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Featured Posts
Raising a feminist
I had a feminist awakening in my early twenties, and since then I’ve become passionate about analyzing female characters in books and films with a critical eye. I search for strong female leads whose identities are not defined by the men in their … [Read More...]
Outside Over There and Gay Pride
Jonathan Cott’s new book There’s a Mystery There (Doubleday) is a terrific examination of what its subtitle calls “The Primal Vision of Maurice Sendak.” It accomplishes this by focusing on a single book, Sendak’s masterpiece, Outside Over There … [Read More...]
Roger’s ALA 2017
My ALA began on a sad note when, while Richard and I were on the way to the airport, Martha texted to tell me that Robin Smith had died. This is such a loss - I knew no one as good as Robin at connecting children and books. I saw it in her many years … [Read More...]
2016 in Review: The Year in Words
For fans of children’s literature, social media has enabled a community of kindred spirits to collectively speculate about what might win the year’s biggest awards at the American Library Association’s Youth Media Awards — which determine the cream … [Read More...]
2017 CSK–Virginia Hamilton Award Acceptance by Rudine Sims Bishop
Good morning. Thank you to the Coretta Scott King–Virginia Hamilton Award for Lifetime Achievement Jury. This award is very special to me. I thank you for choosing me and thereby placing me alongside honorees such as star librarians Dr. Henrietta … [Read More...]
Blogs
Roger’s ALA 2017
My ALA began on a sad note when, while Richard and I were on the way to the airport, Martha texted to tell me that Robin Smith had died. This is such a loss - I knew no one as good as Robin at connecting children and books. I saw it in her many years … [Read More...]
AJL 2017 in NYC
This year's Association of Jewish Libraries conference was in NYC (don't worry, I've already made all the bagel jokes). The conference was hosted by Hebrew Union College, in the vicinity of dynamic and confusing Greenwich Village, and the theme was … [Read More...]
Share your summer reading lists
With schools finished for the season, most have posted summer reading lists. Back in my school days, I remember two kinds of lists: the ones with required reading (classics to be read before grade 9) and the much-preferred lists of books we were … [Read More...]
A tribute
I used to repeatedly tell my friend Robin Smith that my professional motto in life is: WWRD? (What Would Robin Do?) I think she thought I was joking, but I wasn’t. I know enough to respect those who came before me in the field of children’s … [Read More...]
Review of the Week
Review of Long May She Wave: The True Story of Caroline Pickersgill and Her Star-Spangled Creation
Long May She Wave: The True Story of Caroline Pickersgill and Her Star-Spangled Creation by Kristen Fulton; illus. by Holly Berry Primary McElderry 40 pp. 5/17 978-1-4814-6096-5 $17.99 e-book ed. 978-1-4814-6097-2 $10.99 Caroline Pickersgill grew up around industrious women: her widowed mother ran a successful flag-making business from their Baltimore home, and her grandmother sewed George Washington’s first flag during the Revolutionary War. During the War of 1812, … [Read More...]
App Review of the Week
Tiggly Addventure app review
Tiggly Addventure (Tiggly, 2014; iOS and Android) is one of a series of educational apps which can be played alone or with the corresponding Tiggly-brand counting, letter, or shape toys. To begin, choose your goal: you’re either delivering an apple to a grandmotherly creature, or a wrapped gift to a monsterly peer. You play as a small, earnest green character (that'd be "Tiggly") and either way, you’re on a mission: get the thing to its recipient. That means navigating a world where numbers … [Read More...]
Recommended Books
Review of There’s a Mystery There: The Primal Vision of Maurice Sendak
There’s a Mystery There: The Primal Vision of Maurice Sendak by Jonathan Cott Doubleday 242 pp. 5/17 978-0-385-54043-8 $30.00 e-book ed. 978-0-385-54044-5 $15.99 Cott first … [Read More...]
Review of Long May She Wave: The True Story of Caroline Pickersgill and Her Star-Spangled Creation
Long May She Wave: The True Story of Caroline Pickersgill and Her Star-Spangled Creation by Kristen Fulton; illus. by Holly Berry Primary McElderry 40 pp. 5/17 978-1-4814-6096-5 … [Read More...]
Review of Thick as Thieves
Thick as Thieves [Queen’s Thief] by Megan Whalen Turner Middle School, High School Greenwillow 339 pp. g 5/17 978-0-06-256824-3 $17.99 Library ed. 978-0-06-256825-0 … [Read More...]
Review of Walk with Me
Walk with Me by Jairo Buitrago; illus. by Rafael Yockteng; trans. from the Spanish by Elisa Amado Preschool, Primary Groundwood 32 pp. 3/17 978-1-55498-857-0 $18.95 e-book ed. … [Read More...]
Review of Garvey’s Choice
Garvey’s Choice by Nikki Grimes Intermediate, Middle School WordSong/Boyds Mills 108 pp. 10/16 978-1-62979-740-3 $16.95 e-book ed. 978-1-62979-747-2 $7.99 In a little book of … [Read More...]
Interviews
Five questions for 2017 Fiction and Poetry winner Angie Thomas
1. You shared on Twitter that in manuscript stage you wondered how this book’s subject matter would be received (“Are novels that deal with sensitive current issues a no-no?”). How much was that … [Read More...]
Five questions for Susan Juby
In The Fashion Committee (Viking, 14 years and up), author Susan Juby takes readers back to Green Pastures Academy, a high school for the arts and setting of her 2015 book The Truth Commission … [Read More...]
Mo Willems & Laurie Keller Talk with Roger
Talks with Roger is a sponsored supplement to our free monthly e-newsletter, Notes from the Horn Book. To receive Notes, sign up here. Sponsored by While — sob! — the beloved Elephant and … [Read More...]
Patricia Reilly Giff Talks with Roger
Talks with Roger is a sponsored supplement to our free monthly e-newsletter, Notes from the Horn Book. To receive Notes, sign up here. Sponsored by While already beloved for her popular … [Read More...]
Five questions for Juana Medina
Juana Medina's 2017 Pura Belpré Award–winning Juana & Lucas (Candlewick, 5–8 years) introduces new readers to a new set of friends, a Colombian girl named Juana (just like the author) and her … [Read More...]
