Children’s book reviews – Picture Books, Middle Grade, Young Adult – Publishers Weekly
Children's Book Reviews: 6/29/2009 06/29/2009
Reviewed this week: the latest picture book from the Emberley clan, a picture-book biography of the inventors of Day-Glo paint, new novels from Richard W. Jennings and Elizabeth Scott, as well as a round-up of concept books for younger readers. More
Winning ‘Hunger Games’ Essay Announced By Sally Lodge - 06/26/2009
Scholastic announced today that 17-year-old Kayley Hyde of Seattle has won the publisher’s The Hunger Games essay contest. As grand prize winner, she will receive a trip to New York City, where she will be treated to lunch with author Suzanne Collins. Kaylee will also be given a signed, personalized copy of The Hunger Games, an autographed ARC of Catching Fire, and a collectible “mockingjay” pin.
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Putnam to Publish Tale of Pachyderm and Pooch Pals By Sally Lodge - 06/25/2009
An animal odd couple that has captivated the mainstream media and has become a YouTube sensation will soon star in a picture book. In September, Putnam will publish Tarra & Bella: The Elephant and Dog Who Became Best Friends by Carol Buckley, documenting the friendship between an elephant and a stray dog at the Elephant Sanctuary in Hohenwald, Tenn.
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It’s the Dog Days of Summer at Square Fish By Sally Lodge - 06/25/2009
Square Fish Books is going to the dogs this season: Macmillan Children’s Publishing Group’s paperback imprint is featuring its six new canine capers in The Dog Days of Summer promotion. The cover of each book displays a crisp, close-up photo of a pooch on its cover, giving the middle-grade novels a uniform look and surefire appeal to young dog devotees. The promotion encompasses five reprints of books originally published by one of the group’s imprints, as well as one Square Fish original.
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Chicago School Keeps Alexie Novel on Summer Reading List By Claire Kirch - 06/23/2009
Despite public calls to do so from a group of parents, Sherman Alexie’s critically acclaimed YA novel, The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian, will not be pulled as required summer reading for 400 incoming freshmen students at Antioch (Ill.) Community High School. In a meeting on Monday night, school district 117 superintendent Jay Sabatino and the seven-member school board voiced their strong support for the book as an educational tool that engages young readers.
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Web Exclusive Reviews: 6/22/2009 06/22/2009
Four Daily News sports reporters turn in the definitive story of Roger Clemens and drugs in baseball; Miles Kington presents a lively epistolary meta-nonfiction collection about dying; Sam Pocker catches retailers gone wild; and smallpox eradicator D.A. Henderson chronicles his showdown with the disease. Plus: fiction from Jane Porter, Sarah Prineas's second Magic Thief novel, and Alex Flinn's Gossip Girl makeover of "Sleeping Beauty."
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Children's Book Reviews: 6/22/2009 06/22/2009
Reviewed this week: new books from Kenneth Oppel, Rebecca Stead and Paul Griffin, plus PW's review of the sequel to The Hunger Games, Catching Fire.
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Galley Talk: 'Shiver' by Maggie Stiefvater 06/18/2009 Shiver by Maggie Stiefvater is the love story of Sam and Grace, told in chapters that alternate between their points of view. Sam, a werewolf, rescues a young Grace from a wolf attack. Werewolves in Stiefvater’s world respond to the cold—they are wolves in winter, humans in summer, and each year they are human for a shorter period of time, until they remain wolves permanently. So Sam and Grace are on a deadline.
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