"According to the Children's Book Collective, of the 5,000 trade children's books published in 2006, only 87 were authors of color," Paula Chase Hyman told me in a recent email. Now that number seems a bit drastic, even given the lily-white image of Big Publishing, and the only results for "Children's Book Collective" that come up in a Google search are variations on Hyman's press release or blogs reporting on it, which makes this particular statistic sound somewhat dubious—but I'm certainly not arguing with the premise that "authors of color" in the children's market could benefit from increased visibility. To that end, Chase has teamed up with other writers and illustrators to create The Brown Bookshelf, "showcasing the best and brightest voices in African-American Children's Literature."

Their first big campaign, "28 Days Later," will take place next February. The Brown Bookshelf home page will feature a different author every day and then, since 2008 is a leap year, on the 29th they'll be raffling off a "gift basket" featuring all 28 books, donated to a library designated by the winning contestant. "Once we showcase the twenty-eight best voices in African American children's lit," Hyman says of the project, "parents, teachers and librarians will walk away with a full arsenal of recommendations for young readers." There's just the question of that title, which Hyman acknowledges is from the zombie movie, "because it signals the aftermath," which is the say the giveaway. It's a minor point, but I'm just wondering about the appropriateness of naming a campaign promoting reading among the youth after an R-rated movie. Ennh, I'm probably overthinking it... Anyway, the Bookshelf proprietors are taking nominations for books to feature until the end of the month.