Walter Dean Myers

Those of us who attended the Corretta Scott King breakfast at ALA in June wondered why Walter Dean Myers was not there to accept his award.  His editor accepted it in his name.  Early in July we discovered why. The Children's Book World was shocked by the information that one of our giants had died.

There have been many tributes to him. Here are links to a few:

Lyn Miller-Lachmann -- We've Lost a Library
Fuse #8 Production blog on the School Library Journal Website
And here's his biography on the Walter Dean Myers' website

100 Magnificent Books

Here's your reading assignment for the rest of the year. (It's going to take me part of next year, too.)

The 100 best books of 2011 according to Betsy Bird at her blog, A Fuse #8 Production.

Blog -- A Fuse #8 Production

It's 4 am and the temps outside are still in the high/ humid 70s. It's a good thing I insisted we turn on the air-conditioning yesterday. I took the grandkids to the pool yesterday afternoon. Although they jumped right in, there's no way I'm agonna do that until the pool warms up closer to 80 degrees. Instead, I sat in the shade and worked on one of the revisions I have to do for my graduate writing course. (I couldn't use my old laptop out of doors -- I couldn't see the screen. But this new MacPro laptop worked fine.)

There is one blog that is a daily read for me -- A Fuse #8 Production. Betsy Bird is a children's librarian in New York City who has been blogging for years, mostly about books, but she manages to insert a lot of other amazing things and links into her blog as well. Her writing is clever and a joy to read. Once a week she publishes a post she calls, "Fusenews." If you read no other, do read that one. Every paragraph contains news and views she's found across the internet, along with links. And on Sunday, she shows nothing but videos she has found. Mostly about books and writing, but she always throws in an off-topic funny one as well.

Click and enjoy. -wo