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January 1, 2008 by Betsy Bird

My Favorite Children’s Books of 2007

January 1, 2008 by Betsy Bird   4 comments


As you will see, my list is faulty because I don’t see half as many poetry and non-fiction titles as I should.  Still, I sacrificed a lot of blood and sweat and tears to winnow these titles down.  If you don’t see your favorite, rest assured that it was the very very last book I cut from the list.  Honest!

In any case, here are the pretty picks that I liked the best.  Yay!

Picture Books

  • Coffelt, Nancy. (Little Brown & Co.). Fred Stays With Me!
  • Donofrio, Beverly. Illustrated by Barbara McClintock. (Schwartz & Wade). Mary and the Mouse, the Mouse and Mary.
  • Freedman, Deborah. (Knopf – Random House imprint). Scribble.
  • Harrington, Janice. N. (Melanie Kroupa Books – An FSG imprint). The Chicken Chasing Queen of Lamar County.
  • Lee, Suzy. (Kane/Miller). The Zoo.
  • Levine, Ellen. Illus. Nelson, Kadir. (Scholastic). Henry’s Freedom Box.
  • Lin, Grace. (Viking – Penguin). Lissy’s Friends.
  • Lindenbaum, Pija. (R&S Books – FSG). Mini Mia and Her Darling Uncle.
  • Makhijani, Pooja. (Little Brown & Co.). Mama’s Saris.
  • McCully, Emily Arnold. (FSG). The Escape of Oney Judge: Martha Washington’s Slave Finds Freedom.
  • Morales, Yuyi. (Roaring Book Press). Little Night.
  • Rocco, John. (Hyperion). Wolf! Wolf!
  • Schlitz, Laura Amy. (Candlewick). The Bearskinner: A Tale of the Brothers Grimm.
  • Stauffacher, Sue. (Knopf). Nothing But Trouble: The Story of Althea Gibson.
  • Stewart, Joel. (Holiday House). Dexter Bexley and the Big Blue Meanie.
  • Tankard, Jeremy. (Scholastic). Grumpy Bird.
  • Thomas, Jan. (Harcourt). What Will Fat Cat Sit On?
  • Thompson, Lauren. Illustrated by Jonathan Bean.(Simon & Schuster). The Apple Pie that Papa Baked.

Early Readers

  • Willems, Mo. (Hyperion). I am Invited to a Party!
  • Willems, Mo. (Hyperion). My Friend is Sad.

Young Readers

  • Barshaw, Ruth McNally. (Bloomsbury). Ellie McDoodle: Have Pen, Will Travel.
  • Irving, Washington. Illustrated by Gris Grimley. (Atheneum – S&S). The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.
  • Kinney, Jeff. (Abrams Books for Young Readers). Diary of a Wimpy Kid.
  • Orr, Wendy. (Henry Holt and Company). Mokie and Bik.
  • Paros, Jennifer. (Viking). Violet Bing and the Grand House.
  • Perkins, Mitali. (Charlesbridge). Rickshaw Girl.

Fiction

  • Bauer, A.C.E. (Random House). No Castles Here.
  • Berlin, Eric. (G.P. Putnam’s Sons). The Puzzling World of Winston Breen.
  • Carman, Patrick. (Little Brown & Co.) Atherton: The House of Power.
  • Clements, David. (Simon & Schuster). No Talking.
  • Curtis, Christopher Paul. (Scholastic). Elijah of Buxton.
  • Davies, Jacqueline. (Houghton Mifflin). The Lemonade War.
  • Durst, Sarah Beth. (Razorbill – Penguin Group). Into the Wild.
  • Flake, Sharon G. (Jump at the Sun – Hyperion imprint). The Broken Bike Boy and the Queen of 33rd Street.
  • Gantos, Jack. (FSG). I Am Not Joey Pigza.
  • Holm, Jennifer L. Illustrated by Elicia Castaldi. (Ginee Seo – Atheneum – S&S). Middle School is Worse than Meatloaf.
  • Jinks, Catherine. (Harcourt). Evil Genius.
  • Jonell, Lynne. Illustrations by Jonathan Bean. (Henry Holt and Company). Emmy and the Incredible Shrinking Rat.
  • Kluger, Jeffrey. (Philomel). Nacky Patcher and the Curse of the Dry-Land Boats.
  • Moses, Sheila. (McElderry – S&S). The Baptism.
  • Park, Linda Sue and others. (Scholastic). Click.
  • Reeve, Philip. (Bloomsbury). Starcross.
  • Riddleburger, Sam. (Dial Books – Penguin imprint). The Qwikpick Adventure Society.
  • Rowling, J.K. (Arthur A. Levine – Scholastic). Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.
  • Schmidt, Gary D. (Clarion – Houghton Mifflin). The Wednesday Wars.
  • Selfors, Suzanne. (Little Brown & Co.). To Catch a Mermaid.
  • Selznick, Brian. (Scholastic). The Invention of Hugo Cabret.
  • Soule, Jean Conder. (Random House). Never Tease a Weasel.
  • Stewart, Trenton Lee. (Little Brown & Co.). The Mysterious Benedict Society.
  • Tarshis, Lauren. (Dial). Emma-Jean Lazarus Fell Out of a Tree.
  • Taylor, Laini. (G.P. Putnam’s Sons – Penguin imprint). Faeries of Dreamdark: Blackbringer.
  • Urban, Linda. (Harcourt, Inc.). A Crooked Kind of Perfect.
  • Wilson, N.D. (Random House). 100 Cupboards.
  • Wilson, N.D. (Random House). Leepike Ridge.
  • Wolf, Joan M. (Clarion – A Houghton Mifflin imprint). Someone Named Eva.
  • Wynne-Jones, Tim. (Melanie Kroupa – Farrar, Staus & Giroux). Rex Zero and the End of the World.

Graphic Novel

  • Abadzis, Nick. (First Second). Laika.
  • Jansson, Tove. (Drawn & Quarterly), Moomin (Vol. 1).
  • Sturm, James. Illustrated by Rich Tommaso. (Center for Cartoon Studies – Jump at the Sun – Hyperion). Satchel Paige: Striking Out Jim Crow.
  • Tan, Shaun. (Arthur A. Levine – Scholastic, Inc.). The Arrival.
  • Talbot, Bryan. (Dark Horse Books). Alice in Sunderland.
  • Varon, Sara. (First Second). Robot Dreams.

Non-Fiction

  • Barakat, Ibtisam. (Melanie Kroupa Books – FSG). Tasting the Sky: A Palestinian Childhood.
  • Bertholf, Bret. (Little Brown and Company). The Long Gone Lonesome History of Country Music.
  • Bryan, Ashley. (Atheneum – S&S). Let it Shine.
  • Debon, Nicolas. (Groundwood Press). The Strongest Man In the World: Louis Cyr.
  • Fleischman, John. (Houghton Mifflin). Black and White Airmen: Their True History.
  • Griffith, Saul (PhD), Bonsen, Joost. Illustrated by Nick Dragotta. (Harper Collins). Howtoons: The Possibilities Are Endless.
  • Hill, Laban Carrick. (Little Brown & Co.). America Dreaming: How Youth Changed America in the ’60s.
  • Kirkpatrick, Katherine. (Holiday House). The Snow Baby: The Arctic Childhood of Admiral Robert E. Peary’s Daring Daughter.
  • McCarthy, Meghan. (Knopf – RH). Strong Man.
  • Schlitz, Laura Amy. (Candlewick). Good Masters! Fair Ladies!: Voices from a Medieval Village.

Poetry

  • Lear, Edward. (KCP Poetry – An imprint of Kids Can Press). The Owl and the Pussycat.
  • Prelutsky, Jack. (Greenwillow – Harper Collins). The Wizard.

Special YA Shout-Outs to Three Books That Managed to Get Past My “No Young Adult” Stipulation:

  • Asher, Jay. (Razorbill). 13 Reasons Why.
  • Datlow, Ellen and Windling, Terry (ed.). (Viking). The Coyote Road: Trickster Tales.
  • Moore, Perry. (Hyperion). Hero.

Filed under: Best Books of 2007

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About Betsy Bird

Betsy Bird is currently the Collection Development Manager of the Evanston Public Library system and a former Materials Specialist for New York Public Library. She has served on Newbery, written for Horn Book, and has done other lovely little things that she'd love to tell you about but that she's sure you'd find more interesting to hear of in person. Her opinions are her own and do not reflect those of EPL, SLJ, or any of the other acronyms you might be able to name. Follow her on Twitter: @fuseeight.

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About Betsy Bird

Betsy Bird is currently the Collection Development Manager of the Evanston Public Library system and a former Materials Specialist for New York Public Library. She has served on Newbery, written for Horn Book, and has done other lovely little things that she'd love to tell you about but that she's sure you'd find more interesting to hear of in person. Her opinions are her own and do not reflect those of EPL, SLJ, or any of the other acronyms you might be able to name. Follow her on Twitter: @fuseeight.

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. WendieO says

    January 1, 2008 at 5:26 pm

    There was such an uproar about the scientific inaccuracies in Florian Douglas. (Harcourt). Comets, Stars, the Moon, and Mars — among authors of books about science who know about these things. And yet it’s getting on various ‘Best books of the year” lists and has had positive librarian reviews and gushing teacher reviews….. Why? Their complaint is — does no one care about giving children wrong information? I tried to explain that he’s a popular illustrator, but…. -wendieO

  2. Fuse #8 says

    January 1, 2008 at 6:57 pm

    It’s not even in my library system for that matter. Who has brought up the scientific inaccuracies? Time to go searching through the old professional reviews, I think . . .

  3. WendieO says

    January 1, 2008 at 8:14 pm

    I’m not sure the professional library reviews caught the problems. However, one of the reviews that brings up this problem is on the website of science writer (and ex-NASA flight controller) Marianne Dyson. Her review is here: http://www.mariannedyson.com/spacebooks.htm
    — and there was a discussion of this problem on an internet group called NFforKids on Yahoogroups. -wendieO

  4. MotherReader says

    January 5, 2008 at 11:58 am

    I’m printing this list to make sure that I’m on top of my reading. The ALA’s Notable booklist, okay helpful, but Fuse’s booklist, essential.

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