Newberry Honor Recipient Grace Lin Speaks at SU April 22-23

SALISBURY, MD---Can books bridge gaps between cultures? Children’s author Grace Lin believes they can.

The Newberry Honor recipient discusses her works during two lectures at Salisbury University. The first is 10 a.m. Monday, April 22, in the Wicomico Room of the Guerrieri University Center. The second follows at 5:30 p.m. Tuesday, April 23, in Teacher Education and Technology Room 226.

Lin’s first book, The Ugly Vegetables, was a 1999 American Booksellers Association “Pick of the List” and among the Bank Street College of Education’s Best Children’s Books of the Year. More than a dozen more have followed, including Dim Sum for Everyone! and Lissy’s Friends.

Her first children’s novel, The Year of the Dog, was nominated to the Texas Library Association’s Bluebonnet Award Master List in 2006. Her novel Where the Mountain Meets the Moon was awarded the 2010 Newberry Honor, was chosen for Al Roker’s Today Show Kids Book Club and became a New York Times Bestseller. A companion novel, Starry River of the Sky, was released this year.

Lin, a Massachusetts resident, has been honored with the Boston Public Library’s Literary Lights for Children Award. Her 2011 early reader, Ling & Ting, earned the Theodor Geisel Honor. She also has been an Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award nominee for the United States.

Most of Lin’s books focus on the Asian-American experience. “Books erase bias,” she said. “They make the uncommon everyday and the mundane exotic. A book makes all cultures universal.”

Sponsored by the Eastern Shore Regional Library and the Samuel W. and Marilyn C. Seidel School of Education and Professional Studies, admission to her talks is free and the public is invited. For more information call 410-543-6030 or visit the SU Web site at www.salisbury.edu.