I was a horrible child.
My mother likes to tell me all about it, especially now that I have my own baby girl, but it really is true: I cried and cried and cried and cried, and the only thing that made me quiet down was being plunked in front of the tv when Sesame Street was on. My poor, beleaguered, tortured, noble, self-sacrificing parents (mom’s influence on the story becomes more evident as it goes on) would collapse for a catnap or snatch a bite of food, and I would raptly watch for an hour before the show ended and I resumed my screaming. Thanks to Big Bird, Oscar, and especially Cookie Monster, I was talking at 6 months (my first word was “cookie,” and even yet my favorite color is blue) and learned to read by myself. By kindergarten I had gone through all the Nancy Drew books, and I knew how many books each library branch allowed you to take out at once. All this is just to explain how my love of reading began. It hasn’t lessened over the years, and I still love children’s books the best. One day I realized that quite a few of my favorites had the same sticker on the cover; it was round and shiny and said “Newbery.” I looked at my bookshelves and realized I had more than forty books with the same sticker. I also realized that looking up the other books that had won the same award would likely be an excellent way to find more books I might love.
Luckily for me, there are a LOT of Newbery books – as of right now, there are 397. Most years (beginning in 1922), there is one book awarded the Newbery Medal, and any number of runners-up named Newbery Honor books (occasionally there is a year when no medal is awarded, but that hasn’t happened in a long time). I currently have at least a reading copy (i.e. a copy that’s not particularly valuable, usually a paperback that I’ve read so many times and loved so much that it’s falling to pieces) of 330 of them. I’m also collecting first printings, but as I have a minimal (read: nonexistent) budget for such things, this is happening verrry verrry slowly. You can get a decent copy of some of the more obscure books for $50-100, but last time I checked, a first-run signed copy of A Wrinkle in Time, for instance, my very favorite, was running about $12k. If you happen to be a benevolent millionaire, give me a call.
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In any case, I love to discuss the books themselves, and also the authors and related miscellany, so a blog was inevitable. I like to make lists, so I’ll have a detailed list of my collection (mostly for my own reference, as I tend to lose or forget to update it elsewhere), as well as lists of the books and authors, in various formats (such as the list of currently-living authors and their websites, so that if you found yourself reading a book review and wanted to, say, find out if the author was touring so that you could go hear him or her speak, you would be able to do so). If there’s anything missing that you’d like to see, feel free to comment or message me, and I’ll see what I can do!
P.S. And like, for serious reals: benevolent millionaires. Or just generous people who are financially irresponsible. I’m not picky.
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