Document text
They CAN judge a book Mail Tribune / Jim Craven Stephany Biddle, 13, of Medford, helped boot "A Tree Grows in Brooklyn" out of the "book survivor" competition being sponsored by the Jackson County teen library, where Biddle looked for books this week. Teens cover all genres in library �Survivor� contest By Bill Varble You�re marooned on a desert island. Ah, but you have a trunk full of books. But you have to give up all the books but one. Which one would it be? "Anything by Caroline Cooney is the best," says Rebeca Ingle, of Medford, a seventh-grader at McLoughlin Middle School who�s browsing the teen section of the Jackson County Library�s Medford branch. How you can vote For details on the Jackson County Library�s Survivor 2000 book contest, go to www.jcls.org/teeneven.html Teens without easy access to the Internet can go to any county library branch and use a terminal or mark a paper ballot. Rather like those people on last summer�s runaway TV hit "Survivor," Cooney and other Rogue Valley teens are being asked to support their favorite books by voting others off the island. But in the library�s Book Survivor 2000 Contest, they�re deciding the fate of books instead of people. The winner � the survivor book � will be announced on Halloween. Teens who log on to the library�s Web site and vote (or stop at a library branch to vote) are entered in a drawing to win best-selling books or a gift certificate for their favorite books. The game started out with 30 books. Young people last week voted 20 off the island. This week nine more will get the heave-ho. On Wednesday, only the winner will remain. It would be just fine with 13-year-old Stephany Biddle, of Medford, if "A Tree Grows in Brooklyn" were among the books tossed overboard. "It seemed boring," Biddle says. The contest marks the first time the library has used the Internet for a contest says Christine Perkins, a young adults services librarian. She says about 80 kids participated in the first round, and more than that are taking part in the second. "It�s easier to look at a list of 10 books than 30," she says. Books voted off the island so far include such titles as J.D. Salinger�s "The Catcher in the Rye," L.M. Montgomery�s "Anne of Green Gables," S.E. Hinton�s "The Outsiders," Betty Smith�s "A Tree Grows in Brooklyn," Stephen King�s "Carrie." And that�s OK with Jacob Johnson, 15, a South Medford High School sophomore. "These books don�t have any relevance," he says, scanning a list of books as he sits at a reading desk in the library. "I don�t want something that happened a long time ago." Books remaining on the island today are "Dragonsong," by Anne McCaffrey, "The Face on the Milk Carton," by Caroline B. Cooney, "Hatchet," by Gary Paulson, "The Hobbit," by J.R.R. Tolkien, "Holes," by Louis Sachar, "Giver," by Lois Lowry, "Hitchhiker�s Guide to the Galaxy," by Douglas Adams, "I Know What You Did Last Summer," by Lois Duncan, and "Jurassic Park," by Michael Crichton. Among books kids could win are "Timeline," by Michael Crichton, "Mummy," by Caroline Cooney, "Angel of Hope," by Lurlene McDaniel, and "Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen," by Dyan Sheldon. "From what I�ve seen, the votes are pretty evenly spread among the finalists," Perkins says. Which book has the inside track to wind up like that "Survivor" guy, Rich? "There are a lot of good ones," says Amy Burgess, a McLoughlin eighth-grader. "It�s really hard to choose." Perkins says �Jurassic Park� has a lot of support. �They just say, �It�s so cool,�" she says. Johnson dissents. "I didn�t like it," he says. "You can�t recreate stuff like that." Mail Tribune Home | Ottaway Newspapers, Inc. | Dow Jones & Co., Inc. | Privacy | Contact Us Copyright � 2000 Mail Tribune, Inc.