Schmidt Book Garners Another Honor

December 21, 2005 == MEDIA ADVISORY

Lizzie Bright and the Buckminster Boy, a 2005 John Newbery Honor Book authored
by Calvin professor of English Gary Schmidt, has recently been named a 2005
Gustavus Myers Outstanding Book.

Lizzie Bright was one of 10 literary works so honored year by the Gustavus
Myers Center for the Study of Bigotry and Human Rights in North America, whose
chief purpose is "the review and identification of outstanding books written
each year about discrimination and bigotry, and ways to develop equitable
future communities and societies."

The awards were announced this month in Atlanta, Georgia.

"Thank you for bringing forth to young people courage and resiliency through
adversity," the Gustavus Myers Center wrote to Schmidt in announcing his
award.

Schmidt's book, the story of a friendship between an African-American girl and
a white minister's son in Maine in the early 1900s, has as its backdrop an
actual historical event: the eradication of a small African-American community
by the white community that surrounds it.

"I came to this novel with a sense of anger - anger at the events that had
occurred, anger that so much of the story had been forgotten or swept under the
rug," wrote Schmidt in his acceptance letter. "But in the end, anger doesn't
serve a novelist for young readers very well. In the end, I want my readers to
come away from Lizzie Bright not just feeling angry and frustrated, but instead
feeling that much is to be done - so let us get about our business and do it. I
hope that this award can make that call even louder."

In addition to the Newbery honor (from the American Library Association) and
the Gustavus Myers award, Lizzie Bright and the Buckminster Boy has also been
named a 2005 Michael L. Printz Honor Book (also by the ALA) and received two
regional literary awards: The Thumbs Up! Award from the Michigan Library
Association and the Lupine Award from the Maine State Library Association.

-end-
Received on Wed Dec 21 10:54:34 2005