Stay tuned for the last leg of our Skype tour coming this winter! For more information, please read the FAQ.
February 4, 2012: Sweet Reads
Check out these February new releases...
January 29, 2012: Tweet Tips
Coming soon to a Twitter feed near you...
The #MGlitchat team—which includes Mixed-up Files founder Elissa Cruz—will be hosting a series of Twitter chats in February called “Tips from the Pros.” Each week, authors, agents, editors and publicists will share their tips about writing and publishing MG books in today’s market. Want to join the fun? Check the MGlitchat blog for a list of dates, times, and guest experts.
January 26, 2011: Ring! Ring!
What’s it like to win the Newbery? “I picked up the phone, and it was like history changed,” Jack Gantos says of the call informing him he’d just won the Newbery Medal for his novel Dead End in Norvelt. For more about his reaction, check out this article in Publishers Weekly. It was a busy week for Mr. Gantos, who also won the 2012 Scott O’Dell Award for Historical Fiction.
January 26, 2012: Jewish-Themed Books Honored
Winners of the Sydney Taylor Book Award were announced January 17. The award is given annually to new books for children and teens that exemplify the highest literary standards while authentically portraying the Jewish experience. The award memorializes Sydney Taylor, author of the All-of-a-Kind Family series.
The gold medal in the older readers category went to Susan Goldman Rubin for Music Was It: Young Leonard Bernstein. Honor books were Lily Renee, Escape Artist: from Holocaust Survivor to Comic Book Pioneer by Trina Robbins with illustrations by Anne Timmons and Mo Oh; Hammerin' Hank Greenberg: Baseball Pioneer by Shelley Sommer; and Irena’s Jars of Secrets by Marcia Vaughan.
For more…
January 23, 2012: The Newbery Medal Goes to…
According to the publisher, Dead End in Norvelt tells the “entirely true” and “wildly fictional” story of two months in the life of a kid named Jack Gantos, “whose plans for vacation excitement are shot down when he is grounded for life by his feuding parents, and whose nose spews bad blood at every little shock he gets.”
Newbery Honors went to two books: Inside Out & Back Again by Thanhha Lai, which also won the National Book Award last year, and Breaking Stalin’s Nose by Eugene Yelchin.
Other winners today were:
• Kadir Nelson, who won the Coretta Scott King Book Award for Heart and Soul: The Story of America and African Americans;
• Joan Bauer, author of Close to Famous, and Brian Selznick, author of Wonderstruck, who received The Schneider Family Book Award for books that embody an artistic expression of the disability experience;
• Susan Cooper, author of the classic The Dark Is Rising Sequence, who won The Margaret A. Edwards Award for lifetime achievement in writing for young adults; and
• Guadalupe Garcia McCall, who won the Pura Belpré Author Award for Under the Mesquite.
For a complete list of winners and honorees in all categories, visit the ALA Web site…
January 23, 2012: Mixed-up Files Authors Honored at ALA
A huge shout out to Wendy Shang and Sheela Chari, two of our very own Mixed-up Files members, who were honored at today’s ALA winter meeting. Shang was awarded The Asian/Pacific American Award for Children’s Literature for her middle-grade novel The Great Wall of Lucy Wu. Sheela Chari, author of Vanished, a middle-grade mystery, received the honor in the same category. The awards, which are selected by the Asian/Pacific American Librarians Association, recognize works of exceptional literary and artistic merit that highlight Asian/Pacific Americans and their heritage.
For more on the awards...
January 22, 2012: Esme’s Picks
January 19, 2012: The Mystery Revealed
• Horton Halfpott by Tom Angleberger
• It Happened on a Train by Mac Barnett
• Vanished by Sheela Chari
• Icefall by Matthew J. Kirby
• The Wizard of Dark Street by Shawn Thomas Odyssey
Special congratulations to finalist and Mixed-up Files member Sheela Chari, who launched Vanished on our blog this summer!
For more on Sheela and Vanished…
For a complete list of Edgar finalists in all categories, including young adult and adult…
January 18, 2012: The OWL Hoots in March
Jill, a 7th grade English teacher and blogger, is looking for authors, readers, and other bloggers to join her in celebrating March Middle-grade Madness on “The O.W.L.” blog (Outrageously Wonderful Literature for the Middle Grades). Says Jill, “I'm putting together a fun March where I'll do nothing but highlight middle-grade books, but I need a little help.” Visit The OWL to learn more about writing a guest post, posting a review, or hosting a giveaway.
January 16, 2012: The Medals Are Coming! The Medals Are Coming!
Betsy Bird, New York City public librarian and School Library Journal blogger, reveals her predictions for the 2011 Newbery and Caldecott Awards here.... The actual awards will be announced January 23 at the midwinter meeting of the American Library Association. Stay tuned!
January 4, 2012: Narrowing the Field
Finalists for the 2011 CYBIL awards were announced this week. Awards will be given across a wide range of categories including fiction, nonfiction, fantasy and science fiction, graphic novels, and poetry. On the short list for middle-grade fiction is The Great Wall of Lucy Wu by our very own Mixed-up member Wendy Shang.
For the complete list of CYBIL finalists...
For more on Wendy and The Great Wall of Lucy Wu...
January 4, 2012: Blogger Picks Indie Bests
Children’s author, editor, and “Rogue Librarian” blogger Edward T. Sullivan lists his picks for the best books from independent publishers in 2011…
January 3, 2012: Author and Ambassador: Walter Dean Myers
Walter Dean Myers, five-time winner of the Coretta Scott King Award and two Newbery Honors, has been named National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature by Librarian of Congress James H. Billington. Myers, who succeeds author Katherine Paterson, has chosen “Reading Is Not Optional” as the theme of his two-year term of service.
“Walter Dean Myers is one of America’s preeminent authors of books for young people,” says Dr. Billington. “He is a lifelong advocate for reading for young people, and he has practiced what he preaches in schools and detention centers across the country.”
The National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature is named by the Librarian of Congress based on recommendations from a selection committee representing many segments of the book community. The selection criteria include the candidate’s contribution to young people’s literature and ability to relate to children. The position was created to raise national awareness of the importance of young people’s literature as it relates to lifelong literacy, education, and the development and betterment of the lives of young people.
For more about Myers…
For more about the award…
We hope it will be a great year and we’re so thrilled we get to spend it with all of YOU – our readers, fellow writers, teachers, librarians, parents AND kids!
Since we love fireworks, here’s some more!
13 Comments 
Teachergirl! It’s you! You won all four books!
Congratulations!
Please email your mailing address to msfishby@fromthemixedupfiles.com
Flickr photo by dororai
Around my house, we love to laugh. We also love to rhyme, and we particularly like to put the two together. It’s a little known fact that both of these things, rhyming and laughing, were the inspiration behind my very first attempt at creating a children’s picture book. That picture book will never be published (trust me on this), but it started me on the path to writing for children. So I am rather fond of and grateful for fun rhymes.
Laughing over a silly poem is something my middle-grade kids and I have in common, too. It’s a great way for us to bond, especially when it comes to my reluctant readers, because sharing a short, silly poem together seems less threatening than sitting down with a thick novel at bedtime.
So, yes, we take funny poetry very seriously around my house. My kids memorize these poems religiously. (Someday you should hear my oldest recite A Tragic Story by William Makepeace Thackeray. Hil-arious.) Occasionally I recite a few I still remember from my own middle-grade years. (Eletelephony by Laura Richards is my favorite, in case you were wondering.) We also make up our own silly rhymes, which might not be complete works of poetry, but you’ve got to start somewhere, right?
Luckily for us, there are plenty of great but wacky poetry collections available in bookstores or on library shelves. We turn to these for inspiration or in desperation, depending upon whether or not we need something to get us into a rhyming rhythm or something to get us out of a very bad mood. Here is a short list of some poetry collections that tickle our funny bone:
Where the Sidewalk Ends by Shel Silverstein
Arguably the most well-known children’s poetry collection in the world (according to me, anyway), this book has been entertaining children for decades. Other well-known titles by Shel Silverstein include A Light in the Attic, Falling Up, and Runny Babbit: A Billy Sook. Check out his website for a complete list of his titles.
(Not that you asked, but my favorite poem from Where the Sidewalk Ends is Peanut-Butter Sandwich.)
A Pizza the Size of the Sun by Jack Prelutsky
We’ve been fans of Jack Prelutsky for years. Though some of his books are listed for the younger crowd of 4- to 8-year-olds, older elementary students will still enjoy his wacky worldplay in this and his many other poetry collections. You can find a complete list of his titles on his website.
Vile Verses by Roald Dahl
Who doesn’t love Roald Dahl?! And now you can love him all over again when you pick up one of his poetry collections. This one compiles some of the poems published in his other books, such as the The Centipede’s Song from James and the Giant Peach, with new and deliciously vile verses kids in particular are sure to love. And some adults might like it, too. (Okay, plenty of adults already do.) Other collections you might also enjoy are Revolting Rhymes and Dirty Beasts.
Exploding Gravy by X. J. Kennedy
We found this book purely by accident, when my grandmother decided to send it as a birthday gift for one of my children. It’s a perennial favorite now. Unfortunately, it’s out of print, but hopefully you can still find it online or at your local library. If not, I’m sorry. I’d let you borrow mine, but my kids won’t put it down long enough for me to sneak it out of the house.
If I Were In Charge of the World and Other Worries by Judith Viorst
A friend of mine highly recommended this collection, and I think I do remember reading it once when I was a kid. I haven’t shared it with my own kids yet, though. It’s on our TBR list now. From Booklist: “Viorst takes everyday situations that frustrate, bewilder, or bemuse and turns them into fodder for her audience’s personal laugh tracks. . . . (She) succeeds in bringing out the fun in human foibles and her poems that twist traditional fairy-tale endings are positively inspired.”
Do you have a favorite not on this list? If you do, please share the title below in the comments. My kids and I are always looking for more poems to love. Even though we prefer the ones that rhyme, we’d settle for some funny free verse, too. Thanks for laughing along with us!
Elissa Cruz loves wacky poetry enough that she writes it herself when she isn’t busy working on one of her novels. She is represented by Josh Getzler of Russell and Volkening, Inc., and her debut humorous middle-grade mystery is currently on submission. It doesn’t have any funny poetry in it, though. But it should.
From the Mixed-Up Files is the group blog of middle-grade authors celebrating books for middle-grade readers. For anyone with a passion for children’s literature—teachers, librarians, parents, kids, writers, industry professionals— we offer regularly updated book lists organized by unique categories, author interviews, market news, and a behind-the-scenes look at the making of a children's book from writing to publishing to promoting.
Contact
Subscribe
Dec 31, 2010 
