheshire
Book Description
Reading level: 8 and up
Teeming termites?
Predatory spiders?
Beetles that bury bodies?
Discover the real truth: Can owls really live underground? Do worms really eat dead bodies?




Scary Creatures Of The Night  by John Malam
Book Description
Reading level: Ages 8 and up
Leaping lizards and quivering blobs of poisonous jelly! There's no telling what you'll encounter inside these thrilling books, with special “X-ray” pages that let kids peer clear through to the animal's skeleton, colourful “call-out” illustrations, and myth-busting “Did You Know” questions—everything kids need to safely get to know some real-life scary creatures!



Picture Books
Muddy Paws  by Moira Butterfield
When Ben gets a new puppy he wants to give him a name that's just perfect. Find out how this cute, bouncy dog gets to be called Muddypaws. This beautifully illustrated and heartwarming tale of a boy and his sidekick is fun for children of all ages. Kids will love engaging with the lively text and learning to read along with the story. Ideal for ages 3-8, Muddypaws makes a great read-along book for the whole family.  



Muddy Paws Goes To School  by Peter Bently
Book Description
It's the first day of school, and Ben is all set to go. So is his lovable dog, Muddypaws! This beautifully illustrated and heartwarming tale of a boy and his sidekick is a great story for children in their own early school days. Kids will love engaging with the lively text and learning to read along with the story. Ideal for ages 3-8, this book makes a great read-along book for the whole family.




Short Chapter
Magic Tree House #28: High Tide In Hawaii  by Mary Pope Osborne
When the Magic Tree House whisks Jack and Annie off to Hawaii it?s for more than a vacation?they?re in search of a fourth kind of magic for Morgan! On the way they help an island community survive a tidal wave and, of course, take some time out to surf! Ultimately, they discover that the magic that they have found in this set of four books are everyday magics: the magic of the arts, the magic of the natural world, the magic of community; and the magic of fun.

Sunday, February 26, 2012

Happy Birthday Dr. Seuss!!! Join Laura for a special Story Time Friday, March 2 from 10:30 - 12:30 as the Webb Celebrates his birthday with stories, crafts, and more. Regular Story Time will be held on Thursday @10:30.
 
Thanks To Chick-fil-A for becoming the new sponsor of our "Name the fictional character Contest". Name the character and receive a FREE Chick-fil-A Chicken Sandwich from Chick-fil-A, Morehead City. Clues are found in the right column of this blog.

If You Like Nicholas Sparks...
Check out these novels for more heartwarming tales of love and loss.  

For One More Day By Mitch Albom
The Smoke Jumper  by Nicholas Evans 
The Carousel by Richard Paul Evans
Slow Waltz in Cedar Bend by Robert James Waller
Dancing at the Harvest Moon by K.C. McKinnon
Suzanne’s Diary for Nicholas by James Patterson
Ticket Home by James Michael Pratt
Hawkes Cove by Susan Wilson
Sweetwater Creek Anne Rivers Siddons
 
NEW MATERIALS
Adult
Gun Games  by Faye Kellerman
Peter Decker and Rina Lazarus are back in this gripping mystery involving a secret cabal of some of Los Angeles’ most wealthy—and vicious—teens
LAPD lieutenant detective Decker and his wife, Rina, have willingly welcomed fifteen-year-old Gabriel Whitman, the son of a troubled former friend, into their home. While the enigmatic teen seems to be adapting
easily, Decker knows only too well the secrets adolescents keep—witnessed by the tragic suicide of another teen, Gregory Hesse, a student at Bell and Wakefield, one of the city’s most exclusive prep schools.
Gregory’s mother, Wendy, refuses to believe her son shot himself and convinces Decker to look deeper. What he finds disturbs him. The gun used in the tragedy was stolen—evidence that propels him to launch a full investigation with his trusted team, Sergeant Marge Dunn and Detective Scott Oliver. But the case becomes darkly complicated by the suicide of another Bell and Wakefield student—a death that leads them to uncover an especially nasty group of rich and privileged students with a predilection for guns and violence. Decker thought he understood kids, yet the closer he and his team get to the truth, the clearer it becomes that he knows very little about them, including his own charge, Gabe. The son of a gangster and an absent parent, the boy has had a life filled with too much free time, too many unexplained absences, and too little adult supervision.
Before it’s over, the case and all its terrifying ramifications will take Decker and his detectives down a dark alley of twisted allegiances and unholy alliances, culminating at a heart-stopping point of no return.

Hope, A Tragedy  by Shalom Auslander
Description
The rural town of Stockton, New York, is famous for nothing: no one was born there, no one died there, nothing of any historical import at all has ever happened there, which is why Solomon Kugel, like other
urbanites fleeing their pasts and histories, decided to move his wife and young son there.
To begin again. To start anew. But it isn’t quite working out that way for Kugel…
His ailing mother stubbornly holds on to life, and won’t stop reminiscing about the Nazi concentration camps she never actually suffered through. To complicate matters further, some lunatic is burning down farmhouses just like the one Kugel bought, and when, one night, he discovers history—a living, breathing, thought-to-be-dead specimen of history—hiding upstairs in his attic, bad quickly becomes worse.
Hope: A Tragedy is a hilarious and haunting examination of the burdens and abuse of history, propelled with unstoppable rhythm and filled with existential musings and mordant wit. It is a comic and compelling story of the hopeless longing to be free of those pasts that haunt our every present. 

Young Adult 
Dead End In Norvelt  by Jack Gantos
The winner of the 2012 Newbery Medal for the year's best contribution to children's literature and the Scott O'Dell Award for Historical Fiction!
Melding the entirely true and the wildly fictional, Dead End in Norvelt is a novel about an incredible two
months for a kid named Jack Gantos, whose plans for vacation excitement are shot down when he is...


"grounded for life" by his feuding parents, and whose nose spews bad blood at every little shock he gets. But plenty of excitement (and shocks) are coming Jack's way once his mom loans him out to help a fiesty old neighbor with a most unusual chore—typewriting obituaries filled with stories about the people who... founded his utopian town. As one obituary leads to another, Jack is launced on a strange adventure involving molten wax, Eleanor Roosevelt, twisted promises, a homemade airplane, Girl Scout cookies, a man on a trike, a dancing plague, voices from the past, Hells Angels . . . and possibly murder. Endlessly surprising, this sly, sharp-edged narrative is the author at his very best, making readers laugh out loud at the most unexpected things in a dead-funny depiction of growing up in a slightly off-kilter place where the past is present, the present is confusing, and the future is completely up in the air.
Reading level: Ages 10 and up
Description
Juvenile 
The Enchanted Forest Chronicles  by Patricia C. Wrede (Grade 5-9)
Dealing With Dragons: Book 1

founded his utopian town. As one obituary leads to another, Jack is launced on a strange adventure involving molten wax, Eleanor Roosevelt, twisted promises, a homemade airplane, Girl Scout cookies, a man on a trike, a dancing plague, voices from the past, Hells Angels . . . and possibly murder. Endlessly surprising, this sly, sharp-edged narrative is the author at his very best, making readers laugh out loud at the most unexpected things in a dead-funny depiction of growing up in a slightly off-kilter place where the past is present, the present is confusing, and the future is completely up in the air.

Enchanted Forest Chronicles  by  Patricia C. Wrede

Dealing With Dragons: Book 1
Searching For Dragons: Book 2
Calling On Dragons: Book 3
Talking to Dragons: Book 4

"Dealing with Dragons" introduces Princess Cimorene, youngest daughter of the king of Linderwall. Like most medieval tomboys, Cimorene is considered rough, unseemly and stubborn -- she wants to fight with swords
and learn magic. On the advice from a magic frog, she goes out in search of a dragon to
be housekeeper for. But when she's not sending away valiant knights, she's dealing with some very troublesome wizards...

"Searching For Dragons" picks up when the dragon Kazul goes mysteriously missing. Cimorene is, unsurprisingly, very concerned about this and wants to find her. Enter Mendanbar, a young king as unconventional as Cimorene -- not to mention in need of a wife. But even though he goes along to find Kazul, with wizards and laughter all around, he'll find that he's much more interested in Cimorene.

"Calling on Dragons" skips ahead to when Cimorene and Mendanbar are mrried, and Queen Cimorene is pregnant. All is right, right? Wrong. Magic is vanishing in the Enchanted Forest; the king's sword has been stolen. To combat the troublesome wizards, Morwen the witch teams up with Cimorene, Kazul, Telemain the
Magician, and a rabbit called Killer.

"Talking to Dragons" skips ahead even further, to when Daystar is sent off by his mom Cimorene with only a magic sword. Poor kid -- he has to help King Mendanbar escape from an evil wizard's spell, without knowing that Mendanbar is his father. He teams up with a hot-tempered firewitch, Shiara, a dragon, a lizard, and a rather annoying princess. Can Daystar clue in before all is lost?
The new four-volume release from Magic Carpet Books is a good one, with quirky cover illustrations and better quality. While the first book is the best, the following ones each have their own measure of charm. The third book is a little weak at times, and the dragons are a bit less prominent in the fourth book, but each one is still quite enjoyable.
Cimorene is a solid, likable heroine who doesn't like being a stuffy princess, and much prefers keeping house for a dragon, learning magic, and cooking cherries jubilee. Mendanbar is a good love interest, quirky and pleasant enough; Morwen and Kazul are excellent supporting characters.
So if you're a fan of fractured fairy tales, dragon politics and melting wizards, this series will be at the top of your list. Highly recommended for those who like their fantasy with a dash of comedy.