She started out with a dream in a small-town in Ohio. The year was 1928 when she walked into a newspaper office and tearfully declared the love of her life had abandoned her, pregnant and alone. She then took out an add asking for any information leading to the whereabouts of her lost love. The next day she proceeded to write a suicide note, leading the authorities to the top of a bridge, where she sat perched ready to jump…
Mildred Gillars always had a flair for the dramatic and was desperate to be on stage, in the lime-light at any cost. However, after several failed attempts as a Broadway actress, “Midge” followed the love of her life to Germany hoping to some day be his wife.
When war broke out in September 1939, she had already been living there for five years and refused to flee back to America. Was it pride, prejudice, love or the hunger for fame that led to the start of her infamous career as Axis Sally?
Axis Sally, The American Voice of Nazi Germany by Richard Lucas is a fascinating look at the life and trials of Mildred Gillars a.k.a Axis Sally.
For more information or to order your own copy visit
Amazon
The official announcement has been made over here, at the Cybils blog. You can find the remaining short lists up today, too, including Nonfiction Picture Books, one of our family's favorite categories.
In alphabetical order:
Marie Curie (volume 4 in the Giants of Science series) by Kathleen Krull, illustrated by Boris Kulikov; Krull's Isaac Newton made it to last year's short list
Viking Juvenile
The Periodic Table: Elements With Style! created (and illustrated) by (Simon) Basher, written by Adrian Dingle
Kingfisher
Smart-Opedia: The Amazing Book About Everything, translated by Eve Drobot
Maple Tree Press
Tasting the Sky: a Palestinian Childhood by Ibtisam Barakat
Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Tracking Trash: Flotsam, Jetsam, and the Science of Ocean Motion (from the Scientists in the Field series) by Loree Griffin Burns
Houghton Mifflin
The Wall: Growing Up Behind the Iron Curtain by Peter Sís
Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Who Was First?: Discovering the Americas by Russell Freedman (whose Freedom Walkers won this category last year)
Clarion
Getting down to brass tacks now is the Judging Panel, comprised of
Tracy Chrenka at Talking in the Library
Emily Mitchell at Emily Reads
Camille Powell at Book Moot
Alice Herold at Big A little a
Jennie Rothschild at Biblio File
* * *
It was a wild ride. Five panelists, one newborn baby, a couple of holidays over several months, and 45 nominated children's nonfiction books published in 2007 -- on the subjects of history, science, mathematics, reference, biography, memoirs, humor, how to, essays, popular culture, music, and more. Much more.
What an absolute delight to work on the MG/YA nonfiction nominating panel alongside Susan at Chicken Spaghetti, Vivian at HipWriterMama, Mindy at Proper Noun Dot Net, and KT at Worth the Trip, all under the leadership of master wrangler and organizer Jen Robinson. The other panelists made the job of distilling the 45 nominated titles down to seven as easy as possible under the circumstances, and I continue to be amazed at how smoothly our negotiations and jockeyings went. Thank you each, thank you all for several marvelous months.
While we had a fraction of the books some of the other panels had to read (though more than I had to deal with last year on the poetry panel), our hunting and gathering skills were put to work tracking down titles for which review copies weren't furnished. So I'd also like to thank the patient and quick-working libraries in our system that sped books to me, often shortly after processing. And lastly, a big thanks to my kids, who put up with a good deal of questioning, poking, and prodding about what they liked and didn't about the the books they read, with and without me.
And special thanks, again, to Anne Boles Levy and Kelly Herold for coming up with the idea of the Cybils and organizing everything.
One of the reasons I wanted to serve on this particular panel is that for our family, and so many other home school families we know, high quality nonfiction titles are the backbone of our curricula, as well as our some of our children's favorite free-time reading. I wanted, through the Cybils, to be able to publicize some of the best of the bunch, so you and your kids can include these new gems on your "to read" lists.
The other reason is that I realize, sadly, that for many non-home schooling families, nonfiction children's titles are considered the second rate, second tier, B List, utility grade, inferior choice when it comes to children's books, and I wanted to be able to use an opportunity like the Cybils, with such a terrific short list of books of marvelous depth and range, to show that children's nonfiction is not only chock full of superior choices, but every inch the equal of fiction.
I'd like to encourage other readers and fans of children's nonfiction, especially those who are concerned about what children's nonfiction author Marc Aronson calls "nonfiction resistance", to keep up with the subject on Marc's blog, Nonfiction Matters
And one final note -- a raft of terrific children's 2007 nonfiction titles didn't make it to the list of nominees to be considered for the above short list. If your favorite wasn't nominated, it's because you didn't speak up for it. Don't let that happen next year.
"This a good day to please yourself. The harsh realities of the everyday world do not appeal to you today, and you would enjoy escaping to a brighter and prettier world, which would do no harm."
Damn right! Who am I to argue with my daily horoscope? Although I'd already fulfilled it by the time I read it. Looking for some ancient artwork from my very dim past - frankly, it could be anywhere. In a book? (which doesn't narrow it down in our house). In a portfolio (no). In a box? Hmm. So many boxes...I searched. I didn't find it. But delving into twenty years worth of collected ephemera (such a nice word and more pleasant than 'junk') I found a few treasures I'd picked up for future inspiration. I have no truck with the exasperated 'you never use this, why don't you get rid of it?' Things always come in handy. Eventually. If only for looking at...
This next was a good find as I am thinking about trying my hand at designing and hand printing simple fabric, retro-style...I love 1950's patterns possibly more than any other. 
I even found this, which a certain Border Tart may recognise as a relic from an early venture...(about seven years ago I'd say). And yes, it was delicious. I can still taste it now, all crumbly and lemony...although I think we agreed it was more tablet than fudge. Tablet being harder and more Scottish - fudge being softer and more Western. No nationality comparisons meant at all.
Now here is an old, rather crude venture into paper cutting - a leftover Christmas card from 2000 - that was the year I made everyone homemade sweets, and had more time on my hands. (Did I ever really have the leisure time to make various flavoured fondants and hand dip them in chocolate?)
And finally these little darlings, just snippets picked up from a dealer in Reading
All of which is a bit irrelevant to my original intention of finding the old artwork. I was going to write a post about how much I am enjoying papercutting, and finding my old sketchbook full of silhouette designs. How the first really 'me' art I did was when picked I up an ink brush when I was seventeen and...but that will have to wait until next time.
For everyone if the UK which has been mightily rained on...for all you Canadian, US, Australian and New Zealand mothers, celebrating Mother's Day or remembering lost ones...for anyone who feels the "need to escape to a brighter and prettier world" - I give you a very small snapshot of our woods, covered in a gauze of bluebells. Acres and acres of them.
Mildred Gillars was not the only woman to be prosecuted after the war for being 'Axis Sally'.
For details of the two-fold 'Sally' identity and information about German propaganda broadcasts to the world during the Second World War, see my new book 'Hitler's Radio War', available now from Amazon and other reputable book sellers.
Roger Tidy
[email protected]
thanks so much for participating in my wednesday blog hop. already following you.