"Now we had both done what we both swore we'd never do."

Simon & Schuster has reissued V. C. Andrews' notorious Flowers in the Attic and Petals on the Wind in an omnibus edition that screams "if you liked Twilight . . ." But oh how it brings me back.

I began my career as a library journalist with Flowers in the Attic. SLJ editor Lillian Gerhardt had asked me in 1983 to become their YA columnist, and the first thing I wrote about was Andrews, in the essay (named by Lillian), "Passion Power." As with Twilight, the Andrews books were all about forbidden and forestalled love. (Although less forestalled than Meyer: Chris and Cathy do the deed on page 337 of this new edition, and I would like to thank Elissa Gershowitz for her help in determining this fact.) Flowers in the Attic, although putatively aimed at the adult market, reached precisely the same demographic as Twilight, females aged 10 and up. Through the time of the series' height, I worked in two very different libraries, a conservative exurb of Chicago and then a poor neighborhood in the inner city, but the craze respected no boundaries--we could not buy enough copies. I wrote then that girls sought these books out because they acknowledged something girls knew--sex was exciting, scary and dark--in a way that the hygienic sex-is-a-wonderful-expression-of-love themes of the the YA problem novels of the day did not. Plus, it's really hard to miss--probably because reading is generally a solitary act--with a book about secrets.

This was of course all pre-Internet. I wonder how the craze would have played out today?

Jacob's Java?

This past Sunday, Debbie Reese's blog featured her friend and colleague Jean Mendoza's trip to Forks and La Push. With photos! The one thing I like about those books is the weather; Jean Reports that no Cullens were seen on her trip, probably due to the abundant sunshine.

Paging the Ambassador . . .

The most interesting statistic of this teen reading survey concerns who responded to it: "while we purposely marketed the survey to attract male readers, females are the vast majority (96%) of responders."

It would be really good to know if book reading breaks down in similarly dramatic proportions. We know that girls and women read more books than do boys and men, but how much eek! many more?

Can we grow the number of readers?

Zetta Elliott makes some great points re people of color in books and as authors.

Without in any way diminishing the very real problem of the white worldview of children's book publishing, I am struck by how often and widely charges of non-representation ("why aren't there more _____ in children's books?" "where are the books for ____ children?") are made of children's and YA literature. Books for and about boys. Books that show children in non-traditional families. Books that show children in traditional families, attending church. Middle-class black people. Girls who don't like pink.

The thinking goes that if there were more books about and for _____, more kids who are the same _____ would read. I wonder. Although I do believe that readers, at least in part, read for "the shock of recognition" Richard Peck talks about, I'm not sure that translates to wanting to read books "about people like me." It's more about being able to see yourself in circumstances unlike your own. To take the argument to its absurd conclusion, the belief that books should reflect their readers' circumstances means we could all give up reading and just look in the mirror.

But the concern here isn't so much with readers but with nonreaders. Do you remember the scandal of a few years ago with those Freakonomics guys, claiming that an enjoyment of reading was genetic? That kids didn't read because their parents read to them twenty minutes a day, they did so because their parents, as readers, were more likely to read to them twenty minutes a day? This is a little too mechanistic for me but I don't discount it completely. The pursuit of a more varied literary universe is an unalloyed wonderful thing--for readers. But I don't know that it will swell the ranks.

I'll Be Seeing You . . .

Last Friday we had a very entertaining time of proofreading the Guide, aided by candy and fave tunes from the 80s provided by Miss Touch-Me Pod, whose little speaker recalls the halcyon days of AM transistor radios. There was an ongoing war, too, over the merits of The Time Traveler's Wife, loved by Elissa and Chelsey and hooted at derisively by Kitty and me.

But I am glad that time travel seems to be back in a big way and I'll gladly give Audrey Niffenegger the credit if she wants it. The children's book of the summer is Rebecca Stead's When You Reach Me (see my interview with the author here), and I'll be glad when you've all read it so we can talk about it. For those of you who have, and without giving anything away: do the kids and neighborhood remind anyone else of Vera Williams's Scooter?

I also recently enjoyed--and Time Traveler's Wife fans can here hoot at me--Rude Awakenings of a Jane Austen Addict, a chick-lit novel by Laurie Viera Rigler about a young lady of Austen's milieu whooshed into contemporary L.A. via a fall from a horse. The book is a sequel to Confessions of a Jane Austen Addict, about the L.A. gal who trades places with the Regency one, but that conceit seemed rather more ordinary to me so I didn't pick up the book. The two books together make me think of Nancy Bond's sadly neglected Another Shore, about a contemporary girl time-travelled back to colonial times, aware that a girl from then and there has taken her place in the present--and probably has it much, much worse.

Why is it that when I hit my head, I only get a lump?

Blast from the Past

Jen Robinson alerted me to the Amelia Elizabeth Walden Award for YA fiction, new to ALAN/NCTE but not to me. Years ago, Walden offered this award to YALSA, which turned it down because of her insistence that the winning book demonstrate "a positive approach to life." We (I was on the board then) didn't want to get into the position of deciding somebody else's road to happiness. That said, it's nice to see Walden get some recognition again--back in the 50's-60's she wrote several crypto-lesbionic sports novels notable for their fearless female main characters and basketball play-by-plays as exciting as anything penned by the boys.

More weeding wisdom

From Work with Children in Public Libraries by Effie L. Power (ALA, 1943):

"Nationality and race influence mode and type of reading and therefore library selection. Jewish boys and girls are inclined to read serious books on mature subjects, and Italian children who live most naturally out-of-doors under sunny skies read reluctantly but enjoy picture books, poetry, and fairy tales. German American children make wide use of books on handicrafts which Jewish children largely ignore and from which Italian children choose few except those related to arts, such as wood carving, metal designing, and painting. The Czech children read history and biography. Probably the greatest readers of fiction are found among native American children."

I do like this:

"Girls, like boys, are seeking life, but in a different way. They need some so-called boys' books with moving plots and an adventurous hero to take them out of themselves and to keep them from becoming too introspective; for the opposite reason boys need some of the so-called girls' books, for their suggestions of self-analysis and wholesome sentiment."

The most arcane thing I've found thus far is a small LP from 1963 called "A Message from Lois Lenski: The Making of a Picture Book." Who's got a record player?

But tell Carole King to get out out out of my head

I'm pleased to announce that Laurie Halse Anderson has won the 2009 Scott O'Dell Award for Historical Fiction for her novel Chains, published by Simon & Schuster. Congrats, Laurie!

Sitting at the grownups table

Over at Nonfiction Matters, Marc Aronson cautions us to think about the larger context in which debates about social responsibility and the Newbery take place: "What I'd like is a set of comments on the Newbery that is not drawn from a survey of four winners, or the latest demographic chart, but a wider sense of art and culture in our time."

I'm again reminded of the infamous editorial-page fight between Horn Book editor Ethel Heins and SLJ editor Lillian Gerhardt. Rejecting the line (promulgated by the Horn Book among others) that children's books were all of a piece with other contemporary literature, Lillian wrote that "from where we sit, books for children are more accurately described as: the last bastion of yesterday's literary methods and standards." Ethel then said that modern adult fiction had gone to hell and children's books were the last refuge of Story; Lillian subsequently threatened to take the train up to Boston and hit Ethel over the head with a chair.

Because we view both children and children's literature as protected species, it's true that in our field we have debates that would seem peculiar if applied to adult books and readers. We don't worry, for example, about grown men not reading, except insofar as it might "send the wrong message" to their sons. But worries about "representation" of various ethnicities, gender, and sexual orientations do have a precedent in the social change movements of the 60s and 70s, with such critics as Kate Millett warning us about how destructive Henry Miller was to women. I'm guessing that Marc would tell me that someone got there before Kate, too!

Something to whet your appetites

Claire reviews the movie Twilight.

Read and Grow Thin

The New York Times is reporting that reading a novel about weight loss can help you lose weight. I'd love to believe this. But don't.

"Well, here's one thing in the mail that is not a bill."

Said Beverly Cleary in her Newbery acceptance speech, quoting from a letter written to her by a young reader. Cleary went on to bemoan the cookie-cutter class-assignment letters she received by the thousands, and who can blame her?

But who can top her? Lisi Harrison (The Clique), that's who, caught by Chasing Ray in a delicious quote that, with any justice, will come back to haunt her:

"I don't mean to brag -- but I get literally thousands and thousands of letters, thousands and thousands of e-mails from these girls, and I do read them and not one of them has accused me of perpetuating poison into their world and their society," she said. "Every one of them says, 'I suddenly realize that it's not so important to be popular anymore. I used to be like this with our friends, but we've all changed. Truly. I really, really mean it.'"

Which would you rather read thousands and thousands of times? I suddenly realize that it's not so important to be popular anymore or Where do you get your ideas?

Princess Delite

"Speed straight to the happy ending, without stopping to think about the story along the way." Boston Globe critic Joanna Weiss has a great piece on the contemporary commodification of fairy tales.

From the people who brought you . . .

As Peter observed in another context last Sunday, so many people have Ursula Nordstrom spinning in her grave that it must be like a blender in there. This won't help.

Breaking Dawn Breakdown

Gail Gauthier is interesting on the new Stephenie Meyer (which I haven't read yet as I am only halfway through New Moon).

For the Lovers and the Fighters

Claire Gross has a new book list up about war, and Alicia Potter reviews The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants 2.

Fans and readers

We didn't receive a review copy of Stephenie Meyer's Breaking Dawn, so you won't find any spoilers here. What I've been finding fascinating in a train-wreck kind of way are the vox populi debates over at Amazon.com, particularly a discussion thread attempting to start a RETURN THIS BOOK campaign in protest of Meyer's "betrayal" of her readers: "I agree totally. I saw about 20 returned copies at Target tonight. Returning them is the right thing to do. Burn them and she will still have the money. Don't let that happen." And these are fans talking.

I'm interested in the ethical propriety of returning a book because you didn't like it. Can't imagine doing that myself--the reader is paying for consuming the intellectual content, not just for the physical item. I'm equally interested in the whole question of the difference between readers and fans, if there is one. One distinction the Meyer debates seem to bring to the fore is the way fans personalize the object of their affection--the ones who hate Breaking Dawn feel that Meyer has betrayed them and must suffer; the ones who like the book feel they need to be "loyal" to the author: "You do realize Stephenie Meyer reads these don't you? How disgustingly mean can you get? Stephenie Meyer wrote this for us, the twilighters. Her fans."

What makes people behave this way? I'm aware, of course, that the Amazon posters are probably a distinct subgroup of Meyer's readers, or do her books inspire this kind of Ayn Randy cultishness?

Voice of the People

I love Marla Frazee's A Couple of Boys Have the Best Week Ever (a BGHB honor book this year) but wondered about the audience. Lily Feldman clears that up for me.

July/August Horn Book Magazine

Get your collector's edition now! While the limitations of technology (and the absence of a thrilling soundtrack and a screaming crowd) means that the tour de force with which Brian Selznick opened his Caldecott speech won't have quite the same effect on paper, those same images can still be yours for as long as the acid-free paper holds out. Likewise, you won't get the same dramatic impact of Laura Amy Schlitz's bravura performance, but you will get every single word she rather breathtakingly memorized for a notes- or paper-free delivery. (As I've noticed about prior speeches, the thing on the page can be astoundingly different from the thing as written--what drew laughs in Schlitz's speech Sunday night often provokes a more meditative response in print.)

You will only find the speeches in the printed Magazine, (which can be ordered from khedeen at hbookdotcom) but we have uploaded a selection of other articles, including profiles of Selznick and Schlitz by their editors, Simmons prof Amy Pattee on Sweet Valley High (and reflections by several authors on their own adolescent "guilty pleasure" reading) and my editorial on just why Newbery girls and the swingin' teens of Sweet Valley are sisters under the skin.

Is long the new short?

I just picked up Katherine Applegate's Beach Blondes: A Summer Novel (Simon Pulse) and boy are my arms tired. This sucker is 721 paperback pages long, and first in a series to boot. I'm guessing it's so fat for some strategic marketing reason, or perhaps I just haven't yet gotten to the chapter "This Is Summer Speaking," in which the heroine stops the motor of the world in order to expound for fifty-seven pages on the virtues of Vera Bradley bags.

It's not a word to throw around lightly

Poets are supposed to choose their words very carefully. This one doesn't.

But a poet standing up to a bookstore does demonstrate chutzpah, I'll give her that. Thanks to Shelf Awareness for the link.

Code Pink

Scanning the multitudes of new books throughout the office, I am struck--again--by the endurance of pink covers on light teen girl fiction. I know this is nothing new; what interests me is the fact that I wrote about this four years ago, and I'm surprised it still works--not the chicklit formula, which is eternal, but that pink remains the go-to color. When does this kind of genre marker stop signaling "Here I am! The kind of book you like!" and start saying "I've got your number"? Do girls who like this sort of thing appreciate the code, or do they roll their eyes and read despite it? There was a story in PW some years ago about two African American women in a bookstore laughing about the omnipresence of the word "Sister" in the titles of books marketed to black women, suggesting that the ploy had run its course. Will pink? Ever?

My favorite new reviewing word,

from Publishers Weekly's 3/3/08 review of Penny Vincenzi's (love her) An Absolute Scandal: "chickensian."

February Web Watch

Zoe has been poking around again.

Going down a dark hall

I'd like to second Elizabeth's hopes (see comments in Monday's post) for a Gothic revival. I've just finished listening to Jamaica Inn by Daphne Du Maurier, narrated by Tony Britton. When I told friends I was reading it, to a woman they started talking about their adolescent (around 10 up, I think) mania for Du Maurier. I vividly remember reading her short-story collection Kiss Me Again, Stranger (could be a Mary Downing Hahn title) and then the collection Don't Look Now, with the title story providing the story for an astoundingly sexual movie in 1967. Then Rebecca, in college, and that's all.

I can see how Jamaica Inn could be kind of pulse-pounding for a young teen: there's the exciting melodrama involving the drunken, dangerous uncle (the heroine, Mary Yellan, thinks he's a smuggler, but it's worse) and then there's Mary's rather anachronistically saucy badinage with the brooding love interest, and lots of semi-veiled musings on "instinct," which Mary keeps trying to tell herself is "love" but Du Maurier, semi-misogynistically, won't let her. The atmosphere and scene-painting are as good as Rebecca--it's the same landscape (Cornwall) a century earlier.

Is Du Maurier still doing things for teens?

It's better than the hanky code!

These are brilliant. Hey, Leila: does this come in H-E-N-R-Y and R-I-B-S-Y?

Oh, Santa, Please, Please, Please!

I told you Martha and I were writing a book, but apparently somebody, um, beat us to it. More than a century ago.

Meg Cabot as Alistair Cooke

Meg Cabot brings an American classic to life.

We make dreams come true.

At least Lisa Yee's. My next editorial is about George Clooney.



(photo by Richard, taken at Joanna and Norwood Long's house)

Hear Us Roar

The inaugural Horn Book Podcast is up for your listening pleasure. Lolly is setting it up with iTunes so you'll be able to subscribe; for now, go to the podcast page on our site to hear my interview with Jon Scieszka.

I interviewed Jon for our special September issue, Boys and Girls. That too is now just out and you can see the table of contents here and web extras here. I think this is one of the best issues we've done.

Lesbolicious is the word

for this picture of dykon Louise Fitzhugh, looking like James Dean's love child on KT Horning's new blog Worth the Trip. The blog is going to be devoted to coverage of GLBTQXYZ books for kids and teens and with KT at the helm you know the thinking and writing are going to be first-rate.

The delights of genre fiction

Ah, the British boarding school novel--the chums and mates, midnight feasts, and thrilling escapes "over the wall" to go into town and swap cheeky badinage with the local rogues:

"Oi, sweetheart!" shouted one, standing behind his friend and pointing at Jinx. "Wanna sit on my face?"
Christ, she thought, what an invitation! Please do excuse me while I strip off right here, right now, delighted by this obviously not to be missed, once in a bloody lifetime opportunity.
"Why?" Jinx drawled, in her very best "I am ever so bored by you" voice. "is your nose bigger than your dick?"

(from Those Girls by Sara Lawrence, Razorbill October '07)

Get a Clue,

Nancy Drew. Chris Heppermann's review of the new movie is up.

A Question for the Young Ladies

When I was in college in the late 70s, two of the things you had to do before you could be an official lesbian were listen to The Changer and the Changed and read Rubyfruit Jungle.

I'm working on a "Second Look" article about Annie on My Mind (25 years old now) and I'm wondering if that book has similarly become a rite of passage. If so, when--high school?

Share your stories, sisters. Yes, possibly for publication.

And how!

I was happy to see Debbie Reese confirm my impression of American Girl World as hostile territory. Why people continue to see this empire as good for children is beyond me. If you want to educate your children into the joys of brand loyalty and conspicuous consumption, at least Disney is more affordable. And the catalog? Yup, still porn.

"We Are All Winners"

opined Karen Hesse in her Newbery-Medal acceptance speech (yeah, I know, easy for her to say) but I am stoked, not to mention contractually obligated, to announce the winners of Mother Reader's 48 Hour Book Challenge. The Most Books Read Prize goes to the Midwestern Lodestar blog, and the Most Time Spent Reading Prize to the blog Finding Wonderland.

Congratulations to you both. I remain unsure about why my mentioning these winners is supposed to be some kind of prize and have a sneaking suspicion MR is expecting me to make fun of their reading choices or something, but I would never do a thing like that where you could see me. Now shoo, earnest readers. Go outside and play.

Can Linds come too?

Here are some more Readergirlz for you: Join Kati, Jeni, and Posh in their new club!