The Horn Book has a nice collection of reviews of great new children’s holiday titles:  Holiday High Notes.  There are certainly enough titles here to fill up a sleigh and keep a whole bunch of naughty or nice children happy for hours. 

My Buddy, Slug by Jarrett Krosoczka.

This is the rather strange but ultimately wonderful story of Alex whose best friend is Slug.  They do everything together all day long and at first it is fun, but then it gets to be a bit too much for Alex.  Finally, when Slug is sleeping over, Alex complains to his mother.  But Slug overhears and is crushed.  Eventually, after being very lonely, Alex finds a way to apologize to his friend and repair the damage. 

At first, I was a little worried about the premise of a boy having a huge orange slug for a friend, but Slug is really a warm lump of a friend who is completely lovable if a little annoying.  It turns out that using Slug as a friend makes the story more accessible and less judgmental.  The friendly, cartoon-style art is fun and vibrant.  I enjoyed Slug’s comments and l-o-n-g stories as well. 

This one is a lot of fun and can make for an interesting addition to bug storytimes or friend units.  It is appropriate for preschoolers and kindergarteners, but could be used for slightly older children to start a discussion on friendships.

It’s Kind of a Funny Story by Ned Vizzini.

It is always amazing when you read a book by a known author and it is entirely different in tone and writing from their previous book.  Vizzini, author of Be More Chill, a sparkling teen book on being cool, reaches a new depth in this novel. 

Craig works very hard to get into the prestigious Executive Pre-Professional High School, but once he succeeds he becomes more and more depressed, until he is barely getting out of bed and spends his days with his best friend smoking pot.  One night when his depression gets to be too much for him and he seriously contemplates suicide, Craig calls the suicide hotline and is told to go to the hospital.  It is there in the mental hospital that Craig learns about what he really wants and needs. 

Taking clinical depression and making it kind of funny, this book is a marvel.   Vizzini succeeds in making Craig a complicated protagonist who can be related to by all readers.  Add to that a non-stereotypical supportive family as well as vivid mental patients and you have a real world for the reader to be part of.  Craig is witty and sarcastic.  He is so well written that seeing the world through his eyes is large part of the joy of the story. 

Recommend this book to teens looking for something a little dark.  They will find that books about depression do not need to be tragedies.  Teens who enjoy humor will also find a great read here. 

School Library Journal has an interesting article about OST, out-of-school time, which is a school term that directly asks places like public libraries to offer quality programs for children outside of school.  I like that the emphasis is on providing fun for school-aged children.  Many public libraries are already doing this sort of programming.  In fact, I did exactly this sort of thing years ago in the first public library I worked in.  Quality time and programming for latchkey children. 

The Braid by Helen Frost.

There is some poetry that reads complete with rhyme and a galloping rhythm, and then there is poetry like this book where the word play and skill is so skillfully done that it is almost invisible to the reader.  

This is the story of the intertwined lives of two sisters who are caught in the exodus from Scotland in the 1850s and escape into two very different lives that, like the poems that make up the story, are separate but braided together.  Jeannie leaves Scotland for Canada with her mother, father, younger sisters and baby brother.  Sarah stays with her grandmother, moving to an island in the Outer Hebrides.  The two girls slowly grow up apart from one another and often unable to communicate in any way, though they remain connected by a braid of both their hair that each girl carries. 

The stories of the girls are in turn tragic, amazing and typical of so many people forced to leave their homelands.  The skillfulness of Frost’s poetry makes their situation all the more moving.  Once readers finish the book and reach the explanation of the poetic forms, they will find themselves turning back through the poems and marveling at what happened right in front of them but they were unaware of.  It is amazing skill to write this well, but to do it with a limitation of form that doesn’t ever seem to limit the writing is simply remarkable. 

Red Fox at McCloskey’s Farm by Brian J. Heinz and Chris Sheban.

Now this is one that I should save for Poetry Friday, but I just can’t!  I read this to my sons last night and had both of them listening intently all the way to the end, even though the older one had not started out listening at all. 

Red Fox is sneaking onto Farmer McCloskey’s farm to steal chickens, but as he heads in, he runs into the hound dog and then the farmer suspects there is trouble.  With so much unwanted attention, what’s a fox to do? 

The joy of reading this book aloud is twofold.  First is the poetry of the book itself.  Unlike a lot of poetic picture books for children, this one does not shy away from using beautiful words that will stretch listening children’s vocabularies.  This is something I look for in children’s poetry.  Poetry is language and to simplify it too much is to lose some of its power.  This poetry retains its imagery and power, allowing the listener to ride along carried forward by the flow of the language.  But the success of the book is also in the illustrations which are classic in one sense but almost riotously funny in the other.  The dreamy fox pictures where he is thinking of the juicy chicken capture the beauty of nature and the fox himself.  They are luciously and deeply colored.  But the illustrations of the pop-eyed hens and also the one of the farmer on his back in the pig sty are laugh-out-loud funny and zany. 

What a book!  Poetic phrasing and language combined with modern yet classic illustrations.  Share this one with children today!  You will love the language and kids will adore the fold-out pictures that will let them see even more.

You and Me, Baby by Lynn Reiser and Penny Gentieu.

Goodness, just look at that cover!  The bright eyes, button nose, and lack of teeth are enough to get anyone smiling.  And the photographs both on the cover and throughout the book will have you literally sniffing for that amazing baby smell.   The photographs include children and adults with different skin colors, so readers can see themselves right there.  The words in the book are very baby friendly, with looping words like smiling, feeding, waving that will carry you and your baby on a quick tour of their day.   This one is fresh, fun and filled with babies.  Share it with mommies and daddies near you. 

Barnes & Noble has a handy guide to the daily top sellers in a variety of categories, including children’s literature.  Even better, the children’s section is broken down into further categories like alphabet books, animals, bedtime, and fairy tales.  

Of course, my quibble with bestsellers is that they are simply that, the top sellers, not the top quality a lot of the time.  And in the children’s lists, there are always a lot of classic titles mixed in due to popularity.  While I love the classics, I think there are enough great books coming out each year that really should be being purchased and read! 

Link via Neat New Stuff.