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From Cover to Cover: Evaluating and Reviewing Children's Books
 
 
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From Cover to Cover: Evaluating and Reviewing Children's Books [Paperback]

Kathleen T. Horning (Author), Stacy Innerst (Illustrator)
3.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)

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Book Description

18 and up

From Cover To Cover
is a fresh, up-to-date look at some of the best examples of children's literature today, and also includes practical advice on how to write clearly articulated, reasoned opinions so that others can learn about books they have not yet read.

It includes:

  • a short explanation of the process of making a children's book from manuscript to final bound book
  • a description of the importance of the many different parts of a book (jacket flaps, title page, copyright, Cataloging-in-Publication information, etc.)
  • six thought-provoking chapters that explain how ot think about and critically evaluate several different genres of children's books:

      books of information
    • traditional literature (myths, legends, tall tales, folktales)
    • poetry, verse, rhymes, and songs
    • picture books
    • easy readers and transitional books
    • fiction
  • a concluding chapter on how to write reviews that are both descriptive and analytical

From Cover To Cover is an invaluable resource for all professionals who wish to write book evaluations that go beyond a simple personal response.

This definitive guide to reviewing children’s books makes it effortless for parents, teachers, librarians, children’s literature students and general readers who are interested in becoming children’s book reviewers to assess the strengths and weaknesses of a children’s book. An authoritative reviewer in her own right, Kathleen Horning provides practical guidelines for reading critically, evaluating an initial response, answering questions raised during the first reading, putting a response into words, balancing description with criticism, and writing reviews for a particular audience.


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Editorial Reviews

From Booklist

Horning articulates the reviewer's goal as "an informed and reasoned opinion clearly articulated so that others can learn about books they haven't seen." Toward that end, she begins with an enlightening discussion on children's publishing and ends with a practical presentation on evaluating books and writing reviews based on sound analysis. In between, she divides the literature into books of information, folklore, poetry, picture books, beginning readers, transitional books, and fiction, and cogently discusses each one. Pleasing design makes the book all the more readable. The appended source notes comprise a complete, chapter-by-chapter listing of books and magazines quoted as well as those simply mentioned in the text. Anyone entering the field of children's book reviewing, or indeed, the wider field of children's literature, will find From Cover to Cover an excellent guide to analyzing books and presenting clear, useful reviews. Carolyn Phelan --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

About the Author

Kathleen T. Horning is the director of the Cooperative Children's Book Center of the School of Education at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. She was also a children's librarian at Madison Public Library for nine years.

Ms. Horning was the president of the Association for Library Service to Children of the American Library Association in 2007, as well as president of the United States Board on Books for Young People in 2003. She has chaired or served on a variety of children's book award committees, including the AmÉricas Award, the Charlotte Zolotow Award, the John Newbery, USBBY's Hans Christian Andersen Award, the Coretta Scott King Award, the Mildred L. Batchelder Award, the ALA/ALSC's Notable Children's Books, and the NCTE Lee Bennett Hopkins Award committees, and she was selected to deliver the 2010 May Hill Arbuthnot Honor Lecture.

She is the coauthor with Ginny Moore Kruse of Multicultural Literature for Children and Young Adults and of CCBC Choices, an annual publication reviewing the best books for children and young adults. She has a BA in linguistics and a master's degree in library and information studies, both from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.


Product Details

  • Reading level: Ages 18 and up
  • Paperback: 240 pages
  • Publisher: HarperCollins; 1 edition (February 27, 1997)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 006446167X
  • ISBN-13: 978-0064461672
  • Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 5.9 x 0.6 inches
  • Shipping Weight: 10.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
  • Average Customer Review: 3.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #210,287 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

8 Reviews
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Average Customer Review
3.6 out of 5 stars (8 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
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18 of 19 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Good tool for writers, too, February 3, 2000
By A Customer
This review is from: From Cover to Cover: Evaluating and Reviewing Children's Books (Paperback)
This book is should be an essential for anyone writing for children. Horning covers all the genres, offering insight into pacing, character and plot. She better defines what makes a picture book, an early reader, a chapter book, a mid-grade and a young adult -- definitions that are often murky in writing books. Although this book may have been intended for librarians and others in the book industry, I recommend it highly for anyone contemplating writing for children.
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7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars A better subtitle would be understanding children's books, February 1, 2008
By 
Ingrid Masak Mida (Toronto, Ontario Canada) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   
This review is from: From Cover to Cover: Evaluating and Reviewing Children's Books (Paperback)
I get paid for writing reviews of children's books. Most of the books that I'm asked to review are art instruction books or picture books because I also am a freelance artist. I thought that I should read this book to make sure that I hadn't missed anything. However, the title is misleading. It is not really a book about "Evaluating and Reviewing Children's Books". A better title would be understanding children's books. Only the last chapter in the book deals with reviewing children's books and that is the shortest chapter. Most of the book is comprised of a comprehensive overview of the different categories of children's books (non-fiction, poetry, picture, easy readers, transitional and fiction). If I had the opportunity to browse through this book in a regular bookstore, it would have stayed on the shelf.
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4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars Good book, a bit overstated, August 23, 2007
Amazon Verified Purchase(What's this?)
This review is from: From Cover to Cover: Evaluating and Reviewing Children's Books (Paperback)
First let me say that this is a good book, I am glad that I purchased it. It codifies many of the characteristics of a quality children's book, and helps writers and reviewers exercise better critical judgment.

However, the author sometimes "puts a bit too fine a point on it," as a Brit might say. There is a section on the layout of early readers and transitional books which describes a specific target number of words per line, lines per page, text size, etc. I found this section quite helpful overall, and I specified changes to our style guide after reading it. But as useful as this material is, I felt the author's attempt to distinguish numbers of words per line between level 1, level 2 and level 3 early reader books was taking the process a bit too far.

Overall, this is a minor issue. As other reviewers have mentioned, writers will find value in the detailed descriptions of how children learn to read, how they react to themes, styles and plots (and how to recognize weakness in each), and how to target different age groups. Indeed, this is the only book I have found with detailed and usable information on these points.

Summary: Buy it if you are a creator or reviewer of children's books.
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Inside This Book (learn more)
First Sentence:
Reading a book for the purposes of evaluation and review requires more attention to detail than reading a book for personal pleasure or for information. Read the first page
Key Phrases - Statistically Improbable Phrases (SIPs): (learn more)
transitional books, patterned language, title page verso
Key Phrases - Capitalized Phrases (CAPs): (learn more)
Little Bear, Number the Stars, United States, Newbery Medal, The Stories Julian Tells, Betsy Hearne, Goodnight Moon, Margaret Wise Brown, Random House, John Henry, Julius Lester, School Library Journal, Words of Stone, Caldecott Medal, Clement Hurd, Could Muffin, David Macaulay, Lois Lowry, Magic School Bus, Milton Meltzer, Mother Goose, Arnold Lobel, Ferret-Faced Freddy, Little Black Sambo, Sharon Creech
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