**Tell us about your bad book pile? So these are books you love to hate. What are a few of your most hated? **
They are both beloved, they're both about unconditional love which is a hard thing to describe and I think both of them have a sub-text or underlying message that I can't stand. Those two books? Giving Tree and Love You Forever
Is there a book with a sub text that works?
Barbara Morrow's A Good Night For Freedom (Holiday House)
What are some of your other pet peeves?
I think rhyming books are really tricky...most new authors think that all children's books have to be in rhythm and rhyme. Lots of times it's the wrong format. Unfortunately some of these get published. One of my least favorites this year was: Orphan Train by Verla Kay. Let me read the beginning.
Now here was a really surprising book that used rhyme and rhythm successfully. It's Deborah Chandra and Madeleine Comora's George Washington's Teeth (FSG). Again it's a historical book, but the authors take a totally comic approach and their rhyme and rhythm is perfect for that. They also end with a great factual time line (with pictures) of how George lost his teeth.
What else has a good chance of making your bad book pile?
A book that preaches has a good chance! Alma Powell, Colin Powell's wife is guilty of that in her book America's Promise
So how can you get a message across without preaching?
There's a book I really like called Fishing Day by Andrea Pinkney (Hyperion). The little girl in the story learns a great lesson and makes a change, but it's told through story.
Here's another way of doing things. There's a great book out by Durham author Donna Washington called A Pride of African Tales (HarperCollins). Each of her tales has a moral message, but they are beautifully told and they are in the African story telling tradition which is all about giving kids knowledge through stories.
Here's another surprise book I got lately it's Karen Beaumont's I Like Myself (Harcourt). It's a self-esteem book and that's a dicey subject, but the humor really saves the book...illustrations by David Catrow help!
You don't like celebrity books much do you? Why do so many celebrities write them? Why do they get published? Who's this year's worse offender?
Madonna. She's definitely out to teach--she's said so in articles. This year she's bringing out five books, each based on a message from the Caballah..... But she doesn't understand childrens books and she's not a writer. (Read some). You've got to care about a character and get inside that character to write a convincing book.
Here's someone else who did a retelling---Diane Stanley published Goldie and the Three Bears this year...
**Are there any celebrities that have written good books? **
Jamie Lee Curtis does okay, I once read a story by Jimmy Buffet that he wrote with his daughter. called It was pretty good, but I can't say I've ever read a celebrity book that I've loved.
Who are the some of the celebrities who have written bad books?
Here's a few who've made it to my pile: Paulina Porzikova, a high fashion model, wrote a book called Ralphie the Roach about a cockroach...that's one of the worst. The singer Michael Bolton...and the illustrations look like him. John Lennon's estate published little pictures he'd drawn for Sean. John Lithgow, mystery writer Patricia Cornwall, James Redfield who wrote the Celestine prophecy, Jan Karon, singers, Arlo Gutherie and Olivia Newton John, Dom Deluise...those are just a few.
So is every bad book in your pile a celebrity book?
No, some are written by people who've become celebrities in the children's book world. One of my favorite bad books is by Chris Raschka who wrote Arlene the sardine. (read some) It could have been a nonfiction...also you run a huge risk if you take a non-human object and turn it human.
One of my favorite books from last year does just that. It's called Punctuation Takes A Vacation by Robin Pulver (Holiday House) and I've shared it with lots of teachers and kids who adore it...
A writer has to think about what the right medium is for a book. If it's a non-fiction type book that write non-fiction.
What kinds of books really work for kids?
I'll tell you the kinds of books that don't...books that have adult themes like Danny Shanahan's Buckle Down the Workhound about a CEO dog--Shanahan's a great cartoonist, but this book doesn't work.
Mo Willems is an animator who worked for Sesame Street and he seems to know kids and how to involve him. His book, Don't Let the Pigeon Drive The Bus (Hyperion) even took a Caldecott honor award. It's one of the most engaging books I've ever read for children.
Will you read a bit?
Sure.
For young children you want to write a book that gives them places to join in? Like a new book I recently discovered, Pat Thomson's Drat That Fat Cat (Scholastic) which has a cumulative pattern and repeating lines.
For older children, sometimes it's the character that will involve them. One of the books I've been sharing in classrooms is Marcia Vaughan's Up The Learning Tree (Lee and Low)
And then there's beautiful writing. Like in Kathleen Krull's Harvesting Hope: The Story of Cesar Chavez (Harcourt) which really works because it give a very sensory picture of migrant workers that makes so much sense for the subject. There are quiet books like Jacqueline Brigg's Martin's On Sand Island (Houghton Mifflin) which is a picture book story told in poems.