What I'm Reading and Why

Children are a tough audience. I tell them during school visits that I think of them as "ruthless readers."

Ruthless, I say, is what one boy in Michigan defined as "show no mercy."

They seem to like the idea of being people who show no mercy. You'll reject a book because of its cover, I tell them. Or if you don't like the first sentence, or the way the type's laid out. Research shows, I say, that boys won't read a book with a girl on the cover.

And then I look around at the boys and see they're pleased, heads vigorously nodding.

I was thinking about their reading habits recently, and how important it is that they learn to form reading habits, and decided to list the books I read this past week and jot down why:

The Last Summer of the Death Warriors (YA) by Francisco Stork. I loved Marcello in the Real World. I'd read a good review of this one. The children's librarian at my local library had the ARC and loaned it to me. If I didn't know Stork, I might have passed it by. Title's foreboding, cover only so-so.

My Last Best Friend (mg) by Julie Bowe. In a recent blog, Elizabeth Bird said she couldn't keep this book, and the second one, on her shelves. I thought, wow. I should know about these. The local children's librarian hadn't heard of them but she checked her computer. The library had them. They were both available. She said to me, "Do you know how many branches the New York Public Library has?"

Looking Like Me, a new picture book by Walter Dean Myers. Illustrated by Christopher Myers. This was a no-brainer. An author who makes words sing; a graphic, hip-hop cover; illustrations by the boy I know from "Love to call him in the morning love to call him, 'Hey, there, son'."
Note: It's impossible not to read this one out loud.

Back of the Bus, a new picture book by Aaron Reynolds, illustrated by Floyd Cooper. Why? The face of a little boy on a bus holding a marble on the cover is beautiful; I liked him already. I knew from the title what the subject was about and understood from the feeling of the illustration that this was a warm, human approach.

How do you choose books? What does that mean to us as writers?