As Bertha Mahony Miller might have said:  WTF?

Was this a sequel to our newly-crowned Newbery?  If so, how come we’d never heard any advance word about it? The confusion continued when we lifted out the next book:

Fortunately, we then found the paperwork that accompanied these books, sent by a new publisher, Hexwood Books.  According to their press release:

Newbery winners? 

Critics, librarians, and teachers love them.

Kids?  Not so much.

As demonstrated by the popularity of Stephenie Meyer’s “Twilght” series, kids today want to read stories about sexy vampires…stories about fangs poised above the neck of a young innocent…stories about blood slowly seeping into the bodice of a white ruffled nightgown.  Our new series, “Vamped-up Newberys” will satisfy both young people and their teachers – featuring the plots  and characters of your favorite award-winning novels, slightly altered to include today’s most popular subject matter among young people: vampires!

The first five volumes in the series are based on the 2012 winner DEAD END IN NORVELT, last year’s winner MOON OVER MANIFEST, 2007’s THE HIGHER POWER OF LUCKY, JACOB HAVE I LOVED (1981) and that classic from 1945, JOHNNY TREMAIN. 

Take a look at this series.  Share the novels with a kid you love.  Then tell us what you think.  We’d love to hear from you!

Passing the volumes around the office, we began to compare the “Vamped-up” editions with the original books.  Although a good 80% of the content – prose, characters, dialogue – is virtually identical between original and “altered” versions, each of the Hexwood Books has been modified to somehow include vampires.

Remember the sibling rivalry between Sara Louise and Caroline in Jacob Have I Loved?  It’s still there, but now the sisters are feuding vampires:

Johnny Tremain is now a Revolutionary War lad with iron-enriched blood being fought over by two covens of  beautiful and sexy vampires:

And “Lucky” is now “Sucky,” a young vampire who wants to change her ways:

As an example of how the texts have been “vamped-up,” here are the opening paragraphs of the original Higher Power of Lucky:

Lucky Trimble crouched in a wedge of shade behind the Dumpster.  Her ear near a hole in the paint-chipped wall of Hard Pan’s Found Object Wind Chime Museum and Visitor Center, she listened as Short Sammy told the story of how he hit rock bottom.  How he quit drinking and found his Higher Power.  Short Sammy’s story, of all the rock-bottom stories Lucky had heard at twelve-step anonymous meetings – alcoholics, gamblers, smokers, and overeaters – was still her favorite.

Sammy told of the day when  he drunk a half gallon of rum listening to Johnny Cash all morning in his parked ’62 Cadillac, then fallen out of the car when he saw a rattlesnake on the passenger seat biting his dog, Roy, on the scrotum.

 Here are the same paragraphs in the Hexwood edition:

Young vampire Sucky Trimble crouched in a wedge of shade behind the Dumpster.  Her  pointy ear near a hole in the paint-chipped wall of Hard Pan’s Found Object Wind Chime Museum and Visitor Center, she listened as Short Sammy told the story of how he hit rock bottom.  How he quit drinking blood and found his Higher Power.  Short Sammy’s story, of all the rock-bottom stories Sucky had heard at twelve-step anonymous meetings – alcoholics, gamblers, smokers, and reformed vampires – was still her favorite.

Sammy told of the night  when  he drunk a half gallon of plasma listening to Johnny Gash in his parked ’62 hearse, then fallen out of the car when he saw a fellow vampire on the passenger seat biting his dog, Roy, on the scrotum.

Finding the entire “Vamped-up” enterprise a little . . . bizarre, I made a call to Peyton Millman, publisher of  Hexwood Books.  Here is part of our interview:

RS:  WTF?

PM (chuckling): You’re not the first editor from a review magazine to call today, Roger.

RS:  I’m almost at a loss for words.  Many, many Newbery winners are popular and very much loved by children.  Did you really think this kind of gimmick was necessary?

PM:  Well, it appeared to us that there was quite a gap between the books kids are SUPPOSED to read and what they WANT to read.  Why not make the books more appealing–you know, add some chocolate frosting to the Brussels sprout to make it go down a little better.  And what better way to do it than with  vampires?

RS:   I don’t know how you were allowed to alter the texts of copyrighted works.

PM:  We’re marketing these books as parodies…satires.  And the right to parody is protected by law in this country.  If not, what would happen to shows like Saturday Night Live and publications such as Mad Magazine?

RS:  Does that include the right to use the original dustjacket illustrations with only slight variations?

PM:  Let me ask you a question:  when Saturday Night Live spoofs a movie, don’t the performers dress up just like the characters in that movie?  Well, we’re dressing up our books the same way.  And  we make it very clear that these books are satires.

RS:  Where is that made clear?

PM (chuckling):  On the inside back panel of the dustjacket in a very readable six point font.

RS:  Aren’t you worried that some people will buy your editions thinking they are getting the original Newbery winner?

PM (chuckling):  It happens, it happens.  In fact, based on recent sales, it seems to happen a lot.

RS:  So this has been a successful venture?

PM:  We’re already preparing several more volumes in the Vamped-up series for publication:  Bitty, Her First Hundred Thousand Years; When You Leech Me; It’s Like This, Bat; and we’re doing a Christopher Paul Curtis double volume containing Blood, Not Bloody and The Watsons Go to Transylvania, 1363.

RS:  Any plans to branch out?

PM:  Absolutely.  We’re ready to reach out to a younger audience with The Bat in the Hat and Good Bite Moon.  Instead of “an old lady whispering hush,” she’ll be “an old lady who makes your blood gush.”

RS:  That’s disgusting.

PM:  And of course my dream is to vamp-up the  Laura Ingalls Wilder books with Ma and Pa as nomadic vampires.  Now we  know why Pa always called Laura “half-pint.”

The “Vamped-up Newbery” series will NOT be reviewed in the  pages of the Horn Book Magazine, but the books will be available at most retailers beginning April 1.

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Well, no, I can’t imagine William Morrow (or, more exactly, the children’s-book imprints of HarperCollins) doing this, because they know Horn Book reviews sell books and look good excerpted in advertisements. Aside from their sheer numbers, I think the reason bloggers have trouble with publishers is that bloggers generally insist upon reviewing what they want, how they want and when they want, putting the publisher in the position of sending out hundreds of ARCs with no idea of what effect it will have. With us, if the book is hardcover and from a U.S. publisher listed in LMP, they know they will get a review from either the Magazine or the Guide, and that the Magazine almost always reviews books within a two month window either side of pub date. I sympathize with bloggers, who naturally don’t want to just be an arm of a publisher’s marketing department, but I can also see why publishers want some structure. And while this is not going to make me any friends, I have observed too many blogs more than eager to uncritically pass along marketing messages and campaigns, which has the unfortunate effect of changing the playing field for everybody else.

But back to Pam’s point, I wonder if the Horn Book will be receiving review copies from Cavendish/Amazon, since Amazon has long insisted that customer reviews are more effective in selling products on their site than are professional reviews. The problem with banishing the gatekeepers is that you also banish the gatekeepers: we open gates far more often than we close them.

I have more questions. The press release linked above talks avidly (and stupidly) about how good Gennady Spirin’s pictures are going to look on a Kindle Fire (the screen is too small for picture books), but what is Amazon’s commitment to print? What is their commitment to libraries and schools, the Horn Book’s (and, heretofore, Marshall Cavendish’s) primary audience? Will their books be available from sources besides Amazon? (Will other booksellers carry them?)  What is with Amazon’s discounting “list” prices of books they publish and sell? Give your answers or add your questions in the comments.

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*and yes, this includes YOU.

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Mother Goose was upset. How could parents say that…word, that awful word, to their children? How could they use it in front of innocent little darlings almost fast asleep? Their drowsy eyes. Well-washed hands clutching the crisp, white sheets.

She loved children. Why, tonight she was baby-sitting Jack and Jill, Little Jack Horner, and the Three Little Kittens. When they were ready for bed, they would be tucked in and read to, not shouted at. Not sworn at.

Whiskers, Cuddles, and Boots mewed at her feet. So sweet. They’ve lost their mittens. Well, they can’t be far.

Mother Goose looked toward the corner where Little Jack Horner was jabbing his thumb into an already mutilated pie. And then holding his hand up so the purple, sticky juice ran down his arm and stained his new shirt. Good Lord.

“Oh, look. Here are your mittens. Now go and play while I try to get young Mr. Horner cleaned up.”

Why didn’t he cooperate? Why did he kick at her slightly swollen ankles? And why did she have to listen to Jill and the other Jack bicker:

“I didn’t trip you. I just wanted to carry the pail for a change. But oh, no. Mr. Big Shot, Mr. I’m-All-Testosterone-All-the-Time has to carry it.”

“You’re a girl. You’re supposed to just hold my hand.”

“Oh, bullshit. And you should go to Urgent Care. Head injuries can be fatal. That would make a lovely bedtime story—’Jack and Jill went up the hill / but Jack fell down and died from a subdural hematoma.’ That’ll send the tots right to Dreamland.”

Mother Goose shushed them both as Jack Horner pointed with his one clean hand and laughed diabolically. “Look!”

Oh, for God’s sake. Whiskers had his head stuck in a mitten and appeared to be suffocating.

“He did it,” shouted Boots, pointing to Cuddles, who made his wide eyes wider: Who, me?

Mother Goose managed to wrestle the mitten off of Whiskers, who promptly hissed and bit her in the wing.

“Go to bed!” shouted Mother Goose. “All of you. To bed. Now!”

Muttering to one another, and dragging their feet, everyone got into the big bed Mother Goose was so proud of.

“That’s better,” she said. “One story. And then right to sleep.”

Cuddles whispered to Boots, “I’ll bet you can’t eat a whole mitten. I did and it was delicious.”

“Has anybody seen my pie?” asked Jack Horner.

Jill sat straight up. “Is that what that is? I thought Jack was bleeding out.”

Mother Goose arched her long neck. She spread her wings so a giant shadow fell across the bed.

“Go to sleep!” she shouted. “I mean it. Go the f— !”

She almost said it.

The room darkened on its own. The kittens huddled together. Jill searched for a hand to hold. Little Jack Horner whimpered and pulled the covers over his head.

Mother Goose limped to the window. There was that moon—a cold, dead rock in the sky spreading its feeble, borrowed light over a whole new world.

THE END

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We’ve got a great piece coming up in the May issue by Steve Jenkins about the politicization of science and its effect on education. Read it and weep.

The post >Becoming a Nation of Wusses appeared first on The Horn Book.

“To today’s children linear storylines are boring and only relevant in school. Providing access to [video] games/stories became one of the missions of our youth services department. We wanted to be exciting, fun, and relevant to the young customers we see in our library every day.”

Take a look at this American Libraries article about how popular a library can be simply by providing video games and equipment. Then come back and shoot me.

It’s not that I object to the library circulation of video games. Knock yourselves out. It’s the rationale. Since birth, I have given adults who were trying  to be “exciting, fun, and relevant” a wide berth, and I suspect that these librarians are taking the games more seriously than do the kids themselves.  I also think it is rather counter-countercultural to use the ratings determined by the industry’s self-regulatory agency to decide which kids get to play what. Are the selection process and access policies suspended for non-book materials?

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You know how they say everyone has a twin somewhere in the world, a person chance has formed to be their mirror image? Well, mine happens to be rock star Kari Kingsley. How crazy is that?

Not crazy at all, when you, like I, have just spent two days combing through dozens (and dozens) of new YA novels, every other one of which seeming to encapsulate a formula of romance novel plus high-concept commercial hook plus glamorama cover art. In my day we called these paperbacks.

One of the more interesting of post-Harry Potter developments has been the emergence of commercial fiction for young people; that is, books designed to be purchased by kids/teens themselves, written in an undemanding style and with an alluring, quickly graspable premise. Airport books. Except if they were airport books, I wouldn’t have to think twice about not reviewing them. And. There. Are. So. Many. And so many that seem to want desperately to be just like some other book that has already been a hit. Little Vampire Women, I’m looking at you.

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