HIGHWAY CATS by Janet Taylor Lisle

I had HIGHWAY CATS on my list of books I had hoped to read before the Newbery announcement. I finished it today and it was a great read. I love lots about the book. It is the story of cats--stray cats who live near a highway and some new kittens who give them all hope. A very sweet story with great characters. I am not one to love books where animals are the characters and they talk to each other and things. But, I liked this book and believed in these characters. My thinking during reading the book was that it would make a great read aloud for 3rd and 4th grades. The kids would like the plot-the cats are trying to protect the land where they live. But they'd also be able to talk about the characters and themes. So much about being true to who you are. The book is short--just over 100 pages which I think makes for a great length read aloud. It is also a great length for kids who are working to build stamina to read longer books. Definitely a great book for anyone who loves a good animal story. This book is being talked about on lots of Mock Newbery sites. Jean Taylor Lisle shares some insights in an interview on her site. I will definitely be adding it to the school library.

DIAMOND WILLOW by Helen Frost

I just finished DIAMOND WILLOW by Helen Frost. It is a definite must read and would probably make a great read aloud for upper elementary and middle school students. (You would just need to find a way to project the pages up on the screen during the read aloud.)

I am a Helen Frost fan. I especially love her book SPINNING THROUGH THE UNIVERSE. and read that one aloud to my 5th graders.

DIAMOND WILLOW is am amazing book. I can see why it is on so many Mock Newbery lists. The story has lots of layers, as all of Frost's do. And the layers and depth are accessible to kids--which I like. The story is the story of a girl and her sled dog. It is also a coming of age story. Frost tells the story in diamond shaped poems--one per page. And she uses bold text to give us a stronger message on each page. Frost tells the story from several perspectives--both people and animals.

So much I like about this book. I have to love the characters to love a book and I LOVE this character, Willow. I also love the dog (and I don't love all dogs.) I love the metaphor of the diamond willow and I love the layers of meaning that are there for readers.

A quick read because of the format but definitely one I'd want to read again. And one I'll put in the school library.

Look What I Bought!

I just picked up this great new cookie cookbook--MARTHA STEWART'S COOKIES. I am not one to pick up a Martha Stewart Cookbook. It all seems like far too much work for me. (just look at her prop room...). But when I saw this book, I knew I had to have it. Cookies are really the only thing I like to make/bake/cook. And I love to try new ones. This book is full of 175 cookie recipes-with photos! The Table of Contents is quite fun--photos of the cookies with the page numbers. I am going to force myself not to try any of these before I make my last cookie trays but I can't wait to go through it and find a few new cookies to try in 2009. Definitely excited about this one!

THE GRAVEYARD BOOK by Neil Gaiman

THE GRAVEYARD BOOK is one of the books being discussed on many Mock Newbery sites. So, I put it on my next read stack. I enjoyed Coraline and heard that this one was even better.
This is my first report on my Newbery Readiness Reading. A few weeks ago, I posted a list of 5 books that I'd like to have read before the Newbery is announced. Well, my pile has grown and I finished the first on the list. I will report out on the books that I do read before the January 26 Newbery announcement. The reviews won't be long because -by this point--so many others have reviewed them. I'll give you my general feeling and a few links to let you decide if the book is worth reading.

THE GRAVEYARD BOOK is a great book. It is a spooky kind of ghost story which is not my favorite genre, but I am a character reader and this is definitely a character-based book.

Nobody Owens ("Bod") escaped being murdered as a child when he escaped to a nearby graveyard. The ghosts in the graveyard decide to raise him and keep him safe and he lives most of his childhood in the graveyard. But as he grows up, he wants more from life than the graveyard can give him. He learns that life beyond the graveyard is a scary place but that living life is worth it.

The last 20 pages made the book one that will stay with me. I read this as a mom who has a senior in high school--one that will be entering a new phase of life very soon. Neil Gaiman says that he does not see this as a children's book, although children will enjoy it. It is a great coming-of-age/growing up/letting go story that will have lots of audiences. I am a person who does not enjoy horror and who stays away from things that terrify me. I don't see this as a book that will terrify kids--just spooky enough. But I am also not quite sure about the age range that it will appeal to. There is a depth about it that seems meant for older children. And there are ghosts that can be very scary. I know that my 3rd grader is a bit stressed out by the cover--she has mentioned not liking the gravestone every time that she's seen me reading it. Because I am not a reader of this genre, I don't know how it compares to other spooky tales. But what I do know is that it is a great story with a unique setting that works. Monica at Educating Alice shared it with her 4th graders and posted some of their reactions. I can definitely see why it is making its way into Newbery conversations. (although no one seems sure about whether it is actually eligible...)

Other reviews to read:
Fuse #8's is here.

The Book Swede

Becky's Book Reviews

LAST NIGHT--new wordless picture book

I have built quite a good little collection of wordless picture books so I was thrilled to pick up a new one yesterday at Cover to Cover. It is called LAST NIGHT by Hyewon Yum. The illustrations are gorgeous and the plot is a simple ones that kids will be able to follow easily.

The idea of the book reminds me a bit of WHERE THE WILD THINGS ARE. A little girl does not like her dinner so has to go to her room. There, she goes to sleep. She and her bear have a great adventure and she wakes up feeling much better. A great simple book that you may want to check out if you like wordless books. We have been lucky to have lots of great new wordless books this year!

Zorgamazoo

Zorgamazoo

by Robert Paul Weston

illustrated by Victor Rivas Villa

book design by Christian Fuenfhausen

Penguin Group, 2008

review copy provided by the publisher

Zorgamazoo is a novel in verse, but not at all like the ones you're used to. Zorgamazoo is one poem. One 283 page-long poem. In rhyme. Rhyming couplets that can't help but remind you of Dr. Seuss at times.

Dr. Seuss rhymes with a little Roald Dahl thrown in -- the main character, Katrina Katrell, is a spunky little girl who has been abandoned by her rich and disinterested parents to the care of an evil guardian who wants to have Katrina lobotomized. The book design has hints of Geronimo Stilton, with fonts of varying size and style used to enhance and illustrate the telling of the story and keep things moving along briskly. 

Katrina's fate intertwines with that of Mortimer Yorgle, a zorgle who is rather a stick in the mud compared to his adventuresome but failing-in-health father. Katrina bravely runs away from her evil guardian and Morty wins a lottery whose prize is a quest to discover what's happened to the zorgles of Zorgamazoo. Luckily, Morty gets lost and winds up in the same dark, deserted subway station as Katrina, just in time to save her from a gang of thugs. After hearing Morty's story of the lost zorgles of Zorgamazoo, Katrina begs to join him in his quest (having nothing better to do and no home to return to, after all).

The story gets more and more convoluted, as our characters find themselves (and the zorgles of Zorgamazoo) trapped on the moon, and the struggle of good vs. evil takes the form of enchantment and imagination vs. boredom and tedium.

Yes, I have read over what I have written, and yes, I am aware that it sounds like I am babbling. This book defies any kind of description that makes complete sense. You'll just have to get a copy and read it. It might make a fabulous read aloud, but only if the listener is snuggled up beside you and can see the pictures and the way the words play around on the pages.

Visit the Zorgamazoo website to meet the characters, read an excerpt, and get ideas for using the book in your classroom.

Robert Paul Weston blogs at Way of the West.

Examples of illustrator Victor Rivas' illustrations are here.

Reviewed by Ali at Worducopia and Fate at The Fickle Hand of Fate.

GREAT NEW ALPHABET BOOK!

I just picked up HOW TO BUILD AN A by Sara Midda. What a great book! It is a must have for preschool-grade 1 classrooms and it would also make a great gift for a young child.

The book is red, small and square. Very inviting for small hands. Each spread has simple text on the left side with an illustration on the right side. For example "F is for flower". The font is PERFECT for children just making sense of text. It is large with space between the words. There are no fancy/crazy letters. (I checked the "a" to make sure!) And because the pattern of text is the same on each page, it will be one that kids will begin to read on their own. The illustrations are stunning yet simple. Great art but also easy for kids to use as clues when reading.

Below each sentence of text, is an illustration of a child is "building" the letter. And the fun of this is that the book comes with all of the blocks necessary to build every letter so children can build along on every page! With a nice netted bag to store them in.

Really, this book has it all. Great illustrations, patterned text, a perfect font, and a way for kids to build along with the book. I can see kids using this in different ways for years as they grow as readers.

Universal Truths

"I believe that music is the most important when the music stops. When a piece ends, that's when I really measure what effect it had on me or those who heard it." Michael Tilson Thomas



Same with teaching, don't you think?

And reading.
And writing.
And parenting, although the music only pauses for the briefest moments.
And Solstice parties, after all the guests have gone.

Come to think of it, any creative act qualifies.
So go forth and "make some music," but be sure you pay attention to what happens after the "music" stops.

FUSE#8--OUR HERO

Thank goodness for Betsy at FUSE#8. She has compiled all of the Mock Newbery and Caldecott lists. She has also tallied the books being discussed so that we can see which ones seem to be getting the most talk. Definitely worth taking a look at--I may be adding a few books to my holiday reading list...

Poetry Friday -- Inaugural Poet Announced

Poet Elizabeth Alexander will compose the poem for Barack Obama's inauguration. (From yesterday's article in Guardian.)

Barack Obama, perhaps the most literary president-elect of recent years, has chosen his friend, the poet Elizabeth Alexander, to read at his inauguration on 20 January.

Obama had been spotted carrying what appeared to be a book of the Nobel laureate Derek Walcott's poetry last month, but it is Alexander, a professor of African American studies at Yale University, who will compose a poem to be read at his swearing in as president. She will perform alongside Aretha Franklin, Itzak Perlman and Yo-Yo Ma. The participants were chosen based on requests from Obama and from vice-president-elect Joe Biden.
...

She will be contending with the spectres of Angelou's On the Pulse of Morning ("today I call you to my riverside, / If you will study war no more"), Williams's Of History and Hope ("We have memorized America, / how it was born and who we have been and where") and Frost's The Gift Outright ("Summoning artists to participate / In the august occasions of the state / Seems something artists ought to celebrate. / Today is for my cause a day of days. / And his be poetry's old-fashioned praise / Who was the first to think of such a thing.").

Here is an excerpt from Alexander's poem Ars Poetica #100: I Believe

Poetry is what you find
in the dirt in the corner,

overhear on the bus, God
in the details, the only way

to get from here to there.
Poetry (and now my voice is rising)

is not all love, love, love,
and I’m sorry the dog died.

Poetry (here I hear myself loudest)
is the human voice,

and are we not of interest to each other?

Her poem will be a gift to Obama, and to the nation as well. It will add to the ritual of the inauguration, and it will elevate the already historic event.

Can you imagine what it would be like to compose a poem that will be referenced in the same breath as Angelou and Frost?! 

 

Check out Elizabeth Alexander's website here.
Hear her speak on the Poetry Foundation podcast.

Edited to add...Here's a Washington Post article with great quotes from poet laureates about the...um...honor of composing the inaugural poem. (Thanks to Sara for the link.)

The Poetry Friday round up this week is at Author Amok.