Kathy Ishizuka

Ten longlisted titles are all newcomers to the National Book Awards and include three debuts. 

Bloomsbury, Free Spirit Publishing, Lee & Low, Little Brown, and Scholastic are among the publishers represented in our update of guidelines enabling educators and librarians to read books aloud online. Publishers can submit their policies to SLJ for inclusion in our COVID-19 Publisher Information Directory.

Seven months of learning loss. That’s the impact wrought by the pandemic, and low-income, Black, and Latinx children stand to suffer the most. Some cities are adapting the pod concept, working with community partners to serve at-risk students.

"Now is an especially critical time to inform readers," writes Kathy Ishizuka, SLJ editor in chief. "That means publishing stories centered on the people who power libraries and schools. We are here for it, and we hope you are, too."

“He taught me that it is OK to get into ‘good trouble,’ and we all have a moral obligation to speak up and fight against injustices,” says school librarian K.C. Boyd. We remember Rep. John Lewis, including his full address at the 2016 SLJ Summit.

While we're rethinking everything, how would you better serve youth in your community? SLJ is supporting a project to devise a new, crowdsourced vision for libraries. 

Here are the most popular blog posts of the week.

With schools shuttered due to the pandemic, are kids still reading? They are, according to data from Follett. Here are the top 25 lists for ebooks and audiobooks for grades K–3, 3–6, 5–8, and young adult titles.

For educators, a lot has changed amid a global pandemic—and at the same time, much hasn’t.