Newbery Celebration

Well, the 2009 ALA awards have been revealed, and for a group of Columbus bloggers, it was time to gather and reflect on the results. We started at our favorite children's bookstore, Cover to Cover. The gathering included Bill (my blog partner), Katie (Creative Literacy), Abby and Lauren (Authentic Learner), Kristine (Best Book I Have Not Read), Amjed Qamar, Franki (A Year of Reading), and Mary Lee (also from A Year of Reading, and our celebration organizer!!).

One of the first things we found out when comparing reading notes, was that only three people we knew had actually read the Newbery winner, The Graveyard Book. It was a picture-worthy moment for these ladies -- way to go Beth, Franki, and Sally (owner of Cover to Cover)!

As far as how Bill and I fared here at Literate Lives, the results are so-so:

The Graveyard Book -- I had ordered it from the public library, and it was in a TBR pile in my living room. Does it count that I had it in my possession??

The Underneath - We had both read it, and thought that it was very well written, but were not in the group of people that absolutely loved it.

Surrender Tree: Poems of Cuba's Struggle for Freedom - Neither one of us had read it.

Savvy - Bill is so happy about this selection, especially after he and another teacher at our school had led a Grand Discussion on this book just last Thursday. They had over 50 parents and children there -- how great is it that this group had an in-depth conversation about a Newbery Honor book! This is also in my TBR pile, and I will be getting to it immediately.

After Tupac and D Foster - I read half-way through this on Sunday. Personally, I felt that the content of this book was for a much more mature audience.

We gave it our best shot - trying to read the Newbery before it was announced - when we did our Looking for Newbery series. While our success rate was about 50%, we had tons of fun in the process. We'll be back next year, trying to find that one special book that will be announced as a "winner"!

In the meantime, thanks to Mary Lee for organizing tonight's Newbery Celebration. It was a great group of people, many new purchases were made at Cover to Cover, and everyone had a fabulous dinner at The NorthStar Cafe afterward. I've included one final picture of our fun group (unfortunately, Bill was not with us for the picture - he had to leave for his dad/coaching duties before we left for dinner).