Confessions of a Hollywood Star by Dyan Sheldon |
Walker Books |
1904442714 |
Oct 2005 |
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This is the third in a series that began with Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen and My Perfect Life. Lola is about to finish college and embark on a glitzy film career in L.A. However, when a film crew set up camp in her town, her plans change and she decides to stay. She can’t resist a final taunt at her arch-enemy Carla Santini, and smugly informs her that she has a part in the production. The only problem is that she hasn’t’ |
Nickolai Of The North
Nickolai Of The North by Lucy Daniel Raby |
Hodder Children’s Books |
1904442714 |
Oct 2005 |
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A refreshingly different take on how the myth of Father Christmas came to be. When Nickolai was just a baby, the wicked Queen Magda killed his mother and the rest of his elfin people. Taken in and raised by humans, Nickolai is teased at school for his abnormally large ears. |
Secret Scribbled Notebooks
Joanne Horniman |
Allen&Unwin |
1904442714 |
Oct 2005 |
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Another addition to the already vast array of ‘coming-of-age diary’ novels written for teenagers, Secret Scribbled Notebooks tells of seventeen year-old Australian Kate O’Farrell, who is about to finish her exams, leave school and enter the world as a fully fledged proper grown-up. We follow her musings as she struggles to come to terms with her identity, (her parents abandoned her to be brought up by the owner of a guesthouse) falls in love with a ‘Russian Prince’ who lives in a garage and works in a second-hand bookshop, and adapts to a new life as an aunt when her older sister becomes a single parent. |
Ithaka
Adele Geras |
David Fickling Books |
0385603916 |
Oct 2005 |
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There is already a plethora of retellings of Homer’s The Odyssey for young people, though thankfully Ithaka doesn’t claim to add to these. The story is told from the point of view of Odysseus’ wife Penelope, left alone for over ten years, stubbornly resisting rumours that her husband is dead, and pressure from others to find Ithaka another king. Interwoven with her story are the lives of those who surround her in her palace, most importantly Klymene, Penelope’s maid, and her twin brother Ikarios. |