Talk about the kidlit you're reading!

Smish

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Thanks, again! I'm going to merge this with the Talk about the kidlit you're reading thread.
 

romancewriter

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Well last night I read the latest release in Erin Hunter's Warrior series. I've been looking forward to reading that book for a few months now. I've been enamored with that series ever since I picked the first one up, but I'm not so sure about this newest one, The Forgotten Warrior.

I'm not sure what it is. Maybe they're getting a bit too soap opera-y with the story line. I've always thought that in some of the books, some of the actions of the characters don't really make sense given how the character was usually written. Although those situations usually occur when the writer is foreshadowing, and although I get why that happens, I can usually predict why they've twisted the story line to set up a future event.

Anyway long rambling post short, I'm not sure I'm all that thrilled with this latest one. I'm committed now, having read all of them up to this point, I'm sure I'll finish the series, but just not feeling this one. I don't know. Maybe after another read.
 

JoyMC

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My daughter and I have been thoroughly enjoying the Ivy & Bean chapter books. We've read the first four. Bean is very Ramona-esque (she even looks like her), but Ivy is an extremely original, surprising and fun character - she seems shy and quiet on the outside, but she's full of all sorts of mischief and wild ideas and a tendency toward dark magic.

I am also reading Clementine on my own and love love LOVING it!!!!
 

Kitty Pryde

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Kitty - is it Milo: Sticky Notes and Brain Freeze? I know that one's written by a male.

That's the one!

I remember one more, "Dog Friday"--the boy has a dead dad and the other kids at school are forbidden to mention fathers or cars to him, so they all stop talking to him :(
 

JoyMC

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You GUYS. Seriously, if anyone on this thread hasn't read the Clementine books by Sarah Pennypacker, you absolutely must. Just ... get thee to a library. I keep laughing out loud and reading parts out loud to my husband and just generally falling in love with this girl. I went to the library today and got three more of them.
 

SheilaJG

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Clementine! Who doesn't love Clementine? She's so fun, and Marla Frazee's pictures are a perfect fit.

Just finished The Inquisitor's Apprentice by Chris Moriarty. It's historical magical realism, I suppose, set in turn of the century New York and centering around a Jewish boy who can see magic, and thus becomes the inquisitor's apprentice. Some famous names were changed (Morgan became Morgaunt, Astor became Astral), others stayed the same (Thomas Edison, Houdini). I found it a bit slow, but it was fun learning about dybbuks.
 

Kitty Pryde

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I'm reading a really sweet nonfiction kids book right now called Wheels of Change: How Women Rode the Bicycle to Freedom (With a Few Flat Tires Along the Way). It's probably for like middle school kids? But with all the pictures and captions I think a younger kid would enjoy it too. It's all about how in the late 1800s/early 1900s, bicycles and cycling culture helped women gain more rights and freedoms and become more liberated (and get to wear pants!) in Europe and the US. It has a lot of primary sources like photos and ads and hilarious old news articles and stuff. I am enjoying it far too much.
 

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I read Five Children and It by E. Nesbit. There wasn't a whole lot to the plot. The kids had to get themselves out of some interesting scrapes caused by the Psammead's magic, and that was fun. I enjoyed the circa-1900 slang and the weird baby talk everyone uses with the baby brother, nicknamed the Lamb.

It's free on Project Gutenberg, along with its sequels (which I also downloaded).
 

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We're on a Mr. Gum craze here. I love Mr. Gum. So silly. I love that it makes my son laugh out loud - real belly laughs.

I am also halfway through Rules, which is quite gripping now I'm midway.

And I'm now into the final Fablehaven, and still really enjoying it. I love a series that keeps the story going, although I'm now really hoping the end isn't a letdown.

All this reading is broken up into short bursts, whenever I get inspiration for my major rewrite of my MG.
 

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Hey, did you guys know Studio Ghibli's newest film is adapted from Mary Norton's The Borrowers? I LOVED that series when I was a kid. They're calling it "The Secret Life of Arrietty." I've loved every one of their movies except Ponzo, so I have high hopes.
 

Kitty Pryde

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Hey, did you guys know Studio Ghibli's newest film is adapted from Mary Norton's The Borrowers? I LOVED that series when I was a kid. They're calling it "The Secret Life of Arrietty." I've loved every one of their movies except Ponzo, so I have high hopes.

I did, I did! I also love the 90s live action Borrowers movie with Jim Broadbent. And I ditto your love of Borrowers and Ghibli movies. And I also love that other series, the one that's just like Borrowers but they have tails? The Littles? Or something? Though if you are a grownup and you think too hard about it, little humans living in the walls would be creepy.
 

heza

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And I also love that other series, the one that's just like Borrowers but they have tails? The Littles? Or something? Though if you are a grownup and you think too hard about it, little humans living in the walls would be creepy.


Hahaha. I think there are adult horror movies like that somewhere.... People Under the Stairs... or something like that?

But, yes, The Littles. I loved that cartoon.

The previews for Arriety look great; I can't wait. Also, I have this perverse fantasy that Miyazaki will someday animate my book.
 

timp67

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There's an old '70s horror movie called Don't Be Afraid of the Dark that features creepy little people that live in an old house. They are NOT FRIENDLY AT ALL. :)
 

heza

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There's an old '70s horror movie called Don't Be Afraid of the Dark that features creepy little people that live in an old house. They are NOT FRIENDLY AT ALL. :)

Was last year's Don't Be Afraid of the Dark a remake of the 70s film?

... Man. I shouldn't have revisited this thread right before bed... creepy.
 

timp67

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Yes! A remake. Was it good? The '70s one is cheesy but super scary.
 

heza

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Yes! A remake. Was it good? The '70s one is cheesy but super scary.

I can't actually judge. :( I live alone and so avoid the scary movies unless I'm staying over at a friend's place. (Yes, I'm just a large child in all respects.)

But I did hear this morning (from Wiki, 'cause we're close like that), they were shooting for a PG-13 rating and got an R for "pervasive scariness." However, Wiki also says that fans of the original movie thought it didn't measure up to the scariness of the first.

You watch it and tell me... but only during the day. ;)
 

sissybaby

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I'm with Heza. I don't do scary - ever, when it comes to movies. If I'm home alone at night, which I try very hard to avoid, I take a baseball bat with me to take a bath. I realize that's probably a visual no one needs, but the tub leaves one vulnerable, so I had to improvise.
 

MsJudy

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If I'm home alone at night, which I try very hard to avoid, I take a baseball bat with me to take a bath.

Makes sense to me! I'm never really alone. When I take a bath, my dog comes in to mooch a drink. Then she lays down in the doorway and looks sad and worried.

The last cat I had used to lurk on the counter, waiting to sink her claws into my toes whenever they popped up out of the bubbles.
 

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I don't know if non-fiction children's books count (I can't remember any showing up here), but I read a couple of delightful short books by Jean Fritz over the weekend called "Who's That Stepping on Plymouth Rock?" and "Shh! We're Writing the Constitution!" They're two of several children's books she wrote on early American history, light-hearted but historically accurate. (I already have a third one by her, which I bought a few years ago, about George III, entitled "Can't You Make Them Behave, King George?")

They're full of delightful information about such things as the top-secret nature of the Constitutional Convention (which had decided on the 18th century equivalent of a media black-out, and since Benjamin Franklin had a weakness for talk, the other delegates had to keep an eye on him at social gatherings and steer the conversation to safer topics if he seemed to be getting too close) or the comedy of errors at George III's coronation (somebody forgot the King and Queen's chairs at the coronation banquet, and the master of ceremonies decided to train his horse to ride into the hall up to the King's throne and then leave backwards - but he'd trained the horse too well, and it walked backwards all the way *towards* the throne, to its rider's dismay). The book on the Constitution even gives the complete text (minus the Amendments) at the back.
 

Morrell

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When my oldest son was six, he could read, but still preferred to be read to. One day at the library I asked if he wanted a book about any particular subject. He said, "Yes, I'd like to learn about the Resolution-y War."

Jean Fritz's books were a perfect fit.