The nine finalists for the 2019 NSK Neustadt Prize for Children’s Literature were announced. “The NSK Prize is the most prestigious international children’s literary award given in the United States. Roll of drums with applause and gratitude to: the 2019…
Category: Economic Justice/Poverty/Immigration
Learning to Take a Stand: A Review of My Year in the Middle
In a small town in Alabama in 1970, Lu Olivera sits in the middle of her newly integrated sixth grade class. On one side of the classroom are the Black kids, at Red Grove Middle School for the first time.…
For today, a picture book about immigration, separation, longing for one’s mother: Mama’s Nightingale
For one of 2015’s most perfect picture books, our previous reviewer, Terry Farish, picked Mama’s Nightingale by Edwidge Danticat, illustrated by Leslie Staub. Danticat’s novels for adults, such as Claire of the Sea Light, expresses longing, often of a child…
Facing a Hard Past Together: A Review of The Stars at Oktober Bend
Alice is fifteen years old, but she believes she will always remain twelve. That was the year two young men from her town in Australia raped and beat her, leaving her in a coma for weeks and with difficulty speaking…
Announcing the 2018 We’re the People Summer Reading List
For the past four years, I’ve been part of a team to select books for the We’re the People Summer Reading list. This list features recommended titles by indigenous authors and authors and/or illustrators of color, with a focus on…
Celebrate Young People’s Poet Laureate Margarita Engle – powerful voice for many who have been silenced
April is Poetry Month, a perfect time to choose a poem, a book of poems, or even a novel written in poems. Savor the words, the rhythm, the images that will touch your heart and kindle your imagination. Take…
The Power of Creating: A Review of The Stars Beneath Our Feet
For many years I’ve been a Lego builder, creating a town with a combination of Lego kits and buildings of my own design that fit in with the classic appearance of the Modular themes. Because of this interest, I was…
GROUNDWOOD BOOKS a publisher to know
Groundwood Books celebrate diversity. In the words of Sheila Barry, Publisher, their commitment is to publish “the most exciting Canadian voices we can find. Whether it’s a picture book from Nunavut in the Arctic or a Carnival story about a…
MIGUEL’S BRAVE KNIGHT: YOUNG CERVANTES AND HIS DREAM OF DON QUIXOTE
Miguel’s Brave Knight: Young Cervantes and his Dream of Don Quixote by Margarita Engle, illustrated by Raul Colon. Peachtree Publishers In this poetic celebration of the power of imagination, we meet young Miguel Cervantes years before he creates his unforgettable…
Moral Choices in a Dangerous World: A Review of Francisco Stork’s Disappeared
Sara Zapata’s good friend Linda has disappeared, and Sara, a fledgling reporter at a struggling newspaper in Juárez, Mexico, wants to find her and the “only” 62 other young women who have disappeared in the same city that year. Her…