Children's Literature

A research guide for Children's Literature from West Chester University Libraries.

Humanities Librarian

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Rachel McMullin
Contact:
F.H. Green Library, Room 209

Education Librarian

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Katie Manwiller
she/her
Contact:
FHG Library, Room 234
(610) 436-3393
Subjects: Education

Finding Biographies and Critical Reviews of Authors and Illustrators

Finding Book Reviews

Our Library Search tool (search box on the library home page) makes it easy to find book reviews.

Step 1:  Search for a book by its title

Tips:

  • Put the title in quotation marks, if it is more than one word long.
  • Add the authors last name outside of the quotation marks.

Step 2:  After searching, scroll down the column on the left side of the screen until you see the "Source Type" menu. Open it up and select "Reviews"

Finding Scholarly and Professional Sources

Looking for critical works that analyze a particular children's book or author?  While there has not been as much scholarship on literature for children as for adults, there are articles, books, and book chapters out there.  You can try searching for the title of a particular book, but may want to search for your author's name as well, since there may be articles that analyze their work as a whole rather than a single book. 

Once again, the Library Search tool (search box on the library home page) is the best bet. 

Library search includes many popular sources, like book reviews, so you will need to limit to more substantial sources.  Scroll down the column on the left, open the "Source Type" menu and select the following:  articles, books, and book chapters.  If one or more of those categories don't appear, that means there are no sources of those types,