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I was delighted to see that three biographies written in verse were recognized in this morning’s awards. Your Own Sylvia: A Verse Portrait of Sylvia Plath by Stephanie Hemphill (Knopf) was named a Michael L. Printz Honor Book; Margarita Engle, the author of The Poet Slave of Cuba: A Biography of Juan Francisco Manzano (Holt), was the Pura Belpre Author Award recipient; and Frida: Viva la vida! Long Live Life! by Carmen T. Bernier-Grand (Marshall Cavendish) was selected as a Pura Belpre Author Honor Book.

It takes a lot of chutzpah for an author to write a biography of a major poet in his or her own original poems. Hemphill and Engle pull-off this feat beautifully, managing to honor their subjects’ work with contemporary new verse, and, Bernier-Grand is similarly successful in her original poems about Frida Kahlo that draw strong connections between the painter’s life and work. Hopefully these exceptional titles are part of a growing trend, and the attention that they’ve received will encourage more writers, and publishers, to produce exciting nonfiction stories in poetry form.

In a reviewer’s life, there are countless moments when one must look back and consider, in the face of opposing opinions, whether an earlier evaluation still holds. In my (unstarred) review of The Invention of Hugo Cabret, I noted that “bookmaking this ambitious demands and deserves recognition” – and so it has! I commend the Caldecott committee for making their own ambitious choice (of a book that’s certainly not a picture book in the form most will expect), but I still stand by my earlier opinion that Selznick’s story and characters here feel like vehicles to his overall artistic and intellectual vision. As incredible as I found Selznick’s ability to recreate the experience of watching a silent film, I also found the narrative a bit flat, and too full of film-history references that distracted from the boy’s personal journey. Moreover, the latter seemed too directed by the intervention of concerned grown-ups (such as the older film buff who helps unmask the toymaker’s true identity).

It will certainly be fascinating to see what children make of this…

[...] If there’s anyone who questions the enthusiasm of librarians for their line of work–and it sure ain’t me–show them this. Could writers and readers have any better friends? (Further reading.) [...]