Ginnette Cameron-Gardner, Netty Grant and Norman Stein

Netty Grant – Primary Library Volunteer

This week we celebrated Netty Grant’s 97th birthday.  Netty has been a volunteer for more than 30 years at Emanuel School having worked alongside her husband when the Founders were setting up the School’s current site. She has been volunteering in the Library since the beginning, including assisting with the preparation of all incoming new books. We were first located in what is now The Aron Kleinlehrer Performing Arts Centre and Netty has moved with us over the years into the refurbished Hana Weisz Building which opened as the Maria Tirabosco Library in 2002, and then in 2011 into the new four-level Kleinlehrer Family Science Building which also houses the Primary School Library.

Living near the School at Montefiore Home, Randwick, Netty takes her work in our library seriously and really looks forward to her weekly visits. Netty has such a great sense of humour and a sharp wit. We have heard she’s also an outstanding bridge player in Montefiore! Netty interacts well with the students and staff and we love having her on her volunteer days.

New books in the Primary Library

Many of the students enjoy survival books. We have a large number of this genre including Bear Grylls’ Mission Survival series written for ages 9-11 years which are fast-paced, exciting new adventures full of real survival details.

A new survival series called Horizon with various New York Times authors writing each book in the series, has started to arrive in the Primary Library for Upper Primary students.

#1 in the series is Horizon by Scott Westerfield

“When a plane crash-lands in the Arctic, eight young people step from the wreckage expecting to see nothing but ice and snow. Instead they find themselves lost in a strange jungle with no way to get home and little hope of rescue. Food is running out. Water is scarce. The jungle is full of threats unlike anything the survivors have ever seen before – from razor-beaked shredder birds to carnivorous vines. With danger at every turn, these eight kids must learn to work together to survive.” (Google books.)

#2 in the series is Deadzone by Jennifer A. Nielsen

“Having made it out of the deadly jungle, the survivors emerge into a desert which has its own dangers.”  (Google books.)

#3 in the series is A warp in time by Jude Watson

“Trapped in an otherworldly landscape filled with unnatural dangers, Molly and her friends still reeling from their experiences in the desert, emerge into an eerie blue forest, where they make a startling discovery.

Humans — real live humans — are living in the woods. Like Molly and the others, these young musicians crashed and have been hoping for rescue. At first, both groups seem overjoyed to find each other, but in this place, nothing is what it seems. There’s a chilling secret lurking beneath the cheerful facade of the musicians’ camp.” (Google Books)

This series is reminiscent of 1954 classic novel Lord of the Flies by William Golding in which during wartime evacuation a British plane crashes in the Pacific Ocean and the only survivors are boys who then try to survive on an isolated island. There is a choir who have a leader and the others who are ordinary students. The story details their trying to set rules and make order, the conflict between groups and individuals and their descent into savagery as they vie for leadership.

If you have not read a Survival Fiction book before, give one a try during the holidays.