100 Books... from the TES

On World Book Day, here's a list for secondary pupils, courtesy of the TES.

WBD Survey 14

The latest batch of book recommendations from our World Book Day 2011 survey, from visitors to this blog-

Anne: The Road by Cormac McCarthy
Brilliantly written. Gripping story that turns your head (and heart) inside out. Thoughts of McCarthy's world as a possible reality will stay with you for days/weeks/months after you've put it down. Unforgettable, really.

DonnaDB : To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee (again!)
I first read Mockingbird as a high school sophomore in the early 60's. It was the first novel that really engaged me at both a story and a moral level. Later, as a teacher of English, I taught the novel several times. By then, it was through the lens of the civil rights movement. Later still, the background of the story started to become a little foreign. In the Northeast, Jim Crow laws were historic footnotes; civil rights marches almost relegated to WW II status. However, the novel itself and the character of Atticus Finch have continued to inspire readers. It is, above all, a story of choosing to do the right thing, regardless of the consequences.

Peter Lydon: The Day the Universe Changed, by James Burke
Just such a good read about the modernisation of the world.

Cristina: What Makes Us Human, by Charles Pasternak
Because it is a wonderful combination of scientific data from neurology, evolutionary psychology and humor!

George: Swimsuit by James Patterson
It is a fast action packed page-turner, which gives the reader little or no choice in making the decision to put the book down. However it is graphic and not for the squeamish. 

Also: Nat - The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot

World Book Day Survey

We've been posting recommendations from our reading survey for many days now (and there are plenty more to come). The survey will remain open for quite a while. Meanwhile, here are some interim results (full results in due course).

This is now many books I read each month...

1-2: 37%

3-5: 43%

6-8: 9%

More than 8: 11%

I like to read...

In bed: 78%

In a comfy chair: 63%

On my travels: 61%

On the beach: 31%

In the bath: 21%

In the kitchen: 13%

(more than one choice allowed, thus more than 100%)

I like reading...

(Auto)Biography: 55%

'Literary' fiction: 50%

Detective/Crime fiction: 46%

Short stories: 45%

Thrillers: 33%

(more than one choice allowed, thus more than 100%)

WBD Survey 12

On World Book Day itself, here are more recommendations to add to our growing list of excellent books from our survey. Do fill it in! Coming later today, some stats...


@antheald: Waterland, by Graham Swift
I wouldn't want to say this is the best book ever, but it caught me at an important time (I read it in the sixth form) and it tapped into aspects of my life at the time, my having left a school with the scientific bias of like that of Tom's, the schoolteacher narrator.

The novel opened up for me some of the themes and ideas that would become important in my further studies, my teaching and indeed my life. It is at one level a crackingly well-told story that can be seen in the tradition of Dickens (I would later see the connection with Great Expectations) or, perhaps more closely, Hardy, but it is also very much a novel of ideas, about the very nature of storytelling and of the nature of man, who "tells, if only to himself, if only to an audience he is forced to imagine, a story." Thus I see it as leading me on to other works that have become favourites and that I considered for my 'desert island' book, by the likes of Umberto Eco, and Milan Kundera, as well as showing me the way back via the Victorians to Sterne, Chaucer and beyond.

Simon (SCC pupil): The Cherub series
I enjoyed these books and they are very popular now but I only found out about them last year and I have read twelve books already and I didn't get bored once. The author is Robert Muchamore for those interested and the names of the books are;
1) The Recruit- 2) Class A- 3) Maximum Security- 4) The killing- 5) Divine Madness 6)Man Vs Beast- 7) The Fall- 8) Mad Dogs- 9) The Sleepwalker- 10) The General- 11) Brigand MC- 12) Shadow Wave... These books are for ages 12+

Allison: Half the Sky, Nicholas Kristoff
This book is a moving account of the tragedy of human trafficking and the terrible living conditions of countless women in the developing world.  Reading it has made me more aware of how blessed, and has left me looking for ways to make a difference. 

Emma Dawson: The Graveyard by Neil Gaiman
It's a very clever, witty story which is just a bit different to most.

LizzySiddal: Effi Briest, by Theodor Fontane
It's the best German novel of the nineteenth century .... and knocks the spots off Madame Bovary.

Brendy (SCC pupil): Diary of a Wimpy Kid, by Jeff Kinney

WBD Survey 3

Half-term begins today; we resume term on Monday 28th February. Meanwhile, we'll continue to post the many book recommendations we're getting through our World Book Day survey, leading up the day itself on Thursday 3rd March. Here are four more:

Mags: A Short History of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson
It lets me know where I stand in the universe. I read it again every year once now, and feel better each time - even though I promptly forget most of the details. The scientific explanations are accessible and told with gentle irony. I love it.

Scotty : Kensuke's Kingdom, by Michael Morpurgo
This book was inspiring to read at a young age. It is a true story about a boy left in the wilderness. I recommend it to anyone, for this book looks at the lives that other people live and the huge differences to ours.

tse : Of Marriageable Age, by Scott Maas
There are 3 story lines in this that you can't quite connect until 3/4 of the way through.
When one character finally catches a glimpse of one of the other characters you know and love, it's just pure magic!

@fellfromatree: No Time For Goodbyes by Linwood Barclay
The book has a very intricate plot line, and so many twists and turns that I couldn't bring myself to put it down...I just HAD to know what was coming next!

World Book Day 2011 survey

World Book Day this year on Thursday 3rd March, and as usual we'll be marking it at St Columba's in a variety of ways. One of these is a survey of reading habits of pupils, staff, parents, and other visitors to this blog, so in the weeks leading up to the day itself, we're encouraging as many people as possible to contribute.

Just go to the form embedded below, or here, or at the top of the right-hand column, and take a few minutes. We'll report on recommendations over the next three weeks, and afterwards produce some statistics. You can leave your real name, or a nickname, or neither. Thanks!

World Book Day 2010

Since Mock exams are on, and other forms are about to start their College exams, World Book Day here today will be marked fairly quietly. However, we'll still be giving out WBD book-tokens, and the annual Library survey on the College's favourite book, results of which we'll post here in due course.

Meanwhile, take some time out of the busy day to read...

World Book Day 2010

World Book Day this year is on Tuesday 4th March: again, we'll be planning various ways of marking it, in association with the Library. Meanwhile, you can go to the Ireland site here.

See Saturday's post for a list of some recent new books in the Library.

Regal Surprise at Tibradden

To mark the recent World Book Day, the Library ran a short story competition for Juniors. The winner was Milo Reddaway from I form, who told a distinctly surprising story involving the arrival in the College of a very unusual visitor:-

I had just finished Latin and was going to Break. The sun was up and the black clouds looked like a massive army coming to invade the sky. I was passing the Library when I heard a huge blast. The ground trembled and I almost fell on the hard ground. I got up and asked Brendan if he had heard the explosion. He said no, and looking at me as if I were mad, went to Break. Thoughts were racing in my head. “A massive blast and tremor and no one noticed?"

The blast seemed to have come from Tibradden. I raced there as fast as I could, and when I saw the front door I was stunned. The handle had been ripped off and the whole door was covered in deep gashes. “If only Mr Patterson could see this!" I thought. I carefully pushed the door open and went to the Day area. I felt I must be in a dream as standing before me, dressed in full armour was none other than Xerxes, King of Kings, Emperor of Persia ...

Read the full story here.

World Book Day survey results

St Patrick's Day greetings to all.

Our Librarian, Tom McConville, writes:-

On Thursday 5 March, World Book Day, the Library asked the pupils of St Columba’s to vote for their favourite book. This voluntary annual poll is a snapshot of current opinions, conducted through the kind offices of the (ever-patient) English department. All and any books were eligible, from childhood favourites to today’s bestsellers, be they fact or fiction, poetry or drama, in English or any other language.

We achieved a respectable poll of 163 votes (many of the 6th form were already engaged in exams). In a remarkably wide-ranging selection, and a testimony to the very positive reading culture in the school, 105 individual authors were nominated and 125 separate books.

Analysts far more perceptive than the librarian may draw conclusions from these figures, but a brief overview suggests the following. Twilight is Stephenie Meyer’s fabulously popular vampire/human romance, the first of a four-part series, and features Isabella Swan as its heroine, and vampire Edward Cullen as the love interest. Though the vote for it was almost exclusively female, the librarian knows that males borrow and read this book too. A feature of it is that though Edward is ‘dangerous’, for love for Bella he denies himself his full vampire instincts, and, as well as the heightened love story, honour, loyalty, friendship and courage are important, as they are in all good fantasy adventure. The recent film release no doubt boosted the vote, but the book, published in 2005 in the USA, and held here in the library here since March 2007, was seriously popular long before that.

[added 20.03.09 - read Jenny Turner's sharp and funny article on the Twilight phenomenon in the current edition of the London Review of Books.]

Other books which did well in the survey were Khaled Hosseini's The Kite Runner, S.E. Hinton's The Outsiders, Robert Muchamore's Maximum Security, Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird, and Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice. The favourite author, inevitably, was Stephanie Meyer, pursued by Anthony Horowitz. See the leading contenders' list here. Below, the second 'reverse side' of our World Book Day bookmarks, created by Wordle, in today's appropriate colour.

World Book Day competition results

Just over a week ago, the Library marked World Book Day 2009 with activities run in conjunction with the English Department. The results are now out (the prizes are book-tokens):-

• Congratulations to Milo Reddaway, who won the junior short story competition and whose entertaining and other-worldly story will be published here next week (after we return from the St Patrick's Day Exodus on Wednesday morning), as well as in the next edition of The Submarine, the Library magazine due out at the end of term. It's worth waiting for - a story involving this school, Zoroastrianism and guest star Xerxes, King of Kings, Emperor of Persia ..
• The favourite book open draw was won by Philipp Arndt, who chose Daniel Kehlmann's Measuring the World. Next week we'll have Librarian Tom McConville's breakdown of and comments on the results of the College survey for this year's favourite book (not too surprisingly, Stephanie Meyer's Twilight).
• The senior crossword competition book-tokens go to Miriam Poulton, Celeste Guinness, Joey Millar and Oli Smith.
• The Junior Library Quiz book-tokens go to Sam Bewley, William Tidey, Stephanie Cafolla and Lily Guinness.

(top - one of the designs on the reverse side of the WBD bookmarks).

This is the 600th post since SCC English began in July 2006.

World Book Day

And a Happy World Book Day to you all ...

Today, we'll be distributing our 2009 Library/English Department bookmarks (the fourth winner is Pia Gromotka, left), as well as the WBD book tokens to all pupils. During class we'll be conducting the annual 'Favourite Book' survey on behalf of the Library, and the Junior Library Quiz and Senior Crossword puzzle will be available on the supervisor's desk in the Library. Book tokens for prizes, as there will be for the new short story competition - we hope to publish some winners here shortly.

We'd be happy to get comments on favourite books here - just leave a Comment on this post. What's yours? And why?

Bookmarks 2

Another winner of our World Book Day I form book-mark design competition is Alexandra Owens, whose design is today's feature, left.

The Library is also marking the day (Thursday) with a survey in English classes of favourite books, senior and junior crossword competitions, and a junior short story competition, to be handed in by the end of the week (details here).

Meanwhile, VI form have just started their mock exams, the English literature paper being tomorrow morning.

World Book Day bookmarks 1

The Library and English Department are again printing and distributing bookmarks this year for World Book Day (on Thursday). A competition was held in I form art classes for one side of the designs for these, and we'll be displaying the winners' work over the next four days.

So well done to I former Lauren Scully, whose bookmark is shown here and will receive a book-token as her prize. The bookmarks have again been printed by The Postcard Company in Omagh.

More on World Book Day shortly.

World Book Day competition

World Book Day this year is on Thursday 5th March. We'll be celebrating it in various weeks - more detail next week - but this is a post encouraging entries for a new venture, a short story competition being run in concert with the Library.

The competition is being aimed particularly at juniors, but seniors are also welcome to enter, and the Library will be giving book tokens to winners. You should write a short story (1000 words at most) about an encounter in real life with a character from a book. A possible first sentence is :

The Library was quiet. I heard a noise and turned around. 'But,' I gasped, 'what are you doing here? You belong in a book!' ....

The deadline is Saturday 7th March, and winning entries will be published on this blog, and in the Library magazine, 'The Submarine'. Good luck!

Louise C.Callaghan

On World Book Day last Thursday, the poet Louise Callaghan gave readings to three of our forms, and Fiona Boyd of Transition Year now reports on her session. Fiona has also been reading Louise's books, and comments :

What was also really great about the reading was that she introduced each poem before she read it, which gave you a little background/story to it. This made it much easier to follow and as such, connect with. I sometimes wish poets would do this in their books, just a little introduction of no more than a few sentences, about this particular poem, just to let you into it a bit more. But often this would ruin the poem, as often no explanation is needed. Poetry is whatever the poem means to you. Louise’s poems were extremely varied, sticking to no particular theme and showing a wide range of her various influences, styles and way of expressing a certain feeling.

For example 'There Was A Soldier'; this is a really interesting poem about her uncle, who died during WWII, and her visit to his grave in France around four years ago. It’s a very detailed poem, setting an extremely vivid scene for the reader. Her writing is constantly referring back to the war with a mention of it in each stanza, keeping her theme very focused and deliberate. This is a really beautiful poem and I would urge anyone with an interest in war poetry or even poetry at all to read it, even just for the last powerful stanza:

When death came piping
over Picardy
he was never to be a father,
nor an uncle.

Read Fiona's full report here.

Fiona refers to Louise's choice of 'Alder' by the Scottish poet Kathleen Jamie for consideration. Jamie is profiled in the Daily Telegraph here, and can be heard on the excellent Poetry Archive reading her work here. Her collection The Tree House was published in 2004, and coincidentally Louise was discussing 'Alder' in National Tree Week.

Yesterday Louise started workshops with I and II formers (there's another one tomorrow). In these workshops, she is giving these young poets various ways into poetry, including acrostic poems, and advising them to get a notebook and jot down observations and descriptions over the holidays. We hope to publish some of the results after the workshops are completed next term.

World Book Day 2008

Today is World Book Day. Above, the final of three designs by junior pupils for the bookmarks the English Department and Library have jointly sponsored and which will be given to all pupils and staff today (reverse side below). This design is by Aoise Keogan-Nooshabadi (others here and here).

We welcome today the poet Louise Callaghan, who will be reading to three forms this morning in the splendid new Cadogan Music Building (a pupil will report shortly). In addition our Librarian Mr Tom McConville has organised a Library crossword for seniors and a book quiz for juniors (entries are due in by Monday).

Finally, we'll be carrying out our annual survey to find out the College's favourite book - results here shortly.

Bookmark 2

Here's the second design in the competition organised by the art department for the bookmarks we'll be handing out on Thursday for World Book Day. This is by one of the youngest pupils in the school, Bronagh McHugh of Primary. For the reverse side advertising this blog, see Friday's post. The bookmarks have been made by The Postcard Company of Omagh.

Exodus

Today all exams finish, and we have a weekend break until Tuesday morning. There is then a brief but intense period until the end of term on March 14th (early due to St Patrick's Day and the early Easter).

When we come back exams (including Mock Leaving and Junior Cert papers) are handed back to pupils; the Actiontrack team is back for three days of drama workshops with our II form; the Senior Poetry and Junior Poetry Prizes are completed; the House Debating final takes place; we have an expedition to the Smock Alley production of Macbeth; and we celebrate World Book Day with readings from poet Louise Callaghan and by distributing special bookmarks (design above by James Glenn-Craigie, below the reverse side - more designs next week), and with various other Library activities.

World Book Day

Our Librarian, Tom McConville, writes :

"World Book Day on March 1^st was marked by the distribution of book tokens and some very stylish bookmarks. Our survey in search of St Columba’s favourite book showed that Eragon by Christopher Paolini is this year’s choice. The survey, held by the Library with the support of the English department, revealed a wonderful reading range—109 authors were mentioned, and 137 separate books. Other high scorers were Philip Pullman’s His Dark Materials trilogy and Anthony Horowitz’s Alex Rider series, with honourable mentions for The Catcher in the Rye and Lord of the Rings.

Our favourite authors were as follows: 1^st Christopher Paolini and Anthony Horowitz; 2^nd Philip Pullman; 3^rd JRR Tolkien; and 4^th J.D. Salinger, William Shakespeare and Meg Rosoff.

Thank you to all who took part, and to the English Department for facilitating the survey.

€10 Book token winners. Survey: Karl Rysbergen. Junior Quiz: Kezia Wright, Archie Brooke, Eochy O’Conor, Kate Boyd Crotty. Senior Crossword: Ben Armstrong, Lauren O’Connell, Eki Osayande."