Dear friends:

Why can’t I just have Barbara Cook write these for me?

We remain in the thick of our 2020 Boston Globe–Horn Book Awards festivities. We are just concluding nonfiction week, with picture book to come beginning Monday. (That is also my birthday!) Thank you again to the Horn Bookers, the judges, and the recipients for all you have done to keep the BGHB spirit alive during this terrible year.

For purposes of the magical video sequences with the winners [NB: the beginning of Kacen Callender’s interview], I now have a BGHB bowl and plate set of my own. But what to do with them? As gentlemen who joined households at relatively advanced years, Richard and I have lots and lots of bowls and plates. I may need to poll our winners from over the years to get some suggestions.

Over on Calling Caldecott, our own “third-generation Girl Scout who is raising a fourth-generation Girl Scout” Michelle H. Martin goes for a hike with Jennifer K. Mann’s The Camping Trip. I love picture books about sauntering in the woods (see also this note from me) but I think I am happier reading about the outdoors than I am about actually going there, never mind sleeping there, never mind…let’s just say they call it “going to the bathroom” for a good reason.

My birthday weekend reading will probably consist mainly of the new Tana French. I’m tempted to go instead with the third Chief Inspector Gamache novel, but halfway through the second I got a mild attack of the twees — that village at Christmas is just a little too perfect. Soooo I think a break is a good idea, although isn’t it always great to find an author you like and know they have many more stories to tell you?

Love,

Roger