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2020 Mildred L. Batchelder Medal & Honor Books

5 Books
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Mildred L. Batchelder Award is for an outstanding children’s book originally published in a language other than English in a country other than the United States, and subsequently translated into English for publication in the United States.

Booklists with The Same Tags

  • Brown

    Håkon Øvreås, Øyvind Torseter, Kari Dickson

    Hardcover (Enchanted Lion Books, June 4, 2019)
    New in the neighborhood and hounded by fort-wrecking bullies, Rusty is looking glum. And to top it all off, his grandfather has just died. Rusty is stuck sorting out his emotions while the adults are busy sorting out the “practicalities” with the hospital. But one dark night, after watching a superhero movie on TV, Rusty gets an idea… Dressed in brown pants, a black-and-brown striped shirt, a brown mask and cape, and his mother’s brown belt, the superhero BROWN is born! Guided by his grandfather’s ghost, two cans of paint, and a little help from his friends, Brown can do anything! Just as long as nobody's parents find out. The fantastical first book in the award-winning My Alter Ego Is A Superhero series from Norway, Brown has been sold into twenty-seven languages and is illustrated throughout by the now-familiar and beloved Øyvind Torseter.
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  • The Beast Player

    Nahoko Uehashi, Cathy Hirano

    Hardcover (Henry Holt and Co. (BYR), March 26, 2019)
    Elin's family has an important responsibility: caring for the fearsome water serpents that form the core of their kingdom's army. So when some of the creatures mysteriously die, Elin's mother is sentenced to death as punishment. With her last breath, she manages to send her daughter to safety.Alone and far from home, Elin soon discovers that she can communicate with both the terrifying water serpents and the majestic flying beasts that guard her queen. This skill gives her great power, but it also involves her in deadly plots that could cost her life. Can she save herself and prevent her beloved beasts from being used as tools of war? Or is there no escaping the terrible battles to come?
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  • The Distance between Me and the Cherry Tree

    Paola Peretti, Denise Muir

    Hardcover (Atheneum Books for Young Readers, Sept. 3, 2019)
    Recipient of a Batchelder Honor Ten-year-old Mafalda hides the fact that she is going blind from her family and friends in this lyrical, bittersweet debut novel from Italian author Paola Peretti that shows you how to overcome the darkness—even when you can’t see the light at the end of the tunnel.There are a lot of things ten-year-old Mafalda cares a lot about. Like, counting the stars in the night sky, playing soccer, and climbing the cherry tree outside her school. Mafalda even goes so far as to keep a list of all these things, because soon she won’t be able to do them anymore—because she’s going blind. Even with her bad eyesight Mafalda can see that people are already treating her differently—and that’s the last thing she wants. So, she hides the fact that her vision is deteriorating faster than anyone predicted, and she makes a plan: When the time is right, she’ll go live in the cherry tree, just like her favorite book character. But as Mafalda loses her sight, surprising things come in to focus. With the help of her family and friends both old and new, Mafalda discovers the things that matter most.
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  • Do Fish Sleep?

    Jens Raschke, Jens Rassmus, Belinda Cooper

    Hardcover (Enchanted Lion Books, Nov. 19, 2019)
    Some people die when they’re very old, and some in single digits. Only one thing’s for certain: none of us escape it. A fact and absurdity not lost on this winning ten-year-old.Sick since even before Jette can remember, her brother Emil now has died. The feelings that losing him evoke in her are huge and confusing. Most simply, it feels as though a dark raincloud has descended over her family. And then there's the ridiculous fact that nobody seems to know what happens after you die, and yet adults often talk as if they do. Told in the first-person voice of a wry, observant 10-year-old girl, Do Fish Sleep? by Jens Raschke is an honest, darkly funny look into loss, memory, and the search for answers.Originally performed as a one-girl play, Do Fish Sleep? was a breakout success at the box office, and received both the 2012 Mülheimer Children’s Theater Prize and the 2014 MDR Children’s Radio Play Prize. Do Fish Sleep? has been a best-seller in Germany since publication and has been translated into several languages.
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  • When Spring Comes to the DMZ

    Uk-Bae Lee

    Hardcover (Plough Publishing House, March 8, 2019)
    Batchelder Honor Winner, 2020 ALA Youth Media AwardsHonorable Mention, 2019 Freeman Awards (National Consortium for Teaching about Asia)Korea’s demilitarized zone has become an amazing accidental nature preserve that gives hope for a brighter future for a divided land.This unique picture book invites young readers into the natural beauty of the DMZ, where salmon, spotted seals, and mountain goats freely follow the seasons and raise their families in this 2.5-mile-wide, 150-mile-long corridor where no human may tread. But the vivid seasonal flora and fauna are framed by ever-present rusty razor wire, warning signs, and locked gates―and regularly interrupted by military exercises that continue decades after a 1953 ceasefire in the Korean War established the DMZ.Creator Uk-Bae Lee’s lively paintings juxtapose these realities, planting in children the dream of a peaceful world without war and barriers, where separated families meet again and live together happily in harmony with their environment. Lee shows the DMZ through the eyes of a grandfather who returns each year to look out over his beloved former lands, waiting for the day when he can return. In a surprise foldout panorama at the end of the book the grandfather, tired of waiting, dreams of taking his grandson by the hand, flinging back the locked gates, and walking again on the land he loves to find his long-lost friends. When Spring Comes to the DMZhelps introduce children to the unfinished history of the Korean Peninsula playing out on the nightly news, and may well spark discussions about other walls, from Texas to Gaza.
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