Water in the Park: A Book About Water & 
the Times of the Day

For more on Water in the Park, read “Five questions for Emily Jenkins.”

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Is there a bigger baseball fan in the children’s book world than Matt Tavares? His sixth title on the sport, Becoming Babe Ruth, shines a light on George Herman “Babe” Ruth’s charitable side. At the turn of the twentieth century, young George’s delinquent ways land him at Saint Mary’s, a local industrial boarding school. There he meets Brother Matthias, whose majestic home runs in the schoolyard enthrall the boy. Years later when a fire destroys the school, Ruth shows that he hasn’t forgotten his roots. Tavares’s mixed-media illustrations expertly convey the Babe’s charm. (Candlewick, 4–7 years)

In 1936, two baseball players had something to prove. Was twenty-one-year-old Joe DiMaggio ready for the Major Leagues? Should Satchel Paige, pitching great in the Negro Leagues, be playing in the Majors? Something to Prove: The Great Satchel Paige vs. Rookie Joe DiMaggio by Robert Skead explores the game, between the Dick Bartell’s All Stars and the Satchel Paige All-Stars teams, that tested the men’s mettle. Skead portrays the larger issue of race and justice in America while superbly developing the game’s tension inning by inning. Floyd Cooper’s brown-toned illustrations nicely evoke the dreamy reminiscences of baseball legend. (Carolrhoda, 4–7 years)

Hoop Genius: How a Desperate Teacher and a Rowdy Gym Class Invented Basketball by John Coy begins with one James Naismith taking over an unruly gym class. He needs a game where “accuracy was more valuable than force,” and so basketball was concocted. Coy’s spare, precise language reflects the sport’s welcome order as well as its athletic appeal. Joe Morse’s kinetic paintings, at once dynamic and controlled, capture basketball’s combination of power and finesse. (Carolrhoda, 4–7 years)

In the 1930s, when airplanes were still new, young Betty Skelton played with toy planes when other girls played with dolls. Daredevil: The Daring Life of Betty Skelton details the life of the “First Lady of Firsts.” She was a record-breaking aerobatic pilot and auto racer; the first female boat jumper; and she even trained with the Mercury 7 astronauts. Author-illustrator Meghan McCarthy’s signature pictures, featuring bug-eyed characters and a vivid palette, accompany her soaring tale of a little girl with big dreams. (Wiseman/Simon, 4–7 years)

From the May 2013 issue of Notes from the Horn Book.

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1. Possible spoiler alert: At what point in the series did you think up this book’s Big Reveal (re: Jeffrey)?

Jeanne Birdsall: And how do I answer that without giving anything away? Here goes. While I was writing the first book I knew this would happen in a future book, but it wasn’t until I was writing the second book that I knew it would happen in this particular book, the third.

2. Is love in the cards for Aunt Claire? Or did I read too much into her friendship with Turron?

JB: No, you didn’t read too much into that friendship. Thanks for noticing. Was it the jigsaw puzzles of romantic places?

By the time Turron leaves Point Mouette he’s determined to see Aunt Claire again, and she’s hoping he’ll follow through. I can’t tell you any more than that. All will be revealed in the next book.

3. Your pastoral settings — in this case coastal Maine — are always so vividly described. How much is real and how much invented?

JB: My settings are a hodgepodge of real, imaginary, and (sometimes) places I’ve read about. (Arundel, the setting for the first book, borrowed a little of E. Nesbit’s The Enchanted Castle.) Point Mouette started out as a real place called Ocean Point, near Boothbay Harbor in Maine. I found it through dumb luck, seized on the little private beach and the long dock, then began to add and subtract. The golf course was an invention, and the pinewood came from ancient memories of my Girl Scout camp in Pennsylvania. I was forced to subtract a flying blue bug that I just couldn’t work into the story and a beautiful stone chapel I was dying to use. But I couldn’t have Dominic skateboarding on hallowed ground.

 4. Is there one Penderwick sister to whom you feel the greatest connection? Has that changed as the books have progressed?

JB: I go back and forth between Skye and Batty, depending on which of them is struggling the most. (I connect with struggle.) Batty had a relatively easy time of it at Point Mouette, but Skye…didn’t. So right now I’m still feeling pretty Skye-ish. As I get deeper into the fourth book I’ll reconnect with Batty, who has lots to work out in that one.

5. Each of the books is a satisfying stand-alone while also being very much part of a whole. Can you share clues about further Penderwick adventures?

JB: The fourth, which I’m working on now, will take place five-and-a-half years after the end of the third book, which means that the three older sisters will be teenagers. However, to keep the book middle grade, everything that happens will be seen through the eyes of Batty and Ben, who will be eleven and eight respectively. Thus, two writing challenges: to portray the life of teenagers without getting inside their minds and to channel an eight-year-old boy, which I certainly never was. Challenges aside, it’s going to be fun to write about Rosalind, Skye, and Jane as teenagers. Jane will finally get her hands on all the books she hasn’t been allowed to read all these years, including Proust, which she’s reading (slowly) in the original French.

From the June 2011 issue of Notes from the Horn Book. For more on Notes — and to sign up — click here.

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I recently saw Oz, the Great and Powerful in IMAX 3-D. Having read mostly 2-2.5-star reviews, I wasn’t expecting much. But when their grandparents are willing and available to babysit your two small children (“Go, see a movie!”), it doesn’t have to be Citizen Kane you’re watching. And going in with low expectations can definitely work some magic.

The visual aspects of the movie are stunning (and I’m not just talking about the lead actors, James Franco, Mila Kunis, Michelle Williams, and Rachel Weisz, but, wow, what a pretty cast, and in IMAX, no less). Like the 1939 Wizard of Oz, the film starts off in black and white. Once we’re no longer in Kansas — courtesy of Dorothy’s tornado, impressive in 3-D — everything switches to color, and the 3-D imagery ramps up a notch (lots of flowers blossoming dramatically, butterflies fluttering around, even a lunging lion), Avatar-style.

James Franco, as the prophesied wizard, meets Mila Kunis, a lonely witch, and she falls instantly in love with him. When she finds out she’s not his main squeeze she spectacularly loses it, doing her best impersonation of her screechy-girlfriend self on That ’70s Show. It’s not the first time James Franco has toyed with a lady’s emotions; check him out in this hilariously unforgettable act of manipulation from Freaks & Geeks. (And his real-life mom, children’s book author/poet Betsy Franco, probably has stories of her own…)

There’s a big, convoluted plot, with echoes of and parallels to Baum’s Oz books, and then there’s some more visually dazzling stuff at the end. The point is, if you feel like spending two hours looking at nice-looking people in front of gorgeous fake scenery, you could do much worse than Oz, the Great and Powerful.

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She also wrote many other books — several of which were on the Horn Book’s Fanfare list — and was an illustrator. Above is her groovy cover for the May/June 2002 Horn Book Magazine. Also from our archive, you can read her Newbery acceptance speech for Mixed-Up Files, along with a profile written by her husband, David, for the occasion, and one written by Laurie Konigsburg Todd after her mother won the Newbery for The View from Saturday. We also had some fun with her during the 2012 election season. (Jamie Kincaid for Republican VP!)

Konigsburg never wrote down to her readers. Many of her characters are sophisticated, intelligent, witty, unique, and savvy. She wrote about wannabe-witches (Jennifer), restless suburban kids (Mixed-Up Files), Jewish boys playing baseball (About the B’nai Bagels), historical women (A Proud Taste for Scarlet and Miniver, The Second Mrs. Giaconda), possibly-con-artist women (Father’s Arcane Daughter), outcasts, smarty-pantses, heroes — the list goes on.

Roger, whose own thoughts about Konigsburg are here, was quoted in her New York Times obituary. He also remembers leaving his warm bed at 4 am because of one of her stories.

She was truly a star and a Great Lady in the field of children’s literature.

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The main characters of Rainbow Rowell’s Eleanor & Park meet on the bus at the start of sophomore year. Eleanor is the new girl in town, an ostracized, bullied “big girl”; Park is a skinny half-Korean townie who tries to stay out of the spotlight. Their slowly evolving but intense relationship is authentic in its awkwardness — and life-changing for them both. Rowell imbues the novel with rich character development, a spot-on depiction of the 1986 Omaha setting, and powerful descriptive passages. It’s an honest, heart-wrenching portrayal of imperfect but unforgettable love. (14–17 years, St. Martin’s Griffin)

At the start of This Is What Happy Looks Like by Jennifer E. Smith, sixteen-year-old Ellie strikes up a snappy, flirty email friendship with someone who turns out to be teen movie star Graham Larkin. As a result, Graham decides to spend the summer filming his next movie in Ellie’s small town. In person, they feel an instant attraction; however, their relationship faces challenges and disapproval from both sides. This wish-fulfillment fantasy features likable protagonists with undeniable chemistry. The thoughtful narration, from both Ellie and Graham’s perspectives, is slow and unhurried, just like its sleepy small-town setting. (14–17 years, Little Brown/Poppy)

Sixteen-year-old Mallory, star of Lindsey Leavitt’s Going Vintage, is shocked to learn that her boyfriend is emotionally cheating on her with a “cyber wife.” As a result, Mallory decides to go on a technology fast. A to-do list her grandmother made at age sixteen, in 1962, provides the perfect inspiration for a simpler life — with surprising and often hilarious results. Mallory’s experiences will help readers cope with their own breakups and undoubtedly make them think about their tethers to smartphones and social media. (14–17 years, Bloomsbury)

In Sophia Bennett’s The Look, fifteen-year-old Londoner Ted (short for Edwina) is tall, awkward, and clueless about clothes, but has nevertheless been scouted by a top modeling agency. Meanwhile, her vivacious older sister, Ava, is diagnosed with lymphoma. Readers get an inside look at the modeling industry through Ted’s earnest, naive eyes, including some tricky romantic entanglements. Equally compelling is Bennett’s sympathetic portrait of a family coping with a serious illness and getting through it with love and humor. (14–17 years, Scholastic/Chicken House)

From the April 2013 issue of Notes from the Horn Book.

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Vampires have had their day in the sun. Zombies are resting in peace. The new it-girls in supernatural romance seems to be bionic women. [Possible spoilers appear below; and, okay, to be fair, they're not all robots, but I do sense a trend. And just for fun, Freaks & Geeks fans, click here.]

Cinder (Feiwel, 2012) — Marissa Meyer’s Cinderella-meets-sci-fi adventure — helped kick things off. “With no memory of her life before becoming a cyborg, teenage Linh Cinder (who lives with her stepmother and two stepsisters) is forced to earn the family’s living as a mechanic,” begins Cindy Ritter’s Fall 2012 Horn Book Guide review (excerpted from her January/February 2012 Horn Book Magazine review). Clearly this young lady ain’t Walt Disney’s cinder-sweeper, and the Lunar Chronicles series started off with a bang, earning Meyer a spot on the New York Times Bestseller List and giving robot grrrls everywhere a fresh new voice.

Rachel Cohn, coauthor (with David Levithan) of such emo-teen hits as Nick & Norah’s Infinite Playlist (Knopf, 2006), Naomi and Ely’s No Kiss List (Knopf, 2007), and Dash & Lily’s Book of Dares (Knopf, 2010) forges into sci-fi territory with her new book Beta (Hyperion, 2012; check out the book trailer here). The main character, Elysia, a teenage clone for sale at the mall, starts living the high life after being purchased by the governor’s wife. As the story goes on, Elysia begins to question everything she thinks she knows — or has been programmed to believe.

Unremembered by Jessica Brody (Farrar, 2013) begins with the main character floating alone in the ocean, apparently the only survivor of a plane crash. She has no memory of who she is or what just happened [NB: girls with amnesia are another YA trend]. Back on land, she becomes a celebrity; a foster family takes her in, and a mysterious boy, who claims he knows her, starts appearing everywhere. Without going any further with spoilers, take a look again at the title of this post. Also? Are there ever any biotech/pharmaceutical companies in YA fiction that aren’t evil? (Same goes for real-estate developers.) Check out the U.S. and U.K. galley covers on the author’s website.

No spoilers here: from the back cover of the galley of Mila 2.0 by Debra Driza (Harper/Tegan, 2013): “Mila was never meant to learn the truth about her identity. She was supposed to forget her past — that she was built in a secret computer lab and programmed to do things real people would never do. Now she has no choice but to run. The only thing she can’t escape is who she is and what she’s becoming.” ‘Nuff said.

The protagonist of Eve & Adam by Michael Grant and Katherine Applegate suffers a horrible car accident. Thanks to her (*ahem* evil) pharmaceutical-company-exec mom’s shady products, Evening (called Eve) is miraculously healed. Still under observation, Eve is bored; she passes the time by working on Mom’s project to “design the perfect boy,” manipulating DNA in order to create flawless eighteen-year-old male specimen Adam. A loner boy aptly named Solo, nonperfect and human, forms the third arm of the story’s sci-fi love triangle.

YA authors: Kelly LeBrock called; she wants a royalty. And what’s next: sentient mannequins?

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In Beyond Courage: The Untold Story of Jewish Resistance During the Holocaust, author Doreen Rappaport presents numerous instances of Jewish resistance, grouping them by theme and introduced with brief essays, that make up a far-reaching survey. Examples range from secret acts of defiance (forging documents, writing poetry) to outright fighting (the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising) and escape (the Sobibor death camp). The narrative effectively highlights the fortitude and resiliency of humankind in the face of atrocity. Many black-and-white and sepia photographs further develop the subjects and setting. (11–15 years, Candlewick)

Zeina Abirached’s autobiographical graphic novel A Game for Swallows: To Die, To Leave, To Return is set in 1984 Beirut, a city with Christians and Muslims locked in civil war. The story’s focus is a single harrowing night when Zeina’s parents, visiting her grandparents a few blocks away, must make their way home through heavy bombing. Abirached skillfully weaves flashbacks and explanatory asides into the narrative; despite the oppressive atmosphere of fear and uncertainty, much-needed moments of levity shine through. Stark, dramatic illustrations effectively capture elements of the culture and lend nuance to the tale’s high emotions. (11–15 years, Graphic Universe/Lerner)

Seven months since his beloved brother T.J. was killed in Iraq, Matt, the main character in E. M. Kokie’s Personal Effects, is so laden with anger and pain that he is on the verge of exploding. A vocal pacifist pushes Matt over the edge: he breaks the student’s nose and smashes a glass trophy case. Suspended for a week, he worries only about what his violence-prone ex-sergeant father will do. When Matt discovers love letters among T.J’s things, he lights out on a road trip to explore some unknown pieces of his brother’s life. Kokie’s well-crafted debut novel depicts a complex military family while tracing one young man’s hard-won coming of age. (14–17 years, Candlewick)

In Celia Rees’s This Is Not Forgiveness, Jamie has always had a contentious relationship with his older brother, especially now that Rob has returned from Afghanistan with a case of posttraumatic stress disorder. Rob is also sniffing around Jamie’s love interest Caro, a wild but misunderstood girl with a bad reputation—and a past with Rob about which Jamie is in the dark. Meanwhile, Rob’s illness grips him tighter and tighter, making him unstable and highly unpredictable. The book’s climax—explosive, violent, and unexpected—will leave readers unsettled and, like Jamie, looking for answers. (14–17 years, Bloomsbury)

From the November 2012 issue of Notes from the Horn Book.

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Invisible Inkling: Dangerous Pumpkins by Emily Jenkins picks up the story of fourth-grade Brooklynite Hank Wolowitz and his bandipat friend Inkling (an invisible, endangered, pumpkin-loving creature). It’s almost Halloween, and Hank has no one to trick-or-treat with. He also gets in major trouble with his older sister when voracious Inkling destroys her amazing jack-o’-lanterns (Hank takes the blame). Droll illustrations by Harry Bliss allow readers to see Inkling in all his furry glory even when the characters in the book do not. (Balzer + Bray/HarperCollins, 8–12 years)

Adam Gidwitz (A Tale Dark & Grimm) presents another folklore takeoff that manages to be both hilarious and macabre at the same time. In a Glass Grimmly follows Princess Jill and her cousin Jack, along with their frog friend, on a quest to find the “seeing glass.” Using only their wits, the three battle hungry giants, scheming mermaids, and other unspeakable creatures before making their way home armed with new knowledge and self-confidence. Both of Gidwitz’s books have lots of kid-appeal; an appended author’s note is useful for readers wanting to know more about the original stories. (Dutton, 10–14 years)

Unbeknownst to anyone else in Sheepsdale, New York, Joshua’s parents are two of the world’s most dastardly supervillains. To Joshua, they’re still Mom and Dad, so when they’re kidnapped, it’s up to him to save the day. Joshua Dread by Lee Bacon features understated, deadpan narration and imaginative details (such as zombies that can be mollified with tofu) that add up to lots of fun. Brandon Dorman’s black-and-white caricature illustrations enhance the comic-book vibe. (Delacorte, 10–14 years)

Candace Fleming’s On the Day I Died: Stories from the Grave begins with a near car accident: a teenage boy driving down a deserted road at night almost runs into a young lady—who turns out to be a ghost. He ends up in a graveyard surrounded by other adolescent ghosts who tell the stories of their demise. The tales (which all take place in the Chicago area and span the decades from the 1850s to today) feature plenty of suspense, chills, and, occasionally, some gore—perfect for Halloween ghost-story swapping. (Schwartz & Wade/Random, 10–14 years)

From the October 2012 issue of Notes from the Horn Book.

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