booktalk Archives - Page 1281 of 1353

A Long Pitch Home
by Natalie Dias Lorenzi (Author)

Booktalk: Ten-year-old Bilal liked his life back home in Pakistan. He was a star on his cricket team. But when his father suddenly sends the family to live with their aunt and uncle in America, nothing is familiar. While Bilal tries to keep up with his cousin Jalaal by joining a baseball league and practicing his English, he wonders when his father will join the family in Virginia. Maybe if Bilal can prove himself on the pitcher’s mound, his father will make it to see him play. But playing baseball means navigating relationships with the guys, and with Jordan, the only girl on the team-—the player no one but Bilal wants to be friends with.

Snippet: Akash punches his glove, waiting for me to throw the ball. I know now that I am supposed to pitch the ball, not bowl it as I did in cricket. Eyeing Akash’s glove, I pull back my arm and take a step as I let the ball fly. Akash barely has to move, becuse the ball finds it way right where I told it to go–into the soft leather center of his glove.

Akash stands up straight and pushes his hat back. “Man! Nice one, Bilal.”

Natalie is one of my former students!

Tuktuk: Tundra Tale
by Robin Currie (Author) and Phyllis Saroff (Illustrator)

Booktalk: When one furry kamik (boot) slips off an Inuit driver’s sled, Tuktuk is in luck! But as he drags it home, Putak the polar bear, Aput the arctic fox, and Masak the caribou eye this little lemming’s prize and want it for their own. Can Tuktuk outwit the other animals and convince them that one furry kamik is no good for anyone bigger than a lemming?

Snippet: Tuktuk wanted that furry kamik. As the last rays of the setting Arctic sun glittered in his little lemming eyes, he said, “Putak, you are right. You need this furry kamik. I think you should put it on your . . . nose.”

“Really?” said Putak. He pressed his face into the kamik until it stuck.