Match: Keeper v The Ring of Solomon  v A Conspiracy of Kings Judge: Richard Peck And now, it comes down to this. Three books enter, one book leaves. Who. will. win? Better yet — why? Why will one book be selected over another? Peck brings both humor and insight to his judging: “We seem to have awakened into a new [...]

Match: The Ring of Solomon (my review) v. Trash Judge: Karen Cushman Cushman has wonderful things to say about Trash, calling it a “marvelous story of trust, resilience, perseverance, friendship, and ultimately hope.” Cushman then examines…. Oh, forget it. I have tried to be clever and coy by not revealing what the judges pick for [...]

Match: The Cardturner v. Keeper Judge: Grace Lin Listen to this — no, really! LISTEN. Lin both read and listened to the two books in this round, The Cardturner and Keeper. Lin, on those differences: “To save time, I listened to many of them on audio book while I worked on illustrations or commuted. One [...]

Match: A Tale Dark and Grimm v Trash Judge: Pete Hautman Hautman decides to channel his inner younger self while reading these two books. A Tale Dark and Grimm is “a forbidden fruit deliciousness here—like being a kid and having your most favorite and funniest uncle telling you stories that might make your overly-protective helicopter [...]

Match: The Odyssey v. The  Ring of Solomon (my review) Judge: Patricia Reilly Giff I love you, Patricia Reilly Giff. Having just stayed up till 2 in the morning reading a book because the thought of sleeping before finishing it was unthinkable (White Cat by Holly Black), I so appreciate this description of that “I should be [...]

Match: Barbie v Keeper Judge: Naomi Shihab Nye Nye is a poet, and she starts with allusions to one of my favorite poems from one of my favorite poetry books: Robert Louis Stevenson’s A Child’s Garden of Verses. Nye’s own language is wonderful: “Languid, overheated/chilled lostness enables focused horizontal absorption into material,” “bravado-spirit,” “Americana historiana,” [...]

Match: The Cardturner v Countdown Judge: Laura Amy Schlitz Let us be clear about something: all the books in contention for SLJ BoB are good books, or they wouldn’t be here on this list. One may say that a book is not a perfect book, but how often are books perfect? One may say other [...]

Match: Trash by Andy Mulligan v Will Grayson, Will Grayson by John Green and David Levithan. Judge: Mitali Perkins Perkins approached this by examining the elements of the two books. I have to laugh at this, because it is so familiar! I don’t have a “list” that I use for reviews, but when I’ve been on a committee I [...]

Match: A Tale Dark and Grimm by Adam Gidwitz v They Called Themselves the K.K.K. by Susan Campbell Bartoletti (my review) Judge: R.L. Stine R.L. Stine – best known for the nightmares he creates for readers in his books. Guess what? Stine can add another notch to the nightmares he gives — this time to authors! Stine is [...]

Match: The Ring of Solomon by Jonathan Stroud (my review) v Sugar Changed the World by Marc Aronson and Marina Budhos Judge: Adam Rex Oh, sugar, sugar. You know what is made of awesome sauce? Using footnotes in writing about a Bartimaeus novel. Rex gets it! “I’m even going to go out on a limb and say that [...]