Monica Edinger's Blog, page 77
July 30, 2012
The Arty Modern Olympics of Yore
Being an earlier riser I’m very pleased to have access to NBC’s live feed of the Olympics even with its glitchiness (both the feedfails and the seemingly constant commercials). What is also a lot of fun is being able to go poke around for stuff while listening and dipping back and forth into the live stream. And so I came across this Slate articleand learned that there were Olympic art competitions from 1921 to 1948 in keeping with the vision of the originator of the modern Olympics,Baron Pie...
July 28, 2012
Harold and his Purple Crayon Odyssey Among Other Things in this Week’s NYTBR
To live above the merely personal does not require plying oars against colossal currents, either. “Harold and the Purple Crayon” is a great little book and deals with its own verities — the world is not in your control; courage begins at free fall; the best path is not the straight path. The lessons of the “Odyssey,” minus the sex. Harold draws his dream in crayon and then wants to go home, to his window, which has been there all along. The key to his destiny is that window, which is somethin...
July 26, 2012
Coming Soon: Rebecca Stead’s Liar & Spy
I am a huge fan of Rebecca Stead’s When You Reach Me (seemy NYT reviewandthis postas to why)and am very happy to report that her newLiar & Spyis just as good. I read it a while ago, but because I reviewed it professionally only gave it a brief mention here. Yesterday I learned that my Horn Book starredreview was made available to Random House and so, while I can’t put the whole thing here (be sure to keep an eye out for it in September), I will give you the quote from it thattheyare using:
Sta...
July 25, 2012
Middle Grade Readers and Informational Books
The Common Core recommendation for a greater percentage of informational reading in schools has created quite a bit of buzz these days. Since, like many of my middle grade colleagues, I already use a lot of informational material as a 4th grade teacher, I am hopeful that this new emphasis will only be a good one.
For example, when doing an author study of E. B. White I enrich our readings of his iconic children’s books with excerpts from his essays (especially “Death of a Pig“),letters, interv...
July 24, 2012
Margaret Mahy
I was very sad to hear of Margaret Mahy’s passing. I first came to know her from her superb YA novel, The Changover and then became a complete fan by way of several delightful books for much younger readers. In particular, I adored The Great Piratical Rumbustification & The Librarian and the Robbers. These two novellas were perfect read-aloudsfor 4th graders— silly, clever, and fantastic fun.
I was incredibly lucky to meet Margaret at a couple of the summer institutes of Children’s Literature...
July 20, 2012
Real Authors Writing Real Letters to Real Kids
The Rumpus ‘s newLetters for Kids is a fantastic idea. I think I vaguely read about the adult version of this cool thing at some point and forgot it, but here is the kid version. Love, love, love it. I’m wondering if it is okay for a grown-up to subscribe just to see what it is like. Or is that too creepy?
This Just In:Announcing Letters For Kids! Letters For Kids is just likeLetters In The Mail, except intended for subscribers six and older. We’re helping people appreciate the post office at...
July 18, 2012
The Thing About Stars
The question of stars and book reviews is a complicated one. Especially here in the United States where there seems to be something in our national character that makes it hard for us to know how to acknowledge excellence. On the one hand we do recognize those who are heroes and great (especially in sports) while on the other hand find it difficult in our day to day lives to tag something or someone as being “better” or even “best.” Possibly because by doing so there is an implication that th...
July 16, 2012
Great e-Book Debate
Australian author Isobelle Carmodydecided to bring back one of her out-of-print older titles, Greylands, as an ebook and as part of its launch created a one-month-only websitefull of cool stuff including a Great e-Book Debate area where she has invited a bunch of smart people to post and discuss the whole idea of ebooks. Today’s post, “I am not a Luddite” is by my pal Judith Ridge who is, as should be evident from the post’s title, not a fan for some very thoughtful reasons.
My feeling is that...
July 14, 2012
Suzy’s Books
Over the years I’ve been mixed about Wes Anderson’s movies and so I went yesterday to see his latest, Moonrise Kingdom, with no great expectations despite all the glowing reviews. Well, I can say now that I was completely smitten. Of the many aspects of the film that charmed me, the children’s literature connections were of particular interest. I just loved thePeter Pan references as well as the delightful imaginary books that Suzy, one of the two protagonists, lugs along on their journey. Fa...
July 13, 2012
Thoughts on Newbery: The One
We kept waiting for the Big Book.
Every few weeks, as a new shipment of books arrived at each of our different addresses, Susan, Maureen, and I slit open the carton and said to ourselves, Please, let this box contain the One.
The One would be the novel so monumental, so original and vast and funny and tragic, so clearlyimportant, that only an idiot would deny it the Pulitzer Prize.
We wanted a foolproof book, a book about which we could be absolutely certain. Or two such books. Maybe even three....
