Sibling Library

Do you read banned books? We do and we wanted to share our thoughts on the subject this month. Banned Books Week, which was started in 1982, runs from September 18 through the 24, 2022 and remains an important reminder each year of how dangerous banning books can be. The discussion was inspired by the Sacramento Public Library's "Let's Talk About Banned Books" virtual program from June 2022. Until next month, let's read, share, and repeat.

Going in to our third year podcasting, we wanted to get a bit adventurous and revisited our old Choose Your Own Adventure books. We go through our choices and what kind of adventures we ended up taking in three different books from the series. We also discuss a few literary adventures we recently embarked on. Thank you for reading, sharing, and repeating with us. 

It's been long awaited, but we finally did a full read through of one of our favorite series The Unicorn Chronicles by Bruce Coville. What follows in this episode is our discussion about the publishing history of the series, our thoughts about the books, as well as our casting choices for some of the characters should this series make its way to film. Our new segment, "Oh...word?" makes a return with the word Luster. 

Whether you are new or returning to Coville's Unicorn Chronicles series, now is a good time to jump in because the series is being re-released (after over a decade of being out of print) in a uniformly sized paperback format that includes some new content spread out between seven books. Check out brucecoville.com to order signed copies of many of his works, including Julia's favorite Sarah's Unicorn.

Until next month, let's read, share, and repeat!

Continuing our story, we examine what's in a word with a new segment that looks at the history of a word. This month's word is: Pride. In keeping with the theme, we also discuss Walt Wittman's work Live Oak, With Moss. To end the show we talk about a recent author talk we attended at the Charles Schulz Museum with Mac Barnett and Shawn Harris who are the talented duo behind The First Cat in Space Ate Pizza. To find out more about their book visit: https://www.thefirstcatinspace.com/

We also tease what is in store for next month in case you want to join us. We will be completing a complete read through of Bruce Coville's The Unicorn Chronicles series. Until next time, let's continue to read, share, and repeat.

This month we are bringing the mystery to the podcast. In honor of Free Comic Book Day and our alliterative theme, we read Birds of Prey: Murder & Mystery by Gail Simone and Ed Benes. We also came up with our own mystery plot with this fun Mad Lib type generator. 

In this chapter, we talk about a recent author talk we attended with Amy Tan thanks to the Solano County Library. Make sure to keep an eye on your local library to see what kinds of amazing programs they are doing. We discuss her works, her life, and our impressions of it all. We kick off our show with a roundup of what items from books we would like to receive as gifts (as we celebrate all of our birthdays this month as well) and we end with bookends and what we have been reading lately.

To celebrate Women's History Month we invited two of our favorite women to join us on the show. We read and discussed Spinning Straw into Gold: What Fairytales Reveal About the Transformations in a Woman's Life by Jane Gould. Did we like it? Did we hate it? Did we agree with it? You'll have to listen to this super sized episode to find out. Let's read, share, repeat!

This month we discuss some of our favorite literary couples, host our own National African American Read In event with the book Before the Ever After by Jacqueline Woodson, and what we have been reading. We also introduce our read for next month Spinning Straw into Gold by Jane Gould. Let's keep reading, sharing, and repeating.

As we enter into our third calendar year of recording this show we welcome 2022 with some literary would you rather questions, books that will help us reach a goal this year, a Jolabokaflod review, and some of our favorite reads of 2021. Until next episode, let's read, share, and repeat!

In this chapter of Sibling Library, we all give our recommendations to celebrate Jolabokaflod - an Icelandic tradition of gifting books on Christmas Eve. We also each discuss the history and significance of some of our favorite Christmas books for children, which include: How the Grinch Stole Christmas by Dr. Seuss; The Polar Express by Chris Van Allsburg; and The Night Before Christmas by Clement C. Moore (or was it?). Let's continue to read, share, and repeat leading into the new year. Happy holidays!