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Canadian Library Month~ Canada

National Reading Group Month~ USA

Banned Books Week: Celebrating the Freedom to Read~ ongoing until Oct 4, USA

International Children’s and Youth Literature Festival~ ongoing until Oct 4, Berlin, Germany

3rd Annual Cybils (Children’s and Young Adult Bloggers’ Literary Awards) Nominations Open~ Oct 1 – 15

National Young Writers’ Festival~ Oct 2-6, Newcastle, Australia

Boston Globe-Horn Book Awards Ceremony~ Oct 3, Boston, MA, USA

21st Yukon International Storytelling Festival~ Oct 3-5, Whitehorse, YK, Canada

2008 Ceremony of Best Books~ Oct 4, Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia

Américas Book Award for Children’s and Young Adult Literature Winners Ceremony~ Oct 4, Washington, D.C., USA

Orange County Children’s Book Festival~ Oct 5, Costa Mesa, CA, USA

Children’s Book Week~ Oct 6-12, United Kingdom

13th Annual New England Conference on Multicultural Education~ Oct 8, Hartford, CT, USA

School Library Journal Webcast: Capturing Struggling Readers and Reluctant Readers~ Oct 8

Book It! Cheltenham’s Children’s Literature Festival~ Oct 10-19, Cheltenham, United Kingdom

18th Monterrey International Book Fair~ Oct 11-19, Monterrey, Mexico

YALSA’s Teen Read Week: Books With Bite @ Your Library~ Oct 12-18, USA

“Multicultural Bites” with authors Mitali Perkins, Coe Booth and An Na (part of ReaderGirlz’s celebration of Teen Read Week)~ Oct 13

Ubud Writers and Readers Festival~ Oct 14-19, Ubud, Bali, Indonesia

Frankfurt Book Fair~ Oct 15-19, Frankfurt, Germany

55th Jane Addams Children’s Book Awards Ceremony~ Oct 17, New York, NY, USA

IBBY Ireland Conference: Green Gables to Globalization: Crossover, Canada and Children’s Books~ Oct 18, Dublin, Ireland

SCBWI Tokyo Writers’ Day~ Oct 18, Tokyo, Japan

Children’s Literature Council Fall Gala~ Oct 18, Santa Ana, CA, USA

Vancouver International Writers Festival~ Oct 21-26, Vancouver, BC, Canada

The Big Picture Party: Celebrate the Power of Picture Books~ Oct 27, London, United Kingdom

Book Week~ Oct 27-Nov 9, Japan

Tomás Rivera Mexican American Children’s Book Awards Ceremony~ Oct 30, San Marcos, TX, USA

28th Santiago International Book Fair~ Oct 31-Nov 16, Santiago, Chile

Only a couple of days to go till the winners are announced – in the meantime, instead of biting your nails, hop over to the Cybils blog and vote in their polls for your favorites in each category…

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Growing Up Asian in America Art & Essay Contest for Youth~ entry deadline Mar 6, San Francisco, CA, USA

StoryFeast 2008 – International Storytelling Festival~ Feb 1 – 3, Vancouver, BC, Canada

18th New Delhi World Book Fair~ Feb 2 – 10, New Delhi, India

National African American Read-In~ Feb 2 – 3, USA

SCBWI Annual Winter Conference~ Feb 8 – 10, New York, NY, USA

First Nations Public Library Week~ Feb 11 – 16, Canada

ALOUD: A Celebration for Young Readers~ Feb 12 – 14, Toronto, ON, Canada

Taipei International Book Exhibition~ Feb 13 – 18, Taipei, Taiwan

Cybils – Children’s and YA Bloggers’ Literary Award Winners Announced~ Feb 14

Reading the World Conference~ Feb 16 – 17, San Francisco, CA, USA

International Australia and New Zealand SCBWI Conference~ Feb 23 – 24, Sydney, Australia

Freedom to Read Week~ Feb 24 – Mar 1, Canada

Kiriyama Prize Finalists Announced~ Feb 26, San Francisco, CA, USA

New Zealand Post Book Award Winners Announced~ Feb 26, New Zealand

You can find out which books have been shortlisted here. Winners will be announced on February 14th.

There are a couple of my recent favorites in there… which ones are you rooting for?

I have to admit that when I was my boys’ age (9 and 6), I’d never heard of Beowulf and I still haven’t actually read it – but it was the first book Son Number 2 pulled out of the Christmas pile. His grandmother was very impressed! And I don’t think he knew the name because of the film which came out in November – that hasn’t reached the wilds of Yorkshire yet.

Erstwhile Children’s Laureate (UK), author Michael Morpurgo and illustrator Michael Foreman have teamed up on a goodly number of books and their vibrant retellings of legends are always more than a satisfying read. So I’m looking forward to starting on Beowulf as a bedtime story soon: as are my boys, even though they’ve both now read it. They still love hearing stories they already know, as well as new ones.

Two Graphic Novel versions of the story have been nominated for the Cybils – we’ll find out very soon if they’ve been shortlisted; in the meantime you can read a review by A Year of Reading here.

Michael Morpurgo’s retelling is aimed at a younger audience – but then, as Not Just For Kids says, it’s not just for grown-ups! Thanks too for the link to this review of the film by Michael Morpurgo – the message comes through loud and clear: read the book, read the book!

Finally, while looking around to see what anyone else has said about Beowulf, I came across this moving post from author Uma Krishnaswami – Beowulf had a role to play in the setting up of John’s Shelf, a mobile book-shelf for taking books to children at the Children’s Hospital in Albuquerque, New Mexico – they accept donations of books in English, Spanish and Navajo – and who knows, it sounds like an initiative that could (and should) catch on…

As we come to the end of another year (already?!?), all children’s/ya book blogging eyes will be upon the Cybils 2007 finalists lists, which are due out on January 1st and 7th… what a great way to celebrate all that’s been happening in 2007 and bridge to all we have to look forward to in 2008.

To get ready for the moment we’re waiting for, Bookbuds has issued a challenge and the chance to win a copy of the pop-up Narnia…

There’s still time to catch Pam Coughlan‘s article in the latest The Edge of the Forest, which highlights nominations just asking to be read as bedtime stories …

…and nominations which have featured on PaperTigers this year include:

Shanté Keys and the New Year’s Peas by Gail Piernas-Davenport and illustrated by Marion Eldridge;

Hiromi’s Hands by Lynne Barasch;

Cracker: The Best Dog In Vietnam by Cynthia Kadohata;

Kimchi & Calamari by Rose Kent;

Rickshaw Girl by Mitali Perkins and illustrated by Jamie Hogan;

Artist to Artist: 23 Major Illustrators Talk to Children About Their Art;

The Arrival by Shaun Tan;

Twist: Yoga Poems by Janet S. Wong and illustrated by Julie Paschkis;

The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie – well, we’ll be featuring a review in our next update – I’ll put in the link when it’s available…

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…and not forgetting Mama’s Saris by Pooja Makhijani.

So now we wait with baited breath… We were a bit slow on the uptake with our own nominations for the Cybils this year but next year we’ll definitely be jumping on the band-wagon too – though choosing which books to nominate will likely be a struggle!

Before I sign off for this year, I just want to point you in the direction of Jen Robinson’s latest Literacy Round-Up – she highlights some wonderful initiatives in promoting literacy and reading aloud to small children, as well as providing much pause for thought, including Daphne Lee’s article about plans to label books in the UK with recommended age ranges… being based in the UK myself, I can see myself entering the fray there!

So, to all those of you who have supported us since the start of our PaperTigers blog in May this year, and to all those of you who have dropped in since (and maybe this is your first time), we wish you a Very Happy and Book-filled 2008!