What's Coming in May

The other day I got a package in the mail—the upcoming May/June 2013 issue of COBBLESTONE magazine. It’s not on the newsstands yet, so I’ll give you a sneak preview.

Here’s the cover:

The topic is timely, given the recent debate over immigration reform and providing a path to citizenship to people already in this country.

I’m especially impressed by young immigrants. Gedion from Ethiopia, Myint from Burma, and Quynh Thi from Vietnam are three young adults I interviewed for this issue of COBBLESTONE. I met them in St. Paul, Minnesota, at LEAP High School, a school just for immigrants.

You’ll find my interview with Gedion, Myint, and Quynh Thi on pages 13 through 16 of the magazine. There’s also a quick sidebar on page 17 about schools like LEAP and the challenges their students face.

I found the stories of these young immigrants truly inspiring and I hope you will too.

Marathon Monday 2013

Monday morning was lovely. It was crisp but not too cool. My son and I parked at the home of friends in nearby Hopkinton, MA, and walked to the center of town.

Food stands and port-a-potties had sprouted up around the green. My son said the air smelled like “state fair,” a heady mix of fried food and generator exhaust.

On the green, there were runners in yellow and blue. Along the street, there were grown-ups clutching Dunkin’ Donut cups, kids sitting on the curb, and National Guardsmen, ready yet relaxed. Overhead, airplanes dragging advertising banners buzzed.

When the elite runners finally took off, they gone in a blur. Others followed, and some who ran close to the crowd gave high-fives to onlookers along the way.

The Boston Marathon is like a 26.2 mile thread that links the Western suburbs with the city. 

We’ve all seen how Monday’s race ended. But here’s how the day and the race began: with sunshine, fried food, high-fives, and smiles.

Graphic Novel Round-Up

When I worked at the library of Twin Cities Academy, a charter middle school and high school in St. Paul, MN, one of the most popular sections was the shelf stuffed with graphic novels.

If I were still at TCA, here are three graphics from last year that I’d want to add to the collection—and push into people’s hands:

Drama by Raina Telgemeier (Scholastic, 2012)

By the author/illustrator of Smile and the illustrator of the graphic adaptations of Ann Martin’s Babysitters’ Club books, Drama is a standalone, contemporary novel with appealing characters and realistic situations. 

Callie’s big love is stage and set design. She’s found her middle school “home” with the tech crew, where her best friend creates costumes. Callie works closely with a handful of guys—some of them very cute. Complications ensue. Apart from one major meltdown, our heroine keeps her head and grows in the process. Some plotlines dealing with sexual preference may make this title too mature for elementary readers, but Drama’s overall theme of finding acceptance works well for readers across a spectrum of ages.

The Golden Twine by Jo Rioux (Kids Can Press, 2012)

The first volume in what will be a series called Cat’s Cradle, this story follows the adventures of Suri, an orphan who has been traveling with a circus—much to the circus owner’s displeasure. Suri lives in the land of Galatea, where dangerous monsters small and large are still thought to roam the woods. Suri’s dream, naturally, is to become a monster tamer. Golden Twine offers just enough plot twists and parallel threads, creepy creatures and chase scenes, to make the reader impatient to find out what happens next. It’s a solid beginning for an appealing fantasy series.

The Secret of the Stone Frog by David Nytra (Toon Books/Candlewick Press, 2012)

Like a cross between Peter Pan (where children are spirited away in the night) and a Hayao Miyazaki movie (where the world is full of fanciful creatures), Stone Frog is familiar and disturbing. It has the feel of a strange but vivid dream that you remember in full, frightening detail upon waking. 

The artwork is the real star here, recalling the work of Sir John Tenniel for Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. Nytra’s black-and-white drawings are detailed enough that readers (and budding artists) will want to turn the pages of this slim volume again and again.

Best-Sellers of 2012

What to make of Publishers Weekly’s recently released figures on the best-selling children’s books of 2012?

Well, there are a lot of the usual suspects: Wimpy Kids, Suzanne Collins, YA series fiction. There are even some interesting no-shows, like Harry Potter, as Travis Jonker of 100 Scope Notes points out.

The three most interesting titles to me were:

#20 Hardcover Frontlist 
(aka it’s new in hardcover in 2012)

The Fault in Our Stars by John Green

# 29 Hardcover Frontlist

Wonder by R.J. Palacio

#16 Paperback Frontlist
(aka it’s new in paper in 2012)

Out of My Mind by Sharon M. Draper

The first two are no surprise, based on my experience working in a thriving independent bookstore, Wellesley Books. Although neither Fault nor Wonder received big awards from the American Library Association, they were great sellers in 2012. Better yet, at my store at least, Fault appears to be picking up steam as we head into 2013. I’ve sold it to both adults and young adults, most of whom seem to be responding to friends’ recommendations, or word-of-mouth.

I’m totally unsurprised to see that Fault is going to become a movie in the near future, with Shailene Woodley cast as Hazel. Locally, here in the Boston area, Wonder has already been given a marathon staged reading in Newton.

What about that Sharon Draper novel? I’ll admit, Out of My Mind really did surprise me. Focusing on the life of Melody, an eleven-year-old who struggles with severe cerebral palsy, Out wasn’t on my radar. But this is one title I’ll be adding to my reading list.

What are your thoughts? Any books you’re surprised to see—or thought you would see, but didn’t?

Celebrate Caldecott’s Birthday with a Non-Winner

As we move full steam ahead into 2013 and the 75^th Birthday Celebration of the Caldecott Medal, it’s worth taking a moment to remember one of the best picture books NOT to win the award.

Wanda Gàg’s Millions of Cats came out during the Great Depression, a few short years before the Caldecott Medal was born. There being no picture book award at the time, Cats won only a Newbery Honor.

What’s so special about this non-winner?

On the surface, the black and white illustrations may look dated, the hand-lettered text harkening back to a long-gone era. But Cats was revolutionary. It helped us see the picture book in new ways. Anita Silvey sums up the impact of Wanda Gàg’s work in her delightful Children’s Book-a-Day Almanac entry: “In one title, she basically invented the American picture book.”

Not only did Gàg use the two-page spread to move the action,
she also sometimes wrapped text around the art.

Few artists before Gàg considered how they could use the two-page spread to effectively propel the narrative through the art. Even Gàg’s pencil-sketched art dummy for Cats, part of the Kerlan Collection at the University of Minnesota, is packed with forward-moving energy.

Gàg uses repetition in the text to draw readers in and build to a crescendo:

Hundreds of cats, thousands of cats, millions and billions and trillions of cats!

Gàg learned English in grade school in New Ulm, Minnesota, but she learned it well. As the oldest of seven children, she carried throughout her life a deep respect for her young readers. Before Cats was published, she read it aloud to children, making changes when needed so that the text would grab her audience. 

(Take a look at YouTube to see how the book works as a read aloud, and you’ll see that Gàg’s research paid off.)

The hand-written text reflects Gàg’s unusual care and concern over every aspect of the book. Gàg couldn’t find a typeface that worked with the line-weight and texture of her illustrations, so she had her younger brother painstakingly draw the words to her own precise instructions.

The final package is small and precious. Millions of Cats has continuously been in print since its publication.

Her life reads like a novel,
so this Gàg biography was a joy to write!

Full disclosure: I’ve loved Cats since I was little, but I grew to appreciate Wanda Gàg and her revolutionary approach to picture books while writing the book Wanda Gàg: Storybook Artist for the Minnesota Historical Society Press. Later, I was one of many to nominate Gàg to the MN150, a list of 150 important Minnesotans who shaped the state.

No doubt about it, she and her Millions of Cats are winners.

Nonfiction Roundup

The most recent bag of new nonfiction for young readers contains some real gems. Here are a few to seek out and share:

Look Up! Bird-watching in Your Own Backyard, written and illustrated by Annette LeBlanc Cate (Candlewick, 2013).

This is a great beginner’s guide to bird-watching (for folks of all ages), with funny cartoon-style illustrations and tons of useful information. You’ll find more than just info on birds here: Cate also offers a clear, straightforward, and humorous visual explanation of classification. This book has it all.

A Little Book of Sloth, written and photographed by Lucy Cooke (McElderry Books, 2013).

Sloths may not move very quickly, but they’ll capture your heart if you dare to open this book. While it’s lighter on facts than Look Up!, this title is heavy on cute. Cooke profiles sloths living at a Costa Rican sloth sanctuary, including tidbits on habitat, habits, digestion, and diet. But the photogenic sloths steal the show. “Mateo is so cute,” Cooke tells readers, “he should come with a public health warning.” So, for that matter, should the book.

Knit Your Bit: A World War I Story by Deborah Hopkinson; illustrated by Steven Guarnaccia (Putnam, 2013).

No roundup of nonfiction books would be complete without something about boys who knit, right? Hopkinson offers a historical fictional picture book about a boy who learns to knit in order to send warm socks to the troops. The story is fun, but the best bits are in the author’s afterword, where she reprints lines from a 1918 song for Seattle schoolboys:

Johnnie, get your yarn, get your yarn, get your yarn;

Knitting has a charm, has a charm, has a charm;

See us knitting two by two,

Boys in Seattle like it too…

Well, you get the picture.  

Wild Boy by Mary Losure (Candlewick, 2013).

This new narrative nonfiction from the author of The Fairy Ring hasn’t come out yet, but I’m so eager to read it, I’ll share here a link to the trailer. Can’t wait!

Bookmaking Fun

Hooray! I'm celebrating the very first hand bookmaking workshop I've led since moving to Massachusetts this past summer. 

For years, I've led students in grades 4 through 8 in basic hand bookbinding techniques, through classroom visits and a great program called the Student Creativity Festival, run by Success Beyond the Classroom in the Twin Cities. 

Yesterday marked my first workshop with kids in the Bay State.

It took place at a really great public library in the area, Goodnow Library in Sudbury, MA, and was funded by the Friends of the Goodnow Library. Full disclosure: this is also the library where I work part-time in the circulation department and children's room, so I'm (a little bit) biased in its favor. 

The workshop was for ages 11-14, and we had a good group of about ten for a school vacation day event. After I showed some examples of books made from clay, papyrus, and parchment, we made three simple blank books: 

• a skinny, small sewn sketchbook, based on Japanese side-sewn books
• another variation on Japanese side sewing using a rubber band and coffee stir stick, instead of thread
• a traditional sewn pamphlet style book with a velcro button closure

One surprise: the group was divided equally between boys and girls.
One disappointment: Scotch brand velcro buttons don't release easily enough from their backing
One lesson: pre-thread the needles next time!

FYI, if you want to know more about these crafts, check out my oldie-but-goodie book on the topic, co-written with Minnesota Center for Book Arts, Bookworks: Making Books by Hand (Carolrhoda Books, 1995). It's out of print, but still available in many libraries.