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Writer Walter Dean Myers died on Wednesday after a brief illness at age 76, leaving mourners in the adult world and young readers who saw themselves in his books. He expanded the face of publishing so that many children of color saw themselves reflected in his work.

Myers wrote more than 100 books, most of them in the genre of fiction for Young Adults (YA). Most of those dealt with the challenges of urban life for young black men, and the complicated moral minefield they have to negotiate to stay in one piece.

"A turning point for me was the discovery of a short story by James Baldwin about the black urban experience," Myers wrote. "It gave me permission to write about my own experiences. Somehow I always go back to the most turbulent periods of my own life. I write books for the troubled boy I once was."

Walter Milton Myers was born on Aug. 12, 1937, in Martinsburg, W. Va., but he didn't stay there long. His mother died in childbirth when he was a toddler, and his father George sent Walter and his brother Mickey to stay with a Harlem couple he knew, Florence and Herbert Dean. (Florence was George Myers' first wife. In tribute to the parents who raised him, Myers added Dean to his name.) The Deans raised the boys in a loving, protected environment, although young Walter often got tantalizing glimpses of the Harlem street life he wasn't allowed to investigate up close. He was already a rabid reader when he started school at Public School 125. He was one of those kids who was intelligent, but not academically inclined. And he got teased a lot for having a speech impediment.

Tall, thin and with that speech impediment, Myers was smart, angry and, as he told the Los Angeles Times in 1997, "always in trouble." (He didn't tolerate being teased for his stutter.) He hovered around the fringes of Harlem's young criminal life but it was reading that saved him.

"Reading pushed me to discover worlds beyond my landscape," he wrote on his website, "especially during dark times when my uncle was murdered and my family became dysfunctional with alcohol and grief."

Here's your look at highlights from the weekly AP photo report, a gallery featuring a mix of front-page photography, the odd image you might have missed and lasting moments our editors think you should see.

This week's collection includes a woman crying near her burning house after shelling in the eastern Ukrainian city of Slovyansk; a young Muslim girl attending an evening prayer marking the first eve of the holy fasting month of Ramadan in Jakarta, Indonesia; prospective plebes learning how to properly wear their hats during Induction Day at the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland; and a Savannah, Georgia, man checking out the waves on the north beach of Tybee Island as Hurricane Arthur makes its way up the East Coast.

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This gallery contains photos published June 26-July 3, 2014.

See the latest AP photo galleries: http://apne.ws/TXeCBN

The Archive: Previous "10 Things to See" galleries: http://apne.ws/13QUFKJ

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Follow AP photographers on Twitter: http://apne.ws/XZy6ny

Follow AP Images on Twitter: http://twitter.com/AP_Images

Visit AP Images online: http://www.apimages.com

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This gallery was produced by photo editor Jenny Kane in New York: http://twitter.com/jennykanephoto ; http://i.instagram.com/jennykanephoto#

NEW YORK (AP) — A teenager from suburban Chicago who sang an aching Jason Robert Brown song and another from Georgia who chose to sing "Raise the Roof" — and almost did so — have won top honors at the National High School Musical Theater Awards.

Atlanta resident Jai'Len Josey was named best actress and Jonah Rawitz, from the Chicago suburb of Buffalo Grove, got the best-actor crown Monday night at the sixth annual "Glee"-like competition, nicknamed the Jimmy Awards after theater owner James Nederlander.

"I can't emphasize enough how humbled I am to be within this crowd of such amazing actors and individuals. I've made so many amazing friends. I feel like I'm part of a family," said Rawitz. He also thanked him family, especially his mother, who he said taught him to be honest and "how to believe every word that I'm saying." Josey, who is going into her junior year at Tri-Cities High School, said it was "a dream come true."

Each will receive a $10,000 scholarship award, capping a months-long winnowing process that began with 60,000 students from 1,500 schools and ended at the Minskoff Theatre, the long-term home of "The Lion King," which doesn't perform on Mondays.

The 56 teens who made it to New York this year — 28 girls and 28 boys — got a five-day theatrical boot camp fueled by pizza at New York University's Tisch School of the Arts, complete with scrambling to learn an opening and closing group number, performing their medley numbers, advice on their solo songs, plus a field trip to watch "Kinky Boots."

Judges were Rachel Hoffman from casting company Telsey + Company, Tony-nominated producer Arielle Tepper Madover, casting specialist Tara Rubin, Nick Scandalios from the Nederlander Organization, choreographer Sergio Trujillo and NYU's Kent Gash. Composer Stephen Schwartz offered pointers to the teens on Friday.

Rawitz sang from "In the Heights" as Usnavi in the ensemble number and then "If I Didn't Believe in You" from Brown's "The Last Five Years" as a solo. Josey sang Effie Melody White's "And I Am Telling You I'm Not Going" from "Dreamgirls" and then belted out a "Raise the Roof" from Andrew Lippa's "The Wild Party."

The host was Ryan McCartan, who co-stars in "Liv & Maddie" on the Disney Channel and "Royal Pains" on USA. He was proof of how far a Jimmy can go: McCartan in 2011 he won the competition. Others who have found fame include Eva Noblezada, who was a runner-up in 2013 and now plays the lead role of Kim in the London revival of "Miss Saigon."

The shows represented on Monday ranged from "Annie Get Your Gun" and "The Drowsy Chaperone" to "Singin' in the Rain" and "Into the Woods." There was a fair amount of overlapping of roles, with two Jean Valjeans from "Les Miserables," two Drowsy Chaperones and two Aldolphos from "The Drowsy Chaperone," two Usnavis from "In the Heights" and three Shreks from "Shrek," all thrown onstage to duke it out together. A young lady playing Annie Oakley from "Annie Get Your Gun" cradled a rifle and another playing the Tin Man held an axe.

The four runners-up, who each received $2,500, were: Mekahi Lee from Charlotte, North Carolina; Matthew Richards from Logan, Utah; Brooke Solan from Las Vegas; and Sophia Tzougros from Madison, Wisconsin. Andy Karl, from the Broadway musical "Rocky," stopped by and the whole cast helped him sing "Keep on Standing."

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Online: http://www.nhsmta.com

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Mark Kennedy can be reached at http://twitter.com/KennedyTwits

NOME, Alaska (AP) — State wildlife officials in Nome, Alaska, are turning to a unique source to try to keep a herd of musk oxen out of town.

Bear urine.

State wildlife biologist Tony Gorn tells KNOM (http://is.gd/QZEXE7) that they are almost daily now moving musk oxen out of town, but they keep coming back.

He says efforts like using rubber bullets or firecrackers hasn't persuaded the large animals to leave for good.

Gorn says some people think the oxen are trying to find a bear-free zone in Nome. So he's decided to try placing bear urine in a few small containers where the musk oxen have been problematic to see if that drives them out.

For anyone wondering where one can buy bear urine, Gorn says the Internet is a wonderful thing.

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Information from: KNOM-AM, http://www.knom.org