Booklist Online: More than 130,000 book reviews for librarians, book groups, and book lovers - from the trusted experts at the American Library Association

Cindy: Francesca Lia Block writing for middle grade readers about doll houses? Really? But it makes sense, doesn’t it? The maven of magical realism, high fashion, and love is the perfect author for this story that also peeks into the world of how we treat each other. The House of Dolls (Harper, 2010) features Madison [...]

Lynn: You just cannot go wrong with pictures of baby animals but this charming book is something special. “Who’s the cutest critter in the land, ” asks the rhyming text of this beautifully designed new book. Each two-page spread in The Cutest Critter (Adventure 2010) features a single line of text opposite a full page [...]

Lynn and Cindy: We always love attending the ALA conference but this year we are totally geeked! We are signed up for an ALSC Preconference that sounds terrific. Do you love picture books? Look at this: Drawn to Delight: How Picture Books Work (and Play) Today. Learn to look below the surface. Explore technique and [...]

Lynn: This is just waaay too much fun! Here is my promised poem – an Ode to Basketball in honor of the upcoming Sweet Sixteen. My Purdue Boilermakers survived two rounds but have to play Duke Friday. Gulp.

Lynn: “I love dogs,” says the unseen narrator and so will every reader by the end of this humorous look at our canine friends. In Dogs (S&S, 2010) Gravett uses a warm palette with perfectly placed splashes of color on a creamy background, depicting dogs of all sizes and shapes. Big dogs and small dogs, [...]

Lynn: Tell a teenager that you grew up in a house that for years had one TV and one radio and they will look at you as if you have tree roots growing out of your nose. Mark Stamaty tells it like it really was and this bright musical memoir really struck a chord with [...]

Cindy: We try not to tease our readers with blog posts about books that won’t pub for months, but sometimes we get our hands on some real gems very early and want to alert you to watch for them. We’ll be posting longer reviews and comments about these books closer to publication, but here’s a [...]

Cindy: Over at 100 Scope Notes Travis is building a gallery of book spine poems. I was fascinated by this idea and had to try it out. Since this is Women’s History Month I decided to build on that and my love of storytelling. Here’s my found poem, “Every Girl Tells a Story.” Read down [...]

Lynn: Fifteen-year-old Penelope Lumley, recent graduate of the Swanburne Academy for Poor Bright Females, arrives at Ashton Place for her first interview. She is responding to an ad for an “energetic governess for three lively children… experience with animals strongly preferred.” In The Incorrigible Children of Ashton Place (Harper/Balzer + Bray 2010) something seems odd [...]

Lynn: If Spies of Mississippi (National Geographic, 2010) were a TV plot, we’d be shaking our heads and talking about how improbable it was. In fact I found I had the theme of the old series Dragnet running through my head as I read this. But this is real. It is actual history: jaw-dropping, unbelievably [...]