105 Ways to Give a Book

Notable Children’s Books

The Newbery and Caldecott Awards are great, but I really enjoy the ALSC Notable Children’s Books List. While the awards are limited to a few titles, this list brings together a diversity of culture and style. There are funny books as well as serious books. There are books set in Africa and books set in New York City. There are books with toddler appeal and books with teenage appeal (though there is a separate Young Adult list that I’ll talk about later). Best of all, I’ve often read a fair number of the titles. I’m also proud that many of my Top Picks for 2006 are on the list. So, yeah me. The highlights of this year’s list for me, personally, are:

Younger Readers:
Once Upon a Banana, by Jennifer Armstrong
I Lost My Tooth in Africa, by Penda Diakite
Wolves, by Emily Gravett
Lilly’s Big Day, by Kevin Henkes
Duck and Goose, by Tad Hills
Uncle Peter’s Amazing Chinese Wedding, by Lenore Look
Adele and Simon, by Barbara McClintock
Not a Box, by Antoinette Portis
Black? White! Day? Night! by Laura Seeger
Scaredy Squirrel, by Melanie Watt

Middle Readers:
Hugging the Rock, by Susan Taylor Brown
Toys Go Out, by Emily Jenkins
The Year of the Dog, by Grace Lin
Ruby Lu, Empress of Everything, by Lenore Look
Rules, by Cynthia Lord
Clementine, by Sara Pennypacker
Team Moon, by Catherine Thimmesh

Older Readers:
Hattie Big Sky, by Kirby Larson
Gossamer, by Lois Lowry
All of the Above, by Shelley Pearsall
Yellow Star, by Jennifer Roy
Counting on Grace, by Elizbeth Winthrop

Hmm. Seems like there’s a book missing from the list. I can’t quite put my finger on it...

I’ll also use this list to help me fill in the gaps of last year’s reading — since it will be a while before my library starts getting the 2007 books. I’m already noticing quite a shortage of boy books in my favorites, though it seems the Newbery committee had the same problem this year, so maybe it’s not just me.

1 comment:

Jone said...

I will print off this list to read this year. It is a challenge to keep up with the most current release.
BTW, my post is up at http://maclibrary.libblog.net for Poetry Friday. Going to a conference on boys and books so I can't keep track of whos collecting PF sites.