Beehive Awards

Winners of this year’s Beehive awards are always a good place to start when you are looking for something to read no matter how old you are.  The Children’s Literature Association of Utah CLAU conducts the Beehive Award contest every year.  Adults put in extensive hours of reading and discussion to winnow a list of nominees from the thousands of books published for young readers each year.  The five nominee lists are then opened to young people state wide to vote for their favorites.

See this list at http://www.clau.org/

The winners are announced in April.  Go to clau.org for a list of past year’s winners and this year’s nominees.  

You will find something for everyone.

There have been quite a few Candy Bomber books written and Tunnell’s is my favorite.  The photos are from Gail Halvorsen’s personal collection.  The story is well written.  You don’t have to be a history buff to be completely drawn into this compassionate Utah connection to post WWII recovery. 

Shark vs. Train illustrator Tom Lichtenheld will be in Utah in July as a guest at the Books For Young Readers Symposium – for details see http://ce.byu.edu/cw/bfyr/index.cfm

Do you agree with me that no one outgrows “kids” books?  If you do let us know what your favorites are.  

You’ll see a few of mine in a future post.

-Anita

Summer Reading Plan

Around here, most of the children are getting out of school soon; for students at BYU, most of the students left for the summer over a month ago. What better time is there to sit out in the warm sun and pull out a good book?

That's right, it's the time when libraries pull out summer reading programs for children, young adults, and adults alike. My dad always asks me the perennial question in the month of May, "What are you going to read this summer?"

Well, I have a light reading list this summer seeing as I'm doing summer classes, but this is what I hope to read this summer:

• MockingJay by Suzanne Collins
• Jesus the Christ by  James E. Talmage
• The World is Flat by Thomas L. Friedman

And I'm hoping to pick up a few more tutorials on website and graphic design. I am very partial to non-fiction lately.

What's on your summer reading list?

Come check back with us this month as Anita shares books that are excellent for summer reading.

-Hillary

Shakespeare's Love’s Labour Lost

Perhaps this is a single college student concern, but I found I ask the question that King Navarre would ask in a modern context: should I focus my time on academics and professional development or should I focus on a social life and dating? Often it seems that the answer doesn’t come when conscious decision making is involved.

In this Shakespearean comedy, King Navarre and his three lords decide they are going to dedicate three years to studying, and during that time they will fast and avoid women. It seems that when it comes to dating and courtship, it can’t be determined when it will happen. King Navarre and his court discovered this when the Princess of France and her ladies came to visit. After breaking their oaths, most of the kings’ court discovered that the others had broken their vow to study and instead spent their time writing declarations of love to the women. "These are barren tasks, too hard to keep, Not to see ladies, study, fast, not sleep! (1.1.48)

I can only imagine what this would do to a class grade.

Unlike other Shakespeare comedies, the characters don't end up together in the end. Instead, the women head home and claim they will return in a year.

Love's Labour Lost stands as an example of the frustration of pursuing love over other endeavors and not reaping the rewards from the pursuit. If nothing else, perhaps King Navarre and his royal court have grown more wiser from their affair with the French royal court. Hopefully their academics can be salvaged and they will keep the affections of their lovers.

Macbeth, an Example

When you think of some of Shakespeare’s works, Macbeth is often one that comes to mind; the tragedy that rooted from ambition. To quote Shakespeare himself, “Can one desire too much of a good thing?” In this case, the answer unfortunately is yes.

I feel like it all began when the three witches told Macbeth that he would one day become king. Even though his nature was not naturally inclined to do evil deeds, when King Duncan declared that he would spend the night at Macbeth’s castle, Macbeth decided to take control of his destiny and killed the King during the night. Fears of getting caught soon crept in leading Macbeth to take part in the additional deaths of the guards, Banquo, Lady Macduff and her child. His tyrannical reign soon lead to his demise.

I think one of the main lessons we can gain from Macbeth is the dangers of unbridled ambition. In each of our lives, there is always a point where we can decide to go forward with something or chose an alternative course. It was once Macbeth drew the hand of death on King Duncan that his fate was sealed. There was no turning back.

Let us remember the tragedy of Macbeth, keep our ambitions in check, and surround ourselves with those who encourage us to do what’s right.