Betsy Bird's Blog, page 152

Cover Reveal (and Excerpt!): Everything Sad Is Untrue (a true story) by Daniel Nayeri

Arthur A. Levine, Arthur A. Levine. Do you remember Arthur A. Levine?

Silly question. Of course you do. All you need to do is pick up an American edition of any Harry Potter book and you’ll see Arthur’s imprint there on the spine. Arthur has a gift, you see, for seeing the potential in any children’s book. Mind you, I’m not an uninterested party (The Great Santa Stakeout was one of the last books to be published under the Arthur A. Levine imprint with Scholastic) but I’m also not wrong. The...

Fuse 8 n’ Kate: 2020 Caldecott Contenders

If you get your kicks out of Kate and I disagreeing about books, today’s episode may not be for you. Each year I present Kate with 2-3 Caldecott contenders. Which is to say, we discuss books that may or may not win the Caldecott Award (which will be handed out a week from today on Monday, January 27th here at 8:00 ET), giving us a chance to discuss the art and, to a lesser extent, the books’ chances. There were actually a fair number I wasn’t able to get my hands on for today’s recording,...

Unexpected Jolts of Children’s Literature

This week has been an odd one for me. Thanks to a piece I wrote on this blog last year called The Quintessential Librarian Stereotype: Wrestling With the Legacy of Anne Carroll Moore, I inadvertently became one of the top Google hits if you typed in her name. This is why, in the last three days, you might have read me in Slate, The Washington Post, on a radio interview with the CBC (which is my personal favorite because host Carol Off was able to tie the entire discussion into the work of...

Review of the Day: Go With the Flow by Lily Williams, ill. Karen Schneemann

Go With the Flow
By Lily Williams
Art by Karen Schneemann
First Second (an imprint of Macmillan)
$12.99
ISBN: 978-1-250-14317-4
Ages 9 and up
On shelves now

The nice thing about children’s literature is that it often replicates, on a smaller scale, themes and topics that you’ve find in more mature fare. Take, if you will, the protest novel. Which is to say, a novel in which the kids in the book decide to take a stand against an injustice. Examples that come immediately to mind vary from the fluffy...

21st Century Oral Storytelling: How PJ Library Connects Kids to Their Heritage via Podcasting

For reasons entirely of my own, I’ve been fascinated recently with the role of speaking stories aloud, as it relates to human creatures. When we talk about oral legends or storytelling, we get visions of ancient humans crouched around a fire while one of them builds whole worlds out of words. You could see the storyteller, sure, but for the most part it was the audible aspects that were the most important.

And now we have podcasts.

That’s a leap. I’ll back up a bit.

I have two children, ages...

Fuse 8 n’ Kate: Trashy Town by Andrea Zimmerman, David Clemsha, and Dan Yaccarino

How old are we all that Trashy Town is 21 years old? Is it just me or does that seem like a very large number? Continuing to attempt to find storytime classics that librarians love, I had Kate take a look at this readaloud classic. And, if you recall, Kate does not always take to storytime books. Many questions are raised in the course of the proceedings. Does Mr. Gilly work for the city? What is the nature of the rat’s open mouth? Is Mr. Gilly picking up syringes and blood behind that...

Review of the Day: Deeplight by Frances Hardinge

Deeplight
By Frances Hardinge
Amulet (an imprint of Abrams)
$19.99
ISBN: 9781419743207
Ages 12 and up
On shelves April 14th

The other day I was hanging out with some friends when one of them, a young adult author, accused me of harboring an unholy dislike, nay, hatred of the young adult novel as a form. I pointed out that I have no problem with teen literature, I simply don’t truck with it myself. As far as I’m concerned, when it comes to books for youth, all titles stop at 6th grade. Of course,...

Group Interview: The Sowing Circle sisterhood

Often my interviews take the form of one author or illustrator or another. Today, I am very pleased to be interviewing not simply one creator but a whole group at once. The Sowing Circle is a sisterhood of Southern Black writers. And, in their own words, the group mission is to “sow affirming words and images in thehearts of children in order to reap ageneration that is inquisitive,empathetic and enlightened”. Now these same circle members have combined efforts toorganize a blog tour and...

Newbery/Caldecott 2020: Final Prediction Edition

I’m going to try something a little different with the Final Prediction Edition this year. Last year was . . . well, frankly it was lamentable. A poor showing. An embarrassment of prediction-ish-ness. Quite frankly, my finger was so far away from the pulse of the award committees that I might as well have been across the sea. My one and only successful prediction was for The Book of Boy and that wasn’t even on my final prediction list. I got bupkiss. Not even a Caldecott.

So! I’m changing...

Fuse 8 n’ Kate: Knuffle Bunny Too by Mo Willems

This past weekend I took a trip to the Chicago Children’s Museum with my kids, and lo and behold I stumbled upon a Mo Willems exhibit currently showing. I’ve seen plenty of similar exhibits in my day, but what stood out to me about this particular one was how it cleverly integrated elements of his books with honestly good, interactive stations. In a nod to Mo’s background in animation, for example, kids can turn (oddly sturdy) cranks which flip pages featuring his characters doing an array...