Fusenews: Hat tips and doffed caps

• I don’t normally do this, but it is books like this one that make it clear that rules are meant to be broken.  We children’s librarians are familiar with books we consider “for professional use”.  These are titles that are of use primarily to library students, librarians, and teachers.  They tend to have ugly covers.  They tend to have dull, dry (if ultimately useful) language.  They tend to be unmemorable.  Well stop the presses and reign in the horses because I have seen what may be the MOST useful and beautiful professional use title in all my livelong days.  Behold Perfect Pairs: Using Fiction & Nonfiction Picture Books to Teach Life Science, K-2 by Melissa Stewart and Nancy Chesley.  How would one use such a tome?  Well, say you have a teacher that needs to do a science unit of some sort.  This book recommends some really brilliant nonfiction titles for kids (and some nonfiction/fiction pairings that are rather good in their own right) and then works them into Common Core State Standards lesson plans.  There are sample questions and worksheets and pretty much anything a K-2 teacher would need.  It is also lovely on the old eyeballs and clearly well researched.  I love it.  You need it.  No one has heard of it.  Go get it.

• You know, just when I feel like I can coast and rest on my laurels, there goes Travis Jonker raising the bar.  Bar raiser!!!  I mean who else would have come up with the brilliant idea of a Twitter handle author game, pixelated profile pics and all?  I doff my hat.

• Speaking of Twitter, all you folks out there with library degrees looking for a job may find the post 14 Twitter Feeds for Job Seekers to Follow of particular use.  It does a nice job of including some non-library related job sites as well.  Just in case.  Thanks to AL Direct for the link.

• Hey auction hounds!  Those of you with a weakness for original art are in luck.  The Carle Honors are fast approaching and that means the old 2014 Carle Honors Art Auction is on the horizon.  Not attending the gala?  No problemo.  You can just bid on the items (or, if you’re like me, drool over them) here.  The online portion of the auction will close at noon on September 18^th, and leading bidders will be added by proxy bid to the silent auction at The Carle Honors gala in New York City later that same evening. In addition, all of the works will be on display at Books of Wonder (18 West 18th Street, NYC) from September 3 through September 17.  All the more reason to visit NYC, yes yes?

• Boy, are you guys some kind of lucky bums.  Did you not know that the Cybils (the only blogger award for children’s and YA literature) call for judges ends today?  You still have time to submit your name for a category.  What are you waiting for?  Go!  Do!  Read!

What are the 24 Best Baby Books of All Time?  Parents Magazine asked a whole slew of librarians like myself and then published the results.  Fact of the matter is, it’s a pretty darn good list.  Steve Light and Mary Murphy and Nina Laden and all the other usual suspects.  My own contribution might be the most esoteric, but I’ll stand by it till the end.

I was just so pleased to see that Jules Danielson had taken the time to talk to Kekla Magoon in light of her latest book (How It Went Down) and the events in Ferguson.  I do hope that folks take time and all read Kekla’s novel.  It could not be more timely.

This is one of those BoingBoing links that one prays is a hoax.  Surely something this downright evil couldn’t be true, right?  I mean . . . this is preposterous if accurate.

Hat tip to Brian A. Klems for his public service announcement / Writers Digest article The Key Differences Between Middle Grade vs. Young Adult.  It’s not just editors and agents that will thank you, sir.  It’s librarians like myself that see the same manuscripts when authors ask us for feedback.  We are in your debt.

• Wondering what the authors out there thought about Amazon’s recent complaint about big old unreasonable Hachette and its ilk.  Aw.  Poor little behemoth.  But I would love to hear from the Hachette authors and what they thought about the piece.

Filed under: Fusenews