From the Reference Desk: Want to find a really good book? Try NoveList!

August 7, 2013August 7, 2013 / cheshirelib / Leave a comment

Find your next read by searching the NoveList database on the CPL website. On our front page, Just mouse over Research, click on Reading Resources, and then select NoveList. After you enter your Cheshire Library card number you will be at a screen that features ‘Recommended Reads Lists’ in the left hand column.

You can choose from: Best of 2012 Fiction, Canadian Fiction, Fantasy, Fiction A to Z, Graphic Novels, Historical Fiction, Horror, Mysteries, Romance, Science Fiction, Thrillers and Suspense, and Westerns.

Each category is then broken down into subtopics. For example, Mysteries had 15 subtopic lists, from Classic Mysteries to Police Procedurals to Paranormal Mysteries and more; and Historical Fiction has 24 subtopic lists. NoveList provides a short description and book reviews for each title.

When you find a title that interests you, you can click on ‘Check the Library Catalog’ to find out if the library owns it, and if it is available. If the book is checked out you can place a hold on it and we will contact you via email or telephone when it’s your turn to borrow the book.

You can also create your own account on NoveList, where you can keep track of books you have read, books you’d like to read, and other notes pertaining to your reading experience.

Reading lists are also available for younger age groups: teen, age 9-12, and age 0-8.

Sharon Reads: Dean Koontz’s Oddkins: A Fable for All Ages

August 4, 2013August 1, 2013 / Sharon Tyler / Leave a comment

Oddkins: A Fable for All Ages

Oddkins: A Fable for All Ages by Dean Koontz is a book that readers from elementary school ages through adults can understand and enjoy, with beautiful illustrations and a story that feels very real. Isaac Bodkins was a magical toy-maker who creates toys that can come to life in order to help children trough difficult times. He calls his creations Oddkins. However, Isaac has passed away sooner than expected, and before he could train the next toy-maker. The race is now on to see whether a good or evil magic toy-maker will wield the power. A team of Isaac’s Oddkins are on the move to find the toy shop of Isaac’s chosen heir, while evil toys from the hidden sub-basement try to stop them from reaching their goal before the evil toy-maker can purchased Isaac’s toy shop.

Oddkins: A Fable for All Ages might be Koontz’s first book intended for more than just adult readers, but you would never know it from the read. Living toys are a new idea, but Koontz instilled a new life to the idea, with strong personalities for each of the living toys. I loved the idea that the toys are intended to help children facing special difficulties, although I wished all children could have one rather than just the ones with the ‘potential for greatness’, since I think everyone has that potential. However, that would make for one busy magic toy-maker! The Oddkins that face the action, both good and bad, have quirks and personalities that often made me smile or shudder, depending. The good Oddkin’s quest for Colleen Shannon’s shop, Isaac’s nephew’s search for the truth, and an ex-con in search for more ways to inflict pain intersect with the evil Oddkins intent on securing their future and the success of the dark toy-maker. There are epic battles, internal debates, and characters that will take hold of your heart. What else do you need?

I recommend Oddkins: A Fable for All Ages for adults that are fans of Koontz works as well as adults, teens, and the middle grade set. On a scale of one to five, I would give Oddkins a full five stars. There is a combination of fast passed action with enough introspection and personal discovery to keep readers of all ages and all genre preferences entertained and turning the pages.

(This review was originally published on Sharon the Librarian.)

10 Tasty Zombie Novels

July 28, 2013July 15, 2013 / Louise / Leave a comment

Developing a taste for zombies after World War Z? Here are 10 more zombie novels to whet your appetite.

1. Feed by Mira Grant. The infection spread, virus blocks taking over bodies and minds with one, unstoppable command: FEED. Now, twenty years after the Rising, Georgia and Shaun Mason are on the trail of the biggest story of their lives–the dark conspiracy behind the infected.

2. The End Games by T. Michael Martin. In the rural mountains of West Virginia, seventeen-year-old Michael Faris tries to protect his fragile younger brother from the horrors of the zombie apocalypse.

3. Z by Thomas Michael Ford. In the year 2032, after a virus that turned people into zombies has been eradicated, Josh is invited to join an underground gaming society, where the gamers hunt zombies and the action is more dangerous than it seems.

4. The Walking Dead : The Road to Woodbury by Robert Kirkman & Jay Bonansinga. The zombie plague unleashes its horrors on the suburbs of Atlanta without warning, pitting the living against the dead. At first, Woodbury seems like a perfect sanctuary. A mysterious self-proclaimed leader named Philip Blake keeps the citizens safe. But all is not as it seems. . . . Blake, who has recently begun to call himself The Governor, has disturbing ideas about law and order.

5. Zone One by Colson Whitehead. A plague has sorted humanity into two types: the uninfected and the infected, the living and the living dead. The novel unfolds over three surreal days, as it depicts the impossible job of coming to grips with the fallen world. And then things start to go wrong.

6. Zom-B by Darren Shan. When news reports start appearing of a zombie outbreak in Ireland, B’s racist father thinks it’s a joke– but even if it isn’t, he figures, it’s ok to lose a few Irish. That is, until zombies attack the school. B is forced on a mad dash through the serpentine corridors of high school, making allegiances with anyone with enough gall to fight off their pursuers.

7. Paul is Undead: the British Zombie Invasion by Alan Goldsher. Can the Beatles sublimate their hunger for gray matter, remain on top of the charts, and stay together for all eternity? After all, three of the Fab Four “are” zombies, and zombies live forever …

8. Rot & Ruin by Jonathan Maberry. In a post-apocalyptic world where fences and border patrols guard the few people left from the zombies that have overtaken civilization, fifteen-year-old Benny Imura is finally convinced that he must follow in his older brother’s footsteps and become a bounty hunter.

9. The Forest of Hands and Teeth by Carrie Ryan. Through twists and turns of fate, orphaned Mary seeks knowledge of life, love, and especially what lies beyond her walled village and the surrounding forest, where dwell the unconsecrated, aggressive flesh-eating people who were once dead.

10. The New Dead : a Zombie Anthology. 19 provocative, haunting, and genuinely unsettling original stories in this zombie anthology move the genre beyond its usual apocalyptic wastelands. Includes stories by Kelley Armstrong, Max Brooks, Joe Hill, and David Liss.

Powerful Fiction Focused on Bullying for Children and Young Adults

July 25, 2013June 6, 2014 / Sharon Tyler / 1 Comment

Bullying is a topic that is the focus of many fiction and non-fiction books. Partially because of the tragic stories in recent years about both the bullied and the bullies. Part of the interest is also because just about everyone has felt like they have been bullied or on the outside looking in for at least some point in their lives. Some of the young adult and children’s fiction that focuses on bullying as part of the plot line or the everyday lives of the characters is extremely powerful. Here are five of the children’s and young adult books about bullying that I have found to be the easiest to relate to, or most moving.

1. How to Beat the Bully Without Really Trying by Scott Starkey is a children’s chapter book about Rodney, an admitted coward, who moves to Ohio where the middle school bully immediately singles him out, but through accident gains an undeserved reputation as a tough guy.

2. Dear Life, You Suck by Scott Blagden is a young adult novel about seventeen-year-old Cricket Cherpin who lives under the watchful eye of Mother Mary at a Catholic boys’ home in Maine. He has such bleak prospects he is considering suicide when Wynona Bidaban steps into his world.

3. Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson is a young adult book in which a traumatic event near the end of the summer has a devastating effect on Melinda’s freshman year in high school.

4. Everybody Sees the Ants by Amy Sarig King is a young adult book, and 2014 Nutmeg Award Nominee, about overburdened fifteen-year-old Lucky Linderman who begins dreaming of being with his grandfather, who went missing during the Vietnam War.

5. Keep Holding On by Susane Colasanti is a young adult book about high school junior Noelle who is bullied at school and neglected by her mother at home. She reaches her breaking point after a classmate commits suicide.

Other fiction about bullying that I recommend are; Crazy Dangerous by Andrew Klavan(YA), Jake and Lily by Jerry Spinelli(J), The Other Felix by Keir Graff(J), How I Survived Bullies, Broccoli, and Snake Hill by James Patterson (J),and The Odd Squad: Bully Bait by Michael Fry (J).