How to use this Page

Thank you so much, Sara Zarr! I'm exactly nine years into my career, as you were in 2005, and have yet to get a book published. It's very reassuring to know I'm not alone, that this really is the hardest and most frustrating part, and that there may be success around the corner. This is exactly what I needed to hear right now, so thank you.

This is so wonderful to be able to read about the conference...feeling a little more connected and a little less sad that I'm not there. Thanks for sharing the reality of discouragement. I had one book published in 2008, and I experience the ups and downs of the publishing world as I continue to submit. But we must hang in there and hang on to our craft. This blog is great. Thanks!

Thank you so much for this talk. This is definitely the hardest stage to be in, and it's also the group that gets addressed the least. (Most workshops/conferences/organizations/books address the beginner--but what to do AFTER that? And how to grow and not get discouraged?) Thanks so much for talking about this!!

Sara's presentation was one of the best parts of the conference. Any chance we'll be able to read the entire transcript online?? Or in the SCBWI bulletin? She was so inspiring and really understood the journey we all are on.

Thank Heavens for the SCBWI blog! I missed the start of Sara Zarr's speech, but you guys filled me in.

Wasn't Sara's keynote amazing? I so identified with everything she said. Toby - I tried to take copious notes and blogged as thoroughly as I could given my slow typing - it's on my blog, Notes from the Slushpile

Very wise words. And count me among the people who would like to be able to read a transcript of Sara Zarr's entire speech.

Thanks, Candy! I'll take a look now.

I loved Sara's keynote speech, she share the real everyday life of and artist who knows and love herself. I am going to read her books.

I just read this book! YIPPEE!! :D

I. have. to. get. this. book.
You make it sound so awesome (:

Thanks for participating & posting! :)

This looks like a really good book, I'll definitely have to check it out!

I just finished this one on Tuesday and really enjoyed it. I love this roundtable format!

Laura, the cynicism! Hey, I’m not even working right now!

Back to chapter four . . .

See, what I do is PRETEND that my second book has a deadline, and I don’t work on it like I should, so it’s nice to see that someone who actually HAS a deadline doesn’t work on what she needs to do, either.
Beth Fehlbaum, author
Courage in Patience, a story of HOPE..
http://courageinpatience.blogspot.com
Ch. 1 is online!

Beth, trust me, it will never end. But congrats on getting one book done–now on to your second! Once you’ve finished one you at least know you can do that. It really builds confidence. Good luck!

Things I heard my kids say today on a family picnic:

Daughter: “I’m so sassy.”

Youngest: “That sounds dangerous.”

The lesson? Everyone needs some sassy, even if they are on a deadline and distracted by the excitement of being able to see me next week.

ExCUSE me?? Heather, are you going to be there when I visit those Dallas schools? What’s UP?????

Rent has been paid for this month. Ha!!

Hubs went to the new outsourcing company. Not sure how long it will last, but we hope to finish the school year at least.

Sweet! Plans to follow! (Um, off-blog if you guys don’t mind. You probably don’t need the details.)

Oh man, you guys are going to talk about me again.

Ok.

Not trying to distract you,Robin-just popped in to say “Go,go,go!” on finishing your project. You can do it:)!

Yes, Patrick, it’s always about you. That’s not your imagination.

Lady T, thank you! I’m going!

Robin,
As you asked, I will not be friendly to you in any way. If that’s what you want, that’s what you’ll get. I take my friends literally, seriously, with no nonsense or silliness. Pay no attention to the jester hat I’m wearing, nor to the stick with the bells. I’m just trying on clothes for the Renaissance Fair.

–Farida

Farida, are you really participating in the Renaissance Fair? I’ll bet you’ll look so cute. But don’t answer. Then I’ll just get drawn into conversation instead of writing pretend dialogue on a page. But thanks for checking in!

Thank YOU Robin for helping me to procrastinate by reading your fabulous blog. However, I am selfishly concerned because I REALLY want to read this third book that you are procrastinating on. GET TO IT! NOW!!! I am cracking the whip here… NO DELAYS!

Are you kidding me? Porn? Have you SEEN the things readily available in books, the net, the stores aimed at girls? I'll take an AG book or doll over a Bratz doll or a Christina Aguilera cd any day.

The Debbie Reese critique is terrific.

I remember that when that store in Chicago opened, across the street from the flagship 40,000 square foot Borders bookstore, I learned a year later that the Borders store had a $20 million gross sales year, and the American Girls Store had a $25 million gross sales year. Now, Debbie, that's what's TRULY gross about American Girls.

Ahem.

As to the question of the relative pornographic nature of the AG product portfolio, I think I addressed this a few months ago. AG is a commercial proposition from the mind of someone who deeply understood the mechanisms of American Marketing since her dad ran the Leo Burnett Ad Agency. The AG products are sold using these techniques. Vance Packard's classic, The Hidden Persuaders demonstrates how advertising has always utilized sex. Of course the AG marketing materials have sex as their basis. Sex sells. Who exactly plumps hundreds of dollars for those products? Little girls? Of course not: their mothers and grandmothers (and dads and granddads). That is: Grown-ups, who need to be appealed to utilizing the same marketing mechanisms used to move cars, toothpaste, beer, movie tickets, etc.

Book sales remain flat. Bookstore sales dropped 6% last month. I say, heck, why doesn't EVERY publisher start using sexy advertising to push ALL their books. (Runaway Bunny is pretty damn sexy already, actually.)

let me add that Andy and I are using "porn" differently--just as there is food porn, wedding porn, and real estate porn, the American Girls catalog, with its ninety-dollar girls (accessories sold separately) and come-hither-and-buy-buy-buy-me design and lighting, is toy porn.

I took a Visual Anthropology seminar this past few months, studying the history of ethnographic film -- beginning basically with Nanook Of The North, on through Les Maitres Fous, and Dead Birds -- up through Tongues Untied and Reassemblage. Lots of critical theory reading, and anthro analysis with long words and convoluted sentences. There's a fascinating correlation between Ethnographic Film and Pornographic Film: consider how "natives"/"savages" are often naked in ethnographic films (New Guinea tribesman or Amazonian Indians) -- just as in pornographic film, actors' bodies are objectified and presented as "other" than subjectively embodied human being. (One essayist even argues that this objectification of bodies is equivalent to Taxidermy!)

This goes back to the original American Girl question re: Native Americans and in fact all the "categories" of Girls (Hispanic, African American, Pioneer, Immigrant). These book-characters with their simplistically clear ethnic/social categories are being objectified through the simplistic typification of their experience. Similarly, the dolls act to objectify the book-characters' bodies. (Clothed bodies or unclothed bodies -- and by the way, the dolls do Get Naked when they're handled for dressing and undressing.)

Thus, the pornographic content of the American Girls concept is linked to and emerges from its ethnographic content, via the process of objectification.

So -- you can argue that there's a Toy Porn effect. But also there are other porn effects that emerge from the Story-Character identities that go with these particular toys.

If I've contradicted something I wrote in the prior post, well, really, who cares?

Hey Andy---if you've got an electronic copy of the syllabus for that class, I'd love to see it ([email protected]).

Roger---As Jean and I walked down the street, we wondered where the Mirasol doll was. AG fans will recall that Gary Soto's book took a good bit of heat. Jean and I could not stand the thought of entering that space again to look for Mirasol. I looked up the AG website this morning and saw that she was only a special edition/short term "doll of the year" or some such thing.

I read another blog later this morning about AG. Observation from that blogger was that shoppers were affluent whites, and only people of color were sales people. That prompted me to run the reel of my visit in my head, and that's what I saw, too. White women and their daughters buying, dropping one box after another into their baskets; several of the sales people (including the one who told me about the theater productions) were African American.

The juxtaposition of "doll" and "porn" makes me think of those old (yet ever-new) Dare Wright books with Edith and the bears.

The American Girl dolls look a little bit like Edith, don't they? Do you think Edith was an early influence on Pleasant Co?

I never had the dolls when I was little, we couldn't afford them (though I was a fan of the books, and even read through to the historical information in the back). But a friend of mine in third grade had Molly and Samantha, and even though Felicity was my favorite, we'd play. Although, play mainly did consist of dressing them up. And that was all.

At least Barbie has Ken. Put Ken next to Samantha, and I think someone would go through a bit of an inferiority complex.

I agree, though, that the best way to enjoy those dolls is to simply look at their pretty things. Barbie was much more versatile. The top drawer of my dresser was her penthouse suite. It's a pity that little girls have to lose their imaginations to marketing.

And what's even worse about AG--let's not forget that even as they have introduced a doll and story incorporating almost every ethnicity under the sun, and have just come out with yet another caucasian AG doll, ad nauseum, they have yet to come up with an Asian doll and story, as I noted in this post back in Jan:

http://johansennewman.typepad.com/cats_and_jammers_studio/2007/01/get_with_it_ame.html

That is surprising, B. (and happy birthday). I'm guessing they would want to go Japanese rather than Chinese--but maybe they could have a Japanese girl somehow living in San Francisco's Chinatown during the earthquake (thus providing the necessary historical moment) and have her desperately running back into her family's house for her beloved . . . KIMONO.

Last year, Harper's serialized a fun, if over-the-top, novel by J. Robert Lennon about the American Girls phenomenon and the company's founder, Pleasant Rowland.

Of course, the author cautions us that there's no real connection between Pleasant Rowland and his novel's main character, "Happy Masters."

But there are some entertaining coincidences.

A link to a discussion with him:

http://www.zwire.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=16997154&BRD=1395&PAG=461&dept_id=216620&rfi=6

mta

Wow. Taxidermy, indeed.

When my daughter was little, say 8 or 9, she loved her AG Kirsten. Her aunt (jealous of my girlchild) gave it to her. My daughter then saved her pennies to buy TWO more dolls.
I wouldn't pay for them.

When my daughter packed up some of her things during the pre-college preparation days, she looked at these barely-touched dolls and sighed. "How could I have wasted so much money on these?" No comment.

My sister (same sister) recently sold an in-the-box AG doll on e-bay. $300.

I believe my daughter will be doing just the same. At least she will get some of her money back.

OH, Debbie, we went to the AG store once and found it terrifying. Girls and dolls dressed the same---very Stepfordian mothers with their equally Stepfordian daughters. Nary a boy in sight. Piles of money changing hands.

In Nashville, where I live, flying to Chicago for a birthday party at the AG store is quite a common happening. When the kids return, I quiz them about the trip to Chicago. I hear nothing about the Art Institute, Garrett's popcorn, a trip to Wrigley, the elevator ride up a skyscraper...nope, just fly to one of America's most stunning cities, settle into a hotel with a stack of movies on DVD, go to the AG store, swim in the pool, and come home.

Blah.

I'm feeling really lucky at the moment. My 4 year old daughter likes dollies on a small-scale, i.e. Playmobil. We may have a plethora of Playmobil dollies, but at least they all fit into one box when it's time for cleanup. I'm crossing my fingers that she never gloms onto AG. It certainly won't be through me, and I'll exercise my parental right to say NO.

I just saw a hilarious skit on The Big Gay Sketch Show, a cable show. There's a regular character, Fitzwilliam, played in the finest pantomime tradition by a woman as a saucy little boy. Fitzwilliam is kind of an Edith-Ann-meets-Lolita nancyboy. In this episode, he and his magic unicorn Trixie and his father are visiting American Girl Place and he insinuatingly asks the clerk, "Do you have any American Girl . . . accessories?" Why yes we do, replies the clerk and she asks him what he was looking for. Fitzwilliam says, "I should like to buy a vagina, please."

So, don't leave us hanging: Did they stock them? In multiple ethnic varieties?

It's Anonymous Dad Again!!!

When I took my son to Chicago the Only American Girl we saw was Sue (the T-Rex)at the Field Museum!!!
Thank goodness my son is an American Boy- who likes dinosaurs, bugs, and books!!! I did buy him the Skippyjon Jones Stuffed Toy!! It's not really doll!! Ha!!!

This blog keeps me laughing and THINKING!!!

Roger, the story about Fitzwilliam is HILARIOUS. I'd like to see American Girl bring out a transgender doll. All their book titles would work so well:

Meet Fitzwilliam
Fitzwilliam's Surprise
Changes for Fitzwilliam

What I liked about the editorial was how it seemed to be a continuation of a conversation here a few weeks back. I dunno which you wrote first, but it was nifty to notice the tendrils.

I've always been disturbed by how all the accessories make the dolls historically inaccurate, a point tangentially mentioned by the original post. My stepdaughter has a Kit doll, Great Depression, and I cannot believe the amount of "goodies" that she can obtain, being the daughter of an unemployed father. I am told there is some story explanation but it still bothers me. I haven't actually read the books, and while I buy her a ton of books, I stay far, far away from the AG stuff. I agree about the "toy porn", the catalog sort of blows me away.

A little off topic, but funny.
I read Andy's comment so quickly this morning... at first I thought I read "Runway Bunny is pretty damn sexy", instead of "Runaway Bunny".

The editorial is from 1999. It irritated a lot of people and is probably the one editorial I've written that I would like to take back. The context--the editorial page of the HB--was all wrong. It would have been right at home on the blog, though.

I have Native American ancestry (my maternal grandmother), and I don't see the point in being angry that ethnic groups are "left out" or inaccurately or incorrectly portrayed in the American Girls dolls. The company doesn't portray caucasian dolls accurately, doesn't portry their associated historical realities accurately, and it is grotesquely commercialized, a commercialization based on the worst sorts of racial and ethnic stereotypes, and geared furthermore towards the buying capacities of financially comfortable upperclass and upper middleclass families. I don't want to say "white," because undoubtedly some folks with ethnic background are going to be falling into that financial category and are and will be buying those "ethnic" dolls from this company. I would say rather folks with money and heavily endowed with ye good olde American value of crass consumerism. This goes far, far beyond being solely a Native American problem.

WHY would ANY ethnic group feel bad at being left out or marginalized or wrongly portrayed by such a company when the grotesque historical inaccurracies are across the board in all of their products, but most particularly in their "caucasian" products? These dolls don't smell. They are pristine, perfectly clean, and everythign always works out to happy never, neverland. They don't live in worlds where early death, violent death, cruel death really exists. They don't live, in short, in the third world realities that many Native Americans and many early settlers and many depressesion era families, etc., etc, etc. had to live in. THAT'S what is truly obsene about this company and their dolls. It's become a belief system.

To be fair, might I add, neighter have most of you who comment on this blog lived in that kind of reality. Third world reality. I have. And I frankly don't think any of you either could face living in those realities that some of your ancestors did. Frankly, they would stink too much. And you would have too much of American values, white man's values, Eurpoean, western, modern world values in you. You couldn't handle the dirt, the smells, the horrible living conditions, the DISEASES and sufferings that go untreated, the psychological effects of such living conditison, the psychological effects of racism and war on those families. And their children. So. This might be a good opportunity to study your own biases as well, to take time apart, and to reflect on yourselves, too.

If your ethnic group is not portrayed in teh company right now, breathe a sigh of relief at having escaped the atrocity. If your group is portrayed, breathe a sign of relief at being at least in the margins, less obvious! What ethnic group WOULD WANT to be portrayed by a company like this? I have no doubt, does this war in Iraq continue, that they'll come out with some American GI Sally and GI Johnny doll version....

I think, privately, it is "white" or european or Western thinking, whatever you call it, to try to categorize Indian tribal groups anyway, especially when it comes to modern, western products like this or modern western innovations like movies or even museum displays, to say this or that detail is correct or whatever when the real probelm is in the cookie cutter, mass production of a stereotype, of a way of thinking. To pick apart the details of that sort of thing, a company like this, in how accuratelyt they portray this and that with critical thinking is a persepective is "white" is western, is european in the first place! Better to do as many Indian tribes did, rebel against the whole thing, as Roger, basically, is doing. Team up to fight it with other ethnic groups and with caucasians as well who see the problems for their groups equally. It is NOT just a Native American problem! It's a problem for anyone of any ethnic background who thinks intelligently and with real empathy and seriousness on American values of consumerism and racism. Let's get some solidarity here on this, at least. Stop narrowing the focus just to Native Americans only. The problem is far wider than that.

In addition, NO authentic Indian doll that I have ever seen for example has NOT been completely original, completely unique, completely the work of an individual maker. It's totally alien to Native thinking, Native culture the whole idea say of of mass producing Indian tribal dolls in plastic with identical "correct" details of dress and accessories, for each tribe, etc. And Indian children did have and some still do have authentic dolls that are made for them, individually. It's a whole perspective on dolls that is so totally alien to what the Americal Girl dolls company is doing. They shouldn't be trying to represent Indian dolls AT ALL! Period!

Maybe what we ought to be doing in additon to just critizing this company is to actively support and promote individual Indian dollmakers who do create uniuqe dolls and ALL those who strive to work at a craft and make unique objects in this culture. They surely could use the help and support, given how hard it is for all crafts people to survive these days in America.

Yup. The three great values of American culture: Consumerism, racism, and militarism. Alive and well all right. Alive and well....
I won't be able to respond to this as I have a ton of work to do now to try to survive as an individual business person trying to practice some decent IDEALS and values in this American culture...

Ironically, many years ago, my daughter first encountered the American Girl catalog and the phenomenon at the exhibits at ALA!
I had purchased a day pass for her and my husband, and we were surrounded by books- she was thrilled to get the first of the
Time Warp Trio autographed by John Sziescka- THEN she found the AG catalog- which she practically memorized on the plane ride home. At least it did help with math facts- "so, how many glasses of lemonade would I need to sell to buy one of these dolls"?! I can't complain though- history was one of her college majors.
Micki

Do you know the book, Buy Buy Baby by Susan Thomas? It makes a very powerful statement about brand marketing to the very young, including ironic jokes about "character" education. Worth looking at.

Reading the comments on this blog makes me laugh and keeps me thinking, too. Today I'm thinking about why anyone would need to use more than one exclamation point, let alone nineteen.

Wow. I wrote a whole long-winded rant here (i got it out of my system), and it got deleted. ah well.

I will be up front and say that I DESIRED an AG doll when I was a kid (all my friends had several), but was not allowed to have one. I got books instead (and see where it got me?)

I think the most interesting thing I said in the post was:

I recently had the ...er... pleasure (?) of "playing" with an AG doll with an Israeli girl who was visiting my aunt. She is the daughter of a wealthy family friend, and she was the first in her class (she told me with pride) to have an American Girl doll. Then came X and then came Y. She went to the AG store in NY and bought such-and-such... oh, you can imagine the atrocities. As a student in Israel, she had no reference for any of the "historical" aspects of the dolls. And though many can clearly see the pervasive influence America has on Israel (and vice versa), this still feels like cultural imperialism to me. What do you think?

Complaining that AG dolls promote consumerism is like complaining that rain drops promote tsunamis. Okay, so we live in a big consumerist, piggy, hog-up-all-the-resources country. Let's focus on AG first, though. It all starts with little girls, their dolls and their accessories.

Has anyone actually read the books?

I've read 'em. They're perfectly competent formula fiction, beautifully packaged.

Just read through this. Sheesh! I noticed no followup to the comment about Bratz dolls. AG is a product, marketed and promoted as such. It's also a high quality doll that doesn't look like a hooker. If that's porn, bring it on. There is a lower cost doll out there that looks like a girl, not Pamela Anderson, called Only Hearts. They also come with books, though I don't believe the books are as well written. At $15 a doll they are about 3X the cost of a Barbie making them too expensive in the minds of many. Everybody wants a quality product but won't give up the Wal-Mart price. By the way, last year's AG Doll of the Year, named Jess, is a mixed race, home-schooled girl who travels the world. One parent is Asian. Spend 30 minutes actually wandering the aisles of Toys R Us then tell me AG such a terrible thing.

Wow! Cool!

The funny thing is that I would never have thought that a mixed-race/homeschooling/world-travelling identity could be a stereotype! I suppose her parents are NPR-Listening/New-York-Times-reading/Volvo-Driving Liberals.

Andy, that's so five years ago. An NPR listening, NYT reading liberal drives a Prius.

Well for that matter, homeschooling is so five years ago too. Now, we unschool.

"When I took my son to Chicago the Only American Girl we saw was Sue (the T-Rex)at the Field Museum!!!
Thank goodness my son is an American Boy"

Hey now Anon Dad, my GIRL and I also skipped AG and went right for SUE : )
Then we went to the Art Museum to see The Weaver by Rivera. She really wanted to see the bloody Ford Hospital paitning by Kahlo, she's weird like that, but it's not there, this was as close as we could get to Kahlo. In case you can't tell, she wouldn't be caught dead in an AG store. She's 7 BTW.

I was an AG book buyer too when I was younger and completely enticed by the smooth, matte covers and thick paper. I saved up my pennies and quarters to buy them, only to find that I finished reading them in 10 minutes and had no desire to reread them. So I stopped and went to the library instead.

Although children can be sucked in by marketing, they should be able to figure out the value of a dollar and of quality literature on their own. Or maybe they really are just getting dumber.

Yes, please make the bouncing ad stop. It makes it ever so distracting to visit the entertaining Ms. Fuse.

Katherine

Hear! Hear!

Oh, GOD do I agree.

I thought it was my computron!

And Fuse, we love you, too. I can't read your blog over there now but I remain confident that SLJ will see the error of its ways soon, and/or start handing out Dramamine to its readers.

I've just been working on my speech for the Newbery/Caldecott/Wilder banquet and wondering how everyone would like it if I delivered it while bouncing up and down with an ad for the Horn Book on my shirt.

Yes, so true! I can't even tell what the ad is for. How ridiculous.

Me too! I almost posted a begging note to Fuse to please kill that thing! I will never buy that wretched book.

Well, hallelujah that someone spoke up! I second, third, and quadruple that vote! I hate that ad thing so much. I am still visiting Fuse, but it is not nearly as pleasant and you can bet I get the heck out of there pronto.

So SLJ - STOP IT!

I'm joining your boycott, Roger. I won't go to SLJ until someone tells me that ad and ads like it will never appear again.

I hope that lots of other people also boycott and that SLJ notices. It will be interesting to see if they do, or if I find, within the month, a banner ad on your site and on every other site I visit.

Wow, that is super annoying. Especially if you still use an old 466 MHz Processor G3 that falls half a step behind in rendering Javascript. Or Flash. Or whatever they are using. Accessibility issues, what-what?

That ad is beyond the pale, I've felt tormented by it all week. Who would think a place like SLJ would have an ad that makes a red lobster inn popup look like a model of respectful restraint?

Only if it was for a book like FEED could I take it, and then only as a temporary joke.

Of course I went to the site to see the ad--it does make me feel like I'm doing something wrong when I scroll, which is one more piece of self-criticism I don't need.

But forget that, are we all going to be blase about Roger using the word "fucking" in his blog entry? At my computer I swear like Christopher Moltisante, but until now I have tried to contain myself in public. But if the Horn is doing it, then Katy bar the door.

If you use Mozilla as a browser and download their wonderful plug-in that blocks flash animation, you won't see that annoying ad -- or any other bouncing, blinking, flashing ad -- ever again. And all you have to do if you do want to see an animation for some reason is to click on the arrow overlay that replaces the flash image.

I don't work for Mozilla or anything, but have found surfing much more pleasurable since I made the switch. Both are free.

There is an alternative to ignoring SLJ and Fuse8. I'm just sayin'

That ad? Sucks. Big time.

The sad thing? I actually liked Atherton (the book that the Ad From Hell is advertising). I was going to review it. Now there's no way in the world I'm touching that puppy with a ten foot pole. Sorry, Little Brown & Co. Atherton is now the bane of my life.

That shows how ineffective the ad is, though. I've seen other ads for Atherton and even attended a party where the original art was shown, so the book is very high on my radar. And yet I didn't even realize that Atherton is what the ad was for. All I remember is that I couldn't get the stupid thing off the screen.

Amen, brother!

My Fuse habit had gotten pretty strong but this is killing it quick. I look at a lot of web sites with ads on them but I draw the line at the flashing and the bouncing and the twitching. SLJ either doesn't know ugly from attractive, much less tolerable; or they have no respect for their readers; or no interest in keeping them; or all, ah, what was I up to? Or all three!

And as for RS's language, there are ads, and there are fucking ads, and this is maybe the most fucking fuckingest of all fucking ads.

I didn't even notice what book was being advertised--I only noticed that it was yellow and annoying and it wouldn't go away--but it made me go away from the SLJ website!

tsnmb,

yes you're right, there is a mozilla answer, but rather than getting into an arms race where SLJ keeps trying to get their annoying in past my defenses, I would really rather that they just STOP IT RIGHT NOW.

SLJ... SLJ... SLJ... Are you listening? Act quickly! Next step is a call for reparations!

Betsy, I've been trying to read your Fuse #8 blog since about 10 pm tonight (June 14) and it's just not there. not there at all. Just white blankness.

Either SLJ is trying to remove that bouncing banner and has temporarily shut you down, or else hhhmmm. I don't know what.

You might tell SLJ that I never did figure out what the ad was advertising -- no book name showed on my Mac. The quote showed, but I had no idea what it was referring to. So, as advertisement, this bouncing idea seems to have flopped. (flipped and floped?)

p.s. it didn't bother me much because it kept skooting to the bottom of the screen, nicely keeping itself away from the part of your blog I was reading at the time.

-wendie old, librarian, writer, mom

Wendie, if you click on the ad, it will tell you and your Mac all about Atherton, etc. But then you will have only encouraged it.

Please, please, blame the messenger not the book. Atherton, a science-fiction/dystopic story for middle graders is worth reading.

That last message was from me (just so you know that it wasn't from the author or publisher).

I found that if I started at the bottom of the screen and scrolled up it didn't seem as annoying but eventually I had to scroll down again & it bounced along with me. Very irritating.

There have been 26 comments here devoted to the ad and the book which means that the ad has managed to bounce its way over into Horn Book's blog without Little, Brown having to pay for it. Meanwhile, Horn Book blog readers rush over to SLJ's blog to see what all the fuss is about while SLJ pockets the money Little, Brown paid them for the ad.

I'd say that's one successful ad, for both SLJ and Little, Brown. Don't look for it to disappear any time soon.

Not so! I've worked in advertising, and that would not be considered a successful ad! People at an influential and well read website talk of boycotting a whole site because of one ad? People in the book business claiming to never want to read the book or review it? People didn't just pop over to see because of Roger's comment, many of the commenters had already seen it and had already been avoiding it or developing negative feelings about it all all their own.

Public controversy and the resultant attention do often work in the favor of things like this, but this is clearly an example of something backfiring.

I have received word (and I may or may not blog about it) that SLJ has heard the cries of pain and is promising never ever ever to do this kind of an ad again. That said, the ad is still there. So.... huh.

Oh, please, people boycotting a site or refusing to read or review a book just because Roger Sutton voices his disapproval of an ad on a competitor's online journal?

Could it be that he's just pissed that SLJ's now got Fuse8, and he's no longer the hippest blogger in kidlit rags?

Fuse has always been hipper than I, o craven Anonymouse; keep up.

As I leave the office at last I offer this humbly:

I repent in dust and ashes. I tried something new. It ddin't work. I will not do it again. Please don't anyone come to my booth during ALA to hurt me.

My head is hung.

My face is pink.

OK. I'm done.

Victoria Stapleton
Manager, Library Services
Little, Brown Books for Young Readers
Sinner.

No, Victoria, YOU are the latest Blog Laureate, crow-ned with the sacred wreath for your honesty and good humor in the face of scorn and adversity. All hail Victoria!

I hope you set aside your ban to read Brian Kenney's post on SLJ explaining the ad today at http://www.schoollibraryjournal.com/blog/850000285/post/1810010781.html?nid=3366
I confess the ads drive me crazy, but I have been tolerating them to an extent because the bloggers, myself included, are trying to do something new. Please don't throw out the baby with the bath. Give the bloggers a break.

I did go over to Brian's blog and leave a comment there; thanks for the heads-up, Diane. But I'm not going to lump this one in with the "give the bloggers a break" breaks. At least two of the bloggers (Fuse and Brian) said they too found the ad annoying and were as surprised as the rest of us to see it. Their ignorance of the ad is completely correct--as editorial contributors, they should be kept as far away as possible from the department of SLJ that solicits ads. I think you inadvertently expose yet another dimension of the blog-book-reviewing issues: the prospect of the same person reviewing books and soliciting ads for the same blog. That's a potential fuck-up far more serious than the SLJ business, which was really just an example of a bad ad.

Exactly my point. Either consciously or unconsciously I'm going to find myself avoiding reviewing any title that has an ad on my site. This shouldn't be too difficult if I'm able to review books long before they get to the ad stage of things, but Atherton is a case in point. I may still review it (I mean, I actually did like it) but maybe not for a couple months when the fresh pain of the ad has subsided a little.

By "hip" I am going to assume that you are referring to the relative size of my actual physical hips. Which, truth be told, are magnificently wide and able to carry small children without the use of hands. So yes. I am, in this sense alone, more "hip" than Roger. In terms of being cool, however, the man wipes the floor with me.

If Roger wants to swear on his blog, it's his blog, and if you don't like it, you can just skip over the swear words if they raise your blood pressure or if they bore or otherwise annoy you...

It's VERY difficult to nicely ignore an online ad that follows you around...next time around, they'll have the awful thing SPEAKING to you...and I have every popup blockup thingie I can think of in operation on my browser..but it's still not enough, enough, ENOUGH of the bibbity bobbity boo!

These creepcrawly ads give me NIGHTMARES! I wake up in cold sweats thinking they've stolen my idendity!

Am very pleased to see the mention of Sherman Alexie's new book. I admire him greatly and am eagerly anticipating reading this new book of his. YA have been reading his books for years, though the books are not shelved, in my local library, on YA shelves for some odd reason?? He's done a lot of work with Indian young people in schools that people don't seem to know about as much as his books. I watched both of his films, too.

Amen! Why do you think I'm visiting here rather than hanging out with Betsy? I can't stand that thing!

That said, how awesome is Victoria?! Now THAT is how you do PR! Try something new, find that people loathe it, and then make an apology. All is forgiven! Huzzah!

So why hasn't SLJ taken it down?! Let's go over there with pitchforks and flames!

it is gone!

Though I'll miss the indignation it allowed me, hallelujah and praise be!

I wouldn't worry too much--issues of authenticity and stands against Orientalism were relevant when it was only the "other" doing the writing. But the East is starting to talk back now. Even in children's literature which tends to hold to its staples for centuries. And Bollywood has for years alternately vilified and exoticized the West, including that place called Amreeka! So I'd say enjoy the opera and know that the multi-armed gods might be laughing too.

And then there’s the flip side, the retelling of traditionally northern European stories with let’s say low levels of concern about appropriation and authenticity. Red Ridin’ in the ‘Hood, etc. Mein Gott!

Well, I never thought "authenticity" was the genuine concern of most of those who wield that cudgel. I hate to go all Jack Zipes here, but I think it's all about power. Different groups, at different times, use it to get a larger piece of the pie. That can be useful and helpful to the literature as a whole, but it's never as disinterested as the advocates would like it to seem to be.

Yesterday at Smith College the Dalai Lama took a question from the audience: essentially: "What happens if you are accepting toward other religious traditions but they aren't accepting towards you?" He answered that different people needed religions that offer different things. If you need a religion with a Creator God, then you can have that. If your religion proposes Causality (that's Buddhism): then that's the religion for you. He said it was like people who have different illnesses, and need different medicines. Or how when you go to a restaurant, you should be able to have a menu with different foods.

I thought it was a clever response, especially since Mahayana Buddhism has a key doctrine called "Expedient Means" that says the Buddha helps everyone differently and appropriately, according to each person's development and capacities.

That is: the Dalai Lama did what Uma is pointing out: he responded to a question that posited him as "The Other" with a response that brings "The West" neatly under his own umbrella.

With all respect, it was an interesting answer, but I don't know if it was really an answer to the question he was asked.

Tibetan Buddhism -- really, all Buddhism -- has a long tradition of debate. Every technique is employed, including sidestepping the question in order to make the point you wish to make.

It was exactly the kind of response that I meant. A deft sidestep that leaves a verbal silk scarf in the questioner's hand and yet delivers its point effectively. After all, it's only in the Western scheme of things that a question is a sort of rhetorical cup that needs to be filled by an answer.

By the way Uma I sell your marvelous title "Monsoon" at the Eric Carle Museum. It's quite unique in depicting modern Indian life from the perspective of an urban middle class child.

Are you trying to tell me that Tony Snow is a Tibetan Buddhist?

Thanks Andy, that's good to know. I try to do my bit to advance postcolonial views of the subcontinent :-)

I suspect that the Dalai Lama's technical skills at the art of rhetoric are superior to Tony Snow's, and that therefore in a direct face-off the Dalai Lama could more effectively position Tony Snow under a Tibetan Buddhist contextualization than could Tony Snow position the Dalai Lama under a Hegemonic American contextualization.

Ergo: Tony Snow is a Tibetan Buddhist (whether he likes it, or thinks so, or not).

Actually, the Dali Lama answered in a manner much as Jesus would have...expertly slamming the shuttle into the other person's court...requiring he/her to make his/her own responses with his/her own choices and actions...

I grew up with badminton not tennis...

No one has to worry about a book being culturally authentic if it is the real thing in the first place..not the author nor the publisher nor the reader nor the reviewer nor the buyer... The debate and power struggles most notably arise from the suspiciously "smelly" books...although some of them manage to hide the "smell" pretty well...

I think the blogs should have a blog-off to see whose posting can inspire the most responses. Then at the end of the year you could have awards. The Gored Ox awards perhaps. Participants must be 18 years or older. ESPECIALLY on the children's book blogs.

i don't know about the amazon ads on blogs, but this reminded me of a friend who was spun into crisis when her gmail ads started asking things like "are you lonely?" and "will you be single forever?" right after a nasty breakup. the whole situation ended with her, in her office, yelling "DON'T YOU JUDGE ME, GOOGLE! I DON'T NEED THIS FROM YOU!" at her computer screen.

so true.

betty

I would hazard a guess the amazon blog widget (sidebar ad) "knows" your are signed in and is following your trail with cookies, hence the featured books reflecting what you were looking at instead of a children's book.

So it would not matter that the blog in question was children's literature related, it only cares what you are looking for on amazon.

Do I look like Hansel and Gretel?

Nah ... but amazon doesn't care what we look like as long as we buy!

;-)

Please, oh please, can you re-post what was "removed by a blog administrator?" I can't be the only curious cat around here...you could even edit it as you see fit!

Big brother is watching you. Yes, you've left a trail of bread crumbs in your wake. Or at least cookies. Amazon.com has a special kind of ad that affiliates can post on a web site or blog which displays books of interest to the viewer, based on their searching and buying history, as well as those related to the content of the page. It is rather spooky when you encounter it.

Nine times out of ten, at least, and at least on this blog, the "comment has been removed by adminstrator" message comes up when I've deleted a duplicate message or spam. So you didn't miss anything. Sorry.

That freaked me right out the first time I noticed it, too.

who are "George and Ira" and why should we care for their opinion?

George and Ira are the Gershwins, who wrote How long has this been going on.

The thing I hate about the Amazon tracking thingy is that I feel I'm being unfairly pigeon-holed. I might be looking something up for a review or something related to a reference question and somehow Amazon then decides it's something I'm interested in. I wish there was a way to tell them "I'm looking this up but I'm NOT interested in it, really!"

Actually, there is a way to tell Amazon you're not interested in something. Make sure you're logged in, and click on the "your name's Amazon.com" tab at the top. Then you can scroll down to "View and edit your browsing history" and "View and edit your recently viewed items." From there, you can clear your history or remove items individually from it. Of course, you can also delete the cookies from your computer.

Gershwins!! of course!! you should have a literacy test for admission to the dialogue!

Or a courtesy test....

I think it all has to do with background...I got the Gershwin thing because I'm 50, I like jazz "etcetera, etcetera, etcetera".

I'm sure the fresh young things out there might not know where that quote came from.

Sorry, I digress. I'm going to start deleting my cookies, except the chocolate chip ones. Oh boy, stream of consciousness is taking over.

B from OH

Best Books Reviewed
The latest books reviewed here for you! We review books in all genres: Fiction, Non-Fiction, Young Adult, Children's Books and Memoirs

Ace (the band) also said "How long has this been going on."

I have now become TOTALLY CONVERTED to indepdendent booksellers only in cyberspace. I WAS using the Big-A thingie (I refuse to have those squeakers' full name next to mine anymore in cyberspace, then I quit ousing them on my own accord because they are just too big and all-powerful, and NOW, I am REALLY CONVERTED...to Powell's first becuase they answered my plea first and soon to BookSense!!!! And a few more indenpendies too if I can help it....I feel like I stumbled using the Big-A there for a short while, but now I'm going to walk the talk in cyberspace...

I have now become TOTALLY CONVERTED to indepdendent booksellers only in cyberspace. I WAS using the Big-A thingie (I refuse to have those squeakers' full name next to mine anymore in cyberspace, then I quit ousing them on my own accord because they are just too big and all-powerful, and NOW, I am REALLY CONVERTED...to Powell's first becuase they answered my plea first and soon to BookSense!!!! And a few more indenpendies too if I can help it....I feel like I stumbled using the Big-A there for a short while, but now I'm going to walk the talk in cyberspace...

Hey! That's my book on the 3rd shelf from the bottom!

Oh, God. It reminds me of the sign that hung, years ago, over the Dial Books slush pile: "Here today, here tomorrow."

Oh, I feel much better about the sate of things around here now.

Well it certainly is satiating!

But do not overworry--remember, these particular heaps are of books that fall out of Horn Book review scope--adult books, vanity press titles, book-and merchandise, etc--or extra copies sent by publishers who couldn't restrain themselves to the requested two. We review hardcover children's books comprehensively, covering more than 6000 titles a year, with board books, novelty books, and paperbacks reviewed selectively.

I'd take a couple of those off your hands if I didn't live 600 miles away.

Aaaaccchh!

At work? Never!

with pain in my heart,
and sadness at the sight,

Barbarian the librarian

Kind of removes the "romance" from book reviewing, doesn't it? Poor, sad, little books.

I have to respectfully disagree with your assertion that you review hardcover children's books comprehensively. Your submission guidelines clearly state that books from publishers not listed in Literary Market Place aren't considered. Since Literary Market Place only lists publishers that publish three or more titles per year and have a total of ten titles in print, your reviews effectively exclude many micro-publishers, some of whom are producing quality work one or two books at a time.

Sheila is correct, and that is why I chose the word "comprehensively" rather than "completely." In the Horn Book Guide, we wanted to review a definable universe of books, and the LMP rule is what we came up with. I admit that there are good books being published by companies not in LMP, just as there is obviously garbage being published by companies that are. As publishing changes (increasing sophistication of small-press and self published books, more interesting original paperback publishing, electronic publishing, etc.) we know we will have to change too. We just haven't figured out exactly how and to what change yet. In the meantime, ALL children's books published for and available in some form in the U.S. are eligible and considered for review in the Horn Book Magazine, including small presses, foreign titles distributed here, and paperbacks.

it makes one flinch (well, it makes THIS one flinch) to see any books treated so cavalierly - even books which are not worthy of the sainted HB.

I know what you mean, Anonymous--it's bad enough that we even dare to evaluate them. It's like trying to review, well, magic.

Thank you for responding to my comment. I do understand the dilemma of how to define a manageable universe of books in a time when we are approaching 200,000 new books published each year. I'll watch with interest to see how Horn Book and other review journals adapt to a changing world. I hope that you can find a way to include those books that deserve to be included.

While we're on the topic, perhaps you could address a question that has been under discussion among small publishers. LMP has a small press section in which presses too small to be otherwise included in LMP can pay for a listing. Does inclusion in the small press section of LMP qualify a publisher's books for review in the Horn Book Guide?

Wow! All I could think of was the wealth of books you'all did read and review!

I've done a few cabaret shows here in Chicago, and I had occasion to sing at Don't Tell Mama in NYC one lovely Open Mic Night. But I digress...

I'm intrigued that you were playing the assassin game. When I was teaching, I would play the game with my drama students as a way to help them concentrate and/or remember important ideas. I don't see its relevance to singing, even as some kind of mental warm-up. Bizarre. The image of you sitting there, mouth agape, looking around at a bunch of goofs playing this game... hilarious.

Keep that memory, and use it the next time you croon "Send in the Clowns."

I have no clue how, or why, a game of assassin would have anything to do with cabaret, but I suppose it was meant to be a bonding experience. Although one where the object is to isolate victims and kill them off.

Thanks for the "all the gay out there" line, which forced me to clean my screen after an unfortunate spit-take.

Wow, a voice from Chicago cabaret. Here's (again) how old I am: I remember seeing the then unknown Karen Mason with the late Brian Lasser at His 'n Hers.

But you still haven't told us how to play the game.

I much prefer the "Mafia" variation -- in which the killers do their work at "night" while everybody "sleeps" -- because there's much more room for analysis and argumentation. But the essense of both games is that the innocent try to identify the guilty before the guilty kill them either directly or via rhetorical railroading which, developmentally, they become very good at around age twelve.

Ahh, Karen Mason... her sister Kim is a good friend of mine.

See this link for my a close description to my recollection of "Assassin." Roger, I am confounded by the whole "daylight savings" element in your group's game. Sounds like an interesting bunch.

http://www.ultimatecampresource.com/site/camp-activity/assassin.html

Who said "Memories/ like the corners when you're blind . . ."? Was it from a movie? Ah well, anyway . . . that's more like most childhood memories involving "it" games.

Jules, also cleaning off her computer screen from spit-taking for the same reason

The comparable Barbra was, I believe, responsible for that movie song. Because I acutlaly have the sheet music for it somewhere (alert! alert!), I must point out that the memories are lighting the corners of the singer's mind....though blindness would offer an amusing twist to the whole thing.

INcomparable! Incomparable!

Sorry, that was NOT a Freudian slip.