Coretta Scott King Awards 2006 The American Library Association (ALA) Midwinter Meeting in San Diego announced the winners of the Coretta Scott King Award in January. The Coretta Scott King Award is presented annually by the Coretta Scott King Task Force of the American Library Association's Social Responsibilities Round Table. Recipients are authors and illustrators of African descent whose distinguished books promote an understanding and appreciation of the "American Dream." The Award commemorates the life and work of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., and honors his widow, Coretta Scott King, for her courage and determination in continuing the work for peace and world brotherhood. Winners of the Coretta Scott King Award receive a framed citation, an honorarium, and a set of Encyclopaedia Britannica or World Book Encyclopedias. Both the winning and honored books are reviewed below. Author Award Winner Day of Tears: A Novel in Dialogue Julius Lester    During two rainy days in early March, 1859, the largest auction of slaves in America was held in Savannah, Georgia. Pierce Butler, a grandson of a signer of the Declaration of Independence and the former husband of English actress and abolitionist Fanny Kremble, sold more than 400 slaves to pay his gambling debts. Against the backdrop of the so-called "Weeping Time," award-winning author Julius Lester has woven different first-person voices--told in flashback and flash forward scenes--into a moving, generational tale. The main story line is that of Emma, the slave girl who takes care of Butler's children until he breaks a promise and sells her at the auction. Neither quite poetry nor a play, the book gives the voices of each character life and brings the reader closer to understanding, on an individual basis, the legacy of slavery and its impact on whites and blacks alike. The author is the Newbery Honor Book award winner for To Be a Slave. 2005, Jump at the Sun/Hyperion, $15.99. Ages 9 to 13. Reviewer: Valerie O. Patterson (Children's Literature). Best Books: Booklist Book Review Stars , Feb. 1, 2005; United States Kirkus Book Review Stars, March 1, 2005; United States Middle and Junior High School Library Catalog, Ninth Edition, 2005; H.W. Wilson; United States Publishers Weekly Book Review Stars, May 16, 2005; Cahners; United States School Library Journal Book Review Stars, March 2005; Cahners; United States Top 10 Historical Fiction for Youth, 2005; Booklist; United States ISBN: 0-7868-0490-4 Honor Books Maritcha: A Nineteenth-Century American Girl Tonya Bolden    Several years ago, the eighty-one-page memoir of Maritcha Lyons was brought to the attention of the author while she was researching another project at the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture. Both the author and her subject had grown up in Manhattan, although Maritcha was born in 1848 so her experiences growing up as a black girl in a predominantly white society were often shadowed by racism and denial. The author immediately felt a kinship with the girl and decided to write about this child, a freeborn black, who proudly stood up to those denials. Maritcha's father had urged her to write a book and that resulted in her reflecting upon her family history and writing the memoir. Unfortunately, she never kept a diary as a girl, so some of her childhood experiences, as presented in this book, are educated assumptions about how a child would live in that environment in those years. However, there are also many facts about her impressive family and the history of the area. Photographs and drawings add to the story of a young woman who knew the barriers placed in her way were meant to be removed. 2005, Harry N Abrams, $17.95. Ages 8 up. Reviewer: Carolyn Mott Ford (Children's Literature). Best Books: Booklist Book Review Stars , Feb. 1, 2005; United States Children's Catalog, Eighteenth Edition, Supplement, 2005; H. W. Wilson; United States The Children's Literature Choice List, 2005; Children's Literature; United States Middle and Junior High School Library Catalog, Ninth Edition, 2005; H.W. Wilson; United States School Library Journal Book Review Stars, February 2005; Cahners; United States SLJ Best Books, 2005; Cahners; United States ISBN: 0810950456 Dark Sons Nikki Grimes    Coretta Scott King Award-winning author Grimes combines a contemporary plot with an ancient story set during Old Testament times. The prologue sets the stage, introducing readers to Sam and reminding them of Ishmael. Four books and an epilogue later, the young men's stories, told in verse in alternating books, are fully developed. God promised Abraham and Sarah a son, but they were too old to produce, were they not? Years pass, and the couple do not conceive so Sarah encourages Abraham to have a child with her servant, Hagar. For most of Ishmael's youth, he enjoys a close relationship with his father and the relief of knowing that he is blessed by God, but the relationships with both his earthly and spiritual fathers change when Isaac, the promised one, is born. Suddenly Abraham is forced to abandon Ishmael and his mother, and Ishmael is left trying to make sense of it all. Like Ishmael, Sam and his father also grow apart. Trying to bridge the gap caused by the divorce becomes more difficult when Sam's father remarries and his new wife gives birth to David. Sam wants to forgive his father, love his new little brother, and accept his stepmother, but it is difficult. Despite feelings of abandonment and anger, unlike Ishmael, Sam still has an opportunity to strengthen his relationship with his father. But does he really want to? Ishmael's story is not embellished as is the Biblical story of Noah's Ark found in Anne Provoost's In the Shadow of the Ark (Arthur A. Levine/Scholastic, 2004/VOYA August 2004), but it does reveal an emotional intensity that is not readily apparent in the original story found in the King James Version of Genesis. Grimes creates a contemporary retelling. VOYA CODES: 4Q 3P M J S (Better than most, marred only by occasional lapses; Will appeal with pushing; Middle School, defined as grades 6 to 8; Junior High, defined as grades 7 to 9; Senior High, defined as grades 10 to 12). 2005, Jump at the Sun/Hyperion, 160p., $15.99. Ages 11 to 18. Reviewer: KaaVonia Hinton-Johnson (VOYA, October 2005 (Vol. 28, No. 4)) Best Books: Booklist Book Review Stars , Aug. 1, 2005; United States Publishers Weekly Book Review Stars, October 31, 2005; Cahners; United States ISBN: 0-7868-1888-3 A Wreath for Emmett Till Marilyn Nelson Illustrated by Philippe Lardy    The memory of Emmett Till, the fourteen-year-old African-American boy whose brutal lynching in Mississippi in 1955 shocked the conscience of America and helped trigger awareness of the need for civil rights for all Americans, is honored here in a series of intricately interlocking sonnets. As Nelson explains in her introduction, a "heroic crown of sonnets is a sequence of fifteen interlocked sonnets, in which the last one is made up of the first lines of the preceding fourteen." While the choice to explore the lawless violence of a lynch mob through the strict, classic formalism of the sonnet may seem initially surprising, the overall effect is stunning. The cumulative effect of the sonnets, one following another with the inevitability arising from the linkage of the last line of one with the first line of another, gives Till's tragic death a worthy tribute. It is wonderful to see the now-neglected sonnet form introduced to a new generation of young readers reared only on free verse or Seuss-like doggerel. Helpful, detailed end notes explain the various literary illusions in the sonnets, further educating thoughtful readers--and aspiring writers--in the way that one literary text can illuminate and be illuminated by another. Lardy's striking paintings are also accompanied by an artist's note that explains the way in which he carefully selected his visual images to reflect poetic meanings. Few books for young readers offer this level of sophisticated self-awareness of the creative process--here showing how senseless tragedy can be transformed into redemptive poetry and art. 2005, Houghton Mifflin, $17.00. Ages 10 up. Reviewer: Claudia Mills, Ph.D. (Children's Literature). Best Books: Best Children's Books, 2005; Publishers Weekly; United States Booklist Book Review Stars , Feb. 1, 2005; United States Children's Editor's Choice, 2005; Kirkus Reviews; Top 10; United States Kirkus Book Review Stars, March 1, 2005; United States Publishers Weekly Book Review Stars, April 11, 2005; Cahners; United States School Library Journal Book Review Stars, May 2005; Cahners; United States SLJ Best Books, 2005; Cahners; United States Awards, Honors, Prizes: Boston Globe--Horn Book Awards Honor Book 2005 Fiction and Poetry United States ISBN: 0-618-39752-3 Illustrator Award Winner Rosa Nikki Giovanni Illustrated by Bryan Collier    What would happen if you were made to give up your seat on a bus simply because of the color of your skin? That is what happened to Rosa Parks, a black woman in the southern town of Montgomery, Alabama, on December 1, 1955. When she refused to give up a seat that was supposed to be neutral--for blacks or whites--the bus driver called the police. The police arrested Mrs. Parks and took her to jail. When Jo Ann Robinson, a member of the Women's Political Council, heard of the arrest, she formed a committee that put up posters all over the town, urging black people to walk instead of riding the bus. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. spoke to them as part of a large group that had joined together in the fight for equality. This was a country that was founded by a diverse group of people, and every citizen deserved equal treatment and Dr. King urged all blacks to stay off the buses. People from all over the country sent them shoes, coats, and money so they could continue to walk for almost a year--until the United States Supreme Court ruled on November 13, 1956, that segregation in any form was illegal. This would be a good book for an elementary social-studies class. The author explains the situation in simple terms for young children. The illustrator has emphasized the strength of Rosa Parks in his use of dark and light images. 2005, Henry Holt and Company, $16.95. Ages 7 to 10. Reviewer: Debbie West (Children's Literature) Best Books: Booklist Book Review Stars , Jun. 1, 2005; United States Kirkus Book Review Stars, July 15, 2005; United States Publishers Weekly Book Review Stars, August 29, 2005; Cahners; United States ISBN: 978-0-8050-7106-1 ISBN: 0-8050-7106-7 Honor Books Brothers in Hope: The Story of the Lost Boys of Sudan Gregory Christie    Williams founded the Lost Boys Foundation in 2001 to call attention to the plight of Sudanese children who fled from the civil wars. She was amazed at their endurance and faith despite adversity. She has chosen to tell their story in the words of a young boy. Garang's happy, comfortable life with his family is cruelly ended when he is eight years old. While out tending cattle, his family and village are destroyed in the war. He soon joins what becomes a group of a thousand boys like himself. They organize and survive many hardships as they trek toward what they hope is peace in Ethiopia. At a refugee camp there they find help and begin education, until war reaches them again, and they must flee to Kenya. In a camp there, Garang works and studies until Tom, who has helped him before, tells him about people in the United States who are now offering boys like him a new home in America. The mainly double-page acrylic paintings have an immediate impact in their crude stylization. The children have large heads, flat with black painted features; the roughly brushed landscapes only suggest trees, paths, and a flooded river. These are action-packed pictures which depict both the horrors and the hopes of this brutal warfare for the children caught up in it. The text is lengthy but engrossing. There is a map of the boys' journey, and follow-up information from the author. 2005, Lee & Low Books, $17.95. Ages 7 to 11. Reviewer: Ken Marantz and Sylvia Marantz (Children's Literature) ISBN: 1-58430-232-1 Coretta Scott King/John Steptoe New Talent Author Award Jimi & Me Jaime Adoff    Adoff shines as he tells an exceptional story about a young teen who must cope with grief, love, prejudice, and betrayal. Keith James, who looks as if he has stepped out of a time machine with his psychedelic wardrobe and Afro, is devastated by his father's murder. While trying to cope with the pain, Keith must move from Brooklyn to a small town in Ohio and deal with a new school and students who single him out because of his eccentricity and race. Only Keith's love of music, especially guitar icon Jimi Hendrix, and his romance with classmate Veronica keep him going. Keith is plunged further into despair, however, when he learns that his father was far from perfect. Adoff's free-verse style is a natural fit for teens, and many readers will see themselves in Keith. The format makes reading a longer book less intimidating, and it would be a great choice for reluctant or below-grade-level readers. Adoff's short fragments explode off the page. When describing Keith's feelings of being made fun of at school, Adoff writes, "Words like bullets / but without the mess / No blood that you can see." The story's title carries a double meaning when Keith must face his father's adulterous past and meet his half brother Jimi. The plot takes a final, mind-bending twist after Keith meets Jimi, and what Keith learns makes one question whether his father was such a terrible man after all. The book is a tremendous addition to any collection. VOYA CODES: 4Q 4P M J S (Better than most, marred only by occasional lapses; Broad general YA appeal; Middle School, defined as grades 6 to 8; Junior High, defined as grades 7 to 9; Senior High, defined as grades 10 to 12). 2005, Jump at the Sun/Hyperion, 336p., $15.99. Ages 11 to 18. Reviewer: David Goodale (VOYA, October 2005 (Vol. 28, No. 4)). ISBN: 0-7868-5214-3 Coretta Scott King Award - 2004 Coretta Scott King Award - 2003 Coretta Scott King Award - 2002 Coretta Scott King Award - 2001 To stay up to date on new books by these authors, consider subscribing to The Children's Literature Comprehensive Database. For your free trial, click here.