Fortunately / Unfortunately: The best and worst qualities of Newbery contenders
Now we’ve made it through two of our three nomination rounds, we should have a clearer picture of what Heavy Medal readers are seeing as the strongest Newbery contenders. But we don’t. Looking at the list, we have a leader (HANK HOOPERMAN with 15 nominations), but after that, there’s kind of a logjam. 19 different titles have between three and ten nominations. Last year that number was just ten. So over 20 books with solid to strong support, and not much to differentiate them in terms of nominations. Today we’ll see if we can focus in on specific strengths and weaknesses that might separate some of those mid-range nominated books from the others.
To do that, we’ll use one of my all-time favorite picture books, FORTUNATELY by Remy Charlip, as a model and play the “Fortunately / Unfortunately” game. If you don’t know this book, it’s awesome. Here’s a sample from the text as Ned tries to make it to a birthday party on time: “Fortunately a friend loaned him an airplane. / Unfortunately the motor exploded. / Fortunately there was a parachute in the airplane. / Unfortunately there was a hole in the parachute…” And so on (pitchforks! sharks! tigers! What a great story!) Newbery-level picture book text in my opinion, but that year’s Committee went with SHADOW OF A BULL, and I guess I just have to be okay with that.
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Here’s how our exercise works:
- Pick one of the books that you’ve read from our list of nominations. We’re especially interested in those 19 books with between three and ten nominations, but you can pick others as well.
- Keeping the Newbery Terms and Criteria in mind, identify one area where the book is particularly strong and fill in the blank: For example: “Fortunately, this book has very memorable characters.”
- Then follow that up with something you think doesn’t work as well. For example: “Unfortunately, the plot has some problems.”
- You can leave it at that, or elaborate afterwards upon the fortunate and/or unfortunate elements in more detail.
We did something like this a couple years ago too: we called it “One Plus, One Minus“…but I decided “Fortunately” is more fun…I just love that book! I like this exercise because it forces us to look at both the strengths and the possible weaknesses of books that could be near enough to excellence to contend for the Newbery Medal. It’s a little easier when you pick a book that you’re already not very high on, but you can also challenge yourself and choose one of your strongest titles. I’ll do one of each to get us started:
OLIVETTI (not a book I nominated)
Fortunately, the typewriter-as-narrator premise is original, fun, and mostly well-executed.
Unfortunately, the human characters and their interactions were less engaging.
I was all in at the beginning, very interested to learn how the typewriter would tell the story and also play a role in it. But I didn’t really connect with the other characters. Ernest was so self-pitying, and really not nice to Quinn in the beginning…it was hard to warm up to him for a while. His siblings were pretty much one-note characters (one likes sports; one likes frogs…).
THE ENIGMA GIRLS (I did nominate this one and still rate it highly)
Fortunately, the presentation of information was clear and interesting
Unfortunately, I had some trouble tracking with girl was which, especially in the beginning
In this case the strengths and weaknesses are closely tied. I love the way the author got so much information in and treated each girl as an individual with her own story. But I did struggle a bit to keep them straight. I think this got clearer as the book progressed, though, and I’ll look for that on a re-read.
So that’s how the game goes. Please post your own Fortunately / Unfortunately thoughts in the comments below.
Filed under: Book Discussion, Nominations
About Steven Engelfried
Steven Engelfried retired from full-time library work a couple years ago and now works as a part-time Youth Librarian at the West Linn Public Library in Oregon. He served on the 2010 Newbery committee, chaired the 2013 Newbery Committee, and also served on the 2002 Caldecott committee. You can reach him at sengelfried@yahoo.com.
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Fortunately/Unfortunately I was going to do Olivetti, but your sum up was pretty much what I was going to write, so now I have to come up with something else. (For what it’s worth, if I’d intended to do one for Enigma Girls it would’ve looked exactly like your as well.)
Fortunately Max in the House of Spies is funny and features a sympathetic character. Unfortunately, I didn’t quite believe the premise and felt it took too long to get to the training that was the best part.
Interesting Unfortunately about MAX, Alys. I had thinking that the different parts of the books progressed well. Max getting to England; then his school time; then the spy training. But I agree that the spy training was where it really got most engaging. The stuff before seemed needed to establish Max’s character and the spy possibilities. But now I’m thinking…maybe it did take longer than it need to?
I felt the same way about MAX. It just seemed to go on forever. I’m not sure this needed to be a two-part book/series, although we’ll see when we get part two if it is much faster paced.
Just read book 2 (comes out in February.) It has a different rhythm but is good.
I thought that the pull through of the watch making and setting up the multiple locations was so well done and gave important context. It prepared readers for what was coming and showed the character development as Max faces big challenges through big world conflicts. The tone was original. Give it a re-read.
I wish either the story had all fit into one book OR this book had been split into two–one with the Montagu family, ending with Max triumphantly getting himself into spy training, and the second allowing for spy training to be more fully fleshed out.
MAX’s biggest issue is its pacing. It just so firmly feels like part one of a story rather than a complete narrative. The whole book is a build-up to something and ends right as it’s about to happen.
Comparatively, while WESTFALLEN (used to compare because of similar themes) ends with a transition to a future book, the story stands alone. If you skipped the last page, you wouldn’t know it was intended to have sequels.
This is a fun exercise Steven!
Fortunately BLACK GIRL, YOU ARE ATLAS showcases excellent poems that stand alone and work together. UNFORTUNATELY the poems cover mature themes that may reach above the Newbery age criteria.
#yup
YA category. Maybe a Printz contender?
A book I literally finished minutes ago: Jupiter Rising
Fortunately, it had strong characters and pulled at your heartstrings. Unfortunately, I’m not sure that it truly stands on its own merit with the fact that it was a companion novel to Orbiting Jupiter.
That’s a tough one to gauge with JUPITER, but worth thinking about for sure. Especially with the scenes where Jack is talking to Joseph’s grave. It seems like those moments would have to be more powerful for readers who read the first book and know about their unusual friendship. I wonder if readers who didn’t read ORBITING JUPITER felt like they were missing too much?
So often when we identify possible shortcomings in otherwise really good books it really reinforces the need to read a book twice or more. On the second read I’d be focused less on my own involvement in those graveside moments and more on what the writer does to convey the emotion and meaning to all readers…
I did not know there was another book in the series and still really enjoyed the book. I did not know what I was missing. Now I need to go read the first one!
Fortunately, LOUDER THAN HUNGER is a compelling look at a neglected topic–teen boys struggling with an eating disorder. Unfortunately, I found there to be pacing issues. Not a lot happened over the course of the novel and it ran introspective and slow. There’s nothing necessarily wrong with that but I do wonder if it’s going to be a book that middle schoolers actually want to pick up. My guess is that this is going to be a hand sell type of novel.
I’ll choose one I did nominate – The Color of Sound.
Fortunately the author’s word choice and lyrical style lends itself to developing Rosie’s character. Unfortunately, for me the subplot of meeting a past version of her mother felt unfinished or like it didn’t quite fit.
I’m right with you, Ryan. Maybe the most evocative language we’ve seen this year, excluding poetry. But even though that was a fantastical thing going on in Rosie’s summer, it somehow didn’t really seem as impactful as her interactions with new friends and family or her interior thoughts and feelings. Loved that writing, though.
Fortunately, QUAGMIRE TIARELLO COULDN’T BE BETTER doesn’t waste any time in skillfully establishing the groundwork–characters, relationships, and incipient plot points–for an enjoyable, comfortably familiar story about a motley group of kids overcoming differences and obstacles to put on a show.
Unfortunately, one character, who in the aforementioned story would just be a standard secondary character/subplot, hijacks the protagonist, the story, and the reader to the increasing upset of the protagonist, the story that had been so skillfully laid out, and maybe the reader?
Fortunately, the new story, new characters, events, and an increasingly soaring writing style raise the emotional stakes and reader’s investment in the book.
Unfortunately, the new, harder story does not have the clean, unalloyedly happy/cathartic resolution readers might have wished for and expected even as the book’s pages run out.
Fortunately, the story Quag left behind returns in a satisfying way, in fact had been with him all along, a hidden source of strength.
Thanks for expanding to multiple Fortunately’s, Leonard. That also means more Unfortunately’s, but doesn’t necessarily mean we’re being harder on the book, just looking really closely at the possible concerns.
Fortunately, MAGNOLIA WU UNFOLDS IT ALL is distinctively funny, silly, and joyful. Unfortunately, many award-minded readers seem to find sad stories more distinguished than funny stories.
This is not a criticism of HM readers! It’s an observation about awards culture in general. A story that makes you laugh can seem less serious than a story that makes you cry (though MWUIA did make me tear up a little). Also, it’s easier to agree that a story about [insert sad/serious topic] is distinguished. It’s harder to agree on what’s funny.
Fortunately, MAGNOLIA WU is more than just funny. Magnolia’s quest to reunite lonely socks with their mates is a clever metaphor for uniting friends. Right off the bat, we learn that Mangolia has no friends (not to be mean, it’s just a fact). She’s reaching under a washing machine for a lonely sock. Magnolia is like that sock!
Unfortunately, there are many times when the plot stretches credulity. For example, I was confused by Aspen creating a trail of clues to lead Magnolia and Iris to a flamingo book to get his flamingo sock back. How did he have time to do that? In general, Magnolia and Iris have an incredible string of luck reuniting socks with their owners.
Fortunately, many great works of fiction are not entirely realistic. It does seem magical when you meet and connect with new friends and that’s the magic this book captures.
Great points about MAGNOLIA. I think the book does convey a sense of almost-magic within the characters world that makes the coincidences feel exactly right, and not contrived. And that comes from the author’s style, which is funny, but also purposeful. I’m not sure how much the illustrations carry that anything-can-happen atmosphere, but the words to a lot too.
Fortunately, ENIGMA GIRLS brought history came to life with the incredibly well researched and organized narrative. Unfortunately, I would highly recommend for double-digit ages and nonfiction titles have to demonstrate outstanding literary merit with an appropriateness of style for kids.
My pick for the 2025 Robert F. Sibert Informational Book Medal.
I would love to hear what HMAC 2024 member Kyra Nay thinks about it.
I’ve been talking a lot about WRONG WAY HOME, so for this exercise I’ll do ACROSS SO MANY SEAS.
Fortunately, ACROSS SO MANY SEAS is strong in its theme and setting. Unfortunately, we spend such little time with each character that development is limited.
ACROSS SO MANY SEAS covers lesser-known moments in Jewish history, and it’s rare for us to see a middle grade book set in places as disparate as 15th-century Toledo and 1960s Cuba. However, while we sympathize with all the characters, I feel like we don’t get to spend enough time with each of them to see any major character development – especially with Benvenida and Paloma, who open and close the story, respectively. So the overall impression I got was that the book was STRONG in its themes and setting, but I was left wanting to know more about these characters whom I immediately liked. I wonder if Ruth Behar was concerned about the length of the book and how appealing it would be for middle grade audiences if she made it any longer.
Thanks for the insight into ACROSS, Bina…I was wondering why I didn’t rate this book a bit higher and I think that’s it. The structure made sense, and allowed her to explore the themes from different perspectives and time frames. But it did limit the character development. It’s always a challenge with multiple points of view to make sure that all are pretty much equally engaging. ONE BIG OPEN SKY had similar challenges; it was all in a single story, but the switches between points of view meant all three narratives had to be strong (and they usually were, but not always I thought). I still think ACROSS is an excellent book, but your comment helps me see where it falls a bit short.