Classics, Nonfiction, and Children's Literature
In many ways, The Lightning Thief by Rick Riordan felt like the Harry Potter series. A pre-teen realizes he has unusual powers, only to realize that he is a special person living in the ordinary world. In the case of Percy Jackson, he is the child of one of the Greek gods. The magic prevalent
The Newbery Honor book Savvy by Ingrid Law follows similar patterns to the middle grade novel The Lightning Thief, which I read at about the same time (thoughts here). A child (Mibs) has a birthday (this time her thirteenth) and discovers her special powers, testing them by going on a journey with other kids. Savvy
I knew my son (age 3) would love this book as soon as I skimmed through it. Interrupting Chicken by David Ezra Stein (Candlewick, 2010) tells of a father rooster who is trying to tell his daughter chicken some traditional fairy tales, but she keeps interrupting to save the character from the wicked witch, the mean old wolf,
LMNO Peas by Keith Baker (Beach Lane Books, 2010) combines two things my son absolutely loves: the alphabet and peas. (I kid you not. With the right amount of salt and pepper and butter, yes must have butter, he will eat a whole bowl). In Baker’s book, each letter of the ABC books stands for
The ever-talented Mo Willems wrote City Dog, Country Frog (Hyperion, 2010), but did not illustrate it himself; the also talented John J. Muth added his soft illustration style to this story. In this book, a dog from the city forms an unlikely partnership with a country frog. They play all spring and summer and remember during the fall.
Subway by Christoph Niemann (Greenwillow, 2010), was on a new bookshelf recently; it caught my eye because my son (age 3) loves trains and has never yet been exposed to what a subway is. He loves this book! The illustrations are on a black background, with white-painted rounded-edged figures of a parent and two kids, taking
It was last November that my son, then aged 2 years and 1 month, started showing an interest in being toilet trained. At a few times in the past year he has had days of “underwear only” with moderate success. Well, just before his third birthday, which was last week, he went from the “training”
Today opens the 2010 Cybils nomination process. If you don’t know, the Cybils are the Children’s and Young Adult Blogger’s Literary Awards. I didn’t participate last year or even follow it, but this year I intend to do just that! My focus will be on fiction and non-fiction picture books. I am not, at this
This summer, my son and I conquered a major accomplishment in his reading. We successfully read three full-length classic chapter books together: The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis; Winnie-the-Pooh by A.A. Milne; and Peter Pan by J.M. Barrie. For the first book, I read as he played. Then, for the others,
I went through a summer children’s and YA binge during my blogging break. These books did not take long to read, and I read them for the pure entertainment value. They also are not ones that I’ll remember for long, although they were enjoyable. It may be that I am not thinking much of them
I have never watched a “train-wreck” reality show. In fact, I don’t think I’ve ever watched a reality show, unless you count the cooking shows like Iron Chef America. I have no desire to watch reality shows (beyond learning to cook, that is), and I don’t understand the appeal. The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins,
I was not in the mood for trying to write about Paradise Lost last night, so I thought I’d take a Milton break and read something else on my shelf. After I finished I Kill Giants (read my thoughts) two weeks ago, I’d felt a strange compulsion to go check out some more graphic novels.
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