A magic library card

Newbery Medal winner Jerry Spinelli wrote The Library Card as a challenge. He was to write several stories that had nothing in common but an enchanted library card. The result is a magic blue library card that travels through and changes the lives of Mongoose, Brenda, Sonseray, and April Mendez. These are stories that show the positive power and influence books, libraries and the people who love them can have on lives. The stories don't show us how these four kids' lives turned out, only the road down which the library card led them. A couple of the stories are sad, but all beautiful portraits of kids and their problems. Spinelli has a lot of love and empathy for his subjects. The novel has an After Words section at the end which included an interview with the author. There is also "The Book That Changed My Life" in which other authors write about books they love that influenced them. That was my favorite part of the book.