Texas Pages

Want to know what the kids are reading this summer? Lilia Goldin at the Dallas Public Library, who helped distribute 10,000 book logs among the Dallas Public Library Branches, is kind enough to share the most popular titles from the book lists that kids are redeeming for prizes as part of the Mayor's Summer Reading Program.

Here they are:
One Potato, Two Potato by Cynthia DeFelice and Andrea U'Ren, which Lilia reports was the first choice for all elementary school kids
Alvin Ho: Allergic to Girls, School, and Other Scary Things by Lenore Look and LeUyen Pham
The Great Pig Search by Eileen Christelow
Surprises According to Humphrey by Betty G. Birney

Have your kids read any of these? Would love to hear their reviews!

Awhile back, I wrote about the delight that is The Annotated Wind in the Willows, which Norton released this spring.

That led to a friendly e-mail exchange with editor Annie Gauger, which enabled me to ask how, exactly, papers related to this very English book crossed the pond and ended up at the Harry Ransom Center in Austin.

Therein lies a tale.

Amazon is now taking orders for a new version of the Kindle, the Kindle DX. Victor Godinez has details over on the Technology Blog, where he says: "I think it's going to be a mammoth hit for two reasons: the larger display and a built-in PDF reader."

Wired got to fondle one and has posted extensive observations.

Poynter's Jim Romenesko takes a look at how the New York Times, Boston Globe and Washington Post are subsidizing the device for subscribers.

And below, a complete story from the Associated Press.

(Getty Images photo)

It's fun to see the kids' eyes get really big when they meet the authors and illustrators that created the books they love. And you can get that chance today at the free Dallas Children's Book Fair and Literary Festival at the J. Erik Jonsson Central Library. Get all the details on the Dallas Moms blog here.

New releases this month gave me an excuse to reunite with a couple of authors I enjoyed as a much younger person. One reunion was wonderful. The other, not so much.

Let's get the bad news out of the way first. Tom Robbins' B is for Beer (Ecco, $17.95, publishing April 21) is subtitled "A Children's Book for Grown-ups/ A Grown-up Book for Children.)

I was hopeful for this one. The mere idea of a kids' book about beer seemed frothy with potential. I braced myself for a sip of the subversive, counterculture fun that came with classics such as Another Roadside Attraction and Even Cowgirls Get the Blues.

It's not there. Well, maybe in a sentence or two. But B is for Beer amounts to little more than a paper-thin short story about a precocious girl named Gracie with a difficult home life and a zany, beer-loving philosopher uncle. That story is interwoven with lessons about the history and mystery of beer, told by a Beer Fairy -- yes, a Beer Fairy -- that might have been lifted out of a brewery-tour pamphlet.

As much as I would like to say otherwise, this is not a book you would want to slip a child, even to annoy his or her parents. You also won't want to offer it to anyone but the most voracious Robbins fans. If classic Robbins is your favorite homebrew, this is Bud Light -- a pale imitation of the real thing that will leave you unsatisfied, and possibly with a mild headache.

If you are looking for a book you can proudly offer to the young children in your life, or their parents, or anyone else for that matter, rush to pick up a copy of The Annotated Wind in the Willows, by Kenneth Grahame, edited by Annie Gauger (Norton, $39.95).

I had retained only vaguely pleasant childhood memories of Wind in the Willows when I brought this one home to read to my second-grader. I feared that most of it would go over her head. But she was engaged, helped along by the lavish illustrations and timely annotations that helped Dad explain some of the most archaic bits.

This is a classic for a reason, so I won't bother adding my praise to it. OK, I will -- my daughter liked the humor and the adventure; I was enthralled by the beauty of the writing. And the annotations go well beyond mere definitions. They constitute a book in themselves.

Some of the research was done at the Harry Ransom Center in Austin. So we could even consider it a Texas book. Sort of. Wherever you are, if you've ever loved Toad, Badger, Mole and Rat -- or wondered what the fuss is about -- you need this book.

As spotted on artsjournal.com, part a statue of the Mallard family from the children's classic Make Way for Ducklings was stolen from Boston's Public Garden earlier this week. Specifically, "Pack" wandered off. It was feared he might have drifted into a Massachusetts scrapyard.

To which I said, "Weebk!"

But just like Robert McCloskey's book, this story has a happy ending. The Boston Globe reports that Pack reappeared early Tuesday. The hunt for the culprit continues: Police were looking for a boy on a bike, and Officer Michael was expected to be called out of retirement to head the investigation.

The fuss over the little guy -- who will be repaired and rejoin his family soon -- got me wondering about other places where children's literature has become public art.

I'm aware of the Beverly Clearly Sculpture Garden in Portland (not far from Ramona Quimby's home on Klickitat Street), and Hannibal. Mo., has statue of Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn. And, famously, the Little Mermaid statue in Copenhagen.

What else have you come across? We should make a goal of seeing things before they, too, are threatened by scrap-metal hounds.

So just when I'm ready to abandon hope, declare print dead, sell my library at Half-Price Books and devote all my thoughts to American Idol, along comes a note from a the staff at the Dallas Museum of Art's Arts & Letters Live.

They noted that Friday's book signing line for Skippyjon Jones creator Judy Schachner lasted 3 1/2 hours. "She drew in every single book her kitty hieroglyphics! It was incredible!!" The staff had to turn "150+ people" away from the lecture.

So let's hear it for cats with identity crises, who make reading fun for kids, who may yet grow up to be literate and save the world.

On a related note, you can see the entire BooksmArt schedule here. Next up:National Book Award winner M.T. Anderson on April 5.

We seldom delve into books for the small set, but your very littlest Texan probably needs 1 2 3 Texas: A Cool Counting Book.

If for no other reason than this: Their parents, presumably slightly larger Texans, are probably sick to death of counting ducks, bunnies and other cuddly things. Let them count longhorns, jalapenos and bluebonnets instead.

The board book is due in April from Duo Press. Which is based in (gulp) New York. But we won't hold that against them.

More from Nancy Churnin:

When a 15-year-old girl and boy try to solve two kidnappings in Frank McMillan's Cezanne is Missing, they find clues mingled with the stories of two Holocaust survivors and an adventure that involves an old European diary, New York museums, Grand Central Station and a tense chase down 5th Avenue.

Mr. McMillan will talk about his book and do a signing as part of a free event at the Dallas Holocaust Museum/Center for Education and Tolerance on Nov.16. There will be a free mini-workshop afterwards for teachers interested in using this book in their Holocaust curriculum.

(Nov.16 from 2 to 3:30 p.m. for the talk and book signing, 3:30 to 4:30 p.m. for the mini-workshop for teachers. Dallas Holocaust Museum/Center for Education and Tolerance, 211 N. Record St. Suite 100. Free for both. Teachers interested in the mini-workshop can e-mail kchapman@dallasholocaustmuseum.org. 214-741-7500, extension 104. www.dallasholocaustmuseum.org.)

From Nancy Churnin:

Ever wonder how Santa has been figuring out who has been naughty or nice all these years? Mother and daughter Carol Aebersold and Chanda Bell spill one of his secrets in their book, The Elf on the Shelf: A Christmas Tradition. It seems he has his own Santa Intelligence Agency in the form of pixie-elves who visit homes and report back to the big guy nightly. Want more details on how Little Brother is watching? Ms Aebersold will meet fans and sign books at Toy's Unique on Nov.18. And for kids who don't mind cooperating with the information gathering process, each book comes with an elf that they can name and register at www.elfontheshelf.com.

(Nov.18 from 4 to 6 p.m. Toy's Unique, 5600 W. Lovers Lane. Free for the event, $29.95 for the book and elf. 214-956-8697.)

Staff writer Nancy Churning spoke with Jamie Lee Curtis about her writing. She'll will address the Dallas Women's Foundation noon Wednesday at the Hilton Anatole, 2201 Stemmons Freeway. (Tickets $150 at 214-965-9977, ext. 103, or www.dallaswomens foundation.org.)

She'll also sign books5 p.m. Wednesday at Barnes & Noble, Stonebriar Centre, Frisco (and that one's free).

The North Central/NortheastTexas Chapter of the Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators is offering a conference from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Sept. 27, at First United Methodist Church, 313 North Center Street Arlington.
Authors and illustrators taking part include Jim Averbeck, Priscilla Burris, Robyn Conley, Betsy Haynes and Cheryl Zack.
The cost is $90 for society members, $100 for others. E-mail lpowleytx@aol.com for details.

In response to the talk on Christian themes in Harry Potter, I feel so vindicated that I wrote about this back in 2005 for the Dallas Morning News, just before the sixth book was released and back when people were still skeptical about this idea. It's up on the Religion News Blog here.

For Harry Potter fans making Portus plans this weekend, here's a look at the highlights for the rest of the weekend:
Friday: Lots of talk by Potter academics and experts in the morning and afternoon, lots of food, Portus Podcast Palooza from 6:30 p.m. to 1 a.m., North American Federation's 140th Merlin's Cup, Indoor Quidditch Division (meeting for players and officials at 6 p.m., games from 8 to 11 p.m.)
Saturday: Jim Dale, the man of the 100-plus voices behind the Harry Potter CDs, starting at 9 a.m. and continuing all day, screenings of Wizard Rockumentary (a film about the wizard rock bands directed by twin sisters Megan and Mallory Schuyler, 23, of Spokane Washington; DVDs will be on sale), water quidditch from 5-8 p.m., and the hotly awaited Mystery Masquerade Ball from 9 p.m. to 1 a.m.
Sunday: auction, feast, social, a post-portus Wizard Rock Dance Party (from 6-10 p.m.) and your last chance to buy wands, robes and Harry Potter books in every language imaginable, from Greek to Latin to Gaelic.

I noted in the last post how much fun everyone seemed to be having as friends and web colleagues from across the country enjoyed their reunions (www.mugglenet.com staffers from California, Maryland, Georgia and New York were all catching up with each other in anticipation of the big live podcast they will be hosting tonight). But I should add that there was also a worshipful hush emanating from a screening room where the Harry Potter films will be shown throughout the weekend. There were a few fans in the back who made a few attempts to talk back to the screen, making jokes -- which is evidently supposed to be the Rocky Horror Picture Show-type custom at these screenings. But the viewers who were rapt and reverent did not appreciate it and the jokers eventually slunk out of Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban around the same time that Harry exorcised the boggart in Professor Lupin's classroom.

Following up on my last post about the Moaning Myrtles' Toilet Humor' album, one thing that struck me about the Potter fans at Portus is how much fun most of them were having. I ran into one woman whose costume stood out for having a not-quite Potter-like pink pig with wings on her head, setting off her shirt that said "Hairy Otter." It turns out that Valerie Frankel, 27, of San Jose, California was at the convention selling her hot-off-the-Wingspan Press Potter parody, Henry Potty and the Deathly Paper Shortage ('Henry's' concern evidently is that he is not getting enough fan mail). This send-up of the seventh book is a follow-up to her first and only other Potter parody, Henry Potty and the Pet Rock, which won an Indie Excellence Award, a Phelan Award for Humor and was named a USA Book News National Best Book. You can find out more about it here, on www.HarryPotterParody.com.

The Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators will offer a workshop by Marilyn Scott-Waters at their monthly meeting from 1 to 4 p.m. Saturday at First United Methodist Church, 313 N. Center St. in Arlington.

The fee is $15 for members, $25 nonmembers. Click on the Web site above for details.

I heard directly from Doug Valentine, whose video (mentioned here, but this link should take you directly there) still needs to be viewed by anyone who has used or abused a librarian, or just read "Lilly's Purple Plastic Purse."

Doug says he and his wife (and co-star) Karen will both be working at McKillop Elementary in Melissa next year. (She has been in Melissa for two years, and he has spent the past four in the Richardson system.)

I asked him how the video came about. He writes:

Spotted on the Paper Cuts blog:

Lookybook is all about picture books. And it offers parents (or anyone else) an easy way to scan the books. Just click.

I can't see this replacing curling up with my kids on the couch at storytime, but it could be really handy next time I'm shopping for a gift for the nieces.

J.K. Rowling gave a very moving commencement speech at Harvard that stressed the transformative power of the imagination. Read about it here. She urged graduates to empathize with the powerless. The Harry Potter author credited her trials and low points after graduation with giving her the strength and the imagination to become the person she is today.

Brian Selznick, author of The Invention of Hugo Cabret, will be at the Dallas Museum of Art on Sunday. At about 550 pages, the book's notable for being the longest picture book ever to win the Caldecott Medal.

Check out Nancy Churnin's story about the author, as well as his answers to questions from a couple of young fans (Kemper and Casey Watson, the kiddos in the picture).

Brian Selznick, creator of the lushly illustrated The Invention of Hugo Cabret, speaks Sunday at The Dallas Museum of Art.

Staff writer Nancy Churnin caught up with him for an interview wherein he discusses, among other things, what drove him to complete the 544-page work:

Mugglenet.com notes that Scholastic, J.K. Rowling's American publisher, plans a special edition of the first Harry Potter book this September, to signify the 10th anniversary of the first U.S. edition of Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone.

Illustrator Mary Grandpre has created new front and back cover designs for the anniversary edition. See them here.

Brandon Mull, author of the Fablehaven series, will be visiting schools in Plano on Wednesday and Thursday.

Not a student? You can find him 7 p.m. Thursday (May 22nd) at Barnes & Noble, Preston & Park, in Plano.

His publicist tells me: "He will having a small presentation on writing, reading and getting published, a Q&A, and then a book signing. He will also be giving out free posters and bookmarks, so anyone that comes can take something home with them if they don't want to buy a book."

Incidentally, I love this line from his bio:

My copy-editing cohorts Tatia and Laura and I had a discussion tonight about whether Prince Caspian is, as Nancy Churnin writes in her review of the film adaptation, actually the second book in C.S. Lewis' The Chronicles of Narnia. Some research revealed the answer: It is and it isn't.

The Chronicles were first published in this order:
1) The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, 2) Prince Caspian, 3) The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, 4) The Silver Chair, 5) The Horse and His Boy, 6) The Magician's Nephew and 7) The Last Battle.

But if you go to the bookstore or Amazon and buy a boxed set, you'll find they've been rearranged, and are now published in chronological order according to the timeline set forth in the books. That order is:
1) The Magician's Nephew, 2) The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, 3) The Horse and His Boy, 4) Prince Caspian, 5) The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, 6) The Silver Chair and 7) The Last Battle.

So which is right? Purists insist on published order -- that if you read The Magician's Nephew first, you'll find out all sorts of things you're just not supposed to know yet. Others say that if you're looking for the biblical themes and allusions in the books, those become much clearer in a chronological reading. Lewis himself, in a letter published in 1957, said either one was fine with him, although he expresssed just a smidgen of a preference for published order.

What do you think? Discuss.

The Washington Post is reporting that the largest survey ever of youthful reading in the U.S. will reveal Monday that none of J.K. Rowling's popular Harry Potter books has been able to dislodge the works of longtime favorites Dr. Seuss, E.B. White, Judy Blume, S.E. Hinton and Harper Lee as the most read.

Books by the five well-known U.S. authors, plus lesser-known Laura Numeroff, Katherine Paterson and Gary Paulsen, drew the most readers at every grade level in a study of 78.5 million books read by more than 3 million children who logged on to the Renaissance Learning Web site to take quizzes on books they read last year. Many works from Rowling's Potter series turned up in the top 20, but other authors also ranked high and are likely to get more attention as a result.

I've always been a fan of young adult books and hope this study draws more attention to the genre.

How did your favorite books fare?

If there was any doubt that Texas author Rick Riordan was hitting it big with kids with his Percy Jackson series (which started with The Lightning Thief), the author has just signed a multi-book deal with Disney Publishing Worldwide which includes a new, original fantasy series. In the meantime, a 1 million copy first printing has been announced for the fourth in the projected five book series about a boy who discovers his father is Poseidon (yes, the Greek god of the sea). Percy Jackson & The Olympians, Book 4: The Battle of the Labyrinth comes out Tuesday, May 6. I've got an advance copy in hand and Greek god fan that I am, I'm thoroughly getting into it...And while Mr. Riordan won't be in town for the big release, his cousin Minette Riordan, will be at the Barnes & Noble at 7700 West Northwest Highway Tuesday, May 6 from 4 to 5 p.m. to read from the book and host lots of myth-themed activities. Call 214-739-1124 for information.

So, I was asked to be a Reading Ambassador for the fifth graders at Barksdale Elementary in Plano and I brought along my copy of Lois Lowry's latest, The Willoughbys. Now most of the kids were well aware of the two-time Newbery Medal winner through the books of hers that are most frequently assigned: Number the Stars, a story about a Danish family that helps Jews escape during the Holocaust, and The Giver, a futuristic look at a highly programmed society in which memories, music, colors and strong emotions are forbidden (the book is now getting a terrific stage production at the Dallas Children's Theater through Sunday). But with these two books being so serious, they were surprised to be laughing along with me at The Willoughbys, a parody of all those good little orphan kid stories. The bell rang with the kids clamoring for more after I got through the chapter where the not so nice Willoughby kids abandon a baby named Ruth (rendering them 'ruthless'). So what could I do but donate my copy to their school library? I'm always amazed by Lois Lowry's versatility. After three decades of writing for young adults, she still manages to surprise and delight.

Dallas Children's Theater is preparing a stage version of The Giver, Lois Lowry's Newberry-winning work.

Nancy Churnin, with some help from students in the DCT, spoke with the author.

OK, I know that most of you probably have not kept up with the Sweet Valley High series, very popular in the 1980s if you were a pre-high school girl. (I swear, I know that only because I was a clerk who sold them, not because I read them.)

But here's an observation from Entertainment Weekly that says something less-than-sweet about our culture:

"When the first Sweet Valley High book was published in 1983, Jessica and Elizabeth Wakefield, identical twin heroines ... were described as blonde, beautiful, and a "perfect size 6." ... Random House is reissuing 12 books from the original series with a few small editorial tweaks, one of which involves the slightly awkward issue of the Wakefield waistline. The twins' 'perfect size 6' has been reduced to a 'perfect size 4.' "

EW points to a Gawker link where Random House actually boasts about this in a press release.

I'm thinking, maybe I should have my daughters look into Nancy Drew instead. Or turn on the Wii.

(Thanks, Holly Warren, for the spot.)

My friend Joyce loaned me The Tapestry Book 1 and I'm thoroughly enjoying it. It's a first book by Henry H. Neff and it tells the story of Max McDaniels who is still in the process of figuring out his special powers (on page 262). Like Harry, he's born with powers he doesn't understand, he's sent to a special school for kids with powers like him, he is starting to learn about an evil that he must help fight. Yes, I know we've been there and done that before, but I still enjoy the ride! And there are a few nice fresh bits such as the hungry hag in the kitchen who must sniff the new charges so she knows not to eat them...

"In deference to Children's Book Week, I present you with an amazingly long and diverse list of picture books about Texas. There used to not be many, but times have changed, and so has Texas."

Will Howard, compiler of the electronic journal Will's Texana Monthly, is not making an idle boast when he describes the scope of his list. It's a terrific resource, 150 titles, 19 pages, broken down into 18 categories, with links to authors and publishers.

And it's free.

Request a copy from Will at willstexana@yahoo.com.