Fusenews: Terribly Delicious Yellow Eyes

A fun fact for those of you playing at home.  Whenever you see me post two Fusenewses (Fusenewsi?) two days in a row, it usually means I’m working on something long and difficult and unwieldy, so I haven’t time for a serious review and the like.  Right now I’m attempting to wrestle a Penguin preview into some semblance of order.  The goal was to have it up for today.  Now we’re looking at Monday or Tuesday.  My apologies.

• As you may have heard there’s a new American Girl in town, and she’s Jewish.  In tandem with the release of the doll Rebecca, the customary Rebecca stories have been published.  The Jewish Chronicle reported on the release at length.  The piece does, however, contain some rather broad statements.  Consider the following:

Not since Sydney Taylor wrote “All of a Kind Family” more than half a century ago has any children’s publisher undertaken such a comprehensive project on a Jewish subject. Unless another publisher rises to the occasion, Rebecca’s story may provide the only knowledge many young people ever gain, not only about immigrants in American history but about Jews and about the Jewish religion itself.

Look, I’m as ready as the next guy to admit that there isn’t a plethora of contemporary Jewish children’s literature out there.  But there is quite a lot of historical fiction and the idea that "the only knowledge" kids will gain about Jewish people will come via American Girl seems a bit much.  Not hardly.  A cursory glance at the Sydney Taylor Award winners says as much.  Or do they simply mean that these books will, with the power of the American Girl empire, be able to reach more kids?  A little sad if so. Thanks to Susan Ellman for the link.

• Making movies and publishing books?  Slow process.  Buying up their rights?  Super fast!  As per Cynopsis Kids:

Sony Pictures Animation acquires the feature film rights to The Familiars, a forthcoming kid-targeted fantasy book series penned by Adam Jay Epstein and Andrew Jacobson, per THR.  Epstein and Jacobson are set to adapt the book for the big screen, they directed co-write Dimension’s Extreme Movie and are working on Transplants for Disney.  Discussions are under way with Sam Raimi and Josh Donen to produce the feature through their Stars Road Entertainment.  HarperCollins Children’s acquired the North American publishing rights to the book series at Book Expo America (BEA) last week.

• This is the problem that happens when authors in other fields start writing children’s books.  Gwenda at Shaken and Stirred and Colleen at Chasing Ray tell me that it is very exciting that one Kage Baker has written a children’s novel called The Hotel Under the Sand.  They have good taste, so I am willing to believe them in this matter.  You are encouraged to tell me why I should be so excited, though.

• Blog Book Tours are fine in their own way, but here’s a week of cool booktalks that should definitely be on your radar.  Colleen Mondor will be running with a bunch o’ other bloggers a One Shot Southeast Asia tour wherein different bloggers will discuss different books that involve that part of the globe in some fashion.  I’ll be busy during that time and unable to participate but y’all should take note, you note takers you.

Vintage Kids’ Books My Kid Loves gets a little crazy with the scanner.  Her insanity is your reward.  Can’t say as I can identify most on that list, but I wish I could.  Particularly the lady getting abducted one.

• Every time I link to a Nathan Bransford blog post I worry that I’m cheating on my own agent.  But as my agent doesn’t have a blog (probably a good thing from a practical standpoint) this will have to do in the interim.  In any case, Mr. Bransford had an incredibly useful Revision Checklist for fiction manuscripts up the other day that I think you would enjoy looking at.  Enjoy using?  Well, the word "enjoy" is a bit strong.  Let’s just say it could make your book better.  Thanks to Wagging Tales (whose recent dilemma I sympathize entirely with) for the link.

• Editorial Anonymous says, quite succinctly, what belonging to SCBWI actually means.  Word.

• The Onion is my paper of choice.  Fake news is oh so preferable to the real stuff.  And one feature I always enjoy is Commentary Tracks of the Damned.  I’d almost missed that there was one for the commentary, I will repeat, the COMMENTARY on that terrible, no good, very bad Cat in the Hat live action Mike Myers film.  It might almost be worth it to get some buddies together, open up a bottle of wine, and listen to Alec Baldwin try to justify his participation in that monstrosity for hours at a time. A million thanks to Bottom Shelf Books for the link.

• Daily Image:

I know that yesterday’s Daily Image was also a cake and that not long ago there was a wonderful cake-related wrap-up over at Booklights, but come on!  What am I supposed to do when Cake Wrecks talks about children’s literature?

It’s by Coco Cake Cupcakes.  Thanks to Pinot and Prose for the link.

Filed under: Fusenews