Last Weekend Before Battle of the Books!

So Monday will bring the Opening Ceremonies of School Library Journal’s Battle of the Kids’ Books! I’ve already posted about which books I want to win the first round.

Right now, I’m more than halfway through Dead End in Norvelt, by Jack Gantos, and hope to finish it tonight. That will leave me with only three books to read to have all 16 read for this year’s battle. So I’m tempted. Should I throw aside my Reading Plan and attempt to blitz through those last three books? It’s sorely tempting, especially since two of the three don’t come up until the second week.

The three books left are Between Shades of Gray, The Grand Plan to Fix Everything, and Inside Out & Back Again. They are all books I definitely want to read. So we shall see…. I’m going to PLA Biennial Conference in Philadelphia on Thursday morning, and I only bring paperbacks on trips. So I will see how far I’ve gotten by then.

Since Between Shades of Gray is the second match, for now I’ll just weigh in on Amelia Lost vs Anya’s Ghost, judged by Matt Phelan. It will be interesting to see if Matt Phelan, a graphic novelist, will decide like so many other judges and pick the book least like the kind he writes, in this case that would be Amelia Lost.

I don’t have real strong feelings about this contest. Both books are good, but Anya’s Ghost was a bit darker than I like, though it is well done. Amelia Lost is outstanding nonfiction, really telling you about Amelia Earhart. But I don’t get as excited about nonfiction, I’m afraid, as about some of the fiction books in the Battle.

So, Monday, we’ll see what he chooses. And I’ll be madly reading in the meantime!

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