I’ve discovered a great resource for locating new and fabulous children’s books.  While on Nantucket, I picked up a copy of the BookSense Autumn newsletter, children’s edition.  BookSense is an affiliation of independent book stores, and the newsletter contains reviews written by booksellers all over the country.  I took some time today and went through the newsletter book by book, looking up published reviews of each book in our library catalog.  Almost all of the books featured in the newsletter had received acclaim from journals such as Booklist, The Horn Book, VOYA, and School Library Journal.  And most of the featured books are so fresh to the market that almost no other libraries yet have them.

After considering all the reviews, gaps in our collection, and what consistently does well in our library, I ended up ordering about half of the books featured in the newsletter.  And I feel really great about what I ordered: some authors who are already favorites, some first-time authors who sound incredible, and, most importantly, I got a jump on these new books by following the advice of independent booksellers.  Definitely a powerful tool to learn about the best recent books.