Interview with Walter Dean Myers

The Learning First Alliance has posted a great interview with author Walter Dean Myers.

From the interview:

When I see that 50 percent of African-American kids don't finish high school, that's a crisis of tremendous weight to me. These kids are not finishing high school. They're not getting the core knowledge of how to conduct their lives and how to move on. As far as I'm concerned, from a national point of view as an American, we have to rescue these kids. We have to reverse this. We have to go into these communities and turn this around.

Mr. Myers has a new book Dope Sick coming out on February 10. Want a preview? The first three chapters are now available for download on AdLit.org. And wait, it gets even better! The entire book will be available online at harperteen.com from February 10-24.

Book Review: Knucklehead

Knucklehead: Tall Tales and Almost True Stories of Growing Up by Jon Scieszka. (Grades 4+)

Growing up as the second-oldest of six boys, Jon Scieszka had many an adventure as a child. His dad called them Knuckleheads since it was easier than saying "Jim, Jon, Tom, Gregg, Brian, and Jeff!". As in "Get out of the water now, you Knuckleheads!" was just so much easier, and much quicker than saying, "Jim, Jon, Tom, Gregg, Brian, Jeff, get out of the lake now because it is raining and lightning bolts are crashing in the trees all around you." (pg 106.)

In Knucklehead, Jon tells us about his life in elementary school. Grew up in Flint, Michigan where he attended Catholic school and spent summers at a cottage on the lake. He played pranks on his brothers and they played pranks on him.

This book is laugh-out-loud funny and its short chapters make it ideal for reluctant readers. It has a certain gross-out factor and one notable chapter about swearwords (but nothing worse than hell and damn), so be aware of those potential red flags.

To flag all the funny and interesting passages in the book, well, you'd practically mark the entire volume. This book will be an easy sell for booktalking by sharing a passage or two and I'd like to share a couple of my favorite teasers:

When talking about sharing a room with his brother in the cold basement and the space heater they used in the winter:

The twisty metal coils on the heater had a great orange glow when they got hot. Just like the fires we would build with Dad out at the lake.

I guess that's what made me and Jim think we could put out the heater the same way we put out the fires at the lake - by peeing on it. (pg. 16)

and

Watch your brothers. That's what my mom used to tell me and Jim - "Watch your brothers."

So we did.
We watched Jeff roll off the couch.
We watched Brian dig in the plants and eat the dirt.
We watched Gregg lift up the lid on the toilet and splash around in the water. (pg 35)

I was laughing the whole way through this book and I can't wait to booktalk it to some elementary- and middle-school kids. This will be a sure hit with the Diary of a Wimpy Kid crowd.

Read more reviews at Bookends, Fuse #8, A Year of Reading, Becky's Book Reviews, and 100 Scope Notes (among others). Also check out the book trailer, an interview, and Jon Scieszka Worldwide.

Happy Non-Fiction Monday! Anastasia's got the round-up at Picture Book of the Day!

Around the interwebs

Interested in kidlit and kidlit blogs? Check out the brand new site Kidlitosphere Central. This is your one-stop guide to kidlitosphere news, kidlit blogs, the Kidlitosphere Conference and more. It's fabulous!

Tomorrow is the start of Black History Month, so remember to head over to The Brown Bookshelf where they'll be starting Twenty Eight Days Later - an annual feature of spectaular African-American authors and illustrators.

Don't miss the January Carnival of Children's Literature, hosted by Lisa at Under the Covers. I had a particularly strong reaction to the post in Mommy's Favorite Children's Books about what to do when you discover a corporate ad in a children's book. Make sure you head over there and put in your two cents.

Remember, there's still time to enter my giveaway for The Siege of Macindaw, the sixth installment in the Ranger's Apprentice series. I have five advance copies to give away and as of this posting there are only 14 entries, so your chances are good! Who's got kids or students that are Ranger's Apprentice fans? Give them a chance to read the latest book before it's on the shelf!

And on that note, I'm off to snuggle back under my blanket. At 37 degrees, today's actually the warmest day Chicagoland has seen in quite awhile, but it's still pretty cold! :)

Storytime Selections

Earlier this week I had a storytime that went really well. It was that perfect blend of happy kids and fun stories that made for a really nice experience (for kids and librarians alike).

We always start with the song "Shake Your Sillies Out" so they have a chance to move around a little bit and get some of those wiggles out.

Then we read There's a Billy Goat in the Garden by Laurel Dee Gugler with really neat illustrations by Clare Beaton. The pictures are done in fabric and there are lots of nice details to appreciate. It's also a big, colorful book which makes it great for storytime. The story is simple - there's a billy goat in the garden and he will not come out. All of the animals try to get him out (and the kids chimed in with each animal sound), but none succeed until the tiny bee buzzes in and the goat goes running.

Next up was a big book of Freight Train by Donald Crews. This is a perennial favorite and kids named the colors of the cars and pretended to be trains with us. Since they had just named lots of colors, we went right into If You're Wearing Red Today, which is always a fun song to get the kids moving a little bit.

Next up was a personal favorite of mine: Minerva Louise and the Red Truck. Minerva Louise is an oblivious chicken who always seems to get things mixed up. If you've got a lively crowd, they'll find the mix-ups hilarious. Sometimes this one can go over the kids' heads (or maybe they're laughing on the inside... who knows...), but today it was just right.

Then my coworker B whipped out his uke and we all sang "Oh Hey, Oh Hi, Hello". This is a really fun song! We taught the kids the chorus (Oh Hey, Oh Hi, Hello) and then as you go through the verses you sing the chorus in all different ways - quiet, loud, sad, mad, and underwater. B encouraged everyone (kids and grownups alike) to sing along and it was quite fun. You can find this song on Jim Gill's CD Jim Gill Makes it Noisy in Boise, Idaho. If you haven't checked out Jim Gill's CDs, you really should. They are great fun and we use them all the time in our storytimes!

We ended with How Do Dinosaurs Eat Their Food? This is another perennial favorite and it works great with a warmed up crowd. The kids giggled as they shouted "NO!" after each dinosaur's rude behavior. (My personal favorite is the dinosaur throwing his spaghetti in the air.)

You'll notice that we don't generally stick to themes for storytimes. Our philosophy is that it's better to have a handful of great readalouds than use a mediocre book or two just because you're sticking to a theme.

Evening Shift in the Life of a Children's Librarian

12:50p - Arrive at work. Greet coworkers, put things away, change my shoes (there is snow EVERYWHERE!).

1:00p - Check email, check staff blog.

1:13p - Work on evaluating damaged books. We're each responsible for certain sections of books and when books are damaged, we evaluate them to determine if we can fix them, if we want to replace them, or if we want to withdraw them. The funniest "damaged" book I ever got had the following note on the damaged slip: "Cheese in pocket." I opened it up and sure enough there was a small piece of American cheese in the pocket. :)

1:57p - Take a stack of damaged books to our Technical Services department to be withdrawn or fixed.

2:00p - Attend training on the Evanced online summer reading module. We're going to use it this summer and it's going to be really interesting to see what happens since it's very different from what we've done in the past. The training is a webinar, which is like a conference call but with an internet screen on a projector so that all the participants can see what the trainer is showing you online. A librarian from Adult Services covers our desk so that everyone in the department can attend.

3:00p - Training is over so I head back to the office where I sort through my files and get rid of a huge stack of papers that I no longer need. I get about halfway through my files when...

3:30p - I meet with a representative from an audiobook vendor. The previous rep was promoted, so this is a chance for me to meet with the new guy. I talk to him about our needs and he talks to me about how they can meet those needs.

4:00p - Back to my desk to continue organizing files.

4:25p - Take another stack of damaged books to Technical Services on my way to lunch.

4:30p - Lunch break!

5:00-9:00p - I'm on desk. I generally work Thursday nights and they're generally pretty slow. Tonight was no exception, so I work on some audiobook kit weeding and my "missing" list. Every so often we get a printed list of items in our sections that have a "missing" status. That means that we've looked for them on the shelf and they were not there. When we get a missing list, we look for the item one last time and if it's not there we decide whether to replace it or to withdraw the record from the catalog.

I also grab Clementine from the shelf and start reading through it a little bit. In a couple of weeks I'll be reading this title to a group of kids at a local school on their lunch time.

8:50p - We start shutting down the games computers and let everyone know we're closing. We help them find any last thing they're looking for and make sure everyone's downstairs before shutting everything down.

9:00p - The library's closed! Time to go home and watch The Office and 30 Rock!

Youth Media Awards

So, the kidlitosphere is all abuzz with talk of the Youth Media Awards and I have to confess that I couldn't wait to get home from work tonight so I could buzz, too.

The live webcast was great because even if you were, say, out at the reference desk with no sound you could still read the awards. The live Twitter was great until it went kablooey just before the Caldecott and Newbery medals were announced. (My, there was some freaking out going on in Twitterland just then.)

So, The Graveyard Book won the Newbery. I'm not at all surprised (and after all, we did have this on our Mock Newbery list) and the more I think about it the more it seems like a great choice. It's got kid appeal. It's a "boy book". And Neil Gamian wrote an adorable post about getting the news. Okay, I admit it was far from my favorite book of 2008, but that's okay! I'm on board with this medal winner.

I'm also on board with the honor books! Yay for The Underneath! And Savvy! I was very surprised and delighted to see Savvy on the list. Ingrid Law was surprised and delighted, too. I haven't read After Tupac & D Foster and I had never even heard of The Surrender Tree (but rest assured I have checked it out and will read it tonight). My coworker J said to me that it's a very crowd-pleasing list. It's got kid appeal. A first-author. "Ethnic" titles (for lack of a better term). Something that's not a novel (poetry). A little bit of something for everyone.

I am astonished that Chains didn't get any recognition. But hey, it won the Scott O'Dell award and Laurie Halse Anderson got the Margaret Edwards Award, so that's pretty awesome. She also has an adorable post about winning.

I'm not at all surprised that The House in the Night took the Caldecott medal. It's just gorgeous.

I'm also not surprised that Jellicoe Road took the Printz. It's... well, let's just say that it's not my favorite book and leave it at that. I am very pleased about the Printz honor books, especially Frankie, which was a Cybils finalist.

I'm so happy for Mo Willems, winner of the Geisel Award for Are You Ready to Play Outside? We love Elephant and Piggie! I'm also happy about Chicken Said, "Cluck!" and Wolfsnail, which were a couple of favorites for me, as well.

No one is surprised by We Are the Ship taking the Sibert and Coretta Scott King. It's a good thing the book is so large so that all the medals will fit on it. :) I'm a little bit surprised that Kadir Nelson didn't edge in on the Caldecott action, but I suppose three awards will do...

What else? What else? I'm happy to see Waiting for Normal being recognized and Jerk, California is definitely on my TBR list. Both received Schneider Family Book Awards.

Oh, and I was also excited to see Bodies From the Ice win a Sibert honor. And I'm happy to see A Curse Dark as Gold take home the first Morris Award (Elizabeth C. Bunce was happy about that, too!).

So, the excitement's over for now. I just have one more comment I'd like to make and that is about how awesome the blogosphere is. I mean, it takes awhile for the ALA websites to be updated, but the winners could be live-blogged and you could read people's reactions immediately. It was especially fun for me to see the reactions of the authors who were honored. And Twittering about the winners was great. My beloved John Green wasn't honored today, but he was providing live commentary as the awards were announced, as were several other bloggy friends. Makes me feel all warm and squishy to be part of a community that cares about books like that. :)

Book Review: All About Sleep

All About Sleep: From A to Zzzz by Elaine Scott. (Grades 4-7.)

You spend about a third of your life asleep, but what really happens to you while you're sleeping? Ancient physicians thought that you fall asleep because all the blood drains from your head or because heat sinks into the middle of your body. During the late 19th and early 20th centuries some people thought you fall asleep when too much cholesterol builds up in your body or because there's too little or too much blood in your head.

In this readable non-fiction book, Elaine Scott explores brain waves, neurotransmitters, circadian rhythms, and dreams (among many other things!). Although this book is filled with facts, it's not overwhelming because it's presented in a very accessible fashion.

Fun facts are scattered throughout the text. Did you know that Abraham Lincoln had a dream about a president being assassinated three days before he was killed? Or that Harriet Tubman had narcolepsy?

I give this book high marks for being interesting and readable, but lower marks for design*. John O'Brien provides cartoony illustrations, but big blocks of text make up much of the books. Spiffy it is not - you'll find no glossy photos or colorful sidebars here - but please don't let that deter you. Scott presents lots of information in an accessible way, making this a great book for pleasure reading. An index and bibliography make it suitable for research, as well.

Don't miss Elaine Scott's website. Earlier this year I reviewed Scott's Mars and the Search for Life and When is a Planet Not a Planet? and you'll certainly want to check out some of her other fascinating books! She's quickly becoming one of my favorite non-fiction writers!

Don't fall asleep on this Non-Fiction Monday. Check out the roundup at Simply Science (that oughta keep you awake!).

*I might be a little biased here because, to be completely honest, John O'Brien really doesn't do it for me.

Caudill predictions

Looking for the 2010 Rebecca Caudill nominees? Go here! I was right about three of my predictions! - AtL, Feb. 4, 2009

Predictions for the Newbery, Caldecott, and Printz awards are all over the kidlitosphere every year. I've participated in a Mock Newbery and a Mock Caldecott this year. But today I'd like to offer some predictions for the 2010 Rebecca Caudill nominees. The list should be out soon and it'll consist of 20 books.

Last year I offered a few predictions and even got a couple of them right. What would I like to see on this year's Caudill list*?

Lesley M.M. Blume's Cornelia and the Audacious Escapades of the Somerset Sisters was on the 2009 nominee list. There's no stipulation that an author can't win the award twice and there are two other books by Blume that I liked more than Cornelia. Tennyson, which was out in 2008 and The Rising Star of Rusty Nail, which was out in 2007. I'd be happy to see either of those on the list. (It seems like the Caudills tend not to be published in the previous year, so my money'd be on Rusty Nail.)

I'd love to see something by Lee Weatherly on the list. Breakfast at Sadie's (2006) is my personal favorite, but Kat Got Your Tongue (2007) is another possibility.

Other predictions:

Miss Spitfire by Sarah Miller (2007).

The Castle Corona by Sharon Creech (2006) and A Crooked Kind of Perfect by Linda Urban (2007) are both distinct possibilities. I reviewed them both audiobooks here.

Home of the Brave by Katherine Applegate (2007).

Emma Jean Lazarus Fell Out of a Tree by Laura Tarshis (2007).

No Talking by Andrew Clements (2007).

I'm not sure when the list will be announced, but I suspect it may be next weekend that the committee is meeting. (Is anyone reading on the committee? When will they determine the Master list?)

I'm sure there will be 20 great books on the list, some of which I'll have read and some of which will be new to me. That's one of the things I like best about the Caudill list - it's a way to find great books that I might not otherwise have picked up!

So, Illinois librarians and teachers, what do YOU think might be on the list???

*Note: I'm not and never have been on the Caudill committee, so all of this is purely speculation!

And the Mock Caldecott winner is...

Last night I got together with several of my coworkers for a very casual Mock Caldecott discussion. We checked out stacks and stacks of picture books from many Mock Caldecott lists. We ordered pizza. And we talked picture books.

After three rounds of voting, we declared a tie for the Caldecott Medal:

Boycott Blues by Andrea Davis Pinkney, illustrated by J. Brian Pinkney and On the Farm by David Elliott, illustrated by Holly Meade.

We also declared four honor books:

Cat & Mouse by Ian Schoenherr, Wabi Sabi by Mark Reibstein and Ed Young, We Are the Ship by Kadir Nelson, and The House in the Night by Susan Marie Swanson and Beth Krommes.

I've never predicted any of the awards correctly before and the Caldecott stumps me the most out of all of them. But this was a great excuse to get together with my awesome colleagues and familiarize ourselves with some of the best pictures books published this year.

Tomorrow we'll find out for real... can you feel the anticipation building??

Ranger's Apprentice Giveaway!!

I posted yesterday about The Ruins of Gorlan by John Flanagan, which is available as a free eBook until February 15.

If you're a fan of the series, I have exciting news for you... Penguin Young Readers Group has kindly provided 5 advanced copies of the sixth book, The Siege of Macindaw, for me to give away!

This contest is available to US residents. To enter in the giveaway, leave a comment on this post by midnight CST on February 7! Please include your email address if it's not readily available in your profile.

If you help me spread the word by posting about this giveaway on your blog or Twitter, I'll give you an extra entry in the giveaway. Just leave me a link to your post or Twitter page in your comment!

Five winners will be chosen at random on Sunday, February 8. The book won't be on shelves until August, so this is a great chance to get an early look at the next book in this awesome series!