Undercover Llama Blog

Sunday, February 7 was the date of the Ultimate Sock Puppet Showdown workshop at Millennium Library. Check out our sock puppet video series starring our newly-minted puppet heroes:

Episode 1: Glam Sock and The Boyfriend: Love at first sight!


Glam Sock and The Boyfriend 2: Surprise Goth Sock Attack!


Glam Sock and The Boyfriend 3: Glam Sock's Video Diary

The YAC Reviews: Book-to-Movie Adaptations

[Editor's Note: the Library's Youth Advisory Council has taken on the task of reviewing recent book-to-movie adaptations, looking at those age old questions: which is better, the book or the movie? Does the adaptation improve on the book or ruin it? And sometimes: What were they thinking? Did they even read the book? More entries to follow.]

Today's Entry:
My Sister’s Keeper, by Jodi Picoult

First crack at it: Talia K., Grade 9

The book "My Sister's Keeper" is brilliant. Jodi Picoult came up with an amazing plot and told her story beautifully. Unfortunately, the movie completely changes. It hardly seems the same story. Many characters were left out to make room for Cameron Diaz, the star of the movie. Many important characters and many important plot details. The director focused solely on the mom, Kate & Ana when the book also tells the story of the dad, the brother and the lawyer. Also, the end was totally switched around. Not like the book at all! If you've never read the book I'm sure it's a great movie. But, as with most movies, the book is much better.

Next Up: Halla B., Grade 8

---SPOILER ALERT!---

The book to movie adaptation of My Sister’s Keeper by Jodi Picoult was actually extremely well done. The gist of the story is that there are two sisters. One of them (Kate Fitzgerald) has cancer, and the other (Anna Fitzgerald) was genetically modified to be a perfect donor for Kate. Then, Anna decides that she doesn’t want to be poked and prodded anymore, and really doesn’t want to give one of her kidneys up, which is her parent’s latest request, so she hires a lawyer. Anna knows full well that if she wins the lawsuit, becoming medically emancipated from her parents, Kate will die. During this whole thing, the whole Fitzgerald family is dealing with Jesse, Anna and Kate’s brother, who is being overly rebellious. And with Sarah, the family’s mom, who is coping with an indescribable amount of grief and stress.

Now, be aware of the major spoiler coming up. Don't scroll down if you don't want to know the ending!

One more fairly major thing that happens in the book, but this is like the ultimate spoiler, so beware: Kate wants to die. Kate asked Anna to file for medical emancipation.

In the movie, pretty much everything is kept the same as in the book, except for two fairly major events:

1. Campbell Alexander, Anna’s lawyer, doesn’t have a history with Julia Romano. In fact, Julia isn’t mentioned at all in the film. Julia went to school with Campbell a long time ago, and during the novel, she is the guardian ad litem assigned to Anna’s case. During the book, Campbell and Julia get back together after a long absence apart. In the movie, absolutely none of this Julia business is ever mentioned. Unfortunately, this makes Campbell a bit of an uninteresting character. There really isn’t all that much to think about in terms of Campbell, aside from trying to figure out why he has a service dog, even though he isn’t blind.
2. In the book, at the end, Anna dies instead of her already-fading-away sister.      While driving Anna home, after winning the lawsuit, in which the judge pronounced Anna officially medically emancipated from her parents, Campbell crashed his car. Campbell is fine, but Anna is left brain-dead. Her doctor asks Campbell, being the medical power of attorney for Anna, if organ donation is an option. He decides yes. Anna’s kidney, which Kate desperately needs, gets to her. And Kate turns out alright. With her new kidney, Kate makes a full recovery. In the movie, the car crash isn’t even on the horizon. Anna is still medically emancipated, but Kate dies in the end, due to her cancer. Everybody eventually deals with it, but like any other death, it is still immensely hard to accept it and cope with it. And Kate’s death is even worse because Anna decided not to give her the kidney.

Overall, really the book to movie adaptation was pretty decent. It was unbelievable heart-wrenching, especially the movie. The actors/actresses were chosen very well, especially the actress playing Kate. Nick Cassavetes, who directed the film, really knew how to play up your emotions, because it honestly just tore your heart apart. But it was the kind of movie that you still want to see, because the story-line is just such an original and fascinating idea.

Out of ten, I would give the book 9.5. For the movie, I would give it an 8.5.

Did you ever wonder when the next book by your favourite author is coming out? Have you ever felt like knowing when *ALL* the best books are coming out? Well, this page lists them. Every. Single. One. Well, maybe just every major teen book release that's due in the next 9 months (like new Cassandra Clare AND Ellen Hopkins, Sept. 14. Try not to drool or freak out, it's only a few months, you can wait...)

>>YA Lit Blog

Have you ever brought a book home and avoided reading it because you were far, far too excited about it to start? I have. And let me explain why.

When I got the message that Catching Fire (by Suzanne Collins, sequel to The Hunger Games, join the waiting list now) was waiting for me to pickup on the holds shelf this past Friday, I’m quite willing to admit that I did a little tap-dance jig in my chair, and probably let out a miniature shriek. I’ve been waiting for this book since January of this year (when the first book kept me up, hooked, until 1:00 in the morning on a weeknight).

So after checking out my copy of Catching Fire, telling anyone who’d listen about how the book I’d been waiting for FOREVER had finally come in, and carrying the book home lovingly (the thought of a shiny new book in your bag can make everything else in life shiny, including bus rides), did I immediately start reading the book, as I had intended? No. I put the book down on my side table and immediately started a weekend-long process of avoiding it. It makes no sense, I know, but that’s what I did. And I think I’ve figured out why.

When you’ve been waiting for a book for a long time and finally get your hands on it, you’ve basically got two possible scenarios that will play out: either the book will be disappointing, make you feel silly for having waited so long and ruin your appreciation of the rest of the series, OR it will be just as ridiculously addictive as you imagined and take over your life so that you are unable to get anything done.

I was avoiding the book on both counts. The Hunger Games was so good, but most of the story’s intensity came from the characters’ confinement in the Hunger Games arena—the mad dash for survival, the predatory opponents, the game-makers controlling everything from outside—which made it hard to imagine how that intensity could be maintained now that the characters are free and the immediate threat of death removed. So I was a little leery of starting the sequel, for fear that it wouldn’t measure up. I was also worried that it WOULD measure up, and that I’d lose my entire weekend to reading it. There is stuff to do besides read, after all. ;)

Lucky for me and for the rest of the world, it’s looking like Catching Fire will fall into the second, “take over your life so that you are unable to get anything done,” category. Because now that I have started the book, it is near-impossible to put down. Intense fear for the characters’ lives? Check. Shocking and callous deaths at the hands of the Capitol? Check. Massively complicated love triangles? Check. And I’m only 50 pages in. Did I mention that I LOVE that second category?