Anita Silvey Children's Book Expert
Essential Guide to Children's Books and Their Creators by Anita Silvey

Houghton Mif­flin, 2002

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Essential Guide to Children’s Books and Their Creators

Upon pub­li­ca­tion, Children’s Books and Their Cre­ators, Ani­ta Silvey’s com­pre­hen­sive sur­vey of con­tem­po­rary children’s lit­er­a­ture, was called “an invalu­able ref­er­ence … [and] a won­der­ful resource” (Chris­t­ian Sci­ence Mon­i­tor) and gar­nered unan­i­mous praise from librar­i­ans, edu­ca­tors, and spe­cial­ists inter­est­ed in the world of writ­ing for children.

Now The Essen­tial Guide to Children’s Books and Their Cre­ators assem­bles the best of that vol­ume in one handy, afford­able ref­er­ence, geared specif­i­cal­ly to par­ents, edu­ca­tors, and stu­dents. This vol­ume intro­duces read­ers to the wealth of children’s lit­er­a­ture by focus­ing on the essentials—the best books for chil­dren, the ones that inform, impress, and, most impor­tant, excite young read­ers. Updat­ed to include new­com­ers such as J. K. Rowl­ing and Lemo­ny Snick­et and to cov­er the very lat­est on pub­lish­ing and edu­ca­tion­al trends, this edi­tion fea­tures more than 475 entries on the best-loved children’s authors and illus­tra­tors, numer­ous essays on social and his­tor­i­cal issues, thir­ty per­son­al glimpses into craft by well-known writ­ers, illus­tra­tors, and crit­ics, and invalu­able read­ing lists by category.

Reviews

“Afi­ciona­dos of children’s lit­er­a­ture get an edu­ca­tion with The Essen­tial Guide to Chil­dren’s Books and Their Cre­ators, edit­ed by Ani­ta Sil­vey, an updat­ed ver­sion of her Children’s Books and Their Cre­ators (1995). With an ency­clo­pe­dic approach, the vol­ume con­tains 475 alpha­bet­i­cal­ly ordered entries — 375 from the pre­vi­ous edi­tion and 100 new essays — cov­er­ing authors, illus­tra­tors, gen­res, pub­lish­ing trends and more. Writ­ers and artists sound off in entries marked “Voic­es of the Cre­ators”; inci­den­tal illus­tra­tions appear through­out. (Pub­lish­ers Week­ly)

“From Aesop to Zwerg­er, this title holds a wealth of infor­ma­tion about children’s lit­er­a­ture in an eas­i­ly acces­si­ble, alpha­bet­ized for­mat. To cre­ate the work, some mate­r­i­al was tak­en from the ear­li­er col­lec­tion, Children’s Books and Their Cre­ators (Houghton, 1995), and com­bined with more than 100 new essays on more recent titles. When nec­es­sary, infor­ma­tion from the pre­vi­ous title has been updat­ed. In her intro­duc­tion, Sil­vey states that she con­sid­ered “his­tor­i­cal impor­tance, pop­u­lar­i­ty, cur­rent inter­est in and avail­abil­i­ty of the books, and the over­all con­tri­bu­tion of the author or artist.” The titles “include cap­ti­vat­ing sto­ries, com­pelling char­ac­ters and imag­i­na­tive use of language—they appeal to a wide and diverse audi­ence of chil­dren.” In addi­tion to essays on var­i­ous gen­res, themes, and per­spec­tives, “Voic­es of the Cre­ators” pro­vide per­son­al insights of well-known authors and illus­tra­tors. The book also con­tains a sub­stan­tial read­ing list divid­ed into cat­e­gories, such as nurs­ery rhymes, infor­ma­tion books, and Japan­ese Amer­i­can lit­er­a­ture. A sol­id, handy resource for both pub­lic and school libraries.” (School Library Jour­nal)