ACL BayNews - December 2007

December 2007

Calendar / News & Notes / Awards / Professional Reading / Pop-Up Book Roundup

MARK YOUR CALENDAR

Upcoming Events for Children's Librarians

Fri, Jan11, 2008 ACL Meeting 9 am Berkeley PL

Jan. 11-16, 2008 ALA Midwinter Philadelphia, PA www.ala.org

Sun, Jan 27, 2008 Distinguished Books round-up Noon - 4 pm Penny Peck's House

Sat, Feb 2, 2008 Orion School Fest See Below for more info

Fri, Feb 8, 2008 ACL Meeting 9 am Berkeley PL

Feb. 16-17, 2008 Reading the World www.soe.usfca.edu/departments/ime/rtwconf

Sat, Feb 23, 2008 Performers Showcase 9 am Fremont Main Library

NEWS AND NOTES

ACL 2008 Dues Reminder
ACL dues for 2008 are due on January 1, 2008. Please fill out a membership application available at meetings or online at www.bayviews.org/membership.html .Please submit the dues by mail or give them to the treasurer or membership chair at a meeting. The membership chair will contact anyone who didn't prorate his/her dues last year and thus needs to prorate this year to get to a January renewal date. All members will continue to receive BayViews until their dues are 3 months overdue. This year, if a member doesn't renew by institute time in April, the March BayViews will be the last until dues are received. The membership chair will try to email or call overdue members with a reminder, but this is not guaranteed.
Library and other organizational subscriptions are not subject to the January renewal date.
If you have any questions about the status of your dues, please contact Lucy Meinhardt, Membership Chair, at membership@bayviews.org Thank you very much. - Lucy

Reading the World X February 16, 17, 2008 University of San Francisco
Join us to reflect upon a decade of Celebrating Multicultural Literature for Children and Young Adults, featuring many old friends from past conferences as well as new faces and voices - Alma Flor Ada and Leslie Tryon, Ashley Bryan, Sarah Ellis, Rita Williams Garcia, Naomi Shihab Nye, Doris Orgel, Peter Sis, Laurence Yep, Jack Zipes, and more... www.soe.usfca.edu/departments/ime/rtwconf

6th Annual Orion School Children's Authors and Illustrators Festival
February 2, 2008 10-3:30

FEATURING : Madeleine Dunphy ; Candace Fleming ; Elissa Haden Guest ; Matthew Holm ; Francisco Jimenez ; Elisa Kleven ; Eric Rohmann ; Katherine Tillotson

Orion Elementary School ; 815 Allerton Street ; Redwood City

5 and up ; FREE Contact : Sharon Levin sharonlevin@mindspring.com

BayNews needs you! BayNews welcomes any articles, news, ideas on storytime or programs, etc. Just send any articles as a Word attachment to email, to Penny Peck at baynews@bayviews.org. Thanks!

AWARDS ANNOUNCED

National Book Award Winner: The National Book Awards were announced last month. The winner in the Young People's Literature category was Sherman Alexie for The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian (Little Brown, 2007). Based on Alexie's true story, this humorous novel for teens will appeal to any young person who can identify with being an “outsider.” Alexie lives in Seattle, Washington.

New Award in Honor of William C. Morris: YALSA, the young adult librarians' division of ALA, will be awarding the William C. Morris YA Debut Award, starting in 2009. Named in memory of Bill Morris, longtime library promotions director for HarperCollins publisher, the award is funded by the William C. Morris Endowment. The award will go to a first time author who publishes a book for young adults, that is well written, has the highest literary standards, and will appeal to teens.

PROFESSIONAL READING

Artist to Artist: 23 Major Illustrators Talk to Children about Their Art. Philomel, 2007. $30, ISBN 9780399246005.

With all profits going to the Eric Carle Museum, most libraries will want this book. But it will be surprising useful to not just children's librarians; teachers, parents, and children will also find this an enjoyable “coffee table” style book.

The format is very attractive, with each person beginning with a letter to a child who may be inspired to be an artist. On the letter is a photo of the artist as a child. Then, on the right side of the opening, is a gatefold page with a contemporary self-portrait of the illustrator. Open the gatefold and see a scrapbook-like page filled with small illustrations from their earlier work, photos of their studios, and other interesting tidbits. The self-portrait of Robert Sabuda and Matthew Reinhart is (appropriately) a popup!

The illustrators reflect an international vibe, including Anno from Japan, Quentin Blake and Robert Ingpen from England, Petra Mathers from Germany, Gennady Spirin from Russia, as well as different generations from Maurice Sendak to Jane Dyer.

For the entry on Leo Lionni, his granddaughter Annie wrote the letter, and his portrait is a photo. Several (but not all) of the male illustrators talked about how their parents were not supportive of their choice to be an artist. Overall the tone of each letter is encouraging, letting the child reader know that if they really want to be an artist, then he or she can be one!

Pop-Up Book Roundup
by Penny Peck, San Leandro Public Library

Brown, Ruth. THE OLD TREE. Candlewick, 2007. $16.99, ISBN 9780763634612.
Only the final spread has a popup, but a grand one it is. A mail carrier bird talks to all the inhabitants of an old tree, who band together to keep human loggers from chopping down their home. The popup is the large old tree, complete with green leaves, a bird house, a badger's den and a rabbit's hut. A story perfect for a unit on working with your neighbors, and preserving the environment.

Hewitt, Sally and Givan-Cartwright, Chris. POP-UP SEA CREATURES. Abrams, 2007. $14.95, ISBN 9780810958777.
Six spreads feature oversized, dramatic popups of real sea creatures - a leafy sea dragon, lionfish, tiger shark, great devil ray, giant squid, and viperfish. The popups explode out of the pages, in full color paintings showing the underwater environment. Each is captioned with a limerick, describing the animal; the rhymes are a little off and end with the creature's name, but they work well for this browser.

Hardcastle, Sir Henry. EXPLORER: A DARING GUIDE FOR YOUNG ADVENTURERS. Candlewick, 2007. $15.99, ISBN 9780763636487.
Similar in format to the “Dragonology” series, this could easily fit in the nonfiction section on exploration. Addressing the young explorer, the author describes a variety of places worth exploring, from deep in the jungle, to deserted islands, to the deep sea, an Egyptian tomb, polar icecaps, and the highest mountains. Training and survival tips are included, as well as facts about real explorers and noted explorations and discoveries. There is a bit of “imperialist” perspective, with little mention of native peoples. The two popups depict a Mayan temple and King Tut's tomb, and there are several little envelopes with notes, letters, and game pieces that will get lost. Best chosen as a gift book, not for library circulation.

Drake, Ernest. DRAGONOLOGY: FIELD GUIDE TO DRAGONS. Candlewick, 2007. $24.99., ISBN 9780763636869.
Similar to a book for bird-watchers, this field guide was designed with tongue in cheek for dragon-watchers. Bound into the book are a dozen envelopes, each containing the pieces to a cardboard dragon model. The pieces are thick, like a jigsaw puzzle piece, and the rest of the book is a section of spiral-bound pages describing the dragons seen in the models as well as a few other mythical creatures. The text on each dragon reads like a factual animal field guide, but the models and binding make this only for home use, not libraries.

Ceran, Milovoj, Moseley, Keith, and Skwarek, Skip. DRAGON WORLD: A POP-UP GUIDE TO THESE SCALED BEASTS. Abrams, 2007. $15.95, ISBN 9780810994560.
The cover looks like a photo scrapbook, but the inside looks more like a traditional nonfiction book with full color paintings illustrating each page, decorative borders, and interesting sidebars with facts on these imaginary beasts. Beginning with a world map, the book covers dragons in various cultures, including Ancient Greece and Rome, Asia, and the Americas. The final popup is a skeleton model of a dragon, allowing even more comparisons to dinosaur books. The popup dragons are large, and come right out of the center toward the reader; they probably will not stand up to library circulation. But this is great for libraries that have a set of popup or toy books just for kids to use in the library, and can even be used for a report on dragons.

Submitted by : Penny Peck, San Leandro Public Library

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