OYAN Newsletter – Spring Issue

Hot off the press – the Spring 2013 issue of the OYAN Newsletter!

Spring 2013

Ticket sales start today for OLA raffle sponsored by OYAN

Greetings Oregon librarians and people who love libraries!

It’s time to buy your tickets for the annual OLA raffle sponsored by the Oregon Young Adult Network (OYAN).  Online ticket sales start April 17th at 10 AM online at http://bit.ly/152p91l .  The price is $5 for 1 ticket or $20 for 5 and sales are limited to 600 tickets total.  After online sales end on Tuesday the 23^rd at 8 PM, in-person sales will continue April 24-26 during the OLA/WLA joint conference.  Winners will be announced on Friday, April 26^th at the conference. 

The raffle is open to the public and being advertised statewide in the Oregonian this year, so we recommend buying early.  We have numerous great prizes including a 2-night stay at the Sylvia Beach Hotel, great tickets to the Literary Arts festival, a voucher to the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, an amazing Astoria package that includes a hotel stay, kayak rental and more along with many other prizes.  The raffle benefits teen service in Oregon’s public libraries.  OYAN is a part of the Oregon Library Association.  Get your tickets soon!

Thank you,

Mark Richardson
OYAN Vice-chair/ Chair elect
Young Adult Librarian
Cedar Mill Library
markr@wccls.org

Mock Printz Countdown – Final Title!!!

This is it! Mock Printz takes place tomorrow, Saturday 1/26 and this is the final installment in the series of book reviews covering each title.

Seraphina by Rachel Hartman

Seraphina, as her name suggests, has the musical talent of an angel. She avoids sharing her gifts with the others at court because she doesn’t want to attract attention to herself. Seraphina is not just a gifted musician…she also has a terrible secret. With the approaching celebration of the 40-year peace between the Goreddi, Seraphina’s people, and the dragons, she finds herself drawn increasingly more into the limelight. Torn between loyalty to her human peers and her close dragon acquaintances, Seraphina struggles as war looms and she learns more and more about her lineage, with all the unique abilities – and burdens – it brings with it. Can she help bridge the centuries-old grudges between the two species? Can she save her family and herself? Can she find love…and possibly even earn love in return?

This gripping story is set in a unique, rich world with complex characters, including a host of very intriguing dragons, and will keep you hanging on until you find out what happens next.

Mock Printz Countdown – The Drowned Cities

The Drowned Cities by Paolo Bacigalupi

War. Suspense. Violence. Terror. And all told in a distressingly believable way, in a world not too unlike our own.

This is not your run-of-the-mill dystopia. It’s an intense battlefield of survival set in a futuristic America. The story follows two friends, Mahlia and Mouse, through this world as they fight off violent, ruthless soldier boys. Mahlia and Mouse flee to the jungles, only to encounter Tool, a genetically engineered killer, part animal and part human, wounded, dangerous, and hunted by the boy soldiers. The two friends are separated – one captured and one facing horrible decisions about what to do next…and who to save.

In a world ravaged by climate change, disparate warring factions, and unending violence, it’s hard enough to survive, let alone hang onto your own humanity and try to save others. Bacigalupi creates an incredible, if not horrifying, world where he develops heart-wrenching moral dilemmas for his characters to face. And through it all, you’re glued to your seat, unable to tear away from the awfulness of it…hoping for a sliver of light at the end of the chaotic tunnel. A companion to the Printz Award title from 2011, Ship Breaker.

Mock Printz Countdown – Ask the Passengers

Ask the Passengers by AS King

Astrid Jones is a senior at Unity Valley High in a gossip-ridden small town filled with even smaller-minded people.

They say: Why does perfect Kristina Houck hang around that weird girl?

They say: How could anyone be friends with someone as strange as Astrid Jones?

As if the town’s rejection isn’t hard enough, Astrid lives with her caustically critical mother, her socially paranoid, reputation-obsessed sister, and her new-to-stonerhood dad. There is no love for Astrid at home, at school, or in town. So, she takes up a solitary hobby – staring at planes flying overhead and sending her love (and huge, finding-herself questions) to the passengers. And, she finds herself facing bigger and bigger questions as she discovers who she is as a person – someone who loves other girls – and realizes that there is no room in the hearts of her townspeople for someone like her.

Little does Astrid know, though, the very real impact her streams of love have on the passengers who receive them. Just as she is figuring out her own life by sending her love away, so is she changing others’ lives forever in significant ways.

— Just a reminder – Mock Printz is this Saturday, Jan 26 from 12-4pm! If you’re participating in person or remotely, check your email for agendas and details. Got questions? Contact workshop coordinator Susan Smallsreed at susansm@multcolib.org.

Mock Printz Countdown – Code Name Verity

Code Name Verity by Elizabeth Wein

I have told the truth. I have told the truth. I have told the truth…

So claims captured British spy, Verity, as she writes her confession of war information in a trade with the Nazi Gestapo guards for more time to live. Brought to Occupied France in WWII by her best friend and pilot, Maddie (code name Kittyhawk), Verity is captured almost immediately and detained for weeks of tortuous interrogation. She promises to provide her captors with valuable information about British war strategies in exchange for time; the first half of this harrowing tale is Verity’s account of her friendship with Maddie and their joint efforts in the Allied Forces.

The second half of the story is told by Kittyhawk, filling in the blanks of how they came to France and her efforts to locate Verity while assisting the French Resistance who are hiding her from the Nazis. From Kittyhawk’s narrative, you will learn the strength of her friendship with Verity, the lengths they will go to save each other and defeat the Nazi forces. And, if you are able to set this book down without wondering about what happens next, or can finish the story without any sadness or tears, then you just might have even greater resolve than these two extraordinary young women.

Mock Printz Countdown – The Brides of Rollrock Island

The Brides of Rollrock Island
by Margo Lanagan

“There’s something about those Rollrock women, isn’t there?”

This is the story of Rollrock Island, told through the eyes and voices of various isle inhabitants. It’s the tale of the red-headed, seafaring dads; the mysterious, svelte, dark-haired mams; and a village filled only with sons. And of course, the sea witch, Misskaella. As well as the reason that no one comes to the island unless they live there…Rollrock men pull their wives, like their livelihoods, from the sea. Theirs are seal-wives, split magically from their seal bodies by Misskaella for a hefty sum. Rollrock mams bear and keep sons – the daughters they birth are not so lucky. And those sons grow up, learning from their dads all the ways they will try, and fail, to keep their mams and future wives happy on land when they belong to the sea.

It seems an unbreakable cycle…until young Daniel Mallet decides to take matters into his own hands, tired of all the oppressive unhappiness and suffering in his village and home. But, can one boy right the magically unnatural wrongs of generations? That’s for you to determine when you reach the end of this haunting, captivating story.