Notes from The Max

Looking Forward to 2011

2010 is winding down, but we've still got a lot to look forward to in 2011.

The new year will see our celebrations of our 20th anniversary year kick into high gear. We'll host our 20th anniversary Essay Judging in March (where our volunteer essay judges will read and choose the essays that will make up the 20th volume of The Courage of Boston's Children) followed by our 20th Anniversary Awards Luncheon in May. We'll also hold our first final project showcase for our 9th grade students in June, along with publishing a short anthology of their writings, poems, art and multi-media projects.

We're planning on more teachers' workshops and the second year of our national essay contest, in partnership with Cambium Learning Technologies, is already underway. We'll have other 20th anniversary events as well, celebrating the two decades of successful the organization has had and the multitude of supporters, teachers, students and families who have been a part of that sucess.

We certainly hope you'll join us for some of these events. Please remember to check our Events page on our website for the most up-to-date information.

Have a very happy New Year and here's to 2011!

Best of 2010

As the year winds down to a close, here is a look at some of the best children's and young adult books from 2010.

• School Library Journal released its "Best of 2010" list, divided into fiction, nonfiction and picture books. According to SLJ editors, fantasy books continue to dominate the top spots, with books that are "frightening, edgy, wildly funny, electrifying, and magical, with protagonists fighting evil in brilliantly created new landscapes, realms, and kingdoms, as well as in our world."
• SLJ also released its list of the Best Adult Books For Teens, books that are typically published for adult audiences but that will also appeal to older teen readers. This list has fiction and nonfiction selections and includes one of the most buzzed-about books of 2010, Emma Donoghue's Room.
• Kirkus Reviews divded its list of top 2010 books into children's and teens categories, then further subdivided the books by genre (such as books that "make you think," sci-fi and historical fiction). Kirkus culled their list from the thousands of reviews they write each day, selecting the best of the very best.
• Like SLJ, Publisher's Weekly distinguished their best 2010 children's and YA books by sorting them into three categories: fiction, nonfiction and picture books. The fiction category contains books for both middle grade and high school readers, and includes many of the books that earned starred reviews from PW earlier in the year.
• Boston-based children's publishing magazine Horn Book offered up their Fanfare 2010 list, revealing its best children's and young adult books of the year. In addition to picture, fiction and nonfiction books, Horn Book also singles out folklore and poetry books.
• Bookselling powerhouse Amazon.com goes into great detail with its Best Books of 2010 lists: there are lists for both middle grade readers and teens, and editors' picks and customer favorites. And for those tech-savvy readers with a Kindle or e-reader, Amazon also lists its choices for the best e-books of the year. 
• If the above selections weren't enough, there are list "best of 2010" lists from Barnes and Noble and the Columbus Dispatch and for local readers, Boston Globe's 10 Glittering Stars of 2010.

Several books appeared on a number of lists, indicating both widespread popularity and critical acclaim. These titles include Alchemy and Meggy Swan (Karen Cushman), Revolution (Jennifer Donnelly), Incarceron (Catherine Fisher), One Crazy Summer (Rita Williams-Garcia), Will Grayson, Will Grayson (John Green and David Levithan), Mockingjay (Suzanne Collins), Countdown (Deborah Wiles) and Fever Crumb (Philip Reeve).

Taken all together, these lists provide a glimpse into a year in children's and young adult publishing. And, as we move towards the new year, more books will start to get their time in the spotlight as we anticipate the Newbury and Printz awards, which will be announced at the American Library Association's Midwinter Meeting in January.

Happy Holidays!

Happy Holidays and Happy Reading! Stay Warm!

From,

Elizabeth, Meredith and your friends at The Max

The Weather Outside is Frightful

Here in Boston, it's the season for warm coats, hats, gloves and scarves as the temperature drops and snow starts to fall. Inspired by the winter season, here are some cold and icy reading suggestions for middle grade and teen readers. Be warned, though: you might want to make sure you have a blanket near by, just in case you start to shiver.

• A Kingdom Far and Clear - Novelist Mark Helprin teamed up with award-winning illustrator Chris Van Allsburg to create a trilogy of illustrated novels: Swan Lake, A City in Winter and A Veil of Snows. Set in a fictional wintry world, this trio of stories retells the classic ballet Swan Lake, then imagines the tumultuous consequences and events of years later. 
• The Golden Compass - The first novel in Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials series, this book sees young Lyra Belacqua travel to the cold, arctic north and to Svalbard, home of the armoured ice bears. 
• Brian's Winter - In this alternate ending to Paulsen's Newbery Honor-winning book Hatchet, Brian's Winter imagines what would have happened if Brian had not be rescued and instead had to learn how to survive in the wilderness during the winter.
• Ice - In this novel based on "East of the Sun, West of the Moon," Sarah Beth Durst weaves a modern-day fairy tale. Cassie, who lives in an Arctic research station with her father, has her life change in an instant when a polar bear approaches her and asks her to be his bride.
• Odd and the Frost Giants - In this Neil Gaiman story written for World Book Day, Odd is a young Norseman who leaves his village and befriends a trio of animals, who are really gods in disguise and who need his help to outwit the Frost Giant.
• The Snow-Walker Trilogy - from the author of the highly praised Incarceron (Catherine Fisher) comes this trilogy of people ruled by an evil snow-walker, her half-human son and the clever girl determined to see the rightful heir back on the throne. 

Enjoy!

December News from The Max

December - and cold weather - are officially here. In between holiday shopping and seasonal parties, you may have missed some of the literary-related news in recent weeks, so here's a quick overview from The Max:

• Finalists for a couple of American Library Association Youth Media Awards have been announced. YALSA (Young Adult Library Services Association, a branch of the ALA has revealed the five finalists for the Excellence in Nonfiction for Young Adults award and the William C. Morris Award, which honors a book written for teens by a previously unpublished author. The nonfiction finalists include Janis Joplin: Rise Up Singing; They Call Themselves the KKK; Spies of Mississippi; The Dark Game; and Every Bone Tells a Story. The Morris finalists are: Hush; Guardian of the Dead; Hold Me Closer, Necromancer; Crossing the Tracks; and The Freak Observer. The winner will be announced at ALA's Midwinter Meeting in January, along with the winners of the Newbery, Caldecott and Printz awards.
• Saturday December 4th was the First Annual Take Your Child to a Bookstore day. The grassroots campaign was started to encourage parents and guardians to bring their children to a bookstore and hopefully instill a lifelong love of reading. Bookstores across the country - including some in Medford and Andover, MA - particpated by scheduling family-friendly activities. Organizers hope to make this event a yearly occurance.
• A new social networking site called Figment is aimed at literary-minded teens. The project, which launched on Monday December 6th, allows teen writers and readers to post their own writing - whether it's a novel in progress, short stories, poems or more - and then give and receive feedback from the community of users. Approximately 4,000 teens registered as Figment users in the first day. 
• Scholastic, which is the largest publisher and distributor of children's books, recently released a list of the top 10 trends in children's literature for 2010. Among the popular trends are a growing young adult audience (thanks to the many adults who read YA), an increased interest in both dystopian fiction and mythology-based stories, more books in a diary or journal style and less attention on picture books.

Any big stories you think we missed? Let us know in the comments!