What is your favorite thing you learned while researching the book? There were so many favorite things. One is that White, by his own account, was not a great reader. Not that he didn’t read, or have a library in his home, he just preferred being outside and doing a myriad of things from shearing sheep to sailing. That made …
Interview with Candace Fleming and Eric Rohmann
What is your favorite thing you learned while researching the book? As we began to investigate the myths, stories and science of the giant squid we discovered that there are lots of myths and stories but that the science is hard to come by. Despite there being hundreds of thousands of giant squid in the world’s oceans, they are secretive …
Interview with Adam Gidwitz and Aaron Blank
Editor’s note: Aaron Blank is the producer for The Inquisitor’s Tale audiobook. You can listen to a sample of the book here. This audiobook is a wonderful example of using more than one narrator. When assessing books such as The Inquisitor’s Tale, how do you decide to use multiple narrator or a single performer? Aaron: Adam made identifying the characters pretty …
Interview with Laura Shovan
What were you doing when you heard you had won the CYBILS Award for Poetry? I was working on a big revision for my next middle grade novel. One of the judges Tweeted about the award. It was the best Valentine’s Day gift ever. Better than chocolate! This is a LOT of characters to invent and develop. What is your …
The 2016 Cybils Winners!
There’s not much to say in the way of an intro this year: just our thanks to all the bloggers who judged, authors who wrote, and publishers who supported us again in this year’s endeavor. And on that note, here are this year’s winners, in alphabetical order by category: Audiobooks The Inquisitor’s Tale: Or, the Three Magical Children and Their …
2016 Finalists: What’s Being Said
We love all the reactions we’re seeing on Twitter about the winners, and thought we’d share some of our favorites! Masters of Disguise, Floodwaters & Flames, Plants Can't Sit Still & Sachiko are all @cybils finalists! 🎉 https://t.co/XzPuRIcXc3 — Emily Harris (@emily_harris) January 1, 2017 WOO-HOO! Weekends w/Max & his Dad is a @cybils Early Reader/Chapter Book finalist along with …
The 2016 Finalists
I feel intimidated writing this post this year; it’s usually the domain of our illustrious co-founder and overlord, Anne Levy. But 2016 has been a hard year for everyone, and that includes Anne. So I’m writing this in her stead. Thank you for being understanding! A few numbers, to begin with: We had 1163 books nominated, across all categories. Out …
It’s Almost Time!
I don’t know about you, but this whole fall went super fast for me. So when I looked at the calendar and realized it was almost January 1, I couldn’t believe it. Already?! Yes, already. Tomorrow, bright and early (well, if you live in the Pacific Time Zone), we’ll announce this year’s shortlists. So very exciting!
Kidlitcon 2017 – Call for West Coast Hosts!
On behalf of the Kidlitcon 2016 organizing team, we all wanted to let you know that KidLitCon 2016 was a big success! We missed those of you who couldn’t be there. Everyone who attended enjoyed lots of facetime with favorite authors, terrific food, and abundant swag. Bonds were formed with fellow bloggers and kidlit enthusiasts. The halls echoed with laughter! …
And… Go! Cybils Nominations are Open
The 2016 Cybils nominations are now live! Some quick reminders: First off, be sure to check out our category descriptions. If you don’t know where the book should go, please read through the descriptions to help you decide. If you’re still not quite sure, make your best guess, and we can straighten things out behind the scenes. Take a minute to check out our …