
A Fuse #8 Production
November 10, 2022 by Betsy Bird
“Three Strike Summer” is the sports book/ escape narrative / union organizing novel you wish every kid had the chance to read. Good news. Now they can.
January 2, 2020 by Betsy Bird
Kids will love this book. Yeah, it’s a visual/literary masterpiece of picture book art and writing but that means bupkiss if you hand it to a kid, or read it aloud to a group, and they’re bored to tears. Precisely because Fogliano knows how to talk on a kid’s level, precisely because Tamaki has made her art so visually appealing.
November 6, 2019 by Betsy Bird
If there is an art to rendering expository facts with a narrative feel, then Meghan McCarthy is this type of book’s Vincent Van Gogh. Never sacrificing beauty, never skimping on reality, she provides the perfect balance while also managing to come up with books that kids will really really enjoy reading. A treat to eye and ear and a blessing to parents of the firefighting obsessed nationwide. The best at what it aims to be.
August 15, 2019 by Betsy Bird
Good news. I know exactly what to do with this particular middle school book. You need to weigh it down with awards, so many that it can no longer stand under its own weight and is forced to stagger to the display unit that stands front and center in the library where all the best books go. Then, and only then, will it have found its true home.
August 9, 2019 by Betsy Bird
There’s something going on in this book. A wry, whipsmart, funny tale that actually may have a thing or two to say about female empowerment. Or not? It’s easy to read too much into this book, but I’d say it’s also just as easy to read into it everything that you need it to be. Intelligent writing for kids that will not just appeal but engage and entice.
October 28, 2017 by Betsy Bird
The Antlered Ship By Dashka Slater Illustrated by The Fan Brothers Beach Lane Books (an imprint of Simon & Schuster) $17.99 ISBN: 9781481451604 Ages 4-7 On shelves now Take any number of picture books published in a given year. Read them all, cover to cover. Digest them. Ponder them. Then, I have no doubt, you’ll […]
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March 20, 2017 by Betsy Bird
The Youngest Marcher: The Story of Audrey Faye Hendricks, a Young Civil Rights Activist By Cynthia Levinson Illustrated by Vanessa Brantley Newton Atheneum (an imprint of Simon & Schuster) $17.99 ISBN: 978-1-4814-0070-1 Ages 6-10 On shelves now Today I’d like to begin with a small talk about diversity. Not diversity of people necessarily, but diversity […]
August 11, 2016 by Betsy Bird
Ghost By Jason Reynolds Atheneum (an imprint of Simon & Schuster) $16.99 ISBN: 978-1-4814-5015-7 Ages 9-12 On shelves August 30th This is a generalization, but in my experience librarians really enjoy reading within their comfort zones. They’ll travel outside of them from time to time but always they return to the books that they like […]
June 30, 2016 by Betsy Bird
Freedom Over Me: Eleven slaves, their lives and dreams brought to life By Ashley Bryan Atheneum (an imprint of Simon & Schuster) $17.99 ISBN: 978-1481456906 Ages 9 and up On shelves September 13th Who gives voice to the voiceless? What are your credentials when you do so? When I was a teen I used to […]
March 2, 2016 by Betsy Bird
The Storyteller By Evan Turk Atheneum (an imprint of Simon & Schuster) $24.99 ISBN: 9781481435185 Ages 4-8 On shelves June 28th Credit the internet age for doing what the television age never could. I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but there is a movement around the world that can be interpreted as nothing so much […]
Teen Librarian Toolbox
by Amanda MacGregor
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