Tuesday, September 30, 2008
Backlist Sites
Booklist Online
Carol Hurst
Kirkus Online
Peggy Sharp
Planet Esme
Publishers Weekly
Richie's Picks
School Library Journal
The Horn Book
The Urban Book Source (mostly adult content)
Monday, September 8, 2008
No to Age Banding
We are writers, illustrators, librarians, teachers, booksellers, publishers, educationalists, psychologists, parents and grandparents. Some of the undersigned writers and illustrators have a measure of control over what appears on the covers of their books; others have less.
But we are all agreed that the proposal to put an age-guidance figure on books for children is ill-conceived, damaging to the interests of young readers, and highly unlikely, despite the claims made by those publishers promoting the scheme, to make the slightest difference to sales.
We take this step to disavow publicly any connection with such age-guidance figures, and to state our passionately-held conviction that everything about a book should seek to welcome readers in and not keep them out.