Collectibles

In this week's roundup, we find out about Roald Dahl's literally undercover wartime activities, read an interview with author and blogger Laurel Snyder, and learn the last name of a certain Jack:

Roald Dahl, celebrated children's literature author, hunky super-spy. Wow, check this out:

He is known to the world as the author of bestselling children’s books such as Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and James and the Giant Peach. Yet before he became a successful writer, Roald Dahl had a very different reputation--as the sexiest British spy in America.

And it just gets better. My favorite line, hands down: "He was ordered back to the bedroom, and told to close his eyes and think of England."

Interview: Up and Down the Scratchy Mountains. Kelly Herold just did a ">sweet interview with author and blogger Laurel Snyder, on her new middle-grade novel Up and Down the Scratchy Mountains:

Laurel: It's a very old fashioned kind of book, a fairy tale about a snippy milkmaid named Lucy, and a clumsy prince named Wynston. When Wynston is forced to begin searching for a "suitable" princess to marry, Lucy runs away, and they both have some silly adventures in the mountains. And eventually they learn a few lessons--about bad government, honesty, and how to bend the rules. There's a lot of little songs in the book, and some incredible art by Greg Call.

Collecting Children's Books, again. I got into this blog last week and I can't stay away: in surveying some old editions of the famous 19th-century poem "The House That Jack Built," Peter has not only discovered the last name of the Jack in question ("Jingle"!), but he's also found the poem on a hankerchief (cost: one farthing) and uncovered a couple "frisky" illustrations of the "man all tatter'd and torn" and the "maiden all forlorn."

If you need any further encouragement to go read the post (don't you want to learn about Tripod the Rat?), check out this excellently exemplary illustration from the grim, cautionary 1820 version:

"Moomin Madness." Like Heidi, I also loved Philip Pullman's quirky "settled personal canon". And speaking of Moomins and their inclusion therein, this is a very sweet story of early onset Moomin-mania--or rather “mah-mih”-mania. (Found via Children's Illustration.)

Publishers Weekly review revue. PW just put up another slew of kid-lit reviews, including the following starred titles:

• Last Night by Hyewon Yum, ages 3–6. ("Some picture books are written for children; this one gives a sense of what it's like to be one.")
• Jibberwillies at Night by Rachel Vail, illustrated by Yumi Heo, ages 4–8. ("Exuberant and self-proclaimed 'really happy kid' Katie Honors, the tantrum-thrower from Sometimes I'm Bombaloo, now explains what happens when she gets an attack of night terrors, otherwise known as 'the jibberwillies.'")
• Hank Finds Inspiration by Craig Frazier, ages 4–8. ("The artist's signature high-intensity graphics exert their usual force field on readers' attention: Frazier's sophisticated compositions combine style with kid appeal.")
• Enigma: A Magical Mystery by Graeme Base, ages 5–10. ("Akin to The Eleventh Hour, this über-puzzle of a picture book asks readers to crack codes and find hidden pictures, all in aid of solving a mystery relayed in rhyming quatrains.")
• Brooklyn Bridge by Karen Hesse, illustrated by Chris Sheban, ages 10–14. ("Inspired by facts surrounding the inventors of the teddy bear, Newbery Medalist Hesse (Out of the Dust) applies her gift for narrative voice to this memorable story set in 1903 Brooklyn.")
• Chains by Laurie Halse Anderson, ages 10 and up. ("Pursuing similar themes as M.T. Anderson's Octavian Nothing, this gripping novel offers readers a startlingly provocative view of the Revolutionary War.")
• What the World Eats by Faith D'Aluisio and Peter Menzel, all ages. ("Adapted from last year's Hungry Planet, this brilliantly executed work visits 25 families in 21 countries around the world. Each family is photographed surrounded by a week's worth of food and groceries, which Menzel and D'Aluisio use as a way of investigating not only different cultures' diets and standard of living but also the impact of globalization: why doesn't abundance bring better health, instead of increased occurrences of diabetes and similar diseases?")

In this week's roundup, we check out the latest issue of The Horn Book Magazine, test our "knowledge of child readers," and catch up with Wally and Beaver:

The new Horn Book Magazine. The September/October 2008 issue of The Horn Book Magazine is now out, and you can read some of the contents online. In addition to Web Extras for the print issue, you'll find a couple of the features (I especially liked the one in which a second-grade teacher talks about his favorite fictional teachers), a sampling of reviews (including a starred review for the promising All Stations! Distress!), and a few "Stories Out of School," personal reminiscences from the likes of Megan McDonald (of the Judy Moody books) and Sherman Alexie.

CLAT Level III: Children’s Literature Application Test. Also in the latest Horn Book Magazine but deserving of a special mention is the CLAT Level III, a silly but sharp pseudo-quiz that is "designed to test your knowledge of child readers." For example:

If you enjoy the test, make sure you check out the sites of the people behind it (here and here).

Kid-lit authors on the radio. I just caught two great interviews, one with Lauren Child (Clarice Bean, Don't Look Now) and another with Francoise Mouly, who is behind the Toon Books, with her husband Art Spiegelman. (Thanks to 100 Scope Notes for tipping me off to the Child interview, and thanks to Heidi for always letting me know when she hears something cool on KCRW's excellent Bookworm program.)

"Leave It To Beverly." I can barely remember seeing Leave It To Beaver (on Nick at Nite, at the same time as my short obsession with Bachelor-Father), but my brain had clearly carefully archived the speech patterns of all the characters, seeing as I found this to be hysterical. Peter at "Collecting Children's Books" not only found three forgotten TV-tie-in paperbacks by Beverly Cleary, but he also somehow managed to write a long, informative post about them as an imagined conversation between the Beav, Wally, and Eddie Haskell, mimicking the voices perfectly. And no, I checked, it is not too late to track down copies of these for yourself. (Found via Fuse #8.)

Hosting a spa party vs. surviving a shark attack. I hadn't even heard of the Girls' Book of Glamour or the Boys' Book of Survival, but according to Colleen at Chasing Ray, that's just as well: "There are so many things I could say here but what I'm really wondering is if the people who put these books together thought for even half a minute about how appalling they are."

A free online James Bond game to encourage reading. Charlie Higson, the author behind the popular Young Bond series (Silverfin, Blood Fever), has helped create "The Shadow War," an online game to "help address declining literacy standards in young boys," according to a story in the Guardian. In the UK, the books are on a recommended reading list for schoolboys, and the "Shadow War" is intended to draw them into the Young Bond world, playing as either a British agent or a Soviet spy. (Also noteworthy in the Guardian: How to Cook Children: A Grisly Recipe Book.) --Paul

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

It is the story of dragons and demon-lovers, of werewolves  and Walpurgisnacht, of unlikely umlauts and the power of power chords. It is the story of Metal. 

For All Known Metal Bands (the latest triumph in design from McSweeney's), Dan Nelson has descended into the Metal underworld to single-handedly collect the names of nearly 51,000 bands, presenting his research in silver ink on black paper--a treatment sometimes difficult to read in natural light, but one that will glow evilly in the black light of a sunless, suburban bedroom. Cloaked in its Necronomicoid binding, AKMB seethes with ancient magic: a volume which may have been “unearthed from a tomb … or from a metal box submerged in desiccated mud.”

Open it at your peril, gentle reader.

All Known Metal Bands lists these groups of “Ur-men” in alphabetical order, without comment, and repeats the names in the case more than one band shared the name.  From the heroes of Viking Metal (Thor, Thor’s Hammer, Thorr’s Hammer) to Gothic Metal (Black Wytche, Black Witchcraft Savagery, Black Wolf Sacrifice) and beyond, Nelson has assured “those whose ears are never touched by songs of love and weakness” permanent placement in the record of their cülture, and perhaps more importantly, oürs. More of the immortals: 

• Ultra Vomit (2 entries)
• Dark Morbid Death
• Guardians of Profane Secrets
• Lord Goatwarr
• Lucifer in Love
• Ulan Bator (?)
• Violent Marv
• Leatherwolf
• Lazarus Sin
  
• Necrolust (6 entries, included in nearly two pages of Necro/Nekro variants) 

AKMB  serves as an impressive and indispensable tribute to the “quarter of a million humans have undertaken this quest—to unearth, embody, aim, and deliver power itself.” Amen and T.G.I.F., my Metal brothers and sisters. --Jon

Check out my latest Pop Culture Report (#4), in which I look at some great graphic novels, coffee table books, and one huge art book on an iconic dark fantasy figure. This time around, visual reviews of work by Greg Broadmore, Taylor F. Lockwood's Chasing the Rain, Out of Picture 2, Andrew Bolton's Superheroes: Fantasy and Fashion, First Second's Drawing Words and Writing Pictures, Centipede Press' The Art of Lovecraft, classic reprinted Moomim comics from Drawn & Quarterly, and a Fog Mound children's book featured in this week's upcoming Graphic Novel Fridays. As always, this is a DIY, come-into-my-home-and-look-at-some-books kind of video...