The Red Maple Award

The Red Maple Award, established by the Ontario Library Association in 1998, celebrates the best fiction and non-fiction books written for Grades 7 and 8.  The winner is selected by Ontario's young readers.  Here are some titles which stand out for me:

1998 After the War (Carol Matas)

Teenager Ruth is realeased from Buchenwald Concentration Camp at the end of World War II, only to find out she is the only survivor of her family.  She meets a young man who convinces her to travel to Palestine, where many Jewish refugees are headed.  They make a daring escape across Europe.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/After_the_War_%28novel%29

2002 Clara's War (Kathy Kacer)

Clara, a 13-year-old girl imprsioned in a Jewish ghetto called Terezin during the Second World War, faces hunger, disease and death as she awaits transportation to a Concentration Camp.

http://www.openbooktoronto.com/books/claras_war_kathy_kacer

2008 Safe as Houses (Eric Walters)

Teenager Lizzie Hardy walks two children home from school on a wet, blustery day in 1954.  Inside the children's house, she babysits, not knowing that Hurricane Hazel is on its way.  Outside, the Humber River rises at an alarming rate.

http://www.ericwalters.net/novels/safe-as-houses/

2010 Word Nerd (Susin Neilsen)

A 12-year-old boy is picked on at school to the point where some bullies, knowing he has a peanut allergy, contaminate his lunch.  His mother pulls withdraws him, choosing to home school him.  He befriends the landlord's 25 year old son who invites him to his Scrabble Club.  There, he finds the acceptance he never had.

https://vikkivansickle.wordpress.com/2010/05/10/far-from-the-last-word-word-nerd/

2011 The Bite of the Mango (Mariatu Kamara)

One girl's journey from Sierra Leone war victim to UNICEF special representative.

http://www.openbooktoronto.com/news/mariatu_kamaras_bite_mango_wins_cbc_young_canada_reads

2013 Real Justice:  Fourteen and Sentenced to Death:  The Story of Steven Truscott (Bill Swan)

When I was in elementary school, I first read the account of Steven Truscott's trial and conviction for the murder of his 12 year old schoolmate, Lynne Harper.  Pierre Berton wrote a poem "Requiem to a 14 Year Old", which included vivid images of the anxious boy, sentenced to hang, in the Goderich Jail.  Here is another book about Steven Truscott, who ended up in the wrong place at the wrong time and was wrongly accused of murder.

http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/15027125-real-justice

Note:  For more information about the Red Maple award, visit http://www.bookcentre.ca/awards/red_maple_award.

The Silver Birch Award

The Silver Birch Award debuted in 1994 under the umbrella of the Ontario Library Association. Honouring books geared to Grades 3 to 6, this award recognized both Fiction and Non-Fiction books. Registered classes and/or groups read at least five books from an Official Selections List. They cast their votes in the Spring.  The first winner was Daniel's Story, written by Carol Matas.  Here are some of the titles that stand out for me:

1995 Polar:  The Titanic Bear (Daisy corning Stone Spedden)

The true story of a Steiff bear that, along with his owner, a 7 year old boy, survived the sinking of the Titanic.

http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2157716.Polar_The_Titanic_Bear

2000 The Secret of Gabi's Dresser (Kathy Kacer)

When the Nazis conducted house searches for Jewish children in Eastern Europe during WWII, Gabi hid in a dresser in her dining room.  The only piece of furniture that survived the war, it now sits in her daughter Kathy Kacer's Toronto home.

https://www.collectionscanada.gc.ca/obj/015020/f1/nlc000500-v6.jpg

2003 Hana's Suitcase (Karen Levine)

Holocaust education centre operator Fumiko Ishioka received an empty suitcase from Auschwitz. Children visiting the centre asked her about the owner, whose name was written on the suitcase.  A year of research revealed that Hana Brady, born in Czechoslovakia in 1931, was deported along with many other Jews in her town, to Auschwitz during WWII.

http://www.cbc.ca/doczone/m/episodes/inside-hanas-suitcase

2008 The Secret of Grim Hill (Linda De Meulemeester)

Cat Peters wins a soccer match and accepts the prize of going to a private school.  However, inside the halls of the old school, a mystery waits to be revealed about what happened to the last soccer team that attended the school and then disappeared.

http://grimhill.com/the-books/

2010 At the Edge:  Daring Acts in Desperate Times (Larry Verstraete)

Over twenty stroies about ordinary people who show extraordinary courage during the Halifax Explosion, the Tianamen Square protests, 9/11, Hurricane Katrina, etc.

http://www.amazon.com/At-Edge-Daring-Desperate-Times/dp/0545273358

2012 Undergrounders (David Skuy)

Twelve year old Jonathon's mom dies and his landlord kicks him out.  Facing life on the streets, he finds a group of kids living underground who steal to survive.  Jonathon steals hockey gear, suits up and is welcomed by his new "family", a hockey team.  How does he keep his homelessness a secret?

http://fernfolio.edublogs.org/2011/12/14/undergrounders-by-david-skuy/

2013 Making Bombs for Hitler (Marsha Skrypuch)

Lida is kidnapped by the Nazis during WWII and forced to work as an Ostarbeiter in a German munitions factory making bombs.

http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/12524125-making-bombs-for-hitler

2014 One Step at a Time:  A Vietnamese Child Finds Her Way (Marsha Skrypuch)

Brought up in a Vietnamese orphanage, Tuyet is rescued during the last airlift out of Saigon. Adopted by a Canadian family, she now faces surgery to correct her leg, crippled by polio.

http://pajamapress.ca/news_reviews/?page_id=983

For more information, visit http://www.bookcentre.ca/awards/silver_birch_award.