Winners of 2014 TD Canadian Children's Literature Awards

Tonight, the Canadian Children's Book Centre, our nationally-renowned authority on all things related to youngCanLit, and the TD Bank Group announced the winners of the 2014 TD Canadian Children's Literature Awards. (Prix TD de littérature canadienne pour l'enfance et la jeunesse was announced days earlier in Montreal.)

The children's book awards include the following:

1. TD Canadian Children’s Literature Award ($30,000) Sponsored by TD Bank Group;
2. TD Canadian Children's Literature Fan Choice Award Sponsored by CBC;
3. Prix TD de littérature canadienne pour l’enfance et la jeunesse ($30,000) Sponsored by TD Bank Group;
4. Marilyn Baillie Picture Book Award ($20,000) Sponsored by A. Charles Baillie;
5. Norma Fleck Award For Canadian Children's Non-Fiction ($10,000) Sponsored by the Fleck Family Foundation;
6. Geoffrey Bilson Award for Historical Fiction for Young People ($5,000) Sponsored by the Canadian Children’s Book Centre’s Bilson Endowment Fund;
7. John Spray Mystery Award ($5,000) Sponsored by John Spray; and
8. Monica Hughes Award for Science Fiction and Fantasy ($5,000)  Sponsored by HarperCollins Canada.

Congratulations to the Winners in each category!

TD Canadian Children’s 

Literature Award

The Man with the Violin

by Kathy Stinson
Illustrated by Dušan Petričić
Annick Press

In the Tree House

by Andrew Larsen

Illustrated by Dušan Petričić

Kids Can Press

  Prix TD de littérature canadienne 

pour l’enfance et la jeunesse 

La plus grosse poutine du monde

par André Poulin

Bayard Canada

Marilyn Baillie 

Picture Book Award

How To
by Julie Morstad
Simply Read Books

Norma Fleck Award For 

Canadian Children's Non-Fiction

The Last Train: A Holocaust Story

by Rona Arato

Owlkids Books

Geoffrey Bilson Award for 

Historical Fiction for Young People

Graffiti Knight

by Karen Bass

Pajama Press

John Spray 

Mystery Award

Who I'm Not

by Ted Staunton

Orca Book Publishers

Monica Hughes Award 

for Science Fiction and Fantasy

Sorrow's Knot 

by Erin Bow

Arthur A. Levine Books/Scholastic

It was an exciting night for authors, illustrators, publishers, readers, and all of us who are interested in the best of youngCanLit. Hosted by CBC radio host Shelagh Rogers, the Canadian Children's Literature Awards at the Carlu in Toronto was rich with more personalities that I could even count. Some of the authors I can tell you I saw or with whom I spoke (in no particular order) included Lesley Livingston, Adrienne Kress, Rachelle Delaney, Vikki VanSickle, Rebecca Bender, L. M. Falcone, Maureen McGowan, Jocelyn Shipley, Jennifer Maruno, Sylvia McNicoll, Stephanie McLellan, Jennifer Lanthier, Mahtab Narsimhan, Catherine Rondina, Deborah Kerbel, Karen Bass, Erin Bow, Kathy Stinson, Rona Arato, Ted Staunton, Eric Walters, Helaine Becker, Wallace Edwards, Philippa Dowding, Ruth Ohi, Debbie Ridpath Ohi, Allan Stratton, Andrew Larsen, Dušan Petričić, Patricia Storms, Julie Morstad, Frieda Wishinsky, Elizabeth Wennick, Natalie Hyde, Cary Fagan, Jo Ellen Bogart, Loris Lesynski, Bill Swan and Jess Keating. 

And a new award, the Amy Mathers Teen Book Award, was announced, commemorating Amy's Marathon of Books (amysmarathonofbooks.ca), her endeavour to read one YACanLit a day for one year, having started January 1, 2014.  The new award will be handed out for the first time in 2015.

It was a glorious night of winners for everyone!

Mr. Frank

by Irene Luxbacher

Groundwood Books

978-1-55498-435-0

32 pp.

Ages 4-7

September 2014

Mr. Frank is a tailor, and one who has served many people through many decades by creating a wide variety of clothes, and Mr. Frank, the book, begins with the excitement of receiving a special "order for an outfit that made all the others seem rather dull."(pg. 6) From Mr. Frank's hand to the forehead as he receives the call, the order seems overwhelming. But the elderly tailor takes his time thinking about the fabrics and the design, the style and the fit, as well as comfort and playfulness.  This man is more than a tailor, he is a creator of dreams, albeit one with needle and thread.

And as Mr. Frank makes his decisions, he takes several trips down memory lane, first recalling his mending of uniforms from more than 60 years ago when he was but a child, to the suits he tailored as a young man, and then the wild outfits of the 1960's and 1970's.  As fashions and Mr. Frank's tailoring change with the decades, so too does Mr. Frank, going a little more grey and a little more perplexed by the trends, but always accommodating, and taking on a variety of orders.  But it is evident that Mr. Frank will be closing up shop after today, after he completes this most special of orders.  It will be his pièce de résistance.

Irene Luxbacher was inspired by her own father's tailoring to write Mr. Frank, and the respect and admiration she extends is evident in the depth of her illustrations.  Though there is an understated melancholy about Mr. Frank, as he wraps up his tailoring career with one last special order, Irene Luxbacher emphasizes the textures and colours of a full life of creating fashions for others.  From the patterned wallpaper and rug and the textured fabrics, to the bold patterns of the mod clothes of the 1960's, the details all tell of a richness of a life well lived.  There are collages of photographs with magazine pictures, drawings and pattern pieces that I suspect once graced the walls of the real Mr. Frank's tailor shop, as I believe do the wall photos in the residence to which he delivers this last outfit.  In a lovely homage to her father and to the relationships between the generations, Irene Luxbacher has created her own masterpiece for the ages, one that she and her readers will look upon fondly for many years too.

Naptime

by Iris de Moüy

Translated by Shelley Tanaka

Groundwood Books

978-1-55498-487-9

28 pp.

Ages 2-6

September, 2014

I don't often review translations of books but there are always exceptions and Naptime by French illustrator Iris de Moüy, translated by Shelley Tanaka, is one of them.

Seems the young animals of the savannah are not interested in taking their regular naps.  From the zebra to the hyena, hippo, elephant, lion, rhino and cheetah, the young of the African grasslands each have some excuse or other for why they will not be taking a nap.  The petulance of these creatures is evident in their declarations similar to those echoed by children around the world.  Caregivers have all heard:  "I'm too big"; "I'm not a baby"; "I'm busy"; "I'll take a nap when I need one"; "No way!"; and  "You can can't catch me".  Children, yes.  Naptakers, not.

But a little girl takes it upon herself to get them to sleep, one closed eye at a time.  If frustrated parents are listening, somewhere, she declares that "And that's all there is to it!" but she may just as easily be declaring it for herself, wiping her hands off for a job well done. No more grumpy little ones to deal with now.

Through the few words of each animal's insolent statements, a solid message is sent and, in just as few words, the girl takes up the challenge and wins. One, two, three, done.  Similarly, the illustrations are solid and emotive.   A limited palette of black, yellow, green, and gray with the occasional red above or below defines the heat and heart of the savannah and its occupants.  And the broad strokes of the flora and fauna, as well as the font, are powerful in their simplicity, again much like the landscape Naptime depicts. A mighty message in words and art.

Guardian

by Natasha Deen

Great Plains Teen Fiction

978-1-927855-09-6

192 pp.

Ages 13+

October, 2014

Guardian is buried in death, haunted by ghosts and plagued by bullies, youthful and not.  But Natasha Deen guards against wallowing her readers in the sobriety of these elements and instead pens an intricate plot that lacks any predictability, even that which we expect with death.  

Seventeen-year-old Maggie Johnson lives with her father, the local undertaker, in Dead Falls, and she sees dead people.  Actually she sees those confused dead who need her help to let go of life.  Her dad knows about her "gift" and her best friend Nell knows about Maggie's "woo-woo" feelings, but the teen has enough strife with bully Serge Popov that she's definitely not going to let this little secret out.  Unfortunately, when a creepy radio poltergeist sends Maggie to a deserted old mill to find Serge's murdered body, she can't help but become involved, especially when she finds his ghost inexplicably tied to her, 

"...the one person he hated most in the world, and it struck me as funny. Hilarious. Karma was a bitch, but she has a dark sense of humour and I was laughing at the punchline." (pg. 51)

But, it's not until Maggie visits Serge's girlfriend, Amber, and learns the girl is thrilled with Serge's death, and that his parents, the Reverend and Mrs. Popov, plan to have his body cremated without a service, as though he'd never existed, that Maggie actually reveals to Serge that she can see and hear him.  Though relieved that he still has a voice with someone, even Deadhead as he calls her, Serge needs to know what happened if he is ever to move to the next world, wherever that may be.

Luckily Dead Falls is a small enough community that Maggie's innocent (?) sleuthing generally looks like nosiness and gossip. She learns much through her friends including her crush Craig MacGregor, the captain of the water polo team on which Serge played, as well as from her father's love interest, the sheriff Nancy Machio. But it's Serge's reactions and commentary with her visits to those who knew him best (like Amber, his parents, etc.) that elicit the most revealing of secrets, some which Serge is not ready to have exposed. And I did mention the threatening poltergeist that continues to send creepy messages to Maggie, right?

"Help Serge or be killed by the poltergeist. Help Serge and possibly be killed by his psychotic father. What a set of options." (pg. 196)

Guardian is at its heart a murder mystery, albeit a paranormal one, and a superb one at that. But it defines itself with its characters whose thoughts and actions are unpredictable, as are most of ours, and with their development as they learn new things about themselves and others.  Even for Serge, a truly nasty bully, there is hope. And Natasha Deen's writing is a blend of smart dialogue and brisk action that effortlessly takes the reader looking for the "who" who did it. She has a real knack for creating the right atmosphere for friendly discussions and creepy scenarios, as well as thoughtful moments and teen angst.  And Natasha Deen has a wit that seems to infuse her words (or rather those of her characters) taking the edge off frightening elements. Everything is believable (even the poltergeist and Serge).

I don't know what Natasha Deen has in store for Maggie after Guardian but there is a perfect set up here for a sequel, not to complete the story but to examine how Maggie's psychic nature and her relationship with Craig both develop, and I look forward to reading about both.

~  ~  ~  ~  ~  ~  ~  ~  ~  

Consider watching the book trailer for Guardian that Natasha Deen posted in August (I've included it here) and taking a look at her website www.natashadeen.com for more about the author and her writing.

Book Event: My Granny Loves Hockey, and Murilla Gorilla (Pointe-Claire, Quebec)

YA author

  Lori Weber

Photo by Marilyn Gillespie

will be launching her first picture book

My Granny Loves Hockey

Illustrated by Eliska Liska

Simply Read Books

978-1-927018-43-9

32 pp.

Ages 4-8

October, 2014

on

Sunday, November 16, 2014

2:00-4:00 p.m.

at

Livres Babar Books

Pointe-Claire, Quebec 

Also in attendance will be 

picture book author

Jennifer Lloyd

with her newest book in her Murilla Gorilla series

Murrila Gorilla and the Hammock Problem

Illustrated by Jacqui Lee

Simply Read Books

978-1927018477

48 pp.

Ages 5-8

August, 2014

Whether hockey-loving grandmothers or a detective gorilla for emergent readers is your preference, this book event has something for young readers.  And it's a great opportunity to get a signed copy of great #youngCanLit for your child or another loved reader and chat to two Canadian authors about their books and writing.

Earth & Sky

I'm very pleased to be participating in the Earth & Sky Blog Tour organized by Vikki VanSickle at Razorbill to promote a new series by Megan Crewe, author of the Fallen World Trilogy.  Though taking her writing into a different dimension (both temporally and spatially), Megan Crewe has stayed true to her speculative fiction roots and to her young adult fans and I'm excited to share my review of Earth & Sky here with you now.

  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  

by Megan Crewe

Razorbill Canada

978-0-670068128

336 pp.

Ages 13+

Release date: October 28, 2014

We all have gut instincts that tell us when something is wrong, though we might never listen to those warnings, but when teen Skylar gets the feeling that something is "wrong, wrong, wrong", a refrain she gets in her head periodically, she's actually perceiving subtle changes in her environment that no one else seems to pick up on.  For example, when her law class visits the courthouse, she sees a bomb going off and everyone dying, including herself, but it doesn't actually happen.  Strange thing is that it did.  But through a time shift, it was prevented from happening this time, so Skylar could live.

Sounds freaky to me and I can't even imagine why Skylar is not freaking out when a young man named Win shares all this information with her, although it is nice to have someone understand what she's been experiencing and not think she's crazy.

Every now and then, you go somewhere, or you see something, and you feel it doesn't make sense.  It should have been different somehow.  But there's no obvious reason why, and no one else seems to notice. (pg. 32)

Perhaps the freaky part is that Win identifies himself as a Traveler from his planet, Kemya, and tells her that beings from his planet have been coming to Earth for thousands of years and manipulating situations to learn more, using a time field generator that allows them to travel between the present and the past.  Problem is that there are some, like Win, who believe that this experimentation has to stop, especially since the world is becoming less stable with every shift.  Using a weapon, which their leader Jeanant has hidden on Earth, the group intends to take down the time field and let Earth be.  But the security team of Enforcers from Kemya is after them, determined to stop their plan.

Though he is breaking all protocols engaging with an Earthling, Win believes that Skylar's ability to tell when the past has been shifted could help them find Jeanant and the weapon parts.  Skylar agrees to helping, knowing that for "the first time ever, I might have the chance to set the wrongness right." (pg. 62) Using a very cool time cloth, which can function like a laptop and a time-machine, dropping them anywhere at any time (including visits to the Colosseum in 81 AD, China in 938 AD and twelve years earlier when Skylar's seventeen-year-old brother Noam disappeared), Win and Skylar begin a tenuous temporal and emotional journey.

Unfortunately, being very different beings, Win and Skylar cannot always understand the other's motivations, especially since they have personal agendas that they are reluctant to share fully.  But their growing appreciation for the trials each has endured and the companionship they enjoy is bringing Win and Skylar closer.  Now if they just could get all the weapon pieces, live through attacks by the Enforcers and an assortment of history's warriors, and start being more forthcoming with each other, there really may be a chance for them to make things right, all around.

I thought Megan Crewe's first series, the Fallen World Trilogy, was larger than life.  Its premise of a world falling apart with the explosion of a fatal epidemic that pits survivors against each other is overwhelmingly scary, and Megan Crewe's exploration of the human psyche and society's response to dire circumstances is very real.  In Earth & Sky, the surreal fate of the world is in question and Megan Crewe is still able to scrutinize how we might respond when faced with the option of doing the big good for everyone or just helping ourselves.  By extending the whole concept of social justice beyond Earth, Megan Crewe has taken a universal theme of meeting an obligation to society into the galaxy and suggests the possibility of aliens considering their role on other planets, and perhaps our's on theirs.  The fate of Earth may be up to Skylar and the aliens' time shift generator in the sky but the fates of Skylar, Win, and their worlds are safely in the hands of Megan Crewe and I trust that she'll restore some kind of justice in the sequels to Earth & Sky, having offered a smidgeon of promise–and romance–towards that end here.

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See Megan Crewe's official book trailer for Earth & Sky here and check out more about her new series at http://www.EarthSkyTrilogy.com

The Haunting of Heck House: The Wiggins Weird, Book 2

Written by Lesley Livingston and Jonathan Llyr

Illustrations by Steven Burley

Puffin Canada

978-0143184263

280 pp.

Ages 8-12

For release October, 2014

It's less than a week before Halloween and authors Lesley Livingston and Jonathan Llyr launched The Haunting of Heck House (sequel to How to Curse in Hieroglyphics, 2013) yesterday, and I can't think of a better reason to finally post my review of this captivating middle-grade read that smacks of funny and scary in equal parts.

Unbeknownst to their grandfather and guardian, Pops Pendleton, twelve-year-old babysitting aficionados and cousins Tweed Pendleton and Cheryl Shumacher sneak out to compete in an overnight babysitting competition at the previously-unknown home of Sir Hector Hecklestone the Third on Eerie Lane.  Along with their varied babysitting tools of the trade, the two take along a malfunctioning drive-in speaker that holds the talkative essence of the Great Simon Omar, dead magician. (You'll need to read Book 1 in The Wiggins Weird, How to Curse in Hieroglyphics, to understand the means by which a portal into the Egyptian afterlife probably created Speakie i.e., a disembodied Omar with audio).  

While these plucky girls intend to go to the Hecklestone house and prove that they're the best babysitters/housesitters for the job, there seem to be super-natural forces working against them, not the least of which are a grand piano plummeting down the stairs, flying books assaulting them, dripping ectoplasm, doors that open and lock without explanation, and their competition, tech wizard Feedback, and 13-year-olds Hazel Polizzi and Cindy Tyson.  Luckily, the cousins get the help of their friends Pilot and Artie to help problem-solve their way out of a haunted house while playing their make-believe game ACTION! in the roles of the League of Awesome so they can get through some scary situations. 

The house with its "early-Munsters vibe" (pg. 104) seems to have its own agenda and all the kids must share their skills–including lock-picking, tech, gargoyle-translation, role-play and mechanics–to help escape its evil hold, and save the ghosts trapped within.  Never fear, though, because The Haunting of Heck House is more humour than horror, wordplay than wickedness, and fun than frightening.  Of course, an 800-lb. piano tumbling down the stairs at the girls is rather disconcerting but, still believing that their skills are being tested, they all take it with comic sensibility.

"What the heck kinda test was that anyway?" Cheryl glowered. "Agility? Musical appreciation?"
"I really didn't appreciate that," Tweed said grimly. (pg. 106)

Even Simon in his audio-speaker form pipes in that, "Guess there will be no encore tonight". (pg. 106)  And then there's an adorable little gargoyle whose "bat-like wings...red eyes, a sharp-hooked beak and talons"(pg. 130) might have been frightening except Ramshackle purrs and likes being stroked like a pussycat!

It's not surprising that, with Lesley Livingston and Jonathan Llyr both involved in acting, that The Haunting of Heck House is a story ripe with a quick-paced plot, highly-visual settings and characters, and priceless dialogue.  And, while Steven Burley's illustrations of the kids' ACTION! role-plays provide entertaining graphics, The Haunting of Heck House is so well written that it easily provides readers with a virtual visual that runs like a movie that could played at the twins' beloved Starlight Paradise Drive-In, with or without 3D-glasses.  Enjoy the movie!