Join the Butler Children’s Literature Center at the Annual Book Sale for shopping and expert recommendations just in time for the holiday gift-giving season.
Proceeds from the sale go to support the programs, scholarships, and operations of the donation-funded Center.
Questions? Contact BCLC Curator Jen Clemons at jclemons@dom.edu
The Butler Children’s Literature Center is excited to announce a new Wednesday feature of our Effie Lee Morris Collection of African American Books. The original literature collection was bequeathed to us in 2012 by librarian and children’s services advocate Effie Lee Morris, and the Butler Center has continued to grow it each year.
Comprised of both contemporary and historical works, the Morris collection includes a variety of genres published over the course of the last century, including works from award-winning authors such as Walter Dean Myers’ Hoops (Delacorte Press, 1981) as well as newer standout authors like Kacen Callender’s King and the Dragonflies (Scholastic Press, 2020). The collection also contains older and possibly lesser-known titles like John Shearer’s I Wish I Had an Afro (Cowles Book Company, 1970) and works from acclaimed illustrators like Brian Pinkney and Faith Ringgold. As a non-circulating collection, the titles are available for public use in the Butler Children’s Literature Center, Rebecca Crown Library Room 214.
Read and learn more about Effie Lee Morris here, including a digital archive with interviews and their full transcripts.
Today’s Butler Bookshelf is focused on nonfiction books! This week on the Butler Bookshelf you will find My Incredible India by Jasbinder Bilan. Bilan tells the story of a young girl, Thara, and her grandmother, Nanijee. On Friday nights, Thara sleeps over at Nanijee’s house in an inviting bedroom carefully decorated for Thara. In her bedroom, Nanijee stores a beautiful wooden trunk with objects from her travels around India. Each Friday, Nanijee removes an object from the trunk and narrates the story about the uniqueness of the object. Thara falls asleep and dreams of the Nanijee’s stories of growing up in India. The book includes a map of India, a timeline of India’s history, and websites for additional information.
For more amazing titles, check out the list below!
Masked Hero: How Wu Lien-teh Invented the Mask That Ended an Epidemic
Written by Dr. Shan Woo Liu and Illustrated by Lisa Wee
Published by MIT Kids Press
Available now!
My Incredible India
Written by Jasbinder Bilan and Illustrated by Nina Chakrabarti
Published by Candlewick Press
Available now!
No World Too Big
Edited by Lindsey Metcalf and Illustrated by Jeanette Bradley
Published by Charlesbridge
Available now!
Stand Up and Speak Up Against Racism
Written by Yassmin Abdel-Magied and Illustrated by Aleesha Nandhra
Published by Walker Books
Available now!
Writing in Color: Fourteen Writers on The Lessons We’ve Learned
Edited by Nafiza Azad and Melody Simpson
Published by Margaret K. McElderry Books
Available now!
How to Love: A Guide to Feelings & Relationships for Everyone
Written and illustrated by Alex Norris
Walker Books
Ages 13+
Available November 14th, 2023!
Sprouting from Norris’ originally popular webcomic on love advice, How to Love: A Guide to Feelings & Relationships for Everyone‘s conspicuous bright pink cover and unspoken promise of mastering love is an honest, funny, and freeing take on relationships. Unlike the title suggests, this “guidebook” ends up asking more thoughtful questions than giving answers, with chapter titles such as “What if I like being single?” or “Can I be friends with my ex?” that prompt self-reflection and challenge many relationship stereotypes. Norris emphasizes the joys of relationships built upon acceptance and self-love, but they also do not shy away from awkward, embarrassing, or hurtful realities that often meet readers with a warm yet blunt tone of advice like, “there will be times when you feel hurt, but these are the times it is most important to be kind to yourself” (p. 91-92). This book’s candid and accepting nature will easily welcome teenagers into the vulnerable, emotional space of love and relationships.
Each chapter is a short cotton candy-colored comic, and readers can either skip around to topics of interest or read it in its entirety. Norris thoughtfully contrasts the images and text—the simple, clean graphics and vivid colors balance the complexity of romantic feelings, and the humorous graphics often offset the sensitivity and sadness that can accompany relationships. Through these inclusive graphics and text that center self-love, friendship, communication, and connection, Norris masterfully celebrates the journey of love rather than the goal of a relationship.
With colder weather quickly approaching and the sun setting a little earlier, this week’s Butler Bookshelf features books in our collection that celebrate nighttime beauty, the beginning of the colder seasons, and other weather-related stories. Joe is one such character that is fascinated by the night, so much so that he wants to find a way to travel to the stars. While Joe’s friends tell him it’s impossible, his father quickly becomes his fervent copilot as they try everything they can think of to reach the stars. When their towers, rockets, ladders, and trampolines don’t work, Joe’s dad just might have an idea that will let Joe be amongst the stars. Check out A Way to the Stars by David Almond for a tender story of a father and son appreciating the world around them, along with other stories in our collection below!
Cosmic Wonder: Halley’s Comet and Humankind
Written and Illustrated by Ashley Benham-Yazdani
Published by Candlewick Press
Available now!
Gather
Written by Kenneth M. Cadow
Published by Candlewick Press
Available now!
Thank You, Moon: Celebrating Nature’s Nightlight
Written by Melissa Stewart and Illustrated by Jessica Lanan
Published by Alfred A. Knopf
Available now!
Wacky Weather: All About Odd Weather Events
Written by Todd Tarpley and Illustrated by Aristides Ruiz and Alan Batson
Published by Random House Children’s Books
Available now!
A Way to the Stars
Written by David Almond and Illustrated by Gill Smith
Published by Candlewick Press
Available now!
Winter: A Solstice Story
Written by Kelsey E. Gross and Illustrated by Renata Liwska
Published by Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers and Paula Wiseman Books
Available now!
Santiago Saw Things Differently: Santiago Ramon y Cajal, Artist, Doctor, Father of Neuroscience
Christine Iverson
Illustrated by Luciano Lozano
Candlewick Press
November 14, 2023
Ages 5-9
Immerse yourself in the illuminating story of the multitalented Nobel Prize winner Santiago Cajal—the little known founder of neuroscience. Santiago discovered at the age of eight that he loved to draw using charcoal or chalk, especially on gates, doors, and blank walls in the neighborhood. The neighbors felt that the drawings were an annoyance, “but Santiago saw things differently. He was an artist and always would be” (p. 8). Santiago’s father wanted him to be a doctor, but he continued to draw and paint in secret. Santiago and his father stumbled upon human bones in an old graveyard, and he was hooked on human anatomy. “He saw the human body as a work of art” (p. 20). Santiago attended medical school and invented a way to study nerve cells more clearly under a microscope. Through his nervous system work and scientific drawings of nerve cells, he helped doctors learn about the human nervous system, enabling more people to survive and heal from disease.
Pages in this nonfiction picture book are enriched with a combination of digital illustrations and Santiago’s actual detailed scientific drawings of neural pathways. Muted blues, oranges, browns, and greens illustrate a curious young boy and later the man whose curiosity leads to his brilliant discoveries. Illustrations are positioned on sepia-toned pages giving the story an appropriate old-world feel for the backdrop of 1800’s Spain. Iverson’s bold text evokes Santiago’s pioneering spirit, passion, and perseverance. Educators and librarians may choose to share this book with children who enjoy biographies, science, and art and the themes of persistence, determination, and ambitious dreams. The afterword includes a description of the anatomy of a neuron, a self-portrait, and further reading on the personal and professional life of the “Father of Neuroscience.” Santiago Saw Things Differently shines a light on a scientist who deserves more recognition for his remarkable accomplishments.
The theme for this week’s Butler Bookshelf is spooky Halloween stories, featuring Monstrous by Jessica Lewis. Lewis tells the haunting tale of 17 year-old Latavia Johnson who is living with her grandmother in Sanctum, Alabama for six weeks before heading to college. Sanctum is a strange town with even stranger residents who treat Latavia as an outsider. One night, Latavia is yanked out of her home into the Red Wood, a forbidden forest on the outskirts of town, and is given up as a human sacrifice to a bygone monster. Latavia will do whatever it takes to survive including becoming a monster herself. For more amazing titles, check out the list below!
Camp Sylvania
Written by Julie Murphy
Published by Harper Collins
Available now!
Ham Helsing: Raising the Stakes
Written by Rich Moyer
Published by Penguin Random House
Available now!
Hatchet Girls
Written by Diana Rodriguez Wallach
Published by Delacorte Press
Available now!
Misfit Mansion
Written by Kay Davault
Published by Simon & Schuster
Available now!
Monstrous
Written by Jessica Lewis
Published by Delacorte Press
Available now!
The October Witches
Written by Jennifer Claessen
Published by Simon & Schuster
Available now!
The Dubious Pranks of Shaindy Goodman
By Mari Lowe
Levine Querdio
Published November 7, 2023
Age 10-14
Awkward and excluded, 12-year-old Shaindy Goodman just wants to fit in with the girls at Bais Yaakov Middle School. When she’s invited by Gayil, the queen bee next door, to help with a series of pranks, she shrugs off her misgivings in favor of acceptance. Helping out with some harmless jokes, even if it means breaking into school, may be her chance to find friendship. Shaindy quickly realizes the pranks are more mean-spirited than high-spirited, and that only certain classmates are being targeted. Naïve to Gayil’s manipulation, she feels guilty but hopes for the best until the mischief and hard feelings are all pinned on her. As she finally understands Gayil’s acts of revenge for an unintended slight, she lets go of her own anger for lessons of penance, forgiveness, and taking responsibility for her actions.
Lowe uses the period of the Jewish High Holidays of Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, as well as their lessons, as a frame for this middle grade drama of judgement and atonement. She crafts a well-rounded and sympathetic character in Shaindy, expressing a universal need for friendship and belonging, and the way tweens and teens often make poor decisions in search of them. The plot and pace of the title move quickly through the season, mirroring the way bad choices can often lead to snowballing consequences. Moments of lightness, Shaindy’s struggle with roller blades, and final closeness with her sister help temper more serious content and lead to a satisfying conclusion. In the penultimate scene, a classroom of girls offers each other silent acknowledgment of wrongs and forgiveness for them. The wise words of a teacher, “The hardest thing many of you will do in your lives… is admit you were wrong,” (p 155) is a life lesson for those of all ages and religious backgrounds.
To prepare us for spooky season, we are highlighting thrillers, mysteries, books about magic, and of course scary stories in this week’s Butler Bookshelf. In There’s No Way I’d Die First, Noelle, a high-school horror movie buff and aspiring influencer, decides to host an elite Halloween party. However, when the clown she hired for the party starts killing off her party guests, Noelle and her classmates suddenly become characters in a real-life slasher movie. Noelle may know everything about scary movies, but will she make it out of this horror house alive? Find out in Springer’s debut novel.
For more stories that will get you in the mood for Halloween, check out the following titles in our collection!
Curious Tides (The Drowned Gods Duology)
Written by Pascale Lacelle
Published by Margaret K. McElderry Books
Available now!
Hollowthorn: A Ravenfall Novel
Written by Kalyn Josephson
Published by Delacorte Press
Available now!
Midnight at the Houdini
Written by Delilah S. Dawson
Published by Delacorte Press
Available now!
Nightmare King
Written by Daka Hermon
Published by Scholastic Press
Available now!
There’s No Way I’d Die First
Written by Lisa Springer
Published by Delacorte Press
Available now!
The Voice Upstairs
Written by Laura E. Weymouth
Published by Margaret K. McElderry Books
Available now!
Ruptured
Joanne Rossmassler Fritz
Holiday House
Age 9-14
Available November 14th, 2023!
Thirteen-year-old Claire has noticed the tension between her parents for years, so she plans to find solace in reading on their annual summer vacation in coastal Maine. However, when her mom suddenly has a brain aneurysm after sharing a personal secret, Claire is thrust into an unexpected journey of grief and worry. The novel is written in verse, which softens the shock of Claire’s experience and invites readers to cope alongside Claire with lines such as “Is it wrong to grieve for someone who is still alive?” (p. 120) and “not every rupture leads to death” (p. 67). With the help of her aunt who introduces her to photography, a new friend whose mom also had a brain aneurysm, and her desire to have more honest relationships with her dad and friends, Claire starts to heal from the complex waves of trauma and fear.
Fritz uses the calming, flowing, and healing nature of water to contrast the intense experiences Claire faces, comparing relief to a tide and whispers to sea spray. The smooth, free verse form flows quickly, but the short lines, stanzas, and chapters allow for necessary pauses and adds maturity to the prose. Pulling from her own experience surviving two ruptured aneurysms, described in the author’s note, Fritz uses Claire’s curiosity to incorporate information on brain aneurysms—even weaving in facts on health disparities and recovery rates. This novel pairs heavy topics with accessible language, calling to the middle-grade readers that need hope in moments they are forced to grow up too fast.
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