Category: Booktalks

The Kingfisher Soccer Encyclopedia Revised Edition

The Kingfisher Soccer Encyclopedia Revised Edition
by Clive Gifford (Author)

Booktalk: Freshly revised and updated, this is a world soccer book for the 2014 World Cup and beyond. As well as offering practical advice, this informative book also provides an insider’s view of the history of the game, profiles of the great clubs, and facts about women’s soccer teams and players. (Includes free World Cup poster for readers to fill in as the tournament progresses.)

Snippet:
ATTACKING
As soon as a team gains possession of the ball, with time and in space, its players’ thoughts turn to attacking. There are many ways in which a team can launch an attack, from a fast drive into space by a player who is sprinting forward and pushing the ball ahead, to a slow probing attack in which many players keep the ball securely in possession and look for an opening.

Nonfiction Monday

It’s Nonfiction Monday!

Copyright © 2014 Anastasia Suen All Rights Reserved.
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Indivisible: Poems for Social Justice

Indivisible: Poems for Social Justice
by Gail Bush and Randy Meyer (Editors)

Booktalk: America is not easy. It’s a land of high ideals and stirring icons, but it is also a land of harsh realities. We celebrate the incredible achievements of individuals as we turn our gaze from hunger and homelessness in the streets. We have a difficult time matching our words with our deeds. This is where poetry comes in. A poem has the ability to personalize the ideal, to make it tangible in a way that a speech or news report cannot. It can widen the angle through which we view society. It can move us to action. The poems in this anthology do just that: confront, challenge, and inspire. They take us on a journey toward social justice, starting in the shadows and slowly working our way home.

Snippet:
The News You Don’t Get at Home
Luis J. Rodriguez

The news you don’t get at home
is in the dangling flesh pf peasants and workers,
in the silenced tongues of poets and journalists,
in the machine-gunned remains of women and children.

This week’s Poetry Friday Round-up is hosted by Check it Out.

Copyright © 2014 Anastasia Suen All Rights Reserved.
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Don’t Spill the Milk!

Don’t Spill the Milk!
by Stephen Davies (Author) and Christopher Corr (Illustrator)

Booktalk: Over the uppy downy dunes, across the dark, wide river and up the steep, steep mountain, Penda lovingly carries a bowl of milk to her father in the grasslands. But will she manage to get it there without spilling a single drop?

Snippet: Penda lived in a tiny village in Africa with her mum and her aunties. It was rainy season, so Penda’s dad was up in the grasslands looking after the sheep.

Copyright © 2014 Anastasia Suen All Rights Reserved.
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Steering Toward Normal

Steering Toward Normal
by Rebecca Petruck (Author)

Booktalk: Eighth grade is set to be a good year for Diggy Lawson: He’s chosen a great calf to compete at the Minnesota State Fair, he’ll see a lot of July, the girl he secretly likes at 4-H, and he and his dad Pop have big plans for April Fool’s Day. But everything changes when classmate Wayne Graf’s mother dies, which brings to light the secret that Pop is Wayne’s father, too. Suddenly, Diggy has a half brother, who moves in and messes up his life. Wayne threatens Diggy’s chances at the State Fair, horns in on his girl, and rattles his easy relationship with Pop.
What started out great quickly turns into the worst year ever…

Snippet: The dust settled to reveal a man stumbling around the truck bed. He heaved a suitcase onto the ground, and it popped open like one of those 3-D party decorations. He lunged for the passenger door, jerking it so hard it squeaked, then reached into the cab with two hands and hauled a boy out, tossing him onto the jumbled mound of spilled clothing. The door hung open. Momentum slammed it shut when the man gunned the truck and sped away. Gravel and dust spewed over the unmoving heap of clothes and boy.

Copyright © 2014 Anastasia Suen All Rights Reserved.
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The Streak: How Joe DiMaggio Became America’s Hero

The Streak: How Joe DiMaggio Became America’s Hero
by Barb Rosenstock (Author) and Terry Widener (Illustrator)

Booktalk: In the summer of 1941, Yankee center fielder Joe DiMaggio and his favorite bat, Betsy Ann, begin the longest hitting streak in baseball history. But when Betsy Ann goes missing, will DiMaggio keep hitting?

Snippet: Joe’s bat, “Betsy Ann” was almost as famous as Joe himself. He’d soaked her in oil, sprinkled her with resin, and passed her gently over a flame to dry out her wood. Sanding her handles, Joe shaved off fractions of an ounce until she fit his hands alone. Betsy Ann was his treasured “ball bat,” used for games only.

Nonfiction Monday

It’s Nonfiction Monday!

Copyright © 2014 Anastasia Suen All Rights Reserved.
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Alphabet Trucks

Alphabet Trucks
by Samantha R. Vamos (Author) and Ryan O’Rourke (Illustrator)

Booktalk: Everyone’s heard of a tow truck. And a pickup truck. An ice-cream truck? Of course! But what about a quint truck? A lowboy truck? A knuckle-boom truck? Readers will learn about these kinds of trucks—and many more—while learning the alphabet!

Snippet:
Start the engines.
Lift and load.
Shift the gears and
hit the road.

Poetry Friday

This week’s Poetry Friday Round-up is hosted by Check it Out.

Copyright © 2014 Anastasia Suen All Rights Reserved.
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Text Game

Text Game
by Kate Cann (Author)

Booktalk: Mel’s so excited – she has a new boyfriend and he’s perfect. She can’t believe he’s going out with her. But then the weird texts start. They say Ben’s cheating on her, seeing someone else. Should Mel ignore them? Or could they be telling the truth?

Snippet: Ever since I started going out with Ben, I’ve felt great when I wake up in the morning, kind of happy, excited. But when I get up this morning there’s something horrible turning and twisting in my mined, ruining everything, and I know it’s that text.

Copyright © 2014 Anastasia Suen All Rights Reserved.
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Miss You Like Crazy

Miss You Like Crazy
by Pamela Hall (Author) and Jennifer A. Bell (Illustrator)

Booktalk: Walnut and his mom agree that it would be fun if he could go to work with her, and they fantasize about the adventures they could share. Though it can’t always happen, Walnut’s mother assures him that he is always on her mind, and together they find ways to have a physical presence for each other when at work or school.

Snippet: “Ready to make tracks?” Mom asked.
“I want to stay home,” Walnut groaned.
“Don’t you miss me all day?”

Copyright © 2014 Anastasia Suen All Rights Reserved.
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Twelve Minutes to Midnight

Twelve Minutes to Midnight
by Christopher Edge (Author)

Booktalk: Penelope Tredwell is the feisty thirteen-year-old orphan heiress of Victorian Britain’s bestselling magazine, the Penny Dreadful. Her spine-chilling tales–concealed under the pen name Montgomery Finch–are gripping the public. One day she receives a letter from the governor of the Bedlam madhouse requesting Finch’s help to investigate the asylum’s strange goings-on. Every night at precisely twelve minutes to midnight, the inmates all begin feverishly writing-incoherent ramblings that Penelope quickly realizes are frightening visions of the century to come. But what is causing this phenomenon?

Snippet: They arrived at Bedlam just after 11 p.m, the hospital suddenly looming in front of them out of the fog and drizzle. Above the entrance, its high dome and six-columned portico were wreathed in pale shrouds of mist, while the wings of the hospital stretched out on either side, countless rows of pitch-black windows staring out into the night like empty eyes. As they left their hansom cab and scurried inside, Penelope thought she could almost hear the low moans of the patients incarcerated there, carried on the chill wind that whipped across St. George’s Fields.

Copyright © 2014 Anastasia Suen All Rights Reserved.
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