Featured Posts
Five Questions for Mayim Bialik
You may know Mayim Bialik as one of the stars of The Big Bang Theory. Or as Blossom. Or as young Bette Midler in Beaches (*sob!*). Or as a real-life neuroscientist. Or a blogger. Or a mother. Or a *Jewish* mother! Or, now, as a YA nonfiction author … [Read More...]
Dos and Don’ts of Writing Complex Teens…by an actual complex teen
As seen on Facebook: Friend of The Horn Book Christine M. Heppermann -- author, poet, and mother of one most excellent teen Audrey Hinsdale (read her Family Reading post "My Own Discretion Advised") -- posted this advice from her daughter on the "Dos … [Read More...]
BGHB at 50: Seeing the Grey: Reading Molly Bang’s The Grey Lady and the Strawberry Snatcher with Children
I served on the 2012 Boston Globe–Horn Book Awards committee with Thom Barthelmess and Lauren Adams, and I wrote about my kids’ responses to our selections here. So when the Horn Book editors issued an invitation to reflect on past winners and … [Read More...]
“Nazis. I hate these guys.”
Preaching to the choir here (Trump voters notwithstanding), but we are disgusted, enraged, and horrified by the violence and hate perpetrated by White Supremacists in Charlottesville, Virginia, and also by what they stand for. If you need to … [Read More...]
Week in Review, August 7th – 11th
This week on hbook.com… From the May/June 2017 issue of The Horn Book Magazine: Special Issue: Humor: "A Quick Way to Die: Humor in Translation" by Julia Marshall August issue of Notes from the Horn Book: Five questions for author Mitali Perkins, … [Read More...]
Blogs
Always something there to remind me
Here is the sole note I took during last weekend's "(im)possible dreams," Simmons College's Summer Institute, but for the life of me I cannot recall what it was intended to recall. Any ideas? Candy? Neal? Luckily, Shoshana was also there and can give … [Read More...]
“Nazis. I hate these guys.”
Preaching to the choir here (Trump voters notwithstanding), but we are disgusted, enraged, and horrified by the violence and hate perpetrated by White Supremacists in Charlottesville, Virginia, and also by what they stand for. If you need to … [Read More...]
Reading Is LIT: How a Classroom Project Can Impact an Entire Community
As a school librarian, I strongly believe in the importance of books as mirrors and windows for students, especially with so many divisive things happening in our society. Using these sorts of books in the classroom helps to start tough dialogue … [Read More...]
Banquets and bling
Continuing with this series of behind-the-scenes of the Caldecott committee, I thought it would be fun to give you peek at the Newbery/Caldecott/Wilder Banquet, which took place just last month at the ALA Annual Conference in Chicago. (If you haven’t … [Read More...]
Review of the Week
Review of The Music of Life: Bartolomeo Cristofori & the Invention of the Piano
The Music of Life: Bartolomeo Cristofori & the Invention of the Piano by Elizabeth Rusch; illus. by Marjorie Priceman Primary, Intermediate Atheneum 48 pp. 4/17 978-1-4814-4484-2 $17.99 e-book ed. 978-1-4814-4485-9 $10.99 Readers take a journey to Italy during the closing years of the Renaissance to meet a man whose invention is better known than his name. Hired by Prince Ferdinando de Medici to restore and build musical instruments in Florence, Bartolomeo Cristofori … [Read More...]
App Review of the Week
Total Solar Eclipse app review
The Exploratorium’s Total Solar Eclipse app (may 2017 ; iOS and Android) will be at its coolest on August 21. That’s when a total solar eclipse will take place over the U.S., and the app will make livestreams available from several different views. There’ll be live, hosted coverage in both English and Spanish starting at 10 a.m. Pacific time, and non-narrated telescope views starting slightly earlier, from Oregon (9 a.m. PDT) and Washington (9:15 a.m. PDT). Also at 9:15, there’ll be something … [Read More...]
Recommended Books
Review of The Music of Life: Bartolomeo Cristofori & the Invention of the Piano
The Music of Life: Bartolomeo Cristofori & the Invention of the Piano by Elizabeth Rusch; illus. by Marjorie Priceman Primary, Intermediate Atheneum 48 pp. 4/17 978-1-4814-4484-2 … [Read More...]
Review of It All Comes Down to This
It All Comes Down to This by Karen English Intermediate, Middle School Clarion 368 pp. g 7/17 978-0-544-83957-1 $16.99 The daughter of an art gallery–owning mother and a lawyer … [Read More...]
Review of The Little Red Cat Who Ran Away and Learned His ABC’s (the Hard Way)
The Little Red Cat Who Ran Away and Learned His ABC’s (the Hard Way) by Patrick McDonnell; illus. by the author Preschool, Primary Little, Brown 48 pp. g 9/17 978-0-31650246-7 … [Read More...]
Review of The Memory of Things
The Memory of Things by Gae Polisner High School St. Martin’s Griffin 275 pp. 9/16 978-1-250-09552-7 $18.99 g e-book ed. 978-1-250-09553-4 $9.99 It’s the morning of September … [Read More...]
Review of The Good Fight: The Feuds of the Founding Fathers (and How They Shaped the Nation)
The Good Fight: The Feuds of the Founding Fathers (and How They Shaped the Nation) by Anne Quirk; illus. by Elizabeth Baddeley Intermediate Knopf 118 pp. g 8/17 978-1-5247-0035-5 … [Read More...]
Interviews
Five Questions for Mayim Bialik
You may know Mayim Bialik as one of the stars of The Big Bang Theory. Or as Blossom. Or as young Bette Midler in Beaches (*sob!*). Or as a real-life neuroscientist. Or a blogger. Or a mother. Or a … [Read More...]
Five questions for Mitali Perkins
Mitali Perkins's latest novel You Bring the Distant Near (Farrar, 12–16 years) is a sprawling family epic that follows three generations of women in the Das family — matriarch Ranee; her daughters … [Read More...]
Five questions for Kate Klise and M. Sarah Klise
Sisters Kate and M. Sarah Klise created their first book together before either of them turned twelve! Since then, author Kate and illustrator Sarah have collaborated on many picture books and … [Read More...]
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...]
