To choose a Newbery

[Kristen]

A committee has always chosen the Newbery. It's mission was to choose one book, from all that were published during the year, that was particularly great. (for those who are interested here is a link to the handbook received by the committee - http://www.ala.org/ala/mgrps/divs/als... )


ALA has received criticism in the last few years for choosing books that adults prefer more than children and therefore stifling their future desire to read. The assumption being that all librarians, parents, and teachers only recommend Newbery’s. Still many watched in 2009 to see what book the committee would chose.

The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman was the fortunate recipient of the award, and some have argued that the committee has bowed to popular demand. It will be interesting to see what they choose next.

Since it would be impossible to read them all, according to ALA around 5,000 children’s books are published each year, we will follow some of the books that are receiving a lot of attention and choose for ourselves which book we feel deserves the prestigious award.
It's going to be fun.

If you hear of an exceptional book please add it and we will mark it as one to watch.

[[deleted user]]

Yea, The Graveyard Book was NOT my choice for the Newbery.

[Megan]

I've always loved children's lit, but never really followed the current events side of it. So I'm really looking forward to reading the more recently published books with this group. It's like being in the know, how cool!

[Kristen]

Megan wrote: "I've always loved children's lit, but never really followed the current events side of it. So I'm really looking forward to reading the more recently published books with this group. It's like be..."

Oh so glad you came then. I really liked it last year. It was fun making my own choice first and then seeing what happened. It was also great discussing it with others that were following.

[Kristine]

RE: popularity of Newbery books

From Betsy Bird, NYC Librarian
Thoughts on Newbery: True Popularity

Good Masters! Sweet Ladies! by Laura Amy Schlitz is sometimes considered one of these books that don’t speak to young people. That’s the theory anyway, and I reckon it comes from adults who didn’t want to read it themselves. However the book has been amazingly popular in my library, in part because it’s found a great deal of life with kids trying out for plays and needing to give monologues in auditions. My aunt’s forensic team in California won some huge awards because they used the speeches in this book. On top of that if a kid has to do something on a medieval village it’s the funniest, drollest, most amusing book you’ll ever find on the subject.

Now let’s look at The Graveyard Book, a title that supposedly was more kid friendly. I can tell you honestly that I have never had a kid ask for that book. Never. It’s by Neil Gaiman, and I’ve had plenty of children ask for his other title Coraline. But The Graveyard Book is, surprisingly enough (and unlike Good Masters! Sweet Ladies!), a bit of a shelf sitter. It gets assigned in school, so kids check it out for that reason, but so is that old Newbery winner Secret of the Andes, for crying out loud.

[Kristen]

Kristine wrote: "RE: popularity of Newbery books

From Betsy Bird, NYC Librarian
Thoughts on Newbery: True Popularity

Good Masters! Sweet Ladies! by Laura Amy Schlitz is sometimes considered one of these books tha..."

That's really interesting Kristine. I know there are quite a few Librarians among this group. I am curious, would you guys agree? Which of the recent Newberys are the shelf sitters in your library? Does When You Reach Me have more appeal then The Graveyard Book or Good Masters! Sweet Ladies! Voices from a Medieval Village?

[Jess]

Compared to The Graveyard Book, Good Masters could be called a shelf-sitter - but it's still done fairly well. Our 3 copies of Good Masters have had, combined, 92 months of life on our shelves and have been checked out 48 times, combined. The Graveyard book (5 copies) has had 66 months of shelf-life and has 73 checkouts. But it's not really as simple as that, because this combines adult and child readers (I'm at a public library), and Gaiman's book has copies in both our children's and YA areas, plus it's on the Oregon Readers Choice Award list this year, which means it's getting extra attention from that, too. When You Reach Me has had 34 months on the shelf (3 copies) and has 36 checkouts.

I'd love to see stats from other libraries. Since we do 4 week checkouts on all books, I figure that any book that goes out more than once a month is doing pretty well!

[Leigh]

I've seen lots of books win the Newbery that left me scratching my head. My all time favorites are the Russell Freedman biography of Lincoln, A Wrinkle in Time, Jacob Have I Loved, A Single Shard and Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH.

[Jamie]

Leigh wrote: "I've seen lots of books win the Newbery that left me scratching my head. My all time favorites are the Russell Freedman biography of Lincoln, A Wrinkle in Time, Jacob Have I Loved, A Single Shard a..."

Sorry, but just to clarify: when you say your all-time favorites, do you mean your all time favorite head-scratchers or your all-time favorite Newberys?

[Ian]

Jillian wrote: "Yea, The Graveyard Book was NOT my choice for the Newbery."

I agree! I just read it and was like WHATTTTT! I dont get some people!

[Leigh]

Jamie wrote: "Leigh wrote: "I've seen lots of books win the Newbery that left me scratching my head. My all time favorites are the Russell Freedman biography of Lincoln, A Wrinkle in Time, Jacob Have I Loved, A ..."

My apologies, that was not clear at all. My favorite Newbery winners is what I meant. iow, books I actually liked and was pleased that they won the Newbery. Sorry, I must've have been multitasking and so I wrote gibberish. :)

[Leigh]

I really like Good Masters but the kids aren't as enthusiatic about it. Bummer.

[Sheila]

Hi!
What makes a great book? We could go around and around on that topic! Much as we each like to think we are good judges of literary writing, I think personal taste is always part of the evaluation process we make while reading. And the members of the Newbery committee are human. I firmly believe that they make choices as best they can and work very hard to decide which books to honor. But,I also think if another, additional panel of equally qualified people were to do the choosing on any given year, those two groups of experts on children's literature would select different books. There would probably be some overlap but even the winning book would, in my opinion, be different. My idea won't be tested but all anyone needs to do is read a lot of book reviews by various experts who often have conflicting opinions about the same book. I am not saying the awards are useless or have no value-- and I am always thrilled when a book I happen to love wins the top award. As an author, I would be totally in favor of a committee that selected my book as a Newbery Honor Book!: - )

[Martha]

I agree. I have often said that teachers who make the assignment to read a Newbery winner should also include Honors on that list.

[Leigh]

Yep, Honors are sometimes better than the actual winner. And sometimes a book wins but an earlier book by the same author is imo, far superior. The Watsons Go to Birmingham was much better than Bud, not Buddy but BNB won the Newbery. Ditto for Catherine Called Birdy and the Midwife's Apprentice. (Yeah, I know. Catherine Called Birdy is YA and Midwife's Apprentice is JuvLit. Still...)

[Sheila]

Yes, an Honor can be lovely, and the author doesn't even have to make a speech! Charlotte's Web was an Honor Book, and we all know as well as Wilbur that Charlotte herself was a "good writer."