Fusenews: Lullabyes, Legends, And Lies
Yup. Just me and Gwyneth Paltrow. Hanging out and being groovy. That’s the assumption that I would like you to take away from her most recent newsletter where, about 75% of the way down, I recommend good New York-based picture books. Truth be told it was Ms. Paltrow’s assistant and not the lady herself who came in asking for such things, but it still sounds good, right? Me and Gwyneth. Best buds 4-evah.
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Have you read all the Newbery winners? I haven’t. I’m not afraid to admit it either. I made the mistake of trying to read them from oldest to newest and . . . well, I kinda bogged down. Someone out there has read them all, though and she’s a TEN-YEAR-OLD GIRL!!! That’s right. You heard me. And she’s probably the most awesome ten-year-old girl I’ve ever met too. In rural Indiana lives a fourth grader with a blog who reads and reviews books for kids both old and new. Pretty cool.
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In the event that you missed the Scholastic Fall Preview of their upcoming children’s books, fear not. They’ve placed the whole kerschmozzle online for your viewing pleasure. This pleases me mightily since it means that’s one less preview to report on. Woo-hoo! Someday maybe all the previews will be conducted in this manner.
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I am of the correct generation to hear that the name of an album title is "Twistable Turnable Man" and think, "Wait . . . is that . . . Silverstein?" Yup. My Morning Jacket just became that much more hip than their peers. They’re covering Shel Silverstein and they don’t care who knows it. From Spin, "The album takes its title from of one of Silverstein’s quirky poems about a particularly bendy man — Andrew Bird was given the honor of adapting the poem into a song — and features songs penned by Silverstein himself, some of which were originally made famous by other artists. One of the most notable examples is ‘A Boy Named Sue,’ which was originally performed by Johnny Cash and is covered here by Todd Snider." Lotsa whistling then. You can hear a sample on this site. Thanks to 100 Scope Notes for the link.
The 2010 Eisner Award nominations have just been announced and at least two of the books in the Young Person’s category thrill me to pieces. Looky looky!
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Lunch Lady and the Cyborg Substitute , by Jarrett J. Krosoczeka (Knopf)
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The Secret Science Alliance and the Copycat Crook , by Eleanor Davis (Bloomsbury)
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Tiny Tyrant vol. 1: The Ethelbertosaurus, by Lewis Trondheim and Fabrice Parme (First Second)
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The TOON Treasury of Classic Children’s Comics, edited by Art Spiegelman and Francoise Mouly (Abrams ComicArts/Toon)
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The Wonderful Wizard of Oz hc, by L. Frank Baum, Eric Shanower, and Skottie Young (Marvel)
Both Lunch Lady and The Secret Science Alliance were two of my favorite books from last year. Of course, one wonders what the HECK happened to The Storm in the Barn. Scared of a little historical fiction, folks? Pity. But for a fun time read Jarrett Krosoczka’s (who’s name Comic-Con misspelled) reaction to getting "the call".
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Aw man. This is cool. It’s YA-related too, but I don’t care. Have you heard about how Guys Lit Wire is pairing up with a bunch of other literary sites to . . . well, I’ll let them explain:
"After the impressive success of last year’s Book Fair for Boys that saw over 600 books sent to the LA County Detention Center, GLW has teamed up with the Readergirlz, YALSA and If I Can Read, I Can Do Anything, (A national reading club for Native American children) for another book fair event to get books to students enrolled at Ojo Encino Day School and Alchesay High School." Wishlists for these schools are up at Powell’s (excellent choice). Here are the further instructions, if you’d care to buy something for the kids:
First, hit the Powells site and on the upper right click on "wish list". From there you will be prompted for the email address of the list owner. Type in "guyslitwire@gmail.com". You will then be given the choice to select either Ojo Encino or Alchesay. Once you are looking at the lists (which contain hundreds of titles) you can make your selection of a new, used, or sale copy. After your done and ready to make your purchase you will be asked to confirm that you are buying books for a certain wishlist. Checking those boxes will keep the lists up to date and prevent books from appearing as unsold even after they were purchased. Now all you have to do is enter the mailing addresses, and here they are:
Mary Nickless
Ojo Encino Day School Librarian
HCR 79 Box 7
Cuba, NM 87013
(505) 731-2333
Marilyn Hill
Alchesay High School
200 Falcon Way
Whiteriver, AZ 85941
928-338-4848"
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Daily Image:
Nothing in particular caught my eye this week. Time for an old classic, then. From How to Store and Organize Cats:
Filed under: Fusenews
About Betsy Bird
Betsy Bird is currently the Collection Development Manager of the Evanston Public Library system and a former Materials Specialist for New York Public Library. She has served on Newbery, written for Horn Book, and has done other lovely little things that she'd love to tell you about but that she's sure you'd find more interesting to hear of in person. Her opinions are her own and do not reflect those of EPL, SLJ, or any of the other acronyms you might be able to name. Follow her on Twitter: @fuseeight.
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I have a matching Paltrow story.
Several years back I happened to be in Heritage Book Shop, a now-defunct Los Angeles rare bookstore, on a day they were all excited about a mention in Instyle Magazine. Ms. Paltrow had been asked by an interviewer about her favorite local shopping spots and name checked the book store. In truth, according to staff, Gweneth had been in only once, a year and a half previous, for about five minutes. Total p.r. fraud.
Congrats on your mention, but I’m beginning to think, despite their image, that the Air Buddies might be more literate than Apple’s mom.
The article also shows what her kids are currently reading. I was hoping it might have some relatively recent folks that I could congratulate. Alas, the only person that comes close is Greg Foley and I don’t know him myself. *sigh*
Thanks for linking to Newbery-bloggin’ Laura. Very cool!
It’s way too hard to figure out which book to root for on that Eisner list. I enjoyed every last one of them.
Thanks for talking about my blog! If I had started with the Dark Frigate (one of the first) I would have likely given up too. But, it was worth it to read them all! I love books and connecting with other people who love to read and write!
thank you!!!!!
I started to read all the Newbery’s at one time but quickly realized that a lot of them are very dated. I think reading the 100 books on your chapter book list would be a much more worthwhile project than reading all the Newberys.
Have any of your readers out there read all of them? I’m really curious. (I think we can guess now what will be #1). I haven’t read them all–but I have picked up some of them during the time that this list has been running on your blog. A few I had never heard of, I have to admit.
Margo T, I’d love to hear if anyone has read them all. I’m sure someone has. I certainly haven’t…so I decided to chuck my other 2010 reading challenges until I finish all the Top 100 books. If #1 is what we think it is, that means I have a nice round 25 on my TBR list…and I’ve read 4 of those during the countdown! I’m reading Dark is Rising right now. (Yes, my gaps are pretty embarrassing.)
Bless you, Bets, for enriching Ol’ Gwennie’s book list with a bit of color…
I’ve been following Laura’s blog for a while now – cool kid! You should be very proud, Laura! Now, it’s time for to get started on all of the Honors (ha ha).
I have read all the Newberys — definitely go newest to oldest. When it gets awful (and it does), you’re almost done and the thrill of possibly finishing keeps you going….especially on that last (first) one…egads!
Thank you for linking to The Daily Tail, Elizabeth! Hey all, you’ll see more pictures of organized and stored” cats if you click on the link.