Sydney Taylor Book Award Blog Tour

The Sydney Taylor Book Award will be celebrating and showcasing its 2009 gold and silver medalists with a Blog Tour! Here is the preliminary schedule:

Sunday, January 18, 2009
Karen Hesse, author of Brooklyn Bridge
Sydney Taylor Book Award winner in the Older Readers Category
at Jewish Books for Children

Monday, January 19, 2009
Richard Michelson
Author of As Good As Anybody, Sydney Taylor Book Award winner in the Younger Readers Category
and
Author of A is for Abraham, Sydney Taylor Honor Book in the Younger Readers Category
at The Well-Read Child

Monday, January 19, 2009
Ron Mazellan, illustrator of A is for Abraham
Sydney Taylor Honor Book in the Younger Readers Category
at Tales from the Rushmore Kid

Tuesday, January 20, 2009
Jane Yolen, author of Naming Liberty
Sydney Taylor Honor Book in the Younger Readers Category
at The Boston Bibliophile

Wednesday, January 21, 2009
Anna Levine
Author of Freefall, Sydney Taylor Honor Book in the Teen Readers Category
and
Author of Jodie's Hanukkah Dig, Notable Book in the Younger Readers Category
at Abby (the) Librarian

Wednesday, January 21, 2009
Jim Burke, illustrator of Naming Liberty
Sydney Taylor Honor Book in the Younger Readers Category
at The Page Flipper

Thursday, January 22, 2009
Jacqueline Jules, author of Sarah Laughs
Sydney Taylor Honor Book in the Younger Readers Category
at Chicken Spaghetti

Friday, January 23, 2009
Deborah Bodin Cohen, author of Engineer Ari and the Rosh Hashanah Ride
Sydney Taylor Honor Book in the Younger Readers Category
at Becky's Book Reviews

Friday, January 23, 2009
Shahar Kober, illustrator of Engineer Ari and the Rosh Hashanah Ride
Sydney Taylor Honor Book in the Younger Readers Category
at Into the Wardrobe

Full List of 2009 Sydney Taylor Book Award Winners

GOLD MEDALISTS

The Sydney Taylor Book Award Winner for Younger Readers:

As Good As Anybody: Martin Luther King, Jr. and Abraham Joshua Heschel’s Amazing March Toward Freedom by Richard Michelson with illustrations by Raul Colon (Alfred A. Knopf, an imprint of Random House Children’s Books)

The Sydney Taylor Book Award Winner for Older Readers:

Brooklyn Bridge by Karen Hesse (Feiwel & Friends, an imprint of Macmillan)

The Sydney Taylor Book Award Winner for Teen Readers:

A Bottle in the Gaza Sea by Valerie Zenatti (Bloomsbury)

SILVER MEDALISTS

Sydney Taylor Honor Award Winners for Younger Readers:

Engineer Ari and the Rosh Hashanah Ride by Deborah Bodin Cohen with illustrations by Shahar Kober (Kar-Ben, an imprint of Lerner)

Sarah Laughs by Jacqueline Jules with illustrations by Natascia Ugliano (Kar-Ben, an imprint of Lerner)

A is for Abraham: A Jewish Family Alphabet by Richard Michelson with illustrations by Ron Mazellan (Sleeping Bear Press, an imprint of Gale)

Naming Liberty by Jane Yolen with paintings by Jim Burke (Philomel Books, an imprint of Penguin)

Sydney Taylor Honor Award Winners for Older Readers:

Memories of Babi by Aranka Siegal (Farrar Straus and Giroux)

Sydney Taylor Honor Award Winner for Teen Readers:

Freefall by Anna Levine (Greenwillow Books, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers)

NOTABLE BOOKS OF JEWISH CONTENT

Notable Books for Younger Readers:

Mysterious Guests: A Sukkot Story by Eric Kimmel with illustrations by Katya Krenina (Holiday House)

Jodie’s Hanukkah Dig by Anna Levine with illustrations by Knesia Topaz (Kar-Ben, an imprint of Lerner)

Harvest of Light by Allison Ofanansky with photographs by Eliyahu Alpern (Kar-Ben, an imprint of Lerner)

Sammy Spider’s First Shavuot by Sylvia Rouss with illustrations by Katherine Janus Kahn (Kar-Ben, an imprint of Lerner)

My Tzitzis Book by Elisheva Schreiber with clay creations by Batsheva Ravad (Feldheim)

Hanukkah Haiku by Harriet Ziefert with illustrations by Karla Gudeon (Blue Apple Books)

Notable Books for Older Readers:

The Boy Who Dared: A Novel Based on the True Story of a Hitler Youth by Susan Campbell Bartoletti (Scholastic Press)

The Walls of Cartegena by Julia Durango with illustrations by Tom Pohrt (Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers)

Capturing the Moon by Rabbi Edward M. Feinstein (Behrman House)

Kristallnacht, the Night of Broken Glass: Igniting the Nazi War Against Jews by Stephanie Fitzgerald (Compass Point Books)

My Chocolate Year by Charlotte Herman with illustrations by LeUyen Pham (Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers)

The Mozart Question by Michael Morpurgo with illustrations by Michael Forman (Candlewick Press)

Boys of Steel: The Creators of Superman by Marc Tyler Nobleman with illustrations by Ross McDonald (Alfred A. Knopf, an imprint of Random House Children’s Books)

The Bat-Chen Diaries: Selected Writings by Bat-Chen Shahak (Kar-Ben, an imprint of Lerner)

Keeping Israel Safe: Serving in the Israel Defense Forces by Barbara Sofer (Kar-Ben, an imprint of Lerner)

Honey Cake by Joan Betty Stuchner with illustrations by Cynthia Nugent (Random House, a Stepping Stone Book)

Notable Books for Teens:

Nothing by Robin Friedman (Flux)

Rutka’s Notebook: A Voice from the Holocaust by Rutka Laskier (Time, Inc. Home Entertainment)

Gravity by Leanne Lieberman (Orca Book Publishers)

The Freak by Carol Matas (Key Porter Books)

Notable Books for All Ages:

Genesis—the Book with Seventy Faces: A Guide for the Family by Esther Takac with illustrations by Anna Pignataro (Pitspopany Press)

Celebrating with Jewish Crafts by Rebecca Edid Ruzansky with photographs by Roberto Zeballos-Peralta (self-published)

2009 Sydney Taylor Book Awards Announced!

Richard Michelson and Raul Colon, author and illustrator of As Good As Anybody: Martin Luther King, Jr. and Abraham Joshua Heschel’s Amazing March Toward Freedom, Karen Hesse, author of Brooklyn Bridge, and Valerie Zenatti, author of A Bottle in the Gaza Sea, are the 2009 winners of the prestigious Sydney Taylor Book Award.

The Sydney Taylor Book Award honors new books for children and teens that exemplify the highest literary standards while authentically portraying the Jewish experience. The award memorializes Sydney Taylor, author of the classic All-of-a-Kind Family series. The winners will receive their awards at the Association of Jewish Libraries convention in Chicago this July.

Michelson and Colon will receive the 2009 gold medal in the Sydney Taylor Book Award’s Younger Readers Category for As Good As Anybody: Martin Luther King, Jr. and Abraham Joshua Heschel’s Amazing March Toward Freedom, published by Alfred A. Knopf. Two very special clergymen, one a rabbi, the other an African-American reverend are raised in divergently different countries yet experience similar levels of persecution and bigotry that will one day bring them together. As colleagues in America’s struggle for civil rights, they march together from Selma to Montgomery in March 1965. Colon’s colored pencil and watercolor illustrations “offer a beautiful complement to the text, describing two unique paths from childhood to adult life – Martin’s in the rich, warm brown-tones of the American south and Abraham’s in cool blues and grays that reminded the illustrator of old World War II movies. When the two exemplary men join in their march for tolerance, the palettes merge in full color harmony,” comments Debbie Colodny, a member of the Award Committee. This book is recommended for grades 2-5.

Hesse will receive the 2009 gold medal in the Sydney Taylor Book Award’s Older Readers Category for Brooklyn Bridge, published by Feiwel & Friends. While his family left the anti-Semitism of Russia to build the American dream, Joey Michtom’s dream is to visit the glittering Coney Island. “Crafting a story from the spark of a true event, the invention of the Teddy Bear in 1903, Hesse masterfully weaves multiple themes of hard-work, survival, homelessness, and familial dedication with interlocking and parallel stories of families who live reasonably well opposite those less fortunate living in the shadows below the imposing Brooklyn Bridge,” comments Rita Soltan, a member of the Award Committee. This book is recommended for grades 5-8. Hesse also won the 1992 Award for Older Readers for Letters from Rifka, and a 2004 Honor Award for Older Readers for The Cats in Kransinski Square.

Zenatti will receive the 2009 gold medal in the Sydney Taylor Book Award’s Teen Readers Category for A Bottle in the Gaza Sea, published by Bloomsbury. “This story about the relationship between an Israeli girl, Tal, and a Palestinian boy, Naim, via e-mail and instant messaging, is honest but hopeful. Well-written and compelling, the tale of their relationship conveys the confusion, anger, exhaustion, and depression felt by many young people during the 2003 intifada,” comments Susan Berson, a member of the Award Committee. Zenatti’s memoir, When I Was a Soldier, was a 2005-6 AJL Notable Book for Older Readers.

Six Sydney Taylor Honor Books were named for 2009. For Younger Readers, Honor Books are: Engineer Ari and the Rosh Hashanah Ride by Deborah Bodin Cohen with illustrations by Shahar Kober (Kar-Ben), Sarah Laughs by Jacqueline Jules with illustrations by Natascia Ugliano (Kar-Ben), A is for Abraham: A Jewish Family Alphabet by Richard Michelson with illustrations by Ron Mazellan (Sleeping Bear Press) and Naming Liberty by Jane Yolen with paintings by Jim Burke (Philomel Books). Aranka Siegal’s Memories of Babi (Farrar Straus and Giroux) was named an Honor Book for Older Readers, and Freefall by Anna Levine (Greenwillow Books) was named an Honor Book in the Teen Reader Category.

In addition to the medal-winners, the Award Committee designated twenty-two Notable Books of Jewish Content for 2009: six in the Younger Readers Category, ten in the Older Readers Category, and four for Teens. Genesis—the Book with Seventy Faces: A Guide for the Family by Esther Takac with illustrations by Anna Pignataro (Pitspopany Press) and Celebrating with Jewish Crafts by Rebecca Edid Ruzansky with photographs by Roberto Zeballos-Peralta (self-published) impressed the Award Committee with their uniqueness and range. They have been designated Notable Books for all ages. Notable titles, and more information about the Sydney Taylor Book Award, may be found online at www.SydneyTaylorBookAward.org. Interviews with winning authors will be posted on prominent children’s literature blogs as part of a Blog Tour beginning on January 18, 2009; details will be posted here on the Sydney Taylor Book Award Blog.

Bad Blogger

Okay, I'm a bad, bad blogger. I haven't posted in months. But all that is about to change, because the 2009 Sydney Taylor Book Awards will be announced any minute now! And this year, we are planning a blog tour to kick things off. Watch this space for a schedule of authors (and possibly illustrators) along with the blogs where their interviews will be featured!

We're in the Chabad News

The Chabad Lubavitch Global Network website has a great article in their news section about the 2008 Sydney Taylor Book Award winner Strange Relations by Sonia Levitin.

The piece is entitled "Award Winning Novel for Teens Based on Chabad Representatives." They've delved into Levitin's experiences as she created the novel, revealing that her own relationships with Chabad representatives in Bel Air, CA and Honolulu, HI greatly influenced her writing. Levitin herself became more Jewishly observant over time, and is in a good position to write about the Chabad lifestyle from both the insider and outsider points of view, bringing new understanding to readers. As the lubavitch.com article says:

Written for a wide-ranging audience, some passages that describe Marne’s relationship with teenage boys may be deemed be too risqué for reading in homes where value is placed on reserving intimacy for marriage. Levitin said she wrote the book for teens unfamiliar or wary of people dressed in Chasidic
garb.

“The next time they see someone in a hat and coat, and girls bundled up in the heat, instead of being disdainful they should look beyond the external, and feel that they can connect,” Levitin said.

Levitin also describes the main character, Marne, as "me in a different incarnation. I know what it is like to be confused and look for my identity and search for G-d."

Pen Pals

I just read the most incredible exchange of ideas between authors Markus Zusak and Susan Campbell Bartoletti at the PEN American Center website! Markus is the 2007 Sydney Taylor Book Award winner for The Book Thief, and Susan's book Hitler Youth was a 2006 AJL Notable Book.

The PEN American Center is an organization for writers, and it fosters "international literary fellowship." A new method for doing so is the PENPals program, in which they get children's and young adult authors to exchange e-mails. Markus and Susan were their first guinea pigs, and they've done a marvelous job.

The Book Thief is a powerful novel about ordinary Germans trying to live meaningful lives within the confines of the Third Reich. Hitler Youth: Growing Up in Hitler's Shadow is a sensitive nonfiction book that examines how young people's minds were trained to accept the Nazis' terrible ideas. Markus and Susan's common interest in WWII Germany led to a fascinating discussion of their research, their emotional reactions to the content they were dealing with, their writerly doubts, and more. They basically interview eachother, and seem to bond in the process.

Kudos to the PEN American Center for coming up with such an excellent program, and thanks to Markus and Susan for sharing their innermost thoughts with eachother and with the world!

Kristina Swarner and Sarah Gershman

Kristina Swarner and Sarah Gershman
Originally uploaded by heidiestrin

Here we see the lovely Kristina Swarner and Sarah Gershman, illustrator and author of The Bedtime Sh'ma, the 2008 Sydney Taylor Book Award winner in the Younger Readers Category. These charming ladies were at the Association of Jewish Libraries convention in Cleveland recently to receive their awards. They gave a wonderful presentation to a packed room, talking about the genesis of the book - Kristina even showed original artwork to the awed crowd!

The 2008 winners in the Older Readers and Teen categories were at the convention too. During the special celebration for the award's 40th anniversary, Sid Fleischman, whose Entertainer and the Dybbuk won for Older Readers, gave the luncheon keynote address and Sonia Levitin, whose Strange Relations won for teens, participated in a panel on teen fiction.