The Newbery Chronicles

Two podcasting maniacs discuss one West Philly maniac as we talk about Jerry Spinelli's Maniac Magee.

Discussion of the book begins at 27:14.

We'd love to hear from you! Email us at newberychronicles@gmail.com!

Special thanks to Jake Ward for creating our theme music! Check him out at https://jaekwrad.bandcamp.com/album/draw-jaek-2.

Will our episode on Patricia MacLachlan's Sarah, Plain and Tall be a podcast, short and sweet? Listen to find out!

Discussion of the book begins at 19:06.

We'd love to hear from you! Email us at newberychronicles@gmail.com!

Special thanks to Jake Ward for creating our theme music! Check him out at https://jaekwrad.bandcamp.com/album/draw-jaek-2.

Talkin' Robert C. O'Brien's Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH. We tried something new this episode! Our son read this book with us, so we edited in some comments that he had about it. Hope you enjoy (or at least tolerate) us doing something cute.

Discussion of the book begins at 27:11.

We'd love to hear from you! Email us at newberychronicles@gmail.com!

Special thanks to Jake Ward for creating our theme music! Check him out at https://jaekwrad.bandcamp.com/album/draw-jaek-2.

Taking a brief break from the Newbery Medal to discuss our reading habits/favs from 2025!

We'd love to hear from you! Email us at newberychronicles@gmail.com!

Special thanks to Jake Ward for creating our theme music! Check him out at https://jaekwrad.bandcamp.com/album/draw-jaek-2.

Back in the '60s again, so you know it's gonna be good! This time, Rebecca and Michael are discussing Emily Cheney Neville's It's Like This, Cat, which is not a line of dialogue from a hard-boiled noir, unfortunately.

Discussion of the book begins at 25:35.

We'd love to hear from you! Email us at newberychronicles@gmail.com!

Special thanks to Jake Ward for creating our theme music! Check him out at https://jaekwrad.bandcamp.com/album/draw-jaek-2.

...And now the podcast episode where Rebecca and Michael discuss ...And Now Miguel, the 1954 Newbery Medal winner, written by Joseph Krumgold.

Discussion of the book begins at 25:40.

We'd love to hear from you! Email us at newberychronicles@gmail.com!

Special thanks to Jake Ward for creating our theme music! Check him out at https://jaekwrad.bandcamp.com/album/draw-jaek-2.

Will Michael and Rebecca remain skeptical of Johnny Tremain, or will author Esther prove too Forbes-midable of a novelist to resist?

Discussion of the book begins at 18:09.

We'd love to hear from you! Email us at newberychronicles@gmail.com!

Special thanks to Jake Ward for creating our theme music! Check him out at https://jaekwrad.bandcamp.com/album/draw-jaek-2.

Michael and Rebecca discuss the 1936 Newbery Medal winner, Carol Ryrie (NOT Rylie) Brink's Caddie Woodlawn.

Discussion of the book begins at 17:09.

We'd love to hear from you! Email us at newberychronicles@gmail.com!

Special thanks to Jake Ward for creating our theme music! Check him out at https://jaekwrad.bandcamp.com/album/draw-jaek-2.

The cycle begins again: we're back in the 1920s with Eric P. Kelly's 1929 medal-winning book The Trumpeter of Krakow.

Discussion of the book begins at 24:53.

We'd love to hear from you! Email us at newberychronicles@gmail.com!

Special thanks to Jake Ward for creating our theme music! Check him out at https://jaekwrad.bandcamp.com/album/draw-jaek-2.

Your fearless hosts discuss the most recent Newbery Medal winner, Dave Eggers's The Eyes and the Impossible.

Discussion of the book begins at 14:37.

We'd love to hear from you! Email us at newberychronicles@gmail.com!

Special thanks to Jake Ward for creating our theme music! Check him out at https://jaekwrad.bandcamp.com/album/draw-jaek-2.

What better time than March of 2025 to do a retrospective of our reading in 2024?

We'd love to hear from you! Email us at newberychronicles@gmail.com!

Special thanks to Jake Ward for creating our theme music! Check him out at https://jaekwrad.bandcamp.com/album/draw-jaek-2.

After a slightly less lengthy hiatus than last time, we're back again, talking about Katherine Applegate's The One and Only Ivan!

Discussion of the book begins at 13:28.

We'd love to hear from you! Email us at newberychronicles@gmail.com!

Special thanks to Jake Ward for creating our theme music! Check him out at https://jaekwrad.bandcamp.com/album/draw-jaek-2.

After a lengthy hiatus, we ring in the new year by talking about Cynthia Kadohata's slice-of-life novel Kira-Kira. Sorry it's been so long!

Discussion of the book begins at 16:37.

We'd love to hear from you! Email us at newberychronicles@gmail.com!

Special thanks to Jake Ward for creating our theme music! Check him out at https://jaekwrad.bandcamp.com/album/draw-jaek-2.

Rebecca and Michael check out Cynthia Rylant's short and sweet Missing May.

Discussion of the book begins at 7:30.

We'd love to hear from you! Email us at newberychronicles@gmail.com!

Special thanks to Jake Ward for creating our theme music! Check him out at https://jaekwrad.bandcamp.com/album/draw-jaek-2.

Katherine Paterson's Jacob Have I Loved have we discussed.

Discussion of the book begins at 14:30.

We'd love to hear from you! Email us at newberychronicles@gmail.com!

Special thanks to Jake Ward for creating our theme music! Check him out at https://jaekwrad.bandcamp.com/album/draw-jaek-2.

We did it! We finally released another episode! Sorry it took us two months to read The Westing Game, by Ellen Raskin.

Discussion of the book begins at 18:30 (thanks to a listener for suggesting that we say when the discussion begins, in case people want to skip our "what we read recently" part!)

We'd love to hear from you! Email us at: newberychronicles@gmail.com

Michael and Rebecca discuss Scott O'Dell's Island of the Blue Dolphins, which has a heavy historical context. Rebecca talks about a few different sources that shed light on some indigenous perspectives, and here they are:

We'd love to hear from you! Email us at: newberychronicles@gmail.com

We're back with Eleanor Estes's Ginger Pye, the 1952 medal winner. Sorry for the lengthy hiatus! We're just bad at podcasting on a regular schedule, especially when it comes to talking about books about dogs.

We'd love to hear from you! Email us at: newberychronicles@gmail.com!

Just chillin with a stick with a nut for a head. That's what Rebecca and Michael are doing.

Rebecca and Michael talk about The Cat Who Went to Heaven about as long as they talked about the other books they're reading right now, if that gives you any indication of how interesting this book is.

We'd love to hear from you! Email us at: newberychronicles@gmail.com

If Rebecca and Michael could talk to the animals, they'd probably try to get them to listen to the Newbery Chronicles. If the animals listened to this episode, they'd hear us discuss the Hugh Lofting's 1923 Newbery Medal winner, The Voyages of Doctor Dolittle.

In the spirit of the new year, our steadfast pair runs through some notable books they read in 2023!

Michael and Rebecca fight in their discussion about the (for now) most recent Newbery Medal winner, Amina Luqman-Dawson's Freewater. Who won? Was blood drawn? You'll have to listen to find out.

We'd love to hear from you. Email us at: newberychronicles@gmail.com!

We hope you find our discussion about Kate DiCamillo's 2014 "illuminated adventure"... uh, illuminating.

If you have feedback, we'd love to hear it! Email us at newberychronicles@gmail.com!

Michael and Rebecca talk about Christopher Paul Curtis's 2000 medal winner, Bud, Not Buddy. That's pretty much it.If you have feedback, we'd love to hear it! Email us at: newberychronicles@gmail.com!

Talkin' about a dog book this week: Phyllis Reynolds Naylor's Shiloh.If you have feedback, we'd love to hear it! Email us at: newberychronicles@gmail.com!

We discuss legend and national hero Beverly Cleary's sole Newbery Medal win, Dear Mr. Henshaw. Plus a new segment at the beginning where we talk about what we're reading (besides Newbery books)!If you have any thoughts, let us know! Email us: newberychronicles@gmail.com!Also, shout out to Jake Ward for our theme music! Check out his bandcamp: jaekwrad.bandcamp.com

Short episode talking about a short book: Betsy Byars's Summer of the Swans.Also, you may notice that we've added theme music! Thank you very much to our friend Jake Ward, who composed it. You can hear more of his music at jaekwrad.bandcamp.com.Also also, don't forget to give us feedback if you have it: newberychronicles@gmail.com

Have Michael and Rebecca recorded this from the inside of the Met after having run away from home to live in the museum? No, but wouldn't that be cool if we did?We'd love to hear from you. Email us at newberychronicles@gmail.com!

The only miracle was that Michael and Rebecca didn't fall asleep reading this book.We'd love to hear from you! Email us at newberychronicles@gmail.com!

Rebecca and Michael need to float away on a balloon house so they can record this podcast more often.We'd love to hear from you! Email us at newberychronicles@gmail.com!

A house (mildly) divided! Michael (sorta) likes the 1937 Newbery Medal winner, Ruth Sawyer's Roller Skates, and Rebecca (sorta) dislikes it!

Weigh in on this spicy controversy by emailing us at newberychronicles@gmail.com!

We feel bad for not liking this more.

We'd love to hear from you! Email us at newberychronicles@gmail.com!

Hear ye, hear ye! Two white people talking about a book about racial microaggressions!

Don't forget: you can email us at newberychronicles@gmail.com!

Did The Tale of Despereax leave you wanting more casual morbidity? Dead End in Norvelt may just be the book for you!

Email us at newberychronicles@gmail.com to let us know what you think!

We get a little into the weeds of Kate DiCamillo's charming book. Be nice to Rebecca, because she had a cold when we recorded this!

Michael is delighted to find that a childhood favorite still rocks. Rebecca wonders whether or not she has fabricated memories of having read this book before.

We'd love to hear from you! Email us at newberychronicles@gmail.com!

The duo struggles to find interesting things to say about a book that struggles to find interesting things to say.

We'd love to hear from you! Email us at newberychronicles@gmail.com!

Rebecca and Michael do their best to wrestle with the complex and challenging material in Mildred D. Taylor's Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry.

We'd love to hear from you! Email us at newberychronicles@gmail.com!

We had Covid when we recorded this, so you know how dedicated we are to Irene Hunt's excellent novel.

We'd love to hear from you! Email us at newberychronicles@gmail.com!