HPL
Teen Territory Blog

March is National Nutrition Month! National Nutrition Month is a campaign sponsored annually by the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics. It's designed to focus attention on the importance of developing good eating and physical activity habits. The Washington Post has 8 ideas to help you and your family celebrate! Here are some of those tips:

1. Keep healthful foods in the kitchen so they're available and easy to grab. Even bring some with you on the go!

2. Make an effort to fit in fruit and vegetables. Keep some in the car for when you get hungry or start your lunch off with some raw veggies before you eat your main dish. You can also sneak them into your meals, such as diced onions, raw squash, and zucchini in spicy barbecue chicken nachos, or spinach into pasta with tomato sauce.

3. Eat more at breakfast. Americans tend to eat a light breakfast or skip it, grab lunch on the run and eat the bulk of our calories from dinner on through the evening. Your body will stay energized longer with your largest meal earlier in the day, and then metabolize better with less food in the evening.

4. Fit physical activity in so you earn your calories: walk, run, go to a gym, play team sports, use fitness apps or videos and burn calories by taking stairs and parking farther from your destinations.

For The Washington Post's complete list, click here.

Or, for more ideas on nutrition and health, check out some of the books below:

Body Fuel: A Guide to Good Nutrition by Donna Shryer

Ask CosmoGirl! About Nutrition and Fitness from the editors of Cosmogirl

The Scoop on What To Eat: What You Should Know About Diet and Nutrition by Kathlyn Gay

Food Choices: The Ultimate Teen Guide by Robin F. Brancato

Food for Feeling Healthy by Carol Ballard

Food for Sports by Neil Morris

Today J.K. Rowling turns 48-years-old! And Harry Potter turns 33-years-old!

Joanne Rowling (J.K. Rowling) was born in July 1965 in England. In college, she earned her degree in both French and Classics, and then worked as a researcher at Amnesty International. She started writing the Harry Potter series during a delayed train trip (Manchester to London King’s Cross), and during the next five years, she outlined the plots for each book and also began writing the first novel.

Joanne then moved to Portugal, where she taught English as a foreign language. In 1992 she got married and in 1993 she gave birth to a daughter (Jessica). When the marriage ended, she and Jessica returned to the UK to live in Edinburgh, where Harry Potter & the Sorcerer’s Stone was eventually completed. The book was published under the name J.K. Rowling. The “K”, for Kathleen, was added at the request of her her publisher, who thought that a woman’s name would not appeal to the target audience of young boys.

Today, J.K. Rowling lives in Edinburgh with her husband and three children. Her latest book is her first novel for adults! It's called The Casual Vacancy and was published in English in September 2012.

Check out J.K Rowling's website here!

Did you virtually attend last Tuesday's "An Evening of Awesome" with John and Hank Green? The crowd was sold out, which no author has done since Norman Mailer's memorial service, which was almost five years ago!

If you missed the big night, don't worry! You can still watch the evening's events on YouTube! (Scroll to minute 35:12; that's when the good stuff begins.)

Enjoy, nerdfighters!

This coming Tuesday, January 15, author John Green and his brother, Hank, will present “An Evening of Awesome” at Carnegie Hall. This will be a speaking event (also with musical guests, The Mountain Goats) to mark the 1-year anniversary of his most recent, and probably most famous, book, The Fault In Our Stars.

But you can be in the audience right from home via livestreaming video and various Tumblr meetup events! You may or may not know, but John Green has long been known for keeping in contact with his fan base (aka the Nerdfighters) through various forms of social media, and he has said that Tumblr is his social media platform of choice.

There are two opportunities for participation: the livestream event on January 15, and an Ultimate John Green Trivia Challenge, which will run the weekend of January 19-20. All the questions for the Trivia Challenge are fan-sourced from Green’s Tumblr (you can submit a question here!).

Updates and information about how to attend or organize an event can be found on Penguin Teen’s Tumblr and John Green’s Tumblr.

You can read the full article about these "awesome" events at Publishers Weekly by clicking here.

Happy November 30th and congratulations to everyone who passed the 50,000-word mark today (or earlier)! Have any of you finished your novels this year? If so, how did they come out? And how do you feel about finally being done?

If you're searching for something to do with your manuscript and your new-found free time, Writer's Relief has an article that goes over the next steps needed to publish your work. There are four steps:

1. Take a break.
2. Use your break to do some research and prepare for revisions!
3. Roll up your sleeves and revise, revise, revise.
4. Be patient but determined when trying to get your work published.

Writer's Relief reminds us that the process of getting published "takes longer than one month, or even one year. There is no shortcut if you want to get paid up front for your writing by a traditional publisher."

For more about writing, editing, and publishing try one or more of these books:

So, You Want to Be a Writer?: How to Write, Get Published, and Maybe Even Make it Big! by Vicki Hambleton & Cathleen Greenwood.

Writing and Publishing: The Ultimate Teen Guide by Tina P. Schwartz

A Teen's Guide to Getting Published: Publishing for Profit, Recognition, and Academic Success by Jessica Dunn & Danielle Dunn

To Be A Writer: A Guide For Young People Who Want to Write and Publish by Barbara Seuling

Congratulations, writers! Now it's time to relax!

Today is a big day for author birthdays! Three very famous children's writers were born on various November 29ths throughout history-- Louisa May Alcott (1832), C.S. Lewis (1898), and Madeleine L'Engle (1918). Those are some big names!

Today is the halfway point for those of you currently participating in National Novel Writing Month!

Because life is a little too crazy already this year, I have taken 2012 off from NaNoWriMo for the first time since 2005. While I am certainly a little upset about it, as a long-time participant, I'm still happy to be celebrating the novel-frenzy fun with any of you who are writing a novel this month.

For those not in the know, National Novel Writing Month is a "fun, seat-of-your-pants approach to novel writing." The goal is to write a 50,000-word (or longer) novel by 11:59:59pm on November 30.

"Valuing enthusiasm and perseverance over painstaking craft, NaNoWriMo is a novel-writing program for everyone who has thought fleetingly about writing a novel but has been scared away by the time and effort involved." In November, you have permission to do a bad job and write only for the sake of finishing.

A little of my personal NaNoWriMo history:

Year #1 (2006): I was awesome at developing characters but terrible at keeping any kind of plot going for 50,000 words. The end product was mediocre (all things considered) but I wasn't about to go showing it off. Either way, I was DONE. I had just written my first novel!

Year #2 (2007): This year was a flop. My plot literally didn't exist. My characters just went to work, had lunch, and hung out with their friends. I would never let anybody even come close to reading this novel, and I think I may have actually deleted it from my computer. However, on November 30th, I'd finished, and I was now a two-time novelist!

Year #3 (2008): I didn't fully outline a plot but I knew I had to plan out some kind of direction for my story because I did not want a repeat of 2007. I had good characters (based on people I knew in real life, which was probably the best thing I could have done) and a lot of funny scenes, but I had only planned out a basic, overall idea for the plot and I had trouble stretching it all the way to 50,000 words. Because of this, I wound up with a lot of silly and sort of random scenes for length. But again, I finished and was now a THREE-BOOK AUTHOR!

Year #4 (2009): This year I did so much prep work. I typed up a 10-page outline with every scene I planned to include and I also decided to change genres! I moved from realistic fiction all the way to children's fantasy (maybe because I'd just read The Golden Compass and felt inspired). This was kind of fun and allowed a lot of creativity but was weird and kind of unnatural for me.

Year #5 (2010): This was a good year for NaNoWriMo. Even though my life seemed hectic, I had lots of writing time and, while I didn't create a masterpiece, I did an ok job in the end. Five time novelist!

Year #6 (2011): I took the same story idea from 2010's novel and completely re-wrote it, changing characters, scenes, setting, and developing ideas better and more deeply. This was probably my best novel of all, but around November 28th, I lost enthusiasm and had trouble wrapping it up and tying together loose ends. I started to feel bitter toward the novel and thus, with only two days left of NaNoWriMo, I called it quits.

If you're writing a novel for 2012, I'd love to hear about it! We're having a NaNoWriMo discussion at the library tonight at 7pm! Come down and talk about your struggles and successes! I'd love to chat!

Are you a teen? Did you know it's Teen Read Week? Teen Read Week started in 1998 and is celebrated annually the third week of October (this year it's October 14-20). It encourages you to read for the fun of it and every year it has a different theme. It's important to celebrate Teen Read Week because, even though there are lots of really great entertainment options out there, reading for fun is free, entertaining, and proven to help improve test scores!

This year's theme is It Came From The Library! It can be interpreted however you want, but why not check out some of these popular and wonderful YA books that are both spooky and mysterious?

Bliss by Lauren Myracle

Cryer's Cross by Lisa McMann

Horowitz Horror: Stories You'll Wish You'd Never Read by Anthony Horowitz

Oddest of All: Stories by Bruce Coville

Skeleton Creek: [Ryan's Journal] by Patrick Carman 

Wolf Rider by Avi

And be sure to click here to vote for the theme of Teen Read Week 2013! You have the power to choose!

Today is the 13th annual World Smile Day!

The smiley face that we all know today was created in 1963 by a commercial artist from Worcester, Massachusetts named Harvey Ball.

 As the years passed, that image became one of the most recognizable symbols of good will and good cheer in the world. However, Harvey Ball became concerned about the over-commercialization of it, worried that its original meaning had become lost in its constant repetition.

It was out of that concern that he came up with World Smile Day. He thought that everyone in the world should devote one day each year (World Smile Day) to smiles and kind acts.

"The smiley face knows no politics, no geography and no religion.  Harvey’s idea was that for at least one day each year, neither should we. He declared that the first Friday in October each year would henceforth be World Smile Day®." (http://www.worldsmileday.com/)

The first World Smile Day was held in 1999. Worcester, MA, the smiley face's hometown, was and still is the epicenter for World Smile Day. This year the Worcester event will have a marching band, free stuff, clowns, jugglers, a Ring Master, and (best of all) elephants from the Ringling Brothers & Barnum and Bailey Circus!

While all this is going on in town, there will also be "Smile Ambassadors" out delivering Smile Certificates to people and, additionally, there will be local events and activities going on around the world. Is there anything going on at your local library?

After Harvey died in 2001, the Harvey Ball World Smile Foundation was created to honor his name and memory. "Harvey Ball believed that each one of us has the ability to make a positive difference in this world and he lived according to that belief. He knew that any effort to improve the world, no matter how small, was worthwhile. And he understood the power of a smile and a kind act. In furtherance of that philosophy the Harvey Ball World Smile Foundation focuses on small, grass-roots charitable efforts that otherwise receive little attention or funding." (http://www.worldsmile.org/) The Foundation continues to be the official sponsor of World Smile Day each year.

Want to celebrate with a few of your own acts of kindness? Here are a few books to inspire you:

Kids' Random Acts of Kindness foreword by Rosalynn Carter, introduction by Dawna Markova

Real Kids, Real Stories, Real Change: Courageous Actions Around the World by Garth Sundem

Kindness: A Treasury of Buddhist Wisdom for Children and Parents collected and adapted by Sarah Conover

Who Cares?: Millions Do-- A Book About Altruism by Milton Meltzer

Peaceful Kingdom: Random Acts of Kindness by Animals by Stephanie Laland

The Doggy Dung Disaster & Other True Stories: Regular Kids Doing Heroic Things Around the World by Garth Sundem.

Every year since 1968, Americans have observed National Hispanic Heritage Month from September 15 to October 15. This month-long celebration recognizes the histories, cultures, and contributions of American citizens whose ancestors came from Spain, Mexico, the Caribbean, and Central and South America.

Here are some good books that celebrate Hispanic culture:

The House on Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros

Luminous by Dawn Metcalf

Playing For Keeps by Veronica Chambers

Efrain's Secret by Sofia Quintero

Benito Runs by Justine Fontes

Carmen: An Urban Adaptation of the Opera by Walter Dean Myers

Ambitious by Monica McKayhan

Life, After by Sarah Darer Littman

Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky

Bridge to Terabithia by Katherine Paterson

Twilight by Stephenie Meyer

The Catcher in the Rye by JD Salinger

Monster by Walter Dean Myers

To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee

The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie

Face on the Milk Carton by Caroline B. Cooney

A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L'Engle

Crank by Ellen Hopkins

The Chocolate War by Robert Cormier

Ttyl by Lauren Myracle

The Witches by Roald Dahl

Anne Frank: The Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank

Exercise your freedome to read and celebrate Banned Books Week from September 30th through October 6th by reading a

Put one of the following John Green books on hold today:

Looking for Alaska

An Abundance of Katherines

Paper Towns

Will Grayson, Will Grayson

The Fault In Our Stars

We're just one week away from the start of the 2012 Summer Olympics in London! Are you planning to watch them?

Take a look at this year's Olympics website! What's your favorite summer Olympic game? Mine's gymnastics.

In keeping with the Olympic spirit, why not spend the next few days enjoying a good book about the Olympics as well as watching the games? Here are a few ideas to get you started:

Fiction:
Rush for the Gold: Mystery at the Olympic Games by John Feinstein

Pankration: The Ultimate Game by Dyan Blacklock

Artemis The Loyal by Joan Holub & Suzanne Williams

Nancy Drew & The Hardy Boys: At All Costs by Carolyn Keene

In Lane Three, Alex Archer by Tessa Duder

The Century Kids, The 1930s: Directions by Dorothy and Tom Hoobler

Nonfiction:
Fire On Ice: Autobiography of a Champion Figure Skater by Sasha Cohen with Amanda Maciel

Jim Thorpe: Legendary Athlete by Barbara Long

Jesse Owens by Tony Gentry

Inside the Olympics by Nick Hunter

The 2012 London Olympics by Nick Hunter

The Olympics' Strangest Moments: Extraordinary But True Tales from the History of the Olympic Games by Geoff Tibballs

Go USA!

“There must be more to life than having everything.” -Maurice Sendak

It's a sad day for anyone who's ever fallen in love with a children's book. Influential, unrivaled and famous author Maurice Sendak died this morning, at age 83, four days after he suffered a stroke. Maurice "revolutionized children's books and how we think about childhood simply by leaving in what so many writers before had excluded. Dick and Jane were no match for his naughty Max. His kids misbehaved and didn't regret it and in their dreams and nightmares fled to the most unimaginable places" (Associated Press).

If you've never had the privilege of being taken away by one of Maurice Sendak's books, here are a few suggestions to get you started:

Alligators All Around: An Alphabet

Pierre : a Cautionary Tale in Five chapters and a prologue

Very Far Away

Where The Wild Things Are

Also, make sure to take a look at this awesome blog inspired by the beloved Where The Wild Things Are, called Terrible Yellow Eyes. The pieces presented on this site were done as a tribute to his life and legacy.

And enjoy this brief and lovely adaptation of "Where the Wild Things Are," almost undoubtedly his most famous book:

 

Then view this 2006 NBC interview with Maurice Sendak.


"Sendak spoke often, endlessly, about death in recent years - dreading it, longing for it. He didn't mind being old because the young were under so much pressure. But he missed his late siblings and his longtime companion, Eugene Glynn, who died in 2009. Work, not people, was his reason to carry on" (Associated Press).

We'll miss you, Maurice... but the wild things cried, "Oh please don't go! We'll eat you up, we love you so!"

Today marks the 100-year anniversary of the day the Titanic set sail.

It left from Southampton, England on April 10, 1912 and made stops in Cherbourg, France and Queenstown, Ireland before heading westwards over the Atlantic to New York. Four days along the in the big journey, on April 14, Titanic hit an iceberg at 11:40pm. Over the next 2½ hours, the ship gradually filled with water and at 2:20am on April 15, it broke up and sank, bow-first, with over 1000 people still on board, not rescued.

Since then, we have remembered this tragedy with movies, documentaries, books, and even fictional stories. Take a look at a few from our collection:

Titanic: Voices From The Disaster by Deborah Hopkinson

SOS Titanic by Eve Bunting

Titanic Sinks! by Barry Denenberg

Explore Titanic: Breathtaking New Pictures, Recreated With Digital Technology by Peter Chrisp

Titanic by Simon Adams

Kaspar The Titanic Cat by Michael Morpurgo

Titanic: The Long Night by Diane Hoh

Titanic: April 14, 1912 by K. Duey and K.A. Bale

882½ Amazing Answers to Your Questions About the Titanic by Hugh Brewster and Laurie Coulter

Titanic Crossing by Barbara Williams

Unsinkable by Gordon Korman

April is National Humor Month! And who doesn't like to laugh? National Humor Month was founded in 1976 by best-selling humorist Larry Wilde, Director of The Carmel Institute of Humor. It is designed to bring awareness to the joy and therapeutic value of laughter!

So why not have yourself a good laugh? Here are some funny books you might want to try reading:

Fat Vampire: A Never Coming of Age Story by Adam Rex
Going Bovine by Libba Bray

Bras & Broomsticks by Sarah Mlynowski

The Earth, My Butt, and Other Big, Round Things by Carolyn Mackler

Angus, Thongs and Full-Frontal Snogging by Louise Rennison

An Abundance of Katherines by John Green

Beat The Band by Don Calame

Cosmic by Frank Cottrell Boyce

The Big Splash by Jack D. Ferraiolo

Since 1967, International Children's Book Day (ICBD) has been celebrated on April 2nd, on Hans Christian Andersen's birthday. It's a day to inspire a love of reading and to call attention to children's and teen's books.

The philosophy behind International Children's Book Day 2012 is that a story can be passed down through generations and preserved for years and years, and across multiple cultures.

"When we read, tell or listen to stories out loud, we’re also continuing an ancient ritual that has played a fundamental role in the history of civilization: creating community. Cultures, past eras and generations come together around these stories to tell us that we are all one, the Japanese, Germans, and Mexicans; those that lived in the seventeenth century and us today, reading our stories on the Internet; grandparents, parents and children. Stories fulfill all human beings in the same way because, despite our enormous differences, we are all, deep down, the stories’ protagonists."

Here are some stories, in English, that were originally told in other languages. Why not check one out, and get yourself connected to another time and place?

A Time of Miracles by Anne-Laure Bondoux

Soldier Bear by Bibi Dumon Tak

A Faraway Island by Annika Thor

The Lily Pond by Annika Thor (This is the sequel to A Faraway Island.)

Departure Time by Truus Matti

Nothing by Janne Teller

Eidi by Bodil Bredsdorff

Moribito: Guardian of the Spirit by Nahoko Uehashi

Moribito II : Guardian of the Darkness by Nahoko Uehashi (This is the sequel to Moribito: Guardian of the Spirit.)

Tiger Moon by Antonia Michaelis

For more international books, check out information on Batchelder Award Winners. The Batchelder Award is given to the most outstanding children’s book originally published in a language other than English in a country other than the United States, and subsequently translated into English for publication in the United States. Click her for a list of winners of this award from 1968-present.

It's Leap Day!... or, February 29th. I don't know about you, but I find having a bonus day kind of exciting!

Here are some fun facts about Leap Years:

2012, as well as all leap years, consists of 366 days, as opposed to 365. Leap Years are needed to keep our calendar in alignment with the Earth's revolutions around the sun. It takes the Earth 365 days, 5 hours, 48 minutes, and 46 seconds (a tropical year) to circle once around the Sun. However, the Gregorian calendar (ours) has only 365 days in a year, so if we didn't add a day on February 29 about every 4 years, we would lose almost six hours off our calendar every year. That means that after only 100 years, our calendar would be off by approximately 24 days!

Leap years can't just be decided at random though! In the Gregorian calendar, there are 3 criteria that must be met to be a leap year:

1. The year must be evenly divisible by 4.
2. If the year can be evenly divided by 100, it is NOT a leap year, unless...
3. The year is also evenly divisible by 400. Then it is a leap year.

Don't worry if this doesn't make sense. Someone's already done all the work for us, but did you have any idea there was so much behind it? I sure didn't!

Julius Caesar introduced Leap Years in the Roman empire over 2000 years ago, but the Julian calendar had only one rule: any year evenly divisible by 4 would be a leap year. This lead to way too many leap years, however this issue didn't get corrected until the introduction of the Gregorian Calendar more than 1500 years later.

So, that leaves one more question...where does the word "leap" come in to play? This is another complicated explanation but in a normal sequence of years, a calendar date (say February 28th) falls on Monday one year, Tuesday the next year, then Wednesday the year after that and so on. But every fourth year, thanks to the extra day in February, we "leap" over the expected day of the week. So February 28th was a Monday last year, a Tuesday this year, and will be a Thursday in 2013. We "leaped over" Wednesday! Get it?

Happy Leap Day! Enjoy the extra 24-hours!

It's 2012! If you're like a lot of people out there, it's time for you to make a resolution to work on something you've always wanted to improve. No matter what your new year's resolution is, we've got the books to help you get started!

Get more exercise:
Yoga For Teens : How To Improve Your Fitness, Confidence, Appearance, and Health-- And Have Fun Doing It by Thia Luby

Yoga Step-By-Step by Michael Spilling and Liz Lark

Toning For Teens : The 20-Minute Workout That Makes You Look Good and Feel Great! by Joyce L. Vedral

Beyond The Blues : A Workbook to Help Teens Overcome Depression by Lisa M. Schab

Fitness Information for Teens : Health Tips About Exercise, Physical Well-Being, and Health Maintenance Including Facts About Conditioning, Stretching, Strength Training, Body Shape and Body Image, Sports Nutrition, and Specific Activities For Athletes and Non-Athletes by Lisa Bakewell

Recycle more:
The Big Green Book of Recycled Crafts

Recycle This Book : 100 Top Children's Book Authors Tell You How To Go Green edited by Dan Gutman

Recycle : Green Science Projects For A Sustainable Planet by Robert Gardner

Reduce, Reuse, Recycle : An Easy Household Guide by Nicky Scott

Recycle! : Make Your Own Eco-Friendly And Creative Designs : Over 60 Projects For Your Home and Garden by Moira and Nicholas Hankinson

Study harder:
How To Remember Everything : Memory Shortcuts To Help You Study Smarter. Grades 9-12 by Russell Kahn, with Tom Meltzer

The Complete Idiot's Guide To Study Skills by Randall S. Hansen and Katharine Hansen

Super Study Skills : The Ultimate Guide To Tests and Studying by Laurie Rozakis

The Secrets of Taking Any Test by Judith N. Meyers

Study Smart : Hands-On, Nuts-And-Bolts Techniques for Earning Higher Grades by Theodore Silver

Learn a new skill:
Crochet Basics : All You Need To Know To Get Hooked on Crochet by Jan Eaton

The Only Basic Guitar Instruction Book You'll Ever Need : Learn To Play, From Tuning Up To Strumming Your First Chords by Jack Wilkins and Peter Rubie

The Piano : An Illustrated Step-By-Step Guide by Frank Cappelli

Basic Cooking : All You Need To Cook Well Quickly by Jennifer Newens

Pathways In Juggling : Learn How To Juggle With Balls, Clubs, Devil Sticks, Diablos, and Beyond by Robert Irving and Mike Martins

Read more (Here are a few of my favorites that you might not be familiar with):
Every Little Thing In the World by Nina de Gramont

Paper Towns by John Green

The Eternal Smile : Three Stories by Gene Luen Yang

Life As We Knew It by Susan Beth Pfeffer

The First Part Last by Angela Johnson

Or come in to the library to find a book to help you with whatever you want to do or improve!

Have a fantastic year!