Sunday Afternoon Visits: July 9th
July 09, 2006
I'm finally getting caught back up on the blogs are my vacation. Here are a few things that caught my eye, a veritable feast of links for you:
- In honor of the release of the second Pirates of the Caribbean movie, I recommend two posts about pirates: A Readable Feast covers pirate books and pirate-related activities, including delicious-looking pirate food. A Chair, A Fireplace, and a Tea Cozy lists several young adult titles about pirates (including Airborn, for which I'll be posting a review shortly). Thanks to Liz B. for the link to the Readable Feast post.
- Kelly from Big A little a is seeking submissions for the next Carnival of Children's Literature, to be published on July 23rd. Get your submission in by July 15th to be included. And if you feel list hosting for August, visit Here in the Bonny Glen. I'm tempted, but my travel schedule is a bit uncertain for mid to late August. Sigh! Eventually things will slow down.
- This is a bit belated, but A Fuse #8 Production published a blog reader selected list of the Top 25 American Children's Books Written in the Last 25 Years. The winners: for picture books, Don't Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus, and for fiction, Ramona Quimby, Age 8.
- My belated thanks, also, to Melissa Wiley at the lovely Here in the Bonny Glen for listing me among her Top 12 Referrers from Recent Months. And good luck to Lissa on her family's big move to Southern CA.
- Chris Barton has a new historical book list, this one focused on the time period from 1900 to 1950. Prohibition and the great depression are included.
- If you're into this sort of thing, Leila at bookshelves of doom links to a quiz put together by E. Lockhart, "What teen angst novel are you?" I got Looking for Alaska, by John Green, which is the same result that E. Lockhart herself got. Gail Gauthier was disappointed to find herself Catcher in the Rye.
- Leila also brought to light at bookshelves of doom the news the the Wilson School District in downtown L.A. is taking censorship to new levels. "Books now cannot depict drinking alcohol, smoking, drugs, sex, including "negative sexuality," implied or explicit nudity, cursing, violent crime or weapons, gambling, foul humor and "dark content." White-out will be used in some cases to remove offensive words. I particularly enjoyed Tadmack's comments on this topic at Finding Wonderland. ("Equally crucial is the realization that other people live in other ways, and that if a reader chooses to live their life differently when they grow up, it's possible. That's truth. How can anyone honestly object to that?")
- Little Willow has various new book lists and interviews. Based on my recent positive experience with A Bad Boy Can Be Good for a Girl (review forthcoming), I was especially interested in her list of Verse Novels.
- The cool girls have a new fan. See Alison Tuck's Women and Children First blog for more details. The site is "A main course of psychology regarding women, children and adolescents, with generous side orders of pop culture and feminism." I love that the cool girls fit in with this lofty mission!
- As already announced on lots of blogs, Tamar
by Mal Peet won the Carnegie Medal (the U.K. children's book prize, similar to the Newbery award).
- MotherReader laments the "muffin madness" by which Betty Crocker now sells muffin mix that only makes five muffins, instead of the traditional six. Not book related, but if you a platform (like a blog) you might as well use it to vent about the things that drive you crazy. (Don't get me started on American Airlines...).
- Congratulations to Michele at Scholar's Blog on her one-year blog anniversary.
- Becky at Farm School has a post about The Dangerous Book for Boys (which I mentioned earlier), and other, similar books. She can relate well to these sorts of books, because, she says, "my kids tend to go through their days fully armed (pockets full of slingshots, jackknives, cap pistols, and lengths of rope, the latter of which came in surprisingly handy the other week when we had to move a neighbor's sheep) and whose idea of fun is to leap off bale stacks and on and off a moving horse."
- Rick Riordan blogs about his Sea of Monsters tour in England. I'm listening to Sea of Monsters on MP3 these days, but it's been too hot to go walking this weekend, so I'm stalled at the entrance to the Sea of Monsters itself.
- The film rights for Scott Westerfeld's Uglies trilogy have been purchased by 20th Century Fox. Here's the coolest part of the story: "The (husband and wife) producers were plugged into the tale by their daughter, who read the book in school." Isn't that great?
- Illustrator Don Tate has a new bookmarks blog, where he's doing to save links to articles that he wants to read sometime. Also a must-read is Don's post about his library visit at a jail (with 12 to 17 year olds).
- I got a nice little hat tip on Alan Silberberg's blog a while back, and just came across it today. He called me a "kid-lit lioness". I'm not sure what that means, exactly, but I thought it was fun anyway.
- Mary Pearson recently published her list of 60 strong real-world women, which she started after reading the Cool Girls list. This list is simply must-reading - inspirational for girls and women alike.
- Carrie at Mommy Brain has a wonderful post about the love of books, and the first time her daughter truly found a book to be the gateway to a new world. Way to go, Carrie!
- And, apropos of nothing, I keep thinking about how I can't wait until the sequel to Stephenie Meyer's young adult novel Twilight, New Moon is published.
It's great to be back in the kidlitosphere! Hope that you all had a wonderful weekend.