childrens book week day 1

Children's Book Week: Day 1

Welcome to Children's Book Week! Terra's going to start us off with

one of her favorite books from this year, Home of the Brave, by

Katherine Applegate. She writes:

I read Home of the Brave by Katherine Applegate (yes, the Animorphs

author!) while standing in a very long line, waiting to ship stuff

from a convention in NY back here to the store. Boy was I glad the

line was so long! This is a beautiful story (told in poems, not

chapters) about a young African boy, Kek, who is new to America and

trying to make sense of it all, including electricity, snow, and

alienation.

I cannot stress how gorgeous, quiet, and penetrating the language is

here--truly the prettiest book I've read all year, but also this is

like What is the What for kids, a personal, honest (but not horrific)

depiction of an all-too-sad reality in our world today.

Diane met Gretchen Hirsch, editorial assistant at Harcourt, last

February at the Atlanta SCBWI conference. Gretchen talked about

discovering her "first" author/illustrator, Jan Thomas, whose book

What Will Fat Cat Sit On? was published earlier this year.

Gretchen's genuine enthusiasm for this book was contagious and without

even seeing a finished copy of it, I ordered multiple copies for the

store. We have been reordering it regularly ever since and it is a

staple read at our Tuesday morning storytimes with Lynn.

What Will Fat Cat Sit On? is a perfectly silly and irreverant picture

book that begs to be read aloud at storytime, bedtime, or just about

any other time. The illustrations are fantastic- simple, colorful, and

engaging- the expressions of the animals as they worry about their

fate are priceless. Thomas is definitely up and coming and her work is

certainly reminiscent of this guy you might have heard a bit about- Mo