Shelf Life by Robert Corbet (Walker, 2004). A quasi short story collection with a wrap-around romance wherein each “aisle” offers insight into an employee’s “shelf life.” Best when it gives a peek into the scenes behind the shelves; worth reading for Rahel’s story alone. Ages 12-up.

Unrelated Thoughts

Lots of talk in the author community about how school visits are drying up. Many folks who’ve been full time authors for several years are going back to day jobs.

Authors might consider creating bibliographies of their own recommended reads–hand them out at events, slip them into mailings, post them on Web sites. Light a candle!

Cynsational News & Links

Shelf Life recommendation from Richie’s Picks.

Super Stories from the Supermarket by Sally Murphy from Aussiereviews.com.

A preview of “Letters of Imagination,” a silent auction at the upcoming 2005 ALA National conference in Chicago, is available at the Children’s Book Council Web site. Contributing artists include nine Caldecott winners and numerous other award winners. 150 original letters of the alphabet were created specifically for the auction. Bidding will start at $50. Find out more about the auction; see the art by letter (highly recommended); see the art by artist.

Frequent readers will notice that I’ve turned off comments for a while because I’ll be too busy to police them.