Michael Ruzicka, Office Manager, was raised in suburban Los Angeles, received a BA in Creative Writing/Poetry at UC Santa Cruz, then moved to Birmingham, AL, where he spent five years owning an independent bookstore and earned an MLIS. He has brought his librarian skills to Vanderbilt’s Television News Archive, Battle Ground Academy, The Museum of Contemporary Art-Chicago, and the Chicago School of Professional Psychology. Michael is very excited to be a part of Booklist and call Chicago his home.
In a sense, every weekday is award day here at Booklist. Our Review of the Day highlights especially noteworthy titles by giving them the coveted front-and-center space on Booklist Online. We rotate adult, youth, and audio titles throughout the year, choosing each title, regardless of star status, to highlight the spotlight in the current issue […]
The December 15 issue of Booklist is now live. Visit Booklist Online, where you’ll find 176 new reviews and 10 new feature articles and lists. The articles will be free to all for the next two weeks—to have unrestricted access, you’ll need to log in. If you aren’t yet a subscriber, or you do subscribe but haven’t registered […]
Every weekday we feature a different review on Booklist Online. These reviews are notable for different reasons—they may be starred, or in high demand, or especially relevant to the current issue’s spotlight. We’ve collected the reviews from December 3–December 7 below. Monday, December 3 Black Leopard, Red Wolf, by Marlon James The first installment in the Dark Star trilogy […]
As we recover from one family-focused holiday and are poised on the precipice of even more family time, it seems especially appropriate that Patrica Lockwood’s Priestdaddy was awarded the Thurber Prize for American Humor last night. Lockwood’s memoir of her move back, with husband in tow, to her childhood home in the rectory of her father-turned-priest […]
Being a very talented writer does not necessarily mean that talent also spills forth into the fictional bedroom. As seen from the current shortlist of the 2018 Bad Sex in Fiction Prize, even Haruki Murakami can be shortsighted when it comes to the biological facts. His nominated passage may be too hot for daytime reading […]
Every weekday we feature a different review on Booklist Online. These reviews are notable for different reasons—they may be starred, or in high demand, or especially relevant to the current issue’s spotlight. We’ve collected the reviews from November 26–November 30 below. Monday, November 26 Dirty John and Other True Stories of Outlaws and Outsiders, by Christopher Goffard Los Angeles […]
The December 1 issue of Booklist magazine is now live. Visit Booklist Online, where you’ll find 321 new reviews and 6 new feature articles and lists. The articles will be free to all for the next two weeks—to have unrestricted access, you’ll need to log in. If you aren’t yet a subscriber, or you do subscribe but haven’t […]
As an Englishman once said, “And now for something completely different.” The Fortieth Annual Diagram Prize for Oddest Book Title of the Year has been announced with great revelry and Joy of Waterboiling, by Christina Scheffenacker, has taken the prize! The title itself has even offered up the new meme-like acronym JOW. The winner simmered in shortlist controversy as the […]
We here at Booklist always love a good year-end list. While we’re compiling our own best-of-the-year roundup, the Editors’ Choice list (to be announced online December 12 and published in our January issue), there has been a flood of wonderful notable lists from national newspapers. The New York Times, for example, has compiled the staggering “100 Notable […]
Every weekday we feature a different review on Booklist Online. These reviews are notable for different reasons—they may be starred, or in high demand, or especially relevant to the current issue’s spotlight. We’ve collected the reviews from November 19–November 21 below. Monday, November 19 Becoming, by Michelle Obama, Read by Michelle Obama Who but Obama herself could narrate the story of […]
Encouraging Middle-Schoolers to Choose Books
There’s been a lot of discussion among the librarians I know about what to do with middle-schoolers: they just don’t seem to read as much as they used to. I know that here in Chicago, we have a unique perspective on this situation, since our schools run K–8. In my former school system in Maryland […]
Getting Started with the Global Read Aloud
The 2017 Global Read Aloud kicked off yesterday, and I’m here to help. Author and educator Pernille Ripp founded the program as a way to connect students and teachers from different locales around the topics of books. (Think One Book One School or One Book One City, but on a global scale.) Each year, Ripp […]
TWO TRUTHS AND A LIE: Practice Recognizing Fake News
Cindy: There have been a number of YA fiction books with the title “Two Truths and a Lie,” but we’ve found a creative, informational book for middle-grade students that reinforces evaluating information for truth. Fake news, anyone? Two Truths and a Lie: It’s Alive (2017) by Ammi-Joan Paquette and Laurie Ann Thompson is the first […]
Encouraging Middle-Schoolers to Choose Books
There’s been a lot of discussion among the librarians I know about what to do with middle-schoolers: they just don’t seem to read as much as they used to. I know that here in Chicago, we have a unique perspective on this situation, since our schools run K–8. In my former school system in Maryland […]
Getting Started with the Global Read Aloud
The 2017 Global Read Aloud kicked off yesterday, and I’m here to help. Author and educator Pernille Ripp founded the program as a way to connect students and teachers from different locales around the topics of books. (Think One Book One School or One Book One City, but on a global scale.) Each year, Ripp […]
TWO TRUTHS AND A LIE: Practice Recognizing Fake News
Cindy: There have been a number of YA fiction books with the title “Two Truths and a Lie,” but we’ve found a creative, informational book for middle-grade students that reinforces evaluating information for truth. Fake news, anyone? Two Truths and a Lie: It’s Alive (2017) by Ammi-Joan Paquette and Laurie Ann Thompson is the first […]
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