CMIS Evaluation Fiction Focus

Issue 2 of Fiction Focus has just arrived back from the printer and will be winging its way to subscribers in time for the Olympics. Yes, this one is a topical issue with a feature on China and YA reading. Watch out for it - two copies will be arriving in WA Government schools via the Principal and individual subscribers should receive theirs next week.

Meanwhile, here’s the cover.

If you are looking for titles suitable for using in Literature Circles, don’t forget to look in the CMIS Resource Bank. Currently 122 annotated titles are listed that we feel would work well as small group studies. A future search will reflect additions to the database.

If a book has been reviewed in Fiction Focus, age guidelines (such as 12+) indicate the suggested level. Titles without such age suggestions have been reviewed in our sister publication Primary Focus, and will be ideal for younger students - although some will still suit secondary students in Years 7 and 8 where the concept works well.

There is plenty of information about literature circles although much of the material has a US elementary focus. The most common approaches are based on the work of Harvey Daniels, and can be adapted for lower secondary groups.

Latest in the Guardian’s Top Ten series is graphic novels. US comic book editor and writer Danny Fingeroth has selected his Top 10 of the genre.

The first two on his list, Maus and Persepolis, have been reviewed in Fiction Focus. Alice in Sunderland, which comes in ninth spot, will be reviewed soon. Others are older titles, or not necessarily YA, but the list is interesting.

Coincidentally, Clare Snowball, a PhD student at Curtin University, today posted a terrific piece on her blog about challenges to graphic novels in libraries. It’s here.

The Centre for Youth Literature’s website, Inside a Dog, is busy and about to get busier. James Roy has been writer in residence for a week now, and his blog is inviting students to comment on a variety of thoughts, including their favourite animal book. James will be around for a little longer on the site, so point your readers in his direction.  While they are there, they could try writing a book review in haiku.

And the 2008 Inky Awards are being launched tomorrow. Now in their second year, these awards are looking for the teenage vote. Last year’s winners will be there -  Simmone Howell (Notes from the Teenage Underground) in person and John Green (Looking for Alaska) via YouTube.

We’ll let you know the lists as soon as they are announced, but you can also subscribe to Read Alert, the blog from CYC to keep informed.

Lucky for one in October - thirteen titles have made the long list of the 2008 Man Booker Prize. Teachers looking for literary fiction to explore with senior students might like to investigate some of these:

Aravind Adiga - The White Tiger
Gaynor Arnold - Girl in a Blue Dress
Sebastian Barry - The Secret Scripture
John Berger - From A to X
Michelle de Kretser - The Lost Dog
Amitav Ghosh - Sea of Poppies
Linda Grant - The Clothes on Their Backs
Mohammed Hanif -  A Case of Exploding Mangoes
Philip Hensher - The Northern Clemency
Joseph O’Neill - Netherland
Salman Rushdie - The Enchantress of Florence
Tom Rob Smith - Child 44
Steve Toltz  - A Fraction of the Whole

Michelle de Kretser and Steve Toltz are two Australian representatives.

These will be pared to a short list on 9 September and the winner announced on 14 October.

None of the long listed books has yet been reviewed in Fiction Focus.

We know that Children’s Book Week will be here in two weeks, with the announcement of the winning books on August 14. School libraries everywhere in Australia are busy fuelling the minds of their readers.

But if you are lucky enough to have travel on your mind, or if you are just interested in what is going on elsewhere, there are plenty of other book-related events happening around the world in August. Thanks to the Papertigers site for keeping us informed.

The current issue of Papertigers is devoted to literacy.

The Teenreads website has an interview with Cory Doctorow, author of the much-acclaimed Little Brother.

Although not available here yet in conventional book-as-we-know-it form, as we mentioned a few posts ago, as an advocate of Creative Commons, Doctorow has made Little Brother available as a free ebook.

The issues that this title raises are highly relevant for our times.

There’s more on Stephenie Meyer, creator of Bella and Edward, in the Review section of today’s Weekend Australian. The Rowling comparisons just won’t go away.

Breaking Dawn, the fourth title in the vampire ‘trilogy’, will be published simultaneously around the world in just over a week. Big parties, HP-style, are being talked about on the US lists.

Westerblog, the blog of honorary Australian Scott Westerfeld, has alerted us to a post on the io9 scifi blog. Great Opening Sentences from Science Fiction analyses some effective opening lines (yes, Scott gets a mention for The Risen Empire, although he takes issue with the analysis in his own blog and goes on to provide all his own YA novel first lines).

English teachers and TLs doing literature promotion could have some fun running with this idea.

Further to her NY Times essay about YA literature, Margo Rabb interviews Markus Zusak on her blog Books, Chocolates, Sundries.

She asks Markus a number of questions in the email interview including: There is often a stigma that adult readers have against literature for children and young adults. Have you encountered this stigma yourself?

In an editor’s note she rues that this is only an email interview, for reasons that anyone who has met Markus can readily understand.

Her interview with Mark Haddon, also about the YA/adult crossover publishing scene, is also on the blog.