Books Received

A to Zoo: Subject Access to Children's Picture Books. 7th ed. By Carolyn W. Lima and John A. Lima. Westport, CT: Libraries Unlimited, 2006.

Now in its seventh edition, this standard reference work has long been a favorite tool that children's librarians use in order answer many of the questions that they are asked. Often a child or parent will approach a children's librarian and ask a question like the one I put to a librarian I know. "My son is interested in knights," I said. "Do you know of any picture books about knights?" She took out A to Zoo, looked under the heading of knights, and read me the titles of six books. In addition to knights, this edition of A to Zoo provides 1,350 other subject headings. Over 28,000 picture books for preschool children through second graders are listed in this reference work.

Beautiful Angiola: The Lost Sicilian Folk and Fairy Tales of Laura Gozenbach. Trans. Jack Zipes. New York: Routledge, 2006.

In the late nineteenth century Laura Gozenbach published a series of Sicilian fairy tales, which she collected while she was living in Sicily but wrote down in her native German. These tales were never translated into English until Jack Zipes took it upon himself to introduce them to the English-speaking world a few years ago. In 2003 Zipes brought out a collection of Gozenbach's tales, which he translated into English, and the next year he brought out a second collection. In this latest volume, Zipes brings together all of the tales included in his first two collections along with two more tales that he discovered and translated. This volume should appeal to anyone who enjoys traditional fairy tales as well as scholars who are interested in the cultural history of Europe.

Brazilian Folktales. By Livia de Almeida and Ana Portella. Ed. Margaret Read MacDonald. Westport, CT: Libraries Unlimited, 2006.

Part of Libraries Unlimited's World Folklore Series, this collection consists of forty folktales, along with background information, color photographs, and even a few recipes.

The Children's and Young Adult's Literature Handbook: A Research and Reference Guide. By John T. Gillespie. Westport, CT: Libraries Unlimited, 2005.

This annotated bibliography provides detailed information on over 1,000 publications that deal with children's literature. In addition to covering scholarly books and reference works, John Gillespie includes entries on periodicals, professional organizations, special library collections, and Web sites.

Children's Literature Studies: Cases and Discussions. By Linda C. Salem. Westport, CT: Libraries Unlimited, 2006.

Intended as a supplement to the standard children's literature textbooks used in education and library science departments, this book provides future teachers, librarians, and media specialists with a thoughtful introduction to the topics of book selection and censorship.

Extreme Teens: Library Services to Nontraditional Young Adults. By Sheila B. Anderson. Westport, CT: Libraries Unlimited, 2005.

Sheila Anderson sees her audience as librarians who work with young adults, but her book touches on topics that would intrigue anyone who has an interest in adolescent literature. She focuses on teenagers who have dropped out of school, broken the law, or are "nontraditional" in other ways, and she provides helpful suggestions on how to introduce these "extreme teens" to books that relate to their lives.

Rituals and Patterns in Children's Lives. Ed. Kathy Merlock Jackson. Madison: U of Wisconsin P, 2005.

The contributors to this scholarly volume examine the various ways that rituals shape children's lives in such areas as family, religion, education, and play. Several of the chapters have direct connections to children's literature.

Understanding Children's Literature. 2nd ed. Ed. Peter Hunt. London and New York: Routledge, 2005.

Taken together, the fourteen essays included in this volume provide readers with an excellent introduction to the application of literary theory to children's literature. The contributors include some of the leading critics and scholars in the field of children's literature studies, such as John Stephens, Hamida Bosmajian, Lissa Paul, Christine Wilkie...