Niño Wrestles the World

Niño Wrestles the World
Yuyi Morales
2013

What can I say about this book that has not already been beautifully said? Niño, a little boy with a big imagination, dons the mask of a luchador and battles figures from Mexican folklore. Absolutely beautiful! It is incredibly difficult to find books for children on luchadores, La Llorona, El Chamuco, and the other figures in the book. Most of the books you find that cover these topics are folklore collections for older readers. This book introduces beliefs from the Mexican culture in a way children can enjoy. I love the ending where the little sisters prove to be much more of a challenge than any of the folkloric figures. The illustrations and the presentation (“Señoras y Señores,… now accepting ALL COMERS…,” etc) go perfectly together. I love everything about this book, including the luchador profiles at the beginning and end, and note at the back of the book that explains the history of Mexican luchadores. It was my belief that El Santo did make his identity known during his lifetime, although I may be wrong about that. An absolutely amazing book, a recommended purchase, and one that will have a place on my personal library shelf.

Similar (and Beautiful) Covers

Who doesn't notice a beautiful book cover? I've collected a few here that remind me of one another and that I also love. I hope to one day have a cover like this for one of my own books.

Shadowcaster - Cinda Williams Chima

Throne of Glass - Sarah J. Maas

The Outcast - Taran Matharu

If You Like...Egyptian Myths

Who doesn't love Egyptian mythology? I love The Kane Chronicles series by Rick Riordan. I listened to them on audio book, and they are by far one of my favorite audio book series. Katherine Kellgren does the voice of Sadie, and she was already my favorite audio book narrator, and in this audio book she does an amazing job. I am so glad that I was able to enjoy these books with Katherine as narrator. 

I have also read the Percy Jackson series (click here if you're looking for similar books on Greek myths), but I feel that I love the Kane Chronicles even more than Percy Jackson. The books have it all: lightning fast action, humor, life lessons, interesting characters, family, history, and even grilled cheese sandwiches. Check out these titles if you're looking for similar reads. 

Underworlds by Tony Abbott

Tut: The Story of My Immortal Life by P.J. Hoover

Tombquest by Michael Northrop

Pyramid Hunters by Peter Vegas

Great Writing Prompts

A couple of great writing prompts for NaNoWriMo:

The second one reminds me of the Halloween episode of Bob's Burgers:

Vamplets

Destiny Harper works selling corn dogs at the mall, and isn't really sure what to do with her life after high school. She knows she's good with kids, so when she finds an ad for a governess at The Nightmare Nursery, she decides to apply for the job. It turns out that The Nightmare Nursery is in Gloomvania, a place where monsters live and mortals are rare.

Vampire babies are everywhere, and Destiny must take care of them and other monster babies. Vamplets follows her as she makes friends, enemies, and discovers more about the hidden secrets of Gloomvania. The purple tones of the coloring add a layer of mystery to the story, which would be a great read for Halloween. The settings are very interesting to look at, and you'll probably spend quite some time looking over all the details in the pages. One setting even reminds me a little bit of Diagon Alley from Harry Potter. I've loved these graphic novels so much, I'm even considering purchasing these graphic novels for my own library. Spooky Reading!

Ghost Hunting

One of the things we've been working on at the library is creating programs where we use the library's tablets. For the teens, I knew that they probably know more about tablets and smartphones than me, so I wanted to try something that would be fun and entertaining. When one of my coworkers was talking about ghosts and ghost hunters, I thought - that's it! There's so many apps now, and there are so many ghost hunting and ghost detector apps to choose from.

Two apps were downloaded to each tablet: Ghost Observer and Ghost Radar. Ghost Observer allows you to view everything in a sort of grayscale and every so often a shape will appear and the voice will tell you a ghost has been detected. Ghost Radar looks similar to what you might imagine when you think of sonar images. 

I also wanted to download Ghost Sensor because it looks so much like the EMF meter Dean and Sam use on Supernatural, but it was not available on Android. 

The program took place after hours, so there was an extra layer of spookiness because everyone was gone and the library was empty except for the teens and two staff members. One of my coworkers had suggested she come in and make rattling noises and run around and spook the teens, which would have been tons of fun but she was not working that day. 

While the teens waited and ate Halloween cupcakes and cookies, I hid some ghost plushes around the library. Then they split up the tablets and went off using Ghost Observer. If they found a ghost plush they could keep it. After traveling around the library, we returned downstairs and tried Ghost Radar. We had some time at the end, so I'd planned a candy corn toss game where they tried to get candy corn into small cauldrons for a chance to take home some other Halloween prizes. 

This would also be a really fun activity with younger children since the apps are not too scary. My favorite moment of the night - when a teen looked at Ghost Radar and followed the red blob on the screen and paused before he said, "Wait...there's one on me!" 

Your Lie in April

           

 

Your Lie in April (Shigatsu wa Kimi no Uso) is a Japanese manga created by Naoshi Arakawa. It became an anime in 2014 and this past September was released as a film in Japan. The plot centers around piano prodigy Kōsei Arima who, after his strict mother's death, lost his ability to hear notes and no longer plays the piano. He meets violinist Kaori Miyazono through mutual friends, and she slowly begins to bring Kōsei back to the world of music. This series is both visually stunning and heartbreakingly beautiful. There are some dark moments, and some very sad moments. Prepare to cry. Your Lie in April is available for viewing on Crunchyroll and on Netflix. 

If you've already discovered this beautiful manga and anime and are looking for something else to read and/or watch, I recommend A Silent Voice by Yoshitoki Ōima, which was also released as an animated film this past September; as well as My Neighbor Seki by Takuma Morishige, which was released as a home video animated film and a 21-episode tv series. 




A Silent Voice: "Shoya is a bully. When Shoko, a girl who can't hear, enters his elementary school class, she becomes his favorite target, and Shoya and his friends goad each other into devising new tortures for her. But the children's cruelty goes too far. Shoko is forced to leave the shcool, and Shoya ends up shouldering all the blame. Six years later, the two meet again. Can Shoya make up for his past mistakes, or ist it too late?"

My Neighbor Seki: "Toshinari Seki takes goofing off to new heights. Every day, on or around his school desk, he masterfully creates his own little worlds of wonder, often hidden to most of his classmates. Unfortunately for Rumi Yokoi, his neighbor at the back of their homeroom, his many games, dioramas, and projects are often way too interesting to ignore; even when they are hurting her grades."

Both of these mangas are similar to Your Lie in April in that they have a very quiet, gentle setting and are good for readers who love a good story but don't necessarily need a lot of action and fighting.