Crossing Jordan Book

Crossing Jordan by Adrian Fogelin won many awards.

The VOYA (Voices of Youth Advocates) Award in 2000
The ALA (YALSA) 2001 Best Books for Young Adults
IRA 2001 Notable Books for a Global Society (Honor Book)
Georgia Children's Book Award 2001/2002
Rebecca Caudill (IL) Young Readers' Book Award 2003
Sequoayah (OK) Young Adult Book Award 2002/2003
South Carolina Junior Book Award 2002/2003
Sunshine State (FL) Young Readers' Award 2002/2003

This book led me into researching 2 things. First of all, I spent almost an hour you-tubing Crossing Jordan spirituals (and then got distracted into you-tubing my favorite spiritual, Wade in the Water). The Grandmother in the book is frequently singing this song, and it is sort-of the running soundtrack for the book: playing in hard times when the girls are making their way as friends. Secondly, I needed to see what all these awards were all about. The book was good, but that is the task ahead of me for this read.

This book is about two girls who overcome the prejudice of their parents to become friends. Their friendship helps break down the barriers between the adults and their troublesome history with bigotry.

Mostly, this book won state awards. First things first--this is the first Rebecca Caudill Award wining book I have read for this class. Of course, I have read most of the winners of this award over the years without ever realizing it, which, I see now, includes everything from Hoot to Holes, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone to Frindle, Number the Stars to Matilda, The Giver to Shiloh. In her rugged way, Rebecca Caudill's defines a good book as one that "sticks to your ribs." I didn't know she lived and wrote in Urbana, IL, and that this award is given to the author of the book voted most outstanding by students in grades 4-8 in participating Illinois schools. Ah ha--I hadn't realized this was voted on by students! This is just like the Monarch Awards! Okay, now things are coming together in my head.

State Awards aside, this book is also an IRA Notable Book for a Global Society. It meets these criteria (from their website):
• Portrays cultural accuracy and authenticity of characters in terms of (a) physical characteristics, (b) intellectual abilities and problem solving capabilities, (c) leadership and cooperative dimensions, and (d) social and economic status;
• Is rich in cultural details;
• Honors and celebrates diversity as well as common bonds in humanity;
• Provides in-depth treatment of cultural issues;
• Includes characters within a cultural group or between two or more cultural groups who interact substantively and authentically;
• Includes members of a "minority" group for a purpose other than filling a "quota."
I was most proud of this accomplishment for the book. It does a seemingly effortless job of doing all these things. The book really rings true and doesn't feel contrived, which I think is probably the most difficult thing to do when accomplishing all of these things. It really belies the fact that there is a true story under here worth telling besides that of all these issues…a timeless one… of friendship.

It also won the VOYA Award in 2000. VOYA is a bimonthly journal addressing people who work with young adults, 12-18, and literature. I was interested in the fact that this group is owned by Scarecrow Press. I find it a real conflict of interests for a publishing group to be handing out awards and would like to know exactly which award-giving groups are funded by or owned by publishers (so that I can be skeptical of them), and what exactly their motives are for doing so. This is something I don't quite understand. Perhaps this is something we could discuss in class further. It would help me to know which awards I really want to take seriously, and which I want to question. I find a real distatste for awards being used as a marketing tool.

Finally, when researching what ALA/ YALSA (the Young Adult Library Services Association) is all about, I see that they have a new award for nonfiction beginning in 2010. I also hadn't realized that the Odyssy Award for audiobooks and the Printz Award for young adults were under this same umbrella. I see that the Morris Award, which is for a YA book that is written by a previously unpublished author. just debuted this year. Okay, now I am beginning to chunk some of this information on awards and differentiate it. The awards change; new ones are being made all the time.

Crossing Jordan was a good book, a solid good read. I recommend it. The most it has done for me for this class was to help me clarify for myself where these awards come form and how they are changing all the time and which groups sponsor them.