Blast from the Past

One of the panels at KidlitCon was all about blogging the backlist - that is, older books. We often get caught up in the bright shiny new sparkly books out there, and forget what great books have been published already. Whether these books are four years old or forty, there's a kid out there who hasn't read it yet, and that's why they still deserve to be talked about. Too, if they are forty years old, it's an education to go back and look at them with 21st century eyes.

Over at her Fire Escape, Mitali Perkins is picking up this idea and running with it, by way of what she calls a Cuci Mata reading of classic children's books, to see how they read to our eyes. First on the docket: Emily of Deep Valley by Maud Hart Lovelace. If this is an old favorite, or you've never picked it up, stop on by to join the fun.

And of course, I don't need to remind you that most of these marvelous older books are available at your local library.

I'll Take Squicky Article Titles for 100, Alex

Apparently, Alloy Wants to Own Teenage Girls. Don't they know that's illegal in four out of five civilized countries?

In case you're unfamiliar with the company, Alloy is the media empire that's behind such book series as The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants and Gossip Girl, and lots more outside of books. According to this article, it's their stated intention to grab the teenage girls of America and get all the money they can out of them.

I would launch into a good ol' railing post, except that I've read a lot of Alloy's produced books, and . . . um . . . a lot of them are pretty good. Even more of them (ahem GOSSIP GIRL ahem) are, like, waaaay addictive! Whatever their reasons for doing it, at least they're paying attention to the quality of the product.

Still, this makes me feel all squicky. Weigh in!

KidlitCon 2010

Just in case you didn't notice from my last post, and the barrage emanating from my Twitter account, I spent the weekend in Minneapolis at the 2010 Kidlitosphere Conference. Which was awesome. That is all.

You want more? Okay, fine.

So this is my fourth KidlitCon. I'm in the rare position of being just one of three kidlit bloggers who've been to all of them (the others are Jen Robinson and MotherReader, in case you were wondering), and here's what I've found to be true at all of these.

Yes, the sessions are great. They gave me good ideas and food for thought, and reminders about things I know I slack on regarding my blog.

Yes, the geeky book talk is great, as is the geeky tech talk. In real life, I rarely have the chance to go, "Oh, did you read that book yet? What did you think of that one guy, what he did?" and have the reply be, "OH MY GOD! I did! Yes! I couldn't believe it!" or even, "No, but I reeeeally want to after reading that one review!" And then have the conversation continue on to, "What do you think of this new functionality from Blogger?"

Yes, we get fed, and the food is good. This year it was all provided, yowza, and thanks to the organizers and HarperCollins.

But none of that is really what KidlitCon is about for me.

For me, this conference is about the people. I realized that some of the attendees are people that I actually know very well (down to being able to count off the number of their kids, which may just verge on creepy), but I've only met in person a handful of times. Others are people I want to get to know online after meeting them.

So, to the friends I caught up with: Jen Robinson, MotherReader, Book Nut, Melissa Wiley, Mary Lee Hahn, Lisa Jenn, and Laura Lutz: It was so great to see you all, catch up, and bask in your noises of sympathetic devastation when I lost my e-reader. (Which was turned in to lost and found at Mall of America by a very kind . . . Minneapolite? Minneapolitan? and will shortly be posted back to me.) Especially especially great were the hours of conversation about everything from mom details to blogging ethics to new books to what the heck to do in Minneapolis on a Sunday morning. (Answer: not much.)

To the friends I met for the first time or got to know better: PragmaticMom, Janet Fox, Jacqueline Houtman, Charlotte Taylor and anyone I randomly struck up a conversation with. It was fun to get to know you.

To my fellow mad Tweeters, keeping the twitterverse up to date on the happenings: @alicepope, @teacher6th, @BonnyGlen, @LizB, @MaryLeeHahn @RascofromRIF @thepageturn @mudmamba. . . tweet on!

To anyone who wasn't there: next year!

To anyone I forgot to mention, all of the above, or at least as much of it as is personally appropriate.

So this recap wasn't a recap so much as a processing, was it? For hard details, see pictures of the weekend on Flickr, read the Twitter transcript at Greg's The Happy Accident, and check in with some of the many other recaps, collected at the KidlitCon 2010 blog.

Thank you to the able organizers, Andrew Karre of Lerner Books, Brian Farrey of Flux, and Ben Barnhart of Milkweed Editions. You put together an amazing weekend for all of us, and you fully deserve the nervous breakdowns you're going to have now.

Next year will be in Seattle. Woohoo for West Coasters!

The last session, which as per tradition focused on the Kidlitosphere itself and what we're all about, stressed the community aspect of this group. We lose people all the time, but we also gain people all the time, and if we're to maintain our sense of community we have to welcome the newbies with as much warmth as we were welcomed. This conference goes a long way toward making that happen.

Book Review: Strange Angels by Lili St. Crow

Book: Strange Angels
Author: Lili St. Crow
Published: 2009
Source: Local Library

Dru Anderson’s dad always comes back. No matter what manner of long-leggedy beasties he’s hunting this time, he always returns to her. After her mom’s death and the subsequent years of moving around the country, following the things that go bump in the night, Dru can’t count on much, but she can count on this.

And her dad does return from his latest hunt. Unfortunately, it’s as a zombie.

Seems there are a few things that Dad didn’t get around to telling her before he died. Dru’s got to find out what they are, fast. Or the next casualty could be her.

Talk about judging a book by its cover. I looked at that and went, “Oh, yawn. Girl with serious expression, in shadows, tough clothing, and--whoa, original!--a moon. Just another prefab paranormal. I’ll give it fifty pages and then it’s on to the next.”

And okay, there are zombies and werewolves and cute boys and looming danger. But more than any of that, there’s Dru, a girl who would eat Bella Swan for breakfast and floss with Edward’s hair. If you can’t tell, I loved this girl.

Raised on the fringes of the paranormal world (which, rather awesomely, she calls the Real World), Dru’s got the knowledge and the training but not much field experience. Of course, that’s changing fast. She’s in over her head but paddling hard. Dru is tough and gritty, a survivor and a thinker. I mean, she shot her zombified father through the heart. Multiple times. Yet she also spends most of the book this close to a nervous breakdown, after having her only solid anchor in the world ripped away from her. The only thing that saves her is Graves, a new classmate with secrets of his own, who takes her in after she shoots her zombie father and winds up getting bitten by a werewolf for his pains, meaning that they wind up taking care of each other.

There were a few things that almost lost me about this book. Two of them have to do with Graves. One: really? In a paranormal, you name a character Graves? That’s getting beyond silly and into the kind of ironic that wears skinny jeans and smokes clove cigarettes. Two, Graves is mixed-race, Asian-Caucasian. Which is fine, I’m all for some diversity in our white YA world, but St. Crow kept harping on it. Seemed every moment that Dru looked at Graves, she had to mention something about “half-breed” or his skin tone or the epicanthic folds of his eyes. Harpity-harpity-harp. Enough. He’s not white. We Get It.

There’s also a character who turns up about midway through that made my love-triangle sensor go off, with a clanging “Oh for the love of God!” Thankfully, St Crow didn’t give in, but I’m still eying the next two books in the series with mild jaundice. A kind of, "Oh, yeah, prove that you can keep this awesome up."

I can't decide whether to be annoyed or not that the questions didn't really get answered by the end. It's a clear lead-in to the rest of the story, but we never really find out who or what is after Dru, and what the frickity-frack is going on. I'm plumping for not, at the moment, but your mileage may vary.

Do I recommend it? Reservedly. For those who love paranormals but you're tired of wimpy heroines who stand around swooning. If St. Crow can keep Dru at her current level of tough/smart/conflicted/kickass and doesn't give in to current tired tropes, I can't wait for the next ones.

I'm on My Way

Well, not yet. But my various devices are charging up, my clothes are packed, and so far I've remembered to include all the things I traditionally forget (glasses, contact solution, on one memorable occasion shoes. Oy). I leave bright and early in the morning for Minneapolis and the Fourth (!!!) Annual KidlitCon, where I look forward to a weekend hanging out with people I haven't seen in a year or more, talking blogs, books, and the confluence of both.

Will you be joining us? If not, I'll be tweeting the con under the handle @mosylu, with the hashtag #kidlitcon and possibly even doing little posts at this blog. Follow!

A Brand New Way to Mock the Awards

. . . huh. Something about that title just don't sound right.

January is only three months away, which means that award speculation started some . . . uh . . . nine months ago. Mock awards are a staple of school and public librarians looking to expend some of that speculative energy. Well, now some genius on Goodreads has come up with a new way to hold Mock Newbery/Caldecotts/Printzes - lists which the public can add to and vote up. Here they be: Newbery 2011, Printz 2011, and 2011 Caldecott Hopefuls

Let the frenzied ballot-box-stuffing begin. All my Newbery clicks are currently going to Sharon Draper's Out of My Mind, but that may be because I haven't read Deborah Wiles' much-loved Countdown yet.

Okay, and I know I may get tomato'd for this, but I don't think Mockingjay belongs on the Newbery list. Printz, oh, hells yes. All kindsa yes. But not the Newbery, folks. What do you think? Who will you vote up?

Thanks to 100 Scope Notes for the link.

Edited to Correct: the title of Mockingjay. I said The Hunger Games at first. Thanks for the correction, Mike!

Book Review: The Summer I Turned Pretty

Book: The Summer I Turned Pretty
Author: Jenny Han
Published: 2009
Source: Local Library

Once again, Belly’s family is going to the beach house with the Fisher family, as they have every year since her birth. They’ll swim in the same ocean, they’ll walk on the same boardwalk, they’ll share the same jokes and traditions.

But Belly is on the cusp of her sixteenth birthday, and she’s determined that this summer will be different. No longer will she be the ignored little sister, left out of everything. Her brother and the Fisher boys, Conrad and Jeremiah, will have to include her. This year, she’s going to make Conrad just as much in love with her as she’s always been with him.

You know what they say about best-laid plans, though. There are things Belly doesn’t know--about Conrad, about his mom Susannah, and about love. But she’s going to find out.

This book seems like a recipe for fluff. Summer? Check. Beach house, tans, and bikinis? Girl growing into her new body? Check. Hot older boy, subject of years of unrequited yearning? Check, check, oh so check.

But even before we discover the Big Secret in the last quarter of the book, (hardly a secret, it’s foreshadowed so much Han might as well have taken out a neon sign) this story has a heft to it that belies its fluffy aspect. Everyone wants to have a summer of fun while serious changes are going on underneath, and Belly seems to be the last one to notice any of them. This is partly about being the baby of this expanded summer family, and partly the sheer self-absorption that comes along with feeling your way into a brand-new skin. That can be kind of frustrating sometimes, but ultimately Han pulls it off.

So . . . does Conrad ever notice her? It seems so, but then again, so does Jeremiah, and the epilogue can be read both ways. There's a sequel out, It's Not Summer Without You, which I want to pick up both to see which brother Belly picked and how she's dealing with the fallout from last summer.

Book Review: Thaw by Monica Roe

Book: Thaw
Author: Monica Roe
Published: 2008
Source: Local Library

A month ago, Dane was on top of the world. He was a champion skier with a hot girlfriend and a bright future. Then everything collapsed, starting with him. Dane has Guillain-Barre Syndrome, a sudden-onset neurological crisis that’s caused him to lose control of every muscle in his body.

From an athlete who was in total control of his life, Dane has become the closest thing to a vegetable. His girlfriend has dumped him, his friends are MIA, and his family’s shuttled him off to a Florida rehab hospital. Lying in the bed, there’s not much to do but think, and there’s not much to think about but where it all went wrong.

I'll be honest here: this protagonist was the biggest jerk I have ever met, on the page or off. And, y'all, I work in public service. He changes, but slowly, and we keep flashing back to his earlier jerkitude. It’s a heartless kind of Darwinism - to Dane, anyone who succeeds is worthy, and anyone who fails isn’t worth a second glance. He lumps asking for or offering help into the second category, expressing nothing but contempt for an injured skiing teammate and the members of the opposing team who help him down the mountain. You can imagine what this does to his self-image when he is struck down by this real-life syndrome.

It's a testament to Monica Roe's amazing writing that I kept reading and didn’t throw the book across the room. Dane is repugnant and compelling all at once, and his slow understanding of his own failings and weaknesses, and his baby steps toward repairing them, will suck you right in.

Reading Roundup September 2010

By the Numbers
Teen: 23
Tween: 4 (weird!)
Children: 10

Sources
Review Copies: 1
Swapped: 1
Purchased: 2
Library: 30

Standouts
Teen: After by Amy Efaw
A complex heroine with layers upon layers of denial makes this story about attempted infanticide describable only as "Wow. Just . . . wow."
Tween: The Whole World's Crazy (Amelia Rules) by Jimmy Gownley
Another memorable heroine, although obviously not in the same way. Amelia is dealing with divorce, a move, new friends, a new nemesis, and various other life issues, and she does it with wit and sass by the cupful.
Children: Make Way for Dyamonde Daniel by Nikki Grimes
Well, clearly it was just my month for amazing heroines. Also dealing with divorce and a move, Dyamonde Daniel chooses not to wallow, but to reach out to someone else in need (even if that someone needs a slap upside the head).

Because I Want To Awards
Way Better Than I Expected: Strange Angels by Lili St. Crow
Loved the Way This Looked At Teen Female Sexuality (too bad about the main character): Giving Up the V by Serena Robar
Sah-WOON: Linger by Maggie Stiefvater
Neatokeen Nonfiction: Secret Subway by Martin W. Sandler
You Know You Always Wanted to Do This Yourself: The Dunderheads by Paul Fleischman

It's Cybil's Eve!

Taking a break from Banned Book Week for a day, I have to remind everyone that the Cybils nominations start tomorrow. Woot! And double woot! This is the 5th year for the kidlitosphere's beloved homegrown book awards.

October 1st - 15th, anyone can nominate a book in any category. Teachers, librarians, kids, parents, if you loved it, shout it out! Then the first-round judges swing into action, reading like crazy folks, and winnow the giant piles down to a few finalists for each category. Those lists are released January 1st, and that's when the second-round judges clock in, taking the next month to intensively read and debate every single book on their category's shortlist until one is declared the winner. All winners are announced on Valentine's Day.

I've judged for the past three years, and I can tell you it's a lot of work, but so worth it! If you want to check out the judges for this year (and, of course, their blogs!), stop in and have a gander at the panels. Congratulations to everyone who made the cut!

Also on the Cybils website, along the sidebar: finalists and winners from the last few years, a fine resource for anyone who wants to find marvelous books. If you want to show your support for the bestest little award on the internet, get shopping at the CafePress store.

But most importantly of all . . . what are you going to nominate?

Banned Books Links and Stuff

It's Banned Books Week again, which means links are cropping up like daisies in spring.

• HuffPo recently posted a slideshow of 15 (count 'em) movies that were made from books that have been banned or challenged. Some of them are not so much of a surprise (Harry Potter, Brokeback Mountain) and some were new to me (Gone with the Wind?)
• The Goddess of YA Literature gives us some tips about knowing thine enemy.
• 100 Scope Notes shares a Mental_Floss quiz about why certain books have been banned. It's a few years old (hence question 9), but it still might surprise you.
• The librarian response to book banning is to explain that it's each individual parent's responsibility for what their own child reads. We don't hear much from the parent end of it, but author Aprilynne Pike shares just that in a guest post over at Eve's Fan Garden. Awesometastic, Madame Pike.
• Stop on by the comic strip The New Adventures of Queen Victoria for their 2010 Banned Books tribute, which started last Saturday. My personal favorite is Monday's. Bwaha.
• Last but not least: a video! It's from last year (hence the hinky dates) but this much awesome does not expire. 

Right Book, Wrong Time

I have a confession to make. I didn't like "The Goonies."

The first time I ever saw it, I was twenty and went with a friend to a Free Campus Movie Nite. She was well-nigh swooning at the thought of seeing this marvelous movie from her childhood, assuring me that I would love it. I was surrounded by people who were all in a fever of joy at the thought of this apparently defining moment in their cinematic experience, and let me tell you, it's quite something to see a frat boy enraptured by non-Hobbitized Sean Astin. Me? I kept waiting for the marvelousness to start.

When it ended, she turned to me and said, "Well? Wasn't it great?"

"Um. It was okay." I watched her face fall and quickly added, "I would have loved it when I was ten! Seriously!"

I said that mostly to keep her from trying to explain to me how awesome it was. But the more I consume stories, especially stories written for a different demographic than my own, the more that thought has come back to me. "Oh man, I would have loved this when I was (insert age here)."

For instance--and if you need to pretend you never knew me after reading this, I understand--if Twilight had come out when I was fourteen, I would have eaten it up, sparkly vampire and all. Oh, I might have recognized the flaws. But I would have loved it so hard. I would have written fanfiction and worn "Edward" t-shirts and had passionate, hour-long discussions about whether he was right not to have vamped Bella the first time she asked for it. (And yes, if you noticed, I would have been Team Edward. What can I say?)

But I wasn't fourteen, I was twenty-five, and I read Twilight with an "Okay, well, I guess I see the appeal but I'm not really feelin' it." (My withering disdain for Bella Swan didn't really get off the ground until New Moon, with the empty pages after Edward dumped her. Good god, girl. The first month I understand, maybe. Somewhere before the fourth, you should go get a makeover and jump the hot werewolf.)

There's a feeling that Art is great or not-great on its own merits--that the people who love it or hate it, depending on the opinion of the learned elite, are totally wrong-headed. But that leaves out the other half of the equation, the reader, and all they bring to the book. It's a particular consideration for those of us who love kid's and teen books. We're not the target audience, so when we review a book, we have to think about two things: 1) What did I think of it? 2) What would a kid think of it?

This is not saying that all children's or YA lit has a sell-by date, or even that the sell-by date is the same for everybody. I'm still nutty about Harry Potter, and I know there are people older than me who know every word, backward and forward, of Twilight. Clearly it's still saying something to somebody. But I'm not the same person I was at fourteen (thank God!), so it makes sense to me that a book could simply miss its target. The trick is in understanding when that target might have been in my life, and using that knowledge when I write about it.

Banned Book Week Ahoy

Banned Book Week is coming up again (huzzah?), which means that book banning is in the news. Banned Books Week happens one week a year, but that doesn't mean the banners and challengers and nay-sayers and finger-wavers go away for the other 51. Y'all, I puzzled over this deeply last year before realizing that when Banned Book Week is nigh, the reporters notice news of book banning more. Face, meet palm.

This week's book-banning news/reason for crawling under your bed and sobbing gently over the future of America comes to us from Missouri, where a university professor (I know. I know!) has decried the curriculum of his local school district. Under attack: sex ed (natch), and required reading, specifically the high school's, which asks students to read the Vonnegut anti-war classic Slaughterhouse-Five, Sarah Ockler's beautiful and sensitive Twenty-Boy Summer, and Laurie Halse Anderson's yes-yes-yes-it's-really-that-good Speak.

But you know what burns my butter? And that of a lot of other people? This quote:

In high school English classes, children are required to read and view material that should be classified as soft pornography.

One such book is called "Speak." . . . As the main character in the book is alone with a boy who is touching her female parts, she makes the statement that this is what high school is supposed to feel like. The boy then rapes her on the next page. Actually, the book and movie both contain two rape scenes.

Pornography.

Jeebus Christmas.

Some more facts about this prof: his children do not go to the school under attack. So apparently he's prompted by his deep sense of . . . community welfare? Or something? He was also a speaker at a recent seminar called "Reclaiming Missouri for Christ."

I am religious. Some of you know this, some of you don't. (Now you do.) It's very dismaying to see an entire group of people painted with the Crayyyy-zee Brush because some isolated members choose to use religion as a club. Y'know what? Most of us want to live our lives and love our neighbors, not batter them into a fine paste that can then be reshaped in our own image. There's only One who gets to do that, and trust me, Scroggins, you ain't Him.

Something fascinating and new this year is the amount of religious response to this book banning. Like this, from Paul, who writes his post as a dialogue between himself and Christ. This is the final line:

“Paul (I love it when Jesus calls me by my name), I got crucified by a mob. Mobs come from fear. And fear happens when you don’t trust people to think for themselves… For the love of God, give your kids the freaking books.”

Thanks to David Lubar for that link, which almost made me cry at work.

Laurie Halse Anderson's post on the challenge to Speak has some great links by which you can respond to Scroggins, the school board, and the news media in Republic, Missouri.

Author Shannon Hale, blogging from bedrest (the woman is expecting twins any day now and still blogs! Hard-core, Hale. Hard. Core.) had this to say:

"The purpose of literature is not to represent perfect characters, an ideal world, where everyone acts kindly and appropriately. There's no benefit to reading that story, there's no learning, no questioning, no growing for the reader. I want to share just one more thing about the power and importance of great books, and why we need them free and available in libraries."

She then quotes from another blogger, which I will make you click through and read because double-quoting is kinda weird. Shannon Hale, you are awesome.

The blogosphere's afire over this one, naturally, and bless her heart, Reclusive Bibliophile has compiled a list of all the posts. There's also a Twitter hashtag, #SpeakLoudly.

File This Under "Holy Cow"

Congratulations to Jane Yolen, whose 300th book will published later this year. Yes, 300th. That's 3 with two little zeroes after it.

As I say, holy cow.

In highly classy fashion, Yolen tells us that it's not about the numbers, but about the readers.

What I can really recount, though, are the stories I get back from readers. The little boy in a burn unit who read "How Do Dinosaurs Get Well Soon?" until he did, too. The autistic boy who now goes to bed without elaborate coaching because of "How Do Dinosaurs Say Goodnight?."

And many more. I'm gettin' a little verklempt here, people. Go request Elsie's Bird, that special number 300. Let's hope she hits 400 too.

A List You Might Need

ALSC has pre-pulled these needles from the haystack for us: books about Islam for kids. I'm saddened but not shocked to see the dearth of fiction, especially in chapter-book and novel-length. Sigh.

Have you read anything you'd add to this list?

Lee Wind and the Great Debate

Hop on over to Hunger Mountain, kiddies, and watch our own Lee Wind weigh in on "GLBTQ Teen Coming Out Stories: Move Beyond Them, or Keep ‘Em Coming?"

For me, I love GLBTQ books that show kids who are homosexual and that's their life. The coming out to the major players in their life is accomplished, and now they're dealing with other Life Stuff, just like any other kid. They're a gay kid or a lesbian, but they're not The Gay Kid or The Lesbian, like that's the sum total of their existence. For gay or lesbian kids reading about themselves, it's good to know that they are not their sexuality. For straight friends and family, that's also good to know that their friend/brother/sister is still their friend/brother/sister even with this new aspect of their identity.

On the other hand, as Lee says, a lot of places and people aren't so accepting as we would like, and for a lot of kids, understanding their sexuality and coming out are a major source of angst and even fear. They need books that show these experiences honestly, with all the bumps and bruises but the reassurance that's it's better to be yourself than to live a lie.

So . . . what do you think? Do we still need coming out novels on our shelves or should we focus on books with kids who happen to be gay?

Yessssssssss! / Noooooooooooo!

Fuse #8 pointed me at these two little tidbits of kidlit movie news:

1. They're making a movie of Jeremy Fink and the Meaning of Life! I love Wendy Mass's every sterling word, and it's a mystery to me why she doesn't get more critical love. Whatevs, I'll get to see this movie and if they don't completely turd it up, hopefully it will drive more kids to the M sections of my library. Yessssssssssss!

2. Remember the Mr. Popper's Penguins movie? Jim Carrey is going to be Mr. Popper. You heard that. Jim Carrey = Mr. Popper. Say it with me, kiddies: NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO.

One of these days, I will make a book display called, "The Book is Always Better, or Yes I Know the Movie Sucked, That Was Not the Book's Fault." Today, however, I will tenderly cradle poor Mr. Popper and his penguins in my arms.

Reading Roundup August 2010

By the Numbers
Teen: 21
Tween: 11
Children: 16

Sources
Swapped: 2
Purchased: 1
Library: 40

Standouts
Teen: Thaw by Monica Roe
I simply couldn't put this book down, even when I wanted to kick Dane right in the goolies.
Tween: When You Reach Me by Rebecca Stead
This book confused the bejesus out of me, and yet, I kept reading. There's time travel, and unlikely friendships, and growth and Madeleine L'Engle and . . . and  . . . okay, just read it already, willya?
Children: Wild Things by Clay Carmichael
A book about the unlikely families that we cobble together because the pieces don't fit anywhere else. Too bad the cover belonged on a different book.

Because I Want To Awards
Highest Ratio of Tears to Pages: Love is the Higher Law by David Levithan
Most Highly Anticipated: Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins
Twistiest Book Unfortunately Spoiled by the OCLC Summary (AKA, What Were You Thinking, Guys?!): White Cat by Holly Black
So Happy This Character Got Her Own Book: Goth Girl Rising by Barry Lyga
McGowan, You Are One Sick Dude: The Witch's Guide to Cooking with Children by Keith McGowan
So Far Over the Top It's Receding Beyond the Horizon: Jasper Dash and the Flame-Pits of Delaware by M.T. Anderson
Can't Wait to Recommend This to a 10-Year-Old: NERDS by Michael Buckley

Leaving on a Jet Plane

I just bought plane tickets. To where? Well might you ask! To Minneapolis!

Now while I'm sure the fair polis of Minnea has many charms, I'm going there for one of my favorite events of the year: the annual Kidlitosphere Conference, otherwise known as my best excuse to geek out over books and blogging and meet people I mostly know online.

It's October 23rd and I can't wait! Will I see you there?

Has It Really Been a Year?

No way, really? Okay, I guess so.

The Cybils, our beloved blogger-run literary awards, are ramping up again, and they're kicking things off with a call for judges. If you've never judged, now's your chance! If you've judged before, you know what it's like! So . . . yeah, follow the link and throw your name in the hat. You have until September 15.

Even if you don't want to judge, start gathering up your favorites of 2010 now, because the noms start October 1.