A Fuse #8 Production   

The weird thing about putting my reviews on Amazon is that I tend to get a lot of reference questions as a result.  Recently someone wrote me the following:

"My 10 year old daughter wants to read that awful thing by Stephenie Meyer.  You know the one.  Twilight.  . . . It's not even the story (or lack thereof) or the characters (one-dimensional) or the anti-feminist undercurrent or any of the other multitude of problems with the book that I have a problem with but rather that the writing is just so terrible. Can you suggest something to create a diversion?"

Regardless of your opinions of Ms. Meyer's writing, there are other reasons to not want a pre-p...Read More

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Happy Fourth of July, all you happy campers!  We're looking at mostly sunny skies here in NYC, which is a relief after the rainy winter / rainy spring / rainy summer we've been having.  We are a little sick of the rain.  I figure, if you have the weather of Portland, Oregon you should at least get the extra added benefit of getting to see pretty mountains in the distance.  No mountain ranges here, sadly.

By the way, if you're in town, perhaps you'd like to see Jefferson's hand-written copy of The Declaration of Independence.  NYPL will have it on display on the first floor this weekend.  It's in my library, though I haven't had a chance to see it myself.  Accord...Read More

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All right, kids.  Ears perked, and shiny eyes bright and open.  What we have here today is a little bit of info on a children's magazine that I hadn't heard of before now.  And that's a shame.

See, the way I figure it, magazines are kids are a legitimate part of a kid's literary life.  But how often do we talk about these magazines or compare and contrast them?  This side of hardly ever, that's how often.   Now before I was a children's librarian I was a Serials Manager, which is just a fancy pants terms for a person who spends all their time in a college library organizing the magazines.  Seems to me I should be taking a more active interest in the mags for...Read More

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The Secret Circus
By Johanna Wright
Roaring Brook Press
$16.95
ISBN: 978-1-59643-403-5
Ages 4-8
On shelves now.

The way I see it, you can be the kind of publisher who takes risks or the kind of publisher who does the same thing over and over ad nauseam. Taking risks means possibly failing or creating wonderful forgotten pieces of art. Doing the same thing over and over means yet another princess / ballet / dinosaur / train / first day of school book. You'll sell a title here and there, sure, but twenty or thirty years down the road will your book have made any kind of an impressio...Read More

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Now everyone knows that Seven Impossible Things covers the magnificent illustrators of the present day (and there seems to be a never ending supply of the little buggers too).  Yet I also happen to like it when contemporary illustrators tip their hats to the little known greats of the past.  You may take issue with my saying that Abner Graboff is little known, but until I read artist Ward Jenkins's pieces on the man I was unaware of his existence.  Part One introduces the fellow to us.  ...Read More

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And we're back.  I must say, writing retreats live up to their expectations.  Particularly when the retreats are put together by such stellar organizers (who I would name but I'm not sure if they want to remain anonymous or not).  I headed out to Lake Champlain listening to a fine Flight of the Conchords recording ("It's business tiiiiime!") in the world's most ridiculous car.  Observe:

That would be me and my bright red Mustang.  Under normal circumstances, when I rent a car here in Manhattan, I request a compact and get something extravagant...Read More

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Hannah's Winter
By Kierin Meehan
Kane/Miller
$15.95
ISBN: 978-1-93305-98-2
Ages 9-12
On shelves now

I run a bookgroup for homeschooled kids between the ages of 9 and 14 out of my library. They're good kids and voracious readers but they serve as a strange litmus test of what children out there are reading and enjoying today. I often will bring them new books out of curiosity and once in a while, they surprise me with their insights. For example, I got a bunch of Kane/Miller boo...Read More

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Who says press releases have to be all about upcoming books?  From the Arne Nixon Center for the Study of Children's Literature:

Aliki donates art to the Arne Nixon Center

Picture book author/artist Aliki has donated 21 pieces of original art—as many pictures as for one of her famous picture books—to the Arne Nixon Center for the Study of Children’s Literature at California State University, Fresno. Aliki’s colorful illustra...Read More

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One Fine Trade
Retold by Bobbi Miller
Illustrated by Will Hillenbrand
Holiday House
$16.95
ISBN: 978-0-8234-1836-7
Ages 4-8
On shelves now

Folktales. Librarians love 'em. Eat 'em up like ketchup on rye, they do. Children's librarians love folktales even more than their adult brethren. When you go to library school the professors inculcate you with a deep and abiding appreciation of old-fashioned storytelling. Even if you don't kn...Read More

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I'm at a writer's retreat for the next three days or so.  From here on in I'm going to indicate my disappearance with just your average everday gorilla in the library cartoon.  As plans for world domination go, this one's a pip.

I have set up blog posts to continue during my absence.  You should sense little to no change in my blogging.

So why am I even writing this?  Because I love that darn gorilla.  Any excuse to post it, says I.  Plus, from now on I'll be able to say "you know what the gorilla means" and you will.  Thanks to pop-cult.com for the image.

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The Great and Only Barnum: The Tremendous Stupendous Life of Showman P.T. Barnum
By Candace Fleming
Schwartz & Wade (an imprint of Random House Children’s Books)
$18.99
ISBN: 978-0-375-84197-2
Ages 10 and up
On shelves September 8, 2009

I'm trying to work out why exactly this is the only children's biography of P.T. Barnum I remember having seen before. I'm sure there are others. If I could just lift my lazy fingers high enough to type in “P.T. Barnum” into my library's catalog system I'd find a couple. But why only a couple? Why isn't Barnum as p...Read More

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The webs were all abuzz this week over the clever editing job someone did on this Buffy meets Edward short film.  I had all but forgotten that there was a Buffy episode where she woke up, saw that Angel had been watching her while she slept, and consequently threw him out the window. What a lovely mixing of scenes. So pleasant to the eye.  However, if it doesn't appear correctly I may have to muck with the ratio size. I'll keep an eye on it when it posts. Thanks to bookshelves of doom (and mom) for...Read More

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