Bookology Magazine

Vicki Palmquist

Equality’s Call

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Equality's Call
Writ­ten by Deb­o­rah Diesen in read­able-out-loud verse with a refrain that reflects the cumu­la­tive action in the pre­ced­ing pages, this pic­ture book traces the dili­gent efforts of those who worked for decades to make Amer­i­ca’s vot­ing rights more inclu­sive. There is his­to­ry here for every­one to know. The illus­tra­tions add pas­sion and under­stand­ing to the text, help­ing us with more infor­ma­tion.… more

Modern-Day Treasure Hunting

by
David LaRochelle
Why was I crawl­ing through a frozen sew­er pipe on my hands and knees in the mid­dle of winter? I was geo­caching, my lat­est obsession. If you haven’t heard of geo­caching, it’s a world­wide trea­sure hunt using GPS to locate hid­den con­tain­ers called geo­caches. There are lit­er­al­ly mil­lions of geo­caches hid­den around the globe. When I first start­ed play­ing, I was delight­ed to dis­cov­er that there were sev­er­al with­in walk­ing dis­tance of my townhome.… more

Skinny Dip with Brian P. Cleary

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Brian P. Cleary
We're pleased to welcome author and poet Brian P. Cleary for a Skinny Dip this month. His books have made kids guffaw and chortle, all while learning parts of grammar or math! Impossible, you say? Not for Brian, whose brain just works this way.

Humanimal

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This book is a page-turner in all of the right ways. It's an immensely readable nonfiction book that delivers memorable information. Best of all, I believe it will change hearts and minds about our relationship to animals, a necessary step in our evolution if we're engaged in saving our planet.

Writing a Funny Book

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One of my favorite books of Gen­nifer Chold­enko’s is One-Third Nerd, in which a broth­er and two sis­ters attempt to solve the prob­lem of their beloved dog being incon­ti­nent in their rent­ed apart­ment, over which the land­lord threat­ens to evict them. They’ve been told a vet could fix the prob­lem, but surgery for their dog is low on their par­ents’ list of pri­or­i­ties.… more

#OneStatelinerStory

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Modeled after the One School, One Book premise, Phillipsburg School District Elementary ELA & Social Studies Curriculum Director Darlene Noel created a school-wide event called #OneStatelinerStory: Every Classroom. Every Student. Every Family. The fundamental purpose of this event is to build a community of readers through a shared reading experience. Think of it as a really large book club!

I’m Gonna Push Through!

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Have you felt like you couldn’t, wouldn’t, shouldn’t attempt some­thing you real­ly want to do? Maybe you’ve done a good job of con­vinc­ing your­self you’re not up to mak­ing your goal. This is the book for you, your class­room, your book club, your dance troupe, your fam­i­ly … lit­er­al­ly every­one who needs pos­i­tive encouragement. As the author and edu­ca­tor Jas­myn Wright shares, “I’ve taught in low-income and under­priv­i­leged com­mu­ni­ties, so I knew that my stu­dents need­ed more than the bare min­i­mum to excel.”… more

An Autumn Salad from Karen Cushman

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Print Recipe
Warm Salad with Roasted Squash, with Cranberry Vinaigrette, Hazelnuts, and Chèvre
I must admit I’m more of a free-form cook. I don’t real­ly fol­low recipes but adapt them to what I have on hand or what my cre­ative juices are call­ing for. Usu­al­ly. The fol­low­ing recipe I love so much that I make it as sug­gest­ed except for the squash.
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Skinny Dip with Marsha Wilson Chall

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One of my all-time favorite books is Up North at the Cab­in. There is some­thing quin­tes­sen­tial about the cab­in expe­ri­ence for many peo­ple who live in the Upper Mid­west. This book, by our Skin­ny Dip­pin’ author Mar­sha Wil­son Chall, has engaged read­ers and lis­ten­ers for 27 years! Mar­sha has cre­at­ed many pic­ture books that show­case her sto­ry­telling tal­ents, includ­ing Bona­parte, One Pup’s Up, and The Secret Life of Fig­gy Mus­tar­do.… more

Skinny Dip with Kenneth Kraegel

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Kenneth Kraegel
We’re pleased to wel­come author and illus­tra­tor Ken­neth Kraegel for a Skin­ny Dip this month. His newest book, Wild Hon­ey from the Moon, is due to be pub­lished on Novem­ber 5, 2019. School Library Con­nec­tion said, “The rich and lus­cious illus­tra­tions are what make this book so spe­cial; read­ers will want to exam­ine every detail on every page.… more

The Big Book Adventure

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Big Book Adventure
You’ll nev­er guess
Where I have been
Or who I met
Or what I’ve seen.
Shall I tell you? A pig and a striped-tail fox each begin with that refrain, lead­ing the oth­er one through an excit­ing rev­e­la­tion of the books they’ve just read. They become a part of the sto­ry they’re telling, just as one does when one falls in love with a book.… more

When the Meteorologist Writes the Weather Books

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Sky Stirs Up Trouble: Tornadoes
It’s not often that we get to inter­view a sub­ject expert about a series of books on that expert’s area of knowl­edge. We’re pleased to talk with the author of the Bel the Weath­er Girl books, six of them, each pre­sent­ing a weath­er top­ic that kids will feel bet­ter about if they under­stand it: clouds, thun­der­storms, hail, tor­na­does, hur­ri­canes, and blizzards.… more

McDuff Moves In

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When I was young, my moth­er and I lived in a suc­ces­sion of apart­ments, none of which allowed pets. I had a fer­vent hope for a dog or a cat, an ani­mal friend to love. Every year for Christ­mas, I received a new stuffed ani­mal, usu­al­ly a dog because my moth­er didn’t care for cats. I still have those stuffed ani­mals, but I’ve nev­er had a pet. Even when we final­ly moved into a house 20 years ago, we were trav­el­ing so much that we wouldn’t have made a good home for an ani­mal.… more

Welcome to Lizard Motel

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There is a spe­cial peri­od of … child­hood, approx­i­mate­ly from five or six to eleven or twelve — between the striv­ings of ani­mal infan­cy and the storms of ado­les­cence — when the nat­ur­al world is expe­ri­enced in some high­ly evoca­tive way … It is prin­ci­pal­ly to this mid­dle age range … that writ­ers say they return in mem­o­ry in order to renew the pow­er and impulse to cre­ate.… more

Skinny Dip with Sarah Sullivan

by
Sarah Sullivan
Bookol­o­gy is delight­ed to wel­come author Sarah Sul­li­van for an Octo­ber Skin­ny Dip. Look for Sarah’s A Day for Skat­ing, illus­trat­ed by Made­line Valen­tine (Can­dlewick Press, avail­able Novem­ber 5th), a love­ly book to read out loud before you go skat­ing or to explain what skat­ing is. Sarah’s pic­ture book Pass­ing the Music Down is a much-praised sto­ry about old-time fid­dlers inspired by the lives of renowned fid­dlers Melvin Wine and Jake Krack.… more

A Cat’s Guide to the Night Sky

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A Cat's Guide to the Night Sky
A dear­ly drawn cat named Felic­i­ty — hon­or­ing Félicette, a stray cat in Paris who became the first cat in space on Octo­ber 18, 1963 — takes us on an explo­ration of stargaz­ing. As a book on obser­va­tion­al astron­o­my, it’s an  excit­ing book for kids and adults alike. Short para­graphs cov­er what to wear when stargaz­ing, where to go for max­i­mum view­ing, the clas­si­fi­ca­tion of stars, con­stel­la­tions, plan­ets, galax­ies, and short-short sto­ries behind the con­stel­la­tions of each sea­son.… more

Riding a Donkey Backwards

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Riding a Donkey Backwards
The wise fool or the foolish wise man? As the authors explain, "Nasruddin is the wisest man in the village and also the biggest fool. ... If he doesn't make you laugh, he will certainly make you think—and perhaps think sideways instead of straight ahead." Mulla Nasruddin is an ancient Persian folk character, discussed in Sufi studies, familiar throughout India, Syria, Turkey, Iran, and the Middle East.

Try Something New, Have a Blast!

by
Aimee Bissonette
A few months ago my daugh­ter, Aliza, came over after an evening out with her work friends. Aliza told us she and her friends had gone to the Min­neapo­lis Boul­der­ing Project or MBP, an indoor climb­ing gym where peo­ple climb “cir­cuits” of up to 17 feet high with­out ropes or har­ness­es. She was so excit­ed about it — they’d had a blast!… more

Celebrating Rosh Hashanah

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New Year at the Pier
The Jew­ish High Hol­i­days begin with the fes­tiv­i­ties of the New Year on Rosh Hashanah and end ten days lat­er with the obser­vance of the Day of Atone­ment, Yom Kip­pur. It’s a time of reflec­tion and a renew­al of inten­tions to do bet­ter in the com­ing year. Here are a num­ber of books that will help chil­dren under­stand the tra­di­tions of the hol­i­day and expe­ri­ence the joy of the celebration.
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Beethoven in Paradise

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Beethoven in Paradise
Fresh Lookol­o­gy fea­tures books pub­lished sev­er­al years ago that are too good to lan­guish on the shelf. Mar­tin Pittman takes a reader’s heart and runs with it. He lives in a trail­er park called Par­adise, but his home life is any­thing but. Martin’s father is abu­sive, his moth­er com­plete­ly cowed. He has no sib­lings. His grand­ma, Haze­line, who comes on Sun­days to take him to the Howard John­son Prince of Wales buf­fet, is quite a char­ac­ter — one the read­er is unsure of at first.… more

The Night the Forest Came to Town

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The Night the Forest Came to Town
A city can be all hard surfaces, concrete, brick, pavement, and glass. Adults can be preoccupied with their devices. Billboards, street lights, every kind of distraction. There's a distinct separation from nature, a disconnect.

Back-to-School Favorites

by
Thunder Rose
This list was con­tributed by Deb Andries and Mau­r­na Rome, friends, edu­ca­tors, and colleagues! Favorites from Deb Andries: Alma and How She Got her Name by Jua­na Martinez-Neal Dream­ers by Yuyi Morales A Qui­et Place by Doug Wood and Dan Andreasen The Day You Begin by Jacque­line Wood­son and Rafael López Tru­man by Jean Rei­di and Lucy Ruth Cummins Drum Dream Girl by Mar­gari­ta Engle and Rafael López How to Read a Book by Kwame Alexan­der and Melis­sa Sweet Why by Lau­ra Vac­caro Seeger Each Kind­ness by Jacque­line Wood­son and E.B. Lewis… more

My Grandma and Me

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My Grandma and Me
My Grand­ma and Me
Mina Java­herbin
illus­trat­ed by Lind­sey Yankey
Can­dlewick Press, 2019
ISBN 978−1−4263−3304−0 If you were for­tu­nate to have one or two or three lov­ing grand­moth­ers, this book will touch your heart. Grand­mas can be the most lov­ing peo­ple in our long lives, teach­ing us about life, pass­ing along tra­di­tions, shar­ing sto­ries, help­ing us become whole­some adults.… more

What is Research, Really?

by
Melissa Stewart
From an ELA point of view, “research” is some­thing you do to gath­er infor­ma­tion for a report or project. But if you’re a sci­en­tist, research has a whole dif­fer­ent mean­ing. It’s a way of devel­op­ing a new under­stand­ing of the world and how it works. Every once in a while, my hus­band and I have a con­ver­sa­tion about why two seem­ing­ly dif­fer­ent pur­suits have the same name.… more

Vera’s Story Garden

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A Chair for My Mother
Ver­a’s Sto­ry Gar­den Established 
as a Lit­er­ary Land­mark by Unit­ed for Libraries May 4, 2019 by Mary Paige Lang-Clouse, Director
Ethel­bert B. Craw­ford Pub­lic Library
Mon­ti­cel­lo NY I met Vera B. Williams in the ear­ly 2000s while work­ing at the pub­lic library in Nar­rows­burg, N.Y. It should come as no sur­prise to any­one that knew her that Vera didn’t waste any time iden­ti­fy­ing and using her local pub­lic library.… more

When Sue Found Sue

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Is there any muse­um exhib­it more fas­ci­nat­ing than Sue, the T. rex, at The Field Muse­um in  Chica­go, Illinois?  Now there’s a curios­i­ty-rais­ing, shy­ness-rec­og­niz­ing, dis­cus­sion-wor­thy book about the oth­er Sue, the woman who dis­cov­ered the T. rex dur­ing a dig in South Dako­ta. For ele­men­tary school stu­dents and your dinosaur-inspired kids in the library and at home, you can see from the cov­er that this book is irresistible.… more

When We Reach Them

by
Paul W. Hankins
We’re out of school today in obser­vance of Oaks Day here in our area. This morn­ing, Ani­ta Sil­vey, chil­dren’s lit­er­a­ture expert and resource, remind­ed us on Face­book that Pete Seeger cel­e­brates a birth­day today. 100 years. I might not have known that with­out her post. How many of us would? How many of us would have known that Ani­ta Sil­vey has writ­ten one of the best non­fic­tion looks at Seeger’s life and work?… more

Aging Down, Aging Up

by
Elizabeth Verdick
Back when my kids were lit­tle, I start­ed work on a non­fic­tion SEL (Social and Emo­tion­al Learn­ing) series called the “Best Behav­ior” series. More than a decade lat­er, these board books and paper­backs are still going strong, I’m hap­py to say. Titles in the series include Teeth Are Not for Bit­ing, Voic­es Are Not for Yelling, and Wor­ries Are Not For­ev­er.… more

Explorer Academy: The Falcon’s Feather

by
Trudi Trueit
Explor­er Acad­e­my: The Fal­con’s Feather
Tru­di Trueit
illus­trat­ed by Scott Plumbe (with a blend of photos)
Nation­al Geo­graph­ic Part­ners, 2019
ISBN 978−1−4263−3304−0 I’ve writ­ten a pri­or Read­ing Ahead essay about my love for The Neb­u­la Secret, the first book in the Explor­er Acad­e­my series. Now book two, The Fal­con’s Feath­er, con­tin­ues the sto­ry and I think it’s even more excit­ing.… more

Pairing Verse with Nonfiction

by
Roxane Orgill
Why write non­fic­tion in verse? If you do, is it still non­fic­tion? Good ques­tions in a time when gen­res are expanding. I’ve used verse in two non­fic­tion sto­ries: a pic­ture book, Jazz Day: The Mak­ing of a Famous Pho­to­graph, and a book for ages ten and up, Siege: How Wash­ing­ton Kicked the British out of Boston and Launched a Rev­o­lu­tion (Can­dlewick Press).… more

Libraries and Librarians

by
Library Lion
We’re post­ing this when it’s Nation­al Library Week, but we believe every week should be Library Week. If you love pub­lic, school, and spe­cial libraries as much as we do, add these books to your read­ing list and share them with your favorite readers. As always, if you have a book you believe should be on this list, let us know in the com­ments or send us an e‑mail.
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The Lost Forest

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The Lost Forest
How many books can you name that are about sur­vey­ing … and a mys­tery? I know. Right? And yet we see sur­vey­ors every day in fields, on busy street cor­ners, and in our neigh­bor­hoods. What are they doing? Would it sur­prise you to know that near­ly every acre of your state has been sur­veyed? That knowl­edge about those acres is record­ed on plat books and maps that peo­ple in gov­ern­ment and com­merce con­sult all the time?… more

Five Things I Learned
Writing My First Picture Book Biography

by
Sarah Aronson
You would think that being friends with Tanya Lee Stone would mean I wrote lots of non­fic­tion. But the truth is, until I decid­ed to try and write a biog­ra­phy of Rube Gold­berg, I stayed far away from this genre. As a read­er, I loved it. As a friend, I learned so much read­ing Tanya’s work — not just about the facts — but about the foun­da­tions of sto­ry­telling.… more

The Animals in The Stuff of Stars

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Stay Close to Mama
When I first read The Stuff of Stars by Mar­i­on Dane Bauer and Ekua Holmes, I was cap­ti­vat­ed by the beau­ty of the book and its lyri­cal thoughts about the earth and our envi­ron­ment. Ms. Holmes’ illus­tra­tions invite us to look clos­er, to dis­cern the crea­tures she’s so art­ful­ly includ­ed. Ms. Bauer’s text includes a list of ani­mals that roam the earth, bring­ing to mind all of the sto­ries and facts about these spe­cif­ic ani­mals, birds, insects, and reptiles.
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Bookstorm™: Just Like Rube Goldberg

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Just Like Rube Goldberg
Edu­ca­tors across the coun­try have been inspired by Rube Goldberg’s intri­cate, clever, engi­neer­ing-based, but unlike­ly-to-be-made-in-real-life car­toons. Stu­dents are gath­er­ing to cre­ate their own Rube Gold­berg machines, using every­day objects in fun and inno­v­a­tive ways to accom­plish sim­ple tasks with fun results. Just Like Rube Gold­berg inspires all its read­ers with the details about Rube’s child­hood and his trip into adult­hood.… more

The Writing Process as a Living Story

by
Melissa Stewart
In some ways, it’s too bad that the cur­ricu­lum in most schools calls for writ­ing per­son­al nar­ra­tives at the begin­ning of the school year because I think stu­dents could learn a lot by craft­ing a per­son­al nar­ra­tive about the process of research­ing, writ­ing, and revis­ing an infor­ma­tion­al writ­ing assignment. What do I mean by that? Well, late­ly, I’ve been think­ing about my non­fic­tion book-mak­ing process as a liv­ing sto­ry.… more

Make This!

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Make This!
Make This! Build­ing, Think­ing, and Tin­ker­ing Projects for the Amaz­ing Mak­er in You 
Ella Schwartz, pho­tographs by Matthew Rakola
Nation­al Geo­graph­ic Kids, 2019 When pre­sent­ed with this book, wheels start turn­ing, ideas begin pop­ping, and your tem­per­a­ture ris­es! This is going to be fun. And a care­ful­ly thought-through learn­ing expe­ri­ence … but who needs to know that? By the book’s def­i­n­i­tion, “A mak­er is some­one who tin­kers, fix­es, breaks, rebuilds, and con­structs projects for the world around them.”… more

The BEARdecotts

by
Drawn Together
The ALA/ALSC recent­ly announced their Youth Media Awards, result­ing in much excitement. The teacher librar­i­ans at a Min­neso­ta pri­vate school with three cam­pus­es help their stu­dents look for excel­lence in children’s books by hold­ing their own award process each year. Called The BEARde­cotts, after their school mas­cot, the edu­ca­tors select books for a short list that they then share with their stu­dents over sev­er­al months, read­ing aloud, read­ing indi­vid­u­al­ly, mak­ing crit­i­cal analy­ses, and final­ly vot­ing on the most wor­thy books.
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Books Are Our Emissaries

by
Stephanie Calmenson
As authors, we send our books out into the world and, if we’re lucky, they con­nect us to good peo­ple whose paths we would­n’t oth­er­wise cross. For 28 years, Din­ner at the Pan­da Palace has been my excel­lent emissary.  Din­ner at the Pan­da Palace start­ed as a sim­ple count­ing and sort­ing book with lots of ani­mals and a par­ty atmos­phere to make the learn­ing fun. … more

Poetry Books That Celebrate
African American History and Culture

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Poet­ry and the spo­ken word have promi­nent places in African Amer­i­can cul­ture, due at least in part to a strong oral tra­di­tion that has been passed down through gen­er­a­tions. Con­sid­er includ­ing poems from the books below in your read-alouds this month, and the year ahead, as a way to high­light the con­tri­bu­tions of African Amer­i­cans to our nation’s his­to­ry and cul­ture.
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Putting Emotion into Nonfiction Books

by
Carla Killough McClafferty
Many peo­ple think writ­ing non­fic­tion is just string­ing togeth­er a bunch of ran­dom facts. Noth­ing could be fur­ther from the truth. While writ­ing non­fic­tion, I use every sin­gle fic­tion tech­nique a nov­el­ist uses. I feel strong­ly that I need to write my text in a way that will lead my read­ers to invest emo­tion­al­ly with my non­fic­tion text. Real. Raw. Emo­tion. But I don’t tell read­ers what to feel.… more

Skinny Dip with Carla McClafferty

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Carla Killough McClafferty
We’re pleased to wel­come author Car­la Kil­lough McClaf­fer­ty to our Skin­ny Dip col­umn. She is known for her fine and care­ful­ly researched non­fic­tion books, such as The Many Faces of George Wash­ing­ton: Remak­ing a Pres­i­den­tial Icon; Some­thing Out of Noth­ing: Marie Curie and Radi­um; Fourth Down and Inch­es: Con­cus­sions and Foot­bal­l’s Make-or-Break Moment and her most recent Buried Lives: The Enslaved Peo­ple of George Wash­ing­ton’s Mount Ver­non.… more