Fuse 8 n’ Kate: The Stinky Cheese Man by Jon Scieszka and Lane Smith
I’d like to offer a word of warning to my mother with this one. Somehow, this ended up being our longest episode. Mom, if you listen to this on the treadmill, you might do yourself a serious injury. It’s a whopping 48:17 (and that’s edited down!). I guess it’s not surprising when you do a book as long as SCM. And boy howdy do we come up with all kinds of stuff to discuss here.
Listen to the whole show here on Soundcloud or download it through iTunes, Stitcher, Google Play, or your preferred method of podcast selection.
Source Notes:
– Here’s the Children’s Book-a-Day Almanac link from Anita Silvey that discusses The Stinky Cheese Man.
– Here is the extra space that drives Kate so wildly mad. Can you find it on the page?
– This was the Eric Carle book about Adam and Eve, in case you’re curious
– The Picasso Fox.
– The Fla/Fly art
– This was The Frog Prince Continued book Jon would do after this.
– So here’s that “Warden” art that had us stumped. It’s clearly there.
– This is the Struwwelpeter reference that got worked in.
– And for that matter, what’s this witch from?
– This is the Terry Gilliam shot I was referring to:
– Boy. I just love that toothpick. So very much. And I only just noticed here that Lane made the slice of cheese look like it’s smiling.
– This is the ridiculous Stinky Cheese Man stuffed toy. I love him so much! He is, as we suggest, from YottoY
And here’s a link to someone making it run:
– Here he is at #91 on the second Top 100 Picture Books poll I conducted.
– Just gonna say it again. A House That Once Was is a true Caldecott contender. Find it!!
– And here’s a link to the mentioned Astronuts from Jon and Steven Weinberg.
– Did you miss Battle Bunny? Don’t! Read this review and enjoy!
– And here’s the book that came out last year that makes fun of Lane Smith’s name. SO GOOD!
– Yep. The Berenstain Bears podcast Deep In Bear Country is really remarkable stuff. Highly recommended. Though, and I mean this truly, I cannot find them doing Berenstain Bears and the Bully. Ruh-roh.
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– The Florida bookseller who gets tattoos from artists is Becky Quiroga. Publishers Weekly did a piece on her years ago. That said, her Lane Smith isn’t Stinky Cheese Man after all. It’s the ape from It’s a Book.
Filed under: Fuse 8 n' Kate

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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Thanks for the shout-out! I’m getting to “The Berenstain Bears and the Bully” soon, I promise! It’s such an important book and Mike recently updated it to address the wonky ending, so I’m going to cover both versions as well as try to bring in a guest expert on bullying. It’s, hopefully, going to be a good episode? Fingers crossed? Anyway, thanks again!
He updated it?!?! This is new information we didn’t have before.
To the library!
Wait, which book didn’t age so well?
Remind me of the context. Did I say that one of theirs didn’t age well or someone else’s?
Wait, never mind, I think you meant “Squids will be Squids.” Which, yeah, has not held up as well or at least is not as popular. I still remember the one fable with the homework assignment to basically write and stage a Broadway musical. I never got homework as cool as that (though I have helped stage that stuff in my adult life, so clearly that’s the homework that would have prepared me for adulthood!).