< Newbery Medal and Honor Books
Given the Newbery Award's prestige it would be easy to assume that the award winners are all excellent books for children. The Biblioguides Team has not found this to be the case. We always want to provide parents with the information they need to make the best book decisions for their families. With that goal in mind, we've put together a complete list of all medal winners and honor books since inception, and the Biblioguides Review Team is working together to read our way through the winners and to provide a review. Where we have not yet reviewed a book, a description directly from the dust jacket or from the publisher has been provided. In some cases, we have shared a brief synopsis from The Newbery and Caldecott Awards: A Guide to the Medal and Honor Books (1999).
Reviews are the thoughts and opinions of the particular reviewer and do not necessarily represent all members of the team. Reviews will continue to be added as the team reads more of the Newbery books. We hope this list will help you familiarize yourself with the various winners and provide the necessary information to determine which books would be a good fit for your family!
Young Fu of the Upper Yangtze
By: Elizabeth Lewis
Illustrated by: Kurt Wiese
Medal Winner
NOT REVIEWED
Is the life of the Chinese artisan drab and dull? What are his daily joys, fears, loves and hates? How do the superstitions of a hundred generations fetter his mind, and how is Young China defying the "evil spirits" to break these bonds?
YOUNG FU OF THE UPPER YANGTZE is apprentice to Tang the coppersmith. He personifies the new spirit that is rejuvenating an age-old civilization. The battling forces that make China the most fascinating enigma of the world today surge around this intelligent son of a thousand traditions.
Bandits, communists, boatmen, farmers, soldiers, artisans, scholars—all the teeming life of a crowded city thrilling with new vitality—parade through these vivid pages. The book is a story for a story lover; beneath the story surface one feels the solid foundation of a deep understanding of Chinese character, customs, problems and possibilities.
From the dust jacket
Children of the Soil: A Story of Scandinavia
By: Nora Burglon
Illustrated by: Edgar Parin d'Aulaire
Honor
NOT REVIEWED
Two very poor but ambitious and industrious children live with their mother in Sweden at the turn of the twenttieth century. The soil they hoe is poor, their crab trap washes out to sea, and a weaving contest is lost to the gentry. With a little help from a Tomte and a lot of work on their part, they acquire some livestock and the promise of a happier future.
From The Newbery and Caldecott Awards: A Guide to the Medal and Honor Books (1993)
The Railroad to Freedom: A Story of the Civil War
By: Hildegarde Swift
Illustrated by: James Daugherty
Honor
NOT REVIEWED
A LITTLE pickaninny played around the cabin down in Maryland where her mother did the cooking for the Big House. Hers was the freedom of childhood, but as soon as she grew a little older she knew she was a slave. Some of her masters were kind, more of them were not. She saw dreadful things happen to slaves who tried to escape. Her own head was struck by the stone flung at a runaway negro. That wound healed, but never the burning sense of injury in her heart. She resolved to escape.
THAT girl was Harriet Tubman, a real person. She lived not only to make good her resolve but to conduct three hundred slaves along the Underground Railroad that led to the North and freedom. She became known as the Moses who led her people out of bondage.
THIS story of a heroine who is part of the history of our country is told here for the first time in book form. The drama of Harriet's own life is intensely thrilling; the part she played in the life of a nation strikes even deeper into the reader's heart.
From the dust jacket
Swift Rivers
By: Cornelia Meigs
Illustrated by: Forrest W. Orr
Honor
Reviewed by: Sherry Early
Recommended age: 12+ for independent reading, younger for read aloud
Also read and recommended by: Sandy Hall
Children, and adults, who are used to reading more recently published children’s literature will be challenged by the language and somewhat complicated plot line of Cornelia Meigs’s novel about the journey to manhood of a young man who brings a job to completion in spite of many obstacles. The language is somewhat stilted by today’s standards, rich in vocabulary, and very descriptive. Once while I was reading the book aloud, the author used the word “exceedingly.” Karate Kid interrupted, not rudely but just wanting to share with us, and said, “I really like that word ‘exceedingly.’ It sounds good.” I say any author who can make an All-Boy Eight Year Old Karate Kid listen and notice words–and follow the story at the same time, by the way–is a talented writer.
Swift Rivers is the story of eighteen year old Chris Dahlberg, a farm boy in northern Minnesota in the early 1800’s, who decides to make his fortune and take care of his elderly grandfather by running logs down the Mississippi River. Chris and his friend Stuart take the logs all the way to St. Louis and along the way they learn lessons in both forgiveness and persistence. Subplots reinforce the themes: the significance of good character, the necessity for hard work and determination, and the importance of forgiveness and friendship. All these qualities are shown to be vital to true manhood and to survival in frontier America.
Read full review