Look What's New for Kids!

Tutahkhamun by Demi - "Using research that includes the artifacts in King Tutankhamun's tomb, Demi shares the rich details of the king's life, from ostrich and lion hunts, to the challenges of ruling his Kingdom."--Amazon.com.

January Recommendations for Kids

Fiction

Jim Copp, Will You Tell Me a Story: Three Uncommonly Clever Tales by Jim Copp - A reissue of three of Jim Copp’s inimitable tales; mutinous Kate Higgins who wouldn’t take her pill, Martha Matilda O’Toole who forgets nearly everything she needs for school and finally arrives to discover it’s Sunday, and the nightmare fourth grade teacher, Miss Goggins and the Gorilla who fires her!

Jacob Two-Two Meets the Hooded Fang by Mordecai Richlet - Jacob Two-Two, who is two plus two plus two and has two ears and two eyes and two arms and two feet and two shoes and two older brothers and two older sisters. While attempting to run his first errand, Jacob Two-Two annoys the shopkeeper and is sentenced to the Children’s Prison after traveling there by car, train, bus, helicopter, ox-cart, rickshaw, stilts, dinghy, skis, submarine, flying balloon, camel, raft, dogsled, roller skates, glider and motorcycle accompanied by Master Fish and Mistress Fowl. Can Child Power free him from the clutches of the Hooded Fang and save him from being fed to two sharks? Other books in this classic series are Jacob Two-Two ‘s First Spy Case, and Jacob Two-Two and the Dinosaur.

The Cats of Roxville Station by Jean Craighead George - Rachet, a tiger striped cat, is thrown off a bridge near the Roxville train station, and struggles to survive along with other feral cats. Rachet attracts the attention of Mike, a fourteen-year-old foster child, who is not allowed to have a pet. Mike over time gains her trust and begins to learn to speak cat. Laced with facts, this will appeal to readers who enjoy life-like stories.

It’s a Secret by John Burningham - What do cats really do at night that causes them to sleep all day? One night, Marie Elaine follows her cat Malcom on his adventures!

Magic Box by Katie Cleminson - Eva receives a very special box for her birthday, and becomes a master magician! What can you do with a box?


Nonfiction

The Boys’ Book of Greatness: Even More Ways to Be the Best at Everything by Martin Oliver - Contains directions for important boy skills, such as whistling loudly, how to slackline, how to survive a terrible haircut, how to call like Tarzan, how to keep your sneakers from stinking, how to be a ventriloquist, how to skid your bike, how to power a lightbulb with a lemon, how to ride a camel, and many more!

Times Tables Made Easy by Joe Harris - Bright, colorful books packed with hints, tips, and tricks to help with the mastery of the multiplication tables. Fun games and activites are included in this comprehensive book.

109 Forgotten American Heroes by Chris Ying - A sprightly, irreverent look at some standard and unusual American heroes. Which president of the U.S. kept a giant wheel of cheddar chese, about 4 feet high and 2 feet thick in the White House lobby for two years, and served it in his last big party in office? Why are there brass rivets in Levis? Why did Hanson Crockett Gregory, a ship’s captain from Maine put a hole in the doughnut? What are Botts dots and how do they save lives? How can canned Spam be a hero?

Why Pi? by Johnny Ball - Why does anything need to be measured? Find out why math applies to everything from music, sound, weather, pressure, electricity, light, temperature, maps, buildings, earthquakes, and the universe! Find out what a mouthful or a jerk measures. The measure of how bad something smells is measured in hobos! (would be good for booktalks)

You Are the First Kid on Mars by Patrick O’Brien - What would it be like to be the first kid on Mars? What would you see? What would you do?

January Recommendations for Teens

Fiction

Graceling by Kristin Cashore - As a child, Katsa discovers that she is Graced with killing when she accidentally kills a relative when he makes unwanted physical advances. It isn’t long before the king decides to harness Katsa’s unusual talent for his own dirty work. In an act of rebellion, Katsa forms the Council to help people in the surrounding kingdoms who are suffering at the hands of their kings. It is through her Council work that she comes across Po, a young prince who is also Graced with some unusual talents that make him the first real opponent Katsa has ever laid eyes on. Katsa’s story soon turns into one that’s full of romance, rescue missions, and self-discovery.

Vampire Academy by Richelle Mead - Rose and Lissa ran away from the Academy, but no one knows why. They have survived two years of living among the humans undetected, but now the Guardians from the Academy have found them and have brought them back. All eyes are on Rose and Lissa as they struggle to defend themselves against classmates, teachers, and someone else who is watching their every move. It is Rose’s job to protect Lissa, but can she protect her from all of this and the insanity that threatens to take over Lissa’s mind? This is the first book in a series full of action, adventure, friendship and romance that is sure to leave you wanting more.

Freefall by Ariela Anhnalt - Best friends and roommates, Luke and Hayden, at an elite boys boarding school cope with the arrival of a new hot shot fencing team member. Luke is saddled with grief from the loss of his father, and when he and two boys go up to the cliff near their school, and only two return, everyone wants to know what really happened.

Once a Witch by Carolyn MacCullough - Seventeen year old Tamsin is descended from a long line of witches. She has yet to discover her talent, and when mistaken for her older sister, she becomes embroiled in a lethal feud while uncovering layers of family secrets.

Crazy Beautiful by Lauren Baratz-Logsted - In this contemporary retelling of "Beauty and the Beast," a teenaged boy whose hands were amputated in an explosion and a gorgeous girl whose mother has recently died form an instant connection when they meet on their first day as new students.

The Gates by John Connolly - To show a bit of initiative Samuel Johnson and his dog Boswell decide to go trick-or-treating a whole three days early. When they arrived at 666 Crowley Ave, they did not expect to be rudely received and happen to witness the beginning of the end of the world. For those at 666 Crowley Ave were doing things they should not have been doing and cracked open the gates of Hell. Now young Samuel must convince his friends that the gates of hell are opening, find some way to close them, avoid the demons that are trying to stop him and save the world. This book is a crazy and hilarious book well worth reading.

I Am a Genius of Unspeakable Evil and I Want to Be Your Class President by Josh Lieb - The title pretty much says it all. Twelve-year-old Oliver Watson’s got the IQ of a grilled cheese sandwich, or so everyone in Omaha thinks. It turns out that Oliver is really an evil genius who has been working to achieve world domination for several years, and could put Einstein to shame. It is only when Oliver’s father-—and arch nemesis-—makes a sly comment about once being class president that his plans for world domination take a very local twist. He’ll run, and he’ll win, after all it must be easier then running the world. Turns out that getting kids to like you is really harder than it looks. Can this evil genius win the class presidency and keep his true identity a secret, just to one up his father? This story is witty and just a shy advanced but a great amount of fun to read.

January Recommendations for Adults

Fiction

The Brutal Telling: An Armand Gamache Novel by Louise Penny - When the body of an unknown man turns up in Three Pines, a small village in Quebec, investigators find a startling discovery in his cabin: a cache of priceless antiques and missing WWII treasures. Chief Inspector Gamache must sift through the lies to uncover the truth. Considered one of the best traditional mystery series being written today, Agatha-winning Penny achieves what few can, a psychologically acute cozy.

By Blood We Live, edited by John Joseph Adams - Charming gentlemen with the manners of a prior age. Savage killing machines who surge screaming from hidden vaults. Cute little girls frozen forever in slender bodies. Long-buried loved ones who scratch at the door, begging to be let in. Nowhere is safe, not mist-shrouded Transylvania or the Italian Riviera or even a sleepy town in Maine. This is a hidden world, an eternal world, where nothing is forbidden...as long as you're willing to pay the price. Now acclaimed editor John Joseph Adams brings you 33 of the most haunting vampire stories of the past three decades, from some of today's most renowned authors of fantasy, science fiction, and horror. Sure to satisfy the most bloody cravings.

Lady Vernon and Her Daughter: A Novel of Jane Austen’s Lady Susan by Jane Rubino and Caitlin Rubino-Bradway - A delightful and worthy homage to Austen, the Rubino duo have transformed the original novella into a vivid and richly developed novel of love lost and found, and the complex relationships between women, men, and money in Regency England. With wit and warmth, the Rubinos bring to life a time and place where a woman's security is at the mercy of an entail, where love is hindered by misunderstanding, where marriage can never be entirely isolated from money, yet where romance somehow carries the day.

The Piano Teacher by Janice Y. K. Lee - In the sweeping tradition of The English Patient, Janice Y.K. Lee's debut novel is a tale of love and betrayal set in war-torn Hong Kong. In 1942, Englishman Will Truesdale falls headlong into a passionate relationship with Trudy Liang, a beautiful Eurasian socialite. But their affair is soon threatened by the invasion of the Japanese as World War II overwhelms their part of the world. Ten years later, Claire Pendleton comes to Hong Kong to work as a piano teacher and also begins a fateful affair. As the threads of this spellbinding novel intertwine, impossible choices emerge-between love and safety, courage and survival, the present, and above all, the past.

Too Much Happiness by Alice Munro - Ten superb new stories by one of our most beloved and admired writers, and the winner of the 2009 Man Booker International Prize. With clarity and ease, Alice Munro once again renders complex, difficult events and emotions into stories that shed light on the unpredictable ways in which men and women accommodate and often transcend what happens in their lives. A compelling, provocative, and completely satisfying collection.


Nonfiction

The Art of Making Money: The Story of a Master Counterfeiter by Jason Kersten - Art Williams spent his boyhood in a comfortable middle-class existence in 1970s Chicago, but when family fortunes took a turn for the worst, he ended up living in one of Chicago's worst housing projects. He took to crime almost immediately, starting with petty theft before graduating to robbing drug dealers. Eventually a man nicknamed "DaVinci" taught him the centuries-old art of counterfeiting. After a stint in jail, Williams emerged to discover that the Treasury Department had issued the most secure hundred-dollar bill ever created: the 1996 New Note. Williams spent months trying perfecting his technique and went on to print millions in counterfeit bills. Money can’t buy love, but he tried, setting in motion a chain of betrayals that would be his undoing.

Dangerously Funny: The Uncensored Story of "The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour" by David Bianculli - "It is hard for many of us to remember--back when there were only a handful of stations on the dial--just how profoundly influential and controversial the Smothers Brothers were. But David Bianculli's brilliant new book has brought it all back to vivid life. ...This is a superb, at times moving, portrait of an entire age -- seen through the dramatic careers of two endlessly interesting entertainers." -- Ken Burns, Filmmaker

The Imperial Cruise: A Secret History of Empire and War by James Bradley - In 1905 President Teddy Roosevelt dispatched Secretary of War William Howard Taft on the largest U.S. diplomatic mission in history to Hawaii, Japan, the Philippines, China, and Korea. On this trip, secret agreements were concluded that Roosevelt thought would secure America’s Manifest Destiny in the Pacific. In 2005, James Bradley traveled in the wake of Roosevelt's mission and discovered what had transpired in Honolulu, Tokyo, Manila, Beijing and Seoul. Bradley discovered that rather than securing our borders, Roosevelt had started a fire that would smolder and explode into WWII.

Steamy Kitchen Cookbook: 101 Asian Recipes Simple Enough for Tonight’s Dinner by Jaden Hair - Asian dishes do not have to be complex, simple pairings of vegetables and meat or fish with a dash of Asian flavorings make for quick, nutritious, and delicious meals. Take, for example, the combination of chocolate with fried wontons, or Korean BBQ with burgers. Exciting to cook as they are to eat, turns a weekday meal into a creative outlet.

Talking About Detective Fiction by P. D. James - P. D. James examines the genre from top to bottom, beginning with the mysteries at the hearts of such novels as Charles Dickens’s Bleak House and Wilkie Collins’s The Woman in White, and bringing us into the present with such writers as Colin Dexter and Henning Mankell. Along the way she writes about Arthur Conan Doyle, Dorothy L. Sayers, Agatha Christie ("arch-breaker of rules"), Josephine Tey, Dashiell Hammett, and Peter Lovesey, among many others. She traces their lives into and out of their fiction, clarifies their individual styles, and gives us indelible portraits of the characters they’ve created. Essential reading for every lover of detective fiction.