In My Mailbox - New Books This Week (19)

In My Mailbox is a shared posting idea run by Kristi at The Story Siren (read all about it here: In My Mailbox) for bloggers to share the books they've gotten that week to help publicize as many titles as possible. IMM is a semi-regular feature here on Teach 8 YA Book Blog to let my students know the books to be looking for on the classroom shelves and for blog readers to know what book reviews to anticipate along with building excitement about new titles coming out. All titles link to goodreads so you can add books to your "to-read" list.

Won

WHERE SHE WENT by Gayle Forman
I was lucky enough to win an ARC of this sequel to IF I STAY (one of my all time favorite YA books) from ifistaynovels.com. Thanks!







Bought

CITY OF FALLEN ANGELS by Cassandra Clare
The newest in The Mortal Instruments series that started with CITY OF BONES, CITY OF ASHES, and CITY OF GLASS. I'm very excited that this trilogy is going to be made into a six book series so we get to live in the world of the Shadowhunters for even longer. Plus, there is a movie in the works for the first book. Lots of excitement!

BRAIN JACK by Brian Falkner
Last week it was on my library checkout list, but it was such a good techno-thriller dystopian (and perfect for my students), that I had to buy my own copy to have available in my classroom. You can read my review here.

THE ANTI-PROM by Abby McDonald

Title: THE ANTI-PROM
Author: Abby McDonald
Publisher: Candlewick Press
Release Date: March 8, 2011
Number of Pages: 288
Source of Book: ARC from Star Book Tours
Author's Website: abbymcdonald.com

Goodreads Summary:
Three unlikely allies team up for a night of rebellion, romance, and revenge in a high-stakes dramedy from acclaimed young author Abby McDonald.

They’ve spent years at the same high school without speaking a word to one another, but that’s all about to change. Popular Bliss was having the perfect prom until she found her BFF and boyfriend making out in the back of a limo. Bad girl Jolene wouldn’t be caught dead at the prom, yet here she is, trussed up in pink ruffles, risking her reputation for some guy - some guy who is forty minutes late. And shy, studious, über-planner Meg never counted on her date’s standing her up and leaving her idling in the parking lot outside the prom. Get ready for The Anti-Prom, Abby McDonald’s hilarious, heart-tugging tale about three girls and one unforgettable prom night.
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I ended up really enjoying this book, although I wasn't sure if I would when I first started reading it. It ended up being much more meaningful and deeper than I expected from the beginning, so I was happily surprised by the time I got to the end.

This story is told from three different perspectives - that of Bliss, Jolene, and Meg in alternating chapters - throughout prom night. The opening scene of the book starts off with Bliss catching her boyfriend cheating on her with her best friend - at prom. This leads to the unlikely alliance between the three girls who would never have spoken to each other if not for the circumstances that led to them meeting up that night. This turns out to be one of the best things for them. I didn't care for Bliss very much at the beginning because she was a stereotypical, shallow, mean girl type character - and I never relate to them very well, but she came around in the end, but it took awhile.

I so enjoyed the journey of this story. It was written in a classic - tale of one night - type of plot where one thing after another happens throughout just that one night that brings the characters closer together, to a deeper understanding of their goals, and shows them the type of people they want to be. It's one night that leads to self-discovery and inner changes that changes the direction of their lives. It's about getting out of bad situations, needing to accept oneself first before being able to open up to others, and not judging people. These three girls go on an adventure that shows them that opening up to others does not make them weak, but instead can create better relationships.

It's a great story about friendship and not bowing to the stereotype of high school groups and being open to understanding the experiences that others may be going through. This book does it in such a fun way with an endlessly turning plot and all-night adventure to get what each girl wants. It's about finding one's own way and deciding what kind of person you want to be and how you want to be seen by others. And that is a great message to send to teen girls. I'll definitely be putting this one into my classroom and am sure the girls are going to love it.

4 STARS for THE ANTI-PROM

RIVAL by Sara Bennett Wealer

Title: RIVAL
Author: Sara Bennett Wealer
Publisher: HarperTeen
Release Date: February 15, 2011
Number of Pages: 336
Source of Book: Won from The Contemps Challenge
Author's Website: www.sarabennettwealer.com

Goodreads Summary:
What if your worst enemy turned out to be the best friend you ever had?

Meet Brooke: Popular, powerful and hating every minute of it, she’s the “It” girl at Douglas High in Lake Champion, Minnesota. Her real ambition? Using her operatic mezzo as a ticket back to NYC, where her family lived before her dad ran off with an up and coming male movie star.

Now meet Kathryn: An overachieving soprano with an underachieving savings account, she’s been a leper ever since Brooke punched her at a party junior year. For Kath, music is the key to a much-needed college scholarship.

The stage is set for a high-stakes duet between the two seniors as they prepare for the prestigious Blackmore competition. Brooke and Kathryn work toward the Blackmore with eyes not just on first prize but on one another, each still stinging from a past that started with friendship and ended in betrayal. With competition day nearing, Brooke dreams of escaping the in-crowd for life as a professional singer, but her scheming BFF Chloe has other plans. And when Kathryn gets an unlikely invitation to Homecoming, she suspects Brooke of trying to sabotage her with one last public humiliation.

As pressures mount, Brooke starts to sense that the person she hates most might just be the best friend she ever had. But Kathryn has a decision to make. Can she forgive? Or are some rivalries for life?
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All right Gleeks - this is your book (and you've got two more weeks until a new Glee episode - just enough time to read RIVAL!) Before I start raving too much about the book, I just have to share that I read this book on a plane flight, and I am now typing my review based from my notes on airplane beverage napkins as I didn't have any paper with me (what was I thinking?!)

I ADORE this book about the roots of friendship, and popularity, and the fleetingness of acceptance in the high school social hierarchy. It's about figuring out what one really wants, what's really important, and who really matters. Both of the main characters have voices that were so true and honest. It was refreshing that they were both well-rounded and the focus wasn't on boys (although boys do, of course, play a secondary role to the main point of the story-this is YA after all!), but it was refreshing that wasn't the main focus - it was about this friendship, why it started, why it failed, and if it could be saved. It was about girls and the pressures they feel about friendships and rivalries, even if they don't want them that way. It was one of the most interesting contemporary books that I have read recently and the vocal music piece added another level of sophistication to it and heightened the drama.

I love that we get to hear the story from both Brooke and Kathryn's points-of-view in alternating chapters, and that it alternates sections from senior year and junior year (when it all went down). It was a very effective way to tell this story (instead of strictly chronologically) to leave the reader in a bit of suspense as to why these two girls are such staunch rival - and then to find out that they were friends at one point. Tension built throughout the story as we get clues and eventually get the full story of what happened and what turned these two girls into friends and rivals. The big competition looming at the end adds the perfect prize at the end. Wealer writes in a straight-forward and engaging style as we see into the minds of both girls and how they perceive the same situations so differently. One of my favorite lines from this book highlights the writing style and voice and gets to one of the themes in this book about rivalry, "But I don't shatter; I'm not made of glass. Anyway, the parts that break aren't on the outside."

Ultimately, this book shows that sometimes you really don't know someone else, nor can you see yourself clearly as others do. It's a fascinating look into perceptions and intentions and misperceptions and true desires. This is a fantastic new addition to the contemporary genre - and a great YA book! I highly recommend getting this one - it will be a quick read because you won't want to stop until you find out who wins the big competition at the end.

4.5 STARS for RIVAL

Book Birthday - THE EMERALD ATLAS by John Stephens

Happy book birthday (April 5th) to THE EMERALD ATLAS!  

This is a fabulous new middle grades fantasy series, THE BOOKS OF BEGINNING, for those who love an epic series with great characters, magical elements, and entertaining writing (this is one for both boys and girls) with a touch of sibling relationships thrown in. In case you missed my 4 star review, you can read it here. And go celebrate this great book's birthday tomorrow by getting a copy for yourself or a young reader you know.

Have You Heard? YA Bloggers Book Battle

Have you heard about the YA Bloggers Book Battle 2011 - Best Overlooked Book yet? I just discovered it today, and it sounds like so much fun! I always hear about the School Library Journal's Battle of the Children's Books, but it's never anything I'd be able to be involved with myself. It's an NCAA-style bracket for books - what could be better? Well...now there's a chance to be involved, and to give some input into the books selected for the brackets.

The YA Bloggers Book Battle is hosted by Alyssa at theshadyglade.blogspot.com and there's still time to nominate books for the Best Overlooked Book of the last ten years and have book bloggers (including me!) judge the brackets for the battle. This will be going through July as books are narrowed down to the final rounds. Get into the excitement now - go nominate a book or volunteer to be a judge - and keep checking back for updates on her site as the Battle continues.

In My Mailbox - New Books This Week (18)

In My Mailbox is a shared posting idea run by Kristi at The Story Siren (read all about it here: In My Mailbox) for bloggers to share the books they've gotten that week to help publicize as many titles as possible. IMM is a semi-regular feature here on Teach 8 YA Book Blog to let my students know the books to be looking for on the classroom shelves and for blog readers to know what book reviews to anticipate along with building excitement about new titles coming out. All titles link to goodreads so you can add books to your "to-read" list.

Blog Tour (Star Book Tours)

 THE ANTI-PROM by Abby McDonald
Sounds like a good girl-power book and timely









Bought (Couldn't resist one last trip to Borders or using a B&N gift card! And added a couple more to my dystopian list)

ENTWINED by Heather Dixon
Sounds like an interesting mythology-ish tale and has a gorgeous cover!

BABE IN BOYLAND by Jody Gehrman
Just sounds really cute

REAL LIVE BOYFRIENDS by e. lockhart
Needed to complete the Ruby Oliver series (although I miss the original covers!)

PATHFINDER by Orson Scott Card
Sounds like a good fantasy and boy book

STUCK IN NEUTRAL by Terry Trueman
Familiar title and a Printz Honor Book - short and sounds intense

TRASH by Andy Mulligan
Dystopian I've heard great things about

ROT & RUIN by Jonathan Mayberry
Zombie dystopian and total boy book

DELIRIUM by Lauren Oliver
Had to get another copy because too many girls want to read it and I didn't have enough to go around - not a bad problem to have!

BRAIN JACK by Brian Falkner

Title: BRAIN JACK
Author: Brian Falkner
Publisher: Random House Books for Young Readers
Release Date: September 28, 2010
Number of Pages: 349
Source of Book: Library Check Out
Author's Website: www.brianfalkner.com

Goodreads Summary:
In a dystopian near-future, neuro-headsets have replaced computer keyboards. Just slip on a headset, and it's the Internet at the speed of thought. For teen hacker Sam Wilson, a headset is a must. But as he masters the new technology, he has a terrifying realization. If anything on his computer is vulnerable to an attack, what happens when his mind is linked to the system? Could consciousness itself be hacked?

Brian Falkner, author of The Tomorrow Code and The Project, delivers an action-packed and thought-provoking sci-fi thriller in which logging on to a computer could mean the difference between life and death.
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BRAIN JACK is a great boy book, especially for those into computers, code, or the hacking world.  I've always been intrigued by those who have the technological skill to be hackers and this book showcases them in an exciting way. This book is an exciting, don't-want-to-stop-reading, dystopian, techno-thriller full of action. The interesting thing the author did is created the action through much of the hacking moments by writing the coding actions as if they were a battle themselves, thus making it more exciting. This world Falkner created where neuro-headsets are used to make your computer usage faster by skipping the brain to hand keyboard and mouse step, is a scary vision of where technology could go. It's definitely a commentary on how far we should allow technology to go - and is there a time where the technology could get smarter than the people using it? This book has a future world where online gaming is now an addiction as we see drug use in today's society - people can't unplug and it ruins their lives. There are terrorist attacks all the time (in fact Vegas is now a radioactive wasteland) and there are secret and not-so-secret government groups protecting the people and looking for the terrorists - by trying to find the computers from which they are hacking in. It's a book that makes you question who is good and how do you know?

I never knew what was coming next and each time a plot point felt wrapped up and I couldn't imagine where he would take it next, a twist would be thrown in that I was never expecting. It kept is exciting and made me not want to put it down and stop reading. There wasn't too much character development compared to stories that I'm used to, but as far as thrillers go, I think it was fairly typical - this book is more about the action and excitement and suspense. However, I did love Sam and Dodge was great comic relief. This book is one to read, but with the caution that there are some very technical terms, so if you're not familiar with coding/computer technology, it may take a little getting used to, but it's worth the effort.

4 STARS for BRAIN JACK