Photo credit: John Bramley

Since there are already disparaging online reactions regarding the hair color of the actresses in the film version of the paranormal romance Beautiful Creatures (Little, Brown, 2009), eyebrows are bound to be raised over many of the other changes in this tale of dark desires under the elms.

Readers should expect that extraneous characters or subplots will face the chopping block, especially when the source material—the first in the four-book “Caster Chronicles”—is more than 500 pages long. But in terms of the story, a lot has been transformed here, with the blessing of authors Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl. The numerous nips and tucks are a departure from the recent efforts by filmmakers to ingratiate loyal readers, sometimes following a book too literally (like a few of the “Harry Potter” films) or faithfully going by a lean-and-mean road map (The Hunger Games). The result here is a draw.

Photo credit: John Bramley

The series, although very popular, doesn’t have the broader readership of Stephenie Meyer’s “Twilight” saga or Suzanne Collins’ “The Hunger Games Trilogy,” which hooked a larger, more adult readership. This film really needs the solid support of its fan base, the narrower young adult demo, if it wants to launch a franchise.

Director/adaptor Richard LaGravenese’s retelling remains true to the spirits (no pun intends) here and there of this first book, especially in capturing the Southern setting of faded Greek Revival mansions, drooping Spanish moss, Bible thumpers, and where everyone is “surgah.” Gatlin, South Carolina, is a town with no Starbucks (if only, some may wish), 12 churches, and one library (which gets a big wet kiss in the film; the local branch is praised as “holy,” a bastion of ideas). Popular guy-next-door Ethan Wate plans to get the heck out of his hick hamlet as soon as he graduates high school. In the meantime, Ethan armchair travels through the books of Kurt Vonnegut, Henry Miller, and Jack Kerouac.

Photo credit: John Bramley

For months, he has dreamed of a dark-haired girl in a flowing dress wandering on a Civil War battlefield—but he’s killed by a bolt of lightning before he embraces her. Lo and behold, her doppelganger arrives as the new student in his English class: Lena Duchannes (Alice Englert), the niece of the wealthy recluse Macon Ravenwood (Jeremy Irons). Rumor has it he’s a devil worshipper.

Fully aware of all the whispering behind her back, she’s aloof at Ethan’s courtin’ attempts, not believing he really wants to know her, but he stands up for her against the hostile cliques, and eventually makes her smile. However, she really doesn’t fit in—she’s a Caster (technically not a witch) with supernatural powers, and on her 16^th birthday, she will endure the Claiming, when her true nature will emerge, either for the light or (gulp) dark, and murky forces are at work to turn her to the dark side, by using Ethan as a heartthrob pawn.

Some of the book’s, ahem, magic is lost: Ethan also has powers to overcome curses, and the teen lovers are telepathic, reading each other’s thoughts whether they are near or far. On screen, Ethan’s purely mortal. The various special abilities of Lena’s family are not very well explained, leading to a few confusing moments.

In one of the book’s best (though not very original) subplots, Lena and Ethan have to reign in their hormones. Otherwise when they kiss, an electric charge zaps the boy. If they go all the way, the kid will fry—nature’s chastity belt. And the script thwarts suspense by revealing early on what mischief Emma Thompson’s Christian crusader is really up to—though by showing her character’s dementedly demonic side early on, Thompson has more opportunities to chow down on the scenery, leaving Jeremy Irons in the dust. Packed with a lot of plot and action, the series would have been a sure thing as a TV series for the YA friendly CW network, like a teen Walking Dead or True Blood.

If the film survives the poxes and put-downs from fans, it will be due, in no small part, to the breezy charms of actor Alden Ehrenreich as Ethan. He has the looks of mid-1950s Tony Curtis and a goofy affability. Ethan likes a good laugh, but the easy-going Ehrenreich never winks to the camera. Leave that to Thompson, who seems as though she could break out in a giggle fit at any moment.

Photo credit: John Bramley

The biggest departure is that the baddies upstage the cursed couple. The bad girls have all the fun—and the best wardrobe, compared to Lena’s baggy long-sleeve blouses. Their glee is infectious, and that’s especially true for Lena’s wayward and vampy cousin Ridley (Emmy Rossum), a Southern belle Siren, who can make others think and do anything, especially inexperienced teenage boys. She first appears speeding through the countryside in her red BMW convertible, with her hennaed hair slicked back and Ray Bans on. She later morphs into Rita Hayworth from Gilda. She’s not only Old Hollywood ultra-glam, she makes evil joyous.

Directed by Richard LaGravenese
Rated PG-13
123 min.

You have to be in it: The 2013 Samsung K–12 “Return on Intelligence” Gift Programs have been announced by Samsung Techwin, a manufacturer of document cameras. The Superhero Program competition encourages students to prepare a 1–3 minute digital video (camera phone quality is acceptable) in which they portray their favorite historical character. The deadline for entries is May 31. The contest is opened to students in grades K–12 and the video will be judged on presentation performance, character and content accuracy, and content quality. The winner will receive $500 and the student’s class will get a SAMCAM 760 document camera.

To enter the Scholarship Program, high school students must write an essay of no more than 300 words in response to the question: What do you think about technology advancements and how they will change the way we learn in the future? Is it for the better? The deadline for submissions is May 15. Essays will be judged on the basis of original thinking, relevance to the real world, and writing quality. All applicants must be sponsored by a teacher. Five winners will be announced on May 31 and will receive a $1,000 award.

Under its 2013 Grant Program, ten teachers will each have the opportunity to win a SAMCAM 760 document camera for use in school by writing a fun lesson plan of 100 words or less in which they use the camera. The deadline for submissions is May 1, The top 20 finalists will then have to submit a video showing their lesson in the classroom using the SAMCAM 760. Ten winners will be selected on June, and their school district will also keep the camera.

Freebies

Teaching guide: Hurry up and get your free copy of Brother Sam and All That: Historical Context and Literary Analysis of the Novels of James and Christopher Collier (Clearwater Pr., 1999) from AudioGO. The lessons compiled in this companion teaching guide provide teachers and librarians with information about how to use historical fiction in the classroom—just what the Common Core Standards require—and tips for teaching the novels by James and Christopher Collier. AudioGO publishes audiobook and ebook versions of more than 50 novels by James and Christopher Collier, including the classroom favorite, My Brother Sam Is Dead. The first 100 people to email michell.cobb@audiogo.com will receive this teaching guide at no cost.

Publishing News

Trade picture books: This spring, Capstone Young Readers, an imprint of Capstone, is launching a collection of fully illustrated picture books. “We are excited to introduce a range of picture books in both paper-over-board and trade paperback formats,” says Ashley Andersen Zantop, Group Publisher and General Manager. “We believe that quality illustrated titles provide an important stepping stone to reading and an opportunity to inspire imagination, creativity, and a love for good books.” The titles and series scheduled for publication in February 2013 are: Flood by Alvara F. Villa, “Princess Heart” series written and illustrated by Molly Martin, “The Other Side of the Story” series by Nancy Loewen (classic fairy tales), and Charlotte Gullain’s “Animal Fairy Tales” series.

And more picture books: Hank Finds an Egg (ages 3–8) written and illustrated by Rebecca Dudley will be published by Peter Pauper Press in May 2013 as their initial venture into publishing children’s trade picture books for children. The wordless picture book tells the story of a young boy who finds an egg on the forest floor, helps it return to its home in a tree, and is rewarded by his new forest friends. Three additional titles are scheduled for publication: Bruce Arant’s Sheep Won’t Go to Sleep! (Fall 2013), Digby Differs by Miriam Koch (Fall 2013), and Sarra J. Roth’s Not the Quitting Kind (Spring 2014). If you’re a picture book author, Peter Pauper Press is accepting unsolicited submissions online, or you can send your manuscript to Mara Conlon, Senior Editor, Peter Pauper Press, 202 Mamaroneck Ave., White Plains, NY 10601.

Peter Pauper Press has been publishing gift books, references, travel guides, children’s activity books, and other products for adults since it was founded in 1928.

Children’s Lit Conference

Digital Lit: Librarians, teachers, and others who love books are invited to attend e-Looking Glass: Children’s Literature in the Digital Age, a full-day conference to be held at Carthage College Hedberg Library in Kenosha, WI, on April 13, that will explore “how books are being reinvented to create visual and interactive experiences that printed books cannot provide.”  Topics will include the changing landscape of texts (interactive ebooks, book apps, learning products, and online communities), how to integrate this new technology into the classroom, and the design and development of these new types of books. Among the speakers are Brandon Oldenburg, award-winning illustrator and co-founder of Moonbot Studios; Umesh Shukla, animation director and founder of Auryn, a digital publisher of apps; Denise Johnson, author of The Joy of Children’s Literature; William H. Teale, Professor of Education at the University of Illinois at Chicago; and others. Undergraduate continuing professional education credit is available. The cost to attend the conference is $65, and $40 for students. You can register online. The cost of one credit hour is $50; to view the syllabus, contact Marilyn Ward at mward@carthage.edu.

Photo by Hemera

Being out in the field, talking to teachers and librarians about the Common Core (CC), I’ve learned as much as I’ve taught. My world is often centered in my study (where I research and write), or in the graduate classes that I teach, or in the K–12 classrooms that I visit. In those spaces, I’ve learned, secondhand, about students being told they can only read an “L” or an “R” book—and how parents have demanded that libraries rearrange their collections from A to Z, according to carefully determined reading levels, so their kids can read totally non-frustrating texts. But it took being at a workshop out on Long Island, NY, for me to really understand the fundamental clash between guided reading and Common Core—something that many of you doubtless experience daily.

At the workshop, librarians spoke of their schools being, in effect, taken over by guided reading crews with their alphabet soup of labels and rigid instructions. That type of approach made absolutely no sense to me, so I did my homework. I learned that guided reading began as a good idea: breaking classrooms into groups by reading levels didn’t work since poor readers didn’t improve when they were clumped together, so teachers needed a new way to match individual readers, reading levels, and texts. So far, so good. Indeed, as one reading expert told me, providing a space, say 20 to 30 minutes daily, where, as part of the reading diet, a learner experiences clear sailing seems at worst harmless and at best a step toward success.

But this relatively benign approach has turned into an expensive program complete with minatory reading coaches who run around mandating to librarians what kids should be allowed to read. The second problem is that the steroidal guided reading monster is directly at odds with the Common Core.

As literacy expert Timothy Shanahan pointed out in “The Common Core Ate My Baby and Other Urban Legends,” a recent article in Educational Leadership, limiting students to below-frustration texts doesn’t necessarily help them (see, especially, “Legend 4: Teachers Must Teach Students at Frustration Levels”) nor does CC require all kids to tackle weighty tomes far beyond their previous reading ranges. In the early grades, where students are working to become fluent readers, CC doesn’t demand that they read more complex texts. And it’s precisely in that preK-to-2 band that learners may need some reading time where they don’t have to struggle. And that brings us to content.

The key clash between guided reading and CC is that those A-to-Z labels have nothing to do with content—they are about the ease of decoding. Starting in earnest in second grade, CC stresses that knowledge is a key part of literacy. This cuts two ways. Every elementary school librarian knows that a student who’s passionate about a subject isn’t daunted by the text’s difficulty—the multi-syllabic names of dinosaurs being a prime example. Curiosity drives readers on from one record, one wacky fact, one sports stat, one set of rules on how to care for pets, to another—and the text’s length or structure isn’t a formidable barrier. In turn, the Common Core standards emphasize that in order to read a student must identify details that add up to evidence and tap into modes of thinking that add up to argument and point of view. You can’t build those muscles without what librarians used to call “stretch,” or challenging, books.

Whether young people are on a sports team or practice an instrument, whether they play Minecraft or chess, they realize that to be good at something you have to work at it; you have to test your limits. Reading works the same way: you build muscles through confronting and overcoming a challenge, and you’re drawn to that challenge because you have a specific goal. We in library land know of many reading goals that appeal to students—books they want to tackle because they find them engaging, interesting, and exciting. Common Core adds the goal of preparing students for a successful life after school. That is the sort of guided reading that makes sense to me.

The album, inspired by their canoe trip down the Mississippi River, features original mostly folk, country, and bluegrass numbers enhanced by virtuoso performances on a variety of instruments, including accordion, auto-harp, rhumba box, fiddle, udu, drums, pots and pans, tuba, trombone, and many others. According to a recent review in School Library Journal, “this unique, outstanding musical performance should have a place in every library.”

The two childhood friends took a month-long journey on the Mississippi, but never dreamed that their voyage would take them to the Grammys. About to board a plane home to Minnesota, Mailander told SLJ, “We are thrilled that the recording academy chose our album to represent the quality music that’s being made in the children’s genre right now. All the nominees were deserving and we’re honored to be in such great company.”

Four other children’s albums were nominated for a Grammy this year by the National Academy of Recording Arts & Sciences in the Best Children’s Album category: Bill Harley’s High Dive and Other Things That Could Have Happened (Round River); the JumpinJazz Kids’s A Swinging Jungle Tale (JumpinJazzKids), narrated by James Murray and featuring Dee Dee Bridgewater, Al Jarreau, Hubert Laws, and various artists; Little Seed: Songs for Children by Woody Guthrie (Smithsonian Folkways), re-imagined renditions of classic Guthrie favorites by Elizabeth Mitchell; and the Pop Ups’s (Brooklyn-based music duo Jason Rabinowitz and Jacob Stein) Radio Jungle (CDBaby.com).

HEST, Amy. Charley’s First Night. illus. by Helen Oxenbury. Candlewick. 2012. ISBN 9780763640552. JLG Level: K : Kindergarten (Grades PreK–K).

Sometimes a character’s voice, is so strong it transcends the page and pulls at a reader’s heartstrings. Henry has that kind of voice. The little boy finds a stray puppy on a cold snowy day. “We were new together and I was very, very careful not to slip in the snow and I thought about his name. Charley. Charley Korn. My name is Henry. Henry Korn.” Later he brings the puppy home to his parents, and we hear that voice again, “I would be in charge of walking Charley, they said, and I couldn’t wait to walk Charley forever.” Henry wants his new friend to sleep in his room, but his folks have another idea―probably a good one, as the illustration shows the boy should have taken his pet for a quick walk. As the family makes a bed for their recent addition in the kitchen, Henry fits the nook with his own beloved bear and a tick-tock clock, which provides “another little heartbeat in the night.” Night falls and Charley howls when he wakes. Henry tries to follow his parent’s rules, but the puppy wants to sleep on the bed. When both friends get sleepy, the reader can predict the outcome. Oxenbury’s gorgeous illustrations are framed by a border, helping to pace the gentle tale that warms your heart, even in the cold of winter.

MARKLE, Sandra. Snow School. illus. by Alan Marks. Charlesbridge. 2013. ISBN 9781580894104. JLG Level: NEK : Nonfiction Early Elementary (Grades K–2).

Markle’s latest informational picture book focuses on weeks-old snow leopard siblings. Mother has left them unattended when the inquisitive male cub is nearly captured by a hawk. Lesson learned: “Outside the den, it’s a dangerous world.” The two cubs follow their mother over the course of a year as they witness survival lessons in their snow school. One day they will catch food for themselves, so they learn to be quick on their feet, guard their prey, and quiet while hunting. Told in simple narrative vignettes, Markles’s text is illustrated by watercolor scenes that vary from rough-housing between the cubs to the mother’s kill.

PRINGLE, Laurence. Ice!: The Amazing History of the Ice Business. Calkins Creek. 2012. ISBN 9781590788011. JLG Level: NE: Nonfiction Elementary (Grades 2–6).

Heavily sprinkled with primary sources, Pringle’s latest nonfiction work centers on the history of the ice business. Even in Caesar’s time, ice was brought from cold regions to cool a beverage. In 1805 Frederic Tudor lived on a pond in New York when he decided he could profit from shipping ice to the West Indies. Tudor hired Nathaniel Jarvis Wyeth who invented a horse-drawn ice cutter, making ice easier to harvest and transport. Icehouses sprang up along Rockland Lake to store the product for shipping. To lessen the chance of the ice melting, railroads were built to quickly get it to New York City. The ice business soon became an integral part of everyday life. With the invention of the icebox and ice delivery wagons, ice became more affordable for everyone. As an unexpected result, the invention of refrigeration hearkened the end of the ice harvesting industry. It took time to get electrical service across the country, so even until the 1950s, the ice man came. Today, ice festivals celebrate the carving of ice, but the giant icehouses that began it all stand empty or in ruins.

Pringle’s fascinating narrative is as clear as the ice he writes about. Readers will be amazed at the effort it took to bring the frozen commodity to their homes. Photographs, painted postcards, and vintage ice card signs bring a century-old industry to life.

WRIGHT, Johanna. Bunnies on Ice. Roaring Brook/Neal Porter. 2013. ISBN 9781596434042. JLG Level: K : Kindergarten (Grades PreK–K).

Time passes slowly when a champion ice-skater waits for winter to arrive. With a Christmas Eve-like feeling, an excited bunny runs with skates-in-hand to wake her parents for the first big circle around the ice. With scores of fans watching, bunny practices figure eights, leaps in the air, and pirouettes. Wright uses simple sentences to slow the pace of a beautifully illustrated family story. Heavily-textured oils on canvas flow across double-page spreads, allowing the reader time to examine the family’s activities. Humor is scattered throughout the story. The family “eats a balanced diet” while they roast marshmallows in the fire. Muscles are kept loose while playing in a bubble bath. A ballerina-skirted scarecrow looms over the family tending the garden. A perfect combination of art, humor, warmth, and text create a Caldecott-worthy read aloud.

For ideas about how to use these books and links to supportive sites, check out the Junior Library Guild blog, Shelf Life.

Junior Library Guild is a collection development service that helps school and public libraries acquire the best new children’s and young adult books. Season after season, year after year, Junior Library Guild book selections go on to win awards, collect starred or favorable reviews, and earn industry honors. Visit us at www.JuniorLibraryGuild.com.

Fans of Captain Underpants—and of rude, over-the-top humor—are in for a field day: The Adventures of Captain Underpants: The First Epic App (Scholastic; $4.99; Gr 2-6) offers awesome animation and engaging activities. First is the complete Book-O-Rama, here in high resolution and full color. Viewers can read the story or listen to Mike West’s spirited narration with added sound effects and musical accompaniment. Pages aren’t turned per se; a swipe of the screen slides the characters to the next page, or morphs the background into the next setting.

Games, manipulable message boards, and even those flip-o-rama pages found in the books are embedded in appropriate spots. (Readers can choose to engage in these activities or not.) A jump from one page to any other in the text is via a collapsible bar at the bottom of the screen, while a bar at the top allows children to return to the main menu, to select chapters, or to exit to a game. Avatars to help track game progress are easy to create, but with a tap of a button one will be created (and named) for viewers.

Screen shot from The Adventures of Captain Underpants (Pilkey)
©2013 by Dav Pilkey

Activities include hypnotizing Mr. Krupp with the 3-D Hypno-Ring, catching Captain Underpants in the Skate-o-Rama, or slinging underwear at robots and the diabolical Dr. Diaper in an attempt to annihilate them in the Stretch-O-Rama. Beat Box 2000 is a music-making machine; as Captain Underpants flies across the sky, he triggers ka-booms and other, (often uncouth), noises to one of three catchy beats. Users can record their own sounds if they prefer. The games take full advantage of the iPad’s capabilities, requiring the players to tilt and tap their way through various levels using different strategies; plenty of options keep the play fresh.

The app contains “no ads, no social media sharing, no in-app purchasing, no links to outside websites, [and] no location-tracking features.” With access to a full-length story, terrific animation, challenging activities, and loads of irreverent fun, this app will have fans cheering for the 16-year-old “Captain Underpants.”— MaryAnn Karre, West Middle School, Binghamton, New York 

American Indian Lit Awards: The American Indian Library Association, an affiliate of the American Library Association, has announced the winners of the 2013 American Indian Youth Literature Award in three categories—picture book, middle school, and young adult. The books selected “present American Indians in the fullness of their humanity in the present and past contexts.” The top Picture Book award went to The Christmas Coat: Memories of My Sioux Childhood (Holiday House, 2011) written by Virginia Driving Hawk Sneve and illustrated by Ellen Beier. The Honor awards in that category were nabbed by Saltypie: A Choctaw Journey from Darkness into Light (Cinco Puntos, 2010) written by Tim Tingle and illustrated by Karen Clarkson, Kohala Kuamo’o: Nae’ole’s Race to Save a King (2010) written by Kekauleleana’ole Kawai’ae’a and illustrated by Aaron Kawai’ae’a, Mohala Mai ‘O Hau = How Hau Became Hau’ula (2011, both Kamehameha Schools Pr.) by Robert Lono ‘Ikuwa with pictures by Matthew Kawika Ortiz, and I See Me (Theytus Books, 2009) by Margaret Manuel.

In the Middle Grade category, the award went to Free Throw (1999) and Triple Threat (1999, both Lorimer), by Jacqueline Guest, while Jordin Tootoo: The Highs and Lows in the Journey of the First Inuit to Play in the NHL (Lorimer, 2011) by Melanie Florence, and Awesiinyensag: Dibaajimowinan Ji-Gikinoo’amaageng (Wiigwaas Pr., 2010) by Anton Treuer et al. received Honors. Adam Fortunate Eagle’s Pipestone: My Life in an Indian Boarding School (Univ. of Oklahoma Pr., 2010) won in the Young Adult category, with Native Defenders of the Environment (7th Generation, 2011) by Victor Schilling (and others in the series) taking the Honor award.

Established in 2006 and given in even years, the award was created to honor the best writing and illustrations by and about American Indians. Be sure to check out the evaluation criteria and previous winners of the award.

2013 Gryphon Awards: Jason Chin’s Island: A Story of the Galapagos (Roaring Brook, 2012) has received the 2013 Gryphon Award, sponsored by the Center for Children’s Books at the Graduate School of Library and Information Science at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. The book presents the story of the evolution of an island and its plant and animal life over six million years. The $1,000 award, given annually, recognizes “an English-language work of fiction or nonfiction for which the primary audience is children in kindergarten through grade 4. The title chosen best exemplifies those qualities that successfully bridge the gap in difficulty between books for reading aloud to children and books for practical readers.” Two Honor books were also announced: Little Dog Lost: The True Story of a Dog Named Baltic (Penguin/Nancy Paulsen Bks., 2012), written and illustrated by Monica Carnesi, and Kate DeCamillo and Alison McGhee’s Bink and Gollie: Two for One (Candlewick, 2012), illustrated by Tony Fucile.

Children’s Book Committee Awards: The Bank Street College of Education announced the winners of the 2013 Children’s Book Committee Awards. Wonder by R. J. Palacio (Knopf, 2012) was received the Josette Frank Award. Palacio’s memorable story about ten-year-old Auggie, a boy with facial abnormalities, who attends public school for the first time, shows how the experience changes him as well as all of those he encounters. The Award, given annually since 1943 (originally called the Children’s Book Award) honors an outstanding fiction title “in which children or young people deal in a positive and realistic way with difficulties in their world and grow emotionally and morally.”

The Flora Stieglitz Straus Award for a nonfiction title was given to Doreen Rappaport’s Beyond Courage: The Untold Story of Jewish Resistance During the Holocaust (Candlewick, 2012), a chronicle of 21 courageous acts of defiance. National Geographic Book of Animal Poetry: 2000 Poems with Photographs that Squeak, Soar, and Roar! by J. Patrick Lewis, “an exuberant celebration of the animal kingdom and a beautiful introduction to this genre of literature,” won the Claudia Lewis Award. Established in 1998, the award is given for the best poetry book of the year.

The Children’s Book Committee is a nonprofit affiliate of Bank Street College of Education. The Committee was founded 75 years ago to “guide librarians, educators and parents to the best books for children published each year.”

Scholarships

The Association for Library Service to Children (ALSC), a division of the American Library Association (ALA) is offering two scholarships to students pursuing a master’s or advanced degree in children’s librarianship. The ALSC Bound to Stay Bound Books Scholarship, funded by Bound-to-Stay Bound Books, is an award of $7,000 that will be given to four candidates. The ALSC Frederic G.Melcher Scholarship, funded by contributions from librarians and others in the book world as a tribute to Melcher, consists of two $6,000 awards. Applicants must demonstrate academic excellence and leadership, be enrolled at an ALA accredited library school (U.S. or Canada) that offers a full range of courses in children’s materials and library services to children, must not have earned more than 12 semester hours towards an MLS/MLIS, and must take a position in the field of library service to children for at least one year after graduation. The deadline for applying for these two scholarships is March 1. Be sure to check out requirements and complete an application. The recipients will be announced at the ALA Annual conference in June.

Rare Books

First editions: The J.Willard Marriott Library’s Rare Book Division, Special Collections at the University of Utah has received first editions of Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland (1865) and Through the Looking Glass and What Alice Found There (1872) from an anonymous donor. The books are valued at $30,000. Charles Lutwidge Dodgson first made up the story of Alice’s adventures for Alice Liddell and her sisters and gave her the manuscript in 1864. His friend and novelist, Henry Kingsley, encouraged the author to publish the book. He expanded the manuscript from 18,000 words to 35,000 words and published it under the Lewis Carroll pseudonym. Four thousand copies were printed.

CC-licensed image by Flickr user schoeband

My 12-year-old son has spent this week getting ready for midterms. He’s working hard even though he knows, far better than I do, exactly what their weighted contributions to his final grades will be. He can name the percentage allotted to every single quiz, test, assignment, and extra-credit opportunity in all of his classes. And he claims that all he cares about is doing well enough to make the honor roll—no more, no less.

My eight-year-old, though, is taking piano lessons, and his teacher gave him the simple theme from Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony to practice, which gave me a reason to sit, transfixed, in front of an iPod and listen to the entire score. What I heard gave me the one good answer I can offer my sons for why grades really are not the point of education.

Give yourself a treat; go listen to the Ninth. You can’t help hearing how Beethoven plays with you—the music driving ahead with a martial air, you can almost sense the fife and drum of the people marching; now expectant as dusk; now soaring, reaching to and beyond the breaking point up toward sky, toward transcendence, toward Schiller’s “Ode to Joy” sung in the final movement:

Can you sense the Creator, world?
Seek him above the starry canopy.
Above the stars He must dwell.

Be embraced, Millions!
This kiss for all the world!
Brothers!, above the starry canopy
A loving father must dwell.

Can you sense the Creator, world?
Seek him above the starry canopy.
Above the stars He must dwell.

Joy, daughter of Elysium
Thy magic reunites those
Whom stern custom has parted;
All men will become brothers
Under thy gentle wing.

You usually hear the chorus sung in German, but I have recording of just the chorus in which Paul Robeson sings in English (slightly shifted to the political left, so it’s not about a Creator but rather the people united, “All for one and one for all”). When the chorus swells, it’s Robeson’s earth-rattling voice that I hear in my mind.

Beethoven masterfully braids together themes and melodies, so that you’re taken on an ever-winding journey upward. Robeson’s voice tells me the same story: everything is about creation. We put our children through their paces in school not so that they will learn something, or master something, or meet any standards. No. We give them tools so that they can experience the joy, the passion, of creating. All we are doing is saying, “Here, if you know this, there is more you can make; there is another path you can map; there is another song you can compose.” School—from pre-K to postdoc programs—exists so that we can all build more from within ourselves and with our colleagues.

Young people need training, so that they can become builders. In my Beethoven-induced reverie, I was thrilled to see this headline in the San Gabriel Valley Tribune: “Walnut High students build worlds in new academic program”. The article is about a school in California where 75 tenth graders have volunteered to work with three teachers, three periods each morning, to create a society from the ground up. As social studies teacher Justin Panlilio told a Tribune reporter, “Right now, the students are designing a world we call Atlantis. They have to build the government, cultural and economic structures that bind a society together.” Creation—that’s where school leads, not rote and grade percentiles.

My 12-year-old doesn’t have the patience to sit through an entire symphony. The soundtrack of his life is more immediate. But even as he put down one set of study guides and picked up another, he saw me beaming as I listened to the music. Perhaps there was a halftone of pity in his expression: poor old dad just didn’t understand what school life is really like. But I also caught a second of wonder. “Maybe, yes, maybe,” his eyes seemed to say, “there is a wild ocean ahead for me, not just these endless streams to cross.”

CLINE-RANSOME, Lesa. Light in the Darkness: A Story About How Slaves Learned in Secret. illus. by James E. Ransome. Disney/Jump at the Sun. 2013. ISBN 9781423134954. JLG Level: I+ : Independent Readers (Grades 2–4).

In an age when some kids drop out of school because they’re bored, it seems ironic that just over 100 years ago people of all ages risked their lives to learn to read. Rosa goes with her mother in the dark of night to learn her letters in a pit school. Pit schools were large holes covered in branches where slaves could hide while learning the alphabet. They could be whipped for every letter learned. Based on historical facts, the Ransomes weave an enlightening story about the thirst for knowledge.

DAVIDSON, Tish. African-American Scientists and Inventors. Mason Crest. 2013. ISBN 9781422223758. JLG Level: H35 : Series Nonfiction: History 3–5 (Grades 3–5).

Thomas Jennings received the first patent given to an African American for his dry cleaning process in 1821. When car traffic became a problem in the early 1920s, Garrett Morgan invented a crossing pole to regulate the vehicles. Mae Jemison was the first African American female astronaut to fly in space in 1992. In five short chapters, Davidson introduces African American scientists and inventors who made a difference in agriculture, industry, transportation, medicine, and aerospace. When George W. Carter’s crop rotation plan resulted in an excess harvest of peanuts, he invented 270 uses for them. Edison’s light bulb was short-lasting and expensive. Lewis Latimer succeeded in making a less expensive, longer-lasting carbon filament. In spite of racism, lack of education, and resources, these African Americans made important contributions to our history. Chapter notes, chronology, glossary, and resources support this informational text.

FRADIN, Judith Bloom and Dennis Brindell Fradin. The Price of Freedom: How One Town Stood Up to Slavery. illus. by Eric Velasquez. Walker. 2013. ISBN 9780802721679. JLG Level: NE : Nonfiction Elementary (Grades 2–6).

Husband and wife team up in an edge-of-your-seat picture book about a town that stands together to save one of their own. In spite of Ohio’s free state status, the Fugitive Slave Act allows slave hunters to capture runaways and return them to slavery for the reward money. Runaway and teacher John Price is in Oberlin, Ohio when Anderson Jennings and his team catch up with him. Thirteen-year-old Shake Boynton accepts $20 to help capture the fugitive. As the slave hunters take Price to nearby Wellington, they pass college student, Ansel Lyman, who runs to town for help. Hundreds of community members join in the fight to rescue Price. The narrative gets stronger when the Oberlin residents are arrested; a lone girl stands up for her teacher, “There is more goodness in his little finger than in your whole carcass!” The price of freedom in this town is three months in jail, but their release binds them together in a pledge, “No fugitive slave shall ever be taken from Oberlin either with or without a warrant, if we have power to prevent it.” Powerful illustrations accompany this amazing tale.

ORR, Tamra. Louis Armstrong. Mitchell Lane. 2013. ISBN 9781612282640. JLG Level: S68 : Series Nonfiction: Social Studies 6–8 (Grades 6–8).

Footnotes and short chapters combine for a brief introduction to a legend in America’s music history. From a night in jail to posthumous honors, jazz performer Louis Armstrong is portrayed as a man who blazed his own trail, never losing sight of his path. “Pleasing the people” was his way of life. He lived to make music, whether it was on the beat-up cornet he found for five dollars, or his last concert at the Waldorf Hotel.

Orr blends research with dialogue to make Armstrong’s story more accessible to readers of. “My belief and satisfaction is that, as long as a person breathes, they still have a chance to exercise the talents they were born with.” While the author doesn’t omit the hardships Louis faced (multiple marriages, poverty, lack of education and musical training), she paints a vivid picture of a man who was born to bring music to everyone around him. Chapter notes, selected works, and other back matter supplement the short chapters.

WINTER, Jonah. You Never Heard of Willie Mays?! illus. by Terry Widener. Random/Schwartz & Wade. 2013. ISBN 9780375968440. JLG Level: SE : Sports Elementary (Grades 2-6).

The award-winning baseball-loving team, Winter and Widener, is back with another grand slam. Willie Mays, the “Say-Hey Kid,” wanted to be the next Joe DiMaggio. Trouble was he lived in a time when major league baseball teams didn’t allow black men to play with white guys. Then in 1951, Mays got his chance. In his first bat at the Polo Grounds he hit a homerun. In 1954, the Hall of Fame-bound sportsman made a play that even today we still call “the Catch.” Fact-filled side bars add even more details about Willie and the records he broke. Beautiful acrylic illustrations allow readers to feel the tension in the game and the determination of a man who made a difference in the baseball’s history.

For ideas about how to use these books and links to supportive sites, check out the Junior Library Guild blog, Shelf Life.

Junior Library Guild is a collection development service that helps school and public libraries acquire the best new children’s and young adult books. Season after season, year after year, Junior Library Guild book selections go on to win awards, collect starred or favorable reviews, and earn industry honors. Visit us at www.JuniorLibraryGuild.com.

Photo: Stockbyte

Fans of baseball, football, and basketball, you all have something in common: it’s easy for you to tell what team is on the field, which one is off of it, and when players are changing their roles from offense to defense. In baseball, of course, three outs and the team at-bat retreats into the dugout, picks up its mitts, and trots back onto the field. In football, there are many variations and tricks of the trade. For example, a “hurry-up” offense is designed to move so quickly that the defense doesn’t have time to substitute fresh players onto the field. But in general, the exchange of players in our nation’s major sports is a slow and stately process that’s based on principles that kids learn when they first begin playing a particular game. There’s one sport, though, that’s totally different from the others—and I suspect it has a lesson to teach those of us in library land.

Unlike other sports, in hockey, players “change on the fly.” That is, a coach signals a group of players to jump onto the ice even as the others are whizzing off—the exchange happens in the middle of a play, as the puck is speeding down the ice. Hockey is such an exhausting sport that players only last a few minutes playing at full tilt, so a coach is constantly deliberating over whom to put in while trying to outguess the other coach’s moves. It’s a speeded-up, live chess match on ice.

I’m put in mind of hockey because of some recent developments in digital publishing. We’ve long known that Overdrive offers libraries subscriptions, rather than full ownership of books. Now Amazon has gotten into the act, offering its Prime members (who pay an annual fee) an ebook subscription. It strikes me that collection development is similar to the easy ebb and flow of offense and defense that I first described. A librarian knows her collection, sees where she needs to add titles, and from time to time, weeds those titles that have outlived their usefulness. But subscriptions are more like hockey.

In the digital subscription world, a librarian isn’t expecting her collection to remain the same for any length of time. She subscribes according to her current needs, knowing that the materials she has made available to today’s patrons may significantly change in the near future. For instance, she wants the latest and greatest of, say, news and financial databases. But in a subscription model, the constant churning and turnover isn’t just a matter of adhering to the latest dateline. A librarian may gain, or lose, an entire chunk of her collection as her subscription funding comes and goes, or as publishers’ digital policies change, or as patrons’ favorite digital devices shift.

What if we embrace a library model that’s part baseball and part hockey? What would such an arrangement look like? Print books, and some databases, would move in and out of the library at a leisurely pace, similar to ballplayers taking and leaving the field between innings. But digital subscriptions would constantly change on the fly: with new materials in, the old out, and the librarian playing the role of a highly tactical hockey coach, constantly matching ever-changing needs to ever-evolving resources. If that’s the case, the question isn’t “What do you own?” it’s “What do you need this very second?”

I can imagine a two-sport library, but there’s one caution. As you hockey fans well know, there’s one thing that can stop the rapid change of lines: when the game itself stops. The NHL and its players spent much of 2012 embroiled in a battle over money, and as a result, the players lost more than half of the current season. The one real danger in a subscription model is that it could break down totally and publishers could turn to some completely different plan. Well, if that happens, then librarian-coaches will just have to change partners and dance—on the fly.

This year’s theme was “You’re Reading WHAT?!?!” Students age 19 or under were asked to create a short video about a time when an adult tried to censor something they were reading, or about a book-banning incident in the news that involved young people. There are 12 videos among the semifinalists, and voting is easy. The video with the most “likes” will be declared the People’s Choice winner. The deadline for casting votes is February 15 at 5 p.m. EST. The People’s Choice Award-winner will receive a Certificate of Free Expression Excellence from the NCAC.

While the public is choosing their favorite, a stellar panel of judges will be hard at work choosing the grand prize, second place, and third place winners. This year’s judges include Kirby Dick, a documentary director and Academy Award-nominee (The Invisible War), National Book Award-winner and frequently challenged author Sherman Alexie (The Absolutely True Diary of A Part-Time Indian (Little, Brown, 2007)), Cecily von Ziegesar (author of the oft-banned “Gossip Girls” series (Little, Brown)), Onion AV Club National Associate Editor and pop culture maven Tasha Robinson, Kristen Fitzpatrick of Women Make Movies, and 2011 YFEP Film Contest winners Jake Gogats and Caitlin Wolper. Winners will receive $1,000, $500. and $250 respectively and a trip to New York City to attend the Youth Voices Uncensored event. All winners will be announced by the end of February, so check NCAC.org for updates. Get voting now!

Books for GLBTQ Youth

A Rainbow: Forty-nine books from 31 publishers have been selected by the Rainbow Project for their 2013 Rainbow Book List, a project of the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, and Transgender Round Table (GLBTRT) and the Social Responsibilities Round Table (SRRT) of the American Library Association. To make the final selection, the committee evaluated over 150 books for youth, from birth to age 18, published between July 2011 and December 2012. The titles run the gamut from science fiction to fiction to graphic novels, among other genres. The committee notes that there is a dearth of nonfiction titles for any age being published, “including memoirs and history so vital to tying a culture together.” The complete list can be accessed at the GLBTRT website.

The following are the top ten titles: Starting from Here by Lisa Jenn Bigelow (Amazon, 2012), Beautiful Music for Ugly Children by Kirstin Cronn-Mills (Flux, 2012), The Miseducation of Cameron Post by emily m. danforth (HarperCollins, 2012), Ask the Passengers by A. S. King (Little, Brown, 2012), Adaptation by Malinda Lo (Little, Brown, 2012), The Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller (Ecco, 2012), The Letter Q: Queer Writers’ Notes to Their Younger Selves edited by Sarah Moon (Scholastic, 2012), Chulito: A Novel by Charles Rice-Gonzalez (Magnus Bks., 2011), Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe by Benjamin Alire Saénz (S & S, 2012), and Drama by Raina Telgemeier (Scholastic, 2012).

Publishing News: New Imprints

Algonquin Young Readers is a new imprint being created by Algonquin Books for readers ages 7 to 17. The books will run the gamut from short illustrated novels for beginning readers to topical young adult novels. The first list will launch in Fall 2013 with five novels. There will be three title for middle grades—The Time Fetch by Amy Herick, Three Ring Rascals, Book 1: The Show Must Go On by Kate and M. Sarah Klise, and Anton Cecil: Cats at Sea by Lisa and Valerie Martin. If You Could Be Mine by Sara Farizan and Hollis Seamon’s Somebody Up There Hates You are the two young adult titles. The imprint plans to grow to the point where it will publish 15 titles each year and include some nonfiction books with their primarily fiction list, according to Elise Howard, editor and publisher of Algonquin Books for Young Readers.

Amazon Children’s Publishing is launching two new imprints—Two Lions and Skyscape—in Spring 2013. Picture books, chapter books, and middle-grade fiction will be published under the Two Lions banner, with Margery Cuyler as editorial manager, while Skyscape will focus on young adult titles under the leadership of Tim Ditlow.  According to Amazon, Two Lions—one representing the past and the other the future—“is committed to forming strong, creative relationships with authors and illustrators to bring originality of design and literary quality to readers.” Skyscape plans to bring “a wide range of stories with unique voices, compelling narratives, and intriguing perspectives to readers.” Two Lions’s inaugural titles Ininclude Gandhi: A March to the Sea by Alice B. McGinty, Poco Loco by J. R. Kraus, and Slugger by Susan Pearson. The titles for teens are Me & My Invisible Guy by Sarah Jeffrey, Reason to Breathe by Rebecca Donovan, and You Know What You Have to Do by Bonnie Shimko, among others.

Ebook Lending

A new model: Ingram Content Group has added a new content access model to its MyiLibrary e-content platform. The Access Model, designed to help libraries make their ebook lending more flexible, lets libraries “purchase a set of access credits for an ebook and lend it simultaneously to multiple patrons for a set cost and lending period.” This multi-user platform assures library patrons that they will have access to popular titles. “Patron usage of ebooks continues to climb,” noted Dan Sheehan, vice president and general manager, Ingram Content Group Library Services, “and the addition of our new multi-user concurrent Access Model gives libraries the flexibility to meet the content requirements of their patrons and manage budgets effectively.”

The MyiLibrary platform currently offers nearly 40,000 titles from leading publishers and can be accessed 24/7. Random House has just announced that it will be adding more than 36,000 frontlist and backlist titles to MyiLibrary from all Random House Inc. imprints and their publisher-distribution clients, including National Geographic, Smithsonian Books, and Wizards of the Coast, and others.

ARNOLD, Caroline. Too Hot? Too Cold?: Keeping Body Temperature Just Right. illus. by Annie Patterson.  Charlesbridge. 2013. ISBN 9781580892766. JLG Level: SCE : Science Nonfiction Elementary (Grades 2-6).

Written in a voice that speaks directly to the reader, Arnold’s text presents facts about body temperature. “You have a layer of fat under your skin. It is like a built-in blanket that helps protect your body and keep it warm.” The author introduces various behaviors that influence natural temperature, such as weather, clothing, and location. Glossary and author’s note provide supplemental nonfiction text features.

MARKLE, Sandra. The Long, Long Journey: The Godwit’s Amazing Migration.

illus. by Mia Posada. Millbrook. 2013. ISBN 9780761356233. JLG Level: NEK : Nonfiction Early Elementary (Grades K-2).

In picture book format, Markle and Posada tell a story about the 7,200 mile migration of a godwit. Hatching in an Alaskan summer, the bird learns to fly, catch its food, and develop its defenses. In October, it will make a long, nonstop journey to New Zealand. Young readers will enjoy the narrative lilt of the text, while older children will appreciate the numerous facts. Appended information, including an author’s note, round out the nonfiction features. Beautiful collage and watercolor illustrations communicate one bird’s lifecycle in migration.

MARTIN JR., Bill. I Love Our Earth / Amo nuestra tierra. illus. by Dan Lipow. Charlesbridge. 2013. ISBN 9781580895569. JLG Level: PS : Primary Spanish (Grades K-3).

Full-color photographs illustrate a poetic tribute to the seasons of the earth and times of the day. This bilingual picture book uses simple language to convey an introduction to nature. Panoramic views depict mountains and seas. Kids of all ages and cultures illustrate the meaning of each line. This simple overview of a child’s world makes it a good selection for even preschool storytimes.

NELSON, Kadir. Nelson Mandela.  HarperCollins/Katherine Tegan. 2013. ISBN 9780061783760. JLG Level: BE : Biography Elementary (Grades 2-6).

Much-loved and respected author/illustrator Kadir Nelson gives children an up-close-and-personal look at Nelson Mandela. From the tight shot of Mandela on the cover to the final shot of the world leader’s fist in the air, powerful images punctuate this introduction to the life of the first black president of South Africa. Expressive verse allows the author to convey a young boy who saw injustice and vowed to make a difference. A must-have for your picture book biography collection.

For ideas about how to use these books and links to supportive sites, check out the Junior Library Guild blog, Shelf Life.

Junior Library Guild is a collection development service that helps school and public libraries acquire the best new children’s and young adult books. Season after season, year after year, Junior Library Guild book selections go on to win awards, collect starred or favorable reviews, and earn industry honors. Visit us at www.JuniorLibraryGuild.com.

We’re just a few days away from the most important announcement in the world of children’s literature. Awarded every year by the American Library Association, honors like the Newbery and Caldecott Medals are highly coveted by kid lit authors and illustrators. And while libraries all over the country have organized mock awards programs in recent months where participants choose their favorite books as possible Newbery and Caldecott winners, not much has been heard about the other top prizes that will bestowed early on January 28. School Library Journal editors and contributors took a stab at naming a few titles that might just win one of these—lesser publicized, yet still highly sought after—Youth Media Awards.

The Coretta Scott King Awards are given annually to one outstanding African-American author and to one African-American illustrator of books for children and young adults who demonstrate an appreciation of African-American culture and universal human values.

“Two possibilities for the Coretta Scott King illustrator award—for their sheer stunningness and timeliness—are Shane W. Evans for his We March (Roaring Brook), and Kadir Nelson for his artistic representation of Martin Luther King Jr.’s I Have a Dream speech (Random),” effusively says Joy Fleishhacker, former SLJ book review editor and frequent contributor.

For the author award, Daryl Grabarek, editor of SLJ’s Curriculum Connections newsletter and SLJ’s “Touch & Go” blog, has great hopes for Vaunda Micheaux Nelson’s No Crystal Stair: A Novel in Documents, Based on the Life and Work of Lewis Michaux, Harlem Bookseller, illustrated by R. Gregory Christie (Carolrhoda). “This stunner is a lens onto New York City and African-American history, but so much more, including a look at feisty individual whose life was changed by his books, and whose work in turn, helped others realize their dreams,” she says.

Already a Boston Globe-Horn Book Award winner, it could be a shoe-in for a Coretta Scott King—and possibly even a Newbery, Grabarek notes.

The Odyssey Award is given to the producer of the best audiobook for children and/or young adults, available in English in the United States. Phyllis Levy Mandell, SLJ managing editor and Multimedia Review editor, has her heart set on the audiobook versions of Libba Bray’s The Diviners (Listening Library) or Laura Amy Schlitz’s Splendors and Gloom (Recorded Books). Both titles are serious contenders, she says.

The Pura Belpré Awards are presented to one Latino/Latina writer and one Latino/Latina illustrator whose work best portrays, affirms, and celebrates the Latino cultural experience in outstanding works of literature for children and youth.

Shelley Diaz, assistant editor of SLJ’s Book Review anticipates that narrative award will go to either Guadalupe McCall Garcia for her Odyssey retelling, Summer of the Mariposas (Lee & Low) or Margarita Engle’s novel in verse The Wild Book (Houghton Harcourt), both past Belpré winners. Diaz adds, however, that The Revolution of Evelyn Serrano (Scholastic), written by Sonia Manzano (best known as Sesame Street’s “Maria”) might surprise everyone.

The Robert F. Sibert Informational Book Medal is awarded to the author(s) and illustrator(s) of the most distinguished informational book published in the United States in English.

SLJ Executive Editor Rick Margolis and Contributing Editor Rocco Staino both think that Steve Sheinkin’s Bomb (Roaring Brook) could take this top nonfiction award. Barbara Kerley’s Those Rebels, John & Tom (Scholastic) also made Staino’s contender list.

Mahnaz Dar, editorial assistant of SLJ’s Book Review, is going the slithery slimy route, choosing Nic Bishop Snakes (Scholastic) for the Sibert. “Bishop also deserves some kudos for his dedication—he was actually bitten several times while photographing his subjects,” she says. “How many nonfiction writers can boast about bite marks in the service of their craft?”

The Schneider Family Book Award is presented to an author or illustrator for a book that embodies an artistic expression of the disability experience for child and adolescent audiences.

The title that automatically comes to mind when discussing this award, hand down, is Wonder by R. J. Palacio (Random), Grabarek says.  An SLJ Best Book of 2012, the touching middle grade novel has tugged kids’ heartstrings since its publication date. Grabarek also chose it as her school library’s book club pick; now there’s a waiting list read it, with more copies on order. “The writing and characterizations are superb, and there’s a lot here for kids to ponder and talk about—which they’re eager to do,” she argues.

Staino also says Jepp, Who Defied the Stars (Hyperion) by Katherine Marsh might have a shot.

The Stonewall Book Award recognizes works with exceptional merit relating to the gay/lesbian/bisexual/transgender experience.

Diaz and Dar are in agreement when it comes to the novel that will dominate this category: A. S. King’s Ask the Passengers (Little, Brown). “It captures the voice of a smart, sensitive teen perfectly,” says Dar. Diaz adds, “This novel is not only about romantic love, but loves of all kinds: for your family, for your friends, for even strangers. Most importantly, it’s about loving yourself, even though you’re still not sure who that self is yet.”

Other SLJ favorites for the category include two debut works, E. M. Kokie’s Personal Effects (Candlewick) and Emily M. Danforth’s The Miseducation of Cameron Post (HarperCollins). Chelsey Philpot, SLJ’s associate editor of Book Review, is crossing her fingers that the latter will pull ahead for the win.

The Theodore Seuss Geisel Award goes to the author(s) and illustrator(s) of the most distinguished American book for beginning readers published in English in the United States

Mo Willems usually walks away with this prize, and his Let’s Go for a Drive! (Hyperion) just might take it again this year, staffers say. But there are a few fervent fans for beloved author/illustrator Kevin Henkes. “I can’t think of a more charming introduction to reading than Penny and Her Doll. Penny is an endearing, appealing character whom children will adore,” shares Dar.

Fleishhacker can’t decide between the two. “I really like both of these titles for their solid writing, the way that the artwork and the narrative work in harmony to tell the story, their originality, and the way that they are both entertaining and extremely accessible for beginning readers,” she says. “Both of these titles will encourage and stand up to repeated reads—certainly an essential element for a beginning reader.” Diaz hopes that the dark horse, Sonya Hartnett’s pitch-perfect Sadie and Ratz (Candlewick) will be the last easy reader left standing.

Stay tuned to the live streaming webcast announcements on Monday, January 28. Or check our Youth Media Award coverage via Twitter and SLJ.com.

Financial literacy and entrepreneurship: Are any of your students ages 7 to 16 budding entrepreneurs? Well, it’s time to encourage them to create a new business idea for the Second Annual Secret Millionaires Club “Grow Your Own Business Challenge.” There are ten questions and two optional questions that participants must answer such as: How did you come up with your business idea? Who will your customers be? What goods or services will your business sell? How much money do you need to set up your business and how will you raise it? How will you sell and market your goods and services? What makes your new business product or service different from other businesses out there? How can your business have a positive effect on a community? The competition is opened to individuals or teams of two to four students. Make sure to check out the contest’s rules and access the entry form. Entries must be submitted by February 15, 2013.

Four individual finalists and two team finalists will present their winning ideas to Warren Buffett and a panel of judges in Omaha, NE, in May 2013. A teacher who inspired the finalists in creating their business idea can join them and win up to $1,000. A grand prize of $5,000 will be awarded to one individual and one team.

The Secret Millionaires Club is an animated series featuring the voice of financial guru Warren Buffet mentoring a group of kids who encounter and solve financial and business problems. The series currently features 20 short online webisodes and two TV specials. The Secret Millionaires Learn & Earn Learn & Earn Program teaches financial literacy and entrepreneurship. The program offers materials for educators and parents to extend the financial lessons into classrooms.  In March 2013, there will be a new 22-epsode TV series launching on the HUB cable network.   

Minigrant Program

Programs that inspire: The Ezra Jack Keats Foundation, established by the late Caldecott award-winning children’s book author and illustrator, is offering 70 minigrants of $500 each to teachers and librarians in public schools and libraries who submit proposals for a program that fosters “creativity, cooperation and interaction with a diverse community.” There’s a video tutorial and a gallery of past recipients that you can check out. Once you design and plan the program, there’s a short application form to complete and submit by March 15, 2013. Recipients of the grants will be notified beginning May 15th.

The Ezra Jack Keats Foundation supports arts and literacy programs in public schools and libraries across the country. This is the 25th year that the Foundation is offering the minigrant program.

Publishing News

Randomhousekids.com: Random House Children’s Books has redesigned and re-launched their website to help kids and their parents learn about dozens of Random House favorite brands and series (Dr. Seuss, “Magic Tree House,” “Junie B. Jones,” “A to Z Mysteries,” “Dragon Keepers,” “Five Ancestors,” etc.) as well as new books. The site also features author interviews, and kids can have fun with book-related games and activities.

The redesign incorporates two new features: “Book Finder” and “For Parents.” Parents and kids can search for books based on a variety of criteria—age, genre, subject, etc.—using “Book Finder, while the “For Parents” section includes blog posts on topics ranging from how to be a good storyteller to the use of audiobooks with reluctant readers. “It’s a fantastic resource for parents and a destination for their children to have fun interacting with our authors and books in a safe environment,” noted Linda Leonard, Random House Children’s Books’ executive director of digital marketing.

Children’s book publishing: The Book: The Essential Guide to Publishing for Children, published by The Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators (SCBWI) is an updated edition of the SCBWI Publications Guide. The 300-page revamped book, an essential tool for children’s book writers and illustrators, features current articles about the children’s book publishing industry on topics such as maximizing social media, creating book trailers, independent publishing, and promotion. The “Market Survey” lists editors, art directors, and key personnel at all the publishing houses. There’s also “The International Market Survey,” “The Book Reviewers Directory,” “The Agents Directory,” and “Edited By,” a new feature that offers a history of editors’ recent acquisitions. The Book is available online and in hard copy to SCBWI members.

It’s Magic: Ruth Chew’s 29 tales of magic and fantasy, written in the 1970s for elementary graders, will be reissued by Random House Books for Young Readers beginning in the fall of 2013. According to the press release, Chew “made magic available to younger readers before any other author.” New cover art will be created, but the original artwork will be retained for the interior illustrations. Each season, two titles will be released in collectible hardcover and paperback editions as well as ebook versions. In time for Halloween 2013, No Such Thing as a Witch and What the Witch Left will be published. Each season, a collection of three stories will also be released. The first one, in fall 2013, will include The Witch’s Buttons, The Witch’s Garden, and Witch’s Cat. Looking ahead to spring 2014, The Trouble with Magic and Magic in the Park will be reissued.

Spanish-language titles by Latin American publishers.
Photo by Sujei Lugo

Librarians who serve children in predominantly Latino communities were shocked this past December to read a New York Times article claiming that there is a dearth of Latino characters in books written for young readers—a notion that is at odds with their own experiences. In fact, they tell School Library Journal, there is actually a wealth of resources currently available to these kids, and librarians have the power (and the responsibility) to make those meaningful connections.

“When I first started as a librarian 27 years ago, there was very little out there,” admits Tim Wadham, director of the City of Puyallup Public Library, WA, and its Spanish-language collection as well as author of SLJ’s bi-monthly Libro por libro column of K–12 books and programming centering on the Latino experience. “There were some books available from Spain, but nothing that spoke directly to the kids that I was working with. There weren’t that many Latinos writing at that time.”

However, there has finally been a sea change for this population of readers, Wadham argues. “Now, there’s an explosion of very talented authors, writing in English, Spanish, and bilingually,” he tells SLJ.

Lucia Gonzalez, Pura Belpré Honoree for her bilingual The Bossy Gallito (Scholastic, 1994), agrees. “Quality children’s books have been published for decades, especially since the ‘90s boom,” she says.

Raising the Profile
The problem, Gonzalez notes, is a lack of visibility. These award-winning titles “unfortunately…just don’t get into the mainstream market. Instead of being displayed with the ‘regular’ books, they’re set apart,” she says. “Until we make our books an integral part of children’s literature, they are not going to be noticed. We have to make them visible.”

Pura Belpré Honor book by Lucia Gonzalez

Gonzalez, who is also current chair of ALA affiliate REFORMA’s Children’s Roundtable, says she is disappointed in this continued misrepresentation of Hispanic-focused kid lit in mainstream media, a situation that REFORMA is still working to resolve. Since 1971, the group has sought to bring attention to books written by or about Latinos and, in 1996, created the annual Pura Belpré Award, co-sponsored with ALSC, to single out Latino(a) writers and illustrators who affirm and celebrate the Latino cultural experience in outstanding works for youth.

Oralia Garza de Cortes, co-founder of the Award and past president of REFORMA, recalls that one of the principal motivations for establishing the Pura Belpré was because of the lack of literature for her children and patrons that she experienced as a librarian in the late 1980s.

“Ironically, fast forward 30 years…we have the award and better books, but no one knows about them,” she tells SLJ. “That’s why we created the Celebracion event at ALA Annual, where the winning titles are presented—in order to acculturate, or conscientizar other librarians.”

And as the United States population continues to grow more diverse—with Latinos being the most represented minority at 16%, according to the 2010 census—librarians continue to be instrumental in meeting the needs of the communities they serve. Many develop and create their collections according to their changing neighborhoods.

“How wise are librarians that they want to see all groups represented in their collections? They go the extra mile and work with the small presses,” REFORMA past president Loida Garcia-Febo tells SLJ.

Each Community’s Needs
Librarians serving predominantly Latino communities know how important it is for kids to have access to books about their culture, written and/or illustrated by those that share similar ethnic backgrounds.

“Latino authors serve as roles models to Latino aspiring authors,” notes Sujei Lugo, a former media specialist at an elementary school at the University of Puerto Rico who is currently pursuing her PhD in Library Science at Simmons College. While serving her young students, she purchased many supplemental titles in Spanish and English, plus bilingual editions, from Latin American publishers. For many kids, these books offer an alternative history not usually taught in schools, or often relegated to specific holidays or Heritage months, she says.

“Kids have to see themselves as part of the American story,” says Andrew Jackson, director of the Langston Hughes branch of Queens Library.

Yet Jackson also believes it’s even more important for children who have never seen a person of color to have access to these kinds of books. “All children have to expand their worldview, especially those kids who’ve only ever seen negative and/or inaccurate portrayals of Latinos or African Americans on television or in the media,” he explains. “[These books] can tear down stereotypes.”

Adds Lugo, “These books speak about diversity, acceptance—important messages for all kids.”

Wadham is also concerned that books with Latino themes or characters be made more accessible to all kids, and not unfairly pigeon-holed or ghettoized. “I don’t think…a reader should be limited to reading books in [one’s] own culture,” he says. “Kids should be able to read everything; it doesn’t matter where that kid is from or what culture they belong to. It’s good literature, regardless of cultural content.”

Elizabeth Burns, NJ youth services librarian and SLJ blogger, agrees. “We as industry leaders should point to and promote these titles…Our role is to connect the right book to the right reader,” she says. “If a child is looking for a family-themed book, why can’t we offer Julia Alvarez’s How Tia Lola Comes to (Stay) Visit (Knopf, 2001)? These titles are for everyone.”

And, notes REFORMA president Denice Adkins, “Most of our children’s books are about universal themes of childhood—love, fear, growing up. These are topics all children can relate to.”

Expanding the Market
Beyond raising visibility for these wonderful books, many are working to expand the market even further for these diverse voices—and librarians are leading the charge, even at the publishing level.

Garcia-Febo, for example, actively encourages presses large and small to produce stories about Hispanics that portray “the true Latino experience,” in every skin color, economic status, and tradition. “And, from personal experience,” she tells SLJ, “I can say that publishers actually listen.”

She also urges Latino professionals who are already in the publishing industry to continue to promote and foster Latino talent, and cites Marcela Landres as a great mentor to burgeoning authors.

Despite the large selection now available to today’s kids, there has actually been a slight decline in the number of children’s books being published for Latinos recently, according to the University of Wisconsin’s Cooperative Children’s Book center—a distressing report, says Adkins.

That means children’s book publishers should be actively looking to cultivate even more Latino authors and illustrators to create new works, Gonzales tells SLJ.

Notably, librarians wield great influence when dialoging with publishers due to their immense buying power, blogger Burns tells SLJ. “When we talk to publishers at conferences or via social media, it should be a two-way street,” she says. “We have to let them know that these books are popular with our students. ‘If you publish them, we will buy.’”

And within ALA, librarians of any background should strive to become active in the many ethnic library associations, such as Asian Pacific American, American Indian, and the Black Caucus, Garcia-Febo says. “This is a complex issue and we must continue to bring it to the table, not only among ourselves, but also everyone in our community: nonprofit organizations, celebrities, and government agencies,” she says, adding that the more people involved in the cause, the more successful it could be.

Broadening Horizons
For those librarians who want to learn more about how to better serve the Latino community, there are many additional resources available.

Jaime Naidoo, past chair of the Pura Belpré award and organizer of the biennial National Latino Children’s Literature Conference, encourages all library science graduate students to take classes that focus on working with underserved communities and multi-cultural groups. He also urges experienced librarians to continue their professional development in much-needed areas of the study—like this one. The conference, he notes, is a great place to start.

Meanwhile, Lugo praises several Latin American publishers that already produce books about Hispanic children in everyday situations, instead of the cultural emphasis that is prevalent in many books and series currently in print. Venezuela’s Ediciones Ekaré offers bilingual and Spanish-language editions; Editorial de la Universidad de Puerto Rico publishes primarily Puerto Rican authors; and Spain’s Editorial Hotel Papel offers the Libros para crecer en igualdad series, which includes titles that encourage children ages 3–8 to break away from stereotypes and racism.

Librarians’ mission to create lifelong readers and learners has not changed, and reluctant readers, Latino or not, often need a connection to the story to be drawn in. Naidoo describes an unforgettable story-time event with award-winning Latina author/illustrator Yuyi Morales. “A mom came up to me after a Día program in a public library,” he says. “Her daughter never pays attention during story hour, but was transfixed because the author looked just like her. She had her light bulb moment.”

These kinds of eye-opening experiences illustrate the deep and ongoing need for books with Latino characters, a need that has has been articulated for decades by youth librarians, affirms Wadham.

Fortunately, “it has finally become part of a national conversation, which is a good thing, because these are good books,” he says. “We’ll soon see the day that a novel by a Latino will win the Newbery Medal.”

BARNETT, Mac. Chloe and the Lion. illus. by Adam Rex. Disney/Hyperion. 2012. ISBN 9781423113348. JLG Level: HE : Humor Elementary (Grades 2-6).

Mac, the author, and Adam, the illustrator, argue over which character is better for scaring poor little Chloe―a lion or a dragon. A war over the story line ensues. Which is more important―the art or the text? When Mac fires Adam for not following directions, “my-friend-Hank” is hired. The former artist is quickly eaten by Hank’s lion. Little Chloe saves the day by setting them all straight, telling the author, “You’re the writer. Adam is the illustrator. We all add something to the story.”

Barnett’s humorous tongue-in-cheek tale is charmingly illustrated with clay figures of the picture book’s creators, and cartoon-type characters for the remaining players. Using a stage as the story’s backdrop, and balloons for its text, sets the artwork apart from similar books this year. It’s a tale of friendship and teamwork in an unusual mixed-format effort that is a pleasure to read.

BARNETT, Mac. Extra Yarn. illus. by Jon Klassen. HarperCollins/Balzer & Bray. 2012. ISBN 9780061953385. JLG Level: K : Kindergarten (Grades PreK-K).

“In a cold little town, where everywhere you looked was either the white of snow or the black soot from chimneys, Annabelle found a box filled with yarn of every color.” So begins the tale of one little girl who made a difference. She knit a sweater for herself; she still had yarn left. She knit a sweater for her dog, and still had some left. Annabelle knit sweaters for everyone and everything she met, except for Mr. Crabtree. She made him a hat. “Things began to change in that little town.” When the archduke tried to buy the never-ending yarn from the little girl, she refused to sell. So he stole it.

Klassen’s artwork brings Annabelle’s black and white world to life. With pops of color punctuating the simple digital-and-ink shapes, the meaning of the magical yarn materializes. Use of darkness when the archduke steals the box shows the meanness of the act without being too scary for its intended audience. Though the story is moralistic, the charm of the illustrations and the happy ending produce a picture book that is sure to be a classic, regardless of whether it wins the gold.

BUZZEO, Toni. One Cool Friend. illus. by David Small. Dial. 2012. ISBN 9780803734135. JLG Level: P : Primary (Grades K-1).

“Elliot was a very proper young man,” so it’s no surprise that he liked penguins. “In their tidy black feather tuxedos with their proper posture, they reminded Elliot of himself.” During a visit to the zoo, he slips a live penguin into his backpack. (He asked permission, of course.) Unbeknownst to his preoccupied father, Elliot’s new pet skates on a pond in his room, eats anchovy pizza, and swims in the family bathtub.

From turtle-patterned pajamas and footstools, to boxes of caramel candy and diagrams in the father’s office, the illustrations complement the text while hinting at the surprising outcome. Small adds a smattering of color to his simply sketched ink drawings, which along with the use of bubble captions lighten the serious tone of the dialogue between father and child. s. A perfect blend of the visual and text make it an excellent choice for story time. Readers will laugh at the tuxedoed duo’s adventures and shout “read it again” at its conclusion.

COLE, Henry. Unspoken: A Story from the Underground Railroad. Scholastic. 2012. ISBN 9780545399975. JLG Level: P : Primary (Grades K-1).

While doing her chores, a young girl discovers someone hiding in the family’s barn. Without saying a word, each person takes food to the uninvited guest. After a slave-hunting party arrives, the visitor disappears, leaving behind a cornhusk doll dressed in the napkin material as a sign of thanks.

Cole uses charcoal and pen line drawings to illustrate this wordless picture book. In a style reminiscent of Brian Selznick, character close-ups reveal the tension in the story. Readers will feel the family’s fear when the hunting party arrives. They will worry when the runaway peeks through a knot hole. Seeing the Big Dipper through the bedroom window will fill them with hope that the slave will find a safe place to rest. An author’s note shares family stories and background history about the details included in the illustrations.

FOGLIANO, Julie. And Then It’s Spring. illus. by Erin E. Stead. Roaring Brook/Neal Porter. 2012. ISBN 9781596436244. JLG Level: K : Kindergarten (Grades PreK-K).

A dedicated young boy and the animals that live around him diligently wait for seeds to sprout. In well-planned phases, readers feel the slow-moving track of time as the season of brown lingers on. He plants his seeds. He waters them. A silent chorus of anxious planters stares at the dark earth waiting for green to break through. A rainy day brings a sunny one, and with it, green. “All around you have green.”

Stead’s woodblock printing techniques brilliantly tone down the anxious wait for spring. Kids will linger over the details. A turtle uses a magnifying glass to better see the emergence of a sprout. Rabbit watches for the carrot seeds to push through the soil. Even the dog waits for his buried bones to grow. Spring bursts into view on the last double page spread, just like the seeds that were sown. Another winner for Stead and a first-winning book for Fogliano.

STEAD, Philip C.. Bear Has a Story to Tell. illus. by Erin E. Stead. Roaring Brook/Neal Porter. 2012. ISBN  9781596437456. JLG Level: K : Kindergarten (Grades PreK-K).

Winter is swiftly approaching, and bear is getting sleepy, but first he has a story he wants to tell. Mouse doesn’t have time for a story; he has seeds to gather. So Bear helps his friend instead. Duck has to get ready to fly south, so Bear checks the wind’s direction. Frog needs to find a warm place to sleep for the winter, so Bear digs a frog-sized hole. The first snowflake falls, but Bear still hasn’t told his tale. When spring arrives and his friends return, Bear is delighted to remember that now he has time to tell his story. Sadly, he can no longer recall what he wanted to say. In cyclical fashion, his friends prompt him, and the story ends as it began.

Gold medal team of Stead and Stead pair up again in this star-studded effort (2 stars and a Kirkus Editors’ Choice Award). The camaraderie of the characters is skillfully painted in their faces and mannerisms. The gentleness of the big bear is believable in his efforts to help his friends, while putting his needs last. The lesson of the story (shall we say, Golden Rule?) is gently woven between the text and illustrations, allowing the reader to absorb the message with little effort.

For ideas about how to use these books and links to supportive sites, check out the Junior Library Guild blog, Shelf Life.

Junior Library Guild is a collection development service that helps school and public libraries acquire the best new children’s and young adult books. Season after season, year after year, Junior Library Guild book selections go on to win awards, collect starred or favorable reviews, and earn industry honors. Visit us at www.JuniorLibraryGuild.com.

Granted

Día grants: The February 1 deadline to apply for twelve $5,000 mini-grants to help libraries incorporate Día into their programs is fast approaching. The mini-grants, part of the Association for Library Service to Children’s (ALSC) Everyone Reads @ your library grant, are funded by the Dollar General Literacy Foundation and are intended to help libraries start a Día Family Book Club Program. These awards will be given ‘to libraries that demonstrate a need to better address the diverse backgrounds within their communities.” In addition, ALSC will be able to use funds from these grants to create a Día Family Book Club Toolkit that libraries can easily access. Be sure to check out requirements and complete the application soon.

Día is “a nationally recognized initiative that emphasizes the importance of literacy for all children from all backgrounds. It is a daily commitment to linking children and their families to diverse books, languages and cultures.”

Author Lauren Oliver

You Have to Be in It…

YA writing contest: HarperCollins and Figment are sponsoring a young adult writing contest, and bestselling author Lauren Oliver (“Delirium” series) will be the judge. The contest’s theme is “Write a story in which love is dangerous,” and it’s open to 13 to 21 year olds. To enter, aspiring authors must visit www.figment.com (“a community where you can share your writing, connect with other people who love to read, and discover new stories and authors”) and register for free. They should post an original story of no more than 1,500 words by clicking “Publish Now.”

Entries will be judged based on quality, creativity, and relevance to the theme. All stories must be submitted by March 3, and one grand prize winner will be selected by May 1. The winner will receive airfare for two to New York and two nights in a hotel, a day at HarperCollins, have the piece published on Teen.com: a “teen and tween website and source for celebrity and entertainment news, freebies and giveaways, exclusive video interviews, red carpet style, TV recaps, movie reviews, new music, and funny viral videos,” and be offered a one-year unpaid columnist position with Teen.com.

Tech Award: If you are a media specialist in a primary or secondary school and have teamed up with a teacher to plan and execute a great collaborative project involving technology, you have until February 28 to apply for the SIGMS (Special Interest Group for Media Specialists) Tech Innovation Award. SIGMS is the special interest group for school library media specialists within ISTE (International Society for Technology in Education). Make sure to check out the rules and the nomination form. Entrants must describe the collaborative technology innovation project, explain how the administration supported the project’s objectives, describe how the project could be expanded or improved in the future, and provide data collected on the impact of the project. Winners will receive complimentary registration and a traveling stipend to ISTE’s annual conference, $1,000 for the school media center, a $300 professional library, and more.

Nature writing contest: Big Universe is sponsoring a Nature Writing Contest for K–8 students in schools that subscribe to the company’s ebook reading, writing, and sharing platform. The focus of the contest is on the Common Core Literacy Writing and Literacy Language Standards. According to Big Universe, its “literacy website provides a ready-made library of cross-disciplinary informational and literary leveled texts from today’s best publishers with tools for self-publishing, sharing, assessment, and account management.” One of the aspects of the platform is an online writing and publishing tool—and that’s what students must use to enter the contest. Kids must create a book of no more than 200 words that includes some aspect of nature using the authoring tool on the company’s WRITE section. Entries are published to the teacher’s account for review and submission. All entries must be submitted by February 28 and will be accepted in three age groups: grades K–2, 3–5, and 6–8. A winner for each bracket will be announced on March 15, and their books will be published on the Big Universe website.

Sweepstakes tech package: The CDW-G and Discovery Education’s 2013 Win a Wireless Lab Sweepstakes is open to employees of accredited public, private, and parochial schools. Between now and May 3, participants can enter once every day to win some great technology for their schools: an Epson projector, a Xerox multifunction printer, or a Sony Notebook computer—or one of two grand prizes consisting of 20 notebooks or tablets, an interactive white board, three wireless access points, a notebook cart, a document camera, student response systems, and a printer from CDW-G as well as a $5,000 digital media grant from Discovery Education. The grand prize winners will be randomly drawn by May 9 from all eligible entries made during the entire term of the contest. Be sure to check out all the rules and go to the Win a Wireless Lab Sweepstakes page and click on the Enter to Win button. Educators can find out more about the sweepstakes by following Win a Wireless Lab on Pinterest, @WinWirelessLab on Twitter, or Facebook.

HARTMAN, Rachel. Seraphina. Random, 2012. ISBN 9780375966569. JLG Level: FH: Fantasy/Science Fiction. High (Grades 9-12).

Newcomer Rachel Hartman brings an exciting dragon adventure to the list of possible contenders. Already a winner on numerous best lists, Seraphina is a fantasy novel about a half-dragon heroine who lives in a land where a treaty was made with the dragons 40 years ago. When the prince is found beheaded, villagers are quick to blame the powerful creatures. Seraphina must risk revealing her own identity in order to save the kingdom from those who wish the peaceable agreement to end. Romance, political thriller, mystery, and coming-of-age genres combine in this high fantasy.

Leaving the ending open for a sequel, readers of all kinds will devour this new addition to the star-studded year.

KELLY, Jacqueline. Return to the Willows. illus. by Clint G. Young. Holt. 2012. ISBN 9780805094138. JLG Level: A+ : Intermediate Readers (Grades 3-5).

Over a hundred years after its original publication, Kenneth Grahame’s Wind in the Willows (Methuen, 1908) gets a sequel. Written in an amazingly-similar style, Kelly brings back some of our favorite characters in one hilarious adventure after the other. Supplemented by footnotes to translate the English language into American, readers will cheer when Toad is saved once again, and worry as his friends encounter trouble after trouble. New characters enter the Willows (Toad’s nephew) and a once-enemy (Sammy the weasel). The whole story leads to a rousing and satisfying conclusion. Young’s gorgeous illustrations complement the tale.

Kelly begins with an admonishment to read the original before you start. Check your shelves to be sure you have it for your students who will certainly want to read it after they read Kelly’s homage―if not before.

LIN, Grace. Starry River of the Sky. Little, Brown. 2012. ISBN 9780316125956. JLG Level: A+ : Intermediate Readers (Grades 3-5).

A companion to Where the Mountain Meets the Moon (Little, Brown, 2009), Starry River of the Sky begins with a runaway boy who finds work in a village inn. Rendi is harboring secret troubles, but he seems to be the only one who notices that the moon is missing from the village’s sky. He begins to piece things together―missing moon, and also missing sons. When a mysterious guest visits, Rendi joins in her nightly storytelling, and he finds a way to make peace and restore the things that are lost.

Beautiful illustrations, stories-within-stories, and a flowing narrative make Starry River a standout. Though fans of the first work may jump at the chance to read Lin’s latest, newcomers will want to read this one too. Perfect for reading aloud.

MACLACHLAN, Patricia. Kindred Souls. HarperCollins/Katherine Tegen Bks. 2012. ISBN 9780060522988. JLG Level: A : Intermediate Readers (Grades 3-5).

Long known for her heart-wrenching stories, MacLachlan doesn’t disappoint with her newest prairie story. Eighty-eight-year-old Billy has a special bond with his ten-year-old grandson, Jake. Every day they walk the farm where Billy grew up. “Kindred souls, we are,” he says. One day a stray dog makes himself at home with Billy―just about the time that he gets sick. Before he goes to the hospital, Jake promises to rebuild his grandfather’s sod house. The whole family joins in the project, binding them together and granting Billy’s request.

Though the sad ending is inevitable, the magic of the dog’s appearance and the joy found in rebuilding the sod house keep the story from being too painful for young readers. MacLachlan gives the reader hope.

For ideas about how to use these books and links to supportive sites, check out the Junior Library Guild blog, Shelf Life.

Junior Library Guild is a collection development service that helps school and public libraries acquire the best new children’s and young adult books. Season after season, year after year, Junior Library Guild book selections go on to win awards, collect starred or favorable reviews, and earn industry honors. Visit us at www.JuniorLibraryGuild.com.

The books also make excellent resources for Black History Month and can be used year round to enhance civil rights and multicultural studies. Keep them on hand to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom and Dr. King’s iconic “I Have a Dream” speech on August 28.

Belle, the Last Mule at Gee’s Bend.  By Calvin Alexander Ramsey and Bettye Stroud, illustrations by John Holyfield. Candlewick. 2011. Reinforced Trade Edition $15.99. ISBN 978-0-7636-4058-3.

Gr 1-4—In this fact-based tale, elderly Miz Pettway tells young Alex about the important role played by her mule in the struggle for civil rights in her poor African American community. Far from fancy, “but strong and steady, and stubborn,” like the Alabama town’s humble inhabitants, Belle hauled a wagonload of “Benders”—empowered by a visit from Dr. King—on a day-long trip to Camden to register to vote, and later on, was summoned to pull the farm cart bearing the great man’s casket through the streets of Atlanta. An accessible and affecting look at history, told in down-to-earth language and illustrated with lush acrylic paintings.

I Have a Dream. By Martin Luther King, Jr., illustrations by Kadir Nelson. w/CD. Random/Schwartz & Wade. Trade $18.99. ISBN 978-0-375-85887-1; Library Edition $21.99. ISBN 978-0-375-95887-8; ebook $10.99. ISBN 978-0-375-98772-4.
Gr 2 Up–Insightful, articulate, and heart-stirring, Dr. King’s famous oration is as inspiring today as when first delivered in front of the Lincoln Memorial 50 years ago. Nelson’s majestic oil paintings provide a magnificent accompaniment to an excerpt from the speech, showcasing broad scenes of the historic gathering, captivating close-ups of the speaker, and uplifting images that visually convey Dr. King’s dream of “a beautiful symphony of brotherhood.” 

March On! The Day My Brother Martin Changed the World. By Christine King Farris, illustrations by London Ladd. Scholastic. 2008. Trade $17.99. ISBN 978-0-545-03537-8.

Gr 1-5—Writing with unassuming eloquence, Farris provides a compelling look at the March on Washington, effectively balancing fact-filled descriptions of events with unique personal perceptions and pride for a brother who was able to “…touch so many people in such a big way.” London’s painterly illustrations provide you-are-there snapshots that both portray the historical setting and convey the participants’ soaring emotions.

Martin’s Big Words: The Life of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. By Doreen Rappaport, illustrations by Brian Collier. Hyperion. 2001. Trade $19.99. ISBN 978-078680714-7; pap. $7.99. ISBN 978-1423106357.

Gr 2-5—This picture book biography pairs spare paragraphs about Dr. King’s life and achievements with pertinent and profound quotations taken from his writings and speeches. Imbued with the sharp-edged shapes and luminous colors of a stained-glass window, Collier’s breath-taking watercolor and cut-paper collage illustrations combine realism with heart-lifting spirituality. A beautifully written and visually striking introduction to the man and his world-changing wisdom.

Martin Luther King Jr.: A King Family Tribute. Angela Farris Watkins, editor. Abrams. 2013. Trade $18.95. ISBN 978-1-4197-0269-3.

Gr 4 Up–Memories, stories, and reflections about “ML,” as he was called by his relatives, are paired with never-before-published family photos in this scrapbook-style tribute. A celebration of life that is warm, personal, and inspiring.

My Uncle Martin’s Words for America. By Angela Farris Watkins, illustrations by Eric Velasquez. Abrams. 2011. Reinforced Trade Edition $19.95. ISBN 978-1-41970022-4.

K-Gr 4—Told from the perspective of his young niece, Angela, this inviting picture book describes how Dr. King used “words of love” to fight for change. Watkins’s crystalline first-person narrative introduces watershed moments in the Civil Rights Movement, highlights Dr. King’s role as leader, and incorporates phrases from his speeches. Presented in bold lettering, terms such as “nonviolence,” “justice,” and “brotherhood” resound throughout the text and are explained with child-friendly definitions and examples. The realistic paintings dramatically depict events with a mix of vivid action scenes and elegant portraits. Watkins’s companion volume, My Uncle Martin’s Big Heart (Abrams, 2010), also handsomely illustrated by Velasquez, provides an intimate and affectionate look at Uncle M.L. through the eyes of a child.

We March. By Shane W. Evans. Roaring Brook/Neal Porter. 2012. Trade $16.99. ISBN 978-1-59643-539-1; ebook $9.99. ISBN 9781466810846.

PreS-Gr 3—The members of an African American family rise at daybreak, pray and make preparations at their church, and journey to Washington D.C. to join with individuals from diverse cultural backgrounds in a hope-filled “march to justice,/to freedom,/to our dreams.” Told in simple first-person plural text and illustrated with radiant double-page paintings, this powerful picture book reels in young readers and makes them part of an historic moment.

What Was Your Dream, Dr. King? And other Questions about Martin Luther King Jr. by Mary Kay Carson, illustrations by Jim Madsen. Sterling. 2013. Trade $12.95. ISBN 978-1-4027-9622-7; pap. $5.95. ISBN 978-1-4027-9045-4.

Gr 1-4—Utilizing an inviting question-and-answer format, Carson presents an overview of Dr. King’s life, endeavors, and beliefs, providing historical context with clear explanations of segregation and defining moments in the civil rights movement. Straightforward and accessible, the text is sprinkled with primary quotes and accompanied by sepia-toned paintings.

Recovery grants:

You Have to Be in It…

Free audiobooks: To promote its new distribution partnerships, Findaway World, the maker of Playaway, Playaway View, and Catalist Digital, is giving away three $1,000 Playaway starter collections to schools. Media specialists and teachers can visit the website, complete a short survey, and enter for the chance to win one of these great audiobook collections. One school will be selected to receive a starter collection each month, from March through May.

Playaway audio content comes preloaded in circulation-ready media players. Playaway’s new distributors include Mackin Educational Resources, Perma-Bound, Children’s Plus, Baker & Taylor, Classroom Library Company, Delaney Education, Bound To Stay Bound, Central Programs, and AV Café. Each distributor will offer various titles from Playaway’s collection of 17,000 titles. Findaway World will continue its longstanding distribution relationship with Follett Library Resources and Follett Educational Services.

Programming

Arts and humanities awards: Libraries are encouraged to apply for the National Arts and Humanities Youth Program (NAHYP) Award, an initiative of the President’s Committee on the Arts and the Humanities in partnership with the National Endowment for the Arts, the National Endowment for the Humanities, and the Institute of Museum and Library Services. The deadline is February 4. Be sure to check out eligibility requirements before completing the application. Twelve winners will be selected to receive a $10,000 grant. In addition, 38 finalists will receive a Finalist Certificate of Excellence. The award will be presented by First Lady Michelle Obama at a ceremony at the White House.

Programs should be in place for at least five years and “offer sustained and consistent out-of-school or afterschool opportunities for young people to engage hands-on with the arts or humanities.” After-school and out-of-school arts and humanities programs sponsored by museums, libraries, performing arts organizations; educational institutions (e.g., preschools; elementary, middle, and high schools; universities; and colleges), arts centers, community service organizations, businesses, and eligible government entities can submit an application.

Industry News

Professional development: After recently acquiring the assets of Maupin House, a publisher of more than 200 professional resources on literacy topics for K–12 educators and administrators, Capstone has launched Capstone Professional. This new professional development service will include onsite and online training webinars, books, and ebooks. Among Maupin House’s bestsellers are “Caught’ya! Grammar with a Giggle” series by Jane Ball Kiester; Razzle Dazzle Writing  2001) by Melissa Forney; and the CraftPlus K–8 Writing Program, a curriculum aligned to the Common Core Standards. Capstone is a leading publisher of children’s books, digital products, and literacy programs.