Shannon's '09 list

I'm already starting to think about my categories...

1) Drama
2) Non-fiction
3) New Books (08-09)
4) Audiobooks
5) LT friends, that sounds like an interesting book
6) State Awards
7) NY Times Best Seller Lists
8) Graphic Novels
9) Patron recommended
10) Mysteries
11) Series

still thinking about the others?

Sounds like you're off to a good start.

The state award category will cover books that are nominated or have won the:

Gateway Award (grades 9-12)
Truman Award (grades 6-8)
Mark Twain Award (grades 4-6)
Bluebonnet (grades 3-6)
Lone Star ( grades 6-8)
Tayshas (grades 9-12)

Are you a school librarian? Judging from the state awards you named, I'd guess you have ties to Missouri and Texas. What an interesting (and fast-reading) category. You'll have trouble choosing only 9 books, I think.

I'm from Missouri, but living in Texas. I would love to be a children's librarian, but currently work in reader's advisory for the state in the Talking Book Program.

I'm currently living in Missouri, but orginally from Kansas. You suggested some of the children's award books for my Kansas category - an excellent idea, BTW, in case I neglected to say so.

Several years ago, I volunteered at the library in my children's elementary school. I loved it, and enjoyed learning about all the popular books the kids were reading (and actually getting to read a lot of them). The best part, though, was getting acquainted with the kids and talking to them. I'm not sure that volunteering out on the check-out desk isn't a better job than being the paid professional back in the office. I know our librarian made a big effort to spend lots of time with the kids, and did a very cool series on different genres with the older kids, but she still had all the administrative work to do, too.

Do you plan to read current year nominees, or just past award winners for this category?

I was on the Mark Twain Award Committee for MO a few years ago now (selecting the books for the 2006-07 school year). The lists are selected by librarians, but the winners are voted on by kids. I think I'm going to try to read the nominees. It's a good way to stay current on new titles, and generally I've been more impressed with those lists as far as books that "real" kids read rather than the Newbery the last few years.

I'll be watching to see what you end up with - my kids are past the age of reading Mark Twain books, and the high school doesn't keep parents informed about award books like they did in elementary school - I feel out of the loop now.

I'm reading a book about reader's advisory for teens called Reality Rules: A Guide to Teen Nonfiction Reading Interests. I have a feeling this is going to be very bad for my TBR pile.

Drama / Book to Movie

1) Coraline 1.25.09
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I want to read All My Sons. I remember seeing the movie for a college drama class. And Miss Julie. Some Shakespeare and some Tennessee Williams? Including in the to a movie category, perhaps some James Bond? And some Alex Cross?

Non-fiction
1) Everything I Needed to Know about Being a Girl I Learned from Judy Blume 1.13.09
2) Team of Rivals
3) Dewey the Small Town Library Cat who Touched the World 5.25.09
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9)

Since I had a whole category of Beverly Cleary in 2008, I think I'd like to read Girl From Yamhill in 2009. Came across this one while helping a patron at work Shaggy Muses

New Books (2008 - 2009)
1) Tales of Beedle the Bard 1.1.09
2) People of the Book 1.10.09
3) American Wife 2.24.09
4) Testimony 3.19.09
5) Behind the Bedroom Door
6) Two Rivers 4.17.09
7) 3 Willows 4.26.09
8) Wintergirls 4.29.09
9)

I'm a librarian, I really should read Dewey: The Small Town Library Cat Who Touched the World.

Audio
1) Marley and Me 1.11.09
2) The Devil in the White City 1.21.09
3) The Titan's Curse 2.4.09
4) Me Talk Pretty One Day 2.13.09
5) Junie B. Jones and a Little Monkey Business 2.13.09
6) A Crooked Kind of Perfect
7) Elsewhere 3.4.09
8) To Kill a Mockingbird
9) The Tale of Hill Top Farm 4.22.09
10) An Abundance of Katherines 4.17.09
11) Hard Eight
12) Olive's Ocean 5.16.09
13) Eats Shoots and Leaves

I'd also like to listen to To Kill a Mockingbird. I'd also like to listen to some Margaret Atwood and some Toni Morrison in '09.

LT Friends
1) Candy Girl 4.5.09
2) Ella Minnow Pea
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Things that have jumped out at me from others library.. The Secret of Lost Things, Ella Minnow Pea..Tulipomania

YA / Children's
1) Forever 1.15.09
2) battle of the labyrinth
3) Evolution, Me and Other Freaks of Nature 3.23.09
4) Memoirs of a Teenage Amnesiac 4.4.09
5) Beauty Shop for Rent.. fully equipped inquire within 4.18.09
6) Diary of a Wimpy Kid 5.3.09
7) After
8)
9)

I really, really like Sherman Alexie's work and so would suggest The Absolutely True Story of a Part-Time Indian. Although I haven't read that one, one of my favorite books is Indian Killer, which dealt with many of the same issues.

>13 ShannonMDE:: Shannon, how is election fever in Austin going? I just moved from Austin to New Hampshire a couple of months ago and am wondering how Obama's being perceived out there now.

(eta: sorry to be a little off-topic!!)

Austin is Austin.. There were A LOT of Obama shirts at the Texas Book Festival today, but I know there were a lot of librarians there too and librarians tend to be more on the liberal side.

NY Times Best Seller List
1) New Moon 12.22.08
2) Atonement 12.26.08
4) Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim 4.10.09
5) Eclipse
6) Belly Laughs
7) Baby Laughs 5.24.09
8)
9)

Graphic Novels / Comics
1) The Complete Peanuts: 1953 -1954 1.10.09
2) claudia and mean janine the graphic novel by Raina Telgemeier 1.21.09
3) Frequently Asked Questions: An Unshelved Collection
4) Read Responsibly: An Unshelved Collection
5) Unshelved
6)
7)
8)
9)

Because let's face it I want to read some more of the Peanuts anthologies, and hubby's favorite book is now a graphic novel The Master and Margarita, and I love reading Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

I'm a Calvin and Hobbes fan myself. And I like Foxtrot.

I couldn't wait to get started and read two of the books on the Texas lists in the 888 challenge, The Winner's Walk for my children's category and The Absolutely True Story of a Part-Time Indian for the Awards category since it won the National Book Award.

Thanks for the recommendations! I will definitely check those books out!

Mysteries
1) Chocolate Chip Cookie Mystery 3.14.09
2) The Spellman Files 4.23.09
3) The Tale of Holly How
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Perhaps some Agatha Christie, and something in the V.I. Warshawski series. Perhaps some Ann Rule too?

4 of the books I was thinking about reading for my State Award list I've already read, or started and didn't like.. perhaps that category will have to be revisited. Award winners /nominees in general perhaps?

Series
1) Confessions of a Shopaholic 12.31.08
2) Wonderful Wizard of Oz 3.27.09
3) The Last Olympian 5.7.09
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My patrons at the library really like Debbie Macomber and I've yet to read anything by her, and Nora Roberts too..

Through LT I found a whole lot of Reader's Advisory and book blogs (check out the Librarians who LibraryThing Group, if you're interested in more info..) Maybe I'll have to count them on my "LT Friends Category".

Another thing I've learned about my reading from doing the 888 challenge is that if a book I read doesn't fit an existing category, I'm likely to create a category for it.

I'm in the process of loading my IPod with various audiobooks for holiday travel. I've got Marley and Me and
The Titan's Curse ready to go for in the car. That should take up about 10 hours to listen.

Hmm.. is there an animal theme to my reading this year?
All in the TBR pile for the year:
Marley and Me
Dewey: the Small-Town Library Cat who Touched the World
and Shaggy Muses

I read my first book of the year, The Tales of Beedle the Bard and went to the bookstore to spend gift cards and came home with On Chesil Beach and Breathing Lessons.

I think the State Award list will be changed to YA / Children's.. while still taking most of the reading from the state reading lists.

Hi, Shannon,
I just wanted to thank you again for the suggestion of Life of Pi. That is a book that we have here at home and I had forgotten all about it. So that was a perfect suggestion! :)

By the way, I was thinking that you said once that you live in Austin these days. My daughter attends UT and we were in Austin for New Year's. I got to go to Half Price Book Store. That store just north of campus is the best HPB store that I have ever been to. It was so much fun!

Happy Reading!
--BJ

Read and finished People of the Book this weekend. It followed the course of an old Jewish book as it was made, survived the Inquisistion, Nazis, and bombings in Sarajevo. It also describes the various stages of conservation of the book. Toss in some family drama, drama surrounding transfer of the book. I thought it was a good book but not better than March and perhaps on par with Year of Wonders.

Also read The Complete Peanuts: 1953-1954 this weekend. I'm reading the Peanuts collections sort of sporatically and out of order, so I never quite know when characters I like will start to show up, or when they will start to look like the characters I remember.

I've also started Everything I Needed to Know about Being a Girl I Learned from Judy Blume (which I'm still reading). This book is written by various YA and chic lit authors talking about how the writings of Judy Blume have shaped their writings, friendships, family, and lives. It is making me want to re-read Judy Blume's books particularly Forever and Summer Sisters. I'll probably finish this over the weekend.

I loved People of the Book and have both March and Year of Wonders on my wish list for this year. I hope they're as good as you say.

Blah.. reading for school isn't nearly as much fun as reading for fun..
Currently have The History of Texas Music going for school, and The Devil in the White City going in the car, and The Titan's Curse going on the IPod at the gym.

I really loved The Titan's Curse. Such a great series!

I've enjoyed all of Geraldine Brooks work. I read Everything I needed to know about being a girl I learned from Judy Blume a couple of months ago. Like you I have gone on to read or reread several of her titles.

Own
1) On Chesil Beach 1.21.09
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I was a little underwhelmed by On Chesil Beach. I suppose the whole idea of a relationship and a marriage going sour over a misunderstanding about awkwardness regarding consumating the marriage was a bit obsurd. The woman in the book thought she broke him because he "released" early when she was touching him, then she ran out of the room in a panic. He thought she was frigid and disappointed with his performance. They had a fight.. relationship over. THE END.

I also just finished On Chesil Beach and really enjoyed it. Part of the thing is that it took place in a time and location where something like that would have not been unlikely. I was also quite taken with McEwan's use of language.

I guess that's why there are so many books, so that we can enjoy different things!

Hmm.. thinking more about possible titles for that LT Friends category.
The Reader
Letters of a Portuguese Nun

I can't seem to remember who recommended A Crooked Kind of Perfect but I'm tempted to call it a LT Friends book.. because I know someone recommended it but can't remember who.

Lists updated..
Drama / Books to Movie
1 Coraline 1.25
2 Wonderful Wizard of Oz 3.27
3 No. One Ladies' Detective Agency 7.1
4 Julie and Julia: 365 Days, 524 Recipes, 1 Tiny Apartment Kitchen 7.18
5 Time Traveler's Wife
6 Meet Kit and Kit Learns a Lesson
7 Dead Until Dark
8 Girl with the Pearl Earring
9

Non-Fiction
1 The Purity Myth 6.15
2 Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln 6.26
3 Stradivari's Genius: Five Violins, One Cello, and Three Centuries of Enduring Perfection 7.14
4 Assassination Vacation 7.22
5 American Parent 7.28
6 Shape up with the Slow Fat Triathlete 7.30
7 The Trouble Begins at 8: A Life of Mark Twain in the Wild, Wild West
8 The journey that saved Curious George : the true wartime escape of Margret and H.A. Rey 11.8
9 Mayflower: A Story of Community Courage and War 11.11
10 The Great and Only Barnum 11.29
11 The Tipping Point

New Books (2008-09)
1 People of the Book 1.10
2 American Wife 2.24
3 Testimony 3.19
4 Two Rivers 4.17
5 Wintergirls 4.29
6 Handle with Care 7.3
7 Heroic Measures
8 SuperFreakonomics 11.17
9 Along for the Ride 11.20
10 Her Fearful Symmetry

Series -- YA / Children's
1 3 Willows 4.26
2 battle of the Labyrinth
3 Diary of a Wimpy Kid
4Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Roderick Rules 5.13
5 Diary of a Wimpy Kid: The Last Straw 5.14
6 Percy Jackson: The DemiGod Files 5.20
7 Eclipse 5.11
8 Breaking Dawn 6.14
9 Love That Dog 10.22
10 Wake 11.1
11 Hate that Cat 11.8
12 Meet Julie 11.8
13 Fade 11.14
14 The Hunger Games 11.14
15 George and Martha Complete Stories of Two Best Friends 11.22
16 Little House in the Big Woods 11.27
17 Little House on the Prairie 11.29
18 Farmer Boy

Mysteries
1 Chocolate Chip Cookie Murder 3.14
2 The Spellman Files 4.23
3 Tale of Holly How 5.19
4 Invisible Chains: Shawn Hornbeck and the Kidnapping Case that Shook the Nation 5.29
5The Guards 6.3
6 Double Cross 9.4
7 Paper Towns 10.9
8 In a Guilded Cage 10.15
9

Audio x 2
1 Marley and Me: Life and Love with the World's Worst Dog 1.11 (com)
2 The Devil in the White City 1.21 (com)
3 The Titan's Curse 2.4 (com)
4 Me Talk Pretty One Day 2.13 (com)
5 Junie B. Jones and a Little Monkey Business 3.23 (com)
6 A Crooked Kind of Perfect (com)
7 Elsewhere 3.4 (com)
8 To Kill a Mockingbird (com)
9 The Tale of Hill Top Farm 4.22 (NLS)
10 An Abundance of Katherines 4.17 (com)
11 Hard Eight 5.8 (com)
12 Olive's Ocean 5.16 (com)
13 Eats, Shoots and Leaves 5.25 (NLS)
14 Wicked 7.1 (NLS)
15 The Wordy Shipmates 7.14 (com)
16 The Thin Man 7.22 (NLS)
17 Growing up Cuban in Decatur, Georgia 7.23 (com)
18 Tears of the Giraffe 8.1 (NLS)

Graphic Novels / Comics
1 Complete Peanuts 1953-54 1.10
2 Claudia and Mean Janine 1.21
3 Frequently Asked Questions
4 Read Responsibly
5
6
7
8
9

YA / Children's
1 Forever 1.15
2 Evolution, Me and Other Freaks of Nature 3.23
3 Memoirs of a Teenage Amnesiac 4.4
4 Beauty Shop for Rent: Fully Equipped, Inquire Within 4.18
5 Flawed Dogs: The Year End leftovers at the Piddleton last Chance Dog Pound 10.14
6 Number the Stars 10.14
7 The Phantom Tollbooth 10.20
8 Seedfolks 10.22
9 Ten Cents a Dance 10.27
10 After
11 The stinky cheese man and other fairly stupid tales
12 Thirteen Reasons Why 11.13
13 14 Cows for America 11.20
14 Umbrella Summer 11.22
15 Breaking Up is Hard to Do 12.1
16 The Adoration of Jenna Fox

Own
1 Tales of Beedle the Bard 1.1
2 On Chesil Beach 1.21
3 Unshelved
4 The Last Olympian 5.7
5 Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone 8.14
6 Lamb 8.27
7 Hearts of Horses 8.13
8 Nineteen Minutes
9 Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close 9.27
10 Through the Glass Darkly

Memoirs
1 Everything I Needed to Know about Being a Girl I Learned from Judy Blume 1.13
2 Behind the Bedroom Door: Getting It, Giving It, Loving It and Missing It
3 Candy Girl 4.5
4 Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim 4.10
5 Belly Laughs 5.19
6 Baby Laughs 5.23
7 Dewey: the Small-Town Library Cat Who Touched the World 5.25
8 Without You: A Memoir of Love, Loss and the Musical Rent 6.20
9 Eat, Pray, Love:One Woman's Search for Everything Across Italy, India and Indonesia 8.10
10 The Partly Cloudy Patriot 9.28
11 Take the Cannoli: Stories from the New World 10.5
12 The Unlikely Disciple: A Sinner's Semester at America's Holiest University

Audio x 3
19) Sloppy Firsts 8.12 (NLS)
20) Are You There Vodka? It's Me Chelsea 8.18(com)
21) My Horizontal Life: A Collection of One-Night Stands (com)
22) Outliers (NLS)
23) Uncommon Reader (NLS)
24) God Bless John Wayne (NLS) 11.4
25) The Men Who Stare at Goats (NLS) 11.23
26) Holidays on Ice (com)
27) A Rip in Heaven (NLS) 12.19
28) The Wednesday Wars (NLS)