- Submitted by the Northville District Library

Northville High School’s cafeteria was loud and boisterous on Wednesday, March 7, as 29 teams of Northville middle school students competed in Northville District Library’s sixth annual Battle of the Books. Parents, friends and siblings cheered on their favorite team as they competed in the fun reading competition.
Almost 150 students huddled together in teams to cooperate and answer questions about the books they read as a team.

Students from Hillside Middle School, Meads Mill, Our Lady of Victory and St.
Paul’s Lutheran competed to win prizes in both the reading competition and the costume competition.

The Royal Readers, a team of Meads Mill 7th graders, won the reading competition with a score of 276 points out of a possible 280 points. Team members included: Nick Bartschat, Sahil Tolia, Carolyn Wu, Michael Zhang, Valerie Zhang and Larry Zhao. The team was managed by Anita Bartschat.

Second place was awarded to Just Read It, a team of 7th graders from Our Lady of Victory. Third place went to the Page Turners, 8th graders from Meads Mill. Fourth place went to the Book-a-roos, 8th graders from Our Lady of Victory.
Although the teams all did a wonderful job dressing in costume, the winners were: First place to EGG, 8th graders from Hillside; Second place to Men in Books, 7th graders from Meads Mill; Third place to the Book Battlers, 7th graders from Meads Mill.

Suzanne Schimanski-Gross, Teen Services librarian said, “This is our sixth year to host Battle of the Books, with support from Northville middle schools. We love this program, as it is a wonderful way to get middle schoolers to read for fun, and then to compete for prizes. This year there were some extremely creative costumes and team names, which is also part of the fun.”

Books are selected by librarians at the Northville District Library, who choose well-reviewed teen novels in a variety of genres, including historical fiction, humor, science fiction, fantasy and adventure stories. Battle titles are kept secret and announced at the start of the competition in mid-December.

Complete scores and photos can be found at the library’s website on the teen page at www.northvillelibrary.org