This month, Connect the Thoughts (Chronicle Books), a guided journal for young thinkers, is back again as The Children's Book Review's best selling middle grade book.

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This month, Girl to Girl: Honest Talk About Growing Up and Your Changing Body (Chronicle Books), a must-have for every girl navigating her way through the preteen years, is The Children's Book Review's best selling middle grade book.

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Grab your spear, polish your shield, and go back about 4,000 years with the funny and irreverent Percy Jackson as he describes ancient Greek heroes in this highly entertaining and informative companion to Percy Jackson's Greek Gods. Fantastic Illustrations by Caldecott honoree John Rocco immerse you right in the middle of the adventure. Books mentioned [...]

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For many kids, August is back-to-school month. The stories in this month's hot new release kids books will make back-to-school (and anytime) reading a breeze.

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John Rocco discusses his newest picture book, Blizzard, the companion to your Caldecott Honor-winning Blackout.

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A Junior Library Guild Selection 2014

One winter day it started to snow,

and it did

not 

stop.

At first it was fun, 

But four days later, the snowplows still hadn’t come, 

cabin fever was setting in, 

and rations were running low. 

Someone had to take action. 

Will one intrepid boy be able to triumph over a fearsome BLIZZARD? 

“We dug tunnels and secret rooms under the snow.”

 

Blizzard by John Rocco -a book trailer from John Rocco on Vimeo.

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We’ve collected the books debuting on Indiebound’s Indie Bestseller List for the week ending August 24, 2014–a sneak peek at the books everybody will be talking about next month.

(Debuted at #5 in Hardcover Fiction) Adultery by Paulo Coelho: “Linda knows she’s lucky. Yet every morning when she opens her eyes to a so-called new day, she feels like closing them again. Her friends recommend medication. But Linda wants to feel more, not less.” (August 2014)

(more…)

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

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Fox 2000 has optioned the film rights to John Rocco‘s Caldecott Honor-winning picture book, Blackout. The movie studio plans to adapt this work into a live-action movie.

According to Deadline, Rocco will serve as an executive producer along with Ivana Schecter-Garcia. How To Train Your Dragon screenwriter Will Davies will write the script.

Here’s more from the article: ”Rocco’s bestselling book follows a young New York City family, disconnected from each other by their obsessive everyday use of technology, who are separated during a New York City blackout and must find their way back to each other–literally and figuratively–in order to reconnect as a family.”

continued…

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

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With all the Newbery and Caldecott talk and predictions out there I thought it would be nice to take a look at not only what may be the next winner, but what has won in the past. If you have a favorite title you are rooting for post it in a comment. I would love to hear about it! Next week I will post my favorite book of the year that I think is Caldecott deserving in every facet of picture book brilliance.

PAST

From Publishers Weekly, with great interviews of winners from the past 5 years.
The Call That Changes Everything- or Not.

From The Association for Library Service to Children (ALSC) a look at the past.

Newbery Honor and Medal Books, 1922- Present
Caldecott Medal & Honor Books, 1938-Present
2012 Newbery-Caldecott Awards Banquet

From Through the Studio door, an interesting look at what PW dubbed in 1963 "...a pointless and confusing story."
Before They Were Classics

PRESENT

For predictions for this years award winners check out:
ShelfTalker
A Fuse #8 Production
100 Scope Notes
The Horn Book- Calling Caldecott 
Country Bookshelf
Random Acts of Reading

FUTURE

75th Anniversary Logo by Brian Selznick

Mark your calendar for the Caldecott Medal 75th Anniversary!

The ALA will announce all the awards at 8 a.m. PT on Jan. 28 from the Washington State Convention Center in Seattle. The awards include the esteemed John Newbery Medal, Randolph Caldecott Medal, Coretta Scott King Book Awards and Michael L. Printz Award.

The Association for Library Service to Children (ALSC) announced that John Rocco will participate in a Caldecott 75th Anniversary Facebook Forum at 1 p.m. Eastern time on Wednesday, March 6, 2013. Rocco won a Caldecott Honor in 2012 for his picture book Blackout.

Want to learn more about the logo 2008 Caldecott Medal winner Brian Selznick created especially for the 75th Anniversary celebration and the characters in it? Just click here.


And for a little more fun, read Brian's acceptance speech for The Invention of Hugo Cabret  here and watch the illustrated sequence that played on huge video screens during the speech here.

 

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Poor Dennis Abrams of Publishing Perspectives!  He was given the task of interviewing me, and it was one of those days when I was talking too fast about, well, everything.  That Dennis was able to create this beautiful profile for Publishing Perspectives says much about his talent for deep listening and fine cohesion. I am grateful, and I am so looking forward to the Publishing Perspectives Children's Book Conference, to be held on May 31st at the Scholastic Headquarters in New York City, where I'll be joining Peter Brown, John Rocco, and Raina Telgemeier on a panel Dennis moderates.  Earlier in the day, conference participants will meet Pamela Paul, Jenny Brown, Roger Sutton, David Levithan, Ken Wright, Rosemary Stimola, and Erica Rand Silverman, among others.

I hope to find some of you there.  And, again, thank you, Dennis.

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For several uninteresting reasons, I've been unable to visit our libraries regularly. Today, I was finally able to get my hands on some newer library books. Yay!
The above book trailer is interesting in that you just see snippets of the book itself, mixed with interviews from New Yorkers remembering a blackout.
My son picked Blackout over a few other choices and I can't wait to share it with him. The harmony between the words and images is amazing. The unwritten story is deep, but even the broader topic of losing power will strike a chord with little ones. We live in quiet suburbia, so a city tale won't resonate like it will with children who know more about that world, but it's still a way to broaden horizons.
For more information about Blackout, or the author/illustrator John Rocco, visit HERE.

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By Bianca Schulze, The Children’s Book Review
Published: January 23, 2012

“The Caldecott Medal was named in honor of nineteenth-century English illustrator Randolph Caldecott. It is awarded annually by the Association for Library Service to Children, a division of the American Library Association, to the artist of the most distinguished American picture book for children.” ~ALSC

©2012 The Childrens Book Review. All Rights Reserved.

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I got to sit down with Lin Oliver, SCBWI's Executive Director, and learn why the new Illustrator's Marketing Intensive coming up on the Friday before the full 2012 SCBWI Winter Conference isn't just going to be great - it's going to be essential.




You can register now for the Illustrator's Marketing Intensive and the whole Lucky 13th Annual SCBWI Winter Conference!

Hope to see you there,
Namaste,
Lee

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Somewhere along the way I completely missed this Percy Jackson video in which everyone from Brian Selznick to a moustachioed Eoin Colfer (when did that happen?) chat it up.  Video #2 contains a bit of advice  that John Rocco actually had to contend with when he made the jacket for The Lightening Thief: “Green covers don’t sell.”  I love mistaken common publishing wisdom.

Thanks to Bookmaker’s Dozen for the links.

Kids these days.  I dunno what to do with them.  With their electronic thingymajigs and their Facebook whozaz and their cries to not ban books  . . .

Thanks to Marjorie Ingall (who discovered this on her iPhone).

Full credit to Travis Jonker for finding this one.  He’s right.  Orrin Hatch totally whipped out a Harry Potter reference (psst. . . . nobody tell him which HP character Scalia actually resembles).

Now here’s an idea.  Book trailer as music video.  Surely this has been done before, right?  Surely?  In any case, here’ A Train With Wings for the book Liesl & Po by Lauren Oliver.  Harper Collins hired transmedia firm Radiator to create the trailer.  I think the visuals are great.  The song could have benefited if it had made the song less pop rock/Glee-ish and more haunting, but it’s still okay.

Thanks to Stephen Barbara for the link.

Finally I’ll get off-topicy with you but I will at least say that I could see these creatures as characters in a book for kids.  Easily.  Make sure you watch until they start walking.