Leviathan

While I was reading this summer, I found the gem of the Leviathan series. The first book is Leviathan and one of my favorite books I think I've ever read.

Leviathan takes place during WWI but instead of the historical sides in the war, they are divided into Clankers and Darwinists. Clankers rely on machines as transportation and weapons, their technology extremely advanced. Darwinists have been able to create fabricated animals, a mix of animal and science, serving the human needs. The story follows the life of a 15 year old girl Deryn, who secretly enters the British Air Service as a boy. Great Britain is a Darwinist country so after an interesting first day in the Air Service, Deryn is placed on the famous air animal, shaped as a giant whale, the Leviathan.

The book also follows the son of the Archduke and heir to the throne of Austria-Hungary named Alek. When his parents are murdered, starting the war, he knows he is wanted dead. He and his trusty mechaniks instructor and fencing master leave the country at once on their giant Clanker machine, a Stormwalker.

Leviathan is a book packed with action and conflict with an interesting taste of parallel reality science. It is one of my favorites and hope you guys get the chance to read it!

Written by Scott Westerfield, the Leviathan trilogy also includes Behemoth (book 2) and Goliath (book 3).  Preview Leviathan at Google books:  http://tinyurl.com/px2hrt8.

~Review by Katie C., SJH student

Try The False Prince for adventure & suspense

I recently stayed up way too late on a school night finishing The False Price by Jennifer Nielsen.  I saw it listed on a Teens Choice book award list and decided to give it a try.  This book was a refreshing change from all the dystopian novels I’ve been reading lately.  Don’t get me wrong, I love dystopian literature, but this is different.  It has lots of action, suspense, adventure, intrigue, and plot twists.  I was truly shocked a couple of times in the story.  In the middle of it all is a wily, stubborn, and unpredictable main character whom you can’t help but love.

            The book is set in medieval times and includes a royal family living in the fictional realm of Carthya, scruffy orphans, a gang of thieves, pirates – lots of colorful characters.  Here’s the book description from Amazon.com:

“In a discontent kingdom, civil war is brewing. To unify the divided people, Conner, a nobleman of the court, devises a cunning plan to find an impersonator of the king's long-lost son and install him as a puppet prince. Four orphans are recruited to compete for the role, including a defiant boy named Sage. Sage knows that Conner's motives are more than questionable, yet his life balances on a sword's point -- he must be chosen to play the prince or he will certainly be killed. But Sage's rivals have their own agendas as well.”

The False Price is the first book in the Ascendance trilogy.  The second book, The Runaway King, is equally exciting.  The final book of the series, The Shadow Throne, will be released next week, and I will get it for the library ASAP and have it ready for checkout – after I read it, of course.  :-) 
You can read the beginning of The False Prince on Google books:  http://books.google.com/books?id=H8aSwiaUKFQC&lpg=PP1&dq=the%20false%20prince&pg=PT13#v=onepage&q=the%20false%20prince&f=false.

~Mrs. Brownlee

Airborn is an amazing fantasy!

I recently read an amazing fantasy book called Airborn by Kenneth Oppel. He is such an amazing writer, and this book was a Printz Honor book given to the best young adult books of the year. The story is set in the past (think Victorian era when girls still wear long dresses all the time and need chaperones to spent time with guys they like) but in an alternate reality when zeppelins (also known as blimps, like the Hindenberg) are a major mode of transportation. The main character is a boy named Matt who works as a cabin boy on the passenger ship Aurora, which he dreams of captaining one day. There are a lot of overtones of Treasure Island on this story: of course there's sailing the ship, there are pirates, there's an island. However, Airborn also has a spunky girl, Kate, so there's a bit of light romance, too. Kate is bent on finding some fantastic winged creatures her grandfather claimed to have seen and proving their existence to the scientific community. Lots of adventure and suspense in this, and the writing is superb. There is also a sequel. You can read the beginning of Airborn online at Google books: http://books.google.com/books?id=whh8tqQIcGEC&lpg=PP1&dq=airborn%20oppel&pg=PP1#v=onepage&q=&f=false.

Catching Fire was worth the wait!

I stayed up late last night to finish reading Catching Fire, the sequel to The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins. I've gotta stay, I'm really getting hooked on science fiction. I love those futuristic stories that make you angry at the injustice of it all! Everyone has anxiously awaited Catching Fire, and of course now we're all waiting on the third installment of the series.

If you don't know, The Hunger Games is set in a ruined version of the United States that is ruled over by an evil president who censors information, promotes propaganda, and generally squelches freedom while the citizens live in poverty. Each year, two kids are chosen from each of 12 districts to compete in The Hunger Games, which is a nationally televised fight to the death. There is lots of violence in this book, but boy does it say a lot about human nature. There were lots of surprises in Catching Fire. If you like science fiction, you will love this series!

Welcome!

Hey, everybody! Welcome to a new school year. I hope you all had a fun, relaxing summer and now you're ready to have a super school year. Anybody read anything good this summer? I loved the The Last Olympian, the fifth book of the Percy Jackson series. I think the author, Rick Riordan, is a genius. His books are exciting, smart, and really, really funny. I also read books 4 and 5 of the 39 clues series. They are fun as well.

Just for fun, I re-read Twilight. :-) I also tried a new fantasy series that I liked a lot called Skulduggery Pleasant -- isn't that a great title? Lots of magic, secret societies, good vs. evil, and of course a young girl gets pulled in when she had no idea she had magical abilities. It has a lot of dark humor that makes it a fun read.

New Sci Fi - Adoration of Jenna Fox

Over the weekend I finished a great new science fiction book, the Adoration of Jenna Fox by Mary Pearson. It reminds me a lot of Nancy Farmer's House of the Scorpion in that it deals with medical ethics issues: "Just because we have the technology to do it, does that make it right?" Jenna Fox also takes place in the future and sounds like it could possibly be a reality within our lifetime. It really makes you think about medical technology and ask yourself what exactly would be considered going too far when preserving or extending a person's life. Jenna is a very realistic 17-year-old character -- I really admire her outspokenness and honesty. Even though it's sci fi, I could really relate to Jenna's character and her problems.

Twilight movie

Ok, I admit it...I was late getting started reading the Twilight series by Stephenie Meyer. I started reading them at the beginning of August and devoured all four of them within a couple of weeks. Bella and Edward 4ever! I've seen the movie trailer on YouTube, and I'm just not sure whether or not Twilight is going to translate well into a movie. So much of the book talks about what the characters are thinking...of course there is plenty of action, but I think it would be really hard to make the movie as good as the book.