I tend to steer clear of bestselling books on this blog because they’re so well reviewed and blogged while smaller literary books that contain themes of social justice have a chance to draw discussion and perhaps even open…
Author: annangel
Thinking about outsiders and embracing identity
I’ve been thinking a lot about being an outsider as a teen and embracing identity in preparation for a panel I’m on this coming Saturday at NCTE in Chicago. What I find, after a ton of research on developmental stages…
What happens when teens feel unwanted?
Jo Knowles’ beautiful novel, Pearl, reflects the story of a teen girl whose mother admits openly that Pearl, whose grandfather calls her Bean, was nothing more than a rough piece of sand initially. Although her mother assures Bean, “I was…
Listen to the silence
The Dreamer by Pam Munoz Ryan with illustrations by Peter Sis, Scholastic Press, 2011. $17.99 An unrelenting silence surrounds many sickly children. It is the silence of rest and books, broken only by the muffled echoes of other children…
Picture book spotlights independent women at war
Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers 40 pages 16.99 The title Independent Dames might make you think Laurie Halse Anderson’s latest nonfiction picture book tells a contemporary feminist tale. But images by Matt Falkner make it readily…
Monika Schröder, author of Saraswati’s Way, speaks of poverty and education
Monika Schröder grew up in Germany. She studied history at the Ruhr University in Bochumand worked in the German parliament before becoming an elementary school teacher. She has taught in international schools in Egypt, Chile, and the Sultanate of…
Katherine Erskine on Writing Mockingbird
MOCKINGBIRD (National Book Award, 2010), (Crystal Kite Award 2011) In Caitlin’s world, everything is black or white. Things are good or bad. Anything in between is confusing. That’s the stuff Caitlin’s older brother, Devon, has always explained. But now…
Looking at the poverty of silence in Lauren Myracle’s small town
Best-selling middle grade and young adult author Lauren Myracle has a moral compass and she wants to pass that on through stories, usually stories of adolescent and teen girls, that grip her heart and imagination. “I don’t want…
To Play with Barbie or Not to Play…
The following post is a guest post by Lauryn Macy Roberts, a graduate of Mount Mary College’s graduate writing program. Lauryn recalls growing up with Barbies and raising a daughter to play with the iconic doll — but not without at…
Learning to Die in Miami offers insight into how governments create political orphans
Carlos Eire was only eleven, and his brother Tony only 13, when their parents gave them the one thing they would never get in their Cuban homeland: freedom. As part of the Cuban airlift of children called Pedro Pan,…