Finalist for 2008 National Book Award

First and foremost, I have so many books that I would actually like to nominate for this title such as Stephanie Myer's Eclipse but that would be my personal opinion. I would like to say that the list of finalists still has not been released since they just finished picking up nominees. One of the nominees for 2007 was Touching Snow by M. Sindy Felin. It is a story about a family that has immigrated from Haiti and struggles with family inter conflicts. Karina has a stepfather that does not want to lose control of his wife and stepdaughters so he uses excessive force. Karina longs for her independence and education in America. It is a touching story that takes the reader on the life experiences of Karina and her family struggling to survive new America and their stepfather.

2008 Best Books for Young Adults (5)

Twisted by Laurie Halse Anderson

When the unpopular geek turns into the popular senior at school you know that there is trouble to come. Tyler was a geek that got in trouble his junior year of high school for spray painting graffiti at school. For that he was given manual labor over the summer and begins his senior year with a new muscular body that brings trouble for him even though he is unaware of it at the beginning. Tyler finds himself in very unfamiliar territory with the popular girl in school and sister of the bully very much interested in him, his father’s anger with him, school administration and staff looking at his every move and a particular party. Tyler is unable to handle all of the situations at once that he feels suicide is his only way out. This book will deal with issues that some of the students in high school deal with everyday and in the end Tyler realizes that he is not the problem.

2008 Best Books for Young Adults (4)

Skulduggery Pleasant by Derek Landy

A twelve year old girl named Stephanie had her uncle as her closest friend, and now he has passed away and has left his expensive villa to her. Stephanie is a fan of her uncle’s fictional horror books that she believes are just stories until she meets an investigator that turns out to be a skeleton. The skeleton known as Skulduggery Pleasant has found Stephanie to help him stop an ancient evil that her uncle talks about in his books. Together they will need to pull their strengths in order to save humankind from this evil. This was a good book to read to older elementary students, since they always like reading about scary stories. I really enjoyed the duo in this book and it showed readers, young kids, that everyone is scared of something just like the skeleton.

2008 Best Books for Young Adults (3)

Before I Die by Jenny Downham

Imagine being sixteen years old and living with a terminal case of leukemia and you no longer want to have treatments after four years of it; what would you do? Tessa decides to make a list of ten things she would like to do before she dies and we learn about them throughout the book. She would like to experiment with sex, drugs and criminal mischief only because she will not have the time to suffer the consequences. This was a touching book that many young adult readers will like to read especially if they have had known someone close to them that has died. This is a sad story that had me in tears at times only feeling sorry for Tessa for not being able to live her life. She is however able to experience love and in the end realizes the best thing to have around before she dies is family that loves her. This brought back many memories of my loss that our family experienced four years ago and it does make you appreciate family.

2008 Best Books for Young Adults (2)

The Arrival by Shaun Tan

This is an amazing book-picture book. The detail of the illustrations make you feel that you are looking at a photograph and not a pencil sketch. The book is about a man that leaves his family to find a better life for them. He is an immigrant that is looking for better work to support his family. With language being different as well as customs he gets overwhelmed by it all. This is exactly what happens to many of the immigrants that we see now; they don’t know the language and are struggling to make a better life for themselves and their families. The book has no text and you need to decide how to interpret the drawings on the pages, but you actually feel like if you are the man trying to understand the world he has stepped into. This book actually reminds me of my brother that went to study abroad in Amsterdam. He did not know how to speak Dutch and had to learn day by day how to get around and had no family near him. He struggled at the beginning and felt utterly alone just like the book.

2008 Best Books for Young Adults (1)

The Wednesday Wars by Gary D. Schmidt

This was a good book that talked about the life of Holling Hoodhood. He was a seventh grade student in the year 1967 that had a teacher that hated him. What was different about his school was that on Wednesday’s afternoons half of the students went to temple and the other half went to catechism while Holling had to stay with his English teacher Mrs. Baker since he was Protestant. He believed that she hated him since she made him learn Shakespeare during the afternoons that they spent together. During his Wednesday sessions, he learned to like Shakespeare and actually understood it. This was great because it got him thinking about his own life and becoming a man. Holling’s parents were not that understanding or supportive of their children. Holling go to star in a play at school and became very fond of a girl named Meryl Lee with all of this going on in his life plus getting on the cross country team; he needed to start learning what life was all about. It is a great book to let middle school students read especially boys because it will give them a sense of purpose and help them find themselves.

2008 Batchelder Award or Honor Book

The Cat, Or How I Lost Eternity by Jutta Richter

Christine meets a unique cat in an alley on her way to school and she begins to ponder ideas that he is able to transmit or tell her. She is usually late to school because of this and her teacher makes her write lines stating that there are no talking cats and that she would not be late anymore. The cat begins to tell Christine that you have to go through life being cleaver and that you must always look out for yourself in life. Christine does not want to believe that and does not like his sense of spitefulness. Christine in the end begins to be scared of the cat and believes that he is not everything he says he is. Christine believes that being number one in your life is not the main priority of living life. This is a good book to show the young readers not to fall into someone else’s negative attitude and self-interest in life. Also, one should not always be cleaver since it usually takes you back instead of getting ahead in life.

Winner of 2008 Caldecott

The Invention of Hugo Cabret by Brian Selznick
I truly loved this book. It was great having the illustrations to help the text of the book flow, even though the book was 550 pages long, you didn't even realize it when you finished the book. The story talks about the life of Hugo Cabret after he lost his father in a museum fire. His father was a horologist and found a mechanical man in the attic of a museum that he was working at. After his father's death, Hugo's uncle took him under his wing and showed him how to take care of all of the clocks at the Paris train station. After his uncle disappeared, Hugo decided to keep maintaining the clocks so that people did not realize he was missing and would end up sending Hugo to an orphanage. In order to eat Hugo ended up stealing and was caught stealing a toy from the owner of the toy booth at the train station. In order to make up for this and to get back his notebook from mean old owner, Hugo performed chores around his booth. The notebook contained notes that his father had made in order to repair the mechanical man. The store owner, Papa Georges for some reason did not want to give up the notebook and enjoyed having Hugo around but did not let him know that. Then there was Isabella who was Papa Georges' goddaughter and befriended Hugo. All of their lives intertwined with the mechanical man as the glue that put them all together. By the end of the story we learn that Papa Georges was the inventor of the mechanical man and actually a very famous film producer that everyone thought to be dead. Hugo was taken in by Papa Georges and his wife and given a new name and a start to his new life, a magician. You will love this story and get so taken by it that you will not put it down once you start it!

Winner of the 2008 Belpre Award for TEXT

The Poet Slave of Cuba: A Biography of Juan Francisco Manzano written by Margarita Engle

This is a heart-wrenching story about a Cuban boy that was born into slavery. He was denied and education but had the talent to memorize poems in several different languages. To his mistress he was a toy that entertained her guests and several years after she died, he was sold to a cruel woman that had him tortured at her whim. Juan Francisco endured the pain and suffering by reciting his poems to himself in his head while he was being whipped. This story allows us to experience what Juan went through in his life and learn that slavery was not only in the United States. This is a touching story that would be recommended for middle school kids so that this treatment would never happen again.

2008 Newbery winner

Good Masters! Sweet Ladies! Voices from a Medieval Village by Laura Amy Schlitz

This was an interesting book that had 23 monologues and every single story intertwined with the lives of young children living around an English manor in 1255. This is an interesting way to reveal historical concepts to the readers. It creates a great learning environment and it gets the reader involved in the personal stories of each character. The book also has side notes about the Crusades and Jews during that time period.

Two 2008 Newbery Honor Books

Feathers by Jacqueline Woodson

This story brings to light the feelings of a young girl named Frannie in a black sixth grade classroom when a new boy that appears to be white joins the class. The class bully gives him the nickname of “Jesus Boy” and taunts him asking him to go across the highway. This story deals with segregation, deafness and the longing of finding “hope” in young kid’s lives. Frannie’s brother is deaf and longs to be accepted by his peers, Frannie’s best friend Samantha begins to believe that the new boy is in fact Jesus. The main characters go through various struggles with race, prejudice, hope and religion. This is a good book to recommend to readers that hope is a powerful tool to have.

Elijah of Buxton by Christopher Paul Curtis

This is a great book to introduce the students to slavery in the social studies classroom. The book is about a 13 year old boy that is the first child “born free” to former slaves in the town of Buxton. Elijah does not know what it means to be a slave but ends up learning after he travels into America to help Leory get back the money that was stolen from him to free his family. He has to grow up and mature so that he can make it back to his home where he is truly able to be a free man. You begin to feel what Elijah goes through and experience the journey as if you were right beside him. This book will have you laughing and crying alongside Elijah.

FIVE books from the 2008 Notable Books for Children List

Knuffle Bunny Too: A Case of Mistaken Identity by Mo Williams

I really enjoy Mo Williams’s books since they are short and to the point and are interesting for children as well. The Knuffle Bunny books use real photographs for the layout of the pages and have cartoons drawn onto them so it gives it more of a realistic feel to the book. The book is about a day at school when Trixie and Sonja both take their bunnies to school and fight over who has the best one. During the day they are taken away by the teacher and returned in the afternoon. Trixie and Sonja realize that they are sleeping with the wrong bunny at 2:30 in the morning and refuse to go back to sleep until they return their bunnies to the proper girl. This brings Trixie and Sonja together making them best friends.

Little Rat Makes Music by Monika Bang-Campbell

Little Rat comes from a musical family and wants to learn how to play the violin. After realizing that it will take long hours of practice to get to the point of playing the violin like the professionals do she is determined to get there with the help of her tutor named Kitty. Little Rat Makes Music is a great book to teach children that through hard work and dedication they can do achieve any goal that they set their mind to.

Nothing by Jon Agee

This is a great story to teach kids that many people are driven by fads and may do foolish things. In this story Suzie Gump has bought many things and now wants to buy “nothing” from the antique dealer Otis after his store has no more items in it. Otis and the other store owners start selling “nothing” to other people who want what Suzie Gump is buying and soon Otis’ shop gets replenished with all of the items that people are selling to have “nothing.” This book makes me think of what happens when young girls see movie stars with particular clothing and it becomes the latest fad. It goes to show you how silly of a concept that is.

Rainstorm by Barbara Lehman

This book is a great example of children of different races and socioeconomic backgrounds enjoying being kids together. The story is a picture book about a young boy that is bored in his home when it is raining outside with no one to play with. He has so many toys in his house and is waited on by servants but is still lacking the company of friends. While he is wondering aimlessly in his house he finds a key that unlocks a chest that opens up into a fun filled adventure with new friends that he meets. The story is taken from the illustrations in the book. This is a great picture book that I shared with my son and he enjoyed looking at the story and telling me about it from his own perspective. It is also a great book that makes the reader think about what they may be saying or thinking.

When Dinosaurs Came with Everything by Elise Broach
This is a cute book that I really enjoyed reading to my son. It is a story about a little boy that goes out on errands with his mother and receives a dinosaur with every service or item they buy. By the time they finish their errands, they have taken home four dinosaurs and his mother decides to give each one a chore. The way they justify this is by saying that only a part of the family gets chores. This is a great way to show children that chores are fun and get their minds thinking about what would happen if they did actually get dinosaurs with everything. My son loved this book and continues to ask for it every night. I have also started to ask him to continue the story and imagine what happened next.

Winner of the 2008 Schneider Family Award

Kami and the Yaks by Andrea Stenn Stryer

I really enjoyed this story about a deaf Sherpa boy in Nepal that braves a Himalayan storm to find his family’s herd of Yaks. He finds them around a young calf that is stuck and cannot seem to dislodge his leg. He realizes that he needs help and goes down the mountain to get his brother and father. Kami lets them know about the stuck yaks through mime. This is a great story that allows the reader to see that even though someone has a disability they have different strengths in other areas. Kami was deaf, but his other senses were still very strong. I feel that this story allows the reader to accept the fact that a disability should not deter you from doing things or taking risks.

FIVE books from either the 2008-2009 LONE STAR, TAYSHAS, BLUEBONNET or 2 X 2 lists

Bob and Otto by Robert O. Bruel
This was a nice book to teach the younger kids about differences and similarities. The book is about a worm and caterpillar that are best friends and have always done everything together and one day they decide to split up and do different things. Bob the caterpillar decides to one day climb a tree while Otto the worm wants to dig under the earth. The book shows both actions of Bob on the tree at the top of the page and Otto under the ground at the bottom of the page. Once Otto comes out of the ground, he notices that Bob has changed into a beautiful butterfly and regrets digging around in the dirt instead of climbing the tree. Bob tells Otto that without him the tree would not have been able to grow and he would have not been able to eat and turn into the butterfly leaving the reader with the impression that friends always help each other out. I really enjoyed the bright colors used in this book and the first concepts of science that the author introduces to the readers.

Just Grace by Charise Mericle Harper
This was a cute little story that felt like you were reading a young girls diary. The story is about a girl named Grace and it just so happens that there are three other Grace’s in her class so her teacher begins to call her “Just Grace” from a miscommunication. Just Grace feels that she has been through many hardships in her young life such as getting spit at and missing a talent show. She is told by a friend that she should not feel sad for herself because other people have it worse. There seem to be a lot of miscommunication in Grace’s life that lead to her getting in trouble. She is not a mischievous child, but she does want to make other people feel better once they are sad, which usually lands her in trouble. The story is about Grace trying to make her neighbor, Mrs. Luther, feel better since her cat is very scared of her following an accident. Grace’s good intentions seen to get mixed up when she tries to send Mrs. Luther postcard from her cat to make her feel that the cat still loves her and then he suddenly disappears. Mrs. Luther does not think the postcards are very nice since she interprets them as ransom cards for her cat.

First Light by Rebecca Stead
This was an interesting book about a boy named Peter Solomon that went on an expedition with his parents to Greenland. Peter’s father was a glaciologist and his mother a genetic scientist. When Peter gets to Greenland he meets a girl named Thea that is from a secluded underground community known as Graceland she is tired of living underground and wants to bring her family out of the glacier. The residents of Graceland have lived underground for over 200 years with no plans of returning to the surface since they had a genetic mutation and were persecuted for it years earlier. Peter and Thea both have unusual “powers” that end up bringing them together. The interesting thing about the book is that it talks about global warming to middle school kids and about brings in a few science facts for the kids to start thinking about

1 2 3: A Child’s First Counting Book by Allison Jay
I really enjoyed reading this to my two children, they enjoyed the illustrations that you needed in order to appreciate the text. The fact that the numbers were bolded helped identify them to my children throughout the book. The fact that Allison Jay used favorite nursery rhymes to tell the story was great since my kids were familiar with those nursery rhymes already. The story uses the numbers 1 thru 10 and back again to tell about a little girls’ dream.

My Colors, My World/Mis colores, mi mundo by Maya Christina Gonzalez
This was a great book filled with illustrations that allowed you to experience the home life of Maya in the hot desert location. Maya always wants to describe things with vibrant colors and she is able to do this through the descriptions of different things around her house such as flowers, the sunset, a cactus and her father's hair . This is a great book because some of the words are expressed in Spanish and they use many different colorful illustrations.

2008 Quick Picks for Reluctant Readers List (5)

Masquerade: A Blue Bloods Novel by Melissa De La Cruz

I truly loved this book. After getting hooked on Stephanie Meyers’ books this book was a great addition to the vampire stage that I am in. A girl named Shuyler Van Alen wanted to find out what happened to some missing students at her high school and she ended up traveling to Venice to find her mother to help her out. She has also just recently found out that she is part of the elite, wealthy high society of New York who also happens to be vampires. These vampires are part of the blue bloods that are trying to do good since they repented after what Lucifer did to God, and they only fear silver blood vampires who did not repent and are still doing Lucifer’s work.

Glass by Ellen Hopkins

Glass is a book about a 17 year old girl named Christina that has a terrible drug addiction to crystal meth. One day that she is high, she gets raped and ends up being pregnant. Christina believes that she is able to control her addictions since she now has a child to care for. Unfortunately she is wrong and spirals out of control that ends up taking her baby away from her and getting her hooked on crystal meth again. This was an interesting book that shows teens the problems that an addict goes through and all of the trouble and pain that it causes. In the world that our teens are growing up in, they would enjoy reading something that they have seen firsthand and are aware of

Class Pictures by Dawound Bey

This was a great book that just consisted of photo essays. I was touched by some of the stories that the students told about who they were. I feel that this would be a great activity to do in the classroom so that we know what each one is thinking and we can go about trying to help them out to be the best they can be. When looking at the photographs and then reading the essays, I was surprised at some of the things that these kids have gone through in life and still continue to live each day. Everyone needs to take at look at this photo essay book and realize that some of the teenagers in America go through so much more that an adult goes through in one day.

Unwind by Neal Shusterman

Imagine being thirteen years old and waiting to see if your parents want to keep you or get rid of you by donating your body parts to those who may need some organs. This is an interesting book that had a controversial topic-abortion. People in this story were not allowed to have an abortion as a result of a compromise from the war by the pro-life and pro-choice fighters. The compromise did allow you to “unwind” teenagers from 13-18 if you felt they did not suit your families’ needs. The story is about the lives of three teenagers that are trying to survive the “unwinding” process. They also hear of others that are trying to escape the unwinding process that are being helped by “Admiral” and they go off trying to make it to their eighteenth birthday. This was a different twist on the abortion issue with a mix of stem cell research that I am sure would have the readers thinking what if this actually did happen.

Safe by Susan Shaw

Tracey has always felt safe with her mother and even after her death, she felt her presence and it made her feel safe. This remained until the day that she was raped. This is a touching story of a young girl that is raped at the age of thirteen and how she copes with it afterwards. Tracey is afraid to leave her house and her dad’s side but after a while is helped by her friends to begin to trust going outside her house again. Many students would like to read this book just to hear the courage that Tracey had to have to continue living day to day after the horrible rape that she went through. This is a good book that some students that have gone through this would be able to relate to and find courage in.

Winner of the 2008 Coretta Scott King Award for TEXT

Elijah of Buxton by Christopher Paul Curtis

This is a great book to introduce the students to slavery in the social studies classroom. The book is about a 13 year old boy that is the first child “born free” to former slaves in the town of Buxton. Elijah does not know what it means to be a slave but ends up learning after he travels into America to help Leory get back the money that was stolen from him to free his family. He has to grow up and mature so that he can make it back to his home where he is truly able to be a free man. You begin to feel what Elijah goes through and experience the journey as if you were right beside him. This book will have you laughing and crying alongside Elijah.

Winner of the 2008 Coretta Scott King Award for ILLUSTRATION

Let it Shine by Ashley Bryan

It’s amazing what artists can do with color to make a book stand out. This book by Ashley Bryan lets you experience the songs in the book through his illustrations. There is so much color flowing in the pages of the book that you can see people of different colors coming together with the words of the songs. It is a great representation of the spiritual songs “This Little Light of Mine,” “Oh, When the Saints Go Marching In,” “He’s got the Whole World in His Hands.”

Winner of the 2008 Belpre Award for ILLUSTRATION

Los Gatos Black on Halloween, illustrated by Yuyi Morales, written by Marisa Montes
This was a cute story that turned the Halloween point of view around to the monster’s point of view. It had great illustrations that helped move the text along. It is a story that tells what monsters, witches, skeletons, black cats, and the dead do on Halloween. They all get together and throw a ball in the haunted hall, the best parts of the story is when children knock on the door and yell trick-or-treat which is one thing that the monsters hate to see and hear. The book is great for teaching young readers some Spanish words that go with the Halloween season.

Winner of the 2008 Geisel

There is a Bird on Your Head by Mo Williams

I really enjoyed this little story about an elephant named Gerald and a pig named Piggie. They are two best friends (one is careful and the other is not) that are just taking a nap and then a bird lands on the Gerald’s head. After some time another bird lands on his head and then they start making a nest. Gerald gets worried and tries to get Piggie to help him get rid of the birds, nest and after some time three eggs. After the eggs hatch, Gerald begins to lose it and asks Piggie what to do, to help his friend out Piggie suggests that Gerald just ask the family to move off of his head. Gerald tries it and the family of birds happily lands their nest on Piggie's head solving Gerald’s problem but adding it to Piggie. This was a cute little story that my son really enjoyed reading as well. I enjoyed the color scheme of the text especially to help the reader know that if the text was shaded grey Gerald was talking and if it was shaded pink then Piggie was talking. It is also a story about friendship.

2008 Printz Honor Books (2)

One Whole and Perfect Day by Judith Clarke

All Lily wants is one whole perfect day where her family will not do anything that she seems to be freakish. She wants to have a normal day where all of her family members get along and act in a sensible manner. She is tired of being the sensible one in the family and wants her mother to care more about the family and household. For her Grandfather’s 80^th birthday Lily wants everyone to get along. This book is great to talk about the problems that families have and many students may relate to the relationships that Lily and her family have. Every student wants to have a normal day in life, and this book will help students realize that all families do have that one special day.

Dreamquake: Book Two of the Dreamhunter Duet by Elizabeth Knox

This book is great if you like science fiction, fantasy. The story revolves around Laura Hame and the Hame-Tiebold family that is able to deliver dreams to patrons of the Rainbow Opera especially one dream that opens a government conspiracy wide open. The government does not want anyone to know about it and it puts the lives of everyone in the family in danger. It is a story of fate, free will, magic and teen problems as well. If the reader is not at all interested in fantasy then this is not a book for them. This is also the second book of the Dreamhunter duet, but the beginning of the book allows you to understand what happened in book 1 so that you are not left out of the loop.

2008 Printz Award Winner

The White Darkness, by Geraldine McCaughrean

· This book is about a young girl Symone (Sym for short) that loves every aspect about Antarctica. She is willing to travel to with her deceased father’s business partner “Uncle” Victor to see Paris, but instead he takes her to her most beloved place in the world, the Antarctic. Sym feels that only two people truly care about her in her life now that her father is gone, the deceased explorer Lawrence "Titus" Oates and her Uncle Victor. She goes through many obstacles in the Antarctic especially since everyone gets sick on the trip and the plane that is going to return them to safety explodes. Uncle Victor has a hidden agenda in taking Sym to see Antarctica, he believes that there is a route to the center of the earth and must find it even though he may endanger the lives of the others. Sym must learn how to survive in the white barren environment of the Antarctic which she thought to be so peaceful with the help of her imaginary “Titus” Oates. Sym must learn how to grow up, believe in herself in order to survive, and not to be so trusting of people that are not her family. This is a great story of a girl that experiences hardships, and learns how to take care of herself in order to come out alive. This is a great book for young girls trying to find themselves and to gain more self confidence. I really enjoyed this book especially since it is aimed at girls in the middle school.