Cartoonists for a cause

Cartoonists in the Middle East sometimes pay a high price for their work. Take the Beirut-based comics magazine Samandal, for example. In 2015, Omar Khouri and two other Samandal editors were found guilty of denigrating the Christian religion, among other charges, and heavily fined. One of the offending entries was a cartoon called “Lebanese Recipes for Revenge’’ by Samandal co-founder Lena Merhej.

As Samandal struggles to raise money to publish another issue, along comes help from far away. Dan Mazur’s Cambridge-based Ninth Art has published a comics anthology, “Muqtatafat,’’ with work by Khouri, Merhej, and a dozen other cartoonists from Egypt, Jordan, and elsewhere in the Middle East. Proceeds from sales of the book will go to Samandal. The title translates as “a collection of disparate pieces,’’ an apt description for a book that contains a love story, a tale of a dictator, and a meditation on the passage of time. The book grew out of an initiative at Harvard University’s Center for Middle Eastern Studies. Two of the co-editors, Anna Mudd and Paul Beran, used to work there; the third, A. David Lewis, is a graphic novelist with a PhD in religious studies.

And the winner is . . .

Matt de la Peña, author of “Last Stop on Market Street’’ (Putnam) and Sophie Blackall, illustrator of “Finding Winnie: The True Story of the World’s Most Famous Bear’’ (Little, Brown) are the 2016 winners, respectively, of the John Newbery and Randolph Caldecott medals, among the most prestigious awards in children’s literature. Why them and not other of the thousands of children’s books published last year? That will be one of the questions at the fore when Roger Sutton, a key arbiter of children’s books, moderates a discussion called “Winners, Losers, and Something In Between: An Inside Look at Book Awards’’ on Feb. 23 from 5:30 to 7 p.m. at Simmons College’s Management Building, 300 The Fenway.

Sutton is the longtime editor in chief of The Horn Book, which publishes an influential quarterly magazine focused on books for children and young adults.

The panelists are Cathie Mercier, director of the Center for the Study of Children’s Literature at Simmons College who has been a judge for the Newbery, Caldecott, and Boston Globe-Horn Book awards; Nancy Werlin, who has been a finalist and judge for the National Book Awards; and blogger Charlotte Taylor. The snow date is March 1.

Admission is $5, cash only. RSVP at http://www.hbook.com/resourcelist/childrens-books-boston. Seats are limited.

Paul Theroux archives

The Huntington Library in Southern California has acquired the archive of Medford native Paul Theroux, whose travel books span the globe. The acquisition includes drafts for most of the 51 books Theroux has written as well as correspondence, most notably with V.S. Naipaul with whom he had a public feud that lasted nearly two decades. The Huntington, founded by railroad magnate Henry Huntington, is a fitting destination for Theroux, a master of train travel. One of Theroux’s best-known books is the classic “The Great Railway Bazaar: By Train Through Asia’’ (Houghton Mifflin), his account of a four-month trip, published in 1975.

Coming out

¦ “Interior Darkness: Selected Stories’’ by Peter Straub (Doubleday)

¦ “Perfect Days’’ by Raphael Montes (Penguin)

¦ “A Doubter’s Almanac’’ by Ethan Canin (Random House)

Pick of the Week

Vicky Titcomb of Titcomb’s Bookshop in East Sandwich recommends “Georgia’’ by Dawn Tripp (Random House): “This novel is as stunningly beautiful as the artwork that inspired it. Tripp captures the personal and artistic relationships between two difficult, brilliant, and complex people: the artist Georgia O’Keeffe and her husband, photographer Alfred Stieglitz. This is a book that begs to be discussed.’’

Jan Gardner can be reached at JanLGardner@yahoo.com.