As the sound of packing tape being ripped off  hundreds of rolls echoed through the cavernous Javits Center, so ended another Book Expo. Three days of talking and shouting and love for the book (whatever the delivery system). Yes, there were celebrities.. a John Lithgow sighting…droves of attendees waiting patiently for a glimpse of Jane Fonda…Exhausted publishers’ representatives who have been standing on concrete for three days were ready to ship those boxes and return to home base.

Here are my day three picks…(part one; more to come later)

Plagues, Pox and Pestilence by Richard Platt ; illus. by John Kelly
Ages 8 and up
Kingfisher (Oct. 25) 9780753466872

Facts about disease and its transmittal illustrated with sticky, gooey cartoonish illustration.

Accurate straightforward information with a light touch.

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Below is a photo of Christopher Paolini signing posters (like the one on the left) for BEA attendees. Look for Inheritance, the fourth and final volume in the series that began with Eragon, on November 8, weighing in at 704 pages.

Inheritance by Christopher Paolini
Knopf Books for Young Readers (Nov 8) 9780375856112

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The upcoming Wimpy Kid Number 6 has no name yet. The one-day laydown is November 1st. Meanwhile, we have the promo art on the left, and a snow globe, based on that design, on the right.

Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Number 6
Abrams/ Amulet (Nov 1) 9781419702235

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Children’s book illustrator Sophie Blackall created a blog in which she illustrated the romance of “missed connections.” These are collected in this sweetly hopeful volume. (The blog was featured in a Valentine’s Day story on NPR)

Missed Connections by Sophie Blackall, YA/ crossover
Workman Publishing  (Sept. 22) 9780761163589

Following up on my previous post, below are the highlights of day two on the BEA show floor.

Coming in August is Mary E. Pearson’s The Fox Inheritance, the companion volume to The Adoration of Jenna Fox. It is two-hundred-and-sixty years after the original story and Jenna Fox’s friends are still alive, but they’ve lost everyone that they knew. Except Jenna.

The Fox Inheritance by Mary E. Pearson, YA
Henry Holt and Co.   August 30, 2011  9780805088298

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So there I was scooting down the aisle and I notice a line of people waiting. A really, really long line stretching across many aisles. At the beginning was Alice Hoffman. Her new book is a historic retelling of the tragedy of Masada in 70 CE.

Stunning cover, huh?

The Dovekeepers, Adult/ YA crossover
Scribner (October 4, 2011); 512 pages
9781451617474

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And I ran into Caldecott winner, Jerry Pinkney and he showed me his hot-off-the-press book, Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star (Little, Brown, 9780316056960, Oct).

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I was thrilled to discover two reprints.

First from Workman Sandra Boynton’s lap-sized editions of her board books.

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Finally back in print, the Mythomania series. Funny fantastic fractured Greek Myths (for those who don’t know these books, they will be available on NetGalley.com at the end of the month).

Kate McMullan signing Nice Shot Cupid in the Capstone Booth.

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What do you really want to know? Yes, there is a new Elephant and Piggie (Should I Share My Ice Cream?; Mo Willems, Hyperion, 9781423143437; 6/14)

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A bit of silliness at the end of the day is always welcome. From How to Speak like a Wookie (Chronicle, August, 9781452102559; 16.95), with sound effects, of course.

Below are my picks of Day One (photos courtesy of my cell phone):

The Hot Galley

Brian Selznik, with his new book Wonderstruck (and Hugo Cabret)

Wonderstruck by Brian Selznik
Scholastic Press (September 13, 2011)
9780545027892; 608 pages

Similiar to Hugo Cabret in format…story is told in the illustrations as well as the words.

Not to Be Missed

I Want My Hat Back by Jon Klassen
Candlewick (September 27, 2011)
9780763655983

Sly humor, limited language and a twist at the end. It will delight readers who appreciate Emily Gravett’s Wolves and reading teachers obsessed with inference in books.

Robie Harris Tackles the Big Questions

Who Has What? by Robie Harris
Candlewick (September 13, 2011)
9780763629311

Ran into Robie Harris in an aisle and she let me peek at her new book coming this fall. Perfect for preschoolers… answers all those questions in a developmently appropriate way.

From the Illustrator of Eloise

Nina in That Makes Me Mad by Hilary Knight and Steven Kroll
Toon Books/Candlewick (September 27, 2011)
9781935179108

Can’t Wait to Read

The Cheshire Cheese Cat, by Carmen Deedy, illustrated by Barry Moser
Peachtree Publishers (October 1, 2011)
9781561455959

For middle graders.

The new issue of Entertainment Weekly, on stands this Friday, features the first photos from the set of Hunger Games and an interview with the movie’s star Jennifer Lawrence; brief excerpts are on EW’s PopWatch blog.

The movie is currently scheduled for release on 3/23/2012.

For the rest of the cast, the National Post offers a handy who’s who, up to the recent casting of Woody Harrelson as Haymitch and Stanley Tucci as Caesar Flickerman.

A picture book that makes no bones about parents’ frustration in trying to get their kids to sleep has risen to #1 on Amazon. It started as throw-away comment on Facebook, when author Adam Mansbach wrote in frustration, “Look out for my forthcoming children’s book, Go the — to Sleep.” People liked the idea so much, Mansbach went ahead and put together a PDF, which went viral, got covered by the NYT, optioned by Fox, and sold to Canongate for publication in the UK. It is coming out next month from Mansbach’s publisher, Brooklyn indie, Akashic Books.

Some attribute the success to the book being widely available via piracy, but it doesn’t hurt that it features strong illustrations (see sample here), an instantly relatable subject, and makes a great baby shower gift (after all, how do you wrap a PDF?).

Even though the PDF is supposedly viral, according to the New Yorker, you need to know someone to get a copy. You can also try posting your email to DCUrbanMom forum.

In a story today, CNN quotes Akashic publisher Johnny Temple saying a G-rated version will be coming next.

The library world knows that The Hunger Games will be a big movie, but so do a few others. Hollywood news sites breathlessly report each new actor joining the cast. The latest is Stanley Tucci in the supporting role of TV announcer, Caesar Flickerman (the National Post offers a handy who’s who). UPDATE: Woody Harrelson has signed on to play Haymitch.

A Web site with a very specific focus, On Location Vacations, reports that Hildebran, NC will be one of the first filming locations, where casting calls for extras have been drawing crowds.

The movie is scheduled to release in March, 2012.

Just a few short years agom Scholastic introduced the book at BEA with the following quote:

Thanks to hundreds of wonderful teachers and librarians, nearly ten thousand first- and second-graders voted on four finalists for the Irma Black Award and they chose How Rocket Learned to Read by Tad Hills (Schwartz & Wade).

That so many of you read the finalists aloud to your students, led them in discussions, and encouraged them to vote, attests to the importance of the picture book format in supporting the development of critical thinking skills. As one of my second grade students put it, “Rocket should be the Irma Black winner because it tells the truth. You can’t learn to read in a day. It takes time. A lot of time. You can tell from the pictures; it takes seasons.”

Not only that, Rocket is a joy to read aloud, again and again.

Let the celebrating begin! Please join us:

May 19, 2011
Bank Street College of Education
610 West 112th Street
New York City

8:30 AM Light Breakfast | 9:00 AM Award Ceremony | 10:00 AM Book Signing

To RSVP or to make a contribution to the Irma S. and James H. Black Fund at Bank Street College of Education, please email Alesia Yezerskaya, or phone 212-875-4608.

Keynote Speaker: Perri Klass is a pediatrician who writes both fiction and non-fiction. She writes about children and families, about medicine, about food and travel, and about knitting. Her newest book is a novel, The Mercy Rule, and the book before that was a work of non-fiction, Treatment Kind and Fair: Letters to a Young Doctor, written in the form of letters to her son as he starts medical school.

Perri lives in New York City, where she is Professor of Journalism and Pediatrics at New York University. She is also Medical Director of Reach Out and Read, a national literacy organization which works through doctors and nurses to promote parents reading aloud to young children.

Before the Wimpy Kid endured his travails, a kid named Alexander had a Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day, which may also make its way to the screen.

According to Variety, director Lisa Cholodenko (The Kids Are All Right) is negotiating for rights to Judith Viorst’s 1972 picture book. The story notes that, since there are two other titles in the series, “the pic could blossom into a successful franchise along the lines of Fox’s Diary of a Wimpy Kid series.”

The Edgar Awards for best mysteries will be announced at the gala banquet here in New York tonight. Of the five finalists for Best Juvenile, the Buddy Files: The Case of the Lost Boy, by Dori Hillestad Butler (Albert Whitman & Co.) is the only title for younger readers (the rest are for middle-graders).

What! You don’t know the The Buddy Files?

Full disclosure. Neither did I. I tossed my review copy aside as soon asI realized that it was written from the point of view of the dog — to me, a tired conceit. But I was so wrong. I picked it back up a few days ago and read through the whole series of five in almost one sitting. I COULD NOT PUT THEM DOWN! I fell in love with Buddy, his new family, the neighbors who include the Cat-With-No-Name, aloof and smart, and his best dog friend, Mouse, a really big black dog (I’m thinking a Newf).

The voice of Buddy the dog is charming, engaging and perfectly honed. He IS a dog, not a smug, erudite human construct of a dog. Buddy is a mystery solver of the class of Encyclopedia Brown, Cam Janson and Einstein Anderson. In book one, the first mystery is – why was he left at the P-O-U-N-D (dogs don’t say that bad word)? Buddy has the deductive reasoning of Sherlock Holmes but the easily distracted nature of dog. He follows his nose and we do too.

The breezy style of the writing, short chapters and quiet humor of these books make them the perfect transitional readers for kids who have outgrown Nate the Great, want a mystery but have “read everything.”

The Facts:

The Buddy Files by Dori Hillestad Butler, Albert Whitman

1. The Case of the Lost Boy, (3/1/2010)

Newly adopted from the pound, Buddy (formerly King) investigates the disappearance of his new boy.

2. The Case of the Mixed up Mutts, (3/1/2010)

Some people claim that all dogs look alike. Was the switching of these two pugs at the dog park an accident or something more suspicious?

3. The Case of the Missing Family, (3/1/2010)

Buddy has been trying to figure out for the last two books what happened to the family that put him in the animal shelter. He finally finds a clue.

4.The Case of the Fire Alarm, (3/1/2011)

Bullying rears its ugly head at the elementary school where Buddy works as a therapy dog. Can Buddy get to the bottom of the mystery of the pulled alarm?

5. The Case of the Library Monster, (3/1/2011)

Buddy discovers a blue tongued monster in the school library.

Questions about the truth of Greg Mortenson’s books and his handling of his charity continue to roil in the press in the wake of a 60 Minutes investigation. The AP reports that Montana’s attorney general is now looking in to the charity, which is headquartered in Bozeman. Publisher Viking is also investigating the book.

On school librarian listservs, many are vigorously defending Mortenson. As one librarian put it,

I can tell you this: our school did an all-school read this year using the Three Cups book. I wanted our students to see how important education is in other parts of the world and to realize how we take it for granted here. This project would not have been possible without the generous donation from the CAI of 650 books totally FREE. I know that many other schools and libraries have also received such donations.

Author John Krakauer, who contributed money to Mortenson’s charity, the Central Asia Institute, has published his own 89-page inquiry [downloadable free through today. After that, it can be purchased through Amazon’s Kindle Singles]. According to Krakauer, books donated to programs like the one at the above school library are bought at retail by the CAI from outlets that report to bestseller lists. As a result, Mortenson receives a royalty on each book and the sales help to boost best seller list rankings.

If the donated books are $16 paperbacks, that is $10,400 of the CAI’s money literally donated to the school. I doubt that the people who gave money to Mortenson’s cause would be happy to hear their money went to this, rather than to building schools and educating those without resources.

Librarians who have upcoming programs based on the books are left in a sticky situation. They aren’t the only ones; the University of Louisville had just announced plans to present Mortenson with an education award and are left wondering whether to go ahead with it. Officials told the local newspaper that they hope “the reports are unfounded, but will watch closely as the situation unfolds.”

Should libraries cancel upcoming programs? Given the ongoing investigations, it may be premature to do so now. And, this does offer the opportunity for a rich discussion of responsibility and accountability.

What about withdrawing the books? I think most of us would agree that access gives the reading public an opportunity to consider all the information and draw their own conclusions. For children’s selectors there is the further issue of the spin-offs. The middle-grade adaptation and the picture book are both simplistic retellings and perhaps selectors should just pass until the smoke clears.

Arriving this fall is a collection of “lost” stories by Dr. Seuss. The book came about in an interesting way, as revealed on All Things Considered last night. Via eBay, a Random House art director discovered a Dr. Seuss-obsessed collector who had identified magazines from the ’50’s featuring Seuss stories (he had a great business of buying the magazines for a few dollars and reselling them, with the Seuss name noted, for $200 to $400). Those, combined with some stories that were partially finished at Seuss’s death and voilà, The Bippolo Seed and Other Lost Stories.

The Bippolo Seed and Other Lost Stories Seuss Retail Price: $15.00 Hardcover: 72 pages Publisher: Random House Books for Young Readers – (2011-09-27) ISBN / EAN: 0375864350 / 9780375864353

The fourth in Cassandra Clare’s YA Mortal Instruments series, City of Fallen Angels (McElderry/S&S) releases today.

Meanwhile, the film based on the series is still being cast. Lily Collins, who is set to play heroine Clary Fray, was interviewed this week by MTV about the casting process, but didn’t spill any beans.

Collins, the daughter of musician Phil Collins, is currently a hot commodity in Hollywood. She debuted as Sandra Bullock’s daughter in Blind Side, and will appear this summer in Priest, based on the comic series and Abduction in the fall. She has been offered a role in Odd Thomas, based on the novel by Dean Koontz and is set to play Snow White in The Brothers Grimm: Snow White opposite Julia Roberts as the Evil Queen.

Two of what Deadline calls “the most coveted roles for young actors this season” have been filled. Josh Hutcherson and Liam Hemsworth will star opposite Jennifer Lawrence in The Hunger Games, based on the book by Suzanne Collins and to be directed by Gary Ross (Seabiscuit, Pleasantville). Hutceherson (The Kids are All Right), will play the baker’s son Peeta Mellark and Hemsworth (The Last Song) will be Gale Hawthorne.

The movie, expected to be the first in a trilogy, is scheduled for release on March 23, 2012.

Poetry month officially begins this Friday, April 1st — time to get ready!

Instant Programs

Pull out all those 811’s and face them out…stack ‘em on tables. Mark your  favorite poems with sticky notes so you can spontaneously read them aloud. Copy them and put them a bulletin board.

• Pick a theme like haiku. Print and post instructions on how to create these short poems and ask staff to write a few to post. Leave markers hanging on a string with blank paper posted for instant inspiration.

• Enlist those teens who have been hanging out and “causing trouble” to copy their favorite poems on paper.

• Replace those falling apart copies of Jack Prelutsky’s Something Big Has Been Here (Greenwillow) and Shel Silverstein’s Where the Sidewalk Ends (HarperCollins). Display the well-loved de-accessioned copies or (shoot me, I have done this) tear out the pages and post the poems. If you are still stamping books the long list of circ. dates are also fun to post.

• Pick an author to highlight…Prelutsky, Joyce Sidman, Doug Florian, Charles Smith, Kristine O’Conner George, Nikki Grimes, Maryann Hoberman, Karla Kuskin, Naomi Shihab Nye

• Host a Poetry Slam or open mike

What I Am Doing

1. Reading aloud my favorite short poems like “Florian’s Coyote” (Mammalabilia, Douglas Florian, HMH),  Kristine O’Connell George’s Little Dog Poems (Clarion), and Bank Street kid’s favorites from Patricia MacLachlan’s Once I Ate a Pie (Cotler/HarperCollins) and Jane Yolen’s Here’s a Little Poem, (Candlewick)
2. Asking children 8 years and up to copy their favorites on a half sheet of heavy stock paper in various pastel colors. Grown ups are participating and younger students can dictate their favorite rhymes.They write the poem, the author, the title and the book it came from. They may draw a picture and decorate if they wish. (most do not)
3. Collecting these poems. On Poem in Your Pocket Day, April 14^th, I will will paper our school hallways with poems for people to grab and put in their pockets.

Don’t Miss These New Poetry Books

Emma Dilemma: Big Sister Poems by Kristin O’Connell George, illustrated by Nancy Carpenter, Clarion, 2/22/11

Having a four-year-old little sister isn’t all fun-and-games for fourth grader, Jessica. There is a lot to put up with like Emma always tagging along, getting into her stuff and embarrassing her at a soccer game. These short poems give us the good, the bad and the frustrating of the complications of sibling relationships.

Guyku: A Year of Haiku for Boys by Bob Raszka, illustrated by Peter Reynolds, HMH, 10/4/10

From last year, in case you missed it…Just what the title promises…haiku for guys.  Four seasons of short poems, funny, sweet and engaging. You will want to write your own.

Poem in Your Pocket for Young Poets, ed. by Bruno Navasky and the Academy of American Poets; Library Edition (nonperforated pages ISBN 9780810998827); Amulet/Abrams; 4/1/11

I bought the edition with the rip-out pages at a local bookstore before I discovered there was a non-perforated, library edition. A wide-ranging collection of poems from mostly well-known poets that would be perfect for adults and young adults.

I Am the Book, ed. by Lee Bennett Hopkins, illustrated by Yayo, Holiday House, 3/15/11.

Hopkins has collected poems from masters like Jane Yolen, Naomi Shihab Nye, Karla Kuskin, and Kristine O’Connell George for this exuberant read-loud treasure. As they say in the review media…”an essential purchase.”

If you’ve been dreading the movie version of Mr. Popper’s Penguins, the just-released teaser trailer may confirm your worst fears. Richard and Florence Atwater’s Mr. Popper has been updated to a contemporary businessman (Jim Carrey), with a high-end NYC apartment, rather than a poor small-town house painter.

The movie debuts June 17. Little, Brown will re-release the book in May (ISBN 9780316186469).

Official Web Site: PoppersPenguins.com