2016
Mock Caldecott & Mock Newbery
Mock Caldecott & Mock Newbery
2016 Caldecott Contenders (click here)
2016 Newbery Contenders (click here)
The winner of the 2016 East Holmes Mock Caldecott Medal for best picture book is . . . I Yam a Donkey by Cece Bell. A not-so-bright donkey says, "I yam a donkey." A well-educated sweet potato corrects him. "I AM a yam. You are a donkey." This leads to much confusion similar to the "Who's on First?" routine. Our students seem to appreciate books that make them laugh, and this one will not disappoint. The first honor book is Ellie, written and illustrated by Mike Wu. Can Ellie, an artistic Elephant, help her friends save the zoo? This is a great story about art and creativity. The second honor book is The Monkey and the Bee by C.P. Bloom, illustrated by Peter Raymundo. This is a hilarious sequel to last year’s East Holmes Mock Caldecott winner Monkey Goes Bananas. In this one, the monkey has a banana, but now he has other problems involving a bee and an angry lion.
The winner of the 2016 East Holmes Mock Newbery Medal is Echo, by Pam Munoz Ryan. Echo is an amazing book that pushes the boundaries of genre. I describe it as three parts historical fiction, sandwiched by a fairy tale, and held together by a harmonica. After reading Echo, you will never think of a harmonica in the same way again. Echo has important things to say about the value of family, the power of music, and the reality of injustice in the world. It introduces us to characters we grow to care about – Friederich in pre-WWII Germany, Mike in Pennsylvania at the time of the Depression, and Ivy in California soon after Pearl Harbor. All three share several things in common: a burning desire to hold their families together in difficult times, a love of music, and a mysterious harmonica that eventually pulls all three stories together into a surprising and uplifting climax. This book, which weighs in at over 500 pages, is likely the longest book many of our fifth through eighth graders have ever read, but it is, at least according to our Mock Newbery results, one of the best.
The 2016 East Holmes Mock Newbery Honor book (runner-up) is Stella by Starlight, by Sharon Draper. When the Ku Klux Klan's unwelcome reappearance rattles Stella's segregated southern town, bravery battles prejudice in this Depression-era story.