SundayMorningReads

May is Asian-Pacific American Heritage Month. This past Friday, PaperTigers Blog had very interesting post on Japanese poetry forms. Macy’s is holding an online Asian-Pacific American History Quiz with the opportunity to win $100. HBO on Demand has packaged Asian themed movies for the month which includes a feature called “East of Main Street: Small Talk”.

Tarie, who blogs at Asia in the heart, continues to post fantastic information. A few months ago, she shared an e-copy of the fantastic book Alternative Alamat, which I really need to finish and review. Lately she’s been posting book award news you really don’t see anywhere else. Her post yesterday:

Congratulations to Sarah Jamila Stevenson! Her novel The Latte Rebellion (Flux Books, 2011) won the bronze medal in the children’s multicultural fiction category of the 2012 Independent Publisher Book Awards.

Recently on Twitter, an organization called Bridge to Literacy reached out to me. Their website states

Historically, libraries and librarians have actively embraced a role in promoting literacy, and the library profession continues to play an important role in this arena. Yet, there is currently no coordinated national effort among the library community to address the literacy achievement gap that persists for African-American males.

With funding from a 2011 grant awarded by the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS), The School of Information and Library Science at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and the School of Library and Information Science at North Carolina Central University will host Building a Bridge to Literacy for African-American Male Youth: A Call to Action for the Library Community in June, 2012. The outcome for this summit will be the development and dissemination of a white paper that will inform a board range of stakeholders about the magnitude of the crisis, offer recommendations, including a research agenda, about how the library community can actively address the literacy needs of African-American male youth, and encourage collaboration among the library community, the education community, and other local, state, and national agencies to address this gap.

To join the conversation, visit the Summit Blog at http://buildingabridgetoliteracy.blogspot.com and follow us on Twitter @bridge2lit (hashtag #bridge2lit).

The agenda for the three day summit is up. Presenters will include Alfred W. Tatum and Ernest Morrell.

For my Asian-Pacific Heritage Month post, I’d like to share this wonderful video featuring Katie Yamasaki, who I became aware of while reading Zetta Elliott’s recent blog post.

 

Review and a contest!

title: BorderTown: Quince Clash

author: Malin Alegria

date: Scholastic, July, 2012

main character: Fabiana (Fabi) Garza

reading level: 5.0

That Santiago! We left him in Crossing the line standing before a judge facing several counts and now we find him in the second book hiding in his girl’s closet at 2:00am from her mafioso father! He’s Fabi’s cousin, a secondary character who fills out well-developed story lines in this new series. While Santiago struggles with deciding how to shape his identity, Fabi let’s herself get pushed into having a quinceañera that she had every intention of avoiding. She was saving to see New York, something new and different. Besides, her parents can’t afford the expense of a quinceañera. Now, her Milo, Alex and her abuela, have challenged Fabi’s rival, Melodee, to see who can throw the biggest celebration. As we’re getting to know more about Fabi’s friends, we’re realizing how little we really do know about them. What are Milo’s intentions toward Fabi? What’s up with that cutie pie Daniel? Will Fabi’s dad’s health continue to improve? And, how much is Dos Rios, TX going to continue to change?

I really enjoy the way Alegria naturally incorporates Spanish in her text. She doesn’t use the clumpy explanations to translate what’s being said and quite often, you cannot translate in context. So, I’m hoping the final copy does have a glossary. Without sounding preachy or intentional, Alegria subtly eludes to topical issues such as health care, healthy life styles and the push/pull issues of immigration when you live in a border town.

The quinceañera celebration was foreshadowed in Crossing the line and now I’m wondering which of the topics touched upon in this book will be developed in Falling too fast when it’s released in September.

Malin Alegria, who grew up in San Francisco’s Mission District, didn’t want a quinceañera herself. Here’s why.

Don’t miss your chance to win the first books in this series! I forgot to mention in announcing the contest that I will ship internationally. ¡Buena suerte!