Valley News – Newspaper of the Upper Valley is one of the only newspapers online right now that is running the news of Trina Schart Hyman’s death at age 65. She passed away from recurring cancer. Trina Shart Hyman won the Caldecott Medal for Saint George and the Dragon and has received the Caldecott Honor Award twice. Her illustrations are vivid, evocative, and magical.

Children’s books take new look at Thanksgiving offers a look at two of the new Thanksgiving books from this year. First is Thanks and Giving by Marlo Thomas and friends, followed by The Firefighters’ Thanksgiving.

A Reuters.com article on Disney purchasing the assets of CrossGen, the comic book publisher of 26 titles. Disney owns about half of the nonmanga comic book business in the world.

Muppets.com
The Muppets now have a new website that is filled with information on their new ventures. So it may not be literature for kids, but they did just redo The Wizard of Oz muppet style!

FamilyFun: Thanksgiving 2004 offers all sorts of Thanksgiving fun for children and their parents, including crafts, recipes, and games. Some of the crafts may be appropriate to use in a library setting and the coloring sheets are an easy way to offer something seasonal to patrons.

MPR: Minnesota writer Pete Hautman wins National Book Award
Pete Hautman has won the National Book Award for young people for his novel, Godless.

The New York Times Best Illustrated Books for 2004
The NYT offers a slide show with sample art from the top ten illustrated children’s books of this year. Winners include Kevin Henkes, Chris Rashka, and Leo and Diane Dillon.

TheStar.com – Kids’ lit can compete, GG winner says
Kenneth Oppel offers these thoughts on books and other media:
“The pleasures you get from a book are so different from the pleasures you get from a movie,” the boyish looking Oppel said.
“A book is longer, it’s more involved, it’s more intimate and I think it’s longer lived than the pleasures you get from TV or movies. The two happily co-exist. They’re not mutually exclusive.”
Via places for writers.

Author builds empire with friendly spider
This is an article on David Kirk, author and illustrator of the Miss Spider series, which has also become a TV show on NickJr.