More Soaring Eagle nominees

Happy New Year!  We all hope your year promises new friends and new adventures.

Hopefully, those adventures will include reading some wonderful books.  Although we started talking about this year's Wyoming Soaring Eagle book award nominees last fall, we will really  be focusing on them now in the final weeks before voting.  Students who read at least three of the books on this year's list can vote for their favorite at their school or public library; the voting period is February 15 through March 15.

This week, we will focus on three nominees that will particularly appeal to girls:

Tiger’s Curse

Colleen Houck

When 18-year-old Kelsey needs a summer job, she signs on as a temporary helper at a local circus. There, she meets Ren, a white tiger with piercing blue eyes. Kelsey senses an unusual connection with this beast, and begins to spend her spare time with him. Those blue eyes draw her in . . . to Kelsey, the eyes seem almost human.

With her connection to the tiger, Kelsey embarks on the adventure of a lifetime . . . an adventure that carries her across the ocean to India, where Kelsey encounters gods and goddesses, cobras that turn into jewelry, vampire monkeys, and tigers that are not at all what they seem to be.

 

This title is the first in the Houck's very popular series; the sequels are Tiger’s Quest; Tiger’s Voyage; and Tiger’s Destiny.

Raven Boys

Maggie Stiefvater

Blue has always been "different". Her mother is a psychic, as are the others who live in their house, and Blue has found it easiest to accept her differences. She also has been told, by all the psychics, that if she kisses her true love, she will kill him. Blue has become so used to the prophecy that she doesn't even think about it; she has decided that she simply will stay away from boys, especially the Aglionby boys.

Aglionby boys, also known as Raven boys, go to the exclusive boys’ academy for spoiled sons of wealthy parents. Unfortunately, she is drawn against her will to a certain Raven Boy: Gansey. 

Gansey has a secret of his own, however: he is an obsessive quest for the burial site of an ancient dead Welsh king who will reward whoever brings him back to life. Together with his friends, who have various problems and personalities, he joins forces with a sometimes reluctant Blue to explore the mystery and mythology of the ancient king.

What the group does not figure on is a power-hungry psychic, a ghost, a murderer, and true magic.

 

The sequel to Raven Boys is The Dream Thieves, just released.

 

If I Stay

Gayle Forman

If a person is in critical condition between life and death, can they consciously choose whether to go or to stay?

When Mia's family is in a car accident, her parents and brother don't make it. But she does. Her spirit looks upon their deaths as well as her own severaly injured body, and follows herself to the hospital. There, she watches her grandparents, other relatives, her best friend, and her boyfriend as they grieve, worry, and talk to her, hoping that she can hear them and live.

But Mia is grieving too, and is not sure she wants to live with a broken body and the loss of her parents and beloved brother. She feels no physical pain, but the emotional pain of her loss encourages her to let go. Should she leave her family, her friends and go on?

The sequel to Mia's story, Where She Went, is already released.

 

 

 

I hope you found at least one title that sounds appealing; although these are very popular with girls, we've seen many boys reading all three of these. This year's list of Soaring Eagle nominees includes thirteen books; we'll publish reviews of four titles for science fiction fans next.