Semester 2 underway!

This semester has really started off with a bang! We have a whole stack of new magazines and the Laser eBooks are ready to go. We've also spent a lot of time selecting a range of different magazines for students to read. The library now has magazines on cooking, gaming, technology, movies, dirt biking, travel and special interest. These magazines are currently unable to be loaned out, but staff and students are more than welcome to come and read them at recess and lunchtimes at their own leisure. At this point the plan is that the eBooks are for staff to borrow out in a single class set. A number of classic novels have already been uploaded. We are more than happy to search for more titles at teachers' requests. Coming soon to the library is the fourth instalment of the "Inheritance Quartet" written by Christopher Paolini and the second book in the "Lorien Legacies" by Pittacus Lore. Also, Isobelle Carmody is releasing the last book of the "Obernewtyn Chronicles" (finally). There are many staff and students that are looking forward to these new arrivals and it will be interesting to see who gets them first. This semester is setting up to be very exciting and fast paced. The library staff are ready and waiting for your requests. Have a good semester two, Barkly College!

Thyla

I’ll be honest – horror is not my usual choice of reading matter but the idea of Tasmanian Tiger shapeshifters caught my attention enough to pick it up – and once past the first chapter I was hooked.  No way was I planning to go to bed until I knew how this ended – and what frustration when I realised that this was the first in a series!

Tessa is found wandering with no memory about her past.  All she knows is her name and that she is strong and brave and does not cry.  Everything else is a blank canvas to be filled in as best she can.

The police officer who finds Tessa takes her under her care.  Connolly has also lost her daughter, Cat, near where Tessa was found and Connolly hopes that maybe once Tessa has her memory back, they will know what happened to Cat.

She places her in the boarding school where Cat had been and Tessa begins to realise that she is in the middle of something huge – something that she is obviously a part of even though she has no memory of it.   Something that has been happening here for at least 160 years.  The long slashes, like stripes, that appear across her back make that very clear. 

And what are the Sarcos and the Diemens?  Where do they fit into this? And who can she trust?  She is in the middle of a shapeshifters war - and it is like walking on quicksand with no real idea of where to turn.

I love the way Tessa starts out as a blank canvas that slowly becomes painted in as we learn more about her, and her history.  This is a story of a girl who is finding out who she is, making friends and maybe even falling in love a little. It is a horror/mystery about Tasmania’s unique animals, as well as the supernatural and convict history, all wrapped up in one book.

As the blurb on the back cover says:   “Thyla is a story of Tasmania, of darkness, of convicts, of devils and tigers and of promises that stay true through the centuries”

It is the story of what happened to Cat – and what Tessa really is”