ASK! about Fiction

So, this could be the end. What’s a Harry Potter fan going to read if JK Rowling doesn’t reconsider continuing the series beyond The Deathly Hallows?

Here are some suggestions of other Fantasy titles that you may enjoy if you liked the Harry Potter series. Some books for kids can and do appeal to all ages. So re-ignite your belief in magic with these selected reads! All book descriptions from Amazon.com.

Please check our online catalogue for availability of titles. You can also find out more about the Fantasy genre with our Genre Guide.

Stardust
By: Neil Gaiman
Publisher: New York : Spike, 1999
Call No.: GAI –[FN]
Description: “Young Tristran Thorn will do anything to win the cold heart of beautiful Victoria - even fetch her the star they watch fall from the night sky. But to do so, he must enter the unexplored lands on the other side of the ancient wall that gives their tiny village its name. Beyond that wall lies Faerie - where nothing, not even a fallen star, is what he imagined.”

The Golden Compass [First title of the His Dark Materials trilogy]
By: Philip Pullman
Publisher: New York : Alfred A. Knopf
Call No.: Y PUL
Description: “A world as convincing and thoroughly realized as Narnia, Earthsea, of Redwall, wherein lives a half-wild, half-civilized girl named Lyra Belacqua, whose carefree life among the scholars of Jordan College is about the shattered by the arrival of two powerful visitors. “ Followed by: The Subtle Knife and The Amber Spyglass

Dark Lord of Derkholm
By: Diana Wynne Jones
Publisher: New York, N.Y. : Harper Trophy
Call No.: Y JON
Description: “Derk, an unconventional wizard, and his magical family become involved in a plan to put a stop to the devastating tours of their world arranged by the tyrannical Mr. Chesney.” Followed by: Year of the Griffin

A Wizard of Earthsea [First title of the Earthsea series]
By: Ursula Le Guin
Publisher: Various
Call No.: Y LEG
Description: “Sparrowhawk, a reckless youth, hungry for power and knowledge, tampered with long-held secrets and loosed a terrible shadow upon the world. This is the tale of his testing, how he mastered the mighty words of power, tamed an ancient dragon, and crossed death’s threshold to restore the balance.”

So you want to be a Wizard [First title of the Young Wizards series]
By: Diane Duane
Publisher: San Diego : Harcourt, 2001
Call No.: Y DUA
Description: “Thirteen-year-old Nita, tormented by a gang of bullies because she won’t fight back, finds the help she needs in a library book on wizardry which guides her into another dimension.”

The Amulet of Samarkand [First title of the Bartimaeus trilogy]
By: Jonathan Stroud
Publisher: London : Doubleday, 2003
Call No.: Y STR
Description: “As an apprentice to the great magician Underwood, Nathaniel is gradually being schooled in the traditional art of magic. When Simon, a rising magician, brutally humiliates him, he decides to speed up his magical education. Eventually, he masters one of the most difficult spells of all: summoning the all-powerful djinni, Bartimeus. But summoning Bartimeus and controlling him are two very different things.” Followed by: The Golem’s Eye and Ptolemy’s Gate

Artemis Fowl [First title of the Artemis Fowl series]
By: Eoin Colfer
Publisher: New York : Hyperion Books For Children
Call No.: J COL
Description: “Twelve-year-old Artemis is a millionaire, a genius-and above all, a criminal mastermind. But Artemis doesn’t know what he’s taken on when he kidnaps a fairy, Captain Holly Short of the LEPrecon Unit. These aren’t the fairies of bedtime stories-they’re dangerous!”

Magyk [First title of the Septimus Heap series]
By: Angie Sage
Publisher: [New York] : London : Katherine Tegen Books ; Bloomsbury
Call No.: J SAG
Description: “The seventh son of the seventh son, aptly named Septimus Heap, is stolen the night he is born by a midwife who pronounces him dead. That same night, the baby’s father, Silas Heap, comes across a bundle in the snow containing a newborn girl with violet eyes. The Heaps take this helpless newborn into their home, name her Jenna, and raise her as their own. But who is this mysterious baby girl, and what really happened to their beloved son Septimus?”

Skulduggery Pleasant
By: Derek Landy
London : HarperCollins Children’s, 2007
Call No.: J LAN
Description: “Meet Skulduggery Pleasant, Ace Detective, Snappy Dresser, Razor–tongued Wit, Crackerjack Sorcerer and Walking, Talking, Fire-throwing Skeleton — as well as ally, protector, and mentor of Stephanie Edgley, a very unusual and darkly talented twelve-year-old. These two alone must defeat an all-consuming ancient evil. The end of the world? Over his dead body.”

Whispering to Witches
By: Anna Dale
Publisher: New York ; London : Bloomsbury Children’s Books
Call No.: J DAL
Description: “When Joe is traveling to stay with his mother and stepfather for Christmas, little does he imagine the excitement and magical intrigue that awaits him when he falls headfirst into an evil plot to rid England of witches. With great bravery and more than a little help from his half sister, Esme, and a new friend, Twiggy, he has to muster all his courage and ingenuity to solve the riddles surrounding him and save his newfound friends.”

Contributed by Jillian Lim, Librarian, Public Library Services

If you need further fiction-related information or reading suggestions, drop us an email at FictionAdvisory@nlb.gov.sg.
Found this question interesting? What do you think? Post your comments.
If you have a different question, please email to mailto:ask@nlb.gov.sg?subject=ASK_blog- instead of posting a comment.

Kids ASK! about Health & Fitness

Are you trying to get your children started on taking care of their teeth but not sure where to begin? Why not do it the fun way, with interesting books to spark the interest and build their knowledge in dental care and hygiene? Here are some books to give you the lead:

Taking care of your teeth by Sylvia Goulding
Publisher : Vero Beach, Fla. : Rourke Pub., c2005
Call No. : J 617.6 GOU

Brush well : a look at dental care by Katie Bagley
Publisher : Mankato, Minn. : Bridgestone Books, c2002
Call No. : JP 617.6 BAG

Open wide : tooth school inside by Laurie Keller
Publisher : New York : Henry Holt, 2000
Call No. : JP 617.6 KEL

For the availability of the above book titles, please check the library catalogue.

Answered by Ms Lim Shang Nee, Librarian, Children’s Services

Found this question interesting? What do you think? Post your comments.
If you have a different question, please email to mailto:ask@nlb.gov.sg?subject=ASK_blog- instead of sending a comment.

ASK! about Science & Technology

The task of coordinating and controlling air traffic is undertaken by the air traffic control personnel and systems.
For more information about what air traffic control is and how it works, please refer to the following links.

How Stuff Works: Air Traffic Control: www.travel.howstuffworks.com/air-traffic-control.htm
US Gov article on Air Traffic Control in the United States: www.centennialofflight.gov/essay/Government_Role

/Air_traffic_control/POL15.htm
Civil Aviation Authority Singapore (CAAS): www.caas.gov.sg/caas/en/
Regulations_And_Guidelines/?__locale=en

How do one tell ‘which part of the air belongs to which country’? This is referred to as airspace.
see: www.m-w.com/dictionary/airspace.

Controlled airspaces are divided into Flight Information Regions (FIR). According to the National Aviation Office (US), FIR is defined as “an airspace of defined dimensions within which flight information service and alerting services are provided.”
Source: www.faa.gov/airports_airtraffic/air_traffic/
publications/atpubs/NAO/NAODEF.HTM

In Singapore, the CAAS provides a service called “Airspace Management and Organisation”. Airspace Management and Organisation helps to “(1) ensure a safe, orderly and expeditious flow of aircraft movements within the Singapore FIR; (2) provides search and rescue service to aircraft in distress within the Singapore FIR and (3)maximizes airspace capacity in cooperation with ICAO, IATA and other user groups”
Source: www.caas.gov.sg/caas/en/About_CAAS/
CAAS_Services/Airspace_MO/index.html

All websites last accessed July 10, 2007.

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Kids ASK! about Science & Technology

“As the earth turns on its axis, the sun appears to move across our sky. The shadows cast by the sun move in a clockwise (hence the definition of clockwise) direction for objects in the northern hemisphere. Shadow sticks or obelisks are simple sundials. If the sun rose and set at the same time and spot on the horizon every day, they would be fairly accurate clocks.”

Source : “How Sundials Work?” in Lift off to Space Exploration. (Article is found at: liftoff.msfc.nasa.gov/Academy/Earth/Sundial/Sundial-how.html.)

Brief History of Sundials:
“Sundials are perhaps the most ancient of scientific instruments, and the earliest known form of time-keeping. They probably started life as poles in the ground with the direction and length of the shadow giving an approximate time of day. However, by the middle of the second millennium BC there were already fixed and portable versions of more accurate sundials being produced in the Middle East, Egypt and China. These early sundials relied on the height of the sun in the sky to indicate the time by the length of the shadow it produced.”

Source : “Sundials” in Department of
History and Philosophy of Science, University of Cambridge. (Article is found at: www.hps.cam.ac.uk/starry/sundials.html.)

If you want to find out more information on the “sundials”, you may refer to the following books and website:

About Time: A First Look at Time and the Clocks that Measure it by Bruce Koscielniak
Publisher : Boston, Mass. : Houghton Mifflin Co., c2004
Call No. : JP 529 KOS

Anno’s Sundial by Mitsumasa Anno
Publisher : New York : Philomel Books, [1987]
Call No. : JR 529 ANN (found only at Jurong Regional Library)

“Sundial” in Encyclopædia Britannica Online. (Article is found at: www.britannica.com/eb/article-9070362/sundial.)

All websites are last accessed on 23 July 2007.
For the availability of the above book titles, please check the library catalogue.

Answered by Ms Hiew Pek Een, Librarian, Children’s Services

Found this question interesting? What do you think? Post your comments.
If you have a different question, please email to mailto:ask@nlb.gov.sg?subject=ASK_blog- instead of sending a comment.

ASK! about Singapore

Under the Employment Act, a contract of service is any agreement whether in writing or oral, expressed or implied, whereby one person agrees to employ another as an employee and that the other agrees to serve his employer as
an employee. This means that the Employment Act does not require a signed employment letter to validate an employment relationship although employers are strongly encouraged to do so to prevent any unnecessary disputes
between the two parties. A verbal agreement is also a valid agreement.

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ASK! about Singapore

Under the Employment Act, a contract of service is any agreement whether in writing or oral, expressed or implied, whereby one person agrees to employ another as an employee and that the other agrees to serve his employer as
an employee. This means that the Employment Act does not require a signed employment letter to validate an employment relationship although employers are strongly encouraged to do so to prevent any unnecessary disputes
between the two parties. A verbal agreement is also a valid agreement.

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ASK! about Anything & Everything

The Bermuda Triangle over the decades has become notorious for missing ships and planes.

Many reasons have been put forward for this — some blame UFOs and other government experiments and even sea monsters!

However the region is also quite dangerous for atmospheric reasons. The area is well known for large showers and storms which create strong waterspouts. Many small watercraft try and avoid these but sometimes they don’t with disastrous consequences.

Waterspouts many hundreds of years ago were often associated with sea monsters — potentially a metaphor that simply went wrong, while some sailors may have actually thought it was a type of sea monster.

Hurricanes and tropical storm systems also develop and sometimes intensify rapidly in the very warm waters — and this may also contribute to some of the mysterious disappearances of craft over the years.

Source:
WEATHERWATCH
Don White, ANTHONY CORNELIUS
11 March 2006
Daily Telegraph

Books
The Bermuda triangle mystery solved.
By Larry Kusche.
Call no.: English 001.94 KUS

Into the Bermuda Triangle : pursuing the truth behind the world’s greatest mystery.
By Glan J. Quasar.
Call no.: English 001.94 QUA

The fog : a never before published theory of the Bermuda Triangle phenomenon.
By Rob MacGregor and Bruce Gernon.
Call no.: English 001.94 MAC

Please check for availability here.

Answered by Lim Li Ping, Librarian, Public Library Services

Found this question interesting? What do you think?
Post your comments, or send further questions about this or any other topic to ask@nlb.gov.sg

ASK! about Health and Fitness

According to a United States Department of Agriculture analysis, the cholesterol levels of duck, quail and turkey eggs (turkey eggs are not available in New York) are only fractionally higher than those of the chicken egg. (Ref. 1)

Quail eggs are lower in fat and cholesterol than other eggs and are rich in vitamins and omega 3 fatty acids. In Japan they are considered brain food and are packed into children’s school lunches. (Ref. 2)

Source:
(1) NOT JUST CHICKENS: FOR EASTER FEASTS, A CHOICE OF EGGS
JEAN F. TIBBETTS
26 March 1986
The New York Times

(2) QUAIL EGGS: GOOD FOR YOUR BRAIN, HEART AND PARTS SOUTH
LINDA BLADHOLM, food@herald.com
29 July 2004
The Miami Herald

Answered by Lim Li Ping, Librarian, Public Library Services

Found this question interesting? What do you think?
Post your comments, or send further questions about this or any other topic to ask@nlb.gov.sg

Kids ASK! about Science & Technology

Not all items that have light have heat. It would have to be dependent on the item itself. There is though such a thing called ‘cool light’. As mentioned in the ‘Chemilumiscence’ website, “Many chemical reactions produce both light and heat. A burning candle is such a reaction. When a candle is lit, its flame both glows and becomes hot. It is much less common for a chemical reaction to produce light without heat.

The light from such reactions is called cool light, because it is created without heat. Reactions that produce light without heat are called chemiluminescent reactions. Perhaps the most familiar chemiluminescent reactions are those that occur in living organisms. Fireflies produce light without heat by a chemiluminescent reaction. Chemiluminescent reactions that occur in living organisms are called bioluminescent reactions”.

Source : Chemilum

Source : Funtrivia

Materials available at the library for further information:

Light / by Ian F. Mahaney
Publisher : New York, N.Y. : PowerKids Press, 2007
Call No. : J 535 MAH
Click here for item availability.

All about Light by Monica Halpern
Publisher : Washington, DC : National Geographic, c2006.
Call No. : J 535 HAL
Click here for item availability.

Light : a question and answer book /. by by Adele Richardson
Publisher : Mankato, Minn. : Capstone Press, c2006.
Call No. : J 535 RIC
Click here for item availability.

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ASK! about Fiction

Jodi Picoult is definitely a hot author at the moment. No matter how many copies of her books we get, they all fly off the shelves in no time. Trust me, we are getting more copies in. ;p

Why can’t readers get enough of Jodi Picoult?
Barnes & Noble’s “Meet the Writers” feature describes her as being “known for expertly blending provocative themes with family conflicts and difficult moral choices, Jodi Picoult keeps her readers riveted with heartfelt yet impeccably researched novels”. From this reader’s review of The Pact, it’s easy to see that Picoult really manages to get you to feel for her characters.

Someone recently asked for suggestions for other authors which would appeal to fans of Picoult. So we tried looking for authors that dealt with similar things: provocative themes, family conflicts, moral choices, poignant/heartfelt relationships. Here’re some authors that came up in our search: