CENSORED!!!

What would you do if you were told you couldn’t read the Hunger Games? And that all the books were removed from your library because someone complained that they were too violent? Sound ridiculous? Well, it isn’t. Books are censored all the time, all over the world including Canada.  So we want to hear from you. What would you do?

The library was thinking about doing a debate on the issue surrounding censorship. Do you think this would be a good idea or can you think of something better? Let us know!

Post-Secondary School: Get the inside scoop!

We have a program coming up at the end of February. Kwantlen University is hosting three different workshops to help students adjust to post-secondary school life! The workshops are at 1:30pm on February 26, March 5 and March 12 which I know might be a bad time as you're still in school. However, we thought you might have a study block or have friends who are interested in coming. Find more information on the sessions here.

It's Kind of a Funny Story - Ned Vizzini

It's Kind of a Funny Story by Ned Vizzini is the story of a teenage boy by the name of Craig who after an attempt to kill himself is voluntarily admitted into the psychiatric ward at his local hospital. There he confronts his anxiety and depression while meeting and befriending the other patients, specifically a girl with cuts on her face by the name of Noelle. While at the ward, Craig discovers ways to deal with his tentacles or the things that cause him anxiety, and rediscovers what are really his anchors or the things that make him happy.

I loved this book. It was a book about depression that understood the disorder to a par. The reader was able to sympathize with the character, and though it seems contrary to the nature of the central idea of the story, the reader was also able to laugh with the character. It's one of those feel good books, that though it was about depression it made you feel not only understood but also amused. I loved the whole idea. It was really easy to feel for all the characters (except Nia, I hated her, but you were suppose to so it's okay). It was just really thought out, I highly recommend this book.

Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad

Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad. The classic novel is primarily based on morality. As Charles Marlow traverses down the Congo river in an effort to save the chief of the Inner Station, the infamed Kurtz; he deals with multiple conflicts of morality. In a place where things aren't as black and white as good and evil, he has to make a difficult decision between the lesser of two evils. Set in the late 1800's, the reader follows the journey of Marlow during Brussels's imperialistic advances on the Congo.

This was one of the approved books on the AP English reading list. This is the second book I've read from that list. In my humble opinion, I thought this book was not only tiring, but also rather uninteresting. The way it's printed makes the reader bored just looking at the text. Giant paragraphs spanning up to three, possibly more pages, the lack of space for the reader to just rest makes it tiring and something the reader soon comes to look at resentfully. The narrative though interesting at parts lacks any major climatic events, rather than taking the reader along for the ride the extensive way Conrad tells the story drags the reader along. Marlow's lack of opinion or any serious stance on anything - his constant habit of sitting on the fence - makes the reader hate him rather than sympathize for him. Frankly I found myself sympathizing with Kurtz and his embodiment of imperialistic madness rather than the annoying protagonist. However this might still be my predisposed hate of classic novels. Recommendation for AP English's second list on the approved reading list? Try the Great Gatsby, slightly confusing but makes a lot more sense and is an easier read.

The Top 5 Books of 2012... and a little more

Hello all,
So it's been awhile since I last posted here (due to the insanity of the year otherwise known as Grade 12), but anyways...
I didn't get to reading all the books I wanted to in time for the creation of this list (namely Ruins and The 13th Tribe) so this list may be a tad skewed. Regardless though, here are the my Top 5 books that I read in 2012 and that were published in 2012:

1. Opening Moves by Steven James
2. TimeRiders: Gates of Rome by Alex Scarrow
3. Placebo by Steven James
4. The Spirit Well by Stephen R. Lawhead
5. TimeRiders: City of Shadows by Alex Scarrow

Not the strongest showing ever for books this year, as only the top 2 pulled in 5 star ratings from myself - though the rest were definite 4.5s (so they were all still pretty awesome). I read a lot of books from across the years this year, as I do every year, so I thought I'd give the top 10 books I read this year - in general:

1. Les Miserables by Victor Hugo
2. Prey by Michael Crichton
3. Opening Moves by Steven James
4. TimeRiders: Gates of Rome by Alex Scarrow
5. Conqueror by Conn Iggulden
6. Placebo by Steven James
7. The Spirit Well by Stephen R. Lawhead
8. TimeRiders: City of Shadows by Alex Scarrow
9. The Candle Man by Alex Scarrow
10. Seizure by Kathy Reichs

In terms of ratings, Les Mis gets a 6/5 because it's that awesome, Prey, Opening Moves, and Gates of Rome all get 5/5, Placebo through The Candle Man all get 4.5/5 and for some reason I feel like I should have given Seizure a 4.5 instead of the 4 I actually gave it, but whatever...

Last thing, and this is a tad unrelated, but I'll do it anyways. So I recently got accepted into the University of Northern British Columbia and they're running this video contest for which the prize is a full year's tuition and residency, as well as a one year smartphone package and a $2000 credit towards textbooks and food. Now in order to win, one has to be one of the top 5 videos chosen as finalists, and in order to be in the top 5, people have to have voted you INTO the top 5. Here's where you guys come in. I need as many votes as I can get, so I encourage all of you to vote for me - every day if possible. A link to the contest is below. Thanks!
http://www.unbc.ca/northernexposure/entries.html#!/entry/1216634

How did the Golden Gate Bridge come to be an engineering classic?

http://suspensionbrige.weebly.com/

My Top Five Books of 2012 :D

1. The Fault in Our Stars by John Green
2. Divergent by Veronica Roth
3. Pandemonium by Lauren Oliver
4. Every Day by David Levithan
5. The Selection by Kiera Cass
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
6. (because it was a close call between The Selection and this one) Shatter Me :'/

My top 5 for 2012...

This was hard! Last two were published in 2011, but I read them in 2012 so I figure that counts:)

1) Pandemonium
2) Cinder
3) The diviners
4) Legend
5) Blood Red Road

The Scorch Trials - James Dashner

I'm ashamed to say that after school started up this season I haven't had the chance to sit down and read a single book. Horrendous - I know! :P Anyway, now that winter break has rolled around, I'm doing my best to make up for the lost reading time by cramming as many books as I can into the two-week break. Before I begin the actual review I would like to point out that if you haven't read The Maze Runner, you most likely won't understand much of this review. There are just too many aspects to the plot for me to even bother trying to explain. That's not to say you shouldn't continue reading; just a heads up! And one final warning: SPOILERS AHEAD So let's get started...

The Scorch Trials... I'm not quite sure where to begin. I must say I was a bit dissapointed, as I was expecting more from James Dashner after reading (and loving) the first in this series: The Maze Runner. The Scorch Trials was undeniably a GOOD book, but it wasn't the GREAT book I had been hoping for. My biggest issue was the confusion, which I will elaborate more on later in this review.

Nothing too special regarding vocab and writing. The writing was just as descriptive and detailed as it was in the Maze Runner. I still love the made up words that Dashner sticks in here and there.

The plot started off okay. Thomas and his buddies find out the horrors are not yet over; they are subjected to "phase two" of WICKED's plan to save the world (whatever that may be), and Teresa has dissapeared without a trace. New characters are introduced, and new problems are discovered in a barren desert known as the "Scorch" that the Gladers are thrown into. Great, fine, nothing too unexpected there. We all knew escaping the maze wasn't the end; Dashner has to have SOMETHING to put in the remaining two novels in his triology, right?

Anyway, this is where things start getting muddled. The Gladers have been travelling across the Scorch for days, when suddenly, a random thunderstorm strikes and a shack appears in the middle of nowhere. Thomas has a "feeling" that he should go explore the shack ALONE, so he proceeds to do so. And what does he find? TERESA! But Thomas didn't quite recieve the big reunion I'm sure he had been hoping for; Teresa is acting all wierd and does nothing more than give him a cryptic message and a kiss on the lips. Thomas freaks out and makes his friends sprint through the thunderstorm away from the shack and into a village infected by the "Flare", where he meets two "cranks" who apparently work for WICKED. He and the other Gladers are separated in a fight, only to be reunited at a crank party where Thomas is partying with his new friend Brenda, who has hurt feelings because Thomas won't kiss her. Then, Thomas is dragged across the desert in a brown sack by a group of girls who were apparently living in a maze identical to the Glade, and is told by his supposedly best friend Teresa that he is to be killed.

Me no comprende.

First of all, why is there a THUNDERSTORM in a desert?! Speaking of deserts, what is with the random shack in the middle of nowhere? And taking into account that they barely know each other, why does Teresa kiss Thomas? WHO is Brenda? How does she have any right to be angry at Thomas for not wanting to kiss her when they have barely met? It seems like James Dashner is desperately trying to create a love triangle here - and it is NOT working. And since when is Teresa against Thomas? I thought they were both on the same side! What in the world is going on here?

And there's more! Thomas convinces the girls to let him go, but is again captured by Teresa and his new "friend" Aris who is SUPPOSED to be on his side. He is forced to watch a display of affection between Teresa and Aris, and is then thrown into a rectangular box where he is drugged and falls asleep for a few hours. He wakes up to Teresa opening up the box and telling him that she never wanted to kill him and that WICKED forced her to do what she did so that Thomas would feel "betrayed". Thomas is then reunited with the Gladers, and the whole lot of them sit and stare at a stick in the ground for a couple hours, hoping to be rescued by WICKED.

I could continue with explaining the confusion and overall ridiculousness of the plot, but I think you get the point. It just makes no sense whatsoever. As predicted, the Gladers are rescued in the end by WICKED, and are told that the trials are now officially over. It was a satisfactory ending for me. It was unique in The Maze Runner, but I felt like James Dashner took the same exact ending and stuck it onto The Scorch Trials. Hello, Dashner? You can't use the same ending for two different books. It just doesn't work.

I loved the overall idea that James Dashner had come up, and there is no denying that he is a very unique and original author, but the plot just seemed way too confusing for me. I wish he had explained more of what was going on in his story to readers, rather than focusing on non-stop action.

With that being said, I was very impressed with the amount of character development that took place in The Scorch Trials. I always loved Dashner's characters, and they grow on me more and more as the series progresses. I thought that it was impossible for such perfect characters to be improved upon, but Dashner raised the bar with his sequel and did a phenomenal job developing his characters. Teresa was the only character who wasn't quite up to par for me in The Maze Runner, but stands out in particular as being a very developed character in book 2. She loses her mysterious side and I get to know her a little bit better.

 Overall, I would give this book a 7/10, because although it was extremely confusing, all the other elements that make up a good book are present. It wasn't as bad as I make it out to be, and I'm a sucker for Dystopian. Dashner came up with a phenomenal, unique plot idea that could have been done very well if he just kept it simple. I love his ideas, I love his writing, I LOVE his characters. I just don't love all the unneccessary elements he felt the need to include in The Scorch Trials.

BEST Books of 2012...

2012 is officially over, so it's time to create our RPL Teen's Top 10 list! Let us know what your favourite books published in 2012 and let's see if we can narrow it down to 10.

      Here is my top 5 list (see if you agree):
            1.) Seraphina by Rachel Hartman
            2.) Shadow and Bone by Leigh Bardugo
            3.) Pandemonium by Lauren Oliver
           4.) Fault in Our Stars by John Green
           5.) The Diviners by Libba Bray