Fuse 8 n’ Kate: Tuesday by David Wiesner

While normally we might post our podcast episodes on Mondays, it seemed that for this book, of all books, a Tuesday debut was the most appropriate. When my mother suggested we do a David Wiesner title, specifically this one, I pooh-poohed her. Silly mother. Surely we’d already done it. Turns out, not so much. So it was with great joy that I handed it over to Kate. In this episode you’ll get to hear my dead-on theremin imitation (which sounds oddly similar to my playing-the-saw imitation), as well as discussions of whether or not these are frogs AND toads, what happens if you loose your lilypad, and the sad fate of the little old woman in front of the TV.

Listen to the whole show here on Soundcloud or download it through iTunes, Stitcher, Google Play, PlayerFM, or your preferred method of podcast selection.

Show Notes:

If you look at the book a certain way you can see what Kate’s talking about. First image: Terrifying.

Second image: Wackadoodle.

Third image: Kate’s tattoo

I call this next one Ode to a Futuristic Toaster:

Is this David Wiesner? My theory is that this is his cameo. Because, after all, it’s a dead ringer.

An act of violence in the making. You can’t watch but you also cannot look away.

Was this David Wiesner’s dog? And was it too eaten by frogs like the one in this book?

We find the presence of the ambulance at the end of the book to be very unnerving. What is being implied here? I’m a little worried about that old lady we saw in a previous spread. I mean, didn’t she look a LOT like the mom from Love You Forever?

Since The Mysteries of Harris Burdick came out in 1984 and this came out in 1991, I almost feel like this two-page spread is a kind of homage to Van Allsburg’s classic.

Go to David Wiesner’s site for further Tuesday information here.

Read his Caldecott acceptance speech here.

It came in at #24 on the Top 100 Picture Books poll.

As it turns out, and this was a surprise to me, the short film they made of the book is shockingly beautiful. The animation is above par and the background music in particular is quite enchanting. It was created by the “Music and Animation Collection of Paul McCartney”. Consider it a surprising treat.

Some Swell Pup by Maurice Sendak was originally published in 1985. I thought I knew quite a few of the lesser remembered Sendaks but this one’s a new one to me . . .

“Amelia Bedelia turns passive aggression into a kind of art.” I do highly recommend the New Yorker piece The Secret Rebellion of Amelia Bedelia by Sarah Blackwood. It is my favorite kind of piece. A reinterpretation of something people have ignored and disregarded for years.

Bags of Love was the site where I created my scarf for this past Sunday’s Newbery/Caldecott/Legacy Banquet. Trust me, you can make your own too. Here was the end product, which was made up entirely of blue Caldecott Award and Honor winners.

Filed under: Fuse 8 n' Kate