It's Monday! What are you reading?

 We are smack dab in the middle of Hispanic Heritage Month, which runs September 15-October 15.  So what better to add to my personal collection of books about libraries and librarians than Planting Stories: The Life of Librarian and Storyteller Pura Belpré by Anika Aldamuy Denise, illustrated by Paola Escobar.

I've been curious about Pura Belpré since I studied to become a librarian, when we were looking up literary awards to evaluate and enhance library collections.  From the American Library Association:

"The award is named after Pura Belpré, the first Latina librarian at the New York Public Library. The Pura Belpré Award, established in 1996, is presented annually to a Latino/Latina writer and illustrator whose work best portrays, affirms, and celebrates the Latino cultural experience in an outstanding work of literature for children and youth."

I now work in a dual-language campus, and we already have this book in Spanish in our collection.  I'm glad to add it to my own, and enjoyed reading how Belpré, an immigrant from Puerto Rico, became a librarian who made Latinx people feel welcome, seen, and heard in public libraries throughout New York and beyond.

I am also tackling another Bluebonnet Award Nominee this week:  Sweep: The Story of a Girl and Her Monster, by Jonathan Auxier:

I feel like I'm reading a modern version of Charles Dicken's Oliver Twist as told from the chimney sweep's perspective in Walt Disney's "Mary Poppins", with maybe a bit of little orphan "Annie" thrown in for good measure.  Nan was raised, and then orphaned by, a chimney sweep; it's the only life she's known.  She becomes an indentured servant of a cruel sweeper who puts a roof over the head of a ragtag bunch of children who work for him but offers little else in the way of comfort.  Nan is an expert climber of chimneys, but it's a dangerous job...and one day, she gets stuck.

I haven't read past that part yet!  I know that there's got to be a magical element about to appear, because of the title and the piece of charcoal that Nan has saved since her early childhood, the one that always seems to be warm...and now looks like it might have eyes...

It's Monday, and I'm celebrating Hispanic Heritage Month with a new picture book and working through the Bluebonnet Nominee list.  What are you reading this week?