School Library Journal talks to publishing's brightest stars.
Zora Howard: High School Senior, Slam Poet, and Youth Poet Laureate By Lauren Barack - 01/27/2010
Between homework and hanging with her friends, high school senior Zora Howard now fits the role of New York City’s first Youth Poet Laureate into her busy life. We caught up with this 16-year-old, who performs her poetry with such passion about everything from bi-racial hair to her grandmother’s throat cancer, to ask why the world should listen closely to its young people and how this student at Fiorello H. La Guardia High School plans to help. More
Sing, Write, Love: Sarah Weeks talks about her hilarious new picture book, 'Woof: A Love Story' By Rick Margolis - 02/01/2010
You started out as a singer-songwriter, right? Yeah. I studied songwriting and composition at Hampshire College in Amherst, MA. Then I came to New York, figuring if I was going to be a songwriter I had to be on one of the coasts. My being a children's author was a completely serendipitous thing. What happened? One of my sons had separation anxiety when he went to nursery school.
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Katherine the Great: There couldn't be a better choice for our new kids' book ambassador than Katherine Paterson By Kathleen T. Horning - 02/01/2010
Mere days before the announcement of the new children’s book ambassador, speculation was still running wild. Who would they tap for the prestigious two-year position? And, even more to the point, who could possibly measure up to the very capable Jon Scieszka, the first National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature, whose humor and flair would surely be a tough act to follow? As ...
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Sy Montgomery: A Roaring Success By Shanti Menon - 01/20/2010
Whether she’s knee-deep in a pit of snakes, bathing with orangutans, or feeding ice cream to her beloved 750-pound pet pig, Sy Montgomery gets close to nature in ways the rest of us can only imagine. For her latest book, Saving the Ghost of the Mountain: An Expedition Among Snow Leopards in Mongolia (Houghton, 2009), she packed her bags for Mongolia, hoping to track down the seldom-seen snow leopard.
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Myracle Worker By Debra Lau Whelan - 01/13/2010
Don't think for one minute that all the book challenges and hate mail are going to stop Lauren Myracle from writing her controversial children's and YA novels.
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Farewell Ambassador Scieszka By Debra Lau Whelan - 01/06/2010
Jon Scieszka, the first National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature, passed his mantle to Katherine Paterson this week. SLJ spoke to the award-winning author about his accomplishments, the challenges that still exist, and some handy airport security advice.
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A Date with Destiny: First-time author Rachel Ward talks about 'Numbers,' her new thriller By Rick Margolis - 01/01/2010
Jem has a disturbing secret: whenever she looks into people’s eyes, she sees the exact date of their death. Moments before a terrorist attack, she realizes that many of the bystanders are about to die. But when she and her classmate Spider flee the scene, they’re suspected of being part of the plot.
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The Greatest Story Never Told: An interview with National Book Award winner Phillip Hoose By Marc Aronson - 01/01/2010
Talk about chutzpah. It took Phillip Hoose four years to track down Claudette Colvin, but it was worth the wait. Last November, Hoose’s Claudette Colvin: Twice Toward Justice, the true story of a teen who refused to surrender her seat to a white passenger on a segregated bus in Montgomery, AL, in 1955, won the National Book Award for young people’s literature.
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Heavy Medal: A Mock Newbery Blog Jonathan Hunt, Librarian and teacher, Modesto City Schools January 30, 2010 Signing Off
REBECCA STEAD REDUX
Peter Sieruta talks about the first printing.
Monica E... More
2009 National Book Awards On the red carpet with nominees in the Young People's Literature category.
Photos by Rocco Staino.
SLJ Covers 2009 A bigger and better view of SLJ's covers from 2009
BookExpo America 2009: SLJ's Day of Dialog School Library Journal held a Day of Dialog in conjunction with the annual BookExpo America on May 28, 2009 at the Brooklyn Public Library. Full story: bit.ly/1a0G7o
Rockin’, Rollin’ and Ridin’ with Rebecca Frezza & Big Truck. CD. 23 min. Prod. by Big Truck Music. Dist. by CDBaby.com. 2009. $8.99.
Gr 1-5–A veteran of Noggin Channel and PBS Kids, Frezza created these eight exceptional rock ‘n roll songs for elementary grade children who are too old for Raffi, but not old enough for adult pop music.
Friends and colleagues of the late Effie Lee Morris may enjoy this photo of the children's librarian, which Nicholas Glass, founder and executive director of Teachingbooks.net, recently found on his computer. It was taken at the 2009 ALA Annual Conference in Chicago, and features (from left) Ashley Bryan, Christopher Myers, and Morris, also an advocate for children's literature and library service to youngsters with impaired vision, who died of cancer on November 10, 2009.
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Rockin’, Rollin’ and Ridin’ with Rebecca Frezza & Big Truck. CD. 23 min. Prod. by Big Truck Music. Dist. by CDBaby.com. 2009. $8.99. 
