Kung Hei Fat Choi!

Next week we will all be enjoying a break for Chinese New Year. The year of the dog is nearly here; and everyone loves dogs! They are loyal, responsible, helpful, loving, anxious and graceful. Just for fun, click here for your Chinese Zodiac predictions for 2006. Have a great holiday and see you again on 6th February.

Mozart's Birthday

Friday 27th January will be Mozart's 250th birthday! As music students will know, he was a child prodigy who wrote his first symphony at the age of 8, and during his short lifetime wrote over 600 pieces of music. RTHK Radio 4 will mark the anniversary with a day of Mozart music. Visit their web site for more facts about the composer or find books about Mozart in the library (Dewey number 780.92). You can also borrow Amadeus on DVD, for a look a Mozart's life and times.

All about Charles Dickens

For Dickens fans, the BBC have a fun animation to help you discover more about Dickens' life, and what influenced his work. There are also links to other resources about the Victorians, and a game: "Can you survive Charles Dickens' London?". Click here to start.

Booktrusted booklist

Here's a quick way to find new books by subject: go to Booktrusted.com's booklist page. Here you can choose a genre (eg fantasy, school stories, crime and mystery), keyword (eg boys, christmas, classic) and age range. Click on "Find books now" to get your recommendation.

By choosing science "fiction", "adventure" and "teenage", I found A Sterkarm Kiss by Susan Price. A short review is included (it is an exciting time travelling novel!). This book is available in the library.

Airborn by Kenneth Oppel

Nominated as one of the best books of 2005, Airborn is an exciting action-adventure story. The cartoonists at Unshelved recently featured it here, and the author's official website gives you an inside look at an airship. Enjoy!

Happy Birthday Tintin!

On this day in 1929, Tintin - a comic book character created by Hergé made his debut. He went on to be published in over 200 million comic books in 40 languages. The library has Tintin books in English, French and Spanish. Visit Tintin's official web site at http://www.tintin.com/ .

Top Ten Best Books for Young Adults for 2005

Happy New Year! The Young Adults Library Services Association has released its Top Ten Best Books for 2005. This is a US association which takes nominations from members to find books published in the past 16 months that are recommended reading for young adults (ages 12 to 18). See if you agree with the choices here.

KGV library has books by authors on the list: Christopher Paul Curtis, Marchetta Melin, Michael Morpurgo and Kenneth Oppel. (There will be more about Oppel’s Airborn in a future entry.)