Rhonda Belyea

The MOMS Club of Stafford (East) wants to meet you! So, they're bringing a Carnival Open House to share with all the Porter Branch Library customers on Wednesday, September 12, 2012, 10:00am – noon.  The Tumblebus will be here along with games, prizes, snacks, drinks, face painting, balloons, raffle…ALL FREE!!!

The MOMS Club is a non-profit, international support group for stay-at-home moms, including those who have home-based businesses or work part-time. The goals of the club are to provide fun activities for kids and opportunities for moms to socialize with other moms. They are inviting folks to this fun-filled event to see if the MOMS Club would be a good fit for you & your little ones!

For More Info:

Email: eaststaffordmoms@yahoo.com

http://www.eaststaffordmomsclub.webs.com

Dairy Queen by Catherine Gilbert Murdock: "When you don't talk, there's a lot of stuff that ends up not getting said. Harsh words indeed, from Brian Nelson of all people. But, D. J. can't help admitting, maybe he's right. When you don't talk, there's a lot of stuff that ends up not getting said. Stuff like why her best friend, Amber, isn't so friendly anymore. Or why her little brother, Curtis, never opens his mouth. Why her mom has two jobs and a big secret. Why her college-football-star brothers won't even call home. Why her dad would go ballistic if she tried out for the high school football team herself. And why Brian is so, so out of her league. When you don't talk, there's a lot of stuff that ends up not getting said. Welcome to the summer that fifteen-year-old D. J. Schwenk of Red Bend, Wisconsin, learns to talk, and ends up having an awful lot of stuff to say."
 

Angus, Thongs, and Full-Frontal Snogging: Confessions of Georgia Nicholson by Louise Rennison
Presents the humorous journal of a year in the life of a fourteen-year-old British girl who tries to reduce the size of her nose, stop her mad cat from terrorizing the neighborhood animals, and win the love of handsome hunk Robbie.

Anna and the French Kiss by Stephanie Perkins
Anna is less than thrilled about being shipped off to boarding school in Paris--until she meets Etienne St. Claire: perfect, Parisian, and utterly irresistible. The only problem is that he's taken, and Anna might be, too, if anything comes of her almost-relationship back home.

This readalike is in response to a patron's book-match request. If you would like personalized reading recommendations, fill out the book-match form and a librarian will email suggested titles to you.

This Lullaby by Sarah Dessen
Raised by a mother who's had five husbands, eighteen-year-old Remy believes in short-term, no-commitment relationships until she meets Dexter, a rock band musician.

Since you like Sarah Dessen's book, This Lullaby, you might want to check out her other titles. Meanwhile, here are three other titles you might enjoy:

Feeling Sorry for Celia by Jaclyn Moriarty
Life isn't going well for high school student Elizabeth Clarry. Her absentee father just moved back to Australia from Canada for a year, and now he wants to spend "quality time" with her. She's getting anonymous love notes from a boy who refuses to tell her his name. Worst of all, her best friend has run away and joined the circus. In this funny, engaging novel-told as a series of notes and letters-Elizabeth deals with imperfect parents and romantic disappointments as well as tragedies large and small. Over the course of the story, she confronts everything from pimples and forgotten homework to the death of a pet and a suicide attempt by her best friend.


Hope Was Here by Joan Bauer
When sixteen-year-old Hope and the aunt who has raised her move from Brooklyn to Mulhoney, Wisconsin, to work as waitress and cook in the Welcome Stairways diner, they become involved with the diner owner's political campaign to oust the town's corrupt mayor.

Pictures of Hollis Woods by Patricia Reilly Giff
A troublesome twelve-year-old orphan, staying with an elderly artist who needs her, remembers the only other time she was happy in a foster home, with a family that truly seemed to care about her.

This readalike is in response to a patron's book-match request. If you would like personalized reading recommendations, fill out the book-match form and a librarian will email suggested titles to you. You can browse our book matches here.

The Giver by Lois Lowry
Given his lifetime assignment at the Ceremony of Twelve, Jonas becomes the receiver of memories shared by only one other in his community and discovers the terrible truth about the society in which he lives.

If you liked The Giver, you might also enjoy the companion books (they're not exactly sequels) that Lowry has written:

Gathering Blue by Lois Lowry
Lame and suddenly orphaned, Kira is mysteriously removed from her squalid village to live in the palatial Council Edifice, where she is expected to use her gifts as a weaver to do the bidding of the all-powerful Guardians.

Messenger by Lois Lowry
In this novel that unites characters from "The Giver" and "Gathering Blue," Matty, a young member of a utopian community that values honesty, conceals an emerging healing power that he cannot explain or understand.

If you like these books, you might also enjoy:

Airborn by Kenneth Oppel
Matt Cruse is a cabin boy on the Aurora, a huge airship that sails hundreds of feet above the ocean, ferrying wealthy passengers from city to city. It is the life Matt's always wanted; convinced he's lighter than air, he imagines himself as buoyant as the hydrium gas that powers his ship. One night he meets a dying balloonist who speaks of beautiful creatures drifting through the skies. It is only after Matt meets the balloonist's granddaughter that he realizes that the man's ravings may,in fact, have been true, and that the creatures are completely real and utterly mysterious.
 

Among the Hidden by Margaret Peterson Haddix
In a future where the Population Police enforce the law limiting afamily to only two children, Luke has lived all his twelve years inisolation and fear on his family's farm, until another "third" convinces him that the government is wrong.

This readalike is in response to a patron's book-match request. If you would like personalized reading recommendations, fill out the book-match form and a librarian will email suggested titles to you.

Fablehaven by Brandon Mull
When Kendra and Seth go to stay at their grandparents' estate, they discover that it is a sanctuary for magical creatures and that a battle between good and evil is looming.

If you like the Fablehaven series you might like:
 

The Alchemyst by Michael Scott
While working at pleasant but mundane summer jobs in San Francisco, fifteen-year-old twins, Sophie and Josh, suddenly find themselves caught up in the deadly, centuries-old struggle between rival alchemists, Nicholas Flamel and John Dee, over the possession of an ancient and powerful book holding the secret formulas for alchemy and everlasting life.
 
 

The Amulet of Samarkand by Jonathan Stroud
Nathaniel, a magician's apprentice, summons up the djinni Bartimaeus and instructs him to steal the Amulet of Samarkand from the powerful magician Simon Lovelace.

Dragon Slippers by Jessica Day George
Orphaned after a fever epidemic, Creel befriends a dragon and unknowingly inherits an object that can either save or destroy her kingdom.

This readalike is in response to a patron's book-match request. If you would like personalized reading recommendations, fill out the book-match form and a librarian will email suggested titles to you.

Lock and Key by Sarah Dessen

When she is abandoned by her alcoholic mother, high school senior Ruby winds up living with Cora, the sister she has not seen for ten years, and learns about Cora's new life, what makes a family, how to allow people to help her when she needs it, and that she too has something to offer others.

If you like Lock and Key then you might like:

Because I am Furniture by Thalia Chaltas
The youngest of three siblings, fourteen-year-old Anke feels both relieved and neglected that her father abuses her brother and sister but ignores her, but when she catches him with one of her friends, she finally becomes angry enough to take action.

Jellicoe Road by Melina Marchetta
Abandoned by her drug-addicted mother at the age of eleven, high school student Taylor Markham struggles with her identity and family history at a boarding school in Australia.

Push: A Novel by Sapphire
A self-portrait of a black teenage girl, big, fat, unloved, with a father who rapes her and a jealous mother who screams abuse. For Precious, as she is called, hope appears when a courageous teacher, a young black woman, bullies, cajoles and inspires her to learn to read.

Cafe Book Dixon Smith was great this year- getting together during lunch to talk about the hottest new books for teens! The school library was the place to be on May 12 when 56 students cast their votes and here are the results!

Top Pick:

Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins
In a future North America, where the rulers of Panem maintain control through an annual televised survival competition pitting young people from each of the twelve districts against one another, sixteen-year-old Katniss's skills are put to the test when she voluntarily takes her younger sister's place.

Other Favorites:

Anything But Typical by Nora Raleigh Baskin
Cabinet of Wonders by Marie Rutkoski
Chosen One by Carol Lynch Williams
Comet's Curse by Dom Testa 
The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman
If the Witness Lied by Caroline B. Cooney
Somebodyby Nancy Springer

Are you a teen poet? Here's something to celebrate: our annual Teen Poetry Contest!

Headquarters Theater, Friday, April 23, 4:15-5:00. 
Grades K-6.
Call 540-372-1144 to sign up now!  

Looking for a way to learn more about recycling and how to take care of Mother Earth?

Bring your family and enjoy skits, crafts, games, face painting, and activities sponsored by various local community groups at our Earth Day celebration! 
We are pleased to welcome the fun folks from Caledon Natural Area State Park, Friends of the Rappahannock, R-Board, Fredericksburg Parks and Recreation, Master Gardeners, Virginia Tech Extension Office. Thanks to the Virginia Cooperative Extension Office, each child will receive a free seedling!

Organized by CRRL’s own Teen Council!

It was awesome! Were you there? It was on Friday, March 12, 7-9 pm. It was in the Headquarters theater.

Thanks to all the musicians and, hey, you can check them out on MySpace Music: Proof by Assertion, Ambulance Review, and 52 Foreign Dumpsters! (You all were great and you know it!)

Check out this video of Proof by Assertion at Salem Church last August.

You can also see The Ambulance Review performing "No Way!" Says FAA on MySpace.

Fans, you were great, too! Wouldn't be a show without you all! Mark your calendars for the next show at Headquarters: Friday, June 11