Waterstone's Writer's Table - 40 books selected by Philip Pullman
A wonderfully eclectic list, as you might imagine. Good to see Buddenbrooks getting a mention. I can remember being just as amazed when I read this book at about the same age as Thomas Mann when he wrote it. As Pullman says: "How could a 25-year-old know so much, and write so perceptively? The first of Mann's great novels, and still astonishing today."
Follow this link to read about how Pullman made his selection:
The children's laureate, Michael Rosen, is a fierce critic of the Government's education policies. He's against testing - and wants pupils to be excited by literature again. Andy Sharman talks to him...
"Barefoot Books is like the Body Shop of children's publishing," [Leonard Marcus] says. "There's a New Age-y feel to the company." As for the books themselves, Marcus says, "They've chosen the easy way to be multicultural by mostly sticking to so-called timeless tales."
>The only convincing argument against age-banding is that Little Timmy on the school bus might be caught reading a 7+ book when his friend Vernon is reading 9+
Not...
It is nothing to do with that. My objection to age b(r)anding is as passionate and principled as my objection to identity cards - based upon what I foresee as the inevitable restrictions on freedom that will ensue.
Freedom to read widely, irrespective of age, is a fundamental liberty. Age-branding, in this sense, is just as pernicious and potentially authoritarian as the introduction of identity cards.
An excellent feature on Anthony Horowitz from the Irish Indpendent.
Recommended
The Kiss of Death by Marcus Sedwick reviewed by Amanda Craig
It took me a couple of goes to really fall for Sedgwick's first vampire novel, My Swordhand is Singing, but it turned out to be brilliant - about a boy called Peter who discovers that his father has the only sword that can stop vampires and save his sweetheart, deep in a Eastern European forest. If you haven't read it, do, because The Kiss of Death is an equally gripping sequel.
Alan Garner on age-relevant reading
Highyl Recommended
Random House Children's Books has agreed to remove a four-letter swearword from a popular book by Dame Jacqueline Wilson after complaints from Anne Dixon, who insists she is standing up for values of common decency. The 55-year-old said she was horrified when she came across the expletive in the best-selling book My Sister Jodie - a gift for her nine-year-old great-niece, Eve Coulson. She complained to Asda where she bought the book, and the store initially removed it from sale. Asda is owned by Walmart, the US chain which refuses to sell music with explicit lyrics. Now the publisher, in order to appease Mrs Dixon and the supermarket, has said it will - by altering one letter - substitute the word with "twit" when the book is reprinted.
This is merely a stupid, cruel idea invented by some marketing maven who thinks only of the convenience of supermarket shelf stackers and nothing of the way in which children come to books.
splendidly well-written blog entry by Sophie Masson recalling her childhood experiences as self-appointed president of The Bluebell Club...
Older Readers Book of the Year 2008
HARTNETT, Sonya THE GHOST'S CHILD
Younger Readers Book of the Year 2008
WILKINSON, Carole DRAGON MOON
Early Childhood Book of the Year 2008
BLABEY, Aaron PEARL BARLEY AND CHARLIE PARSLEY
Picture Book of the Year 2008 [see previous blogged item]
OTTLEY, Matt REQUIEM FOR A BEAST
Eve Pownall Book of the Year 2008
WATTS, Frances (Illustrated by David LEGGE) PARSLEY RABBIT'S BOOK ABOUT BOOKS
Controversial Australian Prize Winner
A FORMER Children's Book Council president [Kate Colley] has criticised a decision to award one of Australia's most prestigious prizes or children's literature to a book containing swearing and violent images.
Requiem for a Beast today won the Children's Book Council of Australia Picture Book of the Year prize.
The Poetry & Popular Culture blog reports that a forthcoming young adult novel - Freaked by J. T. Dutton - has had to be revised because the copyright holder for Grateful Dead lyrics refused permission to publish quotations at the start of each chapter...
Dutton originally titled the book "Ripple," but her editor lobbied for "Dark Star" instead (both titles of Dead songs). Although the publisher is legally allowed to use the song title in this way, Ice 9 expressed its objection by withholding permission for the epigraphs quoted above. Shortly after the change to "Dark Star" and the conflict with Ice 9, Harper's marketing department decided that "Dark Star" sounded too much like a sci-fi novel title and wouldn't work for Dutton's book. Hence the change to "Freaked," which has no official connection to the Dead. One wonders if Harper had in fact gone forward with a title like "Freaked" from the beginning, whether Ice 9 wouldn't have gone into such a tizzy, whether it wouldn't have withheld permission for the epigraphs, and whether Dutton's book would have been published in a form much closer to the one she initially wanted. But hey, who ever said publishing is actually about the author and the work?
...the success of the Twilight series appears to have unleashed a torrent of creative energy - all those stories she once told herself are now possible future novels. She claims that she has already written 15 outlines for new books - more vampire stories, yes, but also books about aliens, ghosts and mermaids."Now I've found out that people actually like my stories, it's definitely not a problem coming up with ideas about what to write next," Meyer said.
She works best, she added, when the house is wrapped in silence, her children are asleep and her husband has gone to bed. Like the vampires she creates, she really comes alive after midnight.
launch of Guradian's graphic story prize
to enter go to www.capegraphicnovels.co.uk
Emily Windsnap author, Liz Kessler, has a new blog and a newly designed website:
www.lizkessler.co.uk
She is about to set off for a year in camper van and the blog will record her travels.
Just found and very much recommended
Random House is trying to discourage unwholesome behaviour in its children's writers, with an additional clause inserted into standard contracts: ""If you act or behave in a way which damages your reputation as a person suitable to work with or be associated with children, and consequently the market for or value of the work is seriously diminished, and we may (at our option) take any of the following actions: Delay publication / Renegotiate advance / Terminate the agreement."
The 39 Clues, an interactive multi-media adventure series, launches on September 9, 2008. The first book, The Maze of Bones, written by multi-award winning and Number 1 New York Times bestselling author Rick Riordan, is scheduled for simultaneous worldwide publication in the United Kingdom, United States, Australia, New Zealand and Canada.
The official 39 Clues online game will also launch on September 9, 2008, on www.the39clues.com. Combining reading with online gaming and card collecting, this interactive series for children aged 8+ will include 10 books, collectable cards, and an online game where readers uncover information beyond what is revealed in the books and cards and compete for prizes against children around the globe.
Darren Shan's excellent online monthly newsletter
