Dewey's Read-a-Thon

I just found out about Dewey's Read-a-Thon last night.

For 24 hours, you read books, post to blogs about your reading, and visit other readers’ blogs. You also participate in mini-challenges throughout the day. It happens twice a year, in April and in October.

I thought it was such a great idea that I signed up to be a cheerleader right away.

I can't wait to participate next April!

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies

I read The Classics and not only under force. I read Ulysses in just eight, short months. But here is the real Truth: Give me a juicy zombie story and I'm hooked. I read World War Z like it was The Manifesto for the Zombie Apocalypse. (Just in case you are wondering, I am so prepared. When it happens, you should hang with me.)

I knew that I would be reading The Forest of Hands and Teeth once I saw this trailer:



So how could I resist Pride and Prejudice and Zombies?





Every co-worker from every job is chomping at the bit to read PaPaZ. As one of my customers pointed out, "You wouldn't think there would be that much cross-over, but there is."

It makes me wonder what other books in the public domain I could spruce up with a little monster action....

Anna Karenina and Werewolves

The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and Vampires

Frankenstein and oh wait, never mind

What would be your Literary Monster Mash-Up?

Frappy's Challenge - Write A Novel In A Month

A few days ago some friends told me about National Novel Writing Month.
People from all over the world take the month of November to write a 50,000 word novel.

The idea intrigued me. I already had an idea for a novel, albeit a heavily autobiographical one. I already had a few characters in my head. Why not go for it? What was stopping me?

Fear. Fear of Failure. Fear of Success. I'm tired of being Afraid. I'm going for it.

So, here I am only 4,000 words into my novel when I should be half way there.
But I'm not giving up. I work best under pressure, always have.

You'll hear from me along the way, as I curse myself for ever telling anyone I was going to do this.

Gotta go - I have writing to do and none of this will go toward my word count!

Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist

Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist (which was released as a major motion picture this weekend) brings together two popular young adult authors for one unforgettable night in Manhattan.*

Nick is freshly dumped and sees his ex-girlfriend in a club when he asks Norah to be his girlfriend for 5 minutes. Serious, straight edge Norah takes him up on the offer and sheds some emotional baggage in the process. Both have been hurt before, but decide to take another chance.

Think High Fidelity for Teens: Nick and Norah may be the main characters, but the music is the star. Norah realizes no matter what happens one thing is clear - they are musical soul mates. And Nick realizes that it's not about sex or a fast car, but those exciting moments of hand-holding. Here is a playlist I've put together with songs from the book. You won't notice any of these songs on the movie soundtrack, but they are at the heart of the novel.

* Note that this book is for older teens because of language and sexual situations.

Relax and Reflect

I finally finished! I feel like I've learned a lot from this program and I would definitely take part in another one. I was familiar with some of the items, but a refresher is always helpful. My favorite discoveries were Overdrive, Hulu, and Google Earth. I have worked with RSS Feeds before, but after this program I realized that it's something I will use on a regular basis.

The biggest challenge for me was time. As a substitute librarian it is hard to complete an assignment once a week when you're not actually scheduled. My supervisor was very helpful and set aside time for me to catch up. I appreciated this greatly and it was refreshing to see the library take this program seriously. While I felt like the last assignments were somewhat of a blur, I know that I can take my experiences, apply them to my job and as a result, be a better librarian.

Gaming

The Gaming assignment was fun. I ended up playing Scrabble and I won!
I can see why it would be useful for librarians to be involved in the gaming community. It's true that teens won't need to come to us for help, but their parents might as well as novices. In the meantime, I've found a new activity on the web that is addictive. Great.

Maps and Geotagging

Google Earth is fascinating. I could spend all day exploring this site, but there's no time! I first looked at this when it was in the Beta format and I seem to remember that you could get more detail. I am actually glad that has changed, because it brought up all kinds of privacy issues. I guess that's the former news librarian in me!