1.17.2008

A bouillabaisse of children's literature stuff, if you will

I sure do seem to be posting a lot lately, don’t I? There are a couple reasons for this:

1. I had an end-of-the-year project at work that completely prohibited me from blogging during my lunch break. And I was too burned out to do it when I got home. So November and December were pretty shot.

2. Adam has been working late the past few nights so, rather than drinking a glass of chard with him (or a pint of beer, for him), I have been glued in front of the computer. This is the last night he has to work late – you’ll probably see a bit of a drop-off after today.

3. I’m feeling drained after ALA, and I don’t feel like working. Boo.

But I just discovered Bloglines and I am the happiest camper right now. All the time I’ve freed up! I can spend it…you know…blogging more!

Sarah Miller reviewed Ever by Gail Carson Levine – argh! I’m completely pining for that book! Sure, I could probably get a hold of my contact at Harper, but I don’t like to play that card too often. Anyone else have a galley out there and want to do a switch? I have Meg Cabot’s new one, Airhead, or the new Mysterious Benedict Society. Anyone? Anyone?

Thanks (again!) to my daily Shelf Awareness email, I’ve found a new blog! And thanks to Bloglines, I’m not sweatin’ it. It’s Collecting Children’s Books, and I’m completely fascinated. In particular, he has a discussion going about the merits of opening up the Newbery discussions. Apparently, for about 4 years in the 1970’s, the Newbery committee came up with “nominees” – Peter has proof of this – and this allowed everyone to read those books and discuss, discuss, discuss before the actual winner and honor books were announced. I think there is definitely something to this: I like the idea of increasing sales and circulation for a wider circle of books; additionally, this process would allow libraries and booksellers to actually have decent stock of the winners when they’re announced! Can you imagine! The meaningfulness of Mock discussions would increase. Everyone – teachers, librarians, booksellers, children, teens, adults – would feel part of the process and feel invested in the outcome, rather than this hush-hush weird sequestering thing that happens now. If the “youth media awards” are truly the “Academy Awards of the children’s literature world”, it sure would be fun if we tried a system revolving around nominees. Maybe I could even do a spread and take bets? Perhaps?

Ultimately, I’m the rare librarian who actually likes and encourages change. Why shouldn’t we try a different approach and see what happens? If it doesn’t work out, how about we go back to the sequestering?

4 comments:

Anali said...

You JUST discovered Bloglines? How have I not preached the power of the aggregator to you before?

Unknown said...

Actually...*she looks down, embarrassed*...you did tell me about it - months ago. But this is the first time I've delved into it.

If it helps, I bow down to you and all your bad-ass techie knowledge! How did you pick up all this in library school and I did not????

Anali said...

Weren't we both in Glogoff's summer class? That's where. But I remember you didn't like that class much - it really didn't teach as much about "Decision Making for Info-Pros" as it did intro to web 2.0.

Unknown said...

Crap. I was in that class with you. And you're right - I didn't like it. Now I doubly suck!!! I've become one of *those* librarians!