Teen Tech Week 2009

Nonfiction
Scratch Programming for Teens. Jerry Lee Ford. 005.133 Ford (New)
Scratch is a programming language intended to make programming easier to learn for novice programmers. It can be used to create computer games, interactive stories, graphic artwork and computer animation, and all sorts of other multimedia projects. Scratch can also be used to play digital music and sound effects.

Amp Your MySpace Page. Eric Butow and Michael Bellomo. 006.7 Butow (New)
Create a page that makes an impact, reflects who you really are, and generates a buzz. Amp Your MySpace Page shows you how to create backgrounds, incorporate graphics and custom fonts, and include animation, audio, video, and blogs. Discover effective ways to promote yourself and your career, events, music, art, writing, film, and more.

The Ultimate Guide to Video Game Writing and Design. Flint Dille and John Zuur Platten. 794.8151 Dille (New)
here are other books about creating video games out there. Sure, they cover the basics. But The Ultimate Guide to Video Game Writing and Design goes way beyond the basics. The authors, top game designers, focus on creating games that are an involving, emotional experience for the gamer. Topics include integrating story into the game, writing the game script, putting together the game bible, creating the design document, and working on original intellectual property versus working with licenses. Finally, there’s complete information on how to present a visionary new idea to developers and publishers. Got game?

Fiction
Thirteen Reasons Why. Jay Asher. Y Asher
When high school student Clay Jenkins receives a box in the mail containing thirteen cassette tapes recorded by his classmate Hannah, who committed suicide, he spends a bewildering and heartbreaking night crisscrossing their town, listening to Hannah’s voice recounting the events leading up to her death.

Feed. M.T. Anderson. Y Anderson
In a future where most people have computer implants in their heads to control their environment, a boy meets an unusual girl who is in serious trouble.

Ender’s Game. Orson Scott Card. SF/Fan Card
Ender’s Game is the story of Ender Wiggin, a boy genetically engineered to be a superior military mind, and bred to win Earth’s long war with an alien insectoid race by completely destroying their homeworld.

Little Brother. Cory Doctorow. Y Doctorow
After being interrogated for days by the Department of Homeland Security in the aftermath of a major terrorist attack on San Francisco, California, seventeen-year-old Marcus, released into what is now a police state, decides to use his expertise in computer hacking to set things right.

Head Games. Mariah Fredericks. Y Fredericks
Two teenagers connect online in a role-playing game which leads them into their own face-to-face, half-acknowledged courtship.

Eagle Strike. Anthony Horowitz. YPB Horowitz
After a chance encounter with assassin Yassen Gregorovich in the South of France, teenage spy Alex Rider investigates international pop star and philanthropist Damian Cray whose new video game venture hides sinister motives involving Air Force One, nuclear missiles, and the international drug trade.

Evil Genius. Catherine Jinks. Y Jinks
Child prodigy Cadel Piggot, an antisocial computer hacker, discovers his true identity when he enrolls as a first-year student at an advanced crime academy.

Epic. Conor Kostick. Y Kostick
On New Earth, a world based on a video role-playing game, fourteen-year-old Erik pursuades his friends to aid him in some unusual gambits in order to save Erik’s father from exile and safeguard the futures of each of their families.

Gamer Girl. Mari Mancusi. Y Mancusi.
After Maddy’s parents divorce, she’s stuck starting over at a new high school. Friendless and nicknamed Freak Girl, Maddy finds refuge in the interactive online game Fields of Fantasy. This fresh, geeky/cool novel includes online chats and exciting gaming, and features Maddy’s manga-style artwork.

Only You Can Save Mankind. Terry Pratchett. Y Pratchett
Twelve-year-old Johnny endures tensions between his parents, watches television coverage of the Gulf War, and plays a computer game called Only You Can Save Mankind, in which he is increasingly drawn into the reality of the alien ScreeWee.

Oh My Goth. Gene Showalter. YPB Showalter
Jade Leigh, a nonconformist Goth girl in her high school, suddenly finds herself in a strange kind of virtual reality where everyone is a Goth.

Heir Apparent. Vivian Vande Velde. Y Vande Velde
While playing a total immersion virtual reality game of kings and intrigue, fourteen-year-old Giannine learns that demonstrators have damaged the equipment to which she is connected, and she must win the game quickly or be damaged herself.

User Unfriendly. Vivian Vande Velde. YPB Vande Velde
Fourteen-year-old Arvin and his friends risk using a computer-controlled role-playing game to simulate a magical world in which they actually become fantasy characters, even though the computer program is a pirated one containing unpredictable errors.

Double Helix. Nancy Werlin. Y Werlin
Eighteen-year-old Eli discovers a shocking secret about his life and his family while working for a Nobel Prize-winning scientist whose specialty is genetic engineering.

Virtual World. Chris Westwood. Y Westwood
Fourteen-year-old Jack North finds himself literally drawn into the frightening world of what he thinks is a new virtual reality game.

Halo: Contact Harvest. Joseph Staten. SF/Fan Staten
A novel based on the popular game.

Halo: Ghosts of Onyx. Eric Nylund. SF/Fan Nylund
A novel based on the popular game.