Reviews

Teen Librarian Karen Jensen reviews the audiobook of the recently released BETH IS DEAD by Katie Bernet, a contemporary retelling of Little Women

Today's Heavy Medal Mock Newbery finalist is HOW TO SAY GOODBYE IN CUBAN by Daniel Miyares, a graphic novel.

"They aren’t the cookie-cutter tweens and tweens, or cookie-cutter Black characters, or cookie-cutter parts of cookie-cutter families. They are complicated and outsiders and more admirable and loveable for it."

This is an important collection to have in school and public libraries to examine craft, the realities of our climate and what might be next for all of us.

The spirit of a teen girl is always formidable. There’s so much to explore. It’s a gift to spend time inside the mind of one who has a lot to say, who wants many things, who gets plenty wrong—and who does not have to shrink to be loved.

Introduction by Heavy Medal Award Committee Member  Quade Kelley Derrick Barnes’s THE INCREDIBLY HUMAN HENSON BLAYZE is a middle-gradecoming-of-age novel that combines sports, tall-tale folklore, and allegorical history into acompelling narrative about identity choices and their influence on community. 13-year-old Henson is a football prodigy in the small, mostly white town of Great Mountain,Mississippi. When his […]

Breaking down the Caldecott data . . .

These informational works for kids of all ages shine a light on the many contributions Black icons, such as Zora Neale Hurston, Serena Williams, and Malcolm X, and more, have made on American culture.

Am I right? Does it matter? Let's have some fun blindly throwing darts at a wall.