Why am I smiling, you ask?  This picture was taken Monday January 27 right after ALA officially announced the new awards for children and young adult books   published in the past year. I’m holding the daily newsletter that has all the winners listed….and boy did the Marie Holland Library end up with a good amount of them. Stop by the library to check out the display.  If we don’t have the actual award book, we have other books by the author.  This year VA made a huge showing:

 The author of Yaqui Delgado Wants to Kick Your A$$ (2014 Belpre Award) lives in Richmond, VA

 Theodore Taylor, III grew up in Roanoke and went to VCU.  He won the John Steptoe Award for writing and illustrating “When the Beat was Born: DJ Kool and the Creation of Hip Hop”