Booklist Online: Book Reviews from the American Library Association

I’m gonna go ahead and tell you. Nubs: The True Story of a Mutt, a Marine, & a Miracle holds the distinction of being the only book I’ve ever reviewed that made me cry. Now, I’m not talking the kind of cataclysmic sobbing that makes coworkers edge away, nor am I talking about the ever-disturbing [...]

When the opportunity arose to see the film again, this time with a 10-year-old boy present, I jumped at the chance. But not without first warning him that the film was a bit more sedate than other kiddie films, to which he responded, “this is my movie, and I have no intention of falling asleep.” [...]

As you might know from reading 10 inches below this post (or, if for some reason you gets infos from somewhere else other than our little Likely Stories, you already know from anywhere else), the National Book Award nominations were announced yesterday. And while the NBAs are no stranger to odd picks, especially in the [...]

Nothing new here. Just a proof of the old maxim “less is more.”
It takes only 36 seconds (22 if you don’t count the closing information!) for this video to perfectly encapsulate Liz Garton Scanlon’s All the World. It’s simple: if you like this trailer, you’ll like the book, and in that respect it’s hard to [...]

Seven months ago, four Booklist editors were shown up by the book-themed board game It Was a Dark and Stormy Night. Seeing how our scattered egos were approaching reassembly, it was time for another round of humiliation. That’s just how we roll.
Thus: Bookchase. The box claims as its audience everyone from “people who have never [...]

Previously I’ve talked about how much my family enjoys Eric Carle’s The Very Hungry Caterpillar. Tomorrow we’ll be able to share the love during Jumpstart’s fourth annual Read for the Record campaign, which encourages adults and children across the country to read  aloud the same book on the same day—this year it’s Carle’s classic picture book.

If you need a warm-up [...]

Picture-book trailers usually adhere to one formula: artwork  /  zooms   x  pans  +  music = trailer. There’s something soulless about this approach; by removing both the effort of reading as well as the interaction of parent and child, we’re left with a simulacrum of an experience, a readaloud as interpreted by a robot.
However! Occasionally elements [...]

Here’s a quick ‘n dirty look at who won/was nominated for what in the last week:
Brunonia Barry (The Lace Reader, 2008) won the 2009 Baccante literary prize. She will be recognized at a ceremony on September 26th in Matera, Italy.
Author/illustrator Gail Gibbons (Tornadoes, 2009) will receive the prestigious Regina Medal on April 7, 2010 for [...]

Last week, the UK’s Carnegie Medal for Literature (not to be confused with that other Carnegie Medal) was awarded posthumously to Siobhan Dowd, who died of cancer three months after Bog Child was completed. With only three novels under her belt and a fourth on the way, Solace of the Road (to be released Oct. 2009), [...]

The Children’s Literature Association bestowed the Phoenix Award on Rosemary Sutcliff’s novel, The Shining Company (1992). Wondering why the Phoenix award is named the Phoenix? Behold:
The Phoenix Award is named after the fabled bird that rose from its ashes with renewed life and beauty. Phoenix books also rise from the ashes of neglect and obscurity and [...]