Great News! Our latest children's picture book, The Fish House Door, has been named the Gold Medal Winner of the 2010 Moonbeam Award for Best Picture Book in the all-ages category.
The Moonbeam Awards were created by Michigan-based book marketing firm Jenkins Group to bring increased recognition to exemplary children’s books and their authors, illustrators and publishers. This year, there were more than 800 entries in 37 categories.
Congratulations to illustrator Astrid Sheckels, whose gorgeous illustrations bring to life a great story by the late Robert F. Baldwin.
“This year’s Moonbeam Award winners again prove that books change children’s lives,” said Jenkins Group founder Jerrold Jenkins. “Watching our kids read them, and hearing the laughter and seeing the tears, you know these books make a difference.”
Bob's tale is set on an island off the coast of Maine and tells a classic story of the value of tradition and history. Shawn comes from a long line of island lobstermen. His father, grandfather and great-grandfather have all hauled traps, painted buoys and cleaned their brushes on the door of the same fish house for decades. To Shawn, the door is just a weathered old piece of wood with broken hinges. But when an art dealer comes to visit, he gives Shawn a new perspective on the fish house door, giving him a fresh look at the people and traditions that have shaped his past and will chart his future.
In the latest issue of The Working Waterfront, reviewer Kate Quinn said the book "should become a family classic handed down to each new generation for years to come."
Astrid was born and raised in the farming town of Hatfield, Massachusetts. Her detailed illustrations give every story more depth and dimension. She visited the island fishing village of Frenchboro last summer to use as inspiration for her work on the book.
The Fish House Door is Astrid's second book with us. Her first, The Scallop Christmas, written by Jane Freeberg of Georgetown Island, was named the 2009 Lupine Award Honor Book, given annually to a picture book of outstanding merit by the Maine Library Association.
Bob Baldwin, who died in 2007, was a modern day troubadour, singing, playing the banjo and collecting and telling stories wherever he went. His articles and stories appeared in Sea Frontiers, Down East, Offshore, Maine Boats and Harbors and Yankee. His children’s books include New England Whaler and This is the Sea That Feeds Us. After living in Virginia, North Carolina, Massachusetts, Rhode Island and Iowa, Baldwin and his wife Annabelle settled in Newcastle, Maine, where he first heard the story of the fish house door.
Congratulations again to Astrid and to Annabelle, in honor of her late husband. To learn more about The Fish House Door or to buy a copy for yourself, just click here.
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