Book Review: Word Nerd

Word Nerd
By Susan Nielsen

Ambrose is an awkward 13-year-old with no friends and an overprotective mother (but one might give her a break, as Ambrose’s father died on a construction site from a brain aneurysm and then Ambrose nearly died at age 3 from a peanut butter sandwich). His mom changes jobs and towns every couple of years.

With this new move, Ambrose is determined things will be different; he will make things easier on his mom so she will worry less. Ambrose begins to weave a web of lies: yes, Mom, I have friends, school's going great, and to the school bullies, my parents are rich. However, the bullies quickly realize Ambrose is full of baloney with his knock-off shoes, and they spike his sandwich with a peanut. Ambrose nearly dies, ends up in the hospital and all the lies unravel.

Homeschooling appears to be the perfect answer to keep Ambrose safe from the torture of school and the bullies. When the landlord’s son, Cosmo, moves home (after being released from jail), Ambrose’s mom starts her cycle of worry. Cosmo will be a bad influence on her son. Ambrose gets Cosmo out of a tight spot with a former “business partner” and secures a free ride to Scrabble Club. Ambrose begins to weave lies again…the lies to his mother regarding his friendship with Cosmo and the lies to his friends at Scrabble Club continue to build until they explode, landing him at a police station. Can Ambrose mend his lying ways and keep his mom from uprooting him from his only friends?

Karen C-O, Chester County Library

Talking Books for Children

Did you ever wish that you could have access to children's books without having to buy them at the book store or borrow them from the library? Now you can! Just go to Chester County Library's web site (http://www.ccls.org/) and click on the TumbleBooks icon at the bottom of the page.

TumbleBooks are a FREE collection of talking books that teach children the joy of reading in a fun format. Once you access the TumbleBooks web site, you can search for books by genre (e.g., Adventure, Holidays, Sports/Activities) or by an index (alphabetical listings of book titles and authors). There are Story Books and Tumble Readables, which include Early Readers (e.g., Dimples Delight by Frieda Wishinski), Read-Along Classics (e.g., Black Beauty by Anna Sewell) and Chapter Books (e.g., Nancy Drew and the Clue Crew #1: Sleepover Sleuths by Carolyn Keene).

Once you select a book, the narration begins and the pages turn themselves. If you want to turn the pages yourself, you can switch to Manual mode. At any time, you can turn the sound off to read to yourself at your own speed. You can add books to your Favorites list, and the "My Play List" feature allows you to build a list of TumbleBooks that you can play one after another - very cool!

The TumbleBooks site also features puzzles and games to play, as well as audiobooks (narration with no text). Some audiobooks include Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Caroll and The Wizard of Oz by Frank Baum.

Best of all, TumbleBooks are FREE and available to you 24 hours a day, every day! This is a great way to entertain your children -- I wish that TumbleBooks were around when I was a kid!

Lisa U., Chester County Library

2010 Award-Winning Children's Books

The American Library Association has announced the Caldecott and Newbery winners for 2010! The Caldecott Medal is given to the artist of the most distinguished American picture book for children. The Newbery Medal is given to the author of the most distinguished contribution to American literature for children.

CALDECOTT MEDAL WINNER:
The Lion and the Mouse
By Jerry Pinkney
In this wordless retelling of an Aesop fable, an adventuresome mouse proves that even small creatures are capable of great deeds when he rescues the King of the Jungle.

CALDECOTT HONOR BOOKS:
All the World
By Liz G. Scanlon
Follow a circle of family and friends from morning till night as they discover the importance of all things great and small in our world, from the tiniest shell on the beach, to warm family connections, to the widest sunset sky.

Red Sings from Treetops
By Pamela Zagarenski
Nature displays different colors to announce the seasons of the year.

NEWBERY MEDAL WINNER:
When You Reach Me
By Rebecca Stead
As her mother prepares to be a contestant on the 1980s television game show, "The $20,000 Pyramid," a twelve-year-old New York City girl tries to make sense of a series of mysterious notes received from an anonymous source that seems to defy the laws of time and space.

NEWBERY HONOR BOOKS:
Claudette Colvin: Twice Toward Justice
By Philip Hoose
Based on extensive interviews with Claudette Colvin and many others, Phillip Hoose presents the first in-depth account of an important yet largely unknown civil rights figure, skillfully weaving her dramatic story into the fabric of the historic Montgomery bus boycott and court case that would change the course of American history.

The Evolution of Calpurnia Tate
By Jacqueline Kelly
In central Texas in 1899, eleven-year-old Callie Vee Tate is instructed to be a lady by her mother, learns about love from the older three of her six brothers, and studies the natural world with her grandfather, the latter of which leads to an important discovery.

The Mostly True Adventures of Homer P. Figg
By Rodman Philbrick
Twelve-year-old Homer, a poor but clever orphan, has extraordinary adventures after running away from his evil uncle to rescue his brother, who has been sold into service in the Civil War.

Where the Mountain Meets the Moon
By Grace Lin
Minli, an adventurous girl from a poor village, buys a magical goldfish, and then joins a dragon who cannot fly on a quest to find the Old Man of the Moon in hopes of bringing life to Fruitless Mountain and freshness to Jade River.

2009 Holiday Books

No matter the time of year, books are always in season -- but this is especially true during the holidays. This winter, celebrate with these holiday books from 2009:

Auntie Claus, Home for the Holidays

By Elise Primavera

Ages 4-8

When Sophie is cast as the Sugar Plum Fairy in her school's performance of the Nutcracker, her Auntie Claus forgoes her usual fall business trip and transforms New York City into the North Pole, with some unpleasant consequences.

The Christmas Genie

By Dan Gutman

Ages 8-12

When a meteorite crashes into a fifth-grade classroom at Lincoln School in Oak Park, Illinois, the genie inside agrees to grant the class a Christmas wish--if they can agree on one within an hour.

Fancy Nancy: Splendiferous Christmas

By Jane O'Connor

Ages 4-7

Nancy is devastated, which is even worse than heart-broken, when her fancy Christmas tree topper breaks, threatening to ruin Christmas.

Hanukkah Around the World

By Tami Lehman-Wilzig

Ages 8-11

Introduces Hanukkah, the Jewish festival of lights, and describes how it is celebrated in different areas of the world, including Israel, Istanbul, Italy, Poland, and New York City. Includes glossary and recipes.

Heart of a Snowman

By Eugene Yeichin

Ages 4-8

On Christmas Eve, young Owen visits a magical factory run by animals, where he both teaches and learns some interesting things about snowmen.

A Season of Gifts

By Richard Peck

Ages 9-12

Relates the surprising gifts bestowed on twelve-year-old Bob Barnhart and his family, who have recently moved to a small Illinois town in 1958, by their larger-than-life neighbor, Mrs. Dowdel.

The True Gift: A Christmas Story

By Patricia MacLachlan

Ages 7-up

While spending Christmas at their grandparents' farm, Lily becomes convinced that her younger brother Liam is right about White Cow being lonely and helps him seek a companion for her, leaving little time for Christmas preparations or reading.

Looking for Good Read-Alouds?

Are you looking for good read-alouds for children? You should check out the nominees for the 2009 E.B. White Read Aloud Awards. These awards, established in 2004, honor books that reflect the universal read-aloud standards that were created by the work of the author E.B. White in his classic books for children--Charlotte's Web, Stuart Little, and The Trumpet of the Swan. There are two categories: Picture Books and Older Readers.

Books are nominated for their universal appeal as a “terrific” book to read aloud. The Association of Booksellers for Children (ABC) receives a list of book nominations, which is pared down to a short list of four books in each category. A committee of booksellers, chaired by an ABC board member, then decides the winners. Here are the winners and honor books chosen this year:

E.B. White Read Aloud Award for Picture Books:
A Visitor for Bear
By Bonny Becker
Bear's efforts to keep out visitors to his house are undermined by a very persistent mouse.

E.B. White Read Aloud Picture Book Honors:
Louise, the Adventures of a Chicken
By Kate DiCamillo
Longing for adventure, intrepid Louise leaves her comfortable nest and goes to sea.

One
By Kathryn Otoshi
A number/color book that reminds us that it just takes one to make everyone count.

Too Many Toys
By David Shannon
Although he finally agrees that he has too many toys and needs to give them away, there is one toy that Spencer absolutely cannot part with.

E.B. White Read Aloud Award for Older Readers:
Masterpiece
By Elise Broach
After Marvin, who is a beetle, makes a miniature drawing as an eleventh birthday gift for James, a human with whom he shares a house, the two new friends work together to help recover a Durer drawing stolen from the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

E.B. White Read Aloud Older Reader Honors:
The Magic Thief
By Sarah Prineas
A young thief is drawn into a life of magic and adventure after picking the pocket of the powerful wizard Nevery Flinglas, who has returned from exile to try to reverse the troubling decline of magic in Wellmet City.

The Willoughbys
By Lois Lowry
In this tongue-in-cheek take on classic themes in children's literature, the four Willoughby children set about to become "deserving orphans" after their neglectful parents embark on a treacherous around-the-world adventure, leaving them in the care of an odious nanny.

Zorgamazoo
By Robert Paul Weston
Imaginative and adventurous Katrina eludes her maniacal guardian to help Morty, a member of a vanishing breed of zorgles, with his quest to uncover the fate of the fabled zorgles of Zorgmazoo as well as of other creatures that seem to have disappeared from the earth.

Looking for book ideas for boys?

Are you looking for book ideas for boys? You should check out Jon Scieszka's Guys Read web site. It's a web-based literacy program for boys whose mission is "to help boys become self-motivated, lifelong readers."

Book recommendations are listed by category, such as "Outer space, but without aliens," "Mysterious Occurrences," and "Monkeys and/or Apes," just to name a few. October's book-of-the-month is the non-fiction Battle in the Arctic Sea, and the New Book on the Pile is Billy Twitters and his Blue Whale Problem by Mac Barnett.

Jon Scieszka (pronounced CHESS-ka) wrote The Stinky Cheese Man and Other Fairly Stupid Tales, the Time Warp Trio series, and Squids Will Be Squids, among other books. He is also the first (and current) Children's Ambassador for Young People's Literature.

This blog is worth a look!

The Latest Movies Based on Kids' Books

Seems lately that best-selling books translate well to the big screen. Here's a run-down of the latest ones:

Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs
Based on the book by Judi Barrett
Movie Release: September 18, 2009
In the land of Chewandswallow, food (rather than rain or snow) falls from the sky. But something goes awry -- the food falling from the sky gets larger and larger, causing residents to make an escape before being squashed by giant pancakes.
CAST: Anna Faris, Bill Hader, Bruce Campbell, James Caan, Andy Samberg, Tracy Morgan, Mr. T

Where the Wild Things Are
Based on the book by Maurice Sendak
Movie Release: October 16, 2009
Max is sent to bed without supper and imagines sailing away to the land of Wild Things. Max is loved by the wild creatures who make him their king, though he soon longs to be back home with his family.
CAST: Max Records, Catherine Keener, Pepita Emmerichs, Forest Whittaker, James Gandolfini, Catherine O'Hara

The Lightning Thief (Percy Jackson and the Olympians)
Based on the book by Rick Riordan
Movie Release: February 12, 2010
Twelve-year-old Percy Jackson learns he is a demigod -- the son of a mortal woman and a Greek god. He and his new friends set out on a cross-country adventure to catch whoever stole the lightning bolt and to settle an ongoing battle between the gods.
CAST: Logan Lerman, Catherine Keener, Alexandra Daddario, Pierce Brosnan, Jake Abel, Demitri Lekkos