Kathryn Lasky's Blog, page 6

My box of books arrived today

Next Tuesday they will be in stores!

Yippee!

Booklist reviews FACELESS

A page-turner, particularly for readers intrigued by WWII !

Born into a family of British secret agents, 13-year-old Alice has undergone extensive training before her first mission is assigned. She and her mother parachute into Germany in 1944 and join her father in Berlin, where she quickly establishes her new identity as Ute Schnaubel at school and in the patriotic League of German Girls. Soon she’s assigned to help with housekeeping services for the Third Reich within their Berlin stronghold, a maneuver enabled by British intelligence, which wants Alice to report on Hitler’s emotional state. Meanwhile, she secretly befriends a homeless Jewish boy who forages in garbage cans for his food. After Hitler’s death, Alice’s family must immediately escape from Germany on their own. In this historical novel, Lasky makes the idea of a competent 13-year-old spy seem surprisingly convincing. The narrative has its moments of high tension when Alice plays her part as Ute. Somewhat disconnected from the main story, a subplot revolving around Alice’s estranged older sister is resolved in the end. A page-turner, particularly for readers intrigued by WWII.  

— Carolyn Phelan

Faceless is published October 19

I had so much fun writing this one.

This is my fourth book set in and around WWII.

Watch for my new book

FACELESS coming October 19

Spies, sisters, secrets

I had fun as a one-time fashion model

And MM LaFleur did a long interview

The Benefits of a Wandering Mind: Kathryn Lasky’s Boundless Imagination

https://mdash.mmlafleur.com/kathryn-l...

Awards and Accolades

This can happen if you have been writing for 40 years!

Awards and Honors

Newbery Honor Book, ALA, 1984, for Sugaring Time; 

New York Times Best Seller List 2010 for Guardians of Ga’Hoole

National Jewish Book Award, Jewish Welfare Board Book Council, and Sydney Taylor Book Award, Association of Jewish Libraries, both 1982, both for The Night Journey; 

Boston Globe/Horn Book Award, 1981, for The Weaver's Gift; 

In 1986, the Washington Post/Children's Book Guild Nonfiction Award for her body of work; 

National Jewish Book Award and Notable Books designation, ALA, 1997, for Marven of the Great North Woods; 

Notable Books designation, American Library Association (ALA), 1981, for The Night Journey and The Weaver's Gift; 

Notable Book designation, New York Times, and Best Books for Young Adults designation, ALA,1983, for Beyond the Divide; 

Best Books for Young Adults designation, ALA, 1984, for Prank; 

Notable Books designation, ALA, 1985, for Puppeteer; 

Best Books for Young Adults designation, ALA, 1986, for Pageant; 

Golden Trilobite Award, Paleontological Society, 1990, for Traces of Life: The Origins of Humankind; 

Parenting Reading Magic Award, 1990, for Dinosaur Dig; 

Edgar Award nominee for Best Juvenile Mystery, 1992, for Double Trouble Squared; 

Sequoyah Young Adult Book Award, 1994, for Beyond the Burning Time; 

John Burroughs Award for Outstanding Nature Book for Children, and Editor's Choice designation, Cricket magazine, 1998, for The Most Beautiful Roof in the World: Exploring the Rainforest Canopy; 

Orbis Pictus Honor for Outstanding Nonfiction for Children: The Man Who Made Time Travel & John Muir: America's First Environmentalist

Bank Street College of Education Best Books of the Year 2011: Ashes

2006 IRA Teachers' Choice: Broken Song

American Bookseller's Pick of The List, 1997: True North

Library of Congress Notable Book and Parents' Choice Honor Book 1995: The Librarian Who Measured the Earth

Western Heritage Award, National Cowboy Hall of Fame, and Edgar Award nominee, both 1999, both for Alice Rose and Sam. 

ALA Best Book for Young Adults, 1995: Beyond the Burning Time

New York Times Best Illustrated Children's Book, 1996: She's Wearing a Dead Bird on Her Head!

National Academy of Science, Best Book of The Year, 1994: Monarchs

2011 Anne V. Zarrow Award for Young Readers’ Literature

Maine State Library Katahdin Award for lifetime achievement in children’s’ literature: 2010

Endorsed by Amnesty International UK for contributing to a better understanding of human rights and the values that underpin them: The Extra

China is gearing up

All fifteen Ga'Hoole books came out in May

Owls are everywhere! 

And you cannot imagine my delight when I recently discovered that there are more owls in China than anyplace else in the whole wide world. Not only that but just two years ago five orphan owl chicks were discovered by a villager in Xiajiang County, east China's Jiangxi Province. They were taken to a sanctuary and then released just a year and a half ago! And not only that but owls have been a part of Chinese art for more than a thousand years! Screech owls, Barn owls, Horned and Eagle owls have all been represented in many different art forms from ceramics, to bronze statues and stone carvings in your country. I think China loves owls as much as I do.

            So that is why I am so happy that you will be able to meet my friends, the characters in my book series The Guardians of Ga’Hoole. The “stars” of this series are Soren, a Barn owl, his little buddy Gylfie, an Elf owl, one of the tiniest owls  in the world,  as well as Twilight, a Great Gray and Digger, a Burrowing owl.

But you will encounter many more aside from these four. I hope you’ll enjoy the adventures they have. Perhaps you will find one that you think might be like yourself  even though you don’t have wings! I know which one I think I’m most like. But I won’t tell you. It’s my secret. You decide which owl who is most like you and that you could become best friends with.

Fly on, my Chinese friends!

 

Kathryn Lasky

A nice review from Texas

It is rare that an informational book is both lyrical and informative.

Award-winning author, Kathryn Lasky has accomplished that in She Caught the Light: Williamina Stevens Fleming: Astronomer (Illustrated by Julianna Swaney, Harper, 2021, 32 pages, $18.99). Mina was born in 1857 in Scotland, where her father was a photographer. Lasky’s stellar use of metaphor is combined with the illustrator’s talent to create magical pages that take one’s breath away. She describes going into her father’s darkroom ”… to see the magic as the faces of a family portrait emerged on the plates, melting out of the darkness like stars in the night.” Fleming immigrated to Boston, where she worked first as a maid for the director of the Harvard College Observatory. In her short lifetime she broke many barriers, discovering the Horsehead Nebula, classifying more than 10,000 stars, creating a portrait of the universe astronomers would use for a century. Fleming also became the first woman to hold a titled position at Harvard University. Treat yourself to this wonderful book, and read it aloud to someone, child or adult!

Jean Greenlaw, Librarian

Here’s the cover of what’s coming in October

FACELESS: SPIES, SISTERS, AND SECRETS

A  riveting adventure of young British spies on a secret German mission during WWII.

Over the centuries, a small clan of spies called the Tabula Rasa has worked ceaselessly to fight oppression. They can pass unseen through enemy lines and “become” other people without being recognized. They are, essentially, faceless. Alice and Louise Winfield are sisters and spies in the Tabula Rasa. They’re growing up in wartime England, where the threat of Nazi occupation is ever near. But Louise wants to live an ordinary life and leaves the agency. Now, as Alice faces her most dangerous assignment yet, she fears discovery, but, most of all, she fears losing her own sister.

A zoom event on Monday

You can join in

Albert Wisner Library is inviting you to a scheduled Zoom meeting.

Topic: AOL: Kathryn Lasky
Time: Jan 25, 2021 03:00 PM Eastern Time (US and Canada)

Join Zoom Meeting
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