Tag: YA

Thrills and Chills at Skeleton Creek

(First published on Manila Bulletin, Students and Campuses section)

Something sinister is bubbling beneath the surface of the backwater town of Skeleton Creek, and best friends Ryan McCray and Sarah Fincher appear to have stirred it. Ryan and Sarah are convinced that Skeleton Creek is harboring secrets, and they are determined to get to the bottom of it, even though there are forces that want to stop them at all costs.

This is the premise behind Scholastic Press’ latest multimedia venture, following the phenomenal success of its interactive middle reader series 39 Clues, which had readers collecting clue cards and playing online games in the hunt for the Cahill family treasure. This time around, Skeleton Creek by Patrick Carman introduces readers to a new multimedia format: video books.

“Books are having a harder time holding the attention of a wired youth culture. iPods, cell phones, movies, the Internet, video games, and television are distracting even our best young readers,” states Skeleton Creek creator Patrick Carman. “I developed Skeleton Creek for ten to sixteen year olds who have grown up with YouTube and MySpace for one reason: I want them to read. While there will always be plenty of room for traditional books for young adults, publishing has to think outside the box in order to bring back many of our young readers.”

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Num8ers


Chicken House is one of my favorite British children’s book publishers. I’ve enjoyed many of their novels immensely, including Cornelia Funke’s The Thief Lord, Dragon Rider, and the Inkheart Trilogy; Elizabeth Kay’s Divide series; Stuart Hill’s The Cry of the Icemark; and The Mysterious Benedict Society, and I have a whole bunch of Chicken House books still waiting to be read on my shelves.

Chicken House was founded by publishing great Barry Cunningham (as in the subject of J.K. Rowling’s quote, “If it wasn’t for Barry Cunningham, Harry Potter might still be languishing in his cupboard under the stairs…”) in 2000, and it specializes in new writers, artists and ideas. Chicken House joined the Scholastic group in 2005, further cementing their hold in international children’s book market.

I’ve always found Chicken House books to be quirky and highly original, so I received a review copy of Numbers by Rachel Ward, I knew I was in for an interesting read.

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The Spook’s Apprentice

I’ve had a copy of Joseph Delaney’s The Spook’s Apprentice for a couple of years now, and only remembered it last week, when I was digging through my shelves of TBR books for some books to read for Halloween. I remember I looked through a list of books that other Harry Potter fans were reading post-Harry Potter, and this book, the first in a series called The Wardstone Chronicles, came highly recommended.

I hadn’t planned on a Halloween theme for the 24-hour Readathon, but I got home late that day from seeing the Galeón de Andalucía at the South Harbor and had no time to pre-select books for the Readathon. Since the pile of scary books was already sitting on my desk, I just grabbed a bunch of them so I could sign up in the nick of time.

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A Little History of the World

I enjoy trivia of all sorts, so when a friend loaned me his copy of E.H. Gombrich’s A Little History of the World, I gladly dove into many hours of fascinating reading.

A Little History of the World is a compact volume that tells us the story of mankind, from the Stone Age to the atomic bomb. Told as stories, it’s simple enough for young readers to understand without getting the feeling of being patronized, and entertaining enough for adults who have already gone through years of history classes.

Gombrich, an art historian (you may recognize the name from the book The Story of Art), wrote this book in 1935 with the intention of presenting a history of the world for younger readers. The book was actually originally written in German, was banned by the Nazis for being too “pacifist,” and was only translated in English by Gombrich himself (mostly, reportedly, but the book credits his assistant Caroline Mustill as the translator) towards the end of his life (he died in 2001, at 92, still working on it).

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Bartimaeus is back!

I loved Jonathan Stroud’s Bartimaeus Trilogy! While I was deeply satisfied with the series, I was really sad (read: in tears!) to see it end!

This morning, a friend of mine (thank you, Cecille!) tagged me in a Facebook post announcing something I did not see coming — another Bartimaeus novel! Squee!

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