Thursday Afternoon Visits: May 7

A few interesting things have crossed my reader this week from around the Kidlitosphere.

First up, I won a prize at Get in the Game--Read. I hardly ever enter contests for books because, you know, I feel guilty enough about the books that I already have that I'm not reading. But this one, I couldn't resist. Lori Calabrese was giving away a signed copy of David A. Kelly's Babe Ruth and the Baseball Curse. Here's a snippet from the product description: "Then, in 2004, along came a scruffy, scrappy Red Sox team. Could they break Babe Ruth’s curse and win it all?" What can I say? I'm a woman of limited interests. (If it wasn't for books, chocolate, the Pride and Prejudice miniseries, and the Red Sox, I'd be hard pressed to ever come up with Facebook status updates.)

Diary of a Wimpy Kid author Jeff Kinney was named to the Time 100 this year. Travis has the details at 100 Scope Notes. I love seeing a children's book author recognized for his positive impact on kids. Also available at 100 Scope Notes this week, photographic proof of Where the Sidewalk Ends. I knew it had to be somewhere.

Children's Book Week will be observed May 11-17. Elaine Magliaro has tons of great links at Wild Rose Reader. Elaine also has a comprehensive round-up of National Poetry Month links from around the Kidlitosphere. I don't know where she finds the time, I really don't!

For anyone looking for summer reading recommendations for kids, do check out Claire's summer reading list at The Horn Book website. There are some great titles, all nicely organized by age range. Link via Read Roger.

I learned via Omnivoracious that one of my favorite 2009 titles is already on the way to becoming a movie. "Film rights have for Carrie Ryan's YA novel The Forest of Hands and Teeth have been snapped up by Seven Star Pictures. Publishers Weekly is reporting that "the project [is] for an-as-yet-unnamed A-list starlet."" Now that has the potential to be a great movie!

And speaking of my favorite dystopian YA novels, kudos to Lois Lowry for selecting  Suzanne Collins' The Hunger Games as the winner of SLJ's Battle of the (Kids') Books. For responses, see Liz B.'s take at A Chair, A Fireplace and A Tea Cozy or Maureen Kearney's at Confessions of a Bibliovore. Color me envious of all those attending BEA, who may be able too score advance copies of the Hunger Games sequel, Catching Fire. (I'm also envying Sarah Miller, who seems to have herself a copy of Kristin Cashore's Graceling prequel, Fire. One would think that I didn't have hundreds of other books to choose from already. And don't you think that Carrie Ryan's next book should be called Unconsecrated Fire?).

Speaking of Kristin Cashore, she has an interesting post about intertextuality (when later books are influenced by earlier books, and then re-readings of the earlier books are influenced by your experience reading the later books).

Colleen Mondor comments on a trend that she's noticed, of having 12-year-old protagonists in books published for adults. She says: "I"m not saying that adults can't enjoy a book with a child protagonist - we all know and love Tom Sawyer and Scout and all those other classics that have stood the test of time and that's great. But this whole teen trend thing that seemed such a big deal with Special Topics in Calamity Physics is starting to look like vamp novels look in YA. In other words these preternaturally smart children are starting to crop up everywhere and I wish I knew why."

And last but not least, don't miss MotherReader's latest post at Booklights, about her favorite funny chapter books.