Betsy Bird's Blog, page 57

Fuse 8 n’ Kate: Lovable Lyle by Bernard Waber

Considering the fact that the movie of Lyle the Crocodile came out practically a year ago in October of 2022, it may seem a little late to be returning to this particular member of the family Crocodylidae, but what care we? This Lyle title was originally released in 1969. Remember that date. It puts the contents inside in a little bit of context. Today, Kate and I discuss whether or not this lesser known Lyle title falls into the category of “forgotten gem” or “justly unmemorable bit o’ fluf...

Review of the Day: Lovable Lyle by Bernard Waber

Considering the fact that the movie of Lyle the Crocodile came out practically a year ago in October of 2022, it may seem a little late to be returning to this particular member of the family Crocodylidae, but what care we? This Lyle title was originally released in 1969. Remember that date. It puts the contents inside in a little bit of context. Today, Kate and I discuss whether or not this lesser known Lyle title falls into the category of “forgotten gem” or “justly unmemorable bit o’ fluf...

Review of the Day: Eb & Flow by Kelly J. Baptist

Eb & Flow
By Kelly J. Baptist
Crown Books for Young Readers (an imprint of Penguin Random House)
$16.99
ISBN: 9780593429136
Ages 9-12
On shelves now

Here’s what children’s librarians want from contemporary children’s book authors today (which is why it’s so hard to give us what we want): We want contemporary novels about kids from a wide range of experiences. BUT we also want the kids in these books to be from a wide range of economic backgrounds as wel (tons of books about mid or upper income ki...

The Editorial Director and the Translator: A Talk About EBYR’s Stories from Latin America with Kathleen Merz and Lawrence Schimel

If you saw the news this week then you know that Simon & Schuster has just been acquired by private equity firm KKR for $1.62bn. But as we watch large firms acquire massive publishing companies, the experience can be a bit like watching sharks devour sharks. Meanwhile, elsewhere, it doesn’t take much effort to notice that it’s the small publishers doing the innovative, interesting, imaginative work that makes the American children’s book scene as vibrant and interesting as it is today.

Today...

Fuse 8 n’ Kate: The Table Where Rich People Sit by Byrd Baylor, ill. Peter Parnall

I know I say this all the time but I did NOT see Kate’s reaction to today’s book coming. You’d think that a book so embraced by hippies and Quakers would be an easy read. Not so much! Today our discussion centers around whether this book is more like Eloise or Last Stop on Market Street (and not in a good way). We also come to the conclusion that this may, in fact, be both the most capitalistic and least capitalistic book of all time. Special Bonus: We quote what may be the cruelest Kirkus r...

Elf Dog LaRue: A Guest Post by M.T. Anderson

Today it is my very great pleasure to bring you a post from author M.T. Anderson himself. Consider this NSFW if you don’t care for openly weeping at your desk.

Generally, authors for kids do not treat kids’ pets kindly. We kill them. It’s awful. Doesn’t matter what the animal is. Dogs, horses, raccoons, spiders. They all die to teach some child an important lesson about life and death.

            It’s traumatizing. As a young reader, I learned to stay away from animal books because I...

Review of the Day: Mr. S by Monica Arnaldo

Mr. S
By Monica Arnaldo
Katherine Tegan Books (an imprint of Harper Collins)
$19.99
ISBN: 9780063003958
Ages 3-6
On shelves now

We’re far beyond The Kissing Hand now, my friends. Time was that when a parent came strolling into a bookstore or library in search of First Day of School Books for their incipient Kindergartners, there was really only one game in town to try. I cast no aspersions upon that raccoon-laden tale. There truly are children for whom the first day of school is a fraught affair,...

August Themes of Book Displays: Take a Dive Into the Image Search Lottery

Here’s where longstanding blogs can be of use to librarians and booksellers.

In 2004 or so I started my very first children’s literature blog on the Blogger platform. Called “A Fuse #8 Production” it was picked up by School Library Journal as part of its own blog platform in 2006. Since that time I’ve pretty much been on the same site. That means that over the intervening 17 years or so I’ve accrued an astounding number of images. And so now, when I search this image bank for something as inn...

Multidimensional Masculinity and Resuscitating “Literacy Life” in Kids: We’re Talking With Torrey Maldonado Today!

It wasn’t all that long ago that all the talk on the children’s literature social media was about middle grade novels and their prodigious length. Where, the people asked, were the Apple paperback-length books from the days of yore? Where the Goosebumps-sized novels? The conversation on this topic has since shifted (either to AI, once again, or why there are too many grandmother picture books) but let’s just pause for a moment and consider the original complaint. Middle grade is too long, you sa...

Fuse 8 n’ Kate: Farmer Duck by Martin Waddell, ill. Helen Oxenbury

When we’re not talking about the unrealistic L.A. highway driving times in the Barbie Movie, we’re discussing our favorite picture books and whether or not they’re classics. I admit that we have done Helen Oxenbury on the podcast relatively recently, but due to its stature in the children’s literature world, I felt that his was an egregious gap in our knowledge until now. Think of Farmer Duck as a variation on Click, Clack, Moo: Cows That Type, but with a more revolutionary and less unioniza...