2015 Cybils Finalists!

Award Winners, Cybils 1

Happy New Year!

It’s January 1st, and that’s the day the Cybils Award Finalists are announced!

Cybils_2015_logo

Not everyone’s aware of the Cybils Awards — one of the best awards out there for recommending books to children and teens. Cybils stands for Children’s and Young Adult Bloggers’ Literary Awards. The books are judged by book bloggers (such as me!) and the process happens in two phases: On January first, Finalists are announced in eleven categories. On February 14th, one winner will be announced from each category.

But I persist in thinking that the real power of the Cybils is in the lists!

Here’s why the Cybils are so fantastic for librarians and other people who recommend children’s books:

They’re chosen for literary quality and kid appeal. There’s some question in the Children’s Book world whether the most famous literary awards are actually books children like. Cybils judges are charged to take that into account.

There are eleven categories! Something for everyone, even Book Apps! Besides that, they’ve got Fiction Picture Books, Easy Readers and Early Chapter Books, Poetry, Graphic Novels, and Non-Fiction, Fiction, and Speculative Fiction for both Elementary/Middle Grade and Young Adult.

Each list is chosen to include variety and diversity. This partly comes simply from having a panel of judges, but those judges do a good job representing their category well. You’ll normally find ethnic diversity represented, but also books with male and female protagonists and simply books that appeal to a wide variety of readers.

This year, I served on the Fiction Picture Books panel. Later on today, I’ll be posting my Sonderbooks Stand-outs for 2015. You will notice that the two lists don’t completely overlap. Some of the books we chose aren’t my personal favorites. However, I stand by our list, and I’m proud of it! These are high quality books, and I do recommend all the books our panel chose. They are truly wonderful. (For some, I had to have my eyes opened to their wonder by the other panel members.)

And now to take a look at the other categories!

My usual category is Elementary/Middle-Grade Speculative Fiction. I haven’t read any of their choices this year, so I need to get busy reading!

Yay! A Finalist I read and loved! Mortal Heart, by Robin LaFevers, is on the Young Adult Speculative Fiction list. It was my #1 Teen Fiction Sonderbooks Stand-out for 2014. (The Cybils run from mid-October to mid-October publication dates.)

Another book I’ve reviewed, Ling and Ting: Twice as Silly, is an Easy Reader and Early Chapter Books Finalist.

Two books I’ve reviewed are on the Elementary/Middle-Grade Non-Fiction List: I, Fly and One Plastic Bag.

On the Graphic Novels list, I have almost all the books checked out, intending to read. This will increase my resolve! I have read and written a review of The Marvels, by Brian Selznick, but it’s not posted yet.

From the Poetry List, Winter Bees and Other Poems of the Cold was a Sonderbooks Stand-out last year.

The other categories don’t have books I’ve read, but definitely have books I’m intending to read: Middle Grade Fiction, Young Adult Fiction, and Young Adult Non-Fiction. (Okay, with that last list I am halfway through Symphony for the City of the Dead. It is excellent.)

And I don’t usually try these out, but I like that the Cybils makes me aware of good ones: Book Apps.

Now if you want some great ideas of things to read in the New Year, you know where to look!

Happy New Year and Happy Reading!

Review of The Screaming Staircase, by Jonathan Stroud, read by Miranda Raison

Audiobooks, Award Winners, Children's Fiction Review, Fantasy, Starred Review 0

screaming_staircase_audio_largeLockwood & Co.

The Screaming Staircase

by Jonathan Stroud

read by Miranda Raison

Listening Library, 2013. 10 hours on 8 compact discs.
2013 Cybils Winner: Speculative Fiction, Elementary and Middle Grades
2013 Sonderbooks Stand-out: #1 Children’s Fiction
Starred Review

Normally, I won’t listen to a book I’ve already read. In the case of The Screaming Staircase, I’d already read it twice: Once when it came out, and once for the Cybils Award. (It won.) I also named it my favorite children’s book read in 2013. (I don’t allow rereads to count as Sonderbooks Stand-outs any more, so that way I won’t be tempted to give it to this book again in 2015.) So you won’t be surprised that I loved this audiobook (which our library finally purchased). Apparently, I don’t get tired of this story at all!

I’ll refer you to my original review, but point out a few things I noticed.

As a straight mystery (Who killed Annabelle Ward?), this book is wonderfully well-crafted. There are clues and red herrings as well as a life-endangering denouement accompanying some clever deductions from our heroes.

This book is scarier than I remembered it. The Red Room – with blood dripping down from the ceiling threatening to flood them (and they’ll die if it touches them) is incredibly sinister, not to mention the Screaming Staircase, where long-ago monks were led to their deaths and today you can hear their screams in your head. So that’s the only caveat when giving this book to children or suggesting it for family listening (It would be great!) – they have to be able to handle Scary.

As I suspected, though, the only thing better than reading this book is having it read to you with a British accent. The narrator is utterly wonderful! When I got to the part I used to read aloud at schools when booktalking last summer – I could recite the words along with the narrator, but they sounded so much better with a British accent! This narrator also captured the different voices with excellence.

As I mentioned in my first review, there’s so much going on with this book. We’ve got ghosts, swordplay, a deadline which must be met to keep their business, banter between colleagues, an interesting alternate world with great detail as to the different types of ghosts, kids in charge (because only they can see ghosts), and our heroes setting out to show the world that they are excellent at what they do – without the supervision of adults.

If your kids are old enough to handle Scary, this would make phenomenal family listening, because I guarantee the adults will be as mesmerized as the kids. I certainly was. And this was a book I successfully recommended to several adult coworkers. I am having fun listening to the audio version of the first two books in the series in preparation for Book Three coming out soon. I can hardly wait!

jonathanstroud.com
lockwoodandco.com
Listeninglibrary.com

Buy from Amazon.com

Find this review on Sonderbooks at: www.sonderbooks.com/Childrens_Fiction/screaming_staircase_audio.html

Disclosure: I am an Amazon Affiliate, and will earn a small percentage if you order a book on Amazon after clicking through from my site.

Source: This review is based on a library book from Fairfax County Public Library.

Disclaimer: I am a professional librarian, but I maintain my website and blogs on my own time. The views expressed are solely my own, and in no way represent the official views of my employer or of any committee or group of which I am part.

What did you think of this book?

ALA Annual Conference: 2015 Odyssey Award Program

Award Winners, Conference Corner 0

2015 Odyssey Award Presentation

Odyssey Award for Excellence in Audiobook Production
For children or young adults published in the US
Chair: Dawn Rutherford
On the committee you develop “Odyssey ears” So tuned to production notes
463 audiobooks screened.
More than 340 hours of listening each.

Honor Books:

Tim Federle

Five, Six, Seven, Nate! by Tim Federle, narrated by Tim Federle
Tim Federle lived in the Bay Area when he was a child.
Our job as adults is to take our childhood weaknesses and turn them into strengths.
His weaknesses:
–Had a lisp.
–Had a sense of humor that got him sent to the principal’s office every day.
–Was a boy who loved musical theater
Becomes a platform instead of a demerit.

The Scandalous Sisterhood of Prickwillow Place, by Julie Berry, narrated by Jayne Entwistle
Jayne Entwistle

Jayne Entwistle

Books are like oxygen to a deep sea diver (from Flavia DeLuce)
In the theater, instant feedback. No immediate response with audiobooks.
Alone with the book — favorite place to be.
Proves the back and forth conversation, if not as immediate, is still alive.
As an only child, she was practically raised by books.
With this book, the book led her, rather than the other way around.
They had to pause it often because she was laughing too hard.
When she moved to LA, she cried out, “If only I could be paid to read.”

A Snicker of Magic, by Natalie Lloyd, narrated by Cassandra Morris
heard a clip

2015 Award

H.O.R.S.E., by Christopher Myers
Narrated by Dion Graham and Christopher Myers

HORSE

Dion and Christopher:
They read the whole book.
Christopher Myers:
One of the things authors get from ALA is to get outside the studio and get to see the people you’re talking to.
But this book was a conversation. They got to speak and listen both.
The Odyssey Award is about the skill of listening.
The Supreme Court decision was about listening.

Dion Graham: It is a conversation. What we do is about finding ways of listening to each other.

Let’s keep talking, and let’s keep listening!

Newbery/Caldecott/Wilder Banquet

Award Winners 0

Newbery1

Notes from the Caldecott/Newbery/Wilder Banquet

Dan Santat Caldecott Winner
He’s 40, but he feels like a kid pretending to be an adult.
Still feels like he’s pretending to know what he’s doing.
11 years in publishing, over 60 books.
Santat is alphabetically next to Seuss, Sendak, and Silverstein.
Always wanted to believe hard work could mask any shortcomings.
Always worried he’d be discovered as an imposter.
Slow and steady career rise.
Navigated the process by reading reviews.
He reads every single review. To search for answers. What does it take to make a great book?
Had an opportunity to work at Google making google doodles. Would have provided financial security.
Was hoping his friends would tell him to keep it real and making books is what he’s meant to do.
Finally turned it down, because he knew he’d always wonder what he could have done.
Published 13 books in 2014. Terribly tired. Felt like he had nothing left to give. Learned he’s only human. Was angry at himself for being weak. Feeling that he’d peaked. And he couldn’t push himself any more.
He wants far more than he’s capable of. Keeps wanting to work harder.
Just before getting the call, he’d reminded himself he wasn’t good enough.
Maybe is a dangerous place to be.
Magic only happens in fairy tales and feel-good movies.
You just experienced the unimaginable becoming a reality.
After 10 years of working like a dog, he realizes this is a prize that can’t be earned, but he will always try to be worthy of it.
Let him feel he’s good enough. And not invisible.
Other authors and illustrators make it look effortless.
You are the stars in the sky.
Thank you for allowing me to shine with you.
Thanks his wife who supported the decision to decline the job offer from Google.
I’m still a kid pretending to be an adult. His agent tells him what he needs to hear.
Thank to bloggers — Betsy Bird, John Schu, Travis Jonker, Colby Sharp, Nerdy Book Club
A month before Beekle was published, he was worried about the ambiguity of the ending.
To his kids: “Beekle” was his kids’ word for Bicycle. How it feels to be loved unconditionally.
Despite our insecurities, it’s our nature to work our hardest.
You are my proof that I am able to produce something perfect in this world.

Newbery
Kwame Alexander, The Crossover

When I was a child, I wanted to be a fireman and a doctor and a king.
Tonight I feel like a king.
Newbery trance is not kind to clarity and conciseness.
My first librarians were my parents.
Books lined the walls and floors of our home.
Librarian: All about joy and about books.

Honored to be in this room with so many pulchritudinous librarians.
“The most distinguished literature for children” — that sounds perfect.
Went to Key West to write the speech. Went to the Mel Fisher museum — a treasure hunter who found gold.
After 20+ rejections, he finally discovered gold.
About a family — not about his family but from his own familial experiences.
Editor: “Brightly shining yes in a sea of no.”
“How do you win the Newbery?”
Learn words, love words. “Your son intimidates the other children with his words.”

How do you win the Newbery? Be interesting.
Father always hosts a book fair the day after Thanksgiving.
Books are doors to a life of sustainability and success.
Was going to be a doctor.
— Took Organic Chemistry
— Took a course on poetry with Nikki Giovanni
“She smiles like your grandma used to do when you thought you said something profound, but you didn’t.”
“I can teach you to write poetry, but I can’t teach you to be interesting.”

Wrote his wife a poem a day for a year.
Poetry found him.
Use your words. Be interesting. Be eloquent.
His story of becoming a poet.
Living an authentic life, so you’ll have something authentic to write about.
You have to answer the call.
Write a poem that dances. That looks good.
Write a poem that is contagious!

Now that’s a speech!

Wilder Award: Donald Crews
Without his late wife, Ann Jonas, he wouldn’t have gotten on this journey.
They took the fork in the road.
He used to read to his grandma, Big Mama. She said he would go somewhere.
He developed a tendency to doodle in the margins more than work on the problem at hand.
Fork in the road: Applied to and was accepted to an Arts high school.
Teacher asked him about his plans — told him he would apply to Cooper Union.
Failure was impossible.
Fork in the road: Cooper Union.
Graphics teacher told him he didn’t have much talent, but he had the determination to figure out what to do.
Fork in the road: Ann Jonas followed him to Germany and they got married.
Included a book for children in his portfolio. — A to Z
First rejections were in German
Fork in the road: Freelance work.
Failure was impossible.
Fork in the road: Find something only you can do.
Fork in the road: Began to think about his picture books. Freight Train
First book as a full-time children’s book creator.
Parade has a cameo of himself.
Led to Big Mama’s, and now black people fundamental to the books.
Also encouraged Ann to try children’s books.
She supplied the courage to try to be successful artists in New York.
He unreservedly shares any honor with her.

Afterward, a highlight is going through the Receiving Line and getting to congratulate all the Award Winners in person.

Review of The Bears on Hemlock Mountain, by Alice Dalgleish

Award Winners, Beginning Chapter Books, Children's Fiction Review, Old Favorites, Starred Review 0

bears_on_hemlock_mountain_largeThe Bears on Hemlock Mountain

by Alice Dalgleish
illustrated by Helen Sewell

Charles Scribner’s Sons, New York, 1952.
Starred Review
Newbery Honor Book, 1953
ALA Notable Book

Today I was shifting Juvenile Fiction books in the D’s and I saw this book, and couldn’t resist checking it out. I took it home and read it, having to say the refrain aloud:

THERE are NO BEARS
ON HEMLOCK MOUNTAIN,
NO BEARS AT ALL.
OF COURSE THERE ARE NO BEARS
ON HEMLOCK MOUNTAIN,
NO BEARS, NO BEARS, NO BEARS,
NO BEARS AT ALL.

Of course, the main reason I love this book so much is that I remember my mother reading it to me. I remember all the suspense building as Jonathan’s mother and Jonathan say this refrain to themselves, and everyone is thinking about bears. I remember how the crunch, crunch, crunch of the snow changes to drip, drip, drip, which means Spring is coming, and how Jonathan hopes the bears don’t know it. And then how incredibly scary it is when Jonathan hides under the big iron pot and the bears start scraping in the snow around it.

I also love what I hadn’t remembered – that this is a story of a great big extended family – a little bit like the one I have. When my mother read it to me, we still lived near my grandma, who was good at making cookies, as Jonathan’s mother is in the book.

It’s rather astonishing to me, reading it now, at how well this story holds up 63 years later. About the only thing that couldn’t happen today is that nobody needs to cut wood to keep a fire going for cooking to get done. Oh, and probably Jonathan’s father and uncles wouldn’t come with guns to shoot the bear.

This is a chapter book – but a chapter book short enough to read aloud, as I well remember. The suspense is incredible, if child-sized. Bottom line, it’s the story of an eight-year-old who is now big enough to go over a big hill in the snow all by himself to his aunt’s house – because of course there are no bears on Hemlock Mountain.

And that story will never grow old.

Buy from Amazon.com

Find this review on Sonderbooks at: www.sonderbooks.com/Childrens_Fiction/bears_on_hemlock_mountain.html

Disclosure: I am an Amazon Affiliate, and will earn a small percentage if you order a book on Amazon after clicking through from my site.

Source: This review is based on a library book from Fairfax County Public Library.

Disclaimer: I am a professional librarian, but I maintain my website and blogs on my own time. The views expressed are solely my own, and in no way represent the official views of my employer or of any committee or group of which I am part.

What did you think of this book?

Review of Sam and Dave Dig a Hole, by Mac Barnett and Jon Klassen

Award Winners, Contemporary, Delightfully Silly, Picture Book Review, Starred Review 2

sam_and_dave_dig_a_hole_largeSam and Dave Dig a Hole

by Mac Barnett
illustrated by Jon Klassen

Candlewick Press, 2014. 40 pages.
Starred Review
2015 Caledecott Honor

This book is simply genius. So simple. And so much to notice.

The plot is that Sam and Dave dig a hole.

“When should we stop digging?” asked Sam.
“We are on a mission,” said Dave.
“We won’t stop digging until we find something spectacular.”

Their dog goes along with them on their adventure. In each spread, we see the cross-section of the hole — and that they keep just missing a spectacular treasure, in fact, they keep missing treasures that get more and more spectacular.

The dog, however, knows what they’re missing. In every picture, he’s got his nose pointed toward the treasure that the boys are missing. They decide to stop digging downward, to split up, to turn corners — all just before they would have found treasure.

Finally, the boys stop and take a nap. This time, the treasure they have just missed is a bone. That one, the dog is not going to leave be.

But when the dog digs for the bone, the floor of their tunnel collapses and they all fall down. . .

until they landed in the soft dirt.

“Well,” said Sam.
“Well, said Dave.
“That was pretty spectacular.”

And they went inside
for chocolate milk and animal cookies.

At first glance, it looks like they have landed in their own yard, which was pictured at the beginning.

At second glance? Well, something has happened here.

In fact, before our library got this book and I even read it, I read theories about it, thanks to the brilliant Travis Jonker, writer of 100 Scope Notes

Here are his theories about what happened in the book.

And later, he revisits and gives us a link to what Aaron Zenz and his 9-year-old son think happened.

So you see, this is truly a book for all ages. The words and pictures are simple, even iconic. But the details! And the philosophical questions! This is a book that, besides being a joy and delight, will spark conversations.

Absolutely brilliant.

macbarnett.com
burstofbeaden.com
scholastic.com

Buy from Amazon.com

Find this review on Sonderbooks at: www.sonderbooks.com/Picture_Books/sam_and_dave_dig_a_hole.html

Disclosure: I am an Amazon Affiliate, and will earn a small percentage if you order a book on Amazon after clicking through from my site.

Source: This review is based on a library book from Fairfax County Public Library.

Disclaimer: I am a professional librarian, but I maintain my website and blogs on my own time. The views expressed are solely my own, and in no way represent the official views of my employer or of any committee or group of which I am part.

What did you think of this book?

Review of The Crossover, by Kwame Alexander

Award Winners, Children's Fiction Review, Contemporary 0

crossover_largeThe Crossover

by Kwame Alexander

Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, Boston, 2014. 237 pages.
Starred Review
2015 Newbery Medal Winner
2015 Coretta Scott King Author Honor
2015 Capitol Choices Selection

I wrote this review before The Crossover won the Newbery Medal. I was already thinking it would be a perfect book to booktalk, since it’s about basketball, is short, and has many passages that read aloud well.

Personally, I’m not a big fan of novels in verse, and I’m not a big fan of sports novels, but I couldn’t help but like what Kwame Alexander has done here.

Twins Josh and Jordan Bell are the sons of a professional basketball player and the stars of their middle school basketball team. But disharmony comes between them when a girl falls for Jordan. Suddenly he’s all about her and hardly thinking about basketball.

At the same time, their mother is worried about their father’s heart, and Josh can tell he should be worried, too.

There’s family drama and sports action in this book, but I also liked the poetry. It starts out with an onomatopoetic rap about the joy of playing basketball and continues with plenty of variety of form. It ends up being an entertaining and engaging way to tell the story from an articulate young man who also plays basketball.

hmhco.com

Buy from Amazon.com

Find this review on Sonderbooks at: www.sonderbooks.com/Childrens_Fiction/crossover.html

Disclosure: I am an Amazon Affiliate, and will earn a small percentage if you order a book on Amazon after clicking through from my site.

Source: This review is based on a library book from Fairfax County Public Library.

Disclaimer: I am a professional librarian, but I maintain my website and blogs on my own time. The views expressed are solely my own, and in no way represent the official views of my employer or of any committee or group of which I am part.

What did you think of this book?

Review of El Deafo, by Cece Bell

Award Winners, Children's Nonfiction Review, Graphic Memoir, Starred Review 0

el_deafo_largeEl Deafo

by Cece Bell
color by David Lasky

Amulet Books, New York, 2014. 240 pages.
Starred Review
2015 Capitol Choices Selection
2015 Newbery Honor

El Deafo is an endearing and engaging graphic novel-style memoir. I’m not quite sure why everyone is presented as human-rabbit creatures, but that’s part of an informal graphic style that will pull kids in.

Cece Bell got meningitis when she was very young – and lost her hearing almost completely. El Deafo is her story of growing up deaf – wearing hearing aids, learning to lip read, and navigating the ways different people treated her because she was deaf.

Cece got to attend Kindergarten in a class with other kids with hearing problems, but her family moved and she had to go to first grade with hearing students. She’s given a high-powered hearing aid connected to a microphone the teacher wears around her neck. Cece discovers she has a superpower – she can hear what her teacher is saying or doing anywhere in the building.

But making friends is difficult. First, there’s the friend who dominates everything the two do together. Then there’s the friend who always e-nun-ci-ates (which is harder to lip-read) and makes a huge deal of Cece’s deafness.

Cece also illustrates ordinary friendship perils that become larger. For example, she can’t lip read at a slumber party once the lights are shut off. And that boy she has a crush on – what will he think when he sees her with her extra-large hearing aid at school?

This book’s friendly format will catch kids’ interest, and give them a glimpse of what the world might be like if you couldn’t take hearing for granted. No preaching is needed – Cece tells her compelling story, and kids’ eyes will be opened.

cecebell.com
amuletbooks.com

Buy from Amazon.com

Find this review on Sonderbooks at: www.sonderbooks.com/Childrens_Nonfiction/el_deafo.html

Disclosure: I am an Amazon Affiliate, and will earn a small percentage if you order a book on Amazon after clicking through from my site.

Source: This review is based on a library book from Fairfax County Public Library.

Disclaimer: I am a professional librarian, but I maintain my website and blogs on my own time. The views expressed are solely my own, and in no way represent the official views of my employer or of any committee or group of which I am part.

Please use the comments if you’ve read the book and want to discuss spoilers!

YALSA Excellence in Nonfiction and Morris Awards

Award Winners 0

Monday morning, after the Youth Media Awards, I attended the YALSA Award Ceremony for Excellence in Nonfiction and the Morris Awards for books by a first-time author.

I love that YALSA announces the Finalists for these awards ahead of time — so they can get speeches from everyone and do an awards ceremony the same day that the winner is announced.

Here are my notes from the speeches:

YALSA Excellence in Nonfiction Award

Shane Burcaw – Laughing at my Nightmare

(Video speech) He’s 22 years old. Blown away when he found out he was a finalist.
Has Spinal muscular atrophy.
Humor and positivity are keys to dealing with his disease.
Laughing is the best way to overcome.

Candace Fleming – The Family Romanov


She was worried about the story – might as well be another planet for her readers.
Conflict: 3 separate revolutions, each extremely complicated.
Had planned to focus on Anastasia – decided she was boring, so expanded her focus to the other children – they also weren’t that interesting. They were naive and cloistered.
Nicholas and Alexandra were more interesting, but they were adults.
Then expanded focus again to revolutionaries.
She saw a movie where the characters kept asking, “But who is interested in Russian History?”
This award tells her, “You are.”

Emily Arnold McCully – Ida M. Tarbell: The Woman Who Challenged Big Business – and Won!


Why Ida Tarbell? She was a defender of democratic values when they were challenged.
She was the only woman muckraker.
The author tried to squish it into 32 pages, but the story was too big.
Ida Tarbell saw the cost of the oil rush to ordinary people and the environment.
Science taught her to always look beneath the surface of things and verify.
The issues that led to muckraking are back.
She went after the story and told it true.

Steve Sheinkin – The Port Chicago 50: Disaster, Mutiny, and the Fight for Civil Rights


His brother-in-law loves conspiracy theories – told him first atomic bomb was tested in Port Chicago – but that led him to the true story.
Heard from a man whose father was in the mutiny. Loves getting this story out.

Winner: Maya Van Wagenen
Popular: Vintage Wisdom for a Modern Geek


She’s the child of a historian, so knows the power of truth and primary sources.
Always wanted to be a writer.
Found the book before 8th grade — Her mother’s idea was to try the ideas and write about it.
Learned the kind of popularity Betty Cornell talked about was based on being a good friend and reaching out with compassion and understanding.
Greeting the world with your head held high will never go out of style.
None of this would have been possible without books and librarians.
Middle School Librarian was a light to the students there.
Has turned to reading nonfiction because it tells teenagers that their story is part of a much bigger fabric of history, and each one plays a unique part.

Morris Award, Honor Books:

Jessie Ann Foley, The Carnival at Bray

She’s a high school English teacher, here in Chicago. She loved librarians before she was nominated for this award, and now even more so!
Librarians help teens find books that speak to them.
“That is part of the beauty of literature: You discover that your longings are universal longings… You are not alone.” (A quote she read while writing this.)
She kept in tough scenes so girls who have gone through that would not feel alone.

E. K. Johnston – The Story of Owen: Dragon Slayer of Trondheim
due to weather, she isn’t here.

Len Vlahos – The Scar Boys

Central theme: The power of music can give anyone confidence, friends, even save a life.
Music can be an intensely personal experience, but is more appropriately a shared experience.
Music, like math or physics, is a universal language.
Math and physics are the foundation for music.
Music makes us feel something viscerally
Magic dust sprinkled on math and physics
Resonance – sound or vibration in one object produced from sound or vibration in another.
Perfect metaphor for librarians
Immensely skilled at finding the right book and putting it in the right hands.
Finding the perfect book to resonate with that reader and amplify the content.
“School librarians are my heroes.”
Writing is a solitary process, publishing is not.
Librarians help the work of writers resonate far beyond the walls of our institutions.

Leslye Walton – The Strange and Beautiful Sorrows of Ava Lavender

She’s a teacher.
Wrote it with little hope than anyone would actually read it.
Didn’t write it as a YA book. She might have wanted to protect them.
When she was a teen, she experienced isolating grief, and hung out in the local library to find people (in fiction) who were grieving like she was.
There is beauty in sorrow.
I hope it makes someone feel less alone and more alive.
And that there is life beyond that sorrow.
Librarians, you are saving the lives of readers everywhere.

Winner: Isabel Quintero – Gabi, a Girl in Pieces

“To quote someone very dear to me, ‘Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit!'”
Started by reading “I Too Sing America” by Langston Hughes
Offended by someone who asked if her laborer parents were surprised that she is an intellectual.
Now she’s a professor of composition.
She thinks about her parents who had tough jobs when they came to America and worked to make sure their children had a different life.
She thinks about fat girls, pregnant girls, and gay teens.
The only option for a daughter of laborers is to think — because that’s what her parents have taught her to do.
It helps when you have a community of people doing the solitary thing together. (Her creative writing group)
“An honor and a privilege to be here, but that was to be expected, given who my parents are.”

***
Inspiring and lovely speeches! I always love the Morris Awards, because the authors are happy to be published, let alone to receive recognition. Makes me want to go home and Write!

Youth Media Awards 2015!

Award Winners 0

image

Hooray! I got a front row seat for the Youth Media Awards announcements that happened on Monday!

image

As you can see, I had a great view — though I spent most of my time tweeting the winners, rather than taking pictures.

The announcements of all the awards are on the ALA website, so I will just give some general impressions and link to the books I’ve reviewed.

The energy in the room can’t be described! These people who ignored the Super Bowl the night before (Well, I did.) and don’t even turn on the Oscars (Well, I don’t.) were energized and excited to find out who wins the Children’s book awards. We got up early and came through the snow and waited in line to be there, and speculation was high.

I’ll talk about the announcements in the order I remember them happening. It all starts with the Alex Awards — a list of ten adult books with strong appeal for teens. This list contains several I’ve been meaning to read, but none I actually have read.

One of the fun things about the announcements is that all the committees are there. Most committees bring some sort of prop to celebrate their top choice. Here is the Odyssey Award committee celebrating their choice of Horse, by Christopher Myers:

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I didn’t notice if they did, but they could have thrown their props again when The Crossover won the Newbery Medal and a Coretta Scott King Honor.

I’ll go with some general impressions first.

It seemed like a lovely day for the #WeNeedDiverseBooks Campaign. The Wilder Award went to Donald Crews. The Edwards Award went to Sharon Draper. The Arbuthnot Lecture Award went to Pat Mora.

The Virginia Hamilton Award for Lifetime Achievement went to Deborah Taylor, a librarian whom I know from Capitol Choices, and a wonderful choice.

And Graphic Novels! El Deafo, by Cece Bell was a Newbery Honor Book, and, most surprisingly, This One Summer was both a Printz Honor Book and a Caldecott Honor Book.

I was especially happy about El Deafo after hearing Cece Bell speak in the Graphic Novel Author Forum on Friday night. It couldn’t happen to a nicer person! I have read El Deafo and have already written a review, which I’ll post soon.

A Caldecott Committee member whom I happen to know said, “The criteria is for ages up to 14. If they want to change the criteria…” Others have expressed indignation that a book for teens would win a Caldecott Honor, but the criteria indeed say nothing about “picture books” needing to be targeted to younger readers.

Before the awards, people I talked with felt that there would be great indignation if Brown Girl Dreaming did not win the Newbery, though one friend said that the writing in The Crossover is actually better. Yet when it came down to it, no one was indignant. I think that’s because Brown Girl Dreaming did win the Coretta Scott King Author Award, while Crossover won an Honor. In the Newbery, those positions were switched — but the fact that both were represented in both awards shows that those are just two darn good books.

And this completely puts to rest the idea that the Newbery committee might set aside books by African-Americans, thinking the Coretta Scott King Award will take care of them.

The one thing that made me sad was not seeing The Farmer and the Clown up there among the Caldecott Honors. I do love Marla Frazee’s work.

I hadn’t read as many of the contenders as usual this year, but many of those I had read were also my own personal favorites.

My review for The Crossover will be posted soon.

Brown Girl Dreaming, by Jacqueline Woodson, won the Coretta Scott King Award, a Newbery Honor, and a Sibert Honor (for children’s nonfiction).

The Noisy Paint Box, by Barb Rosenstock, illustrated by Mary GrandPré, won a Caldecott Honor.

Sam and Dave Dig a Hole, by Mac Barnett and Jon Klassen (review upcoming), won a Caldecott Honor.

Viva Frida, by Yuyi Morales, won a Caldecott Honor and the Pura Belpré Illustrator Award.

How I Discovered Poetry, by Marilyn Nelson, won a Coretta Scott King Author Honor.

My favorite children’s nonfiction book of the year, A Boy and a Jaguar, by Alan Rabinowitz, illustrated by Cátia Chen, won the Schneider Award for younger readers.

Hidden: A Child’s Story of the Holocaust, by Loic Dauvillier, illustrated by Marc Lizano, color by Greg Salsedo, translated by Alexis Siegel, won a Batchelder Honor.

Finally, my much-loved Waiting Is Not Easy!, by Mo Willems, won a Geisel Honor.