12.08.2008

2nd Annual Mock Caldecott Event at QL!

It’s that time of year again! Awards Season!

Queens Library is hosting its 2nd Annual Mock Caldecott Event on January 6th for its children’s librarians, and the planning committee has settled on our 6 finalists. Here they are:

-Baseball Hour by Carol Nevius, illus by Bill Thomson (Marshall Cavendish)

-Before John Was a Jazz Giant by Carole Boston Weatherford, illus by Sean Qualls (Holt)

-Cat and Mouse by Ian Schoenherr (Greenwillow)

-The Dog Who Belonged to No One by Amy Hest, illus by Amy Bates (Abrams)


-Wabi Sabi by Mark Reibstein, illus by Ed Young (Little Brown)

And since this isn’t the real thing, we can avoid that tedious veil of secrecy that keeps the actual awards so hush-hush. We discussed about 50 titles altogether during the course of 2008, and I do feel that these were definitely in the Top 10 books.

What I’m surprised about is that neither How I Learned Geography by Uri Shulevitz nor A Kitten Tale by Eric Rohmann made the cut. Personally, I was really hoping that Planting the Trees of Kenya by Claire Nivola would make it – it’s one of my favorites for the year – but it didn’t have a chance against some of the showier titles.

Lastly, for the most part, the committee was in agreement that both House in the Night by Susan Marie Swanson, illustrated by Beth Krommes and Wonder Bear by Tao Nyeu left us scratching our heads and saying, “Wha..?” Beautiful, yes. But coherent? Well, that’s debatable. And we did debate it, I assure you.

Stay tuned for the results on Tuesday, January 6th. Let the games begin!

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