Superheroes and African American Authors

We have two new guides to great reads on our website: Superheroes and  Books by African American Authors.  Superheroes leads the reader through some of the best graphic novels, novels and non-fiction featuring superheroes in our department.  You may be interested in the classic Amazing Spider-Man comics for kids and Superman: the Ultimate Guide to the Man of Steel.  Or you may be more interested in new superheroes like Buzzboy: Trouble in Paradise by John Gallagher, Archvillain by Barry Lyga, and Sardine in Outer Space by Emmanual Guibert.  If you get inspired to make your own heroes, you can even visit Heroes!: Draw Your Own Superheroes, Gadget Geeks, and Other Do-gooders. Books by African American Authors leads the reader through great fiction books by African American authors. Younger readers may be interested in Kadir Nelson's He's Got the Whole World in His Hands or Melanie Turner-Denstaedt's The Hat that Wore Clara B.  Older readers may be interested in Sharon Flake's The Broken Bike Boy and the Queen of 33rd Street or Dwayne J. Ferguson's The Werewolf of P.S. 40.
-Elaine B.

Youth Literature Festival

School is getting ready to start and that means the date for the next Youth Literature Festival is getting closer too! Mark your calendar for Saturday, October 9 for a fantastic day filled with your favorite authors, book-related activities, puppets, music and storytelling. Krannert Center for the Performing Arts will be hosting the day-long event from 10-4. You will have the chance to see favorite local authors like Patricia Hruby-Powell, Dan Keding, Sara Latta and Alice McGinty, as well as authors from farther away like Jim Aylesworth, Esme Raji Codell and Jenny Meyerhoff. To get in the mood for a day of meeting your favorite authors, you may want to try Patricia MacLachlan's new book Word After Word After Word - about an author who visits a classroom just like yours. Hope to see you at the festival! -Elaine B.

An Exceptional First Chapter Series

Looking for a GREAT easy chapter book series??? Look no further! Franny K. Stein by Jim Benton is a very popular series that both boys and girls can't get enough of. Franny is from a normal family and lives in a normal house on a normal street. What isn't normal is her desire to be a mad scientist when she grows up and her bedroom populated with her crazy, silly experiments. She is helped in her mad science adventures by her loyal, good humored but not very smart dog, Igor. If you have a child who is hard to interest in reading, these books might be just the thing they need. It doesn't really matter what order you read this series in.


Also be sure to pick up a copy of our favorite Easy To Read Series next time you are in or print it off from this link to our website.
Happy Reading! --Rachel V.