2014 Mock Caldecott Contenders

Last year, we had a ton of fun at our Mock Caldecott party and I'm really hoping to make this an annual tradition. In January, I'll once again be inviting my staff and our neighboring youth librarians over for food and picture books! Taking into account what I learned last year, my staff and I have been looking over picture books for the past couple of weeks to decide what our Mock Caldecott nominees will be for this year's party.

To get started, I pulled a ton of picture books - checking out other Mock Caldecott lists and scouring our New Book shelves for eligible titles. Here are some of the sources I used:

• Allen County Public Library's 2014 Mock Caldecott nominees
• A Fuse #8 Production Newbery/Caldecott 2014 Predictions
• Goodreads 2014 Mock Caldecott group (and this other Goodreads 2014 Mock Caldecott list)
• Watch, Connect, Read: 2014 Mock Caldecott

Staff had time to look through all the books I pulled (and add additional books to the shelf) and each of us was allowed to nominate up to 10 titles. Some were voted for by two or three people, someone only nominated by one. I ended up included every book that was nominated by at least one of my staff members, giving us a list of 21 books - maybe a tiny bit more than I had originally wanted, but I think it's still a manageable number.

Here are the books we'll be looking at in January:

• Brave Girl: Clara and the Shirtwaist Makers' Strike of 1909 by Michelle Markel, illustrated by Melissa Sweet
• Building Our House by Jonathan Bean
• Chu's Day by Neil Gaiman, illustrated by Adam Rex
• The Dark by Lemony Snickett, illustrated by Jon Klassen
• Dream Friends by You Byun
• Dusk by Uri Shulevitz
• Hello, My Name is Ruby by Philip Stead
• If You Want to See a Whale by Julie Fogliano, illustrated by Erin Stead
• Journey by Aharon Becker
• Locomotive by Brian Floca
• The Matchbox Diary by Paul Fleischman, illustrated by Bagram Ibatoulline
• Moonday by Adam Rex
• Mr. Tiger Goes Wild by Peter Brown
• Mr. Wuffles! by David Wiesner
• Nelson Mandela by Kadir Nelson
• On a Beam of Light: A Story of Albert Einstein by Jennifer Berne, illustrated by Vladimir Radunsky
• Take Me Out to the Yakyu by Aaron Meshon
• This is Our House by Hyewon Yum
• Tiger in My Soup by Kashmira Sheth, illustrated by Jeffrey Ebbeler
• When Stravinsky Met Nijinsky: Two Artists, Their Ballet, and One Extraordinary Riot by Lauren Stringer

I'm really excited for an excuse to get everyone together again and to discuss these great picture books. This year, I will be attending the Midwinter Meeting and the awards ceremony is scheduled to start before our typical work shift begins. I still plan to arrange for any staff members who want to come in early to watch the webcast to do so. We had a lot of fun with it last year and I think it generated a lot of interest in the awards process and in the books that won medals or honors. 

Anyone else doing a Mock Caldecott (for staff or the public or kids/students)? What's on your list? Any favorites this year?