When I was in elementary school, my very favorite thing was book orders. Remember those? I used to pore over them, deciding which books I wanted (pretty much all of them), what our family budget would allow me to get (I have six siblings, at least three of which had book orders at the same time) and wondering whether what I ultimately got would last long enough to get me to the next month (pretty much never). When I went to junior high I assumed I had left book orders behind forever.
That is until last month. My sister-in-law, who may be my only relative with a comparable book addiction to my own, works at a day care and thus qualifies as a teacher. Meaning SHE HAS ACCESS TO BOOK ORDERS. And with that, she became my newest ally in increasing the size of my library. Because they get benefits for ordering books, it even counts as a good deed! It's for the children! I am (so far) managing to keep my purchases to reasonable amounts, but more disposable income + book order discounts = lots more books for me!
And thus my newest acquisition, the 2013 Newbery winner. The Newbery Medal has been awarded to "the most distinguished contribution to American literature for children" since 1922. Of those 94 titles, I have read 19, all of which I have thoroughly enjoyed, with one exception: Beverly Cleary's "Dear Mr. Henshaw". (Don't start with me. I love her. She's brilliant. That is not her best work. It's not even the best of the nominated titles that year, which in my opinion is "A Solitary Blue" by Cynthia Voigt. But that aside, she only won the award once, and it was not for the far superior "The Mouse and the Motorcycle", "Emily's Runaway Imagination" or one of the Ramona books. I'm annoyed by it. Clearly.)
Fortunately, I have no such feelings about Katherine Applegate. "The One and Only Ivan" is lovely. Profound, thoughtful and moving, with an interesting premise. Read it.
Author: Katherine Applegate
Potentially objectionable content: Animal neglect
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