This author has written an earlier series: Atherton, which had its own website about the 'world' he had created. This time he's written a very scary book for teens where we have 2 characters - the boy who has written a journal of his experiences and the girl who has video links embedded into his story. It really is quite incredible and will be interesting to see how readers react to this format.

Skeleton Creek
By Patrick Carman.
"Although housebound following an eerie accident, teenaged Ryan continues to investigate the strange occurrences in his hometown of Skeleton Creek, recording his findings in a journal and viewing email video clips sent by fellow detective Sarah. The reader may view Sarah's videos on a website by using links and passwords found in the text." - from the book's summary.
According to one reviewer, Sarah’s video is even more frightening giving a Blair Witch element to the whole experience for the reader. A fascinating mix of story by book / text and visual / video. The two blend together to heighten the reader/viewer’s experience of the building fear for the characters as they are drawn to a derelict dredge and the secret it holds. Check out the publisher’s website for a preview of what this book has in store: http://www.enterskeletoncreek.com/

Finding what titles and what order in series

It can be difficult to know the answer, when asked what are the books in a series and in what order they are written. I found this site which helps when looking for books in a series:

Gaslight Books

Go to the 'Four-Part Trilogy' to find the author or series you are looking for.

Week 9

I made it! For a while there when work had to take priority I thought I'd never catch up. But once I resolved to complete the exercises I began to really appreciate what Web 2.0 has to offer and am very grateful that ACL Learning encouraged and promoted this programme to its staff. Thank You.

What an amazing place the internet has become! I can so appreciate that there is something for everyone. This course has made me aware of tools that are going to be useful in my workplace; Bloglines will keep me uptodate with library matters, LibraryThing and BookBump are going to be useful with sharing book reviews, Google Docs is going to be a great tool for creating documents and spreadsheets for personal use. The best of all for me has been the photograpy sites. Flickr got me motivated to find out about digital cameras and into using my own. I can take all sorts of photos which can be put into albums and used to create great little pieces of my own artwork.

I will be keeping my Blog ongoing and developing in directions as yet I have not decided.....

Week 9

ebooks: Well I've setup my own account and had a look around. Netlibrary has a clean, clear and easy to navigate page setup. I searched for children's and teens books with little success. It was better just to scroll through the lists to find suitable titles. The content page for each title is very useful - certainly helps before deciding to select an item. When I checked the title "Children of Micronesia" I was surprised to find that it was published in 1994. So when I decided to add 'favourites', I chose items that wouldnt 'date' such as "Best Birthday Parties ever!" and "The care and feeding of dinosaurs".

Week 9

Podcasts : Another great teaching tool - as well as all the other uses. I like the idea of getting updates on a favourite podcast and after tripping around the podcast directories, I found 'Uncontrolled vocabulary' - an interactive discussion on current events in world libraries and librarians. I added it to my RSS feed on my Bloglines account and now I just have to check it every so often. And I've linked to my Bloglines at long last!!!! Now I can go back over my Blog sometime in the future and add those hyperlinks.....
At some stage I may want to have a go at podcasting too, but not until this training is over. There is still some way to go.

Week 9

Discover YouTube : I didnt think I would find anything that appealled to me, except for the library domino. Wow!

But I found this one which is just beautiful when looking at the animations. I think it is very clever as I did animation - not very well, as part of my Children's Literature Diploma and know how difficult it is:

Week 8

I had a look at web-based applications via Zoho Writer and Google Docs. I decided to register with Google Docs as I liked its layout. So I've 'published' some of my book reviews and added their book jackets. I just need to add the titles links to our catalogue:

What have I been reading?

I am the great horse

By Katherine Roberts

A thrilling read. This was a book I didn’t want to put down.

Bucephalas, Alexander’s great war horse recounts their dazzling campaign through the Ancient world, from Macedonia to Babylon. Weaving fact, that is Alexander’s epic journey , Katherine Roberts has used her knowledge of horses and her skill as a fantasy writer in this fantastic recreation of the actual battles and created characters, who bring it all to life.

Adventure / horse stories.

Readers : 9+ years

Life as we knew it

By Susan Beth Pfeffer

What would happen to our lives if a disaster changed the world? How would we cope without electricity, without the normal everyday things we take so much for granted?

Miranda keeps a diary which begins with the usual teenage rantings, but gradually she comments about how the weather changes begin to affect her life and the lives of those she loves.

Science fiction stories

Readers : 12+

Notes from the midnight driver

By Jordan Sonnenblick

What happens when a teenager gets drunk, steals his mother’s car and wrecks it in the process of demolishing a garden gnome ? If you are Alex and your mother is a nurse, you get assigned to a rest home to look after a cantankerous old man that’s what.

Humorous but a story with a moral in the telling. Another great read.

Humour

Readers : 12+