Note: A startling encounter on a New York subway platform leads two strangers to a run-down tenement where a life or death decision must be made. In that small apartment, Black and White, as the two men are known, begin a conversation that leads each back through his own history, mining the origins of two fundamentally opposing world views. White is a professor whose seemingly enviable existence of relative ease has left him nonetheless in despair. Black, an ex-con and ex-addict, is the more hopeful of the men though he is just as desperate to convince White of the power of faith as White is desperate to deny it. Their aim is no less than this: to discover the meaning of life. Deft, spare, and full of artful tension, The Sunset Limited is a beautifully crafted, consistently thought-provoking, and deceptively intimate work by one of the most insightful writers of our time.

FIC AND

Anderson, M. T. The astonishing life of Octavian Nothing: Traitor to the nation

: Volume 1: The pox party. Cambridge, MA: Candlewick Press, [2006].

Note: Various diaries, letters, and other manuscripts chronicle the experiences of Octavian, from birth to age 16, as he is brought up as part of a science experiment in the years leading up to and during the American Revolutionary War.

FIC BED

Beddor, Frank. The looking glass wars. New York: Dial Books, [2006].

Note: When she is cast out of Wonderland by her evil aunt Redd, young Alyss Heart finds herself living in Victorian Oxford as Alice Liddell and struggles to keep memories of her kingdom intact until she can return and claim her rightful throne.

FIC BOO

Booth, Coe. Tyrell. New York: PUSH, [2006].

Note: Fifteen-year-old Tyrell, who is living in a Bronx homeless shelter with his spaced-out mother and his younger brother, tries to avoid temptation so he does not end up in jail like his father.

FIC BRO

Brooks, Kevin. The road of the dead. New York: Scholastic, [2006].

Note: Two brothers, sons of an incarcerated gypsy, leave London traveling to an isolated and desolate village, in search of the brutal killer of their sister.

FIC CAB

Cabot, Meg. How to be popular: a novel. New York: HarperTempest, [2006].

Note: Sixteen-year-old Steph Landry finds an old book on how to be popular and decides to change her social status by following its advice, much to the bafflement of her two best friends.

FIC CAB

Cabot, Meg. The princess diaries : Princess on the brink, vol. 8. New York:

Harper Collins, [2007].

Note: At last, Mia is a junior. An upperclassperson. Free of her responsibilities as student body president. So why is it that everything is going so terribly wrong? What is she doing in Intro to Creative Writing? When she has made it through Algebra and Geometry, why must she be faced with Precalculus? And for the love of all that is Genovian, why has Lilly nominated her for school prez again? All this is nothing compared to the news Michael springs on her, however. On top of all the mathematical strife, her beloved boyfriend is leaving for Japan for a year. Precalc has nothing on preparing for the worst separation ever! Turns out there is one way she might convince Michael to stay. But will she? Or won't she? No matter what, Mia seems headed for disaster.

FIC CAB

Cabot, Meg. Sweet sixteen princess. New York: HarperCollins, [2006].

Note: Sixteen is the magic number. Mia doesn't always have the best luck with parties, so even though it's her sweet sixteenth, she doesn't want a birthday bash. As usual, Grandmère has other ideas, and thinks a reality TV special is just the thing in order to celebrate royally. The whole scheme smacks of Lilly's doing -- Lilly, whose own TV show is still only limited to local cable viewers. Will Mia be able to stop Grandmère's plan? Will her friends ever forgive her if she does stop it, since it involves all of them taking the royal jet to Genovia for an extravaganza the likes of which would turn even Paris Hilton green with envy? Why can't Mia get what she really wants: an evening alone with Michael? With a little luck, this sweet sixteen princess might just get her wish -- a birthday that's royally romantic.

FIC CAB

Cabot, Meg. The princess diaries : Valentine Princess. New York: Harper Collins,

[2006].

Note: Mia finds an old diary and enjoys reading what she wrote about her first Valentine's Day with Michael.

FIC DES

Dessen, Sarah. Just listen. New York: Viking, [2006].

Note: Isolated from friends who believe the worst because she has not been truthful with them, sixteen-year-old Annabel finds an ally in classmate Owen, whose honesty and passion for music help her to face and share what really happened at the end-of-the-year party that changed her life.

FIC DES

Dessen, Sarah. the truth about forever. New York: Viking, [2004].

Note: In The Truth About Forever, when asked how she is coping with her father's death, invariably seventeen year old Macy Queen's answer is "fine," when nothing could be further from the truth. In actuality, she is drowning in grief while maintaining a flawless façade of good grades and unblemished behavior. Though she feels lost when her boyfriend heads to "Brain Camp" for the summer, she finds herself a job with the quirky Wish Catering crew, and meets "sa-woon"-worthy Wes, whose chaotic lifestyle is in direct opposition to her own. As the two share their stories over the summer, Macy realizes she can no longer keep her feelings on ice. Though it feels like her future ended with her dad's death, Macy's learns that forever is all about beginnings.

FIC GIL

Giles, Gail. What happened to Cass McBride? New York: Hachette Group, [2006].

Note: Kyle Kirby has planned a cruel and unusual revenge on Cass McBride, the most popular girl in school, for the death of his brother David. He digs a hole. Drugs Cass. Kidnaps her. Puts her in a box-underground. He buries her alive. But Kyle makes a fatal error: Cass knows the power of words. She uses fear as her weapon to keep her nemesis talking--and to keep herself breathing during the most harrowing 48 hours of her life.

FIC KLE

Klein, Lisa. Ophelia: a novel. New York: Bloomsbury, [2006].

Note: Those who think they know the story of Ophelia and Hamlet can think again, because when bloody deeds turn the court of Elsinore into a place of treachery and madness, Ophelia alone will find the means to escape, with nothing more than the clothes on her back . . . and one very dangerous secret.

FIC LEG

Le Guin, Ursula K. Voices. Orlando, FL: Harcourt, [2006].

Note: In this powerful companion to the celebrated "Gifts," conquerors of a coastal city consider reading and writing to be acts punishable by death.

FIC LEG

Le Guin, Ursula K. Gifts. Orlando, FL: Harcourt, [2004].

Note: When a young man in the Uplands blinds himself rather than use his gift of "unmaking"--A violent talent shared by members of his family--he upsets the precarious balance of power among rival, feuding families, each of which has a strange and deadly talent of its own.

FIC MCC

McCarthy, Cormac. Blood Meridian : Or the evening redness in the west. 1992. New

York: Vintage International, [1985].

Note: An epic novel of the violence and depravity that attended America's westward expansion, Blood Meridian brilliantly subverts the conventions of the Western novel and the mythology of the "wild west." Based on historical events that took place on the Texas-Mexico border in the 1850s, it traces the fortunes of the Kid, a fourteen-year-old Tennesseean who stumbles into the nightmarish world where Indians are being murdered and the market for their scalps is thriving.

FIC MCC

McCormick, Patricia. Sold. New York: Hyperion, [2006].

Note: Lakshmi, 13, knows nothing about the world beyond her village shack in the Himalayas of Nepal, and when her family loses the little it has in a monsoon, she grabs a chance to work as a maid in the city so she can send money back home. What she doesn't know is that her stepfather has sold her into prostitution. She ends up in a brothel far across the border in the slums of Calcutta, locked up, beaten, starved, drugged, raped, "torn and bleeding," until she submits. In beautiful clear prose and free verse that remains true to the child's viewpoint, first-person, present-tense vignettes fill in Lakshmi's story. The brutality and cruelty are ever present ("I have been beaten here, / locked away, / violated a hundred times / and a hundred times more"), but not sensationalized. An unexpected act of kindness is heartbreaking ("I do not know a word / big enough to hold my sadness"). One haunting chapter brings home the truth of "Two Worlds": the workers love watching The Bold and the Beautifulon TV though in the real world, the world they know, a desperate prostitute may be approached to sell her own child. An unforgettable account of sexual slavery as it exists now.

FIC MCC

McCarthy, Cormac. The road. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, [2006].

Note: Violence, in McCarthy's postapocalyptic tour de force, has been visited worldwide in the form of a "long shear of light and then a series of low concussions" that leaves cities and forests burned, birds and fish dead and the earth shrouded in gray clouds of ash. In this landscape, an unnamed man and his young son journey down a road to get to the sea. (The man's wife, who gave birth to the boy after calamity struck, has killed herself.) They carry blankets and scavenged food in a shopping cart, and the man is armed with a revolver loaded with his last two bullets. Beyond the ever-present possibility of starvation lies the threat of roving bands of cannibalistic thugs. The man assures the boy that the two of them are "good guys," but from the way his father treats other stray survivors the boy sees that his father has turned into an amoral survivalist, tenuously attached to the morality of the past by his fierce love for his son.

FIC MES

Messud, Claire. The emperor's children. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, [2006].

Note: "The Emperor's Children is a novel about the intersections in the lives of three friends, now on the cusp of their thirties, making their way - and not- in New York City." "There is beautiful, sophisticated Marina Thwaite - an "It" girl finishing her first book; the daughter of Murray Thwaite,celebrated intellectual and journalist - and her two closest friends from Brown, Danielle, a quietly appealing television producer, and Julius, a cash -strapped freelance critic. The delicious complications that arise among them become dangerous when Murray's nephew, Frederick "Bootie" Tubb, an idealistic college dropout determined to make his mark, comes to town. As the skies darken, it is Bootie's unexpected decisions - and their stunning, heartbreaking outcome - that will change each of their lives forever.".

FIC MUR

Murdock, Catherine Gilbert. Dairy Queen: a novel. Boston: Houghton Mifflin

Company, [2006].

Note: After spending her summer running the family farm and training the quarterback for her school's rival football team, sixteen-year-old D.J. decides to go out for the sport herself, not anticipating the reactions of those around her.

FIC POR

Portman, Frank. King Dork. New York: Delacorte Press, [2006].

Note: High school loser Tom Henderson discovers that "The Catcher in the Rye" may hold the clues to the many mysteries in his life.

FIC REI

Reinhardt, Dana. A brief chapter in my impossible life. New York: Wendy Lamb,

[2006].

Note: Sixteen-year-old atheist Simone Turner-Bloom's life changes in unexpected ways when her parents convince her to make contact with her biological mother, an agnostic from a Jewish family who is losing her battle with cancer.

FIC ROS

Rosoff, Meg. Just in case. New York: Random House, [2006].

Note: Convinced that fate is out to get him, fifteen year old David Case assumes a new identity in the hope of avoiding what he believes is certain doom.

FIC SKE

Skelton, Matthew. Endymion spring. first U.S. New York: Delacorte Press, [2006].

Note: Having reluctantly accompanied his academic mother and pesky younger sister to Oxford, twelve-year-old Blake Winters is at loose ends until he stumbles across an ancient and magical book, secretly brought to England in 1453 by Gutenberg's mute apprentice to save it from evil forces, and which now draws Blake into a dangerous and life-threatening quest.

FIC STE

Stewart, Sean and Weisman, Jordan. Cathy's book: If found call (650) 266-8233.

Philadelphia: Running Press, [2006].

Note: Things weren’t so peachy in Cathy’s life before Victor broke up with her. Her father died unexpectedly, she’s failing school, and her best friend is mad at her. But when Cathy decides to investigate Victor’s reasons for ending their relationship, things suddenly go from bad to very, very, very bad as her findings produce more questions than answers. For instance, what does the death of Victor’s co-worker, the strange mark that appeared on Cathy’s arm, and the surreal behavior of several Chinese elders have to do with it? Through Cathy’s unique and irresistible voice and lots of proof in the form of letters, photographs, date book entries, telephone numbers readers can call, websites they can access, as well as secrets only a careful reader will be able to decipher readers will enter a strange and fascinating world where things often aren’t how they appear.

FIC VAK

Vakil, Ardashir. Beach boy. New Dehli: Pengiun, [1997].

Note: The benign neglect of his wealthy family not only affords Cyrus endless opportunities to observe his neighbors and tag along on their adventures, but it gives Beach Boy a cast of characters as wonderfully diverse as middle -class India itself. The big, athletic Krishnan family; the Maharani and her seductive daughter; Minoo and Mehroo Readymoney, Cyrus's cosmopolitan and self-involved progenitors; the household servant Bhagwan; brusque Aunty Zenobia; Mrs. Verma of the hundred different smiles--Ardashir Vakil evokes them all with naughty gusto. Since Cyrus is already wildly precocious and agelessly astute, calling Beach Boy a coming-of-age story in the traditional sense seems wrong. As his parents' marital difficulties reach crisis proportions, what our young hero loses is not so much his innocence, or his illusions, as his child's license to roam freely, an opportunist of insight and experience.

FIC VIZ

Vizzini, Ned. It's kind of a funny story. New York: Miramax, [2006].

Note: A humorous account of a New York City teenager's battle with depression and his time spent in a psychiatric hospital.

FIC WIT

Wittlinger, Ellen. Blind faith. New York: Simon and Schuster, [2006].

Note: While coping with her grandmother's sudden death and her mother's resulting depression and fascination with a spiritualist church, whose ministers claim to communicate with the dead, fifteen-year-old Liz finds herself falling for a new neighbor whose mother is dying of cancer.

FIC ZUS

Zusak, Markus. The book thief. New York: Borzoi Book, [2006].

Note: Liesel Meminger, a foster child living outside Munich during World War II, scratches out a meager existence for herself by stealing when she encounters something she can't resist--books--in this unforgettable story about the ability of books to feed the soul.

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Nonfiction

================================================================================

302.34 DEL

Dellasega, Cheryl and Nixon Charisse. Girl wars : 12 strategies that will end

female bullying. New York: Simon and Schuster, [2003].

Note: Mary Pipher's bestselling Reviving Ophelia triggered widespread interest in the culture of preteen and teenage girls, including the seemingly epidemic pattern of relational agression -- hurting one's peers through gossip, teasing, forming cliques, and other insidious cruelties. Girl Wars explains how this behavior is damaging to both victim and abuser, why it happens, and how both individuals and groups can not only stop the behavior, but overcome the culture that breeds it. In an effective, easy-to-implement step-by-step program, the authors present strategies for tackling the entire issue, from preventative measures to uniting with others, to working to change the norms for girls in school and in society in general Compelling true stories from mothers and daughters -- both victims and abusers -- illustrate the painful consequences of relational aggression, yet show that the behavior can be stopped and changed for the better. Above all Drs. Nixon and Dellasega show us that girls want to help each other and form positive relationships -- all they need is guidance from concerned adults to show them the way.

306 JON

Jones, LeAlan and Newman, Lloyd. Our America: life and death on the south side

of Chicago. New York: Pocket Books, [1997].

Note: The award-winning creators of National Public Radio's "Ghetto Life 101" and "Remorse: The 14 Stories of Eric Morse" combine talents with a young photographer to show what life is like in one of the country's darkest places: Chicago's Ida B. Wells housing project.

363.325 COM

National Commission on Terrorist Attacks. The 9/11 Commission report : Final

report of the National Commission on terrorist attacks upon the United

States. New York: W.W. Norton and Co, [2004].

Note: This authorized edition of the Commission's final report on the terrorist attacks on the US on September 11, 2001 traces the rise of the new global terrorism, as well as detailing the meetings and recommendations made by the bipartisan panel established in 2002. Appendices include names of US officials and others involved, and summaries of the dozen public hearings. This provocative historical record includes chronologies of the doomed flights and substantial reference notes, but lacks an index. Annotation.

364.1 TOL

Tolnay, Stewart, and Beck, E.M. A festival of violence : An analysis of Southern

lynchings, 1882-1930. 2nd. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, [1992].

394.1 SCH

Schlosser, Eric and Wilson, Charles. Chew on this: Everything you don't want to

know about fast food. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, [2006].

Note: Schlosser, the author of the "New York Times" bestseller "Fast Food Nation," and Wilson share with kids the fascinating and sometimes frightening truth about what lurks between those sesame seed buns, what a chicken "nugget" really is, and how the fast food industry has been feeding off children for generations.

794.185 HAB

Habgood, Jacob and Overmars, Mark. The game maker's apprentice: game

development for beginners. New York: Apress, [2006].

Note: If you want to learn the craft of making computer games, then you've come to the right place. This book, and companion CD, provide all you need to create your own games for Microsoft Windows using Game Maker. It introduces beginners of all ages to the art of creating computer games. All the graphics, sound effects, and music you'll need are included to put together no less than nine professional-looking games!.

Professional Development

PROF DEV 028 HON

Honnold, RoseMary. The teen reader's advisor. New York: Neal-Schuman Publishers,

Inc, [2006].

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Berkeley’s Lecture Podcasts

http://webcast.berkeley.edu/index.php

Choose from many different fields and topics—science, history, and literature are just a few of the departments that offer these free audio lectures.

In addition, you can also hear and sometimes see guest speakers from Berkeley.

Choose a class or topic, and click on the icon and a real audio player will open, download the file and begin playing on your tablet.

You can also transfer the files to an iPod, mp3 player, or burn to a CD. Need help getting started? Let me know!

I highly recommend the Jennifer Burns U.S. history series!

We have a couple mp3 players in the library if you want to try it out. I can load a few lectures for you and show you how to use it.

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What can we do you and your classes?

· Do you have a research project coming up?

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· Want your students to know the difference between scholarly information, primary sources and other resources?

· Just want us to tell your students what resources are best for an assignment?

We can help!

We love providing instruction to your students so that they become information literate.

We can come to your class or your class can come to the library. We will tailor instruction directly to your assignment.

We love making project pages that provide 24/7 reference help to students (check out the existing list http://www.saintursula.org/library/projects/)

We can select the most appropriate databases, print materials, etc. for an assignment and give them tips for search strategies.

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The library has a Survey Monkey subscription that you can use. Just email to ask for the username and password.

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