From: Sally Miller <derbymiller>
Date: Fri, 27 Jan 2006 11:55:13 -0500

I hope this doesn't sound sour-grapish or self-serving; I've tried to be "disinterested," in the true sense of the word.
 It seems to me that today there is (and may always have been, for all I know) a large, large gap between "bookstore" books and "school or library" books. With library resources increasingly strapped these days publishers, to stay solvent, have to hope that they are offering books that will be picked up by bookstores, particularly the big chains, both retail and Internet. And the bookstores, to stay solvent, have to offer books they think will "sell." So the question is, what makes a book sell? Usually it's name recognition, I am afraid. So I offer kudos to the librarians and reviewers who diligently seek to promote worthy but unheralded books their wide reading has unearthed. Thanks to the reviewers, thanks to the ALA etc. for the awards that bring deserving books to public attention. And here's to all the writers (and their editors and publishers) who doggedly continue to offer stories they know will probably never sell in the tens of thousands but may engage the hearts and minds of the many children who c an't buy but still hunger. Sally Derby (Coming in the fall, Whoosh Went the Wind!, Marshall Cavendish)
Received on Fri 27 Jan 2006 10:55:13 AM CST