Going Vintage

Going Vintage
by Lindsey Leavitt

When Mallory discovers that her boyfriend, Jeremy, is cheating on her with an online girlfriend, she swears off boys. She also swears off modern technology. Inspired by a list of goals her grandmother made in 1962, Mallory decides to "go vintage" and return to a simpler time (when boyfriends couldn't cheat on you online). She sets out to complete grandma's list: run for pep club secretary, host a dinner party, sew a homecoming dress, find a steady, do something dangerous. But the list is trickier than it looks. And obviously finding a steady is out . . . no matter how good Oliver (Jeremy's cousin) smells. But with the help of her sister, she'll get it done. Somehow. (description from Amazon.com) 

I LOVED this book. It was a breeze to read, sweet, funny, and just... just wonderful. It managed to convey both a vintage feel and a very contemporary atmosphere...kind of like the perfect old tattered reading chair in a cozy new apartment. 

It had a fantastic romantic element, but what I truly loved the most was that Leavitt decides to have Mallory concentrate on really centering herself rather than just jumping into a new relationship.  Girl power. :)  There were great family relationship issues here and even as people dealt with problems you could obviously feel the love and respect between them. 

A definite winner. 

Full disclosure: eARC received from Netgalley

2010 CLA YA Section Annual Meeting - Taking Your Tech Up a Notch

I'm not sure if I've mentioned this before, but I am Co-Chair of the Young Adult section of my state's library association. So, part of my responsibilities is to set up the annual meeting for all Young Adult Librarians in Connecticut. We had our 2010 meeting this past Wednesday.

We did a full day of programming last year, so this year we decided to concentrate on how better to use technology to reach our teen patrons. "Taking Your Tech Up a Notch" was a full day meeting and I'm proud to say was wildly successful!

The day started off with a Skype session with YA author, Paul Volponi. We were able to talk about his books (including Rikers High,Response, and Hurricane Song), his experiences skyping with classes, and his own reading/writing habits. It was a lot of fun and we were able to show how simple it is to set up a skype visit with an author through the Skype An Author Network.

After our skype session, we had lots of "flash" tech presentations. Each 15 min. presentation was by a different Librarian on a different tech topic. We learned about creating a Facebook page for your Teen Department, using Twitter to alert teens, and also using an SMS email service to text teens alerts.

We also discussed switching to an online Summer Reading Program, creating award winning videos with teens, creating awesome book trailers, utilizing Overdrive to download audio books and e-books, great online (and FREE!) softwares like Wordle.

All in all, it was a great day. I got some new ideas for the future and I think everyone else did, too! I cannot wait to see what gets planned for next year...and I think I'll be happy to just be attending. I am still tired! :)