Monica Edinger's Blog, page 57

An Edward Lear Musical: Coromandel

Here’s something intriguing: Coromandel”… avibrant musical odyssey for children and adults…a journey through the mind of poet Edward Lear” that is going to be presented October 3-6 at Here in NYC.

CBC’s Diversity Blog

With every post I become a bigger and bigger fan of the CBC Diversity Blog. It is one of several initiatives by the CBC Diversity Committee of the Children’s Book Council, the national nonprofit trade association for children’s publishers. They’ve got a good page of resourcesfor those “interested inproducing, promoting, buying, or writing diverse books for children,” provide links to various news pieces, and do a weekly round-up you can subscribe to, Best of all, they get some thoughtful peop...

Thoughts on Newbery: The Age Problem

Children are defined as persons of ages up to and including fourteen, and books for this entire age range are to be considered.

That is directly from the Newbery criteria and can be one of the hardest to sort out. At least it has been for me. I teach 4th grade in a 4th-8th grade middle school and since my students come back to me as they get older for book suggestions as well as for an after-school book club, I have some sense of how kids at the upper end of that age range respond to eligible...

Some Slippery Poems Selected by Lemony Snicket and Illustrated by Chris Raschka

The poems contained in this children’s poetry portfolio are not made for children. Poetry is like a curvy slide in a playground—an odd object, available to the public—and, as I keep explaining to my local police force, everyone should be able to use it, not just those of a certain age.

So begins Lemony Snicket’s introduction to “All Good Slides Are Slippery,” a delightful selection of poems that he thinks may appeal to children despite not being specifically written for them. Charmingly illust...

In the Classroom: Middle School as Considered By Someone Who Just Finished It

There are many books out these days written by adults about social aggression — novels for children and teens and others, often nonfiction, for concerned adults. And sometimes there are firsthand accounts from children and teens themselves. Say by a former student of mine,Natasha Lerner, who has just started high school. She is a blogger atHuffington Post Teenand has just written a remarkably insightful blog post about her just-completed and often painful middle school years:”Middle School.”...

AFRICA IS MY HOME is starting to get reviews

My babe’s coming-of-age* publication date of October 8th is getting close and so reviews are starting to appear. Below are links to the ones I’ve come across so far. It is fascinating and a bit nerve-wracking to be on this side of things for a change.

Starred Review in School Library Journal

Betsy Bird on Fuse#8

Publishers Weekly

Kirkus(Full review is up at B&N)

Teri Lesesne

*Since I began work on this in 2000 coming-of-age seems more appropriate than birthday.

Too Nice? Not Nice Enough? Two Novelists Weigh In

Interesting essays and comments on this knotty issue: “Are Novelists Too Wary of Criticizing Other Novelists?”

Philip Pullman on being a yeoman, swallows, the value of analogy, and a few other things

At last I have discovered what social rank I am. Not that I ever wondered very hard about that, but still. I am a yeoman. We recently bought seven acres of rough land right next to our house. It hadn’t been looked after for 25 years or more, and it was full of chest-high thistles and nettles and hogweed, and the ground was ankle-twistingly covered in hummocks and tussocks and anthills and molehills and rabbit holes.

Naturally, I had to have a tractor, and very fine I feel sitting on it, bumpin...

Our Complicated Global World: The Story of David Good

For some of us in the world today it can seem easy to make connections to others far from us. We travel widely and our young people, in and out of school, are making virtual and real journeys to other places and cultures. Having had my own time in another culture as a young Peace Corps Volunteer in 1970s Sierra Leone, I’m aware of how tricky it is to make assumptions about those who live differently than we do. And so I just hope that these easy virtual and real visits do not give these young...

A Conversation between Neil Gaiman and Philip Pullman

My great thanks to Judith Ridge for pointing me to this report of the conversation that happened between these two in Oxford last week. They were meant to have had the conversation last fall, but circumstances kept it from happening. So happy the two finally got together and do so so wish I could have been there (especially as I was just in Oxford a few weeks before).

I was delighted to find a podcast of it and now, having finished listening to it I can say that it is brilliant — you can just...