Richie's Picks: Great Books for Children and Young Adults

Problems?
Ideas?
Suggestions?
Please email BudNotBuddy@aol.com

Thank You!

"If you're reading this, it must be a thousand years from now. Because nobody around here reads anymore."

--Spaz, from THE LAST BOOK IN THE UNIVERSE by Rodman Philbrick (Scholastic/Blue Sky Press, 2000)

Why read?

That's what I was asked by the young man with a basketball and a boom box following a pickup game in which he had thoroughly whomped my middle-aged butt.

And in response to his question I suggested that he try and imagine how it would be to have never gotten to hear a recording of 2Pac, or the Fugees, or Mary J., or Frederick Chopin, or Scott Joplin. (The young man was also a pretty decent pianist.)

I told him to try and imagine not having once heard a CD or an LP, a cassette, a song on the radio, the soundtrack to a musical, or a video on MTV.

I explained to him that I've always loved music so much that upon hearing the first notes of some old song today, I still get the same feeling in my stomach that the song caused thirty or forty years ago, back when I first heard it on the radio, and later played it over and over on the stereo.

My life is so much richer for having--and for having had--an accompanying soundtrack.

I told that young man that from my having so many memorable and viceral experiences with YA lit I can only conclude that any teenager who fails to experience today's Young Adult literature is missing out as badly on one of life's great pleasures as is the adolescent who is completely deprived of experiencing today's and yesterday's music recordings.

During the Sixties--before I starting getting too cool for outwardly expressing admiration for Top Forty music--I would spend the final days of each waning year tuned in day and night to MusicRadio WABC as they counted down their top 100 songs of the year. It was so exciting and fulfilling to hear the past year's soundtrack of my life rewound and replayed. (I sure love that the magic of the Internet allows me to retrieve those old WABC lists today.)

Those end-of-the-year childhood experiences prompt me to now spend lots of time each fall season arguing with myself in regards to the composition of my Best of the Year booklist. And it has me recalling how much fun it has been throughout the year to act as a sort of literary DJ, frequently visiting classrooms and libraries and conferences, turning young people and professionals onto the latest children's and YA "hits" that have moved me emotionally and taught me so much.

In an age when I feel such anxiety about the wisdom of our leaders and the long-term sustainability of the planet we all call home, I am so thankful to the authors and publishers of children's and Young Adult books. For the words in those books will help bring wisdom, tolerance, and understanding to the teens and tweens who will be tomorrow's leaders.

Richie's Picks: THE BEST OF 2004

SAMMY & JULIANA IN HOLLYWOOD by Benjamin Alire Saenz, Cinco Puntos Press, ISBN: 0-938317-81-4http://richiespicks.com/users/stories/picks/sammy_and_juliana_in_hollywood.html

UNDER THE WOLF, UNDER THE DOG by Adam Rapp, Candlewick, ISBN: 0-7636-1818-7
http://richiespicks.com/users/stories/picks/under_the_wolf_under_the_dog.html

HECK, SUPERHERO by Martine Leavitt, Front Street, ISBN 1-886910-94-4
http://richiespicks.com/users/stories/picks/heck_superhero.html

THE REALM OF POSSIBILITY by David Levithan, Random House/Knopf, ISBN 0-375-82845-1
http://richiespicks.com/users/stories/picks/the_realm_of_possibility.html

SAVING FRANCESCA by Melina Marchetta, Random House/Knopf, ISBN 0-375-82982-2; lib. 0-375-92982-7
http://richiespicks.com/users/stories/picks/saving_francesca.html

THE YEAR OF SECRET ASSIGNMENTS by Jaclyn Moriarty, Scholastic/Arthur A. Levine Books, ISBN 0-439-49881-3
http://richiespicks.com/users/stories/picks/the_year_of_secret_assignments.html

NO SHAME, NO FEAR by Ann Turnbull, Candlewick, ISBN: 0-7636-2505-1
http://richiespicks.com/users/stories/picks/no_shame_no_fear.html

LIZZIE BRIGHT AND THE BUCKMINSTER BOY by Gary D. Schmidt, Clarion Books, ISBN 0-618-43929-3
http://richiespicks.com/users/stories/picks/lizzie_bright_and_the_buckminster_boy.html

SO B. IT: A NOVEL by Sarah Weeks, HarperCollins/Laura Geringer Books, ISBN: 0-06-623622-3; ISBN Library: 0-06-623623-1
http://richiespicks.com/users/stories/picks/so_b_it.html

THE OUTCASTS OF 19 SCHUYLER PLACE by E.L. Konigsburg, Simon & Schuster/Atheneum, ISBN 0-689-86636-4
http://richiespicks.com/users/stories/picks/outcasts_of_19_schuyler_place.html

THE SEA OF TROLLS by Nancy Farmer, Simon & Schuster/Atheneum/Richard Jackson, ISBN: 0-689-86744-1
http://richiespicks.com/users/stories/picks/the_sea_of_trolls.html

THE VOICE THAT CHALLENGED A NATION: MARIAN ANDERSON AND THE STRUGGLE FOR EQUAL RIGHTS by Russell Freedman, Clarion, ISBN: 0-618-15976-2
http://richiespicks.com/users/stories/picks/the_voice_that_challenged_a_nation.html

THE RACE TO SAVE THE LORD GOD BIRD by Phillip Hoose, Farrar Straus & Giroux, ISBN: 0-374-36173-8
http://richiespicks.com/users/stories/picks/the_race_to_save_the_lord_god_bird.html

BIRD by Angela Johnson, Penguin Group/Dial, ISBN: 0-8037-2847-6
http://richiespicks.com/users/stories/picks/bird.html

BUCKING THE SARGE by Christopher Paul Curtis, Random House/Wendy Lamb Books, ISBN: 0-385-32307-7; ISBN Library: 0-385-0159-3
http://richiespicks.com/users/stories/picks/bucking_the_sarge.html

CAN'T GET THERE FROM HERE by Todd Strasser, Simon & Schuster, ISBN 0-689-84169-8
http://richiespicks.com/users/stories/picks/can't_get_there_from_here.html

SIGN OF THE QIN: OUTLAWS OF MOONSHADOW MARSH, BOOK 1 by L.G. Bass, Hyperion, ISBN 0-7868-1918-9
http://richiespicks.com/users/stories/picks/sign_of_the_qin.html

THE PURPLE EMPEROR by Herbie Brennan, Bloomsbury, ISBN: 1-58234-880-4
http://http://richiespicks.com/users/stories/picks/purple_emperor.html

THE GARDEN by Elise V. Aidinoff, Harper Tempest, ISBN 0-06-055605-6
http://richiespicks.com/users/stories/picks/the_garden.html

DOING IT by Melvin Burgess, Henry Holt, ISBN 0-8050-7565-8
http://richiespicks.com/users/stories/picks/doing_it.html

THE GOLEM'S EYE: The Bartimaeus Trilogy, Book Two by Jonathan Stroud, Hyperion/Miramax, ISBN: 0-7868-1860-3
http://richiespicks.com/users/stories/picks/golems_eye.html

Short Story of the Year:
"Phat Acceptance" by Jess Mowry
from FACE RELATIONS: 11 STORIES ABOUT SEEING BEYOND COLOR
edited by Marilyn Singer, Simon & Schuster, ISBN: 0-689-85637-7

Richie Partington
http://richiespicks.com
BudNotBuddy@aol.com

"And the beauty of life can only survive if we love one another."
--Tommy James and the Shondells, "Sweet Cherry Wine", #65 on the Top 100 of 1969