Telegraph | News | Author Pullman fights to save 'inspirational' old Oxford boatyard
The author Philip Pullman yesterday condemned the "soulless, bland and corporate" plan that would turn a part of Oxford from which he drew inspiration into a "ditch imprisoned between brick walls"... ...Castle Mill boatyard is, in the author's fictional world, home to the gyptians, a group of boat people who befriend Lyra Belacqua, the main character in the books.
Telegraph | News | Schools told: don't make pupils read same books year after year
While old favourites, such as Tom's Midnight Garden by Philippa Pearce and Robert Westall's The Machine Gunners, were still used by many teachers, the authority said "an orthodoxy was emerging around newer texts". Skellig, about a creature who lives under a family's garage, and Louis Sachar's Holes, about an American boy who is sent to a detention centre, were among the most widely read, often for the second time, having already been covered in the last year at primary school.
This article about Reading Aloud, from The Times, is billed as being 'by Philip Pullman'. But it's not. Pullman is referred to and quoted in the piece, as is Francesca Simon, but it is not he who has just finished reading The Princess And The Goblin to a 9-year-old:
I've just finished George MacDonald' s The Princess and the Goblin, which my nine-year-old would not have managed alone, but which he begged for each night, once the story was launched. That moment when a child's eyes begin to shine because they have fallen in love with a story, or a character or with reading itself is magical.
Guardian Unlimited Books | By genre | Author of the month: Anne Fine
Eminent children's writer Anne Fine, Carnegie and Whitbread winner and the author of Madame Doubtfire, Goggle Eyes and Flour Babies, tells Dina Rabinovitch about her unconventional working methods and why she's the "fiend of compartment D"
Dina Rabinovitch's 'Author of the month', from Wednesday's Guardian...
CommanderBond.net – James Bond 007 - The CBn Interview - The Charlie Higson CBn Interview
The Charlie Higson CBn Interview A discussion with the author of the new Young Bond series. Written by John Cox (23 Feb, 2005, 11:30)On March 3, 2005 Ian Fleming Publications and Puffin Books will release SilverFin, the first of a series of Young Bond novels written by Charlie Higson, co-creator of the hugely popular BBC comedy series, ?The Fast Show", and a successful screenwriter and adult thriller novelist. Today CBn has the extreme honor of being the first James Bond website to interview Mr. Higson about SilverFin and the Young Bond series.
Highy recommended interview from commanderbond.net
Valerie Grove Meets David Levithan
Highly recommended
The Alien Online - Science Fiction, Fantasy and Horror News, Reviews, Articles and more...
A short feature about Nick Gifford from The Alien Online, with mention of his latest teenage novel, Incubus, and substantial quotation from the author himself.
Recommended
Coming Up... on Lebrecht Live, BBC Radio 3
Sunday 27 February 2005 17:45
Norman Lebrecht debates another cultural issue with guests in the studio and around the world. Why are we all reading children's books? Are we becoming willingly infantilised?
An invitation to respond:
At a time when fiction is flourishing as never before and new writers are breaking left and right, more and more adults are turning to children's literature for relaxation and their commuter read. Harry Potter apart, the works of Philip Pullman, Mark Haddon, Jacqueline Wilson and others are selling in multi-millions - and more grown-ups are reading them than kids.So what's going on? Are we as readers retreating into childhood fantasy? Are
we becoming willingly infantilised? Do children's books offer a purer form
of escapism than adults'? Or are we so bored with repetitive descriptions of
sexual calisthenics and relationship difficulties that we turn to children's
writers for an honest, untainted view of the world?Your thoughts please to lebrecht.live@bbc.co.uk and listen in on Sunday February
27 at 1745 (UK time) on BBC Radio 3
Guardian Unlimited Books | Review | The whole of the moon
Jan Mark is transported to a different world in The Widow and the King by John Dickinson
So reads the sub-heading on Jan Mark's review in Saturday's GUARDIAN.
The review itself is atmospherically descriptive but strangely and (for the publisher and author as much as for the prospective reader, no doubt) frustratingly neutral.
David Levithan, author of Boy Meets Boy, is scheduled to appear on the daytime This Morning show at around mid-day.
He is also the subject of ACHUKA's latest interview.
Alan Durant, now a fulltime writer, having left his job at Walker Books last year, is to run a special course for aspiring children's authors at his house in France this August. Here are the details:
| Want to write children?s books ? and get published?
Join Alan Durant, acclaimed author of over 50 books, on a residential writers? course in Northern France. This course on writing for children of all ages will offer the opportunity to develop techniques and share ideas, during one-to-one tutorials and group workshops, with plenty of time for writing in a relaxed holiday atmosphere and lovely rural setting. The course runs from 19.8.05 ? 24.8.05. Cost ?375 to cover fees, accommodation and all meals. Interested? For further details contact Alan Durant by email or by phone on 07944 374734. |
Read ACHUKA's archive interview (from FEB 2000) with Alan Durant:
Coinciding with first paperback publication of Eoin Colfer's The Supernaturalist, a special online challenge site is being launched today. The potential prize is a mini iPod. Get in touch if you want to join the ACHUKA team!
A mini iPod was also up for grabs at the paperback's launch party in London on Friday. Guests were given a word to stick to the reverse of their name badge. The first word mentioned by the author in his party speech would win the prize. ACHUKA's word was 'flan'.
After presenting the prize to the lucky winner, Colfer had some fun at Adele Minchin's expense, psychoanalysing her list of words for the lucky dip.
Guardian Unlimited Books | News | Children's writers become library favourites
Jacqueline Wilson, holder of the record for the longest bookshop autographing sessions (7 hours), is top of the latest public lending right (PLR) tables for the second year running. A younger writer in the genre, Mick Inkpen from Essex, is fourth.
Jacqueline Wilson's latest title - Clean Break
A Mailing Monkey experience...
Teaching Ideas & Resources - TES - The Times Educational Supplement 1
Stuart Hill, author of The Cry Of The Icemark, on his best teacher, from the January 28 edition of TES (not previously blogged or included in Mail List Update)
USATODAY.com - Girls find 'Pants' a perfect fit
A USA Today feature about Ann Brashares...
see also entry for Feb 2nd...
Sisterhood Central - Your source for all things sisterhood!
Puffin's Marketing and Publicity Director, Elaine McQuade is to become 'Consumer Development Director', working across the Penguin Group. What will thise entail? The Penguin Press Release explains, "This new position addresses the increasing opportunities for researching, reaching and communicating with new readers, who are not necessarily accessing Penguin books at the moment. As part of the company?s bid to expand the market for books, Elaine will be leading many of the projects currently in their infancy at Penguin, such as diversity work, a commitment to working collaboratively with the public sector and the book trade on community reading projects and involvement in the industry-wide World Book Day Adult Literacy drive."
Elaine McQuade comments, ?There are an increasing number of diverse initiatives both inside and outside the industry to grow the market. It is extremely far sighted of Penguin to create this brand new position which really will help us maximise all current and future opportunities and I?m very much looking forward to the new role.?
The move means that Adele Minchin becomes Head of Puffin Publicity and Kirsten Grant Head of Marketing, both reporting to Joanna Prior, Group Marketing and Publicity Director. These new roles will become effective from Monday 28th February.
FilmForce: An Interview with Dave McKean
An interview with illustrator, Dave McKean
Highly recommended
Healing herbs help children?s author Julie Hearn cope with her failing sight...
An article in The Times body&soul supplement reveals that children's author Julie Hearn (see ST Book of the Week) has been diagnosed with severe congenital retinal degeneration...
Darren Shan is due to be interviewed on Irish radio 2FM on Monday, February 7th, on the Gerry Ryan show, during the morning.
You can also listen to the show live online:
http://www.rte.ie/2fm/
Schoolgirl... Publishing sensation... 50,000 copies in six weeks (er, wouldn't this make it figure in the bestseller charts, if true?)
Emma Marie, 13, says (of her own book, mark you) in The Times ?It?s a perfect read for the computer generation. Lots of kids out there like playing computer games and this is taking it to a whole new level. The characters go into the world and experience it for real.?
Mmm, original idea, that.
The Times piece continues... "Although Dragon Tamers has a recommended retail price of ?9.95, a copy has featured on eBay for ?35, her publishers discovered."
Blimey, those book-dealing speculators know no bounds. ?35!
Charles Faulkner, for Aultbea Publishing, says: ?I would describe her as a genius . . . You would not know this novel had been written by a 13-year-old. She can take a situation and make it come to life. Even adults have found it interesting. It?s difficult to put down.?
Even adults find it "interesting". It must be some book, then.
The Times adds, "He anticipates sales topping six figures in the book?s first year."
Either numbers are not Times arts reporter Dalya's strongest suit (was it really five and not fifty thousand in the opening para.), or the publisher actually means seven figures.
Guardian Unlimited Books | Review | An Eden of buddleia and fireweed
Jan Mark shares ACHUKA's enthusiasm for Nigel Hinton's Time Bomb, wholly convinced by:
...Andy's philandering spiv of a father, the war-hero cleric with moral feet of clay, the children's unashamed tenderness and affection for each other, and above all the loving recreation of postwar suburban London - the Saturday morning cinema, the traffic-free streets, and the bomb-sites, those Edens of buddleia and fireweed that we took for granted and thought would last for ever.
I Entertain Not Educate (from Hendon Times)
Teachers say what I write is not responsible enough," he says. "I believe that, in fiction, anything goes. My job is not to be responsible, but to be the opposite." ANTHONY HOROWITZ
The 6th Alex Rider book, Ark Angel, is published in April:
Economist.com | Naughty children
A short piece in The Economist, citing titles such as The Otterbury Incident by C. Day Lewis, asks why role models in books for older children were far more rowdy in the past than they are today.
Diane Purkiss of Oxford University believes that rowdiness on such a scale would fall foul of most editors these days. It is not that modern children's literature is devoid of outlaws; rather, rebellious behaviour is either the result of inadequate upbringing or exists safely in the realm of fantasy. "Children don't get to raid people's dustbins any more, although they do sometimes have the power to change the world."
That old Blake magic - The Herald
A feature in the Herald about Quentin Blake:
Quentin Blake, 50 Years of Illustration is at the Dick Institute, Kilmarnock, until March 26. There are book signings,lectures and workshops to accompany the exhibition. Call 01563 554 343 for further information.
Yorkshire Post Today: News, Sport, Jobs, Property, Cars, Entertainments & More
MARGI McAllister looks like the most unlikely target for a Hollywood film company. Wearing a green velvet hat, brown boots and windcheater, the Yorkshire children's author could easily be mistaken for a PhD student or harassed social worker and her long and happy 27-year marriage to a clergyman is hardly the stuff of gossip columns. ...
Urchin Of Tbe Riding Stars, first book in the Mismantle Chronicles trilogy
Darren Shan's latest monthly online newsletter - which he always signs off "all the bloody best") - carries a report of his January trip to Japan and further news of the Shan movie rights sale.
eBay item 6509263468 (Ends 11-Feb-05 15:17:11 GMT) - UNIQUE ASLAN OF NARNIA FIGURE LIFE-SIZE
Sarah Johnson, one-time children's books reviewer for The Times, is selling a large model of Aslan the lion on eBay.
The lion was made by a film props studio for the Granada TV series HOME ON THEIR OWN presented by ULRIKA JOHNSSON. The Johnsons were among the first families to be featured in the series of programmes in which children applied their own ideas to their parents' homes...while the parents were away. Inspired by the C.S. Lewis children's classic story, the Johnson children turned their bedroom into NARNIA IN WINTER...complete with iron lamp-post, snow-covered trees bolted to the floor...fake snow on the floor...and the life-size model of Aslan, King of Narnia, which is now for sale.
