YSS Regional Meetup: Waupaca January 2018: Booklist

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When you invite library staff to bring a book to talk about, you are sure to wind up with a list of outstanding titles. Here is the list recorded at the first regional YSS meetup of 2018 on January 26 at the Waupaca Area Library. Some titles are adult reads, some are YA, some are juvenile fiction and picture books. Descriptions were captured from the booktalks as they were being given and I was writing as fast as I could:

If the Creek Don’t Rise (adult) - fiction pairing with Hillbilly Elegy

In Other Lands (YA) - creative, LGBTQ, unique writing style, flipped gender

York (juvenile) - Alt history, steampunk elements, twins, apartment building as character

Origin - race against time, adventurous

Beautiful Blue World - moral character and compassion shown as strengths

Temeraire series (adult/YA crossover) - dragons ridden by crews, good for readers who liked John Flannigan’s Ranger Apprentice series

Year One by Nora Roberts - dystopic fantasy, steamy scenes but not graphic

America’s First Daughter (adult)- historical fiction about Jefferson’s daughter from 10 years old to old age, strong on moral dilemmas, good book club choice, cross-curriular

Ocean at the End of the Lane by Neil Gaiman - readalike for Coraline

Librarian of Auschwitz (YA) - historical fiction based on a 14 year old girl who became the caretaker of the 8 books at Auschwitz

They Both Die at the End (YA) - two boys living in a world where you know the day you’ll die, empowering, magnificent, and given thumbs up by three librarians

Song of the Lionness Quartet by Tamara Pierce (YA, juvenile)- “badass” female character, fantasy, knights, protaganist is 9 years old at series start, author has a new series coming out

Moxie by Jennifer Mathieu (YA)- set in Texas where football is king, has a Friday Nights Lights twist but with a feminist flavor, Amy Pohler liked it

Epic Crush of Genie Lo (YA)- journey of discovery in a comic book meets real life type of way with Chinese mythology

Sound of Gravel (adult) - nonfiction memoir of a child in a polygamist family with 38 brothers and sisters

Land of Stories (juvenile) - audiobook is a great family listen engaging all ages

Mosquito Land (YA) - audiobook that tackles hard topics like mental illness, blended families, and sexuality

Rot, the Cutest in the World (picture book) - must read funny book for kids and storytime where a rotten potato wants to compete in the cutest in the world contest

Wrinkle in Time (graphic novel) - movie coming out soon, good for teens

Grand Canyon by Jason Chin (nonfiction picture book) - Sue Abrahamson’s pick for the Sibert Award, written at a high level, great art, jam packed with information, Jan Brett-like borders with animals in them, multilevel read, end pages contain extra information

Most People (picture book) - universal themes that are a good answer to all the divisiveness in the world, message is that most people are good and kind

Martin Rising - newest from Andrea Davis Pinckney, great for diversity and civil rights displays

Cry Heart But Never Break (picture book) - translated from the Danish, a book about death who is personified to take Grandma, gives a soft message about grief

One Last Word by Nikki Grimes (nonfiction/poetry) - golden shovel style of poems from Harlem Renaissance poets, art is by different African-American illustrators

Wishtree (juvenile) - predicted to be a Newbery Award or honor book, slow moving but then punches you with emotion

Nowhere Girls by Amy Reed (YA) - Teenage girls have had enough, get ready to be mad, alternates perspectives with masculine rights movement, represents no girl but every girl

No More Reading for Junk: Best Practices for Motivating Readers (Professional Development) - timely regarding summer reading and prizes, a quick read about research from the educators’ point of view about intrinsic and extrinsic motivations to read

Lunar Chronicles series by Marissa Meyer (YA) - excellent as an audiobook

Claymates (picture book) - unique and fresh because the illustrations are take son clay models

Sparrow (juvenile) - a girl who likes birds is accused of attempting suicide for being up on a roof

Roll (juvenile) - a curl up and read it all the way through story by first time WI author Darcy Miller about pigeon competitions, featured on public TV

Price Guide to the Occult - From the author of The Strange and Beautiful Sorrows of Ava Lavender

On the Spot (picture book) - interactive with reusable stickers, good for preschool storytimes

They All Saw A Cat (picture book) - illustrations are colored by the viewers perspective of the cat, great for 1st grade audiences, use to talk about differences and how one sees things, good for a kindness unit

City of Ember (juvenile/YA) - an older but engaging audiobook with a positive portrayal of parents, dystopian fiction

Fortunately the Milk by Neil Gaiman - fantastical story about what happens to a dad who goes out for milk while the mom was out of town, used in a juvenile book club “Cookies & Milk” book club with small cup of milk and a cup of Cookie Crunch cereal, another programming idea is Book! Cook! Where older kids listen to a read-aloud while something is baked

A Hundred Billion Trillion Stars by Seth Fishman - diverse, about big numbers, great endnotes with extensive information, written numbers provided on pages as an aid to the reader, talks about extrapolation, takes the big picture and makes it personal

Refugee by Alan Gratz - a pick for an award or honor book, takes three children in different times and locations and connects them through the refugee experience, personalizes tragedy but sparks hope through a fictionalized account of real things that happened to real children