Fuse 8 n’ Kate: Diary of a Worm by Doreen Cronin, ill. Harry Bliss

Back we return to the words of Doreen Cronin! We’d done her Click, Clack, Moo in the past (and Duck for President too), but not her other massively successful picture book series. This is also our first Harry Bliss book to boot. We go through all 18 different journal entries of this title and discuss its finer aspects. Along the way we speculate about dated elements like playing marbles and hats with fake arrows going through them. We discuss the history of this specific series. Finally we learn how long worms live and think about how this book would be different if it was published today (*hint* there would be backmatter).

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

Show Notes:

Don’t think too hard about how they got that shot, Kate.

Kate pointed out that there are loads of spiders that know how to dig. Everything from trapdoor spiders to burrowing spiders. We wonder what type this one is.

Marbles? So this is an era that never happened. These girls might as well be playing tiddly-winks or jacks. The real reason it’s here? Harry Bliss just likes marbles.

We have many questions. Why why why are the ants walking on their legs, upright (and why does it feel so wrong)?

Do worms have noses? If not then what’s keeping these sunglasses up? Honestly, I’m just grateful that arms of their coats are just hanging there, empty.

Kate’s detective work led to her discover that this is an older $20 bill (thereby backing up her theory that, perhaps, this story takes place in the past).

Kate Recommends: The podcast Good Hang with Amy Poehler

Betsy Recommends: Murderbot on Apple TV

Filed under: Fuse 8 n' Kate