BULLETIN BOARDS & DISPLAY : March is Women's History Month

     Did you know March is Women's History Month? Well, it is. So give it up for the lay-deees!
     I'd had a hard time finding a visually pleasing poster for it, so I was happy to obtain the one above from the "Diversity Store," HERE.

     The World War II woman above is from a free set of historical encyclopedia posters I picked up at some library conference. I cut the commercial stuff off and then my library volunteer aunt created that lovely lady-border around it using flowery stationery. Clever, yes?

     We used the nicest pictures from an old calendar of "Women Reading." "The Reading Woman?" Something like that. Then we added appropriate books to the display. Alcott's Little Women, A Break With Charity (Salem Witch Trials) by Ann Rinaldi, Sacajawea by Anna Lee Waldo, and Beyond the Burning Time by Kathryn Lasky.
     Women's History ain't always pretty, you guys. Shit happens.

     And here's the image I use for a bibliographic bookmark I call "Sugar & Spikes," which features edgier books for edgy girls.

Here's the list of books, all of which are available in our school library:

FICTION

The Astonishing Adventures of Fanboy & Goth Girl by Barry Lyga

Bad Girls, Bad Girls, Watcha Gonna Do? by Cynthia Voigt

Blister by Susan Shreve

Blue Is For Nightmares by Laurie Faria Stolarz

Born Blue by Han Nolan

Boy Proof by Cecil Castellucci

Changeling by Yasmine Galenorn

Cut by Patricia McCormick

Dark Secrets: Legacy of Lies by Elizabeth Chandler

Define “Normal” by Julie Anne Peters

The Diviners by Libba Bray

Generation Dead by Daniel Waters

Ghostgirl by Tonya Hurley

Gingerbread by Rachel Cohn

Glass Houses by Rachel Caine

Go Ask Alice by Anonymous

Goat Girls by Francesca Lia Block

Green Angel by Alice Hoffman

Hard Love by Ellen Wittlinger

Haters by Alisa Valdes-Rodriguez

I’d Tell You I Love You, But Then I’d Have To Kill You by Ally Carter

I Wanna Be Your Joey Ramone by Stephanie Kuehnert

Lucy the Giant by Sherri L. Smith

Midnight Predator by Amelia Atwater-Rhodes

Nick & Nora’s Infinite Playlist by Rachel Cohn & David Levithan

Poison by Chris Wooding

Stoner & Spaz by Ron Koertge

Stop Pretending by Sonya Sones

Sunshine by Robin McKinley

This Song Will Save Your Life by Leila Sales

Threshold by Caitlin R. Kiernan

Tithe: a Modern Faerie Tale by Holly Black

NON-FICTION

33 Things Every Girl Should Know About Women’s History… edited by Tonya Bolden
Girls: a History of Growing Up Female In America by Penny Colman

Gutsy Girls: Young Women Who Dare by Tina Schwager
Patently Female: Stories of Women Inventors and Their Breakthrough Ideas by Vare and Ptacek
Picture the Girl: Young Women Speak Their Minds by Audrey Shehyn

(added after original post:)
     There's also this, which we put on the smaller bulletin board behind the counter--

     Years ago the Librarian and I made these "framed" pics of famous women, just by printing nice pictures out in black & white, and putting a backing frame of black construction paper, then creating labels that say who the women are, and what they're famous for. So we have Jane Goodall, Rosa Parks, and Abigail Adams. It's probably time I added some more ladies to this little gallery.

BULLETIN BOARDS & DISPLAY : "Read the Movie"

"READ THE MOVIE but don't judge the book by the film"

          After I tore down all the Christmas crap in the library, things were bare for a while before I could wrap my head around what to put up next. Then we received a copy of the ALA catalog and I saw the new "READ" poster featuring the cast of the Hunger Games movie, so I thought it would be a good time to revive the "Read the Movie" theme. We've ordered the Hunger Games poster, and I'll add it when it arrives. In the meantime I cut out the image of the poster from the catalog and taped it to the front of the circulation desk, and kids are totally noticing it and squealing and dragging their friends over to look at it. I feel like saying, "Okay, take it DOWN a notch so I don't end up HATING the Hunger Games!"

Left to right: Peeta (Josh Hutcherson), Katniss (Jennifer Lawrence), and Gale (Liam Hemsworth)

ALA ordering info for Hunger Games poster: http://www.alastore.ala.org/detail.aspx?ID=3650

 

Detail of 3-D foam film reels and filmstrip ribbon

          For my b-board I used a construction paper marquee I made a few years ago, with the library symbol. The film reels are cut out of foam sheets, and spray-painted silver. I used black construction paper circles glued between to make it look like rolls of film. The filmstrip ribbon is something you can get at party supply stores that have "movie theme" stuff. I used more foam to create spacers between the halves of the film reels. It wasn't that hard, really.

          I went through all of our posters and used the best from books that were made into films. I purposely did NOT use the Twilight poster because some girls saw it out and said they'd be very disappointed in me if I put that one up. I happily obliged them by exiling it. They reminded me that when it was up before, during the heyday of Twilight, I ended up sticking goggly eyes on Kristen Stewart. They liked that.

          I also weeded out the Diary of a Wimpy Kid poster just because... well, it's lame. The books are lame, the movie looks lame, the poster is lame. The "READ" poster actually has an illustration of the Wimpy Kid on the TOILET. I am not putting that up.

          Oh- and I cut out stars and printed this slogan across several of them: "...but don't judge the book by the film."

         

GENRE : Dystopian fiction

          A Librarian friend and I have created (and presented a workshop on) a bunch of really great "Recommended if you like" lists, or "RIYL" for short.  We presented at the California School Library Association conference, and have continued to work on building our collection of genre lists.  We format them as double-sided bookmarks, with the genre heading and an illustration/picture on one side, and the list of titles on the reverse, and leave them out on the circ desk for students to browse through and keep.  What's really great is when you see kids keeping the bookmarks and checking off each title as they read their way through the list.  (Examples of some of our list titles: "Have You Mythed Out?" "Read the Movie," "RIYL Tim Burton," "Sugar and Spikes," and "Define Normal")

          When the English classes are studying 1984 they all start asking for books "like" 1984, which is a pretty specific sub-genre of science fiction, or rather speculative fiction.  It gets pretty sticky.  If you just do a general search in the library's database for science fiction, you get way too much, same with using "future" as a keyword.  I've started manually adding "dystopian fiction" in the cataloging records for any books that fit the bill, so it's quicker & easier to find them. 

          Here's an updated version of our Dystopian Fiction bibliography:


UTOPIA or DYSTOPIA?



What does the future hold?



The Diary of Pelly D by L.J. Adlington

Feed by M.T. Anderson

The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood

Oryx & Crake by Margaret Atwood

Fahrenheit 451 by Bradbury, Ray

The Roar by Emma Clayton

The Supernaturalist by Eoin Colfer

The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins

The Maze Runner by James Dashner

Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep by Dick

Little Brother by Cory Doctorow

The City of Ember by Jeanne DuPrau

The Ear, the Eye, and the Arm by N. Farmer

The House of the Scorpion by N. Farmer

The Dirt Eaters by Dennis Foon

The Beach by Alex Garland

“Gone” series by Michael Grant

Among the Hidden by Margaret Haddix

Brave New World by Aldous Huxley

Epic by Conor Kostick

This Side of Paradise by Steven L. Layne

The Cure by Sonia Levitin

Fearless by Tim Lott

The Giver by Lois Lowry

Gathering Blue by Lois Lowry

Messenger by Lois Lowry

The Resistance by Gemma Malley

The Road by Cormac McCarthy

The Secret Under My Skin by J. McNaughton

Z for Zachariah by Robert O’Brien

1984 by George Orwell

Witch & Wizard by James Patterson

The Adoration of Jenna Fox by Pearson

Last Book in the Universe by Philbrick

The Forest of Hands & Teeth by C. Ryan

Unwind by Neal Shusterman

“Virtual War” series by Gloria Skurzynski

Truesight by David Stahler

War of the Worlds by H.G. Wells

“Uglies” series by Scott Westerfeld

The Bar Code Tattoo by Suzanne Weyn

Storm Thief by Chris Wooding

*All titles found in our Library*



          At first it was kind of fun, and I was finding plenty of books, but then I started noticing that there are numerous sub-genres of what I guess would fit under the umbrella term "speculative."  Things like post-apocalyptic, steampunk (all the rage now), etc.  And just because a novel is set in the future, does that automatically  make it utopian/dystopian?



          Even some English & Literature teachers have a hard time defining the parameters of general "science fiction."  I bossily intervened earlier this year when one of our English teachers claimed Jurassic Park was NOT science fiction because it's not set in the future.  She told a student he couldn't use it for a sci-fi book report, and since that teacher is a pal of mine, I emailed her several different comprehensive definitions of sci-fi from several different sources, to show that sci-fi isn't just future fiction.  Her reply was, "I think someone has waaay too much time on his hands over there in that library..."

          Which was funny, but unfair.  Isn't that the kind of thing we library people are SUPPOSED to care about?  Isn't that why we're here?  To be anal-retentive about literary details, definitions, and labelling?  (I have many thoughts & ideas on labelling.)  Anyway, she conceded the debate and let the kid use Jurassic Park, so...  I win.  Probably mostly because she doesn't really give a shit, as long as the kids are reading and comprehending.



          (And by the way, unfortunately I now feel compelled to work on a list of science fiction that deals specifically with genetic engineering, cloning, stem cells, etc. starting with Michael Crichton's books.)

          But back to dystopian fiction:

          I know everyone's batshit crazy for the Hunger Games series by Suzanne Collins, and it's obviously THE dystopian teen series at this time.  I'm sure it's great, but the concept just makes me think of Battle Royale by Koushun Takami, which was originally published in Japan in 1999, almost a decade before The Hunger Games.  I haven't read Hunger Games yet, and I never will because I'm totally sick of hearing about it.  (Note: I did read Collins' Gregor the Overlander and totally loved it) 

          I'm sure what differentiates Hunger Games most from Battle Royale is that it's more palatable to teachers and librarians.

          Therefore, if I decide I want to read about teens having to battle to the death for survival in a harsh future, I will read the more controversial and possibly distasteful Battle Royale.  Because that's how I roll.