Lakeview Choices for Caudill Award

The Lakeview results are in for the 2010 Rebecca Caudill Young Readers Book Award. If any of you have missed the 2010 nominees, here is a short description of the top three at Lakeview.

In third place -- Someone Named Eva, by Joan M. Wolf. In 1942 during the German occupation of Czechoslovakia, German soldiers would round up residents of a town and search through the children for those who met the Arryan ideal - blond hair, blue eyes, etc. These children, like Milada in the book, were sent to special schools where they were brainwashed to forget their families and were trained to become good German children who were then adopted by Nazi families and raised as their own. Milada struggles to remember her real family and heritage and resist the branwashing, hoping to be rescued and return to her Czech family.

In second place -- All the Lovely Bad Ones, by Mary Downing Hahn. This is a ghost story that takes place in a Vermont inn run by Travis and Corey's grandmother. There is a legend that the inn is haunted. Travis and Corey decide to bring the haunting to life by faking sightings of ghosts. Unfortunately there really are ghosts and they don't like being faked. This book really scared me as it explains the story behind the ghosts and why they never found eternal peace.

In first place -- Shark Girl, by Kelly L. Bingham. This story is taken from the headlines of sharks attacking people. Jane loses her right arm in a shark attack and has to learn to live her life with only one arm. She tells her story in poetry form as she is frustrated, angry, and feed up with people telling her that she will adjust to her new life.

In about 2 weeks we will hear which of the 20 nominated books is the official statewide winner. As you can see from these short descriptions of only 3 of the twenty nominated books, there are some great reads in this year's list. The 2010 Caudill nominees will remain on display on top of the bookcase by my desk for the rest of the school year. Please stop by and read as many as you can.