WORDS, an image-and-word poem

WORDS is a brilliant short (1:54) film that blends images to create a flowing "word poem" that is lovely, fun and thought-provoking.
It starts out with "play," which leads to "blow" and then "break" and "split" and then "run."

The images examine all aspects of the words. For instance, "run" is a person running, and then a runny nose, running a red light and running away... which leads to fly, and fly (zipper), and fly (work), and then fall... falling down, falling in love, waterfall, the Fall...

They used YouTube images to produce something really mesmerizing. Watch it with your kid, to bring new sense to some basic words and concepts and what they mean to us.


Re:WORDS from Everynone on Vimeo.


Thank you, Everynone, for this brilliant word poem. And BoingBoing for bringing it to our attention.

Halo by Alexandra Adornetto

I’m not so sure it’s a great book… but I can’t seem to put it down.

Halo hits all the right buttons for today’s modern tween girl: the main characters are supernatural (angels); there’s a romance; cute and enigmatic boy characters; a spunky yet conflicted girl protagonist.

Synopsis
Halo tells the story of three angels who have been sent to earth to set things right. Apparently evil is overtaking us, and enough is enough for the Guy upstairs. One of the angels is 17-year-old Beth, who is more susceptible to her new human form than her two older and wiser siblings. She succumbs to the temptations of human emotion and falls in love with a human boy. This sets up a conflict, since she finds herself too busy dating to pay attention to the more charitable pursuits she has been put on earth to fulfill. The whole thing comes to a climax when a sexy male devil character sets his sights on her.

Kinda like Twilight
Whereas Twilight, the hugely popular teen-girl-fantasy novel against which all others must now be measured, had vampires, Halo has angels. Twilight is set in a quiet, nondescript town in the U.S.; so is Halo. Both have strong female lead characters. Both books feature gentle (yet strong) male love interests. In both books, the female lead characters must battle supernatural forces. And in both books the main character is quickly swept off her feet by a boy with whom she falls irrevocably in love, a love she puts beyond all else – including common sense and her responsibilities.

If your teen or tween girl liked Twilight, I’m going to bet that she’ll enjoy Halo.

It’s a gentle love story, an easy read, with just enough action to keep the pages turning. And it's clean. Angel-clean.

However, I would have liked the book to have been edited a bit more carefully. Not only are there occasional grammatical errors, but some of the dialogue is stilted, especially when the kids are tryin’ to talk hip-like. That’s the writer’s fault but also the editor’s, who should have pointed it out and asked for rewrites.

I once had an editor who talked about an author who “worries every word.” Halo feels like it was written a bit hastily, without the words having been sufficiently “worried” by this young author (Alexandra Adornetto is 19.)

But it doesn’t really matter, because the kids are reading the book in droves and loving it, with or without clunky dialogue.

Adornetto is already working on the second book in what will be a trilogy: Hades, due out next year. The third book will be entitled Heaven.

She is also working on a website for young aspiring authors which will offer writing tips. Now, that is something to really look forward to, and something that will undoubtedly help to get kids writing. Good for her.

Related Links
Here's the video trailer for Halo.
And here's a nice video interview (1:30) with author Alexandra Adornetto.

Previous articles posted on Getting Kids Reading
The Twilight Series.
New Twilight Book.
Newest Twilight Book - Free.

New Twilight book

Here's something exciting to tell your teenaged daughter.

There's going to be a new Twilight book out soon.
June 5, to be precise.

Here's the title (deep breath): The Second Short Life of Bree Tanner: An Eclipse Novella.

Author Stephenie Meyer is calling it a novella, although it's 192 pages long. For her that's a novella, since her books typically come in at more than double that size.

The story is the tale of Eclipse (her third Twilight novel), told from the point-of-view of Bree Tanner, a minor character from that book. It will retail for $16.99 in Canada.

Cool facts
Here are some cool facts to casually let slip in conversation with your teenager, showing that you're an oh-so-plugged-in parent who sometimes knows even more than she does.

* Bree Tanner was a newborn vampire created by Victoria. (Your teenager will likely not even remember this character, because Bree was killed off early in her chaotic young life, so this will be a cooler fact than you may realize.)

* $1 from every book will go to benefit the American Red Cross (think about it...)

* Meyer began the book as a short story to "help me examine the other side of Eclipse, which I was editing at the time."

* The book will be posted online, free, from noon June 7 to July 5.

* Stephenie's name is spelled with an "e" rather than the traditional "a" because it's taken from her father's name - Stephen. I've mentioned this one before, but it's still cool.

Here's Meyer's website.
Here's Bree's website.
And here's another article I posted about the whole Twilight series.

Sorry about the long delay in posting - I've had a backlog of deadlines. I'm still not finished with 'em, but I've got too much stuff to blog about to wait any longer! More soon. And thanks for all of the great feedback I've been getting from everyone (you know who you are). Please keep those e-mails and comments coming!

Scott Pilgrim trailer

Scott Pilgrim vs. The World - Official Trailer

This looks like a lot of fun, and I'm hoping it will be a good reading extension.

It's the movie, Scott Pilgrim vs. The World, starring (the adorable) Michael Cera. It's based on the very popular series of Scott Pilgrim books. Here's the official trailer which has just been released.




The movie was shot in Toronto, and lets the city be itself for once (Toronto usually doubles for a big US city). So that's kind of exciting.

Here's the website for the movie.
And the website for the Scott Pilgrim books.
And here's another book recommended by Michael Cera.
And here's a post on Boing Boing about the Scott Pilgrim movie.

Oh, and just for fun, here's that great Canadian please video that I do enjoy so much.