End-o'-the-Week Kid-Lit Roundup
In this week's roundup, we watch kids review books on YouTube, check out some very tiny Golden Books, and get commentary on the Hillary-Barack kids' book "smackdown":
Get ready for Storytubes 2009! Imagine a bunch of super-cute kids creating a bunch of super-cute video book reviews, and putting them up on YouTube, one kid and one book per video, and all under two minutes. That was StoryTubes 2008, and it was such a success that Storytubes 2009 is in the works and fast approaching. If you're involved with a school or public library, go to the StoryTubes site to find how you can get involved. If you're not willing to take my word w/r/t the super-cuteness--or even if you are, for that matter--you must check out the review excerpts in this promo video:
The girl reviewing the chicken book totally reminds me of April from Gilmore Girls, but somehow even cuter if that's possible. After the intro, you can skip ahead to :45, 2:16, and 2:57 for more excerpts. (Found via the ALSC Blog.)
Tiny Golden Books. Speaking of super-cuteness.... Children's Book Illustration pointed us towards someone's beautiful eBay find: a set of miniature Golden Books, just 2" x 3" each. This one is originally from "Tiny Nonsense Stories":
If the covers look familiar, that might be because the illustrator is Garth Williams.
Miffy, "the £150 Million Rabbit." I discovered another international sensation, the Moomins, only late last year. So I guess it shouldn't have surprised me that I'd never heard of Miffy--or so I thought. Once I actually *saw* Miffy, I realized I had just never known Miffy's name:
As you might already know--if you're a person on our planet--Miffy is "the world's most popular rabbit (and think for a moment of the competition for that title: Br'er, Peter, Roger...), whose modest adventures have sold more than 85 million storybooks, been translated into 40 languages." This can all be verified in a very enjoyable Telegraph profile of Dick Bruna, Miffy's creator and basically an accidental multi-millionaire. (I now intend to make Mr. Bruna very slightly richer, as I check out Miffy books for our 16-month-old Silas.) (Found via Bookninja.)
Jim Flora book covers. The Jim Flora Web site has put up covers of all the children's books he worked on. E.g.,
Some nice Amazon customer has even uploaded a few nice interior shots of Charlie Yup and His Snip-Snap Boys. (Found via Fuse #8)
Eoin Colfer/Artemis Fowl tour, continued. I mentioned Eoin Colfer’s touring show--“Fairies, Fiends and Flatulence”--week before last, but I had to share this account from Educating Alice. She went the night of his last U.S. show and related two especially funny bits I hadn't heard before: Colfer had Mo Willems and Jon Scieszka running through the audience helping him do Q&A (how cool is that?) and in response to a question about how he plans out the Artemis Fowl books, he said, "I go down to Philip Pullman’s house and go through his trash." As the post also notes, the whole tour was vlogged, so you can go see some of the show for yourself. (Relatedly: the Scotsman just published a new review of Artemis Fowl and the Time Paradox. The lead: "Why Harry Potter became a Phenomenon while Artemis Fowl only remains a Huge Sensation is a conundrum for future ages to ponder.")
"Hillary vs. Obama in the children's book smackdown." I haven't read either of them yet, but Alex Beam at the Boston Globe gives an entertainingly snarky survey of the kids' books written about Hillary and Barack. ("It's round two of the Barack Obama-Hillary Clinton smackdown. This time, it's about publishing: My soupy, shot-through-gauze children's book is more saccharine than yours.") (Found via Big A little a.) --Paul
FredTownWard on August 11, 2008 at 04:56 AM
I'd say that Alex Beam's "Hillary vs. Obama in the children's book smackdown," is only going to be "entertainingly snarky" to Obama supporters, Hillary supporters presumably being able to detect the creepily worshipful attitude of the far gone Obama disciple that apparently escapes other Obama worshippers.
Still, the most interesting tidbit in the Hillary-bashing Obama love fest was this little reference to that OTHER presidential candidate:
What, no John McCain? Wrong! Yes, John McCain! A week after the Clinton-Obama tomes appear, S&S will publish "My Dad, John McCain," a children's book by his daughter Meghan. "Once we were off and running with the other books, we got a lot of feedback internally," Cooper says. "People asked, 'Why aren't we doing all three?' We're giving them the same attention."
Given just how far left the mainstream publishing industry is, I suppose it is somewhat encouraging that INTERNAL feedback was capable of drawing attention to the existence of the Republican candidate who whatever else you can say about him arguably has the only biography that would not bore a child to tears even if unadorned with worshipful exaggerration.