For some more project-y stuff.

The Boy who was Raised by Librarians, by Carla Morris; illus. by Brad Sneed. What a beautiful book! I could read it every day (and have since I checked it out from the library). I'll probably be doing a review on this for next month's SLISsard line, so I won't go on at length about it now. I love the art, and how the librarians and the library are portrayed-- not staid and gray, but colorful and with individual personalities. A must have for every library!

Dear America: Survival in the Storm: The Dust Bowl Diary of Grace Edwards: Dalhart, Texas, 1935, by Katelan Janke. Nothing should have a title this long, and we all know it. Other than that, I have few negative comments. The character's writing wasn't very realistic-- this is a diary of a farm girl from Texas during the Great Depression (in case you missed it in the title), so I think a little dialect, possibly a few fragments, wouldn't be out of order.

Island: Book Two: Survival and Island: Book Three: Escape, by Gordon Korman. These should all really be one book. Paradise, by Joan Elizabeth Goodman. I would like to see a book by or about a girl, aged 13-54, that isn't about sex.

Survival Themes in Fiction for Children and Young People, 2nd Edition, by Binnie Tate Wilkin. This is nonfiction, in that it is a pathfinder thingy. This is fiction, in that it isn't about Survival Themes at all. Furthermore, it is fiction in that, contrary to what it pretends to be, this isn't really a scholarly work.

Teetoncey, by Teodore Taylor. I have no strong feelings one way or the other. There were some elements of the story that seem to make no sense or have no purpose, so they were weird and unneeded.

Shipwrecked!: The True Adventures of a Japanese Boy, by Rhoda Blumberg. An excellent nonfiction book, with loads of information, an appropriate number of quality illustrative material, and on an interesting topic.

Williwaw!, by Tom Bodett. Probably my favorite book in this set of reviewies.

Monsoon, by Uma Krishnaswami; illus. by Jamel Akib. This may be my favorite picture book in quite some time, excluding

The Boy Who Was Raised by Librarians. The text is free verse, and much better than alot of so-called poetry floating around today. The language is expressive but sounds very natural; it captures a myriad of emotions, and sounds lovely, but isn't false. The illustrations are gorgeous and bright.