“Her face was streaked with blood and rain. Her hair was soaking wet. She was angry. Afraid. Confused. She was inappropriately beautiful”(168).

Ah, doomed young love.

Kevin Brooks’ Being is a dismal UK dystopian science fiction novel that for some readers probably suffers from redundancy, a bad ending, and an abundance of cool. Unfortunately, the questions that develop in the course of the novel are not adequately resolved by the book’s end, which is troubling but works as a strong nod to the novel’s thematic existentialism. Regardless, I loved it and had a difficult time recovering from it. A little medical, a little conspiracist, and a little technological, Being has shades of “Alias,” Trainspotting, Morvern Callar, Chuck Palahniuk, Run Lola Run, and Poppy Z. Brite. As apparent from the name-dropping, this novel has a specific audience although not the conventional science fiction readership. While Being is unsettling with its grime, depravation, and loneliness, it is not an alienating read. Unlike most dystopias, it comforts and confirms our feelings of being unsafe and disconnected in the postmodern world.

While the characterization is sparse, Brooks adeptly cultivates concern for his heroes, Robert and Eddi. Their relationship is atypical for teen literature yet normal for Brooks’ reality. It is loving, but not sentimental. Robert and Eddi are just two unusually messed-up young people in a world of trouble involving circuit boards, fake identities, and a man (or is he a machine?) named Ryan.

Brooks’ evocative sensory language describes old feelings in new ways and creates panic, pain, and fear. “The slice of the scalpel is quick and tight. At first I feel nothing, just the silent peeling of skin and fat, opening up like a blood red smile…then suddenly the pain cuts in. It hurts”(19).

And later:

“It had some kind of miniature connection sockets all around the edge, little gold things…filaments, dulled silver-white shining dark in the light of the eye. Intricate patterns of dots and lines, circles, and waves. Fine hairs, like slender worms, moving to the flow of something invisible”(180).

And the cover is pretty rad, too.

It’s been a while since I have had the time to post, but there have been a number of things that I have discovered about recently, which I would like to share just in case some of you don’t know about them.

The first of these is the Summer Blog Blast Tour, which was organized by Colleen Mondor, the brainchild of Chasing Ray.  This tour consists of a number of interviews with assorted children’s and YA authors, which will take place all week on a variety of lit blogs.  It kicked off on Sunday with an interview of Gene Yang, the author of American Born Chinese, on Finding Wonderland: The Writing YA Weblog.  It will go throughout this whole week and will feature many authors including a few of my favorites like Chris Crutcher, Kazu Kibuishi, and Brent Hartinger.  I would highly recommend going over to Chasing Ray for a peek at the schedule to see what authors you like and where you can find their interviews. Also, thanks to Colleen for putting all this together.

Next I need to mention a phenomenon that I am sure most of you are already aware of, but I just discovered it a few weeks ago so I feel the need to mention it.  The phenomenon that I speak of is called Brotherhood 2.0.  This is a video blog run by John Green, author of Looking for Alaska, and his brother Hank Green who is the creator of a great environmental technology blog called Ecogeek.  The purpose of this vlog is for the brothers Green to avoid textual communication for the entire year and to therefore communicate largely by use of these videos.  Every week day there is a new entry and they are all quite hilarious.  They also give an interesting view into the lives of these two brothers.  This is especially interesting for YA librarians since John is an award winning YA author.  You actually get to see some intimate moments detailing his experiences in the world of YA lit.  The site has developed an extremely large audience, so I am assuming that many of you are already regular viewers, but if you aren’t you should give it a look.  You won’t be disappointed.  I would however suggest starting with the early archives from the first week or two just so you have an idea of what the site is about.

“The Cute Book” by Aranzi Aronzo
Hardcover = $12.95 ISBN=9781932234688

Supplies Needed: Photo-copied patterns from “The Cute Book”, various colors of felt, embroidery thread, needles, Tacky glue, a couple of spools of thread, scissors, cotton stuffing

The steps in this craft program may appear easy, but I’ll caution that you’ll need a group of teens who are determined and patient to see this project through to its completion. The animal forms are very small (approx 3″) and those who aren’t easily discouraged will find this activity rewarding. I would suggest making an animal before your program, so that you’ll have an idea of the areas in which teens may need help. In many cases, teens will find their own solutions to sewing situations and will not require assistance. However, there are teens who have never touched a needle in their life and may need guidance. For beginners, I suggest using the simpler patterns of the panda, bear, rabbit, and kitty. The teens who came to this program were very crafty and ranged between ages 12-18. They also enjoyed the idea that during their next creations they might alter their patterns to resemble anime characters, such as Kuro Neko from the series Trigun or Yuki and Kyo from the series Fruits Basket. Don’t worry; if you get a couple of teens who aren’t down with cute, there are patterns to construct a bad guy, kidnapper, and liar.

Simple Steps
One: Make supplies available and briefly explain the construction process. Two: Teens cut out patterns and animal pieces. Three: Teens sew on faces and other body parts and stuff bodies. TADA! All Done.

Other titles to consider having available for checkout:

Speaking of things cute and cats, here’s a random idea for leaving ‘MySpace Comments’:
A couple of weeks ago, a friend sent me these links in an email: ICanHasCheezburger and Cute Overload!;) Since then, I’ve been randomly inserting cat pics onto my teen patron’s MySpace comments. This way of communicating usually goes well with teens who already have animal pictures on their MySpace page. Not only do they find the pics funny but many will find humor in the slang accompanying the pics (ex. bird flavr watr hitz da spot).

What does an Eclipse teen program and Jewish Culture booklist have in common?
 I’ll give a few hints:

• The item in question was recently reviewed in the latest issue of the YALS journal.  
• It changes at least once a week, if not more, with new information
• You have the authority to add to it and change it.
• It gives you access to booklists that are being updated all the time with new titles

What the Eclipse prom and Jewish culture booklist have in common, is that they are both topics explored in further detail on the TeenLibWiki. These two articles were also recently added to the wiki and/or updated within the past month.
TeenLibWiki has changed. There is more documentation, such as how to start a new page or how to upload images. 
Add your program ideas. We have created a new section just for programming ideas. Please add your best to the list and get some tips from others.  
We (still) need your help. A wiki works best when people are adding information and editing content.
Give and Take Challenge.  I challenge you! If you login to the TeenLibWiki and find at least one useful piece of information that helps you do your job as a librarian serving teens, then I challenge you to add something to the wiki that may prove useful to someone else. And if you don’t find anything useful, maybe we need your useful ideas so please add anyways =)
Some current wiki features:

Jewish Culture Booklist - a list of magazines, fiction, and non-fiction.

CD Album Covers - step-by-step on making CD Album covers

Eclipse Prom - resources for hosting an Eclipse Prom / Release Party