Audio book award.
Honor Books
Curse of the Blue Tattoo by LA Meyer
Elijah of Buxton by Christopher Paul Curtis
I’m Dirty by Kate & Jim McMullen
Martina the Beautiful Cockroach by Deedy
Nation by Terry Pratchett
Award Book
Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie (YES!!!!)
New Talent Award
Shandra Strickland for Bird (HOORAH!)
Illustrator Honor Books
We Are the Ship by Kadir Nelson
Sean Qualls for Before John Was a Jazz Giant
Jerry Pinkney for The Moon Over Star
Illustrator Award Book
Floyd Cooper for The Blacker the Berry
Author Honor Books
Hope Anita Smith for Keeping the Night Watch
Joyce Carol Thomas for The Blacker the Berry
Carol Boston Weatherford for Becoming Billie Holiday
Author Award Book
Kadir Nelson for We Are the Ship
Best Young Children
Piano Starts Here The Young Art Tatum by Robert Andrew Parker
Best Middle School
Waiting for Normal by Leslie Connor (YEAH!!!!!!)
Best Teen
Jerk, California by Jonathan Friesen (Ooo! Haven’t read this one!)
Forgive my miss-spellings and the items I miss, I’m doing this live from the webcast.
Adult books with teen appeal. 10 books chosen each year.
City of Thieves
Dragons of Babel
Finding Nouf
Good Thief
Just After Sunset
Mudbound
Over and Under
Oxford Project
Sharp Teeth
Three Girls and Their Brother
Each year Publishers Weekly asks children’s booksellers to vote on a wide variety of categories. They include favorite picture book and favorite novel of the year. But it gets much more interesting that that!
How about most innovative book? The book you wish everyone would shut up about? Book you were happiest to see back in print?
Click through the see the answers. I’m amazed that I agree with so many of their responses!
The 2009 Scott O’Dell Award has been announced. The winner is Chains by Laurie Halse Anderson which is definitely one of the favorites for the Newbery which will be announced next Monday.
Harry Hungry! by Steven Salerno
Harry’s tummy begins to rumble and he starts to howl with hunger. His mother rushes to him with a snack but he calls for more! Blueberries, cookies, and he still wants more. He toddles to the fridge – tips it on its side and gobbles it all right down. He heads outside, eats the flowers, the hose and the mailbox. And he is still hungry! What will it take to get this baby to stop eating everything in sight?
Expect delighted expressions when Harry tips the refrigerator on its side. The book moves from what seems to be a conventional story about a hungry toddler to a wonderful wild ride with a toddler eating ever more spectacular things. The tone switches with ease from a funny toddler story to almost a Godzilla-style rampage.
Salerno’s illustrations are a delight with their thick lines and bright colors that will project well to a group of children. Read this one last at a story time about snacks and you will have them eating out of your hand!
Appropriate for ages 3-6 with older children appreciating the humor most of all.
Same Difference by Siobhan Vivian
Emily feels like a third wheel now that her best friend Meg has a boyfriend. So when Emily gets the chance to attend a summer art program in Philadelphia, she decides to go even though she has never considered herself a real artist. Emily’s summer is split between the big city and her suburban home. She discovers new things about herself and makes a new best friend, Fiona, who is also an artist. Emily’s friendship with Meg and her relationship with her family suffer as she realizes that she is changing while everyone at home is staying the same. This is a book about finding who you really are when you don’t know who in the world that is.
Vivian’s tone here is perfection. Readers see the world through Emily’s eyes and by the end of the book are understanding that Emily is not seeing things as clearly as she first thought. The book could easily have been one of an artist fleeing their suburban roots, but Vivian makes it much more than that as Emily realizes that home and the past are vital pieces of her too.
The book has just enough tension to keep things interesting but never moves into melodrama or excess. There is a natural rhythm to the book, making it all ring true. Vivian’s characterizations are also nicely done, with even secondary characters shown as complex and surprising.
Highly recommended, this novel will appeal to many teens who see themselves as not fitting in with their background or family or friends. It is a classic dilemma faced by adolescents that is captured in a wonderfully drawn novel. Appropriate for ages 13-17.
The LA Times has a fascinating article on the real reason that Disney is not continuing the Narnia series on film. Essentially it is a matter of money, both in marketing and in their relationship with Walden Media. I love seeing the drama behind the drama.
The good news for fans of the films (and I wasn’t a fan of Prince Caspian) is that a third film deal may be announced as early as the end of this week. Voyage of the Dawn Treader is the next in the series and should be a swashbuckling good time. I consider the first three books the easiest to make into film. The others look very daunting.
