- Winner of a 2009 Christopher Award!
- Winner, Great Lakes Book Award for Best Picture Book
- Selection for the 2010-11 Texas Bluebonnet Award master list
- Junior Library Guild Selection
- First Book Selection
- Parenting Magazine Best Books 2008 Selection
- Smithsonian Magazine Best Books 2008 Selection
- Honorable mention for Favorite Picture Book of the Year in the 2008 “Cuffies,” from Children’s Booksellers natonwide!
- Anne Izard Storytellers’ Choice Award
- CBC/NCSS Notable Social Studies Trade Book
Cal is not the readin’ type. Living way high up in the Appalachian Mountains, he’d rather help Pap plow or go out after wandering sheep than try some book learning. Nope. Cal does not want to sit stoney-still reading some chicken scratch. But that Book Woman keeps coming just the same. She comes in the rain. She comes in the snow. She comes right up the side of the mountain, and Cal knows that’s not easy riding. And all just to lend his sister some books. Why, that woman must be plain foolish—or is she braver than he ever thought?
That Book Woman is a rare and moving tale that honors a special part of American history—he Pack Horse Librarians, who helped untold numbers of children see the stories amid the chicken scratch, and thus made them into lifetime readers.