A Notable Book

Awards, starred reviews, and citations—when and if they come—and wel­come as they are—need, I think, to be con­sid­ered as gifts, not rewards. I sup­pose some peo­ple sit down and write book a book intend­ing to win a New­bery. If they do, I’m will­ing to bet my bot­tom buck they don’t.

I’ve won my share of awards and they have always come as a sur­prise. I’ve also NOT won an award, such as when my (unnamed) pub­lish­er insist­ed I would win one.

When you do win you need to say “Thank you,” of course. Then go back to work. That said, one of the hard­est books I wrote was writ­ten right after I won the New­bery. I think it was hard because I had won. Expec­ta­tions beyond me were high. My own expec­ta­tions were impos­si­ble: A case of “I’ll show them it was no stroke of luck.” (It prob­a­bly was)

But what does the author gain by awards, starred reviews, and cita­tions? Gen­er­al­ly speak­ing, your income goes up, not because of any (if it exists and it rarely does) award mon­ey that comes, but because you get increased sales. That is to say that you get more read­ers. As one pub­lish­ing mar­ket per­son once told me, “Stick­ers suck in read­ers.” Taste­less but true.

So I was par­tic­u­lar­ly pleased to know that my 2019 book, The But­ton War (Can­dlewick) was just select­ed as a 2019 Notable Chil­dren’s Books in the Lan­guage Arts. 

It’s a hard book to read. It’s not hard because it is long or com­plex. On the con­trary, it is short and sim­ple. But it is a sto­ry about war and kids, and there is noth­ing to sug­gest a hap­py con­clu­sion. War is bru­tal, and what hap­pens to the boys in this tale is equal­ly bru­tal. That it is based on a true sto­ry doesn’t make it eas­i­er. “War,” said a famous Amer­i­can Gen­er­al, “is hell.”

But here is one review of the book:

“I so want­ed to like this mid­dle grade his­tor­i­cal fic­tion book set in Poland dur­ing WWI. But the char­ac­ters were just hor­ri­ble. Patryk, our MC, is a very weak char­ac­ter and a bit of pushover. He and his friends are the epit­o­me of meek fol­low­ers. They seem more con­cerned with the going along with Jurek’s rules than their own safe­ty and the lives of their friends. Jurek was a bul­ly and slight­ly unhinged. There was seri­ous­ly some­thing wrong with him. He cre­ates a dare type game to see who can get the best but­ton (from the sol­diers sta­tioned in their city). He much resem­bled a sociopath and I hon­est­ly could­n’t stand him. I did­n’t like any scene that he was in even though I knew he was to play the part of the villain.

“I did enjoy the parts that looked at the war com­ing to their town. In one aspect every­thing changed when the first bombs were dropped on their town, but as chil­dren, whose worlds great­ly revolved around them­selves, much went on the same as always.”

Which, of course, is pre­cise­ly the sto­ry I intend­ed to tell.

My own mantra is, “Writ­ers don’t write writ­ing. They write reading.”

That’s to say hav­ing read­ers is what it is all about.

Which means, I’m delight­ed to have received the citation.

Thank you.