The Bruin Book Club will meet in the Media Center Conference room during both lunches on Tuesday, Sept. 17.   Bring the book you're reading and be ready to share!  We'll schedule our monthly meetings and set our reading goals for the year.  Join us!  

Below is just a small sampling of the hundreds of books we ordered last week.   These titles, and MORE, will be here soon!

 

Again, but Better

Shane has been doing college all wrong. Pre-med, stellar grades, and happy parents...sounds ideal -- but Shane's made zero friends, goes home every weekend, and romance...what's that? Her life has been dorm, dining hall, class, repeat. Time's a ticking, and she needs a change -- there's nothing like moving to a new country to really mix things up. Shane signs up for a semester abroad in London. She's going to right all her college mistakes: make friends, pursue boys, and find adventure! Easier said than done. She is soon faced with the complicated realities of living outside her bubble, and when self-doubt sneaks in, her new life starts to fall apart. Shane comes to find that, with the right amount of courage and determination, one can conquer anything. Throw in some fate and a touch of magic - the possibilities are endless.

 

 

 

 Apocalypse Taco

Sid, Axl, and Ivan volunteer to make a late-night fast-food run for the high school theater crew, and when they return, they find themselves. Not in a deep, metaphoric sense: They find copies of themselves onstage. As they look closer, they begin to realize that the world around them isn't quite right. Turns out, when they went to the taco place across town, they actually crossed into an alien dimension that's eerily similar to their world. The aliens have made sinister copies of cars, buildings, and people--and they all want to get Sid, Axl, and Ivan. Now the group will have to use their wits, their truck, and even their windshield scraper to escape! But they may be too late. They may now be copies themselves . 

 

 

Killing November

November is as good as dead. She just doesn't know it yet.

At the international Academy Absconditi, there's no electricity, no internet, and an archaic eye-for-an-eye punishment system. Classes range from knife throwing and poisons to the art of deception. And the students? All silver-spoon descendants of the world's most elite strategists--training to become assassins, spies, and master impersonators.
One is a virtuoso of accents--and never to be trusted. Another is a vicious fighter determined to exploit November's weaknesses. And then there's the boy with the mesmerizing eyes and a secret agenda.
November doesn't know how an ordinary girl like her fits into the school's complicated legacy. But when a student is murdered, she'll need to separate her enemies from her allies before the crime gets pinned on her . . . or she becomes the killer's next victim.

 

 

 

L'Vis Lives

L-vis is an imagined persona, a representation of artists who have used and misused Black music. Like so many others who gained fame and fortune from their sampling, L-vis is as much a sincere artist as he is a thief. In Kevin Coval's poems, L-vis' story is equal parts forgotten history, autobiography, and re-imaginings. We see shades of Elvis Presley, the Beastie Boys, and Eminem, and meet some of history's more obscure "whiteboy" heroes and anti-heroes: legendary breakdancers, political activists, and music impresarios.

A story of both artistic theft and radical invention,L-vis Lives! is a poetic novella on all of the possibilities and problems of "post-racial" American culture--where Black art is still at times only fully accepted in a white face, and every once in a while an "L-vis" comes along to step in to the void.

 

 

 

NFL Confidential

A current pro player takes fans on a pseudonymous trip through one of the most infamous years of football--the very long, sometimes funny, often controversial 2013-2014 season--sharing raucous, behind-the-scenes, on-the-field, and in-the-locker-room truth about life in the National Football League.

Johnny Anonymous' life goal was to be nothing greater or less than the Best NFL Back-Up of All Time(tm). For two years, he was content earning hundreds of thousands of dollars to stand on the sidelines doing absolutely nothing. But early in his third year, a starting lineman is injured, and he suddenly finds himself on the field.

For most players, this moment is a dream come true. But not so for our author, one of the incredibly rare birds in football who reach the highest echelons, but who actually hate America's favorite game. That's right. Johnny Anonymous hates football. He hates what it does to his body, his brain, his life. Luckily, he can see the humor in his own situation, but also in the machinations of the NFL.

Part truth-telling narrative, part whip-smart commentary that only a true insider could bring, part hilarious, NFL Confidential gives football fans a look at a world most would give anything to see, and gives non-fans a wild ride through the strange, and sometimes disturbing customs and realities of football today. Here is a truly unaffiliated look at the nation's biggest, most lucrative pastime over the course of one of its most transformative seasons.

From hard-to-stomach diets, showdowns in the weight room, shenanigans in the locker room, the looming dread of being cut from the team, the racial issues that still exist in modern-day football, the rock-star lifestyle that players find themselves able to afford and sometimes enjoy a little too much, the notion of being lauded in a league plagued by controversy and the sharp contrast between the love/hate of the game and the reality of the job, Johnny reveals a never-before-seen side of the NFL.

 

Our first huge order of new books arrived a few weeks ago in the RBHS Media Center.   We've got them positioned on a cart near the Circulation Desk.  Here are some selections from the New Book Cart:

 

 

Queens of Fennbirn:     Book three of the popular Three Dark Crowns series by Kendare Blake.  I'm currently reading book 2, and am anxious to see how Blake resolves the conflict between the three sisters, one elemental, one naturalist, and one poisoner.   Will they follow the path dictated by tradition and history?

 

 

March, Book Two:    Congressman and author John Lewis delves once again into the history of the Civil Rights Movement.  Inspired by a 1950s comic book, Lewis and co-author Andrew Aydin, along with artist Nate Powell, have created a graphic novel which takes readers behind the scenes of the some of the pivotal moments of the movement. 

   

 

Crazy Rich Asians:   Is the book always better than the movie?  Author Kevin Kwan tells the story of New Yorker Rachel Chu, who has been invited to spend the summer in Singapore with the man she hopes to marry.   It turns out her boyfriend neglected to mention the way he's used to living:  a home that looks like a palace, private planes, servants.  Oh, and he also just happens to be one of the country's most eligible bachelors.  

In conjunction with the Unbound Book Festival, Columbia Public Schools is giving  students and teachers have  the opportunity hear from Allegedly author Tiffiany Jackson, who will be at RBHS on Thursday, Oct. 4. 

 Jackson, a 2018-2019 Project Lit author, will be speaking about  importance of reading diverse books that will aid in students ability to step in another person’s shoes to gain perspective. She will discuss how using literature aids students in talking about important topics that affect their everyday lives, develop empathy towards a compassionate understanding of themselves and others and recognize the dangerous consequences of inaction. 

Attention RBHS readers!  Join us for a book discussion of Tiffany Jackson's Allegedly on Thursday, Sept. 20.      We'll hold an additional meeting on Tuesday, October 2.   Ms. Jacskson will be visiting RBHS on Oct. 4.

We are working on the WeVideo issue and will let you know as soon as it is resolved.