{"id":3235,"date":"2011-03-24T23:24:18","date_gmt":"2011-03-25T03:24:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/?p=3235"},"modified":"2011-03-25T00:05:19","modified_gmt":"2011-03-25T04:05:19","slug":"battle-of-the-kids-books-second-round-begins","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/?p=3235","title":{"rendered":"Battle of the Kids’ Books Second Round Begins"},"content":{"rendered":"

I admit that I pay absolutely no attention to basketball. For me, March is the time of School Library Journal’s Battle of the Kids’ Books<\/a>, a tournament where celebrity children’s book authors judge between sixteen outstanding titles from the previous year.<\/p>\n

I’ve already discussed my first round picks<\/a>, and the winners of the first half of the first round<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Now the first round has been completed. Because my prediction rate is so dismal (3 out of 8 this year — still much better than last year!), I like to wait to name my second round picks until the first round is done. It’s just as well I did, since my favorite in the top half of the brackets, A Conspiracy of Kings<\/a><\/em>, and my favorite in the bottom half of the brackets, One Crazy Summer<\/a><\/em>, have both already been knocked out.<\/p>\n

The second round began today in a match judged by Laura Amy Schlitz<\/a>. Her analysis is absolutely brilliant, and she explains so much better than I why The Cardturner<\/a><\/em> is such a wonderful book. I was very happy about that result. One match picked correctly<\/a> in the second round!<\/p>\n

The second half of the first round went better for me than the first half, though I have to admit I wasn’t as passionate about this set of books — except One Crazy Summer<\/a><\/em>, which lost.<\/p>\n

Matches Six<\/a> and Seven<\/a> did go as I hoped\/predicted, won by The Ring of Solomon<\/em> and A Tale Dark and Grimm.<\/em> Match Eight<\/a> did not go as I predicted, but I didn’t feel strongly, and Mitali Perkins’ judging convinced me that I will definitely have to read the winner, Trash<\/em>.<\/p>\n

For the second half of Round Two, here are my hopes, though I admit with my favorites out of the running, I’m less invested in the outcomes. (Though the judges’ critiques seem particularly outstanding this year, and I know I will enjoy reading the rest of the Battle action.)<\/p>\n

Match 3: The Odyssey<\/em>, by Gareth Hinds
\nvs. The Ring of Solomon<\/em>, by Jonathan Stroud
\njudged by Patricia Reilly Giff<\/p>\n

My hold for The Odyssey<\/em> still hasn’t come in, and I wouldn’t mind if it won, but my prediction here is The Ring of Solomon<\/em>. It’s not as incredibly good as the Bartimaeus Trilogy<\/a>, but it’s still wonderfully crafted and a great read.<\/p>\n

Match 4: A Tale Dark and Grimm<\/em>, by Adam Gidwitz
\nvs. Trash<\/em>, by Andrew Mulligan
\njudged by Pete Hautman<\/p>\n

I’m looking forward to what Pete Hautman<\/a> has to say about these books. I’m currently almost finished reading A Tale Dark and Grimm<\/em>, but my hold hasn’t yet come in for Trash<\/em>. However, based on what’s been said about Trash<\/em>, I think I’m going to pick it.<\/p>\n

To borrow from Susan Patron, my “inner librarian” likes A Tale Dark and Grimm<\/em> more than my “inner me” does. I think it will be a fantastic book to recommend for kids who have read all the Goosebumps<\/em> books and want to go on to something a little longer. As for me, it did remind me of reading fairy tales when I was a kid, but bottom line I enjoy the actual fairy tales more. And I never was crazy about the gory and grim part of the fairy tales, which is what’s emphasized here.<\/p>\n

But it’s going to be fun to read what Pete Hautman has to say about them.<\/p>\n

To sum up, my favorite in the top half of the brackets out of the remaining books is now The Cardturner<\/em>, with Keeper<\/em> as a close second. My favorite in the bottom half is The Ring of Solomon<\/em>. I am still fondly hoping that A Conspiracy of Kings<\/em> will come back from the dead to win it all. <\/p>\n

However things turn out, it’s going to be fun to watch.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I admit that I pay absolutely no attention to basketball. For me, March is the time of School Library Journal’s Battle of the Kids’ Books, a tournament where celebrity children’s book authors judge between sixteen outstanding titles from the previous year. I’ve already discussed my first round picks, and the winners of the first half […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[62],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3235","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-events"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3235","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3235"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3235\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3235"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3235"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3235"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}