Publications about books for children and young adults
A non-hysterical newspaper article in the Boston Globe about whether parents should let their pre-teens see The Hunger Games or not. Katie is going to be reviewing the movie for us so look out for that. She’s already posted some read-alikes.
Has anyone seen Tomorrow, When the War Began? I don’t know if it got a theatrical release here but it’s on PPV. Should I watch?
About Roger SuttonRoger Sutton has been the editor in chief of The Horn Book, Inc, since 1996. He was previously editor of The Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books and a children's and young adult librarian. He received his M.A. in library science from the University of Chicago in 1982 and a B.A. from Pitzer College in 1978. Follow him on Twitter: @RogerReads.
I dunno about the movie, but Tomorrow the book is a more gritty, realistic look at war and survival than Hunger Games imo. And someone stole our library’s copy, so it must be good, right?
I loved the first book in Marsden’s series but got worn out as it went on and on.
I do wish they could have unearthed one parent who *will* be letting his or her kids see the movie, and not just to appear cool on the playground.
Why don’t you take Josh and let us know?
I was kinda surprised that one of the teachers at our local Catholic school recommended it to a fourth grader. It really is young adult. I’ve been looking for younger read-alikes (although that doesn’t really help with the kids who want to read it because “everyone” is reading it)
“Do you have any books where a bunch of kids play this game where they slaughter each other? Yes, but does it come in a board book?”
Ha! This happens every time there’s a huge marketing blitz for a teen book – I’ve had 10 year olds who wanted to read Twilight, Jodi Picoult, etc. etc. and parents who were totally at their wits’ end, wanting them to wait (or not read them at all). So I have younger read-alike lists to help me and the other staff. Of course, no one’s ever really happy with this compromise – the kids want the actual book every single one of their extremely cool friends are reading and the parents want them to read Little Women and Anne of Green Gables until they’re in college. I do have parents ask me if the book is suitable and then I get to be the non-cool librarian who told Mom it wasn’t a good book for the 9 year old…
Here are a few sci-fi/dystopian fiction suggestions for ages 9-11.
Here is one of our sisters’ take on the issue:
http://www.thedigitalshift.com/2012/03/k-12/why-im-taking-my-fourth-grader-to-see-the-hunger-games/#comments
I just saw the movie and it wasn’t bad. It’s not great either but I thought that there was more to like than dislike. The characters are ‘stock’ but the series was started in the ealy 90′s when ‘stock’ characters were not as noticable. Also, being a product the 90′s, there are a lot of things that today look like common tropes or cliches. The story takes a while to get going but there are some semi-instense scenes. For the most part, the actors are pretty likable and the acting is just fine.
I think one thing to remember is that this was made in Australia so I’m sure the budget wasn’t that big. If this had 80 million like THG, I’m sure it would have been better. But all-in-all, I thought the production values were pretty good.
I’m not sure if it’s worth 5$ on PPV but if you have a Redbox or something like that near by, I could think of worse ways to spend $1.50