Each Kid = Different Tastes in Books. Here's How to Cope.

It's easy to forget about reading during the summer and fall. It's beautiful out. There's cross country and soccer. In the summer, we live at the pool and run around outside as much as possible.

You read at bedtime, mostly, or when you're waiting for something else to begin.

And then the days start getting shorter. The gorgeous leaves drop and...and... the pool closes. Books become more appealing. But if your child has "read everything already" and has different tastes from his older brothers and sisters, you may find yourself at a loss. Rather than list books here, though, I'll show you some places to look for endless suggestions. 

Scholastic, of course... it's a site not just for teachers, and not just for ordering books. Scholastic will suggest books by age and to an extent by your child's interest. If your girl is a Big Nate fan, or a Harry Potter fan, there are similar novels out there. You can order directly from Scholastic or try another series at the library, and if your child falls in love, well- you're all set for Christmas!

Amazon.com I know, it's not rocket science. But did you know that Amazon will suggest books by age, genre, and has a listing of children's books that were National Book Award finalists? That Amazon link will take you directly to the children's recommendation page. You can look by age, by season (down farther on the page), or by award winners. Remember, Caldecott is for picture books (usually read aloud to a child), and the Newbery is for juvenile and children's books, more from fourth grade through junior high.

I found it really tricky to find Amazon's list of related children's books, created by a feature they call "Listmania". It's as if there's this secret, hidden feature that you have to know exists. It lurks, it lingers, you think you have it...and then... Nope. You're on some Kindle thing and or ordering some garden implement you don't need.

Back to the home page. But fear not. It's not easy - I spent 13 whole minutes with Amazon.com's wonderful help people but we found it.

 http://www.amazon.com/gp/richpub/listmania/byauthor/A20SJ6TILO1N26/ref=pd_ys_sf_lf_lm

Catchy, isn't it? Ok. It's not that bad. First,  go to the home page of www.Amazon.com, and sign in.  Then click on Your Recommendations, at the upper right. Then go waaaay down to the bottom right, and you'll see a column that says Your Participation: 

Your Participation

• Your Profile
• Your Reviews
• Your Listmania Lists
• Your So You'd Like To Guides
• Items You've Tagged
• Your Images

Click on "Your Listmania Lists" But wait! you say. I have not made any lists yet.  Yes. And you'll be reminded of that. But meanwhile, you can search in the little box next to the word LISTMANIA for any topic that your child might currently be obsessing on, such as dinosaurs or trucks. And most likely, a parent out there has made a list of child-friendly books on this topic. This was a wonderful resource when my nephew was fascinated by trains.

Goodreads.com You need to make an account for this, but it's free. I review books I have read, and connect with friends to learn what they're reading, but for now I posted a request for recommendations for my nine year old nephew. I am always looking for new books for boys, in particular. There's a link there for "Ask for Recommendations", and you are given space to describe exactly what type of book you are looking for. Here's what I put: 

Amy Lesemann wants to read: I need books for my nine year old nephew. He loved the Genius files, by Dan Gutman, and is working his way through the Baseball card series. Despite this - he usually prefers realistic fiction (I know, I know- baseball card = fantasy. So he's not consistent!) :) Amy

Goodreads, like Amazon, has a "listopia" feature that is fun for us adults to browse, as well. There are all manner of lists, goofy and serious. Goodreads features what it considers to be its best, or at least, most interesting lists:

 

Best Books About Creepy Crawlies Hmmm. Quite a range here! I'm not actually sure what audience this list maker was aiming for - except maybe for the "best list" list.

Great Dystopian Novels (YA)

...always good for that moody middle schooler/early teen in your life....

Books That Should Be Made Into Movies

...and then there's the list of Books That Were Better Than The Movies. As in, All Of Them.

Scholastic, though, is also useful for online and hard copy activities for teachers and homeschoolers. If you're interested in doing a little research with your child about what the voyage over was REALLY like for the Pilgrims, or what the clothing looked like, visit the Scholastic Thanksgiving website over the next month or so. There are slide shows, videos, letters to and from settlers.... an amazing amount of material to look at, watch, and interact with. 

So - start now to help your child find books he or she will love, not just tolerate. Teachers, homeschoolers, and parent, there's a lot to learn about on the Scholastic Thanksgiving site. And it's fun, too. 

And learning + fun is the best possible combination.

   Thanksgiving at the Plimouth Plantation....

"Alice" and "Shiloh" author and Newbery Award winner at Literati Bookstore!

I had a thrill that I immediately shared with everyone I could reach, including my 19 year old daughter – Phyllis Reynolds Naylor was coming to Ann Arbor’s Literati Bookstore this past Saturday! Oh, joy! Ecstasy! If the name doesn’t come to mind, she wrote several series of books; the oldest, Shiloh¸ was set in West Virginia, and featured a young beagle and a strong-minded boy, versus the dog’s owner, a hard drinking man living on his own in the mountains.

It would be easy to just hate the man, and love the dog and the boy. But being Naylor, she doesn’t make it that easy. You want the boy to just take the dog and run, but that’s not that easy, either. The boy’s father forces him to confront issues of differing attitudes in the country towards pet ownership (is it a pet, or livestock –with a mission as a hunting dog?). What rights does this man have, as the owner? But then, what rights does the dog have, to food and shelter, and freedom from fear? Naylor wrote about these issues, in the context of poverty and isolation in the mountains of West Virginia, with a straightforward approach that earned her the Newbery Award in 1992.

Naylor writes several series, including The Boys Against the Girls,  the Witch saga, the Bernie Magruder series (The Besseldorf Mysteries), and perhaps her most famous series, the just completed Alice books. Her books are often funny enough to make you laugh aloud and draw somewhat curious stares; like the best young adult and children's literature, they're just good books, and adults enjoy them as much as kids do. The final Alice book, entitled, Now I’ll Tell You Everything, covers Alice's college years, with appropriately adult topics. The only issue is that sometimes the fourth grader who loved Alice in Blunderland may also want to read the book about Alice in college - and this may pose a problem for her parents. It's simply not appropriate, featuring such issues as an attempted date rape. This is a good topic to discuss with middle school students and up, but even with-it Ann Arborite parents may shrink from discussing what exactly is going on in some of the well-written descriptions of what very nearly goes horribly awry for one of the characters. 

 Naylor’s current book tour brought her to Ann Arbor this past Saturday, and she discussed how she had intended for the first Alice novel to be a single book. 

“And then the letters started pouring in,” she said. “And the reviewers said they couldn’t wait to see what happened next.” She decided she would be willing to write a series – provided she would only need to write one a year. “I did not want to be stuck writing a sit-com,” she said. But initially, being consistent with the details was not as easy as it seemed.

“You might notice in the first few books, that Alice has three different birthdates – all in May,” she observed. So the publisher finally hired a researcher/writer to create an “Alice encyclopedia”, which both she and the Alice fact checker/editor could use to insure that all the books were consistent. Does Elizabeth, in fact, have pierced ears? What’s the name of Pamela’s parents? “I used it all the time,” Naylor confessed.

Naylor also observed that the Alice books pop up on the yearly “Most Banned Books in America” lists. “And every time I finished a book, I would stop and think, now what on EARTH could they possibly object to in THIS one? And I never could figure it out,” she said. “But one condition I insisted on with my publishers was that Alice be allowed to grow up, and change from book to book, and so the girls do talk about things that girls talk about, like sexuality and boys. And in one book the girls talk about losing their virginity. So that did get me in trouble.”

There was a low laugh from the audience. And then a little voice piped up from the back of the room. “What’s ‘virginity’?” said a young girl.

And there was a much bigger laugh.

In trouble again, Mrs. Naylor.