Featuring Guadalupe Garcia McCall

Fellow Texan Guadalupe Garcia McCall is raking in the awards this season. She was recently named a Lee Bennett Hopkins “Promising Poet!” The Lee Bennett Hopkins Promising Poet Award was established by Hopkins along with the International Reading Association in 1995 to encourage new poets in their writing. These poets have only published two books (to qualify for the award), but their work has already been judged to be of high quality. The award is given every three years. Congratulations, Guadalupe! Previous recipients include.

2013 Guadalupe Garcia McCall
McCall, Guadalupe Garcia. 2011. Under the Mesquite. New York: Lee & Low.

2010 Gregory Neri
Neri, Gregory. 2009. Chess Rumble. New York: Lee & Low Books.

2007 Joyce Lee Wong
Wong, Joyce Lee. 2006. Seeing Emily. New York: Abrams.

2004 Lindsay Lee Johnson
Johnson, Lindsay Lee. 2002. Soul Moon Soup. Asheville, NC: Front Street.

2001 Craig Crist-Evans
Crist-Evans, Craig. 1999. Moon Over Tennessee: A Boy’s Civil War Journal. Boston: Houghton Mifflin.

1998 Kristine O’Connell George
George, Kristine O’Connell. 1997. The Great Frog Race and Other Poems. New York:  Clarion.

1995 Deborah Chandra
Chandra, Deborah. 1993. Rich Lizard and Other Poems. New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux.

For more information, check out my resource book, The Poetry Teacher’s Book of Lists.

Rivera Award
In addition, her debut novel (in verse), Under the Mesquite, was also named a Tomás Rivera Mexican American Children’s Book Award recipient—an award that doesn’t necessarily go to a work of poetry. It’s given by the Texas State University College of Education which established the award in 1995 to honor authors and illustrators who create literature that depicts the Mexican American experience.  The award was named in honor of Dr. Tomas Rivera, a distinguished alumnus of Texas State University. For more information, look here.

PFA & PFAMS
Of course, I'm also very proud to brag that Guadalupe is a contributor to our Poetry Friday anthologies, too! Her powerful poems, “The Bully,” "Bailes," and “Doña Pepita” appear in The Poetry Friday Anthology for K-5 and “The Café” and “The Boy” appear in The Poetry Friday Anthology for Middle School. For more details, go here.

TLA
Guadalupe will also be speaking at the upcoming post-conference poetry institute (P*CON) at the Texas Library Association conference next month in Fort Worth—along with Amy Ludwig VanDerwater, Charles Waters, Jane Yolen, Michael Salinger, Rebecca Kai Dotlich, Robert Paul Weston, Sara Holbrook, and Will Richey (and teens). An amazing line up, right? I'll be sharing more info about that event along with my ninth annual Poetry Round Up very soon.

Next?
I know Guadalupe is working on the finishing touches for another novel in verse and I can’t wait to see it. Meanwhile, be sure to check out her lovely novel of magical realism (not in verse), Summer of the Mariposas. Clearly, Guadalupe is a talent to watch...


Image credit: TeenLitRocks

Posting by Sylvia M. Vardell © 2013. All rights reserved.