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Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award Candidates 2020

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Argentina
Maria Teresa Andruetto, Author Web page
CEDILIJ, Organisation
Jorge Luján, Author
María Wernicke, Author/Illustrator Web page

Australia
Randa Abdel-Fattah, Author Web page
Jeannie Baker, Illustrator Web page
Bronwyn Bancroft, Illustrator Web page
Ursula Dubosarsky, Author Web page
Susanne Gervay, Author Web page
Morris Gleitzman, Author Web page
Indigenous Literary Foundation, Organisation Web page
Robert Ingpen, Illustrator Web page
Margo Lanagan, Author Web page
Magabala Books, Organisation Web page
Melina Marchetta, Author Web page 
The Literature Centre, Organisation Web page

Austria
Renate Welsh-Rabady, Author
Linda Wolfsgruber, Illustrator Web page
Lisbeth Zwerger, Illustrator

Azerbaijan
Solmaz Amanova, Author
Aynur Mammadova, Illustrator
Sevinj Nurugizi, Author Web page

Belarus
Piatro Vasiuchenka, Author

Belgium
Anne Brouillard, Author/Illustrator
Carll Cneut, Illustrator
Ingrid Godon, Illustrator Web page
Anne Herbauts, Author/Illustrator Web page
Thomas Lavachery, Author
Prix Bernard Versele, Organisation
Klaas Verplancke, Author/Illustrator Web page

Bolivia
Biblioteca Thurucapitas, Organisation

Bosnia and Herzegovina
Mirsad Bećirbašić, Author
Šimo Ešić, Author

Brazil
Roger Mello, Author/Illustrator Web page

Bulgaria
Maya Dalgacheva, Author
Julia Spiridonova, Author

Cameroon
Christian Epanya, Author/Illustrator Web page

Canada
Deborah Ellis, Author Web page
Marie-Francine Hébert, Author Web page
Jon Klassen, Author/Illustrator Web page
Uma Krishnaswami, Author Web page

Canada/Iran
Nahid Kazemi, Illustrator Web page

Chile
Fundación Había Una Vez, Organisation Web page

China
Gao Hongbo, Author
Xiong Liang, Author/Illustrator
Zhang Zhilu, Author

Colombia
Ivar Da Coll, Author/Illustrator
Proyecto Gulliver, Organisation Web page

Democratic Republic of Congo/United Kingdom
Dominique Mwankumi, Author/Illustrator Webb page

Croatia
Dubravka Kolanović, Illustrator Web page

Cyprus
Tsangaris Hambis, Illustrator

Czech Republic
Petr Nikl, Author/Illustrator
Květa Pacovská, Illustrator

Denmark
Kim Fupz Aakeson, Author
Biblo.dk, Organisation Web page
Lilian Brøgger, Illustrator Web page
Louis Jensen, Author Web page
Dorte Karrebaek, Illustrator

Ecuador
Edna Iturralde, Author Web page

Egypt
Yacoub El-Sharouni, Author/Oral storyteller/Promoter of reading

Estonia
Ulla Saar, Illustrator Web page
Leelo Tungal, Author
Urmas Viik, Illustrator

Faroe Islands
Rakel Helmsdal, Author/Illustrator/Oral storyteller/Promoter of Reading Webb page

Finland
Linda Bondestam, Illustrator Web page
Marika Maijala, Author/Illustrator Web page
Timo Parvela, Author Web page
Irmelin Sandman Lilius, Author/Illustrator
Maria Turtschaninoff, Author Web page

France
A.C.C.E.S., Organisation Web page
L’Agence Quand les Livres Relient, Organisation Web page
Benjamin Chaud, Author/Illustrator Web page
Olivier Douzou, Author/Illustrator Web page
Timothée de Fombelle, Author Web page
Bernard Friot, Author Web page
Jean-Claude Mourlevat, Author Web page
Marie-Aude Murail, Author
Geneviéve Patte, Promoter of reading Web page
François Place, Author/Illustrator Web page
François Roca, Illustrator

Georgia
Giorgi Chachanidze, Illustrator
Bondo Matsaberidze, Author Web page
Tea Topuria, Author Web page
Mariam Tsiklauri, Author

Germany
Jutta Bauer, Illustrator Web page
Nadia Budde, Author/Illustrator Web page
Nikolaus Heidelbach, Illustrator
Internationale Jugendbibliothek, Organisation Web page
Janosch, Author/Illustrator
Labor Ateliergemeinschaft, Organisation Web page
Stiftung Lesen/German Reading Foundation, Organisation Web page

Greece
ECHO Refugee Library, Organisation Web page
Vagelis Iliopoulos, Author/Promoter of reading
Antonis Papatheodoulou, Author Web page
Loty Petrovits-Andrutsopoulou, Author Web page

Greenland
Naja Rosing-Asvid, Author/Illustrator Web page
Lene Therkildsen, Promoter of reading Web page

Hungary
Istvan Csukas, Author
Tibor Zalán, Author

Iceland
Sigrún Eldjárn, Author/Illustrator

India
A & A Book Trust, Organisation Web page
Pratham Books, Organisation Web page

Iran
Children’s Book Council, Organisation Web page
Farhad Hassanzadeh, Author
Mehdi Hejvani, Promoter of Reading
Jamshid Khanian, Author Web page
Mobile Library of Iran, Organisation
Houshang Moradi Kermani, Author
Read with Me, Organisation Web page
Farshid Shafiei, Illustrator
Mohammad Reza Shams, Author
Aliasghar Seidabadi, Promoter of reading Web page

Ireland
PJ Lynch, Illustrator Web page
Sheena Wilkinson, Author Web page

Israel
Rutu Modan, Author/Illustrator

Italy
Beatrice Alemagna, Author/Illustrator Web page
Chiara Carminati, Author
Lampedusa Library, Organisation
Sarolta Szulyovszky, Illustrator Web page

Japan
Kyoko Matsuoka, Promoter of reading Webpage
Seizo Tashima, Illustrator

Jordan
Taghrid al-Najjar, Author Web page

Republic of Korea
Heena Baek, Illustrator
Korean Children’s Book Association, Organisation
Lee Juyoung, Promoter of reading
Uk-Bae Lee, Illustrator

Latvia
Gundega Muzikante, Illustrator Web page
Gita Treice, Illustrator Web page

Lebanon/Belgium
Fatima Sharafeddine, Author Web page

Lithuania
Kestutis Kasparavicius, Author/Illustrator Web page

Netherlands
De Schrijverscentrale, Organisation Web page
Joke van Leeuwen, Author/Illustrator Web page
Gideon Samson, Author Web page
Toon Tellegen, Author
Thé Tjong-Khing, Illustrator Web page
Marit Törnqvist, Author/Illustrator Web page
Edward van de Vendel, Author
Sylvia Weve, Illustrator Web page

Nicaragua
German Nicaraguan Library and the Bibliobús Bertold Brecht, Organisation Web page

Norway
Lene Ask, Illustrator Web page
Rune Belsvik, Author Web page
Gro Dahle, Author Web page
Harald Rosenløw Eeg, Author Web page
Stian Hole, Author/Illustrator
Marit Kaldhol, Author Web page
Leser Søker Bok, Organisation Web page
Gry Moursund, Author/Illustrator
Svein Nyhus, Author/Illustrator Web page
Maria Parr, Author Web page
Øyvind Torseter, Illustrator Web page

Palestine
Sonia Nimr, Author

Philippines
Virgilio Senadren Almario, Author
Kristiyano-Islam Peace Library, Organisation Web page
Neni Sta. Romana Cruz, Promoter of reading

Poland
All of Poland Reads to Kids, Organisation Web page
Iwona Chmielewska, Illustrator Web page
Paweł Pawlak, Illustrator
Małgorzata Karolina Piekarska, Author Web page
Marcin Szczygielski, Author
Józef Wilkoń, Illustrator Web page

Portugal
Bernardo P. Carvalho, Illustrator Web page
António Jorge Gonçalves, Illustrator Web page
Maria Teresa Maia Gonzales, Author
Catarina Sobral, Illustrator Web page

Romania
Florin Bican, Author/Oral storyteller/Promoter of reading
Andrea Kürti, Illustrator Web page
Vasile Olac, Illustrator

Russian Federation
Anastasia Arkhipova, Illustrator Web page
Ilga Ponornitskaya (Eugeniya Basova), Author
Nina Dashevskaya, Author
Russian State Children´s Library, Organisation
Alexander Traugot, Illustrator
Mikhail Yasnov, Author

Serbia
Jasminka Petrović, Author
Ljubivoje Ršumović, Author

Slovenia
Slavko Pregl, Author
Anja Štefan, Author

South Africa
Biblionef, Organisation Web page
Niki Daly, Author/Illustrator Web page
Gcina Mhlope, Author/Oral storyteller/Promoter of reading Web page

South Africa/South Africa
Beverley Naidoo, Author

Spain
Elena Odriozola, Illustrator Web page
Jordi Sierra i Fabra, Author Web page

Sudan
Salah Elmur, Illustrator Web page

Sweden
Eva Eriksson, Illustrator Web page
Gunna Grähs, Illustrator
Joanna Hellgren, Illustrator Web page
Olof Landström, Illustrator
Pija Lindenbaum, Author/Illustrator Web page
Eva Lindström, Author/Illustrator Web page
Frida Nilsson, Author Web page
Klara Persson, Author/Illustrator Web page
Anna-Clara Tidholm, Illustrator Web page
Cecilia Torudd, Author/Illustrator
Jakob Wegelius, Author/Illustrator Web page
Ilon Wikland, Illustrator
Monica Zak, Author/Oral storyteller/Promoter of reading Web page

Switzerland
Albertine, Illustrator Web page
Franz Hohler, Author Web page

Taiwan
Jimmy Liao, Author/Illustrator Web page

Turkey
Aytül Akal, Author Web page
Ayla Çınaroğlu, Author/Illustrator Web page
Mustafa Delioğlu, Illustrator
Huban Korman, Illustrator Web page

Ukraine
Kateryna Shtanko, Illustrator
Lesia Voronyna, Author

United Kingdom
Allan Ahlberg, Author Web page
David Almond, Author Web page
Quentin Blake, Illustrator Web page
Theresa Breslin, Author Web page
Aidan Chambers, Author Web page
Aidan & Nancy Chambers, Promoters of reading Web page
Michael Foreman, Author/Illustrator Web page
Emily Gravett, Author/Illustrator Web page
Daniel Hahn, Promoter of reading Web page
Frances Hardinge, Author Web page
Shirley Hughes, Author/Illustrator Web page
Elizabeth Laird, Author Web page
Margaret Meek Spencer, Promoter of reading
Patrick Ness, Author Web page
Luke Pearson, Author/Illustrator Web page
Jan Pienkowski, Illustrator Web page
Katherine Rundell, Author Web page
Marcus Sedgwick, Author Web page
John Shelley, Illustrator Web page
David Wood, Author Web page

United States
Laurie Halse Anderson, Author Web page
Eric Carle, Author/Illustrator Web page
Kate DiCamillo, Author Web page
Margarita Engle, Author Web page
Maira Kalman, Author/Illustrator Web page
Stephen Krashen, Promoter of reading Web page
Christopher Myers, Author/Illustrator Web page
Jerry Pinkney, Illustrator Web page
Javaka Steptoe, Illustrator Web page
Tim Tingle, Oral storyteller Web page
Jack Zipes, Author/Promoter of reading

Zambia
Lubuto Library Partners, Organisation Web page

Roundups Rule But Occasionally A Single Title Review Shows Us The Attention Children’s Books Deserve And Need

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Page 50 of yesterday’s Observer Review was instructive.

On the top half was a roundup of Young Adult ‘books of the month’, mentioning seven books with throwaway soundbites such as “a masterclass in world-building”, “a bold arresting first book”, “utterly page-turning and relatable”, “another coming-of age triumph”, “an unashamedly frothy romp”, with the remaining copy being, out of necessity, almost purely descriptive and summarising. So there you have it, the seven books get their mentions, all warmly and equally recommended.

https://www.pressreader.com/uk/the-observer-the-new-review-1705/20191020/282583084784106

And on the lower half of the page there is a full orthodox ‘review’ of – as in a critical discussion of – a single title, The Secret Commonwealth by Philip Pullman. 

https://www.pressreader.com/uk/the-observer-the-new-review-1705/20191020/282591674718698

The contrast is made all the more stark by the excellence of Alex Preston’s review (a meditation on parallels Preston detects in Pullman’s fiction with Peter Frankopan’s non-fiction The Silk Roads). Not only does the review make you want to read the novel under scrutiny (I haven’t yet), it also makes you think, Ah, I must look out for this man’s opinions on other books. I like the way he reads and thinks about what he has read. And because he has more space he doesn’t have to summarise his very positive feelings for the book in just three or four words. He is able to say “Pullman’s best novel so far is both diagnosis and cure, a work of extraordinary depth and humanity. That Pullman is our best children’s author is clear; The Secret Commonwealth establishes him as one of our greatest writers, full stop.”

You know in an instant that if Preston was reviewing another Young Adult book he would give you his honest critical view, weighted against his opinion that Pullman is the best.

This is not to say that the reviewer of the roundup piece could not also have written just as interestingly about any one of her selected novels. I am saying, as I have said before, that it is not space, and the limitedness of that space, alone that renders the reviewing of children’s books in the mainstream press ineffective. It is the scatterbrained use of the space when it is given, and the impulse to mention as many books as possible in an unfaltering register of praise. It is dangerous because it renders the authors of children’s and young adult books, and those who publish them, unused to receiving negative reviews. Bad books are published. The best authors are not always on top form. If a review (even a short mention) is worth reading at all it should be capable of conveying such judgements, and not read like soundbites from a publisher’s catalogue.

All the more lamentable then that Saturday’s Guardian Review seems to have gradually shelved its weekly individual review of a children’s book in favour of a monthly roundup.

 

Costa Judges Announced

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The judges for the Costa Children’s Book Award will be:
Danny van Emden, children’s buyer and deputy manager at West End Lane Books in West Hampstead; Charlotte Eyre, The Bookseller;
Bali Rai, writer

Malorie Blackman’s Autobiography Announced

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Merky Books, Stormzy’s PenguinRandomHouse imprint, will be publishing Malorie Blackman’s autobiography in 2022.

Stormzy has referred to the Noughts and Crosses series as his “favourite books of all time”, which “showed me just how amazing storytelling could be”.

The Merky imprint  publishes just two or three books a year. Titles to date include Stormzy’s Rise Up, Chelsea Kwakye and Ore Ogunbiyi’s Taking Up Space, and the forthcoming verse novel by Derek Owusu, That Reminds Me.

The announcement was made via video link on Twitter:


 

Death Of Richard Jackson, Judy Blume Editor

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The death of, Richard Jackson, a significant children’s books editor and champion of Young Adult themes has been announced:

Richard Jackson, an editor who published books by Judy Blume, Paula Fox, Virginia Hamilton and other award-winning authors that broadened the scope of children’s literature, then late in life became a children’s author himself, died on Oct. 2 in Towson, Md. He was 84.

…His work as an editor beginning in the 1960s that changed the landscape of literature for young people. At a time when many people still thought of Nancy Drew and Hardy Boys mysteries as the height of sophistication for young readers, he published authors who wrote about bullying, race, sexuality, adolescent angst of all kinds.

He often found himself defending the books he published against complaints from librarians, school boards and parents who deemed them too strong. 

Of publishing Judy Blume, Jackson said, “I felt her voice was so extraordinarily pure, I just couldn’t worry that we were going to raise hackles… There’s always someone to be offended. But it was never to raise hackles that we published her. It was the voice, and the absence of adult regret, instruction or nostalgia in those novels. She turns them over to the kids, over to the characters.”

More >>> https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/13/books/richard-jackson-dead.html
Updated full-length obit. >>> https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/13/books/richard-jackson-dead.html?smid=tw-nytobits&smtyp=cur

Irish Times Reviews

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Sara Keating leads her Irish Times piece with a review of In The Key Of Code  by Aimee Lucido.

In The Key of Code (Walker Books, £6.99, 10+) takes a totally original approach to the verse novel, using the language of music and computer code to carry the story. Emmy is the daughter of struggling musicians who have moved to California hoping for a big break. Unable to make instruments sing the way her parents can, Emmy feels like an outsider in her family, and her status as the new girl only heightens her alienation. At her new school, she is the “only one in a room full of duets trios symphonies singing a solo”…. … In the Key of Code is thoroughly original in both concept and execution, and it manages to sneak in an empowering history of women’s involvement in computers too.

See what other books are reviewed in the piece here >>> https://www.irishtimes.com/culture/books/children-s-books-in-the-key-of-code-breaks-new-ground-1.4037729

 

New Author Signs Three Book Deal With Chicken House

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Chicken House has revealed a three-book deal with debut author Holly Rivers.

The first book in the middle-grade mystery series will be called Demelza and the Spectre Detectors and will  be published next February (2020).

The series was acquired from Kate Shaw at the Shaw Agency, who describes the first book as a “gothic, gripping and gorgeous story”.

According to The Bookseller, Demelza and the Spectre Detectors will be leading Chicken House’s publishing programme in its 20th anniversary year, and will be a lead title at Frankfurt Book Fair next week. 

 

 

Egmont On The Move

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The Bookseller reports that Egmont will be leaving the Yellow Building in Shepherd Bush and moving to a space in WeWork’s Minster Court

“Under the relocation plans, the children’s publisher will introduce hot desking and staff will enjoy a free coffee and beer bar,” The Bookseller says, and quotes Cally Poplak, toe company’s m.d. as follows: 

Egmont has always embraced flexibility and family-friendly ways of working, which is why we were an early adopter of flexible hours almost 20 years ago. Agile working is something we have been wanting to adopt for some years to push our flexibility even further and broaden our appeal as an employer. The challenge has always been finding the right office space and sufficiently reliable technology, and now the stars have aligned to make the ambition a reality in a new WeWork office in central London at 2 Minster Court, which even has a connection to one of our titles, The Hundred and One Dalmatians. 

Staff are hugely excited and heavily involved in the planning and transition, which will see everyone move from having their own desk to one central shared Egmont space overlooking Tower Bridge, a number of common areas, multiple bookable meeting rooms, phone booths and a free coffee and beer bar. Through the planning process, we have already seen a reduction in paper and waste and even better collaboration.

 

Bookshop Day 2019 Saturday 5 October

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Today is  the 7th Bookshop Day. 

Search for your local participating bookshop here: https://booksaremybag.com/bookshops

BOOKS ARE MY BAG is a nationwide campaign run by the Booksellers Association to celebrate bookshops. It launched in 2013 and today comprises Bookshop Day and the Books Are My Bag Readers Awards. At the centre of the campaign is the iconic BAMB tote bag. Since the campaign launched, over a million people have worn a Books Are My Bag to show their love for their local bookshop.
 
Every year over a thousand bookshops around the country take part in Bookshop Day by holding special events, creating bespoke window displays and more. The BAMB Readers Awards are the only awards curated by bookshops and voted for by booklovers.

Harvey Awards Winner In Children’s/YA Category

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Best Children’s or Young Adult Book

WINNER: Laura Dean Keeps Breaking Up With Me 
by Mariko Tamaki and Rosemary Valero-O’Connell (First Second)

Nominees:

  • Hey Kiddo by Jarrett J. Krosoczka (Scholastic Graphix)
  • Mr. Wolf’s Class #2: Mystery Club by Aron Nels Steinke (Scholastic Graphix)
  • New Kid by Jerry Craft (HarperCollins Children’s Books)
  • On a Sunbeam by Tillie Walden (First Second)

For all the other category winners see > https://www.comicsbeat.com/nycc-19-presenting-the-2019-harvey-awards-winners/