Monica Edinger's Blog, page 141

Hayley Mills, the Miley Cyrus of My Tweendom

It is all Roger Sutton's fault.

This morning I saw his tweet: "Re Little Princess: does anyone else love the Shirley Temple movie? Chick was INTENSE."  After a second on youtube, I quickly found my favorite bit from the movie and tweeted back, "@HornBook Me., I loved Shirley as Sara Crewe. Remember "Old Kent Road"? http://bit.ly/qz2cb.

After indulging in a few additional pouty Shirley clips  I thought — what about Hayley Mills?  Now yes, her Parent Trap is on television often.   But what about s

Maria Kalman is Happy to Be Here

And I'm happy she is here too.  You will be too after seeing her latest, "I Lift My Lamp Beside the Gold."

via @ReadingRants

And What About Beatrice, Mr. Snicket?

Snicket said: "I can neither confirm nor deny that I have begun research into a new case and I can neither confirm nor deny that the results are as dreadful and unnerving as A Series Of Unfortunate Events. However, I can confirm that Egmont will be publishing these findings."

A new series from Lemony Snicket to be published by Egmont!  Reported here, here, and here.

In the Classroom: Chris Raschka

I've been a longtime fan of the children's book creator, Chris Raschka, and so was completely delighted to see the interview he gave over at Seven Impossible Things Before Breakfast. This reminded me of the ways I've used his books in our weekly Literary Salons when the children bring in baked treats, I proved juice, and we do something "literary."  Sometimes it is a bunch of prepared readings from recent books the kids have read.  Sometimes it is choral poetry.  Or original poetry. Sometimes it

Katrina Never Forgotten

In my experience as the daughter of Holocaust survivors, as time goes on there can be a tendency for the historical record of horrible events to become simplified — for certain iconic images and stories to take on the burden of representing all of it. So far I am heartened to see that hasn't happened with Katrina. For example, two recent high-profile books have come out and everything I've seen about them gives me the imrpression that their creators have done things right. One of them is Dave Eg

Lev Grossman's The Magicians

Read Lev Grossman's  The Magicians a few months ago and have been eagerly awaiting publication so I could see what others thought.  Now that it is out here's my goodreads review for those who want to know what I thought!

This novel begins with a disaffected teen, the sad and unhappy Quentin Coldwater, off to a college interview. But the interview never happens; instead Quentin ends up at Brakebills, an upstate New York Bard-Vassar-like college of magic. There he learns much about sorcery and eve

Truth and/or Fiction

Very interesting post by Guy Gavriel Kay asking "Are Novelists Entitled to Use Real-Life Characters?"

Dave Egger's Max at Sea

So I went into the novelization thinking it would be a place to put all these passages and scenes that wouldn't fit into the movie. And I did end up using a few of those scenes. But while I was working on the book, it was funny, because I started going in new directions, different from any of the screenplay versions, pushing it into some territory that was personal to me. So in a way the movie is more Spike's version of Maurice's book, and this novel is more my version.

From an interesting interv

New Book from Matthew Skelton

A few years ago there was a big hoopla for  Matthew Skelton's debut novel, Endymion Spring. I was invited to a lovely dinner to meet the very engaging author, went off to read the book (which I enjoyed), and then wondered when we'd hear from the author again.  Took a while, but evidently his next book, The Story of Cirrus Flux, is out in the U.K and is reviewed in the Guardian.  Appears to be a completely different world and set of characters from the first book.

A. S. Byatt's The Children's Book

It begins with the discovery of a boy hiding in a museum.

The time is 1895, the boy is Philip Warren, and the museum is the precursor to the Victoria & Albert: the South Kensington Museum.  And, oh, yes –there's a remarkable piece of art that the boy is besotted with — the Gloucester Candlestick.  However, while this may make many children's book mavens think immediately of E. L. Konigsburg classical story for children, let me say straight out — A. S. Byatt's The Children's Book is a book for gro