TAG: YA

The evolution of the legend of Arthur

Posted in Explore and Discover on January 22, 2019 at 6:00 am

By Caitlin Wheeler A young boy grows up poor, not looked after by his foster parents. Abused, neglected, and destitute, he expects little from life, and life expects little from him. Until one day, everything changes. The child in servant’s clothes now wears a crown, and his childhood among the people turns out to have […]

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Fanfiction primer: Reading and writing what you love

Posted in Explore and Discover on November 13, 2018 at 6:00 am

By Caitlin Wheeler THE DETECTIVE Tired of writing serial mysteries, Arthur Conan Doyle had just unceremoniously shoved Sherlock Holmes over a cliff mid-wrestling match with a never-before-mentioned arch nemesis. Fans were incensed, devastated, or both. Many of them turned to writing apocryphal works (writings of dubious authenticity), pastiches (im […]

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Great digital reads for the whole family

Posted in Explore and Discover, kids, Parents and Teachers, Teens on November 6, 2018 at 6:00 am

BY SHERI BOGGS November marks the time of year when families start drawing close together for the holidays and you know what that means—lots and lots of family time! The Library District has got you covered with several themed booklists available on our popular OverDrive digital platform. FOR KIDS We Are Family is a handpicked […]

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Banning books silences stories: Reading a banned book celebrates your intellectual freedom

Posted in Explore and Discover, Parents and Teachers on September 18, 2018 at 6:00 am

by Melissa Rhoades Banned Books Week is September 23–29 this year. Did you know that at least 23 of the 100 books on PBS’s 2018 Great American Read book list have been banned or threatened with a ban in the United States? That means almost one-fourth of America’s “most loved” novels (as determined by popular […]

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How to Identify a Dragon

Posted in Explore and Discover, kids, Parents and Teachers, Teens on August 21, 2018 at 6:00 am

by Caitlin Wheeler When I was young, I loved C. S. Lewis’s The Chronicles of Narnia. I especially loved The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, a book that, in my eight-year-old estimation, had everything a book ought to: quests, nightmares, magic spells, enchanted islands, warrior mermaids, anthropomorphized stars, and of course, dragons. Eustace Claren […]

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Young adult booklist for Pride Month

Posted in Parents and Teachers, Teens on June 11, 2018 at 6:00 am

by Caitlin Wheeler As I wrote about in a previous blog that spotlighted children’s books, June is LGBTQ Pride Month. You can learn more about Pride Month and LGBTQ representation in that post. For adult titles, check out my Pride Month blog on that as well. Here, I’m recommending some great young adult (YA) literature […]

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Bicentennial of a Monster’s Birth

Posted in Explore and Discover on April 17, 2018 at 6:00 am

By Melissa Rhoades On January 1, 1818, the debut novel of a 20-year-old woman was anonymously published in London. Within five years, a second edition was released and a play based on the book premiered. The novel and its spin-offs remained a hit, and in 1910, Edison Studios created the first movie based on Mary […]

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Vote for your favorite kids & teens books

Posted in News on February 15, 2018 at 6:00 am

It’s award season again, and not just for movies and music. Here in Washington state, kids and teens have the opportunity to vote in five different readers’ choice book awards, starting in March through May 1.  At Spokane County Library District, we think that letting kids have a voice in selecting the best books written […]

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Audiobooks: Are they reading or cheating?

Posted in Explore and Discover on November 22, 2017 at 6:00 am

by Abra Cole Readers quickly divide into two groups when it comes to audiobooks: those who consider listening to audiobooks as reading and those who don’t (“it’s cheating!”). On which side do you fall? I am a lifelong member of the pro-audiobook club. I’ve been listening to books for as long as I can remember. […]

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Ever louder bumps in the night: Scares for all ages

Posted in Explore and Discover on October 24, 2017 at 6:00 am

by Susan Goertz As a chill grips the autumn air and the chlorophyll leaches from the leaves, my mind turns toward the spooky. Nothing to get your heart racing and the cold sweat pouring on a crisp night like a good scary story. Horror is a very broad genre. There are a lot of options […]

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