Ten Titles on Tuesday: 6/8/21

Some changes, some links, some random thoughts (and a GIF, because I can)

Programming note! 🗒 Starting next week, Ten Titles on Tuesday will be changing name and format — transforming into Notes from the Reading Nook.

You’ll still receive it on Tuesday mornings, and it will include the following sections, or a combination thereof:

• Ten titles that are on my radar/library holds list — books that have my attention but that I haven’t actually read yet (exactly what you already get)

• Links of possible interest

• Topical mini booklists as occasions arise (e.g., April 13, May 4, May 21)

• Reader questions (That’s you — send ‘em my way anytime!)

• Other niblets I haven’t thought of yet

This is — as everything with this newsletter — an experiment. I’m changing up things on Tuesday to be clearer about what you’re getting, and make more room for me to vary and improve what I offer. (This iteration was based on your feedback! If you have further thoughts, feelings, ideas about this change or anything else, your comments are always welcome — just hit reply.)

This has nothing to do with anything, I just love Clarissa (forever)

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This week’s Ten Titles, never in any particular order:

1. Chavela and the Magic Bubble by Monica Brown

2. The Secret Footprints by Julia Alvarez

3. Under the Lemon Moon by Edith Hope Fine

4. How the Ox Star Fell From Heaven by Lily Toy Hong

5. The Stars Beckoned: Edward White's Amazing Walk in Space by Candy Wellins

6. Astronaut Training by Aneta Cruz

7. Goodnight, Astronaut by Scott Kelly

8. Moonstruck! Poems About Our Moon edited by Roger Stevens

9. George’s Secret Key to the Universe by Lucy and Stephen Hawking (this is a space adventure series apparently chock-full of real science, from the Hawkings, no less — I am intrigued and pretty sure I’m going to order them all on cd for my kids)

10. The Griffins of Cary Castle by Heather Shumaker

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An interesting note for those of you who live down here in the weeds of the world of children’s books along with me: two days ago We Need Diverse Books announced they will no longer be using the term #ownvoices, and will instead use the specific descriptions that authors use for themselves. If you want to read their press release — along with their reasons for the change, which are valid (marketing ruins everything, and I work in marketing, so I should know) — you may do so on their website.

Now for a booklist! I love a good booklist more than sugar or alcohol or even an extra hour of sleep (the extra hour is the only thing that means anything to me on that short list)… Rebekah Gienapp’s 15 children’s books about beauty that challenge stereotypes, via her blog Nurturing Brave Kids Who Seek Justice, is one I dove into headfirst. It’s a powerful list full of titles we know and love — The Proudest Blue: A Story of Hijab and Family by Ibtijah Muhammad; Not Quite Snow White by Ashley Franklin (I reviewed this in issue No. 21); Sulwe by Lupita Nyong’o (issue No. 23); and Glory: Magical Visions of Black Beauty by Kahran and Regis Bethencourt (issue No. 24) — as well as ones I’ve never heard of and have already put on hold (Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Black Boy by Tony Medina and Love Your Body by Jessica Sanders).

I think the thing I like most about writing about children’s books — not to mention reading them with my kids — is that I don’t know about all of them, can never know about all of them, and they just keep coming. To think less than 600 years ago, the overwhelming majority of people weren’t able to own a single book in their lifetime, even a Bible (and forget books for kids for ages beyond that) and now here we are, with so many books in the world there aren’t enough years in a life to read them all. (Thank you Gutenberg!) I, for one, feel lucky.

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Read good books and take good care 😘
Sarah
@can_we_read