Morning, poppins!

Yesterday, for the first time in a long while, I submitted a Video Sunday for your approval.  Trouble is, I may have failed to mention one of the most fascinating videos out there with a tie-in to books for kids, so I’d like to rectify the situation today.

The title of the article read, ‘Last Week Tonight’: John Oliver Turned a 20-Year-Old Kids’ Book with ‘Startling Parallels’ to Trump into a Bestseller.  Naturally I tried figuring out what book they were talking about but I was coming up short.  Turns out it’s good old The Kid Who Ran for President by Dan Gutman.  That’s a title that is consistently on New York City public school reading lists every single year.  Wouldn’t be surprised a jot if that’s how Last Week Tonight‘s writing staff heard about it (some of them must have kids).  Glad to see it getting a bit of attention here and there. I won’t give away which candidate the “startling parallels” refer to (kidding!).  Thanks to PW Children’s Bookshelf for the link.

---

A Gene Luen Yang comic piece for the New York Times simply called Glare of Disdain?  Don’t mind if I do!

---

Horn Book came out with their 2015-2016 Yearbook Superlatives post once more.  Fun bit.  I wonder if they collect them throughout the year as they do their reading.

---

Tis the battle of the smarty-pants!  Who did it better?  Adam Rex and Christian Robinson at Horn Book or Jory John and Bob Shea at Kirkus?  The choice is yours (though Christian Robinson probably sweeps the deck with his magnificent “Black people are magic” line).

---

See how I’m going from a Horn Book post to a Horn Book / Kirkus post to a Kirkus review?  That’s why they pay me the big bucks, folks.  In any case, usually when I post a review on this blog I like to link the books mentioned in the review to Kirkus.  Why?  Because they’re the review journal that has the most free archived older children’s book reviews online.  Generally this is a good plan but once in a while it throws me for a loop.  For example, a reviewer of the original Nate the Great back in 1972 had serious problems with the title.  Your homework for the day is to read the review and then figure out what precisely the “stereotype” the book was faulty of conveying really was.  I’ve read this review about ten times and I’m still baffled.  Any ideas?

---

So I worked at NYPL for a number of years (11 in total).  Of those, I spent about five or six of them working in close proximity to the original Winnie-the-Pooh toys.  And in all that time I never knew them to look as good as they do right now.  Oo la la!  Goggle at that restored Kanga!  And a Piglet where his skin ISN’T falling off his body?  I don’t even know the guy now.  No word on whether or not the restoration yielded more information on the music box in Pooh’s tummy (or if it’s even still there).  Still, they look great (and appear to have a whole new display area too!).  Thanks to Sharyn November for the link.

---

Did you know that Cricket Media (which runs Cricket Magazine as well as other periodicals) has a blog?  I tell you this partly because I’m trying to contact someone at their Chicago location and so far my efforts have been for naught.  A little help?

---

Did you know there was a children’s book award for science fiction?  Yup. “The Golden Duck Awards, which are designed to encourage science fiction literature for children, have been given annually since 1992.”  And as far as I can tell, they may still be going on.  Check out their site here to see for yourself.  You can suggest books from the previous year too, so have at it, peoples.

---

So I give up.  Slate?  You win.  You do good posts on children’s books.  I was wrong to doubt you.  That post about how your son loves “bad guys” so you read him Tomi Ungerer’s The Three Robbers?  That’s good stuff.  And the piece on how terrible the U.S. is at translating children’s books?  Also excellent.  To say nothing of all the other excellent posts you’ve come up with and researched well.  I doff my cap.  Your pop-up blog is a rousing success.  Well done you.

---

Question: How often has a documentary been made about a nonfiction children’s picture book about a true subject?  Once at least.

---

Saw this next one on the old listservs and figured it might be of use to someone:

I just wanted to pass along an opportunity that I’m hoping that you’ll hope promote for ALSC. Every year, we give away four $600 stipends for ALSC members to attend Annual for the first time. Applications are open now and are being accepted up to October 1, 2016. For 2017, Penguin Random House is including one ticket for each winner to the Newbery-Caldecott-Wilder Banquet. Here is some more information.

---

Daily Image:

Because I just cannot stop with the Stranger Things.  This one came via my friend Marci.  Look closely enough and you’ll see Will hiding in the Upside Down.

Thanks to Marci Morimoto for the link.

Display Comments Add a Comment

Finding Winnie: The True Story of the World’s Most Famous Bear Written by Lindsay Mattick Illustrated by Sophie Blackall Little, Brown and Company   10/20/2015 978-0-316-32490-8 32 pages Ages 4—8 . . “Before Winnie-the-Pooh, there was a real bear named Winnie. In 1914, Harry Colebourn, a veterinarian on his way to tend horses in World …

Add a Comment

• First and foremost, this:

That would be Kadir Nelson’s tribute to the Schomburg Library in NYC. A couple things to note about it.  First, in an amazing bit of research you can see that he includes both the old Schomburg Library (now overrun with ivy) and the new Schomburg together at the bottom.  Second, the inclusion of Langston Hughes front and center is particularly clever since Langston is practically the first thing a person sees when they enter the building.  Or rather, Langston’s words which are embedded in the very floor.  I do miss the Schomburg. This brought all that back.

• In all the talks we’ve heard from people about A FINE DESSERT and A BIRTHDAY CAKE FOR GEORGE WASHINGTON, I sometimes feel like we haven’t heard enough from the teachers about how they teach topics like slavery.  That’s why posts like Monica Edinger’s In the Classroom: Teaching About Slavery are so important.  If you read no other link today, read this one.

• This one’s for the librarians.  Want to know all the different rates publishers charge libraries for ebooks?  A handy dandy chart explains all.

• Travis Jonker knew not what he hath wrought when he posted about The Most Annoying Board Book Ever.  I know precisely what book he’s talking about (as does anyone else who has encountered it).  I never get rid of books, as my household will attest, but THAT book I gave away with a flourish when I moved.  I wasn’t going to use precious box space cluttering it up with that monstrosity.  One of the buttons that’s supposed to sound like snoring actually sounds like Darth Vader.  And believe you me, you do NOT want the unsettling feeling that Vader is lurking around your house.

• Me Stuff:  WGN Radio in Chicago and I chatted about How to Keep Your Children Interested in Reading, as I talked up Brightly’s recent list of 50 Best Books for 7- and 8-year-olds.  Such fun stuff.  I’m now their official WGN librarian, apparently.  The gig is mine!

Speaking of radio, have you guys all heard James Kennedy (of 90-Second Newbery and The Order of Odd Fish fame) on Matthew Winner’s Let’s Get Busy podcast?  If you listen to no other interview on that show (and I include my own when I say that) listen to this one.  The two guys basically hit it out of the park right at the start when James mentions the plethora of The Call stories as they relate to ALA Award committees.  The dog church bit . . . seriously, you just have to listen.  And not just because an Oakland newspaper said of James that, “Between his wardrobe choices and excited mannerisms, he had the familiar air of Professor Gilderoy Lockhart in the Harry Potter film adaptations, only he was not a braggart.”  I always think of him as more a Xenophilius Lovegood type, but maybe that’s just the Rhys Ifans talking.

• Man. I gotta apologize. Somebody somewhere alerted me to the Booktoss piece Say It With Me: Intersectionality and I’ve forgotten who they are.  Mea culpa.  In any case, this is a great piece of writing.  From Beyonce at the Superbowl to Ben Hatke’s Little Robot.  Not an easy connection, but Laura Jimenez manages it.  Kudos.

• I think I failed to post this before, but Mike Lewis did a killer rundown of the CTTCB’s Social Media Institute in his piece Exiting the Echo Chamber.  I am, however, a little jealous at the title.  Wish I’d thought of it myself.

• Why, yes.  I would like to attend a Roll of Thunder Hear My Cry exhibition at the Brooklyn Public Library.  However did you know?  But quick question: When did Wendell Minor illustrate the series?  It makes me happy but I want to see that work.

• Things I’m Surprised More Publishers Don’t Do With Their Backlist: This. I guess it helps if you have a big recognizable name, but still. Now can we PLEASE discuss doing this with William’s Doll?  You want money?  I have money. (Fun Fact: I don’t have money – I just want to see it brought into the 21st century)

Though it contains an image of the original Winnie-the-Pooh toys that has to be more than eight years old (Donnell Library!), the Huffington Post article Christopher Robin Was Real, And Other Facts About Winnie-The-Pooh’s Author has some nice items in it.  Particularly point #2.  H.G. Wells?  Really?

• Here’s another one for the librarians.  Booksellers too, as it happens.  According to a recent Nielsen Report, Social Omnivores And Book Placement Majorly Influence Children’s Book Buyership.  No surprises there.  What is surprising is that when it comes to selecting books, “The shelf has more influence than the promotional table, window display, bargain bin, etc. combined by a very wide margin.”.  Yep.  Your displays may look all kinds of pretty, but nothing beats good old fashioned shelving when it comes to checkouts/sales.  Who knew?  Thanks to Carl Schwanke for the link.

• Word I Don’t Use Enough: Ostrobogulous. Disagree on peril of defining it (though this may help). Thanks to Phil Nel for the link.

• This Kirkus editorial called Sandra Boynton Slaps Us Around (a great title that) fits in nicely with my post Girls: Beyond Eyelashes and Bows, don’t you think?

• “Where are the children’s books that celebrate working-class values and voices?” is not a question being asked by many folks here in America.  It is, however, being asked in The Guardian by Elen Caldecott.  And it is a question I would very much like us to start answering over here as well.

• Ashley Bryan, the patron saint of children’s literature (as I mentally refer to him) is popping up all over New York City.  Lucky lucky New York City.

• Daily Image:

Alison Morris, currently working as the Senior Director of Collection Development & Merchandising at First Book, is the cleverest crafty person I know.  Years ago she showed me how to make F&Gs into birdhouses.  Now she’s making classic children’s characters into marble magnets.

Want to make your own?  Instructions can be found here.  Cheers, Alison!

Display Comments Add a Comment

       

Tales of wonder usually have happy endings. They may have danger and darkness, forbidden places and strange creatures, witches and cruel magic...but wonder tales -- fairy tales -- do have happy endings...with very few exceptions. The journey may be fearsome, but salvation and awakenings occur in the end...and these stories endure forever.

...............

Beauty, Horror, and Ignition Power...

Enchanted Hunters, The Power of Stories in Childhood by Maria Tatar, takes the reader on a wonderful journey through children's literature.

In the chapter entitled, Beauty , Horror and Ignition Power, she writes about the effect of wonder tales on the imagination of children, including the balance between the dark side and positive endings. Here are excerpts..."We rarely worry about the effects of beauty, but horror is another matter...with an allure all its own, horror has the power to frighten as well as to fascinate...how much do we want children to find in their stories and how soon?..." 

Tatar then illustrates the idea of too much horror with "Hans Christian Anderson's 'The Girl Who Trod On The Loaf', a tale that revels in torturing Inger, the 'girl' in the title." Tatar then writes, by contrast. of three classic tales  where all ends well. 

 "By contrast,'Little Red Riding Hood', 'Hansel and Gretel', and 'Snow White' begin with the child as victim, but they end with the triumph of the underdog and the punishment of the villain. 'Children know something they can't tell; they like Red Riding Hood and the wolf in bed' Djuna Barnes once declared. Fairy tales and fantasy enact perils and display horrors, but they always show a way out, allowing children to explore great existential mysteries that are far more disturbing when they remain abstract and uncharted rather than take the concrete form of the story."

The illustration of Little Red Riding Hood is by Hermann Vogel.

..............

The Defining Dynamic of the Fairytale      

Amanda Craig,is an acclaimed British novelist,  journalist, and  children's book reviewer. The following excerpt is from her insightful review of Marina Warner's "Once Upon A Time, A Short History of the Fairy Tale", in the Guardian   

"One of the most interesting aspects of reworking fairytales is that it tends to be practised by idealists and reformers, whether devout Christians, such as CS Lewis, or socialists, such as JK Rowling. The defining dynamic of the fairy tale is optimism (as opposed to the tragic tendencies of the myth), but this has encouraged bowdlerisations from the dark and gruesome aspects of many originals – Dickens hated the way the illustrator George Cruikshank softened stories, the brothers Grimm tinkered to “excuse the men and blame the women”, and the ambiguity of the fairytale led to them being twisted into Nazi propaganda, with Little Red Riding Hood being saved from a Semitic wolf.

Happily, they have also been transmuted by modern feminism: Neil Gaiman’s striking novella, The Sleeper and the Spindle... conflates and subverts Snow White and Sleeping Beauty into a tale of female courage and choice..." Read it all in the Guardian   

The illustration from Tom Thumb is by Warwick Goble.

 .................

Where the Light is Golden...

“October knew, of course, that the action of turning a page, of ending a chapter or of shutting a book, did not end a tale. Having admitted that, he would also avow that happy endings were never difficult to find: "It is simply a matter," he explained to April, "of finding a sunny place in a garden, where the light is golden and the grass is soft; somewhere to rest, to stop reading, and to be content.” ― Neil Gaiman, The Sandman, Vol. 4: Season of Mists

Illustration by Mike Dringenberg or Kelly Jones .

..............................

 Humane Society of Missouri

The Humane Society of Missouri helps more than 85,000 homeless, abused and unwanted animals each year. Here is their mission statement:

.......................

 "Perfect for Me"

 

.......................

 
Dr. Seuss’ ‘What Pet Should I Get?’

"First, though, the book itself: It features a round-faced brother and sister — his close-
cropped hair is bristly on top, she has a long, wispy ponytail — who enter a pet store excited about the prospect of taking a new animal home. 'Dad said we could get one./ Dad said he would pay,' the boy exclaims. Inside, they confront a head-­spinning lineup of choices. Also, they don’t have much time — their mother has told them to be home by noon. A few pages into their predicament and again toward the end, the words MAKE UP YOUR MIND charge across the top of a two-page spread, each held aloft by a different invented Seussian creature — ­floppy-limbed, scruffy-coated, oddly proportioned, jubilantly weird. On one of those pages, the boy sums up the book’s central point in a deceptively innocent lament: 'Oh, boy! It is something to make a mind up!' ” 

Here is a link to read all of Russo's article: SUNDAY BOOK REVIEW

Here's a link to a delightful and informative Dr.Seuss Today Show  report on the new book, Theodore Geisel, his widow, his personal assistant, and his publisher.  

.......................

Winnie-the-Pooh

"To the uneducated, an A is just three sticks."

“People say nothing is impossible, but I do nothing every day.” 

“We'll be Friends Forever, won't we, Pooh?' asked Piglet.
Even longer,' Pooh answered.” 

“I think we dream so we don’t have to be apart for so long. If we’re in each other’s dreams, we can be together all the time.” 

A.A. Milne, Winnie-the-Pooh

The illustration is by Earnest Shepard.
...................

Rescuing Wonderful Shivery Tales

This is the title of Marina Warner's excellent and inclusive article in the NY Review of Books . Warner writes about contributions to the world of wonder tales and children's literature by Jack Zipes, Philip Pullman, Peter Wortman, and Maria Tatar. In the case of Tatar, she concentrates on her work in introducing, translating, and annotating the Turnip Princess, the tales collected by Franz Xaver von Schonwerth.

Here are excerpts from this informed and insightful article:  

"Jack Zipes has long been a staunch advocate of fairy tales and their proper study since his
book Breaking the Magic Spell (1979) issued a devastating blast against the wishful thinking of mass entertainment and shook the staid and soporific scene of folklore studies. To interpret the tales he has combined Marxism, feminism, cultural materialism, and even—for a short period—evolutionary biology. He has stirred readers with a similar passion for his material, while attacking the use of literary fantasy in movies and television to camouflage moral manipulation. Writers whom he admires—Jane Yolen, Terri Windling, and above all Angela Carter—and the films informed by their work have supplied countermodels to the sins of the dream factory. 

In the epilogue of the new critical collection, Grimm Legacies, Zipes, drawing on the work of the philosopher Ernst Bloch, once again argues that fairy tales are best understood as utopian thought experiments. When the peasant crushes the ogre, the poor lad finds justice; persecuted by malicious relatives, the kind sister gets her due, the courageous girl saves her beloved siblings or lover... 

Zipes is on a lifelong mission, as ardent as the Grimms’, to bring fairy tales into circulation for the general increase of pleasure, mutual and ethical understanding..."

The illustrations for the Grimm's Hansel and Gretel and King Thrushbeard are by Arthur Rackham.

...........................

 FOR YOUNG FANTASY AND ANIMAL LOVERS EVERYWHERE

By Don Blankenship, educator and reviewer for Good Books for Kids . This is an excerpt from his review of Castle In The Mist... 

"This is the second book in the Planet of the Dogs series and I must say I enjoyed it, cover to cover. This work can be read as a sequel to Planet of the Dogs, an ideal situation, but can also be read as a stand-alone with no loss to the flow of the story. This read is suitable for children of approximately eight years and up as a reader, or can well be read to children much younger. Adults will love this one also; I know I did, but then I have my fare share of kid still in me...

The art work by Stella Mustanoja McCarty is of the same high quality that we found in the first book in this series (and we find in the sequel to this book also), and is a delight to the eye. These are a series of black and white drawing, probably enhanced by the use of charcoal, which fit the text perfectly. When you bring a skilled artist and writer together that know children and know their dogs, then you know you are in for a treat."

Read sample chapters of Castle In The Mist at our website: Planet Of The Dogs.

The photo, above, of the boy, Chase, and Rose, the therapy dog, are by Susan Purser. Susan and Rose bring hope and caring to many people, of all ages, from young readers to the ill and the aged.

We have free reader copies of the Planet of The Dogs book series for therapy dog organizations, individual therapy dog owners, librarians and teachers...simply send us an email at [email protected] and we will send you the books. 

 

Our books are available through your favorite independent bookstore, Barnes & Noble, Amazon, Powell's and many more...Librarians, teachers, bookstores...You can also order Planet Of The Dogs, Castle In The Mist, and Snow Valley Heroes, A Christmas Tale, through Ingram with a full professional discount.

The  illustration and book cover are by Stella Mustanoja-McCarty. 

 .........................

Pan In The Garden

"In many ways , modern children's literature remains an Edwardian phenomenon. This period defined the ways in which we still think of children's books and of
the child's imagination. During it's few years, this age produced a canon of authors and works that are still powerfully influential in the field...Our default mode of childhood, if you like, remains that decade or so before the first World War; the time between the death of Queen Victoria in 1901, and the assassination at Sarajevo in 1914, the time when writers looked back over loss and could only barely anticipate the end of the old order"

In the chapter "Pan In the Garden", Seth Lerer, in his book, Children's Literature, A Reader's History from Aesop to Harry Potter, writes of the impact of the Edwardian era on children's literature..."the years before the First World War in Britain and America were also years that socially and politically redefined childhood." 

Children's books written in the Edwardian era are known, even today, by many children:   The Secret Garden (Frances Hodgson Burnett), Peter Pan (JM Barrie), The Wind In the Willows (Kenneth Grahame) and more.

The cover illustration is by Inga Moore.

..............................

 

 
"Logic will get you from A to B. Imagination will take you everywhere." Albert Einstein

 

 

The illustration is from Miyazaki's Castle In The Sky.

.........................

Disney Got It Right in 2011-- After Previous Stumbles

According to Rotten Tomatoes, 90% of the critics (out of 127) liked the 2011 Disney production of Winnie the Pooh. Here is excerpt from the review by Michael DeQuina in Movie Report. 

..."the writing team and directors Stephen J. Anderson and Don Hall make it work by never losing sight of the spirit of the characters, world, and Milne: imagination, innocence, and heaps of heart--best encapsulated by the bear's simple, moving gesture of friendship that so eloquently ties up the story, characters, themes and the enduring legacy that is Pooh."

Here's a link to the trailer: Winnie-the-Pooh

........................

Maine has an organization - EmBrace A Vet -  that provides healing support with therapy service dogs. They also provide retreats for groups of vets and their families. This is from their site:

"Embrace A Vet is a nonprofit organization dedicated to providing direct and supportive services to these Maine Veterans and their families living with PTSD and/or TBI. Besides helping to save the lives of our veterans by providing love and hope through a new canine 'best friend', we also save the lives of many of the dogs who we adopt from shelters."

Embrace A Vet is the recipient of a $5,000 grant for their Paws for Peace Program. This funding, from the Planet Dog Foundation (PDF) will aid in the placement of 12 dogs with veterans in need,

Learn more about Embrace A Vet here. 

Here's a link to their new video: 

.......................

Reading Is Fundemental

Jessica Lahey, in the Motherlode section of the New York Times, wrote an excellent article on reading,literacy, and RIF. Here is an excerpt...

"Fortunately, Reading Is Fundemental (RIF), has been enriching children’s childhoods through the distribution of free books since 1966, when the founder Margaret McNamara resolved to give books to the children of Washington, D.C., children who may not
otherwise have the chance to own books. RIF delivered books into the hands of these children by way of their iconic Bookmobiles; magic vehicles of wonder that pulled right up to the schoolhouse door and invited children to select, and take home, books of their very own. In its first year, RIF gave 200,000 books to 41,000 Washington children, and by the time I stepped into my first Bookmobile in 1977, I was just one of 1.1 million children RIF served that year.

RIF’s vision has remained constant since Ms. McNamara handed out those first books: to
create “a literate America in which all children have access to books and discover the joys and value of reading.” While RIF promotes literacy for all children, its priority is to provide books to children in underserved and impoverished communities. Since 1966, RIF has given 412 million books to more than 40 million children, and today, it hands out 15 million carefully selected tomes each year.

Literacy is a prime predictor of student success, as well as a range of economic and physical well-being. According to the National Center for Education Statistics, nearly half of the adult population, or 93 million Americans, read at or below the basic level needed to contribute successfully to society. Adults below this basic level of literacy are far more likely to be unemployed and live in poverty, while individuals who achieve higher levels of literacy are more likely to be employed, earn higher wages, and vote in state and national elections"...

Here's a link to read it all: Motherlode 

 

..............................

Go Ask Alice

Anthony Lane,in an effervescent New Yorker article, wrote about Lewis Carrol, the Alice books, the world of nineteenth century Oxford,and several biographies in what Lane calls the Carrolllian maze. Here is an excerpt from this fascinating article...
"Conversations about what is real, what is possible, and how rubbery the rules that govern such distinctions turn out to abound in the tales of Alice. Yet they are sold as children's books, and rightly so. A philosopher will ask how the identity of the self can be preserved amid the ceaseless flow of experience, but a child -- especially a child who is growing so fast that she suddenly fills the room -- will ask more urgently, as Alice does, "Was I the same as when I got up this morning? I almost think I can remember feeling a little a little different" Children, viewed from one angle, are philosophy in motion."

 After I had prepared this post, I found that it was already posted by Maria Tatar on Breezes From Wonderland. Tatar has since added more about Alice including information about a new Annotated Alice by Mark Burstein and other news about 175 translations worldwide.  

Here is a link to Grace Slick singing White Rabbit at Woodstock (August 1969)

The illustration of Alice is one of ninetytwo by John Tenniel for Lewis Carrol's books.

...........................

 

 A Rose Is Not a Rose...

This excerpt is from a fascinating article by Marina Warner in the Guardian

"A fairytale doesn’t exist in a fixed form; it’s something like a tune that can migrate from a symphony to a penny whistle.

Or you can compare it to a plant genus, to roses or fungi or grasses, that can seed and root and
flower here and there, changing species and colour and size and shape where they spring. But if the prevailing idea of an archetype gives too strong an impression of fixity, the picture-language of fairytale is fluid and shapeshifting: a rose is not a rose, an apple not an apple; a princess or a villain signify far more than what they seem. A dictionary of fairytale would look more like a rebus made up of icons: snow, crystal, apples, dark forests, pinnacled castles, mermaids, toads, giants, dragons, sprites, fair princesses, likely lads and crones.

The symbolism comes alive through strong contrasts and sensations, evoking simple, sensuous phenomena that glint and sparkle, pierce and flow, by these means striking recognition in the reader or listener’s body at a visceral depth (gold and silver; diamonds and rubies, thorns and knives; wells and tunnels). It’s an Esperanto of the imagination, and it’s available for any of us to use – in almost any medium..." 

The painting of Sleeping Beauty is by Edward Burne Jones. The illustration is by Jennie Harbour.

...........................

 KIDLITOSPHERE CENTRAL

The Society of Bloggers in Children’s and Young Adult Literature 

I highly recommend Kidlitosphere as a source for anyone interested in children's literature.

No Dark Deeds Here

This excerpt of the review by Jo Williams in the St Louis Post-Dispatch, sums up the Minions, a movie for the very young.

"If you’re old enough to read a movie review in a newspaper, you’re too old to fully appreciate “Minions.” Ditto if you’re old enough to read the menu at a fast-food joint, the height requirements at an amusement park or the price tag on a shiny yellow toy. This spinoff of the “Despicable Me” cartoons is like a pre-verbal version of “Inside Out,” all coos and colors and cute facial expressions. Tiny tots will eat it up like jelly beans. But what about their bigger siblings and baby-sitters? Will they be trapped on a sugar-rush cycle with no hope of escape?

Yes, but … The mad scientists at Dreamworks have scrubbed this ’toon of anything that might scare or challenge the target audience"... 

Here is the trailer: Minions

............ 

Add a Comment

Mm. Double quick time Fusenews today, I should think. All the goodness. Less of the commentary. As such . . .

• What is the scariest children’s film of all time? If you mentioned a particular film that involved decapitated heads and Wheelers, this link’s for you.

• I’m not a teacher so I had no idea what the Best Websites and Apps for teaching and learning really were.  Now I do.  Thanks to Travis and Mr. Schu for the link.

• In case you missed it, the Guardian Children’s Fiction Award 2015 longlist was released and there are at least two Yanks present and accounted for.

• This one’s for any high school students you might know.  They’re looking for kids who know how to write funny stuff.  Since this is very much my wheelhouse, I’m going to ask you to think particularly of any funny girls you know.  Let’s make sure this puppy is well represented in both genders, shall we?  Due date: August 3rd so get cracking!

• The Kirkus/7-Imp piece on Private Readers is absolutely fantastic.  It isn’t just what we read but how we chose to read it (and keep it to ourselves).

• Made my day:

So did this, actually.

• Absolutely love this too:  Non-required summer reading.  Beautifully rendered. Thanks to Mike Lewis for the link.

• Question: Which hugely famous (and still alive) children’s book illustrator used to paint naked geishas for the troops during WWII?  The answer may surprise you.  Or not.  After all, have you ever checked out the bodies in A Circus is Coming?  Va-va-voom!  Extra sidenote: Is that clown with the glasses a barely disguised Kay Thompson?  Discuss.

• How sad that one of my former co-workers won’t be around to bid me goodbye as I leave NYC.  I mean, I understand why.  He’s got places to go.  People to see.  But still, bidding goodbye to the talking parrot head just isn’t going to have the same oomph.

• This note is just for my sister.  Kate, we need to do this.  Call me.

• Daily Image:

Okay. So this is pretty much just about the coolest float I’ve ever seen. As I am moving to Evanston, IL, it seems only fitting to know how they celebrate the 4th of July.  Recently, this float (in a photo taken by Junko Yokata) was on the route.  I have never, in all my livelong days, seen a Newbery float before.  Absolutely remarkable.

Thanks to Junko for the image.

Add a Comment

• Of all the most deserving, least lauded children’s book awards out there, my favorite might be The Phoenix Awards.  “The award, given to a book originally published in the English language, is intended to recognize books of high literary merit. The Phoenix Award is named after the fabled bird who rose from its ashes with renewed life and beauty. Phoenix books also rise from the ashes of neglect and obscurity and once again touch the imaginations and enrich the lives of those who read them.”  They’ve just announced the 2015 winner and I admit that I never read it (One Bird by Kyoko Mori).  There was a time, when I was young, when I tried to read as many Phoenix books as possible.  Someday, maybe, I’ll try again.

• And speaking of obscure awards, did you see the Seven Impossible Things post on Kirkus recently called The Coolest Picture Book Award You’ve Never Heard Of … A lot of you folks should know about this.  I suspect your books would be eligible (it’s for wildlife and nature).

• Heck, while we’re at it let’s also mention once more the Mathical Award which is given to books that “inspire young people to engage with mathematics in the world around them.”  The submission info is here.  Marc Aronson’s thoughts on the matter are here.

• For those of you in the market for ideas for your next middle grade novel, I suggest checking out this Dunmore, PA housing advertisement.  Have at it. Thanks to Kate for the link.

• New Podcast Alert: You know I’m just goofy for new children’s literary podcasts.  Heck, I once did an entire Literary Salon on the topic.  Well, Ms. Julie Sternberg has just started Play, Memory.  As she describes it: “I interview authors and others about the ways in which themes that recur in children’s literature–themes like the secrets we keep in childhood; the times we disappoint our parents; and the times our parents disappoint us–have played out in their lives.”

• And in other podcast news, there’s an interview with Fuse #8 favorite Frances Hardinge over at Tor.com.  Because anything that has to do with Ms. Hardinge is awesome.  I recently found myself having lunch at the same table as Patrick Ness and, at a loss of anything else to say to him, I realized we both belonged to the Mutual Admiration Society of Frances Hardinge.  So to speak. Thanks to Sarah Hagge for the link.

• There’s a nice big post on endpapers up and running at Nancy Vo’s Illustration blog.

This one’s rather interesting to me.  Folks in my family often send me links that have to do with libraries or librarians in some way.  I find some more useful than others.  Still, I was very intrigued by the recent piece called The Archivist Files: Why the woman who started LA’s branch libraries was fired. Wowzah.  Them’s good reading.

Speaking of librarians, did you know there’s an entire site out there dedicated to them dressing up and posting pictures of themselves?  Yup. Librarian Wardrobe. The more you know.

“But there’s a third set of children’s books: those that fall into an uncanny valley between enjoyable literature and ignorable junk. These are books that exert an irresistible pull on adult consciousness but don’t reward it. They are malign presences on the bookshelf. They hurt. One of them may be the best-selling children’s picture book of all time.”  That’s a hard sentence to beat and, as it happens, I agree with author Gabriel Roth every which way from Sunday.  He discusses what may be one of the worst “canonical” picture books of all time.

• A nice little write up of the panel I moderated at BEA called Telling the Truth at Every Age.

• This doesn’t actually have any connection to children’s literature really (though you might be able to make a case for it) but did you know that there’s a site created by NYPL where you can look at old photos of pretty much every single block in the city?  It’s called OldNYC and I’ve just handed you a website that will eat away at your spare time for the rest of the day.  You’re welcome.

• I was discussing this with buddy Gregory K the other day.  Can you think of a single instance where a Newbery Award winner went out, after winning said award, and became an agent?  Because that’s what Ms. Rebecca Stead has just done and I think it’s safe to say that it’s an unprecedented move.

• Daily Image:

So there’s this artist out there by the name of James Hance.  And this, my friends, is just the tip of the iceberg in terms of the content he has available.  Here’s a taste:

Thanks to Stephanie Whelan for the link.

Add a Comment

Finding Winnie: The True Story of the World’s Most Famous Bear
By Lindsay Mattick
Illustrated by Sophie Blackall
$18.00
ISBN: 978-0-316-32490-8
Ages 4-7
On shelves October 20th

What is it with bears and WWI?  Aw, heck.  Let’s expand that question a tad.  What is it with adorable animals and WWI?  Seems these days no matter where you turn you find a new book commemorating a noble creature’s splendor and sacrifice on the battlefields of Europe.  If it’s not Midnight, A True Story of Loyalty in World War I by Mark Greenwood or  Stubby the War Dog: The True Story of WWI’s Bravest Dog by Ann Bausum, it’s Voytek, the Polish munitions bear in Soldier Bear or,  best known of them all, the inspiration for Winnie-the-Pooh.   With the anniversary of WWI here, the children’s literary sphere has witnessed not one but two picture book biographies of Winnie, the real bear that inspired Christopher Robin Milne and, in turn, his father A.A. Milne.  The first of these books was Winnie: The True Story of the Bear That Inspired Winnie-the-Pooh by Sally M. Walker.  A good strong book, no bones about it.  But Finding Winnie has an advantage over the Walker bio that cannot be denied.  One book was researched and thought through carefully.  The other?  Written by one of the descendants of the veterinarian that started it all.  Add in the luminous artwork of Sophie Blackall and you’ve got yourself a historical winner on your hands.

Now put yourself in Harry’s shoes.  You’re suited up. You’re on a train. You’re headed to training for the Western Front where you’ll be a service vet, aiding the horses there.  The last thing you should do is buy a baby bear cub at a train station, right?   I suppose that was the crazy thing about Harry, though.  As a vet he had the skills and the knowledge to make his plan work.  And as for the bear, she was named Winnipeg (or just Winnie for short), and she instantly charmed Harry’s commanding officer and all his fellow soldiers.  During training she was great for morale, and before you knew it she was off with the troop overseas.  But with the threat of real combat looming, Harry had a difficult decision to make.  This little bear wasn’t suited for the true horrors of war.  Instead, he dropped her off at The London Zoo where she proceeded to charm adults and children alike.  That was where she made the acquaintance of Christopher Robin Milne and inspired the name of the world’s most famous stuffed animal.  Framed within the context of author Lindsay Mattick telling this story to her son Cole, Ms. Mattick deftly weaves a family story in with a tale some might know but few quite like this.

Right from the start I was intrigued by the book’s framing sequence.  Here we have a bit of nonfiction for kids, and yet all throughout the book we’re hearing Cole interjecting his comments as his mother tells him this story.  It’s a unique way of presenting what is already an interesting narrative in a particularly child-friendly manner.  But why do it at all?  What I kept coming back to as I read the book was how much it made the story feel like A.A. Milne’s.  Anyone who has attempted to read the first Winnie-the-Pooh book to their small children will perhaps be a bit surprised by the extent to which Christopher Robin’s voice keeps popping up, adding his own color commentary to the proceedings.  Cole’s voice does much the same thing, and once I realized that Mattick was playing off of Milne’s classic, other Winnie-the-Pooh callbacks caught my eye.  There’s the Colonel’s surprised “Hallo” when he first meets Winnie, which struck me as a particularly Pooh-like thing to say.  There are the comments between Harry’s heart and head which reminded me, anyway, of Pooh’s conversations with his stomach.  They are not what I would call overt callbacks but rather like subtle little points of reference for folks who are already fans.

I was struck my Mattick’s attention to accuracy and detail too.  The temptation in these sorts of books is to fill them up with fake dialogue.  One might well imagine that the conversation with Cole is based on actual conversations, possibly culled together from a variety of different accounts.  Since Mattick isn’t saying this-happened-like-this-on-precisely-this-date we can enjoy it for what it is.  As for Harry’s tale, you only occasionally get a peek into his brain and when you do it’s in his own words, clearly taken from written accounts.  Mattick does not divulge these accounts, sadly, so there’s nothing in the back of the book so useful as a Bibliography.  However, that aside, the book rings true.  So much so that it almost makes me doubt other accounts I’ve read.

As for the text itself, I was mildly surprised by how good the writing was.  Mattick makes some choices that protect the young readers while keeping the text accurate.  For example, when little Cole asks what trappers, like the one who killed Winnie’s mother, do, Lindsay’s answer is to say, “It’s what trappers don’t do. They don’t raise bears.”  Hence, Harry had to buy it.  She also has a nice little technique, which I alluded to earlier, where Harry’s heart and mind are at odds.  The heart allows him to buy Winnie and take her overseas.  The mind wins in terms of taking her to The London Zoo in the end.

I like to put myself in the place of the editor of this book.  The manuscript has come in.  I like it.  I want to publish it.  I get the thumbs up from my publisher to go ahead and then comes the part where I find an illustrator for it.  I want somebody who can emote.  Someone just as adept at furry baby bear cubs as they are soldiers in khaki with teeny tiny glasses.  But maybe I want something more.  Maybe I want an illustrator who puts in the rudimentary details, then adds their own distinctive style to the mix.  I’m willing to get an artist who could potentially overshadow the narrative with visual beauty.  In short, I want a Sophie Blackall.

Now I’ve heard Ms. Blackall speak on a couple occasions about the meticulous research she conducted for this book.  The Canadian flag she initially mistakenly placed on a ship of war has been amended from an earlier draft (the Canadian flag wasn’t officially adopted until 1965).  She researched The London Zoo for an aerial shot that includes everything from the squirrel enclosure to Winnie’s small block of concrete or stone.  Blackall also includes little visual details that reward multiple readings.  A scene where Harry departs on the train, surrounded by people saying goodbye, is contrasted by a later scene where he returns and far fewer people are saying hello to their loved ones.  One soldier has lost a leg.  Another greets his much larger son and perpetually handkerchief clutching wife.  Another doesn’t appear at all.  And finally, Blackall throws in beautiful two-page spreads for the sake of beauty alone.  The initial endpapers show an idyllic woodland scene, presumably in Canada.  Later we’ve this red sky scene of the ship proceeding across the Atlantic Ocean to Europe.  For a book about WWI, that red is the closest we come (aside from the aforementioned missing leg) to an allusion to the bloody conflict happening elsewhere.  It’s beautiful and frightening all at once.

In the world of children’s literature you never get a single book on the subject and then say, “There! Done! We don’t need any more!”  It doesn’t matter how great a book is, there’s always room for another.  And it seems to me that on the topic of Winnie the bear, friend of Christopher Robin, inspiration to a platoon, there is plenty of wiggle room.  Hers is a near obscure tale that is rapidly becoming better and better known each day.  I think that this pairs magnificently with Walker’s Winnie.  For bear enthusiasts, Winnie enthusiasts, history lovers, and just plain old folks who like a good story.  In short, for silly old bears.

On shelves October 20th.

Source: F&G sent from publisher for review.

Like This? Then Try:

• The Journey That Saved Curious George by Louise Borden

• Stubby the War Dog: The True Story of WWI’s Bravest Dog by Ann Bausum

• Christian, the Hugging Lion by Justin Richardson

Add a Comment

Winnie: The True Story of the Bear That Inspired Winnie-the-Pooh
By Sally M. Walker
Illustrated by Jonathan D. Voss
Henry Holt (an imprint of Macmillan)
$17.99
ISBN: 978-0805097153
Ages 4-7
On shelves now

I worked in close proximity to the real Winnie-the-Pooh for five years. From 2006 to 2011 he was a daily delight. To clarify, I was working alongside the original Winnie-the-Pooh toys owned by the real Christopher Robin, son of A.A. Milne in New York Public Library’s Central Children’s Room. We had Piglet, Tigger, Kanga (no Roo), Eeyore, and Winnie himself. Though ironically I never read his books as a child, in my time as a children’s librarian working in the Children’s Center at 42nd Street I became well versed in his story. Winnie was purchased at Harrods for Christopher Robin who eventually named him “Winnie” after some bear he’d seen in a zoo. If pressed to conjure up facts about that zoo bear I might have been able to tell you that its name was Winnipeg, but that was about as far as my knowledge on the matter went. Sometimes it takes a children’s book to learn about a children’s book character. Winnie: The True Story of the Bear That Inspired Winnie-the-Pooh relates the true history of a man and his bear. Illustrated with aplomb by Jonathan D. Voss, the book’s charm is the true measure by which you can assess how well it lives up to its namesake. Accuracy and adorableness in one small, furry package.

There are many things Harry Colebourn could have purchased as his troop passed through the small train station, but what did he end up with? A baby bear. A baby black bear, if you want to be precise about it. Good natured and orphaned, Harry promptly names her “Winnie” after his company’s hometown “Winnipeg” and she becomes the darling of his troop. When WWI calls his company across the wide ocean, Winnie comes along. But killing fields are no place for a baby bear so it’s to the London Zoo that Winnie goes. Once there, Harry promises her that when the war is done he’ll take her back to Winnipeg. It’s a promise he doesn’t keep. Upon his return Harry sees that Winnie is not only happy but a star of the zoo. She’s so gentle that children everywhere come to see her. Even a boy by the name of Christopher Robin . . . Copious photographs of the real Winnie and Harry grace the front endpapers while Christopher Robin graces the back. There is an additional Author’s Note on Harry, Winnie, and black bears as well as a Bibliography of sources.

As I began reading the book I wondered if the story of Winnie would be akin to other military animal tales out there. Would Winnie aid the Allies much in the same way as Voytek in Poland or was she more of a mascot like Stubby? Neither, as it happens. Though Winnie did make it onto a boat headed for France, her keeper was smart enough to recognize that while some bears would thrive in a war zone (see: Voytek), Winnie was not one of them. Really she was just a baby and after seeing her playing and cuddling with Harry the thought of her existing in a place where bullets would fly is terrifying. This is a sweet wartime tale, perfect for reading to younger children who take things on face value and aren’t aware of what WWI really entailed.

The art of Jonathan D. Voss caught me by surprise. With just a half glance at the cover I initially though the illustrator was Amy June Bates (who illustrated the somewhat similar Christian, the Hugging Lion back in 2010). An understandable mistake but once I actually went so far as to, oh I dunno LOOK at the book, I could see that Voss has a crisper line as well as a sure and steady grasp on the material. This being the first picture book that he has illustrated, he does a good job of making some really iconic images. The view on the cover of Harry hugging Winnie to his chest, as one might cuddle an infant, is downright heartwarming. Likewise the image of Winnie asleep under Harry’s cot as his long arm drapes down, his wrist bending in sleep, works. And if the four shots of Harry playing with Winnie were a YouTube video they’d get more hits than any other cute animal video to date. There is the occasional misstep, I’m afraid. A boy riding Winnie later in the book bears the slack-jawed look of a very small grown man and not a little boy. Indeed Voss appears to be most comfortable when Winnie is his focus. There’s not a single image where that bear doesn’t feel 100% authentic. One suspects the artist spent a great deal of time studying baby black bears and how they move. He also does a decent job of rendering the stuffed Pooh accurately. The arms are admittedly a bit long but the stance and nose are on target.

One objection I’ve heard to the story is that there isn’t enough Christopher Robin / real Winnie-the-Pooh info included in this story. I can see where this critic is coming from but I respectfully disagree. To my mind, Winnie’s story is fascinating in and of itself regardless of what famous literary character she ended up inspiring on some level. Hers is a story of tragedy turned to great good luck. Few orphaned bears in the WWI era would have found such a caring owner, let alone one that let them travel to Europe. Her life was notable at the time and makes for no less an interesting story today.

For my part, the book gets into tricky territory when we view the quoted dialog. Now Ms. Walker is a known entity. She does this stuff for a living. Wins big nonfiction awards like the Sibert for Secrets of a Civil War Submarine and the like. So when we get to a section where Harry is quoted saying “I’ll feed her condensed milk. She can stay with me in camp. Winnipeg can be our mascot,” then we have to naturally assume that the quote comes from one of the listed sources Walker provides at the back of the book. The quotes are not sourced but since Harry’s diary is one of those aforementioned sources, there’s a strong likelihood that the quotes come from there. I’m giving the book the benefit of the doubt in this matter, since faux dialog is the bane of the modern nonfiction picture book.

Read this book and few will wonder that after seeing Winnie in person, Christopher Robin wanted a bear of his very own. Indeed, the vast majority of children who are read Winnie may think to themselves (or say out loud) at some point, “When do I get my own?” Sorry, kids. If it’s any consolation you can see the Winnie-the-Pooh toys in the main New York Public Library location anytime the building is open. Maybe it won’t be the same as getting to ride a sweet bear in the zoo, but it’s still a part of this story on some level. Cute, not saccharine, and pleasing to boot, this is one story-behind-the-story kids will definitely appreciate. Lovers of Pooh welcome but not required.

On shelves now.

Source: Final copy sent from publisher for review.

Like This? Then Try:

• The Journey That Saved Curious George by Louise Borden

• Stubby the War Dog: The True Story of WWI’s Bravest Dog by Ann Bausum

• Christian, the Hugging Lion by Justin Richardson

Interviews: Julie Danielson interviews Sally M. Walker about the book over at BookPage.

Misc: For more interior illustrated spreads, go to Seven Impossible Things Before Breakfast.

Video: Forgot a movie was made out of this story as well, didn’t you?  You’re forgiven.  It came out in 2004 and was made for TV after all.  That said, it had some big name cast members.  Michael Fassbender starred.  Stephen Fry shows up.  David Suchet. And someone put the whole thing up on YouTube so if you’ve an hour and a half to kill . . .

Display Comments Add a Comment

• In the realm of “How crazy is this?” I have a whopper of a weirdo story.  As you may or may not know, for many years I worked with the delightful Winnie-the-Pooh toys in the Children’s Center at 42nd Street.  Because the toys originally hailed from Britain I become well and truly familiar with folks insisting that they be sent “home”.  In fact, if you’d like to read the entire history of the British M.P. who made it her misbegotten mission, you can do so here.  I hadn’t thought of the debacle in a while, until a most peculiar and bizarre piece ran in Newsweek.  It is difficult to ignore a clickbait headline like Behind Bullet-Proof Glass Winnie-the-Pooh Is In Jail.  Come again?  Riddled with inaccuracies one Cole Moreton decided it would be a good idea to give the impression that the Winnie-the-Pooh toys are now housed in the “basement” of the Schwarzman building.  By “basement” one assumes he means “ground floor” but from the piece you’d be convinced that they were stuffed in a dusty closet lit by a single lightbulb on a string.  It is a shockingly poor piece of journalism (not a single NYPL employee is interviewed).  If Mr. Morten had spoken to even a single person he might have scooped Time when they reported that Winnie might be making a visit to Britain in the future.  Ah well.

• In other news, my library’s President was recently interviewed by Humans of New York sounding the good sound byte.  Go, Tony, go!

• I am very very very very excited by this list: African-American Interest Young Reader’s Titles 2014-15.  It shall aid in my buying, yea verily it shall.

• From time to time I do some freelance for the company Zoobean.  They specialize in reader’s advisory and now, for the first time, they’ve paired with the Sacramento Public Library to use Beanstack, an advisory app for young children.  Well played, y’all!

• Christmas may be over but that doesn’t stop me for wanting things.  Like this poster from Sara O’Leary’s upcoming picture book This Is Sadie, illustrated by Julie Morstad:

• Oooo. Pretty.  Pop-Up glow-in-the-dark Harry Potter books.  Purdy.

• My reviewing took a bit of a header since the birth of kiddo #2 but I still engage.  Just the same, I cannot say that I haven’t engaged in all the Top 20 Most Annoying Book Reviewer Cliches at one time or another.  With the possible exception of “unflinching”.  That one doesn’t come up when dealing with board books very often. (example: “Martin offers an unflinching look at a brown bear’s ursine strength, never hesitating from delving into what it is they truly do see”).

• “Are You an Adult Who Reads YA Novels? Congratulations, You Saved Publishing in 2014.“  You heard it here first, folks.  Thanks to Wayne Roylance for the link.

• Daily Image:

Hope you got all the gifts you desired. Me? I never got this amazingly hipsterish version of Clue, but boy is it special.

I mean, what kind of Clue makes Miss Scarlett the least attractive?

 

 

Add a Comment

Zounds!

No reason in particular I wrote that word.  I just like to say “Zounds!” from time to time. Onward!

• I initially misread this post as “Summer Reading Takes a Hit From Online Scanning and Skimming Researchers Say” (which shows you where my mind is these days).  It’s not “Summer” but Serious Reading Takes a Hit From Online Scanning and Skimming Researchers Say.  I am not dead to the irony of linking to such a piece within a post where the entire purpose is to skim and scan.  That said, I’m just grateful that summer reading isn’t taking that hit.  Now THAT would be a catastrophe.  Thanks to Wayne Roylance for the link.

• This is somewhat related. The New York Times put out an article talking about the necessity of literature for the very young.  Called Books, and Compassion, From Birth it won’t say much that you don’t already know, but hopefully it’ll get some readers aware of what needs to be done.  It also ties in quite beautifully with author Jason Boog’s delightful July release Born Reading: Bringing Up Bookworms in a Digital Age — From Picture Books to eBooks and Everything in Between.  In the interest of transparency, I wrote the introduction for that book, but the content is all Boog.  Consider it the most necessary bit of parental instruction you’ll find.  Hand to folks at baby showers.  Please.

• I’m about a week behind in all my news, so you probably saw this long ago.  But just in case you didn’t I was amused by this mash-up of Syd Hoff/Richard Scarry and some very adult novels.  Here’s the link and here’s one of the images in question:

Awesome.

• It wouldn’t be the first time Mac Barnett and Daniel Handler have appeared on the same panel.  Heck, it probably wouldn’t even necessarily be the best time but there’s nothing like an imminent birth to make a person want to attend the 2014 ALSC National Institute. Aside from the great guests, folks get to go to a place called Children’s Fairyland.  I went to see whether or not I’d added the attractions there to my Complete Listing of All Public Children’s Literature Statues in the United States and found that I had not yet.  I think on maternity leave I go back to updating that post.  It’s 75% done.  Just need to keep adding on suggestions (and I see that the Albany Public Library turned it into a Pinterest board, which is rather fascinating in and of itself).

• I was fascinated by the recent ShelfTalker post To Host or Not to Host?  The gist of it is that local authors will often ask a bookstore to host an event for their book.  No big surprise there, except what do you do when they’ve published through Amazon?  The back and forth in the comments is worth your time and money.

• Good old Rocco Staino wrote up the recent celebratory 90-Second Newbery hosted at NYPL.  The gist of the article is quite clever too.  I had noticed vaguely, but without putting it together, that this year’s film festival featured a lot of forgotten Newbery book winners.  I mean, does anyone at all remember The Old Tobacco Shop: A True Account of What Befell A Little Boy in Search of Adventure?  And I blush to say it, but I had no idea that Anne Carroll Moore won a Newbery Honor back in the day.  Wowzah.  How is THAT fact not better known?

Display Comments Add a Comment

Hey all!  Before I dive into the oddities of the world in which we live, I just wanted to give a bit of a shout out to two distinct groups that allowed me to sprawl my librarian self all over their respective gatherings.  First up, credit and love to Nancy Castaldo and all the folks who made this weekend’s Eastern NY SCBWI Regional Conference the success that it was.  I’m mighty appreciative that I was able to offer the dessert keynote on Saturday.  Moreover, thanks to everyone who came out to see my censorship panel on Saturday at the Brooklyn Book Festival with David Levithan, Francesca Lia Block, and Lauren Myracle.  It’s always nice to moderate something that hardly needs any moderation at all.  Extra thanks to anyone who stayed around for my picture book reading later.  David Maybury I be looking at you.

And now, because the weekend was so darned exciting, I’m going to do some super quickie round-ups of the recent news.

• What’s that you say?  Beautiful posters inspired by the work of Roald Dahl?

Don’t mind if I do!

• I have dealt with difficult reference desk requests in the past, but Benji’s story on dealing with a student looking for Effie?  That takes the cake.  Thanks to 100 Scope Notes for the link.

• All right.  Love this look at what the voices behind Disney’s Winnie-the-Pooh looked like when it first came out and what they look like today.  Had no idea Clint Howard was Roo.  That’s gonna take some reconfiguration in my noggin.  And I thought Thurl Ravenscroft was the first Tigger!  No?  Thanks to PW Children’s Bookshelf for the link.An

• Though it falls squarely into the Couldn’t Be Published in America category of European picture books, Sergio Ruzzier’s remarkable The Birds is WELL worth reading through today.  And not just because I like the name.

• Ever been curious about the history of children’s theater in New York City?  Well, you lucky ducks, I just found a post that’s gonna make your day.

• Confused as to where exactly I work and what exactly I work for?  My job has gotten a bit more complicated since I became part of BookOps.  This interview with my colleagues by Booklist should clear up any and all confusion, though.  At least I hope it does.

• Take one look at this image and tell me what you think it is:

If you said it was an Anne-of-Green-Gables-inspired-wedding-shoot you would be correct.  Sadly it wasn’t a real wedding, but you can tell it’ll serve as inspiration to a lot of folks.

• The title probably says it all for this one: Reading for pleasure puts children ahead in the classroom, study finds. Yup.  Thanks to Amie Wright for the link.

• Hooray!  The good Elizabeth Bluemle has collected The Stars Thus Far for 2013 and they’re a doozy.  A bunch of five stars are up, but not a single six star book has appeared so far this year.  Whodathunkit?

• Looks like we have a bookless library on our hands.  Now the only question is whether or not we’ll be seeing the community clamoring for print or not.  Not so sure I agree with the statement that “it will take more than 100 years before all libraries are paperless” (so that’s inevitable, eh whot?) but we can all watch this site with some interest.

• Daily Image:

Yup.  That’s gonna be the walls of my house someday.  Though the books will undoubtedly be thinner.

Thanks to Aunt Judy for the link!

Display Comments Add a Comment

• Today I shall begin by ripping out your heart and stomping it into tiny shreds upon the floor.  You may be aware that for years I have worked with the real Winnie-the-Pooh toys at NYPL.  You may also know that the real Christopher Robin had a serious falling out with his father about the books.  Now Ian Chachere has written was is easily the BEST graphic story about Christopher Robin at the end of his days.  Thank you for the link, Kate.

• Well, get out your fire hoses and start running for the hills (I prefer my mixed metaphors shaken, not stirred).  The Newbery/Caldecott prediction season is about to begin 4 realz.  Calling Caldecott is gently starting its engine, checking its rear view mirror, and making sure the gas tank is full.  Heavy Medal, meanwhile, is putting pedal to the medal (so to speak), revving this puppy as loud as it can go, and then tearing down the street leaving only burnt rubber and flames in its wake.  If you have favorites, they will be systematically destroyed (even, God help us, Doll Bones if Nina’s comments are any indication).  Personally I’m just biding my time until Jonathan Hunt attempts to defend Far Far Away as a Newbery contender.

• Speaking of the berry of new, Travis Jonker is churning out the fun posts on Newbery stats.  They remind me of the glory days of Peter Sieruta (he loved these sorts of things).  Want to win a Newbery of your very own?  Then you’d better check out So You Want to Win a Newbery, Part 1 and Part 2.

• What causes the most problems in Greek mythology?  The answer may surprise you (not really).  My mom was right to point out that the last sentence should contain a he/she there.

• Whenever I hear that a celebrity has written a children’s book my reaction isn’t so much outrage as a kind of resigned, “What took them so long?”  In my perverted take on Andy Warhol’s famous quote, in the future everyone will have their own children’s book for 15 minutes.  The latest not-so-surprising travesty is Rush Limbaugh’s are-we-absolutely-certain-this-isn’t-from-The-Onion book Rush Revere and the Brave Pilgrims.  And we could pull out the usual jokes and all (certainly I’m highly tempted to buy a copy, if only to randomly quote from it on this blog to comedic effect from time to time) but it was Thom Barthelmess who classed the joint up recently by writing of it, “I believe that librarians can shape that discourse by modeling respect for those with whom we disagree. And I believe that every time we suggest to a child that her book choice is inappropriate we weaken the foundation on which she is building a life of reading. This, my friends, is where intellectual rubber meets the freedom road. Let’s be sure we’re holding the map right-side up.”

• How did I miss this?  Last year I did indeed notice the plethora of Chloes.  So why didn’t I see the abundance of 2013 Floras?  Fortunately Elissa Gershowitz at Horn Book was there to pick up my slack.

• Good old Common Core.  It’s so common.  So core-y.  Over at Publishers Weekly their inaugural Common Core column has posted.  It’s called Cut to the Core: Distinguishing Common Core Myth from Reality.  Check it.

• Speaking of Common Core, not too long ago I gave a talk about it at a New Jersey SCBWI Conference.  Now over at 1600 Words a Day, author Amy Armstrong summarizes me with a Snapshot of Betsy Bird’s Session on the Common Core with Nonfiction Recommendations.  If you want to hear what I’ve read and liked nonfictionwise in 2013, this post may prove useful.

• Once you start talking about Common Core it’s hard to stop. I’ll just close up my mentions of it here by pointing out that if you ever wanted some great reading, it’s fun to take a gander at Museums in a Common Core World.

• Um . . . awesome.

If you’re not a regular reader of the very rare middle grade science fiction / fantasy blog Views From the Tesseract, I cannot recommend it highly enough.  Stephanie’s recent post on the book The Fallen Spaceman is fabulous.  Particularly when you discover which Caldecott winner and his son did the illustrations.  Australian readers in particular are urged to comment on it.

• Daily Image:

I don’t suppose this is technically a children’s literature article, but the hidden underground flowering world they discovered not that long ago sure feels like something out a kids book. Just a taste:

 

 

Display Comments Add a Comment

You folks have been awfully good about my recent shoddy blogging, so I tip my hat in your general direction.  Jules of 7-Imp and I are putting the final touches on our book for Candlewick editing-wise and, as you might imagine, it eats up large swaths of time like an irate and hungry badger.  There is no situation in which a badger cannot be used as an example.  True fact.

In other news, there’s an author/illustrator out there that I happen to like very much.  His name is Aaron Zenz and over the years he has startled me time and again with the relative brilliance of his creativity.  If he wasn’t making multiple inspired pieces for the Re-Seussification Project then his kids were contributing to the stellar Boogie Woogie blog.  Well, Aaron and Co. are some of my favorite folks so when I saw the Friends of Zenz page asking to help ‘em out in the midst of some pretty upsetting surgery, you can bet I jumped on board.  If you’ve a minute, you can too.  They’re swell folks.

So I got to meet J.K. Rowling the other day.  Yup.  The woman who basically set me on the path of children’s librarianship in the first place via her books and I up and met her.  You see the good Dan Blank had tickets and one of those tickets happened to have my name on it.  So I got to see her speak with Ann Patchett about this adult novel of hers The Casual Vacancy (a title I’m certain she stole from the notes of Lemony Snicket) and then I stood in a long line and got my copy signed.  The conversation between us is as follows:

J.K. Rowling: Thanks for coming.

Betsy Bird:  Guh.

Many thanks to Dan for the opportunity.  He’s blogged about the experience here and just so you writer folks know, he’s doing another session of his author platform course starting Oct 31, with a free webinar. The course features Jane Friedman, Richard Nash, Colleen Lindsay, Kathleen Schmidt, Joanna Penn and Jeff Goins as guest speakers.  Info on the session is here and the webinar is here.

“COMIC LEGEND: There was a Winnie the Pooh comic strip where the characters acted a lot more aggressively than most Winnie the Pooh fans are used to.

STATUS: True”

Thus we find the strangest and maybe most engaging link of the day.  Apparently there was a Winnie-the-Pooh syndicated comic strip out there for a while that contained the Disneyfied Pooh and friends.  And apparently it was written by some seriously odd souls.  How else to explain some of these downright weird inclusions?  Comic Book Legends Revealed explains more (you’ll have to scroll down a little but they’re worth finding).  This one’s my favorite:

Wowzah.

And speaking of bears . . . how do you get kids interested in the political process?  Have ‘em vote for bears, of course!  The West Linn Public Library had an inspired idea.  They’re holding a bear election through election day on November 6 and, as they explained it to me:

“inviting kids (and adults) to vote for their favorite bear from children’s literature: Pooh, Paddington, Mama Berenstain, or Corduroy. We have also gotten staff involved by asking them to volunteer to be bear campaign managers. The response from staff and patrons has been tremendous! Our campaign managers have embraced their roles beyond my wildest dreams by designing posters, stickers, bookmarks, and games to support their bear.We are having so much fun that I thought I would share with other libraries. I have even created a campaign video for my candidate, Mama Bear—here is that link: http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=vb.153513568034372&type=2“  Love it!  I suppose I’m a staunch Pooh supporter thanks to my job, but it’s tough.  Paddington comes in at a close second in my heart.

Okay, let’s do the Me Stuff all in one fell swoop today.  First off, I made a reading list for NYC’s New Victory Theater to accompany their upcoming shows.  Check it out here.  I never properly thanked Miss Kathleen at Mental Floss for including me in the 24 Library-Centric Sites We Love round-up, to say nothing of the compliments regarding my video with Travis Jonker. Thanks to Maureen Petry for the links!  I’m speaking at a Joan Aiken event tonight so enjoy this piece written by Lizza Aiken, Joan’s daughter, entitled Voices: The magical mysteries of children’s literature.  I was interviewed at the blog The Children’s Book Review as part of their ongoing librarian series.  And the Children’s Media Association blog gave me what could well be the most flattering spotlight I’ve received in my long internet life. Whew!

There was a Bibliography-Off between Judy Blume and one of my favorite comics Patton Oswalt not long ago.  As Jezebel described it, “The only thing that could really be better than this (for a Sunday, anyway) is if Calvin and Hobbes were real and they spoke at a TED Talk about the vividness of a small child’s imagination.” I just wish S.E. Hinton had heeded Patton’s call to give him a hand.  She’s on Twitter all the time, y’know.  Thanks to Marjorie Ingall for the link!

Maybe you can’t see Phil Nel speaking in my library tomorrow about Crockett Johnson.  If not, here’s the next best thing.

Display Comments Add a Comment

Ack!  Winnie the Pooh is 90 years old, today!  Wow.  That's original fluff-brained Pooh, not cute-i-fied ad nauseam Disney Winnie.  When it comes to Pooh and Christopher Robin and Piglet, I am a Milne/Shepard ONLY fan.   I especially dislike what Disney did to Eeyore, who has been my favorite character since I reached adulthood.

Winnie and his friend, Piglet, live in a glass display case in the New York Public Library, now.  These toys are the original stuffed animals on which A. A. Milne based his stories.  Rabbit, Rabbit's Friends and Relations and Owl are based on actual animals.  Everyone else was a member fo Christopher Robin's bedroom menagerie.  Except the Heffalump.  I'm not sure where the Heffalump came from.

To mark this august occasion, Christopher Robin's estate allowed the first-ever "authorized" sequel to The House at Pooh Corner to be published in 2009.  Return to the 100 Acre Wood by David Benedictus introduced a new wild character and brought back all of the old favorites.  I still like the old stories, the ones I and my son grew up with, best of all.

Don't forget the Jack Gantos giveaway has another week to go.   (Yeah, I just linked to my own blog in my blog!)

Add a Comment

Though I mentioned it yesterday, I was pleased as punch to discover the recent winners of the Society of Illustrator’s Original Art.  The Gold?  It went to a plucky (and very good) little nonfiction title by the name of Witches! The Absolutely True Tale of Disaster in Salem, both written and illustrated by Rosalyn Schanzer.  I dare say that the silver winners were none too surprising (Kadir Nelson & Lane Smith = yup yup yup) so I love the surprise Schanzerization of the award.  Ditto the Founder’s Award going to Zachariah Ohora.  His Stop Snoring, Bernard has some gorgeous art, no question.  The best part?  One of the judges was none other than Jules Danielson, blogger at Seven Impossible Things Before Breakfast and one of my co-writers (the other being Peter Sieruta) on my upcoming Candlewick book.  I do believe that is the very first time a blogger who was not an author or illustrator has served on this committee.  Well blazed trail-wise, Jules!

• Oh, and while we’re on the topic of all things Jules, as you can see she’s influential.  So when she releases her list of Favorite Picture Books of 2011 (So Far…) folks sit up and take notice.  I know I do.  She’s got some of my favorites on there, it’s true.  Do be so good as to check ‘em out!

• On the one hand I’m thrilled to pieces that actress Joanna Lumley is spearheading the creation of a national center for children’s literature in Scotland!  On the other hand, does it really have to be in J.M. Barrie’s old house?  Really really?  Oh, all right.  Whatever it takes to give me an excuse to go to Scotland.

• Hark, A Vagrant has a new series of Nancy Drew cover interpretations up and running  Anyone else find The Sky Phantom as weird as I do?  And I know my library circulates a copy of The Message in the Hollow Oak.  How did I not notice its peculiarities before?

• In my last Fusenews I managed to write up a long and detailed series of thoughts on the University of Chicago’s current exhibit on Soviet-era children’s literature.  Then I failed to save that draft.  Pfui.  I recall that I probably mentioned that the next Guest of Honor at the 2012 Bologna Book Fair will be Russia and that enterprising jet setters might have some fun comparing the art in the Chicago exhibit with the art they’ll be displayed in Bologna next year.  Seems likely anyway.

• Read your Frances Hardinge interview, dear.  It’s good for what ails you
  5 Comments on Fusenews: Words, words, wonderful words, last added: 8/15/2011
  Display Comments
  Jennifer Schultz said, on 8/15/2011 5:47:00 AM
  

  Many good links to start off this rain-threatening Monday morning in northern VA! However, I did an error message for the Welcome to My Tweendom link. Just FYI (I will look it up, but just wanted you to know).

  Dan Santat said, on 8/15/2011 8:58:00 AM
  

  I aspire to be as handsome as Kadir’s painting of me.

  Elizabeth Bird said, on 8/15/2011 11:05:00 AM
  

  Thanks, Jennifer! That was a glitch on my end. Has been corrected.

  Dan, are you calling Kadir a liar? That man paints what he sees.

  AZ said, on 8/15/2011 11:30:00 AM
  

  Thanks for highlighting the CNLTooty Celebration! I’m in awe of the many wonderful illustrators who are both inspired BY the kiddos and also giving the gift of inspiration TO them as well. It’s great fun as a family to watch the amazing art come in

  Dan Santat said, on 8/15/2011 12:36:00 PM
  

  Dare I say that I’m jealous of my own portrait? Two words. Cheek bones.

  Add a Comment

On Thursday, May 5, 2011, Pamela Paul of The New York Times wrote an article entitled “New Study Finds Gender Bias in Children’s Books.” Paul sheds the spotlight on the study “Gender in Twentieth-Century Children’s Books: Patterns of Disparity in Titles and Central Characters” published in the April issue of Gender & Society. According to the study “there has been a bias toward male characters — men, boys and, yes, animals — in children’s literature over the last century.”

Janice McCabe, the study’s lead author, examined approximately 6,000 children’s books published from 1900 to 2000. “Of those, 57 percent had a central male character compared with only 31 percent with female protagonists.” In addition, “at most one-third of children’s books published per year included central female characters that are adult women or female animals. But male animals or male adults appeared in 100 percent.”

For those of you who are avid readers of children’s literature, like myself, this is certainly not a revelation. I will be the first to admit that I grew up reading Clifford the Big Red Dog, Curious George and Winnie the Pooh, to name a few. What do they all have in common? Well, a quick survey shows that the protagonists in each are male. This in no way diminishes these books as classics in the canon of children’s literature but it does illustrate that a fundamental disparity exists.

In truth, whether they realize it or not, girls and young women long for female protagonists in the books they read. I know I did. Hermione Granger is one of the many reasons I adore the Harry Potter series. She is a brilliant, courageous and strong young woman. It’s incredibly empowering to have a female character that is not only equal to but also excels beyond her male counterparts. How often can you say that? Unfortunately, not often enough. And that, dear readers, is the problem.

Now more than ever girls and young women need protagonists that speak to them. Protagonists whose characteristics they can emulate. Hermione Granger‘s brilliance. Olivia the Pig‘s feistiness. Katniss Everdeen‘s strength.

The audience is waiting. It’s time to answer the call.

0 Comments on Where Are All the Girls? as of 1/1/1900