Hubbub and Blurt: FIC

Showing posts with label FIC. Show all posts

Saturday, May 2, 2015

“Mr. and Mrs. Bunny — Detectives Extraordinaire! by Mrs. Bunny and translated from the Rabbit” by Polly Horvath

FIC HOR

What would happen if you lived on a small island with your slightly bizarre parents and you came home one day to discover that they had been kidnapped? And a weird note left on the refrigerator hinted that you could be next?

Well, if you’re Madeleine, a very bright, very motivated fifth-grader who has just won your school’s top awards for writing, reading and music, you hire detectives. And you wouldn’t be the least bit concerned if the detectives were two bunnies and this was their first case.

Together, these fedora-wearing bunnies and this intelligent girl have to face down evil, foxy kidnappers and charm a code-breaking marmot to make sure that Madeleine and her parents are happily reunited.

Readers are likely to find the situations — such as how Madeleine has to squeeze into Mr. and Mrs. Bunny’s house — funny and imaginative.

— Tracy Grant/Washington Post
“Mr. and Mrs. Bunny — Detectives Extraordinaire! by Mrs. Bunny and translated from the Rabbit” by Polly Horvath. Ages 8-12. $16.99

Monday, April 27, 2015

The Flint Heart by Katherine and John Paterson

FIC PAT

Sunday, March 29, 2015

Homesick by Kate Klise

FIC KLI

Benny's parents are getting divorced, his mom left and his father has become a hoarder, to make matters worse his hometown has been entered into a contest, and now the pressure is on to get the house cleaned up.

Here's the Loring catalog listing:

Homesick
	Call #: FIC KLI Klise, Kate.
	Published 2012
	Reading Level: 4.3 Interest Level: 5-8
	Lexile: 610

We have other books by Kate Klise:

The show must go on!
	Call #: FIC KLI Klise, Kate,
	Series: Three-ring rascals ; bk. 1
	Published 2013
	Reading Level: 3.4
	Lexile: 540

Dying to meet you
	Call #: FIC KLI Klise, Kate.
	Series: 43 Old Cemetery Road ; bk. 1
	Published 2009
	Reading Level: 4.4 Interest Level: 3-6
	Lexile: 730

Saturday, February 28, 2015

The Dream Stealer by Sid Fleischman, pictures by Peter Sis

FIC FLE

Grade 2–5—Basing a story on a carved Mexican figure, Fleischman weaves a short tale around a Dream Stealer, Zumpango, who perches outside windows waiting to snitch nightmares from sleeping children. Scared by some of the critters he has lassoed, he starts taking happy dreams. But he hasn't reckoned with Susana, who wants back her interrupted dream of a happy reunion with a friend with whom she has had a fight. She tricks Zumpango into flying her to his lair to take back the dream. There she faces down and outfoxes the nightmare creatures (some borrowed from folktales) and agrees to be Zumpango's new friend if he will leave her good dreams alone. When she is returned home, a phone call from her old friend provides a cheerful end. Sís's ink drawings feature just the right mix of surreal, funny, scary, and reassuring images (but sharp readers will note that while the text has the Dream Stealer escaping an ogre feet first through a narrow window, the illustration shows him stuck head first). Set within a loving Spanish family, the tale twinkles with Fleischman's signature crisp language and laugh-out-loud wordplay. All in all, it's a quick, unique read that's sure to give young chapter-book readers shivers, laughs, and satisfaction.—Susan Hepler, School Library Journal

CHAPTER 2
Bedtime for Susana

While he waited, the night visitor chewed on green
chili peppers he'd picked along the way-not too mild,
not too hot.
He kept a sharp eye on the windows below.
Susana was hiding from her mother, first behind
her father-he with the smiling black mustache.
Then she ducked behind her little grandmother,
who stood taking off small gold earrings.

Page 5

Monday, January 26, 2015

The Book of One Hundred Truths by Julie Schumacher

FIC SCH

I should probably mention something right now before this story goes any further: my name is Theodora Grumman, and I am a liar.”

It’s hard for Thea to write four truths a day in the notebook her mother gave her for the summer. Especially when her grandparents’ house on the Jersey Shore is even more packed with family than usual, and her cousin Jocelyn wont leave her alone. Jocelyn just might be the world’s neatest and nosiest seven-year-old, and she wants to know what’s in Thea’s notebook. But Thea won’t tell anyone about the secret she has promised to keep–or how she lost her best friend (Truth #12), whose name was Gwen.

Now Thea has to babysit in the afternoons, and all Jocelyn wants to do is spy on people. Neither of them expect to see Aunt Ellen and Aunt Celia at the boardwalk in the middle of the day, or for their aunts to lie and insist they were at work. Could it be Thea’s not the only one in the family keeping secrets this summer?

“…a page-turner of a story filled with vividly real characters and a profound, multi-layered plot spiced up with a bit of mystery, suspense and humor. Highly recommended.”

-KidsReads.com

“The lessons… feel genuine, as do the relationships among other members of this big, boisterous extended family. With their help, Thea learns that everyone makes mistakes and that telling the truth, no matter how difficult, is always better than lying.”

-Publisher’s Weekly

Monday, January 12, 2015

The Children of the King by Sonya Hartnett

FIC HAR

Three children have been sent to live in the countryside, safe from the war in London. When they find two boys hiding in a castle, the past and future come together to make an extraordinary adventure. A hauntingly beautiful story from one of Australia's most acclaimed writers for adults and children.

Sonya Hartnett's work has won numerous Australian and international literary prizes and has been published around the world. Uniquely, she is acclaimed for her stories for adults, young adults and children. Her accolades include the Commonwealth Writers' Prize (Of A Boy), The Age Book of the Year (Of A Boy), the Guardian Children's Fiction Prize (Thursday's Child), the Children's Book Council of Australia Book of the Year for both Older and Younger Readers (Forest, The Silver Donkey, The Ghost's Child, The Midnight Zoo and The Children of the King), the Victorian Premier's Literary Award (Surrender), shortlistings for the Miles Franklin Award (for both Of a Boy and Butterfly) and the CILP Carnegie Medal (The Midnight Zoo). Hartnett is also the first Australian recipient of the Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award (2008). In 2014, Hartnett published a new novel for adults, Golden Boys, and her third picture book, The Wild One.

This is what the record looks like for The Children of the King in the Loring Catalog.
If you click on the picture you will be able to see the
Subject Headings and Publication Information.

Sunday, October 12, 2014

Diary of a Wimpy Kid

FIC KIN

All of the copies of Diary of a Wimpy Kid went out the first week. There were some tears from students who searched for them without success. We have 13 total copies and over 400 students so plenty of other books went out as well.

Reading and Me

When I read, I experience in poet Jane Hirshfield’s words, “a clarification and magnification of being”. Hirshfield is speaking specifically of poetry here, “its word-woven and musical invocation”. The treasure - the ability and freedom to read – and its result – knowledge, insight, wisdom, understanding, empathy, compassion - is lifeblood of human civilizations. The exploration of words (those squiggly shape pictures on the pages) – broken down into those letters in a row then a space then some more letters in a row, each having a sound and a way – knowable! – to become the sentence, the paragraph, the verse, the poem, the story, the novel, the treatise, the manifesto, the sacred statement, the myth – this exploration of words, how to read them and what they mean – this is reading. If you cannot read, the list of loss goes on forever. The works of these authors: Aardema. Alcott. Avi. Babbitt. Bemelmans. Carle. Cooney. Coville. Dahl. Dorros, DePaola. Ehlert. Galdone. Hamilton. Henkes. Keats. Kimmel. Lester. Lobel. Lowry. MacLachlan. McKissack. O’Dell. Peck. Peet. Pinkney. Polacco. Rylant. Seuss. Silverstein. Spinelli. Travers. Ungar. Van Allsburg. Wells. Wilder. Young. Zieffert. Language is a living thing – these stories are mirrors of our lives and doors into other families and cultures.

I worked for many years at the Reference Desk in the Children’s Room of the Public Library. The first key to that room is an adult who will bring a child and choose books to look at and read aloud. The second key to that room is consistent regular persistent introduction to the wealth lined up on each shelf. The third key is the habit of use – a willingness, a commitment, to go weekly, to bring a big rolling box, to read and reread and reread the books at home. Ask the librarian questions, look for answers in the books. The questions may not be “homework related” –- the questions may be “What’s a good book about taking a bath? Try The Tub People by Pam Conrad. “My child thinks she will never be able to figure some things out.” How about Leo the Late Bloomer by Robert Krauss? “We are planting a garden.” How about Allison’s Zinnia by Anita Lobel?

During my year with Minnesota Reading Corps I helped children with reading skills. I held open the door. I held open the passages. I focused on the vowels and helped turn squiggly picture shapes into words made of letters. Mystery to meaning. We walked through these doors. This is blending, this is segmenting. In blending students connect sounds together, in segmenting they separate words into sounds. The reading path begins with awareness of the page content. Reading is decoding. The words are made of sounds! The sentences are made of words! There are syllables and segments! There are rhymes! We can blend, we can combine separate sounds into meaningful words! We can take this words apart and make different words! This is segmenting, this is blending, this is reading! This has meaning. We work to achieve comprehension by constructing meaning from the written text. This word means something you can know. This vocabulary makes meaning. This story is for YOU. You make this story mean something. This is the world that reading opens and enriches. There are fierce thunderstorms here and nannies who arrive by umbrella. There are Enormous Crocodiles, Muffins for Moose, Snowy Days, Giant Peaches and Millions of Cats. There is a Bear Hunt and An Old Lady Who Swallows a Fly. There is a Velveteen Rabbit and a Garden of Verses. There is a place where there are Wild Things. This is the world that is lost to a child who cannot read.

Today in the USA most children learn to read at school. Few bring homemade lunches anymore and most bring complications that arise from our culture’s technological fixations and media fascinations. Nevertheless, schools and teachers are diligently striving to teach these children to read. Some take to it, others do not. Some have help from home, many do not. Some speak languages other than English and cannot read in either language. Some will learn to read. Some will not. Others will require a faithful consistent daily reading tutor. Be that person another student, an Associate Educator, a teacher, a parent, an encourager – we all had helpers. Here at Loring Library we have books. And I am here to open doors and read aloud and answer questions and point the way and listen and learn. Welcome to Loring Library.