Jesse Klausmeier

Librarians, publishing professionals, writers, and children’s literature scholars gathered on Friday, October 4, at Simmons College in Boston to celebrate the three winners and eight honorees of the 47th annual Boston Globe-Horn Book Awards, which honor excellence in children’s literature in three categories: picture book, fiction and poetry, and nonfiction. Author Jesse Klausmeier, who uses a cane to walk, started the night on an upbeat note when she took to the podium and explained that she had leaned on Horn Book Editor-in-Chief Roger Sutton only because “I just wanted some nice man candy on my arm.” In her speech , she thanked her publisher, her family, and Reading Rainbow’s Levar Burton—to whom the book is dedicated— for making possible Open This Little Book (Chronicle, 2013), an honor winner in the picture book category.

Jonathan Bean

The picture book winner, Jonathan Bean, spoke movingly about how he wrote and illustrated Building Our House (Farrar, 2013) while battling Lyme disease. His speech was a love letter to the family and friends that helped him through his five-year ordeal, which involved countless doctors’ visits, frustration, and him moving back to his parents’ home when his health became too precarious. His large immediate family was in the audience to support him. The nonfiction winner and honorees spoke of their research for their titles. Honoree Christy Hale described her book Dreaming Up: A Celebration of Building (Lee & Low, 2012) as a “celebration of ways young and not so young build.” Her fellow honoree Andrea Davis Pinkney, the author of Hand in Hand: Ten Black Men Who Changed America (Disney, 2012), gave a shout out to librarians: “Thank you to all of you in this room who put books in the hands of young readers.” And Robert Byrd, who won the award with Electric Ben: The Amazing Life and Times of Benjamin Franklin (Dial, 2012), told the audience how as a child, he honed his illustrating skills by copying pictures from classic picture books such as Munro Leaf’s The Story of Ferdinand (Viking, 1936).

Roger Sutton & Rainbow Rowell

Rainbow Rowell, the winner in the fiction category, had the audience roaring as she told them how she pitched Eleanor & Park (St. Martin’s Griffin, 2013) to her agent as a story about “two kids in a truck driving away from everything that hurt them.” She spoke with humor and honesty about how difficult writing her second novel was. “I wrote for three months in free fall.” Even when her work was so heart-wrenching it made her feel ill, Rowell kept going, she said, because, “The only things worth doing are the things you’re afraid of.” The Boston Globe-Horn Book Awards were established in 1967. Winners are selected by a panel of judges, which this year included Horn Book reviewer and Vermont College of Fine Arts instructor Sarah Ellis, children’s librarian Pamela Yosca, and retired school librarian Karen Kosko. Winning and honor books must be published in the United States, but their authors and illustrators can be from any country. A complete list of the winners and honorees can be found on the Horn Book website, where videos and images of the awards ceremony will also be posted.