Mock Newbery 2020 - Final Voting List

So we're voting tonight. My first choice is at the top.


This Promise of Change: One Girl’s Story in the Fight for School Equality by Jo Ann Allen Boyce
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Holy shit.

Some gut punches here.

Delivered in verse that is truly poetic.

Interspersed with media coverage from the time.

Damn.

p. 89: "All those cups of sugar. / All those cakes and pies / Mrs. Smith baked with those borrowed cups. / How did they bear to swallow them? / How do I bear / to swallow this?"

p. 124: "The news is something / that happens / to other people / in other places. / Until it happens to you."

p. 168: "It's the little things that help. ... It's the little things that hurt."

p. 192: "It's the big things that grow from the little things."



Genesis Begins Again by Alicia D. Williams
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Gen broke my heart. The racism within her family and classmates - and within herself - was, quite frankly, shocking to me. The brown bag test and the bleach elicited out-loud reactions. Powerful stuff.





The Line Tender by Kate Allen
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

One of our strongest Mock Newbery contenders so far. Although I stopped reading for a while after an unexpected tragedy struck and traumatized me. Mr. Patterson was a fantastic character. The postcards were lovely. Would probably recommend for middle school v. elementary.

p. 84: "I love that you can just throw around 'uterus.' You are highly evolved."



Sweeping Up the Heart by Kevin Henkes
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Beautifully written. We are completely in Amelia's head for a week.

p. 11: "She was moving quickly because she was eager to work, but more to the point she was reinventing her walk, trying to make it faster and more graceful. Purposeful. Her legs had grown so much lately that she felt out of sync, as if her body belonged to someone or something else. And she'd recently decided that she hated her knees."


Dear Sweet Pea by Julie Murphy
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Charming with a sweet resolution. Although I never got over Sweet Pea hiding her dad's mail.

p. 10: "And because he's a true best friend, he even slams my bedroom door for me because my hands are full."

p. 34: "Heck, when I fed Miss Dillon's cat for a week when she went on a cruise, she told me she'd pay me too. She just didn't say it would be in seashells she'd found on the beach and painted herself. When one of them started stinking up my room, Dad found a dead snail inside. Mom said it was a good lesson in doing nice things without expecting anything in return. I thought it was a good lesson in why you should check your seashells for living creatures before taking them home."

p. 53: "He laid claim to Greg on his first day. Oscar says it's like he peed on him to mark his territory."

p. 240: "We all love each other, but it's like on those shows about doctors where they need a certain kind of blood for a patient, but all they have is the wrong kind. This is what that feels like. We have plenty of love. It's just not the right kind."

p. 255: "Sometimes it's easy to forget that quiet moments mean just as much as the loud ones, because it's no always about moving. Sometimes it's about sitting perfectly and quietly still."



The Bridge Home by Padma Venkatraman
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Liked it more than I thought I would. I feel like I need a shelf of child-laborer books to hand to my students when they complain about having to do anything.





Caterpillar Summer by Gillian McDunn
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

Kind of generic. And I know I'm supposed to be more sympathetic to Chicken, but my lord he was annoying.






The Mighty Heart of Sunny St. James by Ashley Herring Blake
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

While collecting Mock Newbery reviews to paste into a blog post, I realized that I evidently never wrote anything about this one. So ... not my favorite.






Pay Attention, Carter Jones by Gary D. Schmidt
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I very much welcomed the return to the breezy narration style of The Wednesday Wars. But ... I was disappointed in the rest. Also, too much cricket.

Wait, let me review the pages in which I stuck bits of paper ..

- Heartily agree with the disgust re: 1% milk
- Laughed at the possible "serial killer" identity of the Butler
- "Evocative connotations" get a plus
- Liked the point made about Loyalists
- Dying to know the relationship of Principal Swieteck to our protagonists of yore
- The Eggplant was a nice touch

Ok, moving up from a 2 to a 3.



Queen of the Sea by Dylan Meconis
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

I was so excited by the idea of the book, but it was rather boring. Extra star because I appreciate the work that went into it.






Butterfly Yellow by Thanhha Lai
My rating: 1 of 5 stars

Hated it. Which was so disappointing. I loved Lai's previous books. Enough people liked it at the last Mock Newbery meeting, though, that I forced myself to finish it. The Kindle said it would take 2 hours. I dragged it out over 2 weeks. Everyone was annoying and the trauma flashbacks were exceedingly traumatic. I am now convinced every itch is a worm.