Looking for Newbery - Sir Gawain the True

I picked up Sir Gawain the True by Gerald Morris from the library multiple times, but I just never go around to reading it up until this point.  But when perusing one of my favorite places for Mock Newbery titles, I saw that Sir Gawain made the shortlist of the Heavy Medal blog at SLJ.  I knew it was time to get this book from the library one last time and actually read it!

But in this post, I'm not going to talk about Sir Gawain the True's literary merits.  I'm just going to say that this book was flat out F-U-N!!  It's the kind of book to which kids will gravitate, especially boys, though as a female, I had belly laugh after belly laugh myself, so girls might be amused as I was.  There are great fights, people getting bopped on the head, magical elements, dragon slaying, and beheadings.  And the illustrations by Aaron Renier are perfect for this book - my favorite illustration involves a knight wearing bunny slippers.  Kids will love this!!

But through all the humor, there actually is a great message for kids about staying true to your word and being polite.  And knowing that, I am pleased to find out that there are other books Morris has written in this series - The Knights' Tales.

Now that I've written this post, I'm actually going to go back and read about why Nina and Jonathan put Sir Gawain the True on their mock Newbery shortlist.  Regardless, I'm so happy I finally read it and can now share it with students.  Sir Gawain is pure entertainment!!

Looking for Newbery - With a Name Like Love

I wish I could remember which list include With a Name Like Love by Tess Hilmo because it's one of my favorites. I won't lie, I was a bit put off by the title, sounded a little romantic for my taste, but once I picked it up, I couldn't put it down.

At thirteen, Ollie is the oldest daughter of a traveling preacher named Everlasting Love. Everlasting is the son of a traveling preacher and loves the life of going from town to town saving souls and preaching the word. Ollie, on the other hand, is a typical 13 year old who would love to settle down somewhere, attend a real school, have friends other than her sisters and live in a real house, not the trailer pulled behind her father's truck. She loves her father and respects what he does, she just wishes he would do it in a more permanent setting.

When the Loves pull into Binder, a small town like so many others, their life changes. Ollie meets a boy with a cloud over him. His father has been killed and his mother is in jail after admitting to the murder. His family lives on "the wrong side of the tracks" and the rest of the town won't give them a break. Ollie feels sorry for him and thinks there is more to the story than what is known publicly. She talks it over with her mother and father and pretty soon the family is wrapped up in the politics and drama of an unsolved murder and a family in crisis.

Tess Hilmo does great job of creating the tension of the small town complete with a crooked sheriff with connections to the state attorney, a bitter mean woman who runs the local store and her bully sons. I was angry at all of them as I read the story and couldn't wait for each one of them to "get theirs!"

Of course the story wouldn't be complete without the positive side of life in the small town and Ollie's family is blessed to be taken in after a fire by Mrs. Mahoney who understands Ollie's desire to settle down and does what she can to make that happen. Tess Hilmo uses her to provide hope for Ollie and to temper the bad side of a bad situation.

This is absolutely one of my favorite books of the year. I have recommended it to the better fifth grade readers because there are some fairly graphic violent moments and themes that a mature reader can handle. I hope this book doesn't get lost in the shuffle because it is definitely well done. I may be jumping the gun a bit, but I can see this as a future Grand Discussion selection.

Looking for Newbery - Hound Dog True

Hound Dog True by Linda Urban felt very personal for me and therefore touched my heart in profound ways. 


First, like the main character, Mattie, one of my daughters had a very difficult time talking to others when she was young - I saw firsthand how painful her shyness could be.  Every time Mattie moved, she would need to get up in front of her new teacher and new classmates and share something interesting about herself.  The time, energy, and agonizing that went into this for her was painful to read.  She protected herself with her writing, her imagination, and her solitude.  When a new character, Quincy, tried to break past the wall Mattie had built around herself, Mattie questioned her motives and tried to insulate herself from having too much contact with her.


Second, Uncle Potluck, Mattie's uncle, a school custodian, reminded me so much of a custodian from my school who just passed away.  They were both articulate, had many rich life experiences, they cared for others, and they always wanted to make children feel good about themselves.  Uncle Potluck loved Mattie unconditionally and saw her for exactly who she was.  What a gift for Mattie.  I loved the part when the reader finds out how Potluck got his name, but I do think that if I was sharing this with students, I would need to fill in some background knowledge about what a potluck actually is.

The language that is used in this book is terrific, but some of my favorite phrases come from Uncle Potluck:

• "traitorous knee, 

• gave its service in the illumination of youth, 

• director of custodial arts, 

• recording our custodial endeavors for posterity, 

• prognostication."  

And that's just to name a few.

Another part of Hound Dog True that I loved was how Mattie learned to be brave about big things, you have to do many small things that are brave as well.  Being brave is like being in training -- thanks to Mattie's school principal for that analogy.

And finally, how perfect that the reader sees the power of writing to get a character past difficult times.  That's a huge message!

Hound Dog True is a wonderful book with incredible characters and lovely language.  Definitely another favorite for me in 2011.

Looking for Newbery - Chengli and the Silk Road Caravan

One of my all time favorite Newbery winners is A Single Shard by Linda Sue Park. I love the story and the history that goes with it and Linda Sue Park does such a beautiful job of writing that I made it a regular in my read aloud rotation when I was still in the class room. It was a book that students didn't generally pick up on their own, but when they heard the story they loved it too. I added it to one of our early Newbery Club reading list and as usual, the kids who read it loved it.

It was because of A Single Shard that I was drawn to Chengli and the Silk Road Caravan by Hildi Kang. I found it on the same Twitter list I mentioned earlier and the subject matter drew me in. Chengli is a boy in ancient China, working as a laborer for a silk merchant in Chang'an China, the trading center for all of the caravans coming across the desert.

He is drawn to the desert by a mysterious wind that only he can feel or hear. Chengli believes it is the spirit of his dead father, a well respected inspector. He finally reaches a point of not being able to resist the calling of the wind and runs away from his master and the old cook who served as his guardian after the death of his mother. He joins a caravan that is headed across the desert as camel keeper. As fate would have it, his caravan is chosen to escort the girl princess who has been promised in marriage to a distant king.

Hildi Kang does a masterful job of describing the difficult life of the caravan. Walking for days and weeks and months on end through hot deserts, fighting bandits and protecting themselves from unscrupuolous fellow caravan workers. On the journey Chengli and the princess develop an uneasy friendship and when he is responsible for saving her life twice, their friendship becomes strong.

Chengli's journey is not a waste. Along the way he meets officials who knew his father and don't believe the son of such a respected inspector could be working as an animal keeper for a caravan. Chengli is able to convince them by showing them the one clue that links him to his father and the story ends with the promise of a bright future.

Hildi Kang brings the reader into the desert with the caravan and the excitement of the chase when the princess is kidnapped is hard to put down. It's obvious from the detail that she has done her research and she tells the story of Chengli in a way that is interesting and easy to read. With cliff hangers in every chapter, this would make a great read aloud and I think it deserves more attention then it has been given.

Looking for Newbery - Sparrow Road

I'm going to be honest,  Bill and I agreed to not tell what our favorite books are until the very end of our series, but I have to make this declaration: I love, love, love Sparrow Road by Sheila O'Connor!!  As a friend said recently, I'm surprised this book isn't being more seriously talked about in regards to the Newbery award (I found it on the Anderson's Bookshop Mock Newbery list).

Sparrow Road is a story that tugged at my heartstrings from the first sentence all the way to the last.  The main character, Raine O'Rourke (great name, right?), moves far away from home when her mother takes a summer job as a cook/maid at an artists' retreat on Sparrow Road.  Raine spends a lot of time wondering why they have moved from their familiar home with her grandpa to a place called Comfort, where they know no one, and  also wonders what the relationship is between her mom and the head of the artists' retreat, Viktor.

The artists themselves make wonderful foils for Raine - so incredibly quirky and eclectic.  Each artist has a gift - Lillian writes poetry and plays the piano, Eleanor is writing a book, Josie makes gorgeous quilts and other fabric creations, and Diego constructs art from others' garbage.  Each of these individuals contribute greatly to Raine finding her inner creative self during the summer.

The fact that the house that hosts the artists' retreat used to be an orphanage plays heavily into the story line.  It becomes part of Raine as a writer and as a person, and we discover interesting tidbits about other characters in the story as well.  The orphanage part truly is intertwined throughout everyone's story in a masterful way by O'Connor.

The language in the story is gorgeous as well.  I'm just listing a few examples:

"This is going to take some brave from both of us" -- Raine's mom talking about their move to Sparrow Road.

"Diego was right.  Sparrow Road wasn't really silent.  It was filled with a background hum most people didn't slow down enough to hear.  A steady insect buzz, birdsong, the rustle of leaf brushing against leaf.  I could even hear the wind whistle through the weeds." -- Raine commenting on her first day of silence, something enforced for the artists at Sparrow Road to get in touch with their creativity.

"Just tell yourself you're going for a walk.  Forget you're up on stage.  Disappear while the words do all the work.  Come on back when the audience starts clapping." -- advice Raine gets when she gets stage fright about sharing her story with others.

There's another integral part of the story that I've deliberately left out because it's too important for you to hear it from me.  You really need to read about it and see how it develops on your own.

In case there were any doubts in your mind, I ADORE Sparrow Road!!!!!!!!!

Looking for Newbery - The Cheshire Cheese Cat: A Dickens of a Tale

First of all, let me apologize for going with a "re-post" so early in our yearly quest for Newbery winners. We spent the past week in Florida, a surprise gift to our children, and I'm still trying to wake up after 16 hours on the road and coming home to a house that looked like Christmas just ended a few hours ago, when it was really a week and oh yeah...school starts again tomorrow!

Let me just wrap up the apology by saying it was all worth it. As my kids get older I know these family trips will be getting fewer and farther between so I treasure every minute of them. There's a future blog post here I think, but for now, let's look for Newbery.

I posted The Cheshire Cheese Cat back in November and since then have gotten it into the hands of several students who absolutely love it. One of them even came to me asking about Charles Dickens books in the library. We discussed titles and, given the season, A Christmas Carol came up. She wasn't aware that the famous story done by the Muppets, Mickey Mouse and countless others was actually a literary classic written in the 1800s. I don't know if she went on to read any other Dickens classics, they would have been a challenge, but in any case this book served as an introduction to great literature.

I said in my original post that it would make a great read aloud, and I'll stand by that. The chapters end with great cliff hangers and the twists and turns are exciting and fun. I haven't seen this on a lot of lists so far, but I did find it on a list my friend Maria at Teaching in the 21st Century sent me on Twitter. She and I had a conversation with our Newbery Club members about the books we have been reading and I made the point that with all of the books I've read this year, I still don't think I've read the winner. Time will tell, and I'll still give my opinion.

Looking for Newbery - Dead End in Norvelt

I had the pleasure of hearing Jack Gantos speak in 2010 at a dinner during the NCTE convention.  He was witty, clever, quirky,  and articulate.  So it came as no surprise when I read his book, Dead End in Norvelt, that it has the same characteristics that he does.

Dead End in Norvelt came to my attention as I followed various Mock Newbery groups online.  This book was mentioned on Heavy Medal's blog at SLJ.  As I look at how many post-it notes I put in this book while reading it, I would definitely have to agree with those opinions.

I enjoyed so much about Dead End in Norvelt, but my favorite part of the book was the relationship between the main character, Jack Gantos, and his elderly neighbor, Miss Volker.  Together, they are quite busy one summer writing obituaries for the many other elderly people dying in Norvelt (a town named after Eleanor Roosevelt).  What is unique about the obituaries that Miss Volker composes and has Jack scribe, then type, are their depth.  Miss Volker not only tells the pertinent details about the deceased, but she also connects them to the person's personal history as well as the history of the world.  She is so passionate when she dictates the obituaries for Jack.

Miss Volker says:

"History often sheds more light on the present than the past."

Toward the end of the book, Jack sums up why Miss Volker feels it is so necessary to revisit history:

"The reason you remind yourself of the stupid stuff you've done in the past is so you don't do it again.  That was what Miss Volker had been teaching all these years."

What a great lesson for us all!

One of Jack's quirky characteristics was his perpetual nosebleeds.  Anytime he was worried, in trouble, grossed out, or under any pressure, his nose would respond by spurting blood.  Of course, the nosebleeds usually happened at very inopportune times; one of my favorites was when he was looking at a dead body for the first time in a funeral home and his nose started dripping blood on the white satin lining of the casket.  He had just seen the person's dentures and when wondering out loud why they weren't in the person's mouth, he was told the lips were sewn together so dentures are not necessary.  The information proved to be a little too much for Jack.

Between being grounded for the entire summer for disobeying his mother, digging a hole for a bomb shelter for his dad, reading myriads of books on historical events while grounded, helping write obituaries, driving Miss Norvelt's car, and wondering if the Hells' Angels are coming to live in Norvelt or destroy it, Jack is quite a busy guy.

I enjoyed one of Jack's descriptions of himself:

"My brown curls stood up on my head like a field planted with question marks.  There was no reason to brush it.  The question marks would just stand up into exclamation points and then wilt back into question marks.  Besides, I was a boy.  It is okay to be a boy slob because moms think they still have time to cure you of your bad habits before you grow up and become an annoying adult slob for someone else."

What a gift of words - it elicited a great visual for me!  Passages such as this one and the many obituaries Miss Norvelt dictated remind me of the beautiful language I would expect from a Newbery winner.  Starting our "Looking for Newbery" series with Dead End in Norvelt seems like a really good idea!