Innehållsförteckning för Vol. 118, No. 1, 9/1/21 från Booklist

Letter from the Editor George Kendall This is a particularly exciting time for us here at Booklist. September launches a new volume year, and how fitting to begin with a Spotlight on Sports, considering the spectacular summer Olympics many of us enjoyed in July. On a personal note, watching events like the Olympics motivates me to exercise, but, unfortunately, after a few weeks that urge passes. Holding an Olympics at least every year would be the best for my health. But I digress. Here we celebrate women’s tennis in the Adult section with Bill Ott’s Core Collection (p.30) inspired by Billie Jean King’s popular memoir, All In. In Youth, don’t miss a powerful and inspirational Writers & Readers, by Schuyler Bailar, the “first transgender athlete to compete for a men’s…

ADULT FICTION Apples Never Fall. By Liane Moriarty. Sept. 2021. 480p. Holt, $28.99 (9781250220257). The Delaneys are a nice family. Stan and Joy sold their tennis school and retired, and they have good relationships with their adult children, Amy, Troy, Logan, and Brooke. But one Valentine’s Day, Joy goes missing. The narrative flashes between the investigation into her disappearance and the previous September, when Savannah, a young victim of domestic abuse, shows up on the Delaneys’ doorstep. Though Savannah cooks and cleans, the Delaney children are suspicious of how comfortable she is in their parents’ home. Meanwhile, as evidence mounts against Stan, cracks in their lives start to show. Logan was dumped, and Brooke is separated and divorced. Troy is facing a dilemma with his ex-wife. Throughout the novel, there…

Spotlight Top 10 Sports Books for Youth The diversity within sports is on full display in this year’s Top 10 Sports Books for Youth—reviewed in Booklist between September 1, 2020, and August 2021—including fiction and nonfiction accounts of sports such as double Dutch, Muay Thai, skateboarding, and even one fantastical competition involving dragons.—Ronny Khuri Above the Rim: How Elgin Baylor Changed Basketball. By Jen Bryant. Illus. by Frank Morrison. 2020. Abrams, $18.99 (9781419741081). Gr. 2–5. This picture-book biography of NBA legend Elgin Baylor, impressively illuminated by Morrison, tracks the baller’s life from youth to the big leagues, highlighting his principled stand against discrimination, as well as his innovative basketball skills. Ana on the Edge. By A. J. Sass. 2020. Little, Brown, $16.99 (9780316458610). Gr. 4–7. Sass masterfully balances Ana Jin’s…

ADULT NONFICTION Journalism & Publishing Cokie: A Life Well Lived. By Steven V. Roberts. Nov. 2021. 272p. Harper, $27.99 (9780062851475). 070.092520973. In this adoring tribute to award-winning journalist, analyst, and writer Cokie Roberts, his multitalented, multifaceted wife of 53 years, veteran journalist Steven Roberts extols the skills and exposes the strengths she developed throughout her personal life and career. Readers learn of the bedrock values that supported Cokie in every endeavor, lessons gleaned as the child of the politically dynastic Claiborne family of Louisiana and from the marriage of her parents, Hale and Lindy Boggs, both of whom served in Congress. NPR listeners and Sunday morning show viewers long admired the uber-professional journalist and pundit who could provide keen insights based on her on-the-ground observations of war and legislative battles.…

Booklist Core Collection Women’s Tennis by Bill Ott With the recent publication of Billie Jean King’s much-lauded new memoir, All In, and the release of Oscar winner Garrett Bradley’s documentary miniseries about 23-year-old Naomi Osaka, who lit the Olympic torch at the 2020 Games in Tokyo (the first tennis player to do so), women’s tennis has found the spotlight it has long deserved. What better time, then, to showcase books about women tennis players over the decades? This list stretches from Victorian England to the present and covers key figures in the women’s game from Lottie Dod to Serena Williams. It should also be noted that, in addition to these titles written for adults, there is also a wealth of material on women’s tennis and tennis stars available in books…

YOUTH NONFICTION Older Readers Chasing the Truth: A Young Journalist’s Guide to Investigative Reporting (She Said Young Readers Edition). By Jodi Kantor and others. Sept. 2021. 256p. illus. Philomel, $17.99 (9780593326992). Gr. 8–12. 364.15. In this young adult edition of She Said (2019), the best-selling book about the Harvey Weinstein case, coauthors and New York Times reporters Kantor and Twohey offer teen readers insights into how investigative journalism works. The book begins with brief accounts of the authors’ backgrounds and motivations, along with exhortations about the social good that can come from careful investigation (wrongdoings exposed, voices returned to the silenced, justice restored). Next comes a detailed, event-by-event description of their investigation into Weinstein, set within appropriate and ample context. The accessible text, which includes explanations, character profiles, and conversations,…

YOUTH FICTION Older Readers The Mirror: Shattered Midnight. By Dhonielle Clayton. Oct. 2021. 304p. Disney/Hyperion, $18.99 (9781368046428). Gr. 9–12. Clayton delivers the second book in the four-book fairy-tale series The Mirror, following Julie C. Dao’s The Mirror: Broken Wish (2020). Zora Broussard is a young Black woman who flees to New Orleans from New York during the 1920s jazz era. She arrives in the South with little to her name except a pair of magical ruby shoes and the desire to be normal. Trying to forget a terrible accident her magic caused, she finds solace and a slice of happiness in singing. When Zora meets a dashing magical pianist named Phillip, their blossoming romance brings them into contact with an enchanted mirror that foretells the couple’s future. Their love story…

Fall 2021 Youth Preview by Taylor Crossley This announcement section offers Booklist readers a selected preview of especially notable new titles for young adult, middle-grade, and young readers. All titles will be published in the fall 2021 and winter 2022 seasons. Young Adult Nonfiction Become an App Inventor: The Official Guide from MIT App Inventor; Your Guide to Designing, Building, and Sharing. By Karen Lang and Selim Tezel. Candlewick/MITeen, $22.99 (9781536219142). Gr. 7–12. Feb 2022. The Call of Antarctica: Exploring and Protecting Earth’s Coldest Continent. By Leilani Raashida Henry. Lerner/Twenty-First Century, lib. ed., $37.32 (9781541560956). Gr. 6–12. Oct. Chasing the Truth: A Young Journalist’s Guide to Investigative Reporting. By Jodi Kantor, Megan Twohey, and Ruby Shamir. Philomel, $17.99 (9780593326992). Gr. 7–12. Sept. The Creative Gene. By Hideo Kojima. VIZ, $22.99…

High-Demand Hot List Proving there’s no rest for the weary collection developer, publishers are announcing 2022 books, including new titles from a wide array of popular writers. —Susan Maguire Anthem. By Noah Hawley. Grand Central, $29 (9781538711514). Jan. 2022. The next blockbuster from the author of Before the Fall (2016) is the Vonnegutian adventure of a man who breaks out of rehab with a woman named Louise to join a man called the Prophet on his way to defeat the Wizard in a setting that skewers present-day America. The Candy House. By Jennifer Egan. Scribner, $27 (9781476716763). Apr. 2022. Revisiting characters from A Visit from the Goon Squad (2010), Carnegie Medal–winner Egan’s latest presents a technology that externalizes memories so they can be shared, in a dazzling, imaginative novel that…

Spotlight Top 10 Sports & Recreation The subjects addressed in books about sports and recreation continue to embrace diversity, as is gloriously evident in this year’s top 10, which includes titles on polo in inner-city Philadelphia, treasure hunts, and Victorian spiritualists. Titles included were reviewed in Booklist from September 1, 2020, through August 2021. —Bill Ott All In. By Billie Jean King. 2021. Knopf, $30 (9781101947333). Tennis star King recounts her life and career in this sterling memoir about one of the most consequential figures in the ongoing fight for gender equality and human rights. Chasing the Thrill: Obsession, Death, and Glory in America’s Most Extraordinary Treasure Hunt. 2021. By Daniel Barbarisi. Knopf, $27.95 (9780525656173). Barbarisi’s mesmerizing account of a modern-day treasure hunt reveals a whole subculture of Indiana Jones…

News & Views by Sarah Hunter and Maggie Reagan Book Links Packaged with this issue of Booklist is the September issue of Book Links, which connects children’s literature to the curriculum while paying special attention to potential STEM connections. In this social studies–oriented issue, you’ll find annotated bibliographies that explore athlete activists, the Jim Crow era, and the Indian residential school system. A feature tied to Banned Books Week explores stories related to police violence, while a list of books about recess and play addresses the importance of social-emotional learning. In interviews, we chat with Newbery Medalist Laura Amy Schlitz, who heads back to ancient Greece in her latest epic novel, and to writer and educator Kate Messner, who corrects common misconceptions in American historical education with her energetic and…

WRITERS & READERS We Are Always Enough By Schuyler Bailar In the fall of 2015, I became the first transgender athlete to compete for a men’s team in any NCAA Division I sport. At our first meet, I stood alongside my new (male) teammates, our names blasted over the PA system. I remember feeling so overwhelmed with nervousness. As the National Anthem played, I reached for my swimsuit shoulder strap—a pre-meet ritual I’d done before every single competition for years. Of course, men’s speedos do not have shoulder straps. So, finding only my bare shoulder, tears stung my eyes. This is me, I thought to myself, looking out at the pool—my first true home. This is all of me. The echoey natatorium and crowd faded away in that moment. I…

High-Demand Hot List for Youth There are some big 2022 books from high-profile authors in this list, but don’t miss the titles sneaking in at the end of this year, either.—Sarah Hunter Ain’t Burned All the Bright. By Jason Reynolds. Illus. by Jason Griffin. Atheneum/Caitlyn Dlouhy, $19.99 (9781534439467). Gr. 7–11. Jan. 2022. Reynolds and Griffin’s genre-defying title combines text and art in a sharp, expressive exploration of what it means to be Black today. Cold. By Mariko Tamaki. Roaring Brook, $18.99 (9781626722736). Gr. 8–12. Feb. 2022. Well-known for writing comics, Tamaki turns to prose with this eerie mystery about Georgia, who’s obsessed with Todd, her murdered classmate. The Excalibur Curse. By Kiersten White. Delacorte, $18.99 (9780525581758). Gr. 9–12. Dec. The final book in White’s Camelot Rising trilogy finds Guinevere faced…

AUDIO Adult Audio All That She Carried: The Journey of Ashley’s Sack, a Black Family Keepsake. By Tiya Miles. Read by Janina Edwards. 2021. 9.5hr. Books on Tape, DD, $76 (9780593394090). A dingy cotton bag on display at the opening of the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History and Culture in Washington, DC, was so extraordinary, Harvard historian Tiya Miles was inspired to explore its journey. In 1921, Ruth Middleton embroidered this sack in memorial to her great grandmother Rose, an enslaved woman in 1850s South Carolina, who gave it to her nine-year-old enslaved daughter Ashley on the eve of their forced separation. She never saw Ashley again after the girl was sold. Within the sack was a tattered dress, three handfuls of pecans, and a braid from Rose’s…

Booklist Backlist Pro Wrestling Roundup by Ronny Khuri Like it or not, professional wrestling has always been popular with children—of all ages—and why shouldn’t it be? Wrestling is a unique form of theater, more about storytelling than dangerously roided-out meatheads smashing each other’s spray-tanned faces into steel objects. And it can provide a natural gateway into other storytelling forms, including books. The following titles are sure to pump up young wrestling fans, bringing the glamour, drama, and excitement of the squared circle to the page. Bump. By Matt Wallace. 2021. HarperCollins/Katherine Tegen, $16.99 (9780063007987). Gr. 3– After 12-year-old MJ discovers a school for aspiring wrestlers, she finds belonging in the sport and its community. Wallace, drawing on his own pro-wrestling experience, paints an authentic picture of the wrestling business, coloring…