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Looking for the best books for your kids and teens? Of course you are! Fortunately, the Canadian Children’s Book Centre  (a national not-for-profit organization founded in 1976) publishes just such a list. And we’re thrilled to share that sixteen Orca titles made the list for Spring 2013.

“All of the titles in Best Books for Kids & Teens have been handpicked by expert committees of educators, booksellers, and school and public librarians from across Canada. The reviewed materials include picture books, junior/intermediate fiction, graphic novels, and powerful teen fiction, in addition to a wide array of non-fiction, magazines and audio/video resources.” —Canadian Children’s Book Centre website

The following Orca titles were selected for the list this season. Congratulations to all the authors on their achievement!

Close to the Heel, Norah McClintock
Dead Run, Sean Rodman
Edge of Flight, Kate Jaimet
High Wire, Melanie Jackson
I, Witness, Norah McClintock and Mike Deas
Jump Cut, Ted Staunton
Kiss, Tickle, Cuddle, Hug, Susan Musgrave
Oracle, Alex Van Tol
Pieces of Me, Darlene Ryan
Prince for a Princess, Eric Walters
Pyro, Monique Polak
Redwing, Holly Bennett
Seeing Orange, Sara Cassidy
Shallow Grave, Alex Van Tol
Three Little Words, Sarah N. Harvey
Uncle Wally’s Old Brown Shoe, Wallace Edwards

CCBC members receive a copy of Best Books for Kids & Teens as part of their membership package, as do subscribers to Canadian Children’s Book News.

Best Books for Kids & Teens can be purchased at select bookstores or online at: www.bookcentre.ca.

The Canadian Children’s Book Centre presents: TD Canadian Children’s Book Week ~ by Holly Kent, Sales and Marketing Manager, The Canadian Children’s Book Centre

The Canadian Children’s Book Centre runs several programs that promote the reading, writing, illustrating and publishing of quality Canadian children’s books in Canada. TD Canadian Children’s Book Week is one of our most ambitious programs, and the results are overwhelming.

Each year, the Canadian Children’s Book Centre sends dozens of authors, illustrators, and storytellers on a whirlwind of tours in every Canadian province. The first Book Week took place in 1977. Eleven authors set out on the first Children’s Book Festival tour sponsored by the one-year-old Children’s Book Centre. Today, close to 35,000 children, teens and adults participate in activities held in every province and territory across the country. In 2012, 29 touring creators gave 396 readings in schools, public libraries, bookstores and community centres host events as part of this major literary festival.

The best thing, in my opinion, about TD Canadian Children’s Book Week is that so many communities who wouldn’t normally be included in an author tour are able host readings and presentations. Aside from the fact that authors are touring less and less, Canada is big – really big. Travel to less populated cities and towns can be prohibitively expensive. TD Canadian Children’s Book Week is sometimes a child’s first encounter with an author, and often their first experience getting excited about reading.

Willow Dawson, an author/illustrator from Ontario read at Eliot River Elementary School in Cornwall, PEI during TD Book Week 2012: “After the session, a bunch of kids stayed behind for autographs. Thankfully, I didn’t have to rush off to the next event so there was a little time to draw each of them a small picture. The next day I received a really beautiful email from a mother thanking me for inspiring her son to read for the first time in his life. He was one of the kids who stayed after for a picture! Her message really made me choke up.”

Each year, TD Book Week celebrates a specific theme for which books are chosen and classroom materials are created. The 2012 theme was Read a Book, Share a Story, selected in part to celebrate the 100^th anniversary of Lillian H. Smith becoming the first trained children’s librarian in Canada, and in the British Empire. The twenty-nine authors, illustrators, and storytellers who toured Canada were the very embodiment of this theme.

The 2013 TD Canadian Children’s Book will be held May 4 – 11 and we are excited to announce the authors, illustrators and storytellers who will be touring. Visit the TD Book Week site in September to find out what province/territory