Dimond Library - Info Lair for Lynx Learners.
Dimond Library - Info Lair for Lynx Learners.
New items, events, discoveries, opportunities, and ideas of possible interest to Dimond staff, students, and families will be noted here as time, energy, and inclination of the library staff allows.
Opportunities, Challenges, Competitions
ConocoPhillips presents ARTS IN THE PARK Youth Art Competition 2006. Hey kids, the word is out....we want your ART! Arts in the Park is an event to showcase young artists. The theme for 2006 Arts in The Park projects is Alaska Faces. Everyone, ages 6-18, is welcome to enter one piece of artwork in the appropriate age group. Create one of your own masterpieces to be displayed at Town Square on June 3, 2006.
For more Information, Contest Rules, and Official Entry Form go to the website (click here) or call 279-3551.
Battle of the Books 2007
Need some good titles to keep you company? Why not get a head start for Battle of the Books 2007.
The Beekeeper's Apprentice - Laurie R. King. Under Sherlock Holmes's tutelage, Mary Russell, a very modern fifteen-year-old whose mental acuity is equaled only by her audacity, tenacity, and penchant for trousers and cloth caps, hones her talent for deduction, disguises, and danger.
Longitude: The True Story of a Lone Genius Who Solved the Greatest Scientific Problem of His Time by Dava Sobel. Lacking the ability to measure their longitude, sailors throughout the great ages of exploration had been literally lost at sea as soon as they lost sight of land. This problem lead John Harrison on an epic scientific quest, and a forty-year obsession with building his perfect timekeeper, known today as the chronometer.
My Sister's Keeper - Jodi Picoult. Anna is not sick, but she might as well be. By age 13, she has undergone countless surgeries, transfusions, and injections to help her sister, Kate, fight leukaemia. Anna was born for this purpose, her parents tell her, which is why they love her even more.
Norman Tuttle on the Last Frontier - Tom Boddett. Norman gets grounded so often his life feels like a prison work-release program. As he contemplates a long and lonely adolescence on the Last Frontier, he's sure there's more to life than being the most awkward kid in Alaska.
On Basilisk Station - David Weber. Honor in trouble: Having made him look the fool, she's exiled to Basilisk Station in disgrace and she's set for ruin by a superior who hates her. But the people out to get her have made one mistake. They've made her mad. A great Sci Fi read.
Pawn of Prophecy - David Eddings. Garion did not believe in magic dooms, even though the dark without a shadow had haunted him for years. Brought up on a quiet farm by his Aunt Pol, how could he know that the Apostate planned to wake dread Torak....thus begins the first book of The Belgariad.
Rules of the Road - Joan Bauer. It seemed to me that the people who made the rules of the road had figured out everything that would help a person drive safely. Somebody should stick up some signs on the highway of life. It would make the whole experience easier. Life was too hard sometimes.
Sabriel - Garth Nix. Sabriel has had little experience with the random power of Free Men or the dead who refuse to stay dead in the Old Kingdom. Her father, the Abhorsen, goes missing and she knows she must enter the Old Kingdom to find him.
Slam! - Walter Dean Myers. Greg "Slam" Harris can do it all on the basketball court. He knew he could be one of the lucky ones, making it all the way to the top. But what if his luck runs out? His grades aren't so good and his temper--well, his is always on the verge of exploding. Can he lose it?
When the Emperor was Divine - Julie Otsuka. On a sunny day in Berkeley, CA, in 1942, a woman seeing a sign in a post office window, returns to her house, and matter of factly begins to pack her family's possessions. As Japanese Americans they have been classified as enemy aliens and are about to be uprooted from their home and sent to a dusty internment camp in the Utah desert for the rest of World War II.
Witch Child - Celia Rees. The year is 1659, a time of fear and lies. For Mary Newbury, it is a time of desperation. while she watches, unable to intervene, her wise and beloved grandmother is falsely condemned, tortured and hanged as a witch. Soon the relentless crowd may turn upon Mary.
A
A new art piece, "Yellow Shovelnose Guitarfish" by Ray Troll now graces the library wall just inside the main door. Troll is the artist who created Sharkabet, A Sea of Sharks from A to Z, published by West Winds Press in association with the American Museum of Natural History. Our painting is a larger version of the "Y" page in the book. The new acquisition is part of the one percent for art required for public constructions and ties in with our suspended central art piece of waves, prisms, and sea creatures called "Raptures of the Deep" by Jane Kaufman.
Besides these artistic sea creations, our hanging beluga whale and porpoise skeletons add scientific weight to the sea theme, and Tara Cox's enormous painting of beluga whales in their ocean environment on the far library wall lets us be surrounded all day long by the sea idea.
And although not from a sea habitat, our large stuffed panda donated by cafeteria worker Eleanor Hruby sits comfortably in a corner on top of our video collection with a copy of Salmon by John Baxter under one paw. Does that make him a sea panda?
New Library Stuff - Spring 2006
Alaska
Alaska: A Climbing Guide
Alaska's Daughter: an Eskimo Memoir of the Early Twentieth Century
Alaska's No. 1 Guide: the History and Journals of Andrew Berg
Eagle Lady
Glaciers of Alaska
Living off the Land
Living with Wolves
Ocean Treasure
Restoring Alaska
Secrets of the Aurora Borealis
Ada Blackjack: A True Story of Survival in the Arctic-- Jennifer Niven. When twenty-three-year-old Inuit Ada Blackjack signed on as a seamstress for a top-secret Arctic expedition, her goal was simple: to earn money in order to provide for her young son. She and four men set out into the far North together in September 1921, but as winter set in, the expedition was beset by hardship, starvation, and tragedy. When Ada found her way back to civilization two years later, she was the expedition's sole survivor. Ada's gripping tale of her survival in the wild, and the chaos and upheaval that attended her return to the world, comprises one of the most amazing untold adventures of the twentieth century.
Following the Alaskan Dream: My Salmon Trolling Adventures in the Last Frontier -- Marilyn Jordan George. After a half-century in Southeastern Alaska, and 30 years on the fishing grounds trolling for salmon, Marilyn recounts the blessings and the trials of raising a family among the eagles and whales in a land of wood heat, wool long-johns, and deck-bucket bathrooms.
Alaska's Homegrown Governor: A Biography of William A. Egan --Elizabeth A. Tower. "Born in Alaska, Raised in Alaska, Schooled in Alaska" was how 25-year-old William A. Eagan advertised himself during his first campaign for Alaska Territorial Legislature in 1940. Without an opportunity to attend college, Egan received his political education in the legislature. Fifteen years later, Alaskans chose him to lead the Alaska Constitutional Convention and then serve in Washington, D.C. as an Alaska-Tennessee Plan senator. In 1959, Egan, from small-town Valdez, became Alaska's first state governor - the only governor born and educated in Alaska during the first 43 years of statehood.
Non-Fiction
Astonishing Animals: Extraordinary Creatures and the Fantastic Worlds They Inhabit (Tim Flannery & Peter Schouten) Full color paintings illustrate these 97 animals, ranging from the White Uakari with its flaming red (and startlingly human) face to the Illuminated Netdevil, like a deep-ocean Christmas tree, to the Tomato Frog, round and deep orange, of Madagascar. A tour through this colorful volume is eye-grabbing and mind-ripping--you can learn a lot.
Quantoons: Metaphysical Illustrations--Tomas Bunk & others. Physics problems and freaky illustrations adorn this National Science Teachers Assn collection for science and math buffs. Included are 58 contest problems that ran between 1991 and 2001 in Quantum magazine. Illustrator Bunk is a regular contributor to Mad magazine, and it shows.
Insect Lives: Stories of Mystery and Romance from a Hidden World--Erich Hoyt & Ted Schultz, eds. "Alien creatures have overrun planet Earth. They wear their skeletons on the outside, bite sideways, smell with antennae, taste with their feet, and breathe through holes in the sides of their bodies......They are the insects." That lead-in to the Introduction tells a lot. This collection has been called, "the finest entomological writing of the past couple of millennia..." with pieces ranging from Aristotle to Darwin, the Bible to Wordsworth and Thoreau. True dessert for bug buffs.
Virus and the Whale: Exploring Evolution in Creatures Small & Large--from National Science Teachers Assn. Aimed at middle school, but too good not to have available beyond that.
Almost Lost: The True Story of an Anonymous Teenager's Life on the Streets. Edited by Beatrice Sparks, who edited Go Ask Alice, Annie's Baby, It Happened to Nancy, Kim: Empty Inside, and Treacherous Love.
The World's Best Thin Books: What to Read When Your Book Report is Due Tomorrow
Why Terrorism Works--Alan Dershowitz
DSM-IV--Diagnostic & Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. A thick reference for psychology classes, heavy on more than one level.
Waking Up American--Coming of Age Biculturally...First-Generation Women Reflect on Identity. From the book cover: "Today, one in five Americans is either foreign-born or first-generation, the highest level in U.S. history. "
Fortune's Bones: The Manumission Requiem [poetry]
Give Me My Father's Body: The Life of Minik, the New York Eskimo--Kenn Harper. In 1897, Robert Peary brought home "trophy" Eskimos as "cargo" and gave them as "living specimens" to the American Museum of Natural History. Minuk, a boy, was the only one who survived and stayed for 12 years until he found his father's skeleton on display at the museum. He was disillusioned and left for Greenland, but fitting in was a question anywhere.
Climate Crash: Abrupt Climate Change and What it Means for Our Future (John D. Cox) That catastrophe movie, The Day After Tomorrow, may not be so far wrong after all...
Damned Lies & Statistics: Untangling Numbers from the Media, Politicians, and Activists (Joel Best) A guide to spotting bad statistics and learning to think critically about influential numbers.
Dinner at the New Gene Cafe: How Genetic Engineering is Changing What We Eat, How We Live, and the Global Politics of Food. (Bill Lambrecht)
Promised the Moon, The Untold Story of the First Women in the Space Race
Marley & Me: Life & Love with the World's Worst Dog
My Forbidden Face: Growing Up Under the Taliban,A Young Woman's Story--Latifa (psuedonym).
Good Brother, Bad Brother: The Story of Edwin Booth & John Wilkes Booth
Shockwave: Countdown to Hiroshima
Bodies from the Ash: Life & Death in Ancient Pompeii
Chances Are... : Adventures in Probability
American Prometheus: The Triumph and Tragedy of J. Robert Oppenheimer
How the Bible Was Built
Modern Mind: An Intellectual History of the 20th Century
Nanofuture: What's Next for Nanotechnology
1491: New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus
Proteus Effect: Stem Cells and Their Promise for Medicine
Last Imaginary Place: A Human History of the Arctic World
Indian Givers: How the Indians of the Americas Transformed the World
Guys Write for Guys Read
The Da Vinci Code (Dan Brown) --2 paperback copies, plus copies of Brown's other books, Digital Fortress, Deception Point, Angels & Demons.
The Witch's Boy (Michael Gruber) Raised by a witch, a cat, a bear, and a demon, Lump is ugly, misshapen, and wants vengeance on those who have been cruel to him. His desire for money and revenge endangers himself and all who have helped him.
Away Laughing on a Fast Camel and Then He Ate My Boy Entrancers (Louise Rennison) Georgia Nicholson's adventures as recounted in her diary continue in these two chuckle-to-laugh-out-loud reads.
Elsewhere (Gabrielle Zevin) A young girl finds herself facing a different kind of existence in Elsewhere after her death. She has to live in reverse, getting younger when she wants to get older.
The Afterlife (Gary Soto) An East Fresno High School senior becomes a ghost after he's murdered in a restroom at a club where he went to dance.
Now You See It....(Vivian Vande Velde) Wearing found sunglasses temporarily after her glasses break, Wendy sees a world quite different from what her normal glasses show--cheerful corpses, little blue men who eat socks for lunch, portals to another world, and others who want her sunglasses.
MirrorMask (Neil Gaiman & Dave McKean) Part graphic novel, part movie echo, part original art work, this tale of circus performer Helena's wish to have a more ordinary life leads to its loss to a being from another world or dimension. Helena must struggle in that other dreamworld to get her old life back, which means battling chaos.
Firebirds (Sharyn November, editor) A collection of original fantasy and science fiction stories by several outstanding writers, including Nancy Springer, Lloyd Alexander, Michael Cadnum, Nancy Farmer, Meredith Ann Pierce, Garth Nix, Patricia McKillip, Diana Wynne Jones, and others.
Cirque Du Freak #5--Trials of Death and #6--The Vampire Prince (Darren Shan) Two fill-ins for the collection. Dimond Library now has #'s 1 through 9 of this popular vampire series.
The Woman Who Rides Like a Man (Tamora Pierce) Book 3 in the Song of the Lioness series. Lots of action and conflict for Alanna.
Runaways--Teenage Wasteland (Brian K. Vaughan and Adrian Alphona) Graphic novel about super-powered kids with super-villain parents. Great intrigue from Marvel.
In the Time of the Butterflies (Julia Alvarez) The four Mirabal sisters served freedom, but three lost their lives during the time of the Dominican Republic dictator Trujillo.
Midnight at the Dragon Cafe (Judy Fong Bates) A Chinese immigrant girl growing up in a small Canadian town finds secrets and confusion of cultures in the 1960s.
Every Man for Himself: Ten Short Stories about Being a Guy
Twins (Marcy Dermansky)--Two blond, beautiful, tormented twin sisters, Sue and Chloe, try to survive adolescence...and being twins. Funny, honest, told in alternating voices.
The Farming of Bones (Edwidge Danticat)--A young Haitian orphan girl in the Dominican Republic faces loss, terror, and dislocation.
Tree Girl (Mikaelsen)
The Night Thoreau Spent in Jail [play]
Smiler's Bones (Lerangis)
Monkey Town: The Summer of the Scopes Trial (Kidd)
Under the Persimmon Tree (Staples)
Iqbal (D'adamo)
Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West (Maguire)
Gil's All Fright Diner (Martinez)
Never Let Me Go (Ish)
Peeps (Westerfeld)
Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince (Rowling)
Hat Full of Sky (Pratchett)
Full Tilt (Shusterman)
Push: A Novel (Sapphire)
Looking for Alaska: A Novel (Green)
Storm Catchers (Bowler)
Absolutely, Positively Not (LaRochelle)
Bee Season: A Novel (Goldberg)
Children (and those who like good stuff at any level)
Sharkabet, an alphabet book
Audiobooks Collection Grows
At the beginning of the year, several teachers requested that we acquire more audio books, especially for books read in Battle of the Books and other books and plays studied in the curriculum. We started with three; we now have more than thirty. Some were donated (...and we are still available for donations - hint); most were purchased.
Audiobooks new to Dimond April/May 2006
When the Emperor was Divine (Julie Otsuka)
The Lovely Bones (Alice Sebold)
Walden (Henry David Thoreau)
The Great Gatsby (F. Scott Fitzgerald)
A Child's Christmas in Wales (Dylan Thomas)
Life of Pi (Yann Martel)
My Sister's Keeper (Jodi Picoult)
Sabriel (Garth Nix)
Norman Tuttle on the Last Frontier (Tom Bodett)
Da Vinci Code (Dan Brown)
Old Man and the Sea (Ernest Hemingway)
The Pearl (John Steinbeck)
A Day No Pigs Would Die (Robert Newton Peck)
The Giver (Lois Lowry)
Longitude (Dava Sobel)
Soldier's Heart (Gary Paulsen) -- on order
Videos and DVDs: New and On Order April/May 2006
New
Adolescence (VHS)
Secret Life of Mosses (VHS)
Ellis Island (DVD)
Everyday Life in the Renaissance (DVD)
Night and Fog (DVD)
On Order
Extreme Oil (DVD)
NOVA: Inside the Human body (DVD)
Story of 1 (DVD)
Global Warming: Signs & Science (DVD)
They Made America (DVD)
Coral Reef Adventure (DVD)
Ebola: The Plague Fighters (VHS)
Dive to the Abyss (VHS)
Secret of Photo 51 (VHS)
Storms of the Century (Savage Planet) (VHS)
Tsunami: The Wave that Shook the World (DVD)
Kaboom! (VHS)
Glaciers: Alaska's Rivers of Ice (DVD)
Thrill Ride: The Science of Fun (DVD)
Why Dogs Smile and Chimpanzees Cry (DVD)
All Quiet on the Western Front (DVD)
The Barbarians (DVD)
Dreamtime of the Aborigines (DVD)
Chasing el Nino! (VHS)
Some New Books to Read
The Blackstone Book of Magic and Illusion - Harry Blackstone, Jr. Through Blackstone's eyes, you'll explore the long and colorful history of the art of illusion--from the temples of ancient Egypt to the vaudeville stages of the 1920s, to Broadway, Las Vegas, and television shows of today.
WWII: The People's Story - Nigel Fountain, Gen. Ed. The real story of the world's most extraordinary conflict is the one told by the children, the soldiers, the nurses, the parents, and the shopkeepers who lived through it. These anecdotes and stories, culled from interviews with thousands of everyday people who lived through WW II, are both a celebration and tribute to the human spirit.
Wolf: Legend, Enemy, Icon - Rebecca L. Grambo Wolves have long evoked both fear and admiration as symbols of beauty and danger. Their image has changed dramatically through the centuries--from creator and helper to symbol of evil, from predator to prey, from legend to icon. The many legends, myths and facts in Wolf, together with 150 extraordinary photographs and illustrations, provide a compelling look at a remarkable animal.
Biography
Come Back to Afghanistan - Said Hyder Akbar. Said Hyder Akbar was living an ordinary teen life in California on 9/11. After the fall of the Taliban his father sold his CA business and went back to Afghanistan where he became President Hamid Karzai's chief spokesman before being appointed governor of Kunar, a volatile province that borders Pakistan. Hyder, 17 years old, convinced his father to let him join him during three successive summer vacations in a land he'd never visited before. Throughout his travels in Afghanistan, Hyder carried a minidisc recorder which gave him opportunity to share what he witnessed in radio documentaries and this book where he weaves his personal journey--a teenager struggling with his identity in his parents' homeland.
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