Between songs, Arlo Guthrie likes to strum his guitar and tell a story he learned from his father, Woody Guthrie. It goes like this: Two rabbits, a mama and a papa, are running full speed from a pack of baying hounds. Spotting a hollow log, the rabbits rush in and are immediately surrounded by the [...]
“Different Drums” roundup
April 18, 2013 By Leave a Comment
In our March/April “Different Drummers” issue, we asked authors, publishers, and critics to name the strangest children’s books they’ve ever enjoyed. Here’s what they had to say: Elizabeth Bird – “Seven Little Ones Instead” Luann Toth – “Word Girl” Deborah Stevenson – “Horrible and Beautiful” Kristin Cashore – “Embracing the Strange” Susan Marston – “New [...]
Different Drums: How Can a Fire Be Naughty?
April 17, 2013 By Leave a Comment
The Horn Book Magazine asked Elizabeth Law, “What’s the strangest children’s book you’ve ever enjoyed?” When I was in nursery school, my favorite bedtime books were two my mother stole from the Unitarian Sunday School library, Martin and Judy, volumes II and III, by Verna Hills Bayley. I loved these books, about two friends who [...]
Review of Eleanor & Park
April 17, 2013 By 4 Comments
Eleanor & Park by Rainbow Rowell High School St. Martin’s Griffin 328 pp. 2/13 978-1-250-01257-9 $18.99 e-book ed. 978-1-250-03121-1 $9.99 It’s the start of a new school year in 1986 Omaha when sophomores Eleanor and Park meet for the first time on the bus. They are an unusual pair: she’s the new girl in town, [...]
Different Drums: Something Wicked
April 16, 2013 By 1 Comment
The Horn Book Magazine asked Christine Taylor-Butler, “What’s the strangest children’s book you’ve ever enjoyed?” A freak tent, a dust witch, a quote from Macbeth, and a villain named Mr. Dark. Such was the stuff of Something Wicked This Way Comes. I’d always been fascinated by carnivals. They seemed to spring out of vacant parking [...]
Different Drums: New and Strange, Once
April 12, 2013 By Leave a Comment
The Horn Book Magazine asked Susan Marston, “What’s the strangest children’s book you’ve ever enjoyed?” In a field that celebrates the works of Maurice Sendak, William Steig, and Jon Scieszka, and in which anthropomorphic animals are regularly clothed only from the waist up, “weird” is difficult to define. In 1994, I had worked at Junior [...]
Different Drums: Horrible and Beautiful
April 11, 2013 By Leave a Comment
The Horn Book Magazine asked Deborah Stevenson, “What’s the strangest children’s book you’ve ever enjoyed?” This ended up being a challenging assignment, because much literature for youth is pretty weird when coldly explained (kids travel through space and time to duel a giant brain!), and we don’t think twice about it. Saying that I adore [...]
Two Writers Look at Weird
April 11, 2013 By Leave a Comment
Are they weird? What is weird, anyway? And will Jack ever reply to Polly? From the March/April 2013 special “Different Drummers” issue of The Horn Book Magazine.
May Massee: As Her Author-Illustrators See Her
April 10, 2013 By Leave a Comment
by Ludwig Bemelmans About seven years ago a typographer brought Miss Massee to my house for dinner. It was a dreary building of six rooms in a noisy neighborhood. The windows of my living room looked out at a cobweb of telegraph wires, a water tank, and a Claude Neon sign that flashed “Two Pants [...]
Ludwig Bemelmans
April 10, 2013 By Leave a Comment
by May Massee Every writer leaves bits and pieces of his own story in his books whether he knows it or not, so I thought I’d look through some of Ludwig Bemelmans’ books to see what he says about himself here and there. The trouble is, I find a paragraph that shows what a good [...]
