CCBC Choices comes to the Wisconsin State Journal

by Jonathan O'Connell

Librarians from the Cooperative Children’s Book Center (CCBC) are writing a monthly column for the Wisconsin State Journal, titled "Books for Young Readers." The column will review new books for children and young adults.

State Journal staff members used to write the column, but the paper decided recently to ask the CCBC librarians if they would be interested. The three librarians of the CCBC, Megan Schliesman, Director Ginny Moore Kruse, and Kathleen T. Horning, were happy to oblige. The three will rotate as writers of the column.

"For us, it’s just a natural extension of what we do," Schliesman says. "We’re reading and evaluating new books throughout the year for our annual publication CCBC Choices, so the idea to write the column makes a lot of sense." CCBC Choices is an annotated listing of recommended books for children and young adults, written by CCBC staff. The 2000 edition, available through CCBC, outlines 223 titles.

The column in the State Journal, which will appear in the Family section on the first Tuesday of each month, outlines various books for children that the CCBC recommends. Schliesman, who wrote the first part of the column for the Sept. 5 issue, says it is one way to highlight new books for parents who are looking for quality reading material for their children.

The CCBC librarians have also co-authored both volumes of Multicultural Literature for Children and Young Adults, in addition to editing and contributing to many other publications about children’s books and literature.