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Books We Love Sizzling Summer Sweepstakes
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(ContentDesk) June 6, 2004 -- We Love believes that readers want to know where to find all the terrific being published by small press and online publishers. And during our Sizzling Summer Sweepstakes, we are offering readers the opportunity to win lots of those books. Visit www.bookswelove.net, and discover a wonderful new world of books. Visit the author pages at We Love, sign their guest and enter our contest. You'll make some new friends and get the chance to win some fabulous books. The 80+ members of bookswelove.net are authors published in electronic and trade paperback formats by small press publishers. The -- many of them award winners and best sellers -- are available in both print and electronic formats, and they can be purchased either through the publisher's online bookstore,
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Audio slideshow: Eric Hill ? Spot the dog and me
<p>The author and illustrator of the perennially popular Spot stories shows how he draws 'my little puppy' and explains how fell into writing the books almost by accident. Photographs by Martin Godwin and Ladybird</p><br/><p style="clear:both" />
Beswitched by Kate Saunders | Book review
<div class="track"><img alt="" src="http://hits.guardian.co.uk/b/ss/guardiangu-feeds/1/H.20.3/69225?ns=guardian&pageName=Beswitched+by+Kate+Saunders+%7C+Book+review%3AArticle%3A1365709&ch=Books&c3=Obs&c4=Books%2CCulture+section%2CChildren+and+teenagers+%28Books+genre%29&c6=Geraldine+Brennan&c7=10-Mar-07&c8=1365709&c9=Article&c10=Feature%2CReview&c11=Books&c13=&c25=&c30=content&h2=GU%2FBooks%2FChildren+and+teenagers" width="1" height="1" /></div><p class="standfirst"><strong>Geraldine Brennan </strong>enjoys a winning combination of girls' boarding school, spells and time travel</p><p>Fictional girls' boarding schools are traditionally where spoilt little minxes go to be turned into well-rounded citizens through rigorous application of rags in the dorm, order marks, hockey and lacrosse. The stories have eternal appeal with their blend of fierce competition and loyalties plus a dose of character-forming nemesis, but the underpinning values might deter contemporary readers.</p><p>Kate Saunders's tale of the jolliest term on record at St Winifred's, 1935, offers everything you might expect from Angela Brazil with the advantage of the perspective of a "maggot" (new girl) from the present day.</p><p>Flora Fox is summoned to St Winifred's from 2010 after her dorm-mates-to-be dabble in the spellbook of the school's founder, who had some peculiar extra-currricular talents. This causes today's Flora to swap lives with a 1930s Flora, whose parents have shipped her off for an English education while they run bits of India.</p><p>Ms Fox, as spoilt and headstrong as they come, had been heading for a very hip boarding school where the head is called Jeff and the students can keep their phones and iPods and order takeaways. Her shock at entering a world without hair straighteners and laptops, where schoolgirls speak when spoken to, is well realised through faithful evocation of the sounds, smells and textures of the 1930s, from scratchy uniforms to carbolic soap and roaring motorbikes.</p><p>Flora gets into hot water for using the word "bollocks" but relishes saying "crikey" and "putrid" and lives in fear of "ponies". As a "colonial", Flora is a target of the school bully, Consuela, who is herself vilified because her parents are divorced.</p><p>Flora herself and her new gang of three ? sweet, round and rather dim Dulcie, fiercely bright and bossy Pogo and spiky, charismatic Pete (Daphne) ? are well-drawn characters whom we care about, especially Pete, who has elements of the Chalet School's Joey Bettany and Jane Eyre's friend Helen Burns and whose hard edges soften in a believable way. The core value of the St Winifred's girls ? never let your friends down ? is one that will not go out of fashion.</p><p>There is much to learn about 1930s girlhood, including the comforting function of sugar: in the absence of boys, nice clothes, ensuite showers and hair products, a girl could always count on the sweet shop and her tuck box.</p><p>The play on Flora's surname on the jacket design and chapter headings is the only jarring note: it sets up expectations that are not met in the story. However, this does not detract from the pleasures of a highly readable novel which combines wit and charm with hidden depths.</p><div class="related" style="float: left; margin-right: 10px; margin-bottom: 10px;"><ul><li><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/booksforchildrenandteenagers">Children and teenagers</a></li></ul></div><br/><div class="terms"><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk">guardian.co.uk</a> © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our <a href="http://users.guardian.co.uk/help/article/0,,933909,00.html">Terms & Conditions</a> | <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/help/feeds">More Feeds</a></div><p style="clear:both" />
The Queen Must Die by KAS Quinn
<div class="track"><img alt="" src="http://hits.guardian.co.uk/b/ss/guardiangu-feeds/1/H.20.3/74358?ns=guardian&pageName=The+Queen+Must+Die+by+KAS+Quinn%3AArticle%3A1366738&ch=Books&c3=Guardian&c4=Books%2CChildren+and+teenagers+%28Books+genre%29%2CCulture+section&c6=Linda+Buckley-Archer&c7=10-Mar-06&c8=1366738&c9=Article&c10=Review%2CFeature&c11=Books&c13=&c25=&c30=content&h2=GU%2FBooks%2FChildren+and+teenagers" width="1" height="1" /></div><p class="standfirst">Linda Buckley-Archer travels back in time</p><p>What child would not be irritated at being landed with a triple-barrelled name on account of a three-times-divorced mother? Bookish New Yorker, Katie Berger-Jones-Burg ? daughter of the aptly named Mimi, a former member of the girl-band, Youth 'n Asia ? endears from the start in this debut children's novel. Exasperated by life at home and at school, Katie discovers the solace of reading and writing her diary while hiding under her bed, surrounded by great piles of books. Her mother's failed attempt to give up smoking, for example, prompts the following diary entry: "'Get a grip' I told Mimi ? 'and stop leaning out the window, the neighbours will think you're going to jump ? and the snow will ruin your tint job.' That did the trick."</p><p>The downside of life with this chaotic if colourful mother is portrayed with wit and lightness of touch. However, when Katie wakes up under a sofa in Buckingham Palace in 1851, the back-story of Mimi and her oh-so-21st-century lifestyle serves principally as a permanent and humorous contrast to the deportment of the other maternal presence in the book, Queen Victoria.</p><p>The time-travel genre, spanning historical and fantasy/science fiction, allows Quinn to introduce a supernatural element to the narrative; Quinn spends little time pondering the mechanics of time travel but is clearly drawn to the historical possibilities of the genre.</p><p>Katie is befriended by Victoria's daughter, Princess Alice, and James, the son of a court doctor, and it soon becomes apparent that her appearance in Victorian England is linked to a planned assassination attempt on the monarch by a shadowy group called the Black Tide. Setting the novel in the weeks leading up to the Great Exhibition ? brainchild of Prince Albert and his personal PR triumph ? Quinn showcases the Crystal Palace in two dramatic set pieces. This miracle of Victorian engineering was so huge it housed three mature elms, whose attendant bird population, incidentally, contributes to an ingenious plot point.</p><p>But if both time-travelling and historical novels can open a window on to the past, one advantage time-slip has over its sister genre is its potential for what might be described as time tourism, in which the reader experiences the foreignness of another century through the eyes of a contemporary guide ? and Katie is well suited to the role.</p><p>Children love to laugh at the absurdity of former times and Quinn readily supplies details of hygiene, diet and dress to amuse or shock: babies are given port; Prince Leopold, who suffers from haemophilia, is forbidden solid food in case it <em>thickens</em> the blood; the girls are drowned in undergarments (in contrast to such 21st-century details as Mimi bursting out of her barely-there top as she sings to a baseball crowd). So, in the tradition of Mark Twain's <em>A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court</em>, each century acts as a mirror for the other, and there is undoubtedly an undercurrent of nostalgia here for a society whose boundaries were more rigidly defined.</p><p>Katie's nationality, too, adds to the "fish out of water" theme. Her baffled incredulity as she witnesses a royal cricket match with its googlies and poncey costume made me laugh out loud. So while I have some minor quibbles about pace and the portrayal of villains, I was won over by the humour in this story. There is still much to be revealed in the subsequent volumes of the trilogy but I'm certain that the spirited Katie Berger-Jones-Burg will persuade readers to come back for further instalments of this engaging, time-travelling adventure.</p><p>Linda Buckley-Archer's <em>Time Quake</em>, final volume of the Time Quake trilogy, is published by Simon & Schuster.</p><div class="related" style="float: left; margin-right: 10px; margin-bottom: 10px;"><ul><li><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/booksforchildrenandteenagers">Children and teenagers</a></li></ul></div><br/><div class="terms"><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk">guardian.co.uk</a> © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our <a href="http://users.guardian.co.uk/help/article/0,,933909,00.html">Terms & Conditions</a> | <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/help/feeds">More Feeds</a></div><p style="clear:both" />
Fresh territory for parallel-world fantasy
<div class="track"><img alt="" src="http://hits.guardian.co.uk/b/ss/guardiangu-feeds/1/H.20.3/55071?ns=guardian&pageName=Fresh+territory+for+parallel-world+fantasy%3AArticle%3A1367603&ch=Books&c3=GU.co.uk&c4=Science+fiction+fantasy+and+horror+%28Books+genre%29%2CChildren+and+teenagers+%28Books+genre%29%2CBooks%2CCulture+section&c6=Imogen+Russell+Williams&c7=10-Mar-05&c8=1367603&c9=Article&c10=Blogpost&c11=Books&c13=&c25=Books+blog&c30=content&h2=GU%2FBooks%2Fblog%2FBooks+blog" width="1" height="1" /></div><p class="standfirst">Stories of other worlds adjacent to our own are perennially popular, but the latest generation are refreshingly recognisable</p><p>Parallel-world and portal fantasies, involving characters who step into worlds beyond, are perennially popular, especially with children. As in <a href="http://www.harpercollinschildrens.com/kids/gamesandcontests/features/princecaspian/">CS Lewis's Narnia</a>, or <a href="http://www.fantasticfiction.co.uk/g/alan-garner/elidor.htm">Alan Garner's grittier Elidor</a>, the young protagonists often discover that they've breached the gap in order to fulfil a prophecy, and have heroic clean-up roles to play. Subsequently, they may return home safely, or even wind up as royalty - or <a href="http://www.schoollibraryjournal.com/articles/blog/1790000379/20080403/lion.jpg">both</a>. </p><p>Perhaps portal fantasy goes down so well with children because the idea of being a fate-sent hero in another world contrasts pleasingly with the reality of being a homework drone and washer-up in this one. And teenagers already inhabit the parallel world of adolescence, where all the colours are brighter but the greys and blacks are quicksands of despair. But the Narnia books are falling out of favour, not only because of the Christian only-just-subtext but because of the insidious suggestion that death and sweet fruit in Aslan's country are preferable to growing up and developing an adult sexual identity. Current variations on the theme of travel between worlds seem to be moving away from chivalric escapism, encouraging the reader to see their own world newly vivid instead.</p><p>China Miéville's <a href="http://www.randomhouse.com/delrey/unlundun/">UnLunDun</a>, like <a href="http://www.neilgaiman.com/works/Books/Neverwhere/in/191/">Neil Gaiman's Neverwhere</a>, features a contiguous fantasy capital, UnLondon, alongside the everyday one. Miéville's poetic, cartographic imagination produces an uncity defended by broken brollies ("unbrellas"), a half-ghost love interest, Hemi, and a contemporary, pollutant villain ? the Smog ? and his UnLondon is a far cry from Neverland or bucolic Narnia. The fantasy convention he has most fun with, though, is the idea of the prophesied Chosen One (or, in UnLondon, the "Shwazzy"). Of the two 12-year-olds drawn into UnLondon, it's charismatic Zanna who's supposed to be the Shwazzy. But when she's knocked out by a malignant tendril of Smog, it's Deeba ? who features in the Propheseers' portentous, ambulant Book only as "sidekick, funny" ? who has to take over and save the day, which she does with common sense and aplomb. UnLunDun is both a cracking portal fantasy and a simultaneous deconstruction of the genre.</p><p><a href="http://www.rhiannonlassiter.com/books/rightsofpassage.html">Rhiannon Lassiter's Rights of Passage</a> series takes a post-colonial look at portal convention, plotting the effect selfish Earth kids might have if they arrived in a world with completely different technology and mores. In Borderlands, four disaffected teens use a worldgate which deposits them in the desert near the fortified city of Shattershard ? Alex, modelling himself on his Macedonian namesake, throws in his lot with the desert Hajhim and offers them weapons expertise, while his manipulative sister Laura trades plastic hair-clips for wealth and influence. Subtly, Lassiter indicates that gun-running isn't heroic because it happens in another world, and that you can't leave your morals or your issues at home when you fancy a break from quotidian reality.</p><p>More whimsically, <a href="http://www.fantasticfiction.co.uk/p/susan-price/foiling-dragon.htm">Susan Price's Foiling the Dragon</a> is a portal fantasy, in which the people of Angamark, having decided that a dragon with one caprice is more appealing than a monarch with many, import poets from Earth to satisfy his conversational (and eventually gastric) demands in exchange for protection from an irate king. Paul, the latest import, far from being a fated hero, is terrified from start to finish, and fights to get back to the safety of Earth as swiftly as possible, leaving the dragon in victorious possession. </p><p>Taking a holiday in another world is one of my favourite pastimes, but I'm more and more drawn to the "working holiday" model of contemporary portal fantasy. Mythological beasts and enchanted swords may be thinner on the ground, but the reading experience seems richer.</p><div class="related" style="float: left; margin-right: 10px; margin-bottom: 10px;"><ul><li><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/sciencefictionfantasyandhorror">Science fiction, fantasy and horror</a></li><li><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/booksforchildrenandteenagers">Children and teenagers</a></li></ul></div><div class="author"><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/profile/imogenrussellwilliams">Imogen Russell Williams</a></div><br/><div class="terms"><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk">guardian.co.uk</a> © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our <a href="http://users.guardian.co.uk/help/article/0,,933909,00.html">Terms & Conditions</a> | <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/help/feeds">More Feeds</a></div><p style="clear:both" />
Ali Sparkes wins Blue Peter Book of the Year award
<div class="track"><img alt="" src="http://hits.guardian.co.uk/b/ss/guardiangu-feeds/1/H.20.3/1856?ns=guardian&pageName=Ali+Sparkes+wins+Blue+Peter+Book+of+the+Year+award%3AArticle%3A1366922&ch=Books&c3=GU.co.uk&c4=Books%2CChildren+and+teenagers+%28Books+genre%29%2CAwards+and+prizes+%28Culture%29%2CCulture+section&c6=Lindesay+Irvine&c7=10-Mar-03&c8=1366922&c9=Article&c10=News&c11=Books&c13=&c25=&c30=content&h2=GU%2FBooks%2FChildren+and+teenagers" width="1" height="1" /></div><p class="standfirst">Frozen in Time, Ali Sparkes's novel of two children cryonically frozen for 50 years, wins Blue Peter prize for children's fiction</p><p>Ali Sparkes's novel <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Frozen-Time-Ali-Sparkes/dp/0192727559" title="Amazon: Frozen in Time">Frozen in Time</a> ? the adventure of two children cryonically frozen for half-a-century and then returned to life in 2009 ? has won this year's <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/cbbc/bluepeter/getinvolved/bookclub/" title="BBC: Blue Peter book club">Blue Peter Book of the Year</a> award.</p><p></p><p>Announced this afternoon on a special edition of the venerable children's TV show, the Blue Peter Book awards have the unusual distinction of being judged by a panel of eight- to nine-year-old readers. Sparkes pronounced herself delighted to have won the prize. "I think if you asked any children's author which they thought was the most important prize for children's books, it's highly likely they would say the Blue Peter prize," she said.</p><p></p><p>"Not only does it have a big TV audience, which is important, but well, it's Blue Peter! You can talk about Carnegie, and Kate Greenaway, you can talk about Smarties ? but everyone immediately understands about the Blue Peter prize.</p><p></p><p>"Even on the way over to the TV studio, the taxi driver asked me if I had got a Blue Peter badge!"</p><p></p><p>Initial entries for the prizes were whittled down into three shortlists of three by the programme's editor, Tim Levell, children's librarian Debra Conway and <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2009/mar/04/matt-haig-shadow-forest" title="">last year's overall winner, Matt Haig</a>. Panels of young readers then decided on winners in three separate categories, as well choosing the overall Book of the Year.</p><p></p><p>So, as well as the top honours, Frozen in Time took the Book I Couldn't Put Down prize. Dinkin Dings and the Frightening Things by Guy Bass, meanwhile, took the Most Fun Story With Pictures prize, and Why Eating Bogeys Is Good For You by Mitchell Symons carried off the Best Book With Facts prize.</p><p></p><p>Jamie Fenlon, 10, was one of the prize's judges; he reported a process as engaged and passionate as any of the infamous behind-the-scenes debates at the Man Booker prize. Fenlon said that discussions, while restrained and good-mannered for the most part, did generate some "big fights", and at one point a lady told the judges they had to halt their deliberations before things turned physical.</p><p></p><p>As Fenlon's verdict on Frozen in Time reveals, the judges subjected each of the books to a thorough and exacting analysis. "It's not the kind of book that I would have picked out in a shop," he said. "The cover didn't persuade me and the blurb didn't persuade me, and the introduction [in which the two modern characters are stuck indoors on a rainy day in the summer holidays] was really dull. But the rest of the book is fantastic ? it's outstanding."</p><p></p><p>Fenlon said that judging the prize had been "really hard", with nine books to get through, but it was "really good fun".</p><p></p><p>And to go with the trophy that all winners receive, did Ali Sparkes get her coveted Blue Peter badge? "I did of course, almost immediately after I arrived ? and pinned, correctly, on the right-hand lapel. A wonderful moment."</p><p></p><p><strong>The shortlists</strong></p><p></p><p><strong>Best Book With Facts:</strong></p><p>Usborne Lift-the-flap Picture Atlas ? Alex Frith & Kate Leake (Usborne)</p><p>Tail-End Charlie ? Mick Manning & Brita Granstrom (Francis Lincoln Children's Books)</p><p>Why Eating Bogeys is Good for You ? Mitchell Symons (Red Fox)</p><p></p><p></p><p><strong>Book I Couldn't Put Down:</strong></p><p>Cosmic ? Frank Cottrell Boyce (Macmillan)</p><p>The Boy Who Fell Down Exit 43 ? Harriet Goodwin (Stripes)</p><p>Frozen in Time ? Ali Sparkes (Oxford University Press)</p><p></p><p></p><p><strong>Most Fun Story with Pictures:</strong></p><p>Peter the Penguin Pioneer ? Daren King (Quercus)</p><p>Spells ? Emily Gravett (Macmillan)</p><p>Dinkin Dings and the Frightening Things ? Guy Bass & Pete Williamson (Stripes)</p><div class="related" style="float: left; margin-right: 10px; margin-bottom: 10px;"><ul><li><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/booksforchildrenandteenagers">Children and teenagers</a></li><li><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/culture/awards-and-prizes">Awards and prizes</a></li></ul></div><div class="author"><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/profile/lindesayirvine">Lindesay Irvine</a></div><br/><div class="terms"><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk">guardian.co.uk</a> © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our <a href="http://users.guardian.co.uk/help/article/0,,933909,00.html">Terms & Conditions</a> | <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/help/feeds">More Feeds</a></div><p style="clear:both" />
Shirley Hughes's top 10 picture book characters
<div class="track"><img alt="" src="http://hits.guardian.co.uk/b/ss/guardiangu-feeds/1/H.20.3/92838?ns=guardian&pageName=Shirley+Hughes%27s+top+10+picture+book+characters%3AArticle%3A1366092&ch=Books&c3=GU.co.uk&c4=Best+books%2CChildren+and+teenagers+%28Books+genre%29%2CBooks%2CCulture+section&c6=Shirley+Hughes&c7=10-Mar-03&c8=1366092&c9=Article&c10=Feature&c11=Books&c13=Top+10s+%28Books%29&c25=&c30=content&h2=GU%2FBooks%2FBest+books" width="1" height="1" /></div><p class="standfirst">From Fungus the Bogeyman to Babar the Elephant, the creator of Dogger and Alfie looks at the compelling creations that turn small children into readers</p><p>Shirley Hughes has written and illustrated more than 50 books, selling some 11.5m copies, and collected a string of awards for creating some of the most enduring characters in children's literature, including Dogger, Alfie, and Lucy and Tom. </p><p>Her latest book is Don't Want to Go, published this week by The Bodley Head.</p><p><a href="http://www.guardianbookshop.co.uk/BerteShopWeb/sortResults.do?keyword=shirley%20hughes&isbn=&title=&author=&publisher=&format=&pageNo=0&category=&sort=p.author_surname">Buy Shirley Hughes books at the Guardian bookshop</a></p><p>"With picture books small children can see themselves as readers long before they have learned to decipher the text. They turn the pages with relish, exploring the plot through the illustrations with tremendous concentration. They are learning how to look, rather than being passively overwhelmed by fast moving electronic imagery. Little wonder then, that the great heroes and heroines of picture books are among the world's best remembered fictional characters."</p><h2>1. Fungus the Bogeyman ? Raymond Briggs</h2><p>Fungus is one of Briggs's most inventive picture books. Adults as well as children will be gleefully sucked down into that world deep in the slime, a place of blocked drains, dubious smells and infestations, where the Bogey family thrive. Fungus's sorties above ground to plague luckless humans who are fighting a losing battle against Bogeydom are wonderfully funny. </p><h2>2. The Bear with Sticky Paws ? Clara Vulliamy</h2><p>When The Bear with Sticky Paws arrives at Pearl's house, chaos of one kind or another ensues. Clara Vulliamy can draw real children as convincingly as she can invent anthropomorphic animals, a rare quality in contemporary picture books. (I have to declare an interest here, as she is my daughter!) These stories explore Pearl's changing reactions to the engagingly maverick bear, who tears through the action with delicious abandon.</p><h2>3. Ginger ? Charlotte Voake</h2><p>The relaxed simplicity of this kind of illustration is the hallmark of a true professional. Many small people will strangely identify with Ginger the cat's irritation when a kitten arrives to ruffle his life. The pictures sprawl nonchalantly across the page but nevertheless express a great deal of emotion.</p><h2>4. The Very Hungry Caterpillar ? Eric Carle</h2><p>One of the simplest and most brilliant ideas for a picture book ever. The caterpillar literally worms his way through the story holes punched in the pages. Even the youngest child can follow his progress with her fingers to the glorious dénouement when he emerges as a beautiful butterfly.</p><h2>5. Olivia ? Ian Falconer</h2><p>Olivia's jaunty piggy personality is expressed with the true economy of line we expect from a New Yorker cover designer. She is, of course, really an irrepressible preschooler, bouncily engaged in dressing up, taking a bath, reluctant to go to bed and very good at wearing people out. Along the way she also stars as an opera diva, prima ballerina and a talented abstract painter.</p><h2>6. Katie Morag ? Mairi Hedderwick</h2><p>Although anthropomorphic animals abound in picture books there are not so many convincingly real child characters. Katie Morag lives on a Scottish island and the details of her life there, all the neighbours and bustling activity of a seagoing life, are the kind you can linger over and return to again with increasing pleasure.</p><h2>7. Captain Haddock ? Hergé</h2><p>Hergé has been described as the Homer of strip cartoon. His impeccable draughtsmanship matches his soaring inspiration as a storyteller. Tintin and Snowy are great heroes, but Captain Haddock steals the show ? short tempered, fond of drink, but an intrepidly loyal friend in a tight spot. His exclamations alone ? "billions of blue blistering barnacles!" ? are a claim to immortality.</p><h2>8. Little Tim ? Edward Ardizzone</h2><p>Part of Little Tim's enduring appeal is that with his friend Ginger he can take off, go to sea and have all kinds of exciting adventures without grown-ups tagging along. Ardizzone's style both as a storyteller and an artist are in the great English tradition. He uses line and wash with the relaxed eloquence of a true master.</p><h2>9. Babar the Elephant ? Jean de Brunhoff</h2><p>"Babar" is perhaps my most favourite of all picture book characters. This wonderfully illustrated saga opens when his mother is shot by a cruel hunter. Luckily, on the very next page a kind old lady gives him her purse. He goes on not only to acquire a smart outfit of new clothes and win a devoted wife and family, but to become King of the Elephants and have many breathtaking adventures.</p><h2>10. Moomin ? Tove Jansson</h2><p>The Moomins are another great saga that every child should experience. Tove Jansson's deceptively simple strip cartoon format creates a whole readily inhabitable world. Moominpappa and mamma and their children are irrepressible optimists, though many tiresome villains cross their paths. The dialogue is superb.</p><div class="related" style="float: left; margin-right: 10px; margin-bottom: 10px;"><ul><li><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/bestbooks">Best books</a></li><li><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/booksforchildrenandteenagers">Children and teenagers</a></li></ul></div><br/><div class="terms"><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk">guardian.co.uk</a> © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our <a href="http://users.guardian.co.uk/help/article/0,,933909,00.html">Terms & Conditions</a> | <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/help/feeds">More Feeds</a></div><p style="clear:both" />
Chris Wormell's world of animals
<p>Illustrator <strong>Chris Wormell</strong>'s children's books are full of colourful animals of every description. His latest book, One Smart Fish, tells the story of evolution. Here, he explains how he creates his books, from first spark to final picture</p><br/><p style="clear:both" />
Children's book doctor: Julia Eccleshare answers your queries
<div class="track"><img alt="" src="http://hits.guardian.co.uk/b/ss/guardiangu-feeds/1/H.20.3/30173?ns=guardian&pageName=Children%27s+book+doctor%3A+Julia+Eccleshare+answers+your+queries%3AArticle%3A1363133&ch=Books&c3=Guardian&c4=Children+and+teenagers+%28Books+genre%29%2CCulture+section%2CBooks%2CKurt+Vonnegut+%28Author%29%2CTerry+Pratchett+%28Author%29%2CJD+Salinger+%28Author%29%2CRoger+McGough&c6=Julia+Eccleshare%2CBenjamin+Zephaniah&c7=10-Feb-27&c8=1363133&c9=Article&c10=Feature%2CReview&c11=Books&c13=Children%27s+book+doctor&c25=&c30=content&h2=GU%2FBooks%2FChildren+and+teenagers" width="1" height="1" /></div><p><strong>Q</strong> Do you have any suggestions for getting an 18-year-old boy on to adult books? He has enjoyed Harry Potter, <em>Artemis Fowl</em> and the Alex Rider books.</p><p><strong>A</strong> Finding what to read next is always a challenge and it is especially so when crossing from clearly labelled and strongly marketed children's books to adult fiction. Full of action and strongly plotted, the books your son enjoyed were key titles in a resurgence of high concept children's fiction which became bestsellers. They were published within four years of each other and were utterly of the moment; your son's enjoyment was probably enhanced by the fact that his friends were reading them, too. Since then there have been many "crossover" novels designed for all ages from early teens onwards. Realism from Melvin Burgess and Kevin Brooks and fantasy adventures such as Cornelia Funke's <em>Inkheart</em> or Philip Reeve's <em>Mortal Engines</em> or any of Terry Pratchett's titles are easy steps on the way to classic cult titles such as Kurt Vonnegut's <em>Slaughterhouse-Five</em>, Alex Garland's <em>The Beach</em> or, most topically, JD Salinger's <em>The Catcher in the Rye</em>.</p><p></p><p><strong>Q</strong> My grandchildren are four and two. Of course, my first instinct is to give them the books I loved sharing with my own children, but I do realise that times have changed. Can you help?</p><p><strong>A</strong> If you have books in your home which they can enjoy when they come to visit, they will appreciate them as being particular to you. The books will already feel specially selected since you have kept them over the years. And, though they may be from a previous generation of childhood, a remarkable number will still be available today; Pat Hutchins's <em>Rosie's Walk</em>, John Burningham's <em>Mr Gumpy's Outing</em>, Judith Kerr's <em>The Tiger Who Came to Tea</em> and Eric Carle's <em>The Very Hungry Caterpillar</em> are titles which are now in their 40s and still going strong. But, of course, you are right that that books published right now are, in important respects, different. Changing visual fashions and technology mean that colours are often brighter and images bolder. Attitudes to children and childhood have also changed hugely, especially in the pre-school years. Some contemporary books reflect these changes, although the conventions of using animals and inanimate characters means many have a timeless quality. Illustrators such as Lauren Child, already widely familiar in the pre-school field through her Charlie and Lola TV series, are among the many contemporary creators of books which feed the imagination and allow children to dream and wonder. Some have also reillustrated classics ? as Child did with <em>Pippi Longstocking</em> ? creating a stepping-stone for the next generation into the enchanted gardens of the past.</p><p></p><p><strong>Q</strong> Why don't children read or learn poems any more?</p><p><strong>A</strong> When I was at junior school, we learnt a poem one week and wrote one the next. For me, writing was torment while learning was fun and there was little connection between the two. The poems we learnt were almost entirely written for adults. Although poetry publishing for children has been slimmed down in the last few years, John Agard, Roger McGough, Michael Rosen and Grace Nichols all write poetry that appeals directly to children who relish language, construction and meaning. They are widely read, though mostly in schools, which is why parents may not think much is happening. Try an anthology such as Michael Rosen's <em>A-Z: The Best Children's Poetry from Agard to Zephaniah</em>, published by Puffin.</p><p>Email your questions to books@guardian.co.uk</p><div class="related" style="float: left; margin-right: 10px; margin-bottom: 10px;"><ul><li><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/booksforchildrenandteenagers">Children and teenagers</a></li><li><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/kurtvonnegut">Kurt Vonnegut</a></li><li><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/terrypratchett">Terry Pratchett</a></li><li><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/jdsalinger">JD Salinger</a></li><li><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/roger-mcgough">Roger McGough</a></li></ul></div><div class="author"><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/profile/juliaeccleshare">Julia Eccleshare</a></div><div class="author"><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/profile/benjaminzephaniah">Benjamin Zephaniah</a></div><br/><div class="terms"><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk">guardian.co.uk</a> © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our <a href="http://users.guardian.co.uk/help/article/0,,933909,00.html">Terms & Conditions</a> | <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/help/feeds">More Feeds</a></div><p style="clear:both" />
50 years of Alan Garner's eerie brilliance | Alison Flood
<div class="track"><img alt="" src="http://hits.guardian.co.uk/b/ss/guardiangu-feeds/1/H.20.3/76118?ns=guardian&pageName=50+years+of+Alan+Garner%27s+eerie+brilliance+%7C+Alison+Flood+%3AArticle%3A1364913&ch=Books&c3=GU.co.uk&c4=Alan+Garner+%28Author%29%2CChildren+and+teenagers+%28Books+genre%29%2CFestivals+%28Culture%29%2CBooks%2CCulture+section&c6=Alison+Flood&c7=10-Feb-26&c8=1364913&c9=Article&c10=Blogpost&c11=Books&c13=&c25=Books+blog&c30=content&h2=GU%2FBooks%2Fblog%2FBooks+blog" width="1" height="1" /></div><p class="standfirst">The 50th birthday of Alan Garner's The Weirdstone of Brisingamen is a great excuse for a festival ? and some serious re-reading</p><p>We went to an autumnal wedding near <a href="http://www.alderleyedge.org/">Alderley Edge</a> when I was 10, and I remember so clearly the walk we went on the next day: cold and gloomy and grey though it was, I scurried off by myself to lean against a rock and try, desperately to imagine myself into the world of Alan Garner's <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/product-description/000712788X/ref=dp_proddesc_0?ie=UTF8&n=266239&s=books">The Weirdstone of Brisingamen</a>. I wanted the svart-alfar to attack me, Cadellin to rescue me, and the still, anticipatory atmosphere of those dimly lit woods almost convinced me they might.</p><p>Unsurprisingly, nothing happened, and we returned home. But I'm reminded of my childhood adoration of Garner by the startling news that it is 50 years ? 50 years! ? since he published The Weirdstone, his first novel, and the occasion is being marked with events throughout this year. There's an interview with Garner and a lecture at the Oxford literary festival in March, an exhibition of the author's works in Chester this autumn, and most joyfully, a <a href="http://www.weirdstone.org.uk/index.php">weekend festival in October</a> in Alderley Edge where, among guided walks and lectures and readings and commemorative badges, there will even be a medieval fair.</p><p>Count me in: The Weirdstone of Brisingamen is a book that deserves to be celebrated, along with the rest of Garner's dark, unforgettable children's books: The Weirdstone's sequel The Moon of Gomrath, The Owl Service and Elidor. Drawing on the legend of <a href="http://www.derbyscc.org.uk/alderley/edge_legend.htm">Alderley</a>, the novel follows the adventures of Colin and Susan. Susan is the unwitting possessor of the Weirdstone, a magical jewel that binds 140 knights into an enchanted sleep in Fundindelve, a cave on Alderley Edge. </p><p>When Colin and Susan are chased by dark elves, the svart-alfar, they are rescued by Cadellin Silverbrow, the wizard who has been searching for the lost jewel for more than 100 years. Evil forces (including the Morrigan, disguised as a "powerfully built" woman whose "head rested firmly on her shoulders without appearing to have much of a neck at all") are abroad and also looking for the jewel, and the children undergo a series of terrifying adventures, including one narrow escape that has been burned into my mind and has also, I think, contributed to a slight tendency to claustrophobia.</p><p>Escaping from the svarts, Colin and Susan and their dwarf friends are forced to climb through a deep, narrow tunnel. "They lay full length, walls, floor and roof fitting them like a second skin. Their heads were turned to one side, for in any other position the roof pressed their mouths into the sand and they could not breathe. The only way to advance was to pull with the fingertips and to push with the toes, since it was impossible to flex their legs at all, and any bending of the elbows threatened to jam the arms helplessly under the body," writes Garner, in my trusty ancient copy which serendipitously happens to be here in London rather than at my parents'. "Colin found that he had to rest more and more frequently. He thought of the hundreds of feet of rock above and of the miles of rock below, and himself wedged into a nine-inch gap between."</p><p>They encounter a hairpin bend, where Colin gets jammed, and then, most horrifically, to water ? unable to see how long it lasts, and with retreat impossible, they each decide that it's "better a quick road to forgetfulness than a lingering one" and push on through. It's sending shivers down my spine even now.</p><p>I also adored The Moon of Gomrath, particularly Susan's compulsive building of a fire that calls the Wild Hunt, but my favourite Garner novel must be The Owl Service and its plaintive, petrifying, "she wants to be flowers and you make her owls". It's a long wait until October: I think I'm going to have to read them all again in anticipation.</p><div class="related" style="float: left; margin-right: 10px; margin-bottom: 10px;"><ul><li><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/alangarner">Alan Garner</a></li><li><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/booksforchildrenandteenagers">Children and teenagers</a></li><li><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/culture/festivals">Festivals</a></li></ul></div><div class="author"><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/profile/alisonflood">Alison Flood</a></div><br/><div class="terms"><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk">guardian.co.uk</a> © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our <a href="http://users.guardian.co.uk/help/article/0,,933909,00.html">Terms & Conditions</a> | <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/help/feeds">More Feeds</a></div><p style="clear:both" />
John Grisham to write legal thrillers for children
<div class="track"><img alt="" src="http://hits.guardian.co.uk/b/ss/guardiangu-feeds/1/H.20.3/82143?ns=guardian&pageName=John+Grisham+to+write+legal+thrillers+for+children%3AArticle%3A1364421&ch=Books&c3=GU.co.uk&c4=Books%2CJohn+Grisham+%28Author%29%2CChildren+and+teenagers+%28Books+genre%29%2CFiction+%28Books+genre%29%2CCulture+section&c6=Lindesay+Irvine&c7=10-Feb-25&c8=1364421&c9=Article&c10=News&c11=Books&c13=&c25=&c30=content&h2=GU%2FBooks%2FJohn+Grisham" width="1" height="1" /></div><p class="standfirst">Thriller writer John Grisham reveals that new children's series will feature a teenage legal maverick, Theodore Boone</p><p>If his success with young readers is anything like his achievement with adults, horsehair wigs for kids may soon be ousting Harry Potter merchandise from the shops. <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/johngrisham" title="Guardian: John Grisham">John Grisham</a>, whose legal thrillers have shifted more than 250m copies to adult readers, is set to move into the children's market with a new series of novels about a 13-year-old "who knows more about the law than most lawyers" and gets caught up in a murder trial.</p><p></p><p>Grisham's move, <a href="http://www.thebookseller.com/news/113686-hodder-signs-series-by-grisham.html" title="The Bookseller: Hodder signs series by Grisham">revealed on the Bookseller website</a> today, will begin with his first serial character, teenage legal maverick Theodore Boone. He has signed a two-book deal with Hodder (not his usual publisher) for the Boone novels, the first of which will be published on 10 June this year.</p><p></p><p>Oliver Johnson, who was Grisham's editor at Century and now works for Hodder, told the Bookseller the Boone books were a "terrific new project". He said: "Theodore Boone is vintage Grisham: great legal drama, a lovable hero who brought a smile to my face and a really satisfying ending, all delivered at breakneck, page-turning speed."</p><p></p><p>Many a literary name ? from Ted Hughes and TS Eliot to Booker winners Margaret Atwood, Roddy Doyle, Ian McEwan and Peter Carey ? has written for children in the past. Big-name commercial novelists going after the youth market are rather rarer, although James Patterson, perhaps inevitably given his presence everywhere else in the book market, established the <a href="http://www.jamespatterson.com/books_max.php" title="James Patterson: Maximum Ride">Maximum Ride series</a> for young readers in 2005, and has already published five books, with a sixth due out next month.</p><p></p><p>In 2007, <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2007/sep/29/booksforchildrenandteenagers.nickhornby" title="Guardian: Slam review">Nick Hornby published Slam</a>, about a teenage skateboarder. In the same year, Joanne Harris published a fantasy novel reworking Norse mythology for young readers, <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Runemarks-Joanne-Harris/dp/0385611307" title="Amazon: Runemarks">Runemarks</a>, and a sequel is promised.</p><p></p><p>Before Grisham, few people would have expected stories about lawyers to be the stuff of multi-million-selling blockbusters. Even fewer, presumably, would tip legal thrillers for the 9-to-12-year-old market as obvious winners. But with Grisham on the case, the verdict is always liable to surprise.</p><div class="related" style="float: left; margin-right: 10px; margin-bottom: 10px;"><ul><li><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/johngrisham">John Grisham</a></li><li><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/booksforchildrenandteenagers">Children and teenagers</a></li><li><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/fiction">Fiction</a></li></ul></div><div class="author"><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/profile/lindesayirvine">Lindesay Irvine</a></div><br/><div class="terms"><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk">guardian.co.uk</a> © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our <a href="http://users.guardian.co.uk/help/article/0,,933909,00.html">Terms & Conditions</a> | <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/help/feeds">More Feeds</a></div><p style="clear:both" />
Teenage fiction's death wishes | Alison Flood
<div class="track"><img alt="" src="http://hits.guardian.co.uk/b/ss/guardiangu-feeds/1/H.20.3/50267?ns=guardian&pageName=Teenage+fiction%27s+death+wishes+%7C+Alison+Flood%3AArticle%3A1364179&ch=Books&c3=GU.co.uk&c4=Books%2CChildren+and+teenagers+%28Books+genre%29%2CCulture+section&c6=Alison+Flood&c7=10-Feb-25&c8=1364179&c9=Article&c10=Feature&c11=Books&c13=&c25=&c30=content&h2=GU%2FBooks%2FChildren+and+teenagers" width="1" height="1" /></div><p class="standfirst">With novels about leukaemia, car crashes and the afterlife topping young adult reading lists, why are teenagers so fascinated by tales of death and dying?</p><p>An 18-year-old girl who dies in a car crash, only to relive her final day again and again; a 15-year-old who's aging backwards in another dimension after dying in the real world; a dying teenage girl attempting to experience all life has to offer in the months before her death at 16. Undead vampire teenager Edward Cullen ? he of the ivory turtleneck sweaters and sparkly skin ? might be propelling <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/stephenie-meyer" title="Guardian: Stephenie Meyer">Stephenie Meyer</a> to the top of the teen reading charts, but a different furrow ? in which the teen hero or heroine is actually dead, or dying ? is being quietly ploughed by a growing host of young adult writers.</p><p></p><p>Since Susie Salmon, the murdered teenager of Alice Sebold's bestselling novel<a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/filmblog/2010/feb/22/the-lovely-bones-peter-jackson" title="Guardian: The Lovely Bones"> The Lovely Bones</a>, exploded onto the page in 2002 ? "My name was Salmon, like the fish; first name, Susie. I was fourteen when I was murdered on December 6, 1973" ? we've been treated to an abundance of skilfully drawn dead (or dying) teenage protagonists. Jenny Downham wowed critics and readers alike in 2007 with <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2007/jul/15/booksforchildrenandteenagers.features2" title="Guardian: Before I Die">Before I Die</a>, in which 16-year-old Tessa is trying to lose her virginity before she dies of leukaemia. Jay Asher had a word-of-mouth hit the same year with <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2010/jan/23/thirteen-reason-why-jay-asher" title="Guardian: Thirteen Reasons Why">Thirteen Reasons Why</a>, which saw 13 people sent a cassette tape by dead schoolgirl Hannah Baker, detailing the reasons why she committed suicide. Gabrielle Zevin impressed two years earlier with <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2005/oct/29/featuresreviews.guardianreview5" title="Guardian: Elsewhere">Elsewhere</a>, in which hit-and-run victim Liz Hall, 15, wakes up on a ship to Elsewhere, where inhabitants age in reverse until they return to Earth as babies.</p><p></p><p>And with The Lovely Bones back in the books charts thanks to the release this month of Peter Jackson's film, the trend looks set to continue. Lauren Oliver makes her authorial debut next week with Before I Fall, a pitch-perfect Groundhog Day/Lovely Bones hybrid in which 18-year-old Sam Kingston dies in a car crash, only to relive her last day again and again. "The thing is, you don't get to know. It's not like you wake up with a bad feeling in your stomach. You don't see any shadows where there shouldn't be any," writes Oliver. "You don't remember to tell your parents that you love them or ? in my case ? remember to say goodbye to them at all. If you're like me, you wake up seven minutes and 47 seconds before your best friend is supposed to be picking you up. You're too busy worrying about how many roses you're going to get on Cupid Day to do anything more than throw on your clothes, brush your teeth, and pray to God you left your make-up in the bottom of your messenger bag so you can do it in the car. If you're like me, your last day starts like this."</p><p></p><p>Oliver, 26, a former editorial assistant at Penguin in New York, says she was inspired not by The Lovely Bones, but by "a zeitgeist movement towards darker material". "I was affected by it," she says. "I'm including all the paranormal stuff, and the vampire books. We've come to think of them as a romance but it's a very dark picture of romance, when someone wants to kiss and kill you. There seemed to be pink covers everywhere, and teen stuff was flip and frivolous: a celebration of consumption. But the pendulum had been swinging back from chick lit for a while. Books are a reflection of culture [and] with the financial crash happening, people are feeling darker."</p><p></p><p>Having her protagonist Sam narrate from beyond the grave was, says Oliver, "there from the beginning". "This character with trouble seeing her life - it seemed to me from the start that one of the only ways for her to see clearly was by seeing her death as intimately linked with other people's lives."</p><p></p><p>Gayle Forman, who follows the thoughts of 17-year-old Mia as she lies in a coma after a car accident in her novel <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/If-I-Stay-Gayle-Forman/dp/0385616201" title="Amazon: If I Stay">If I Stay</a>, published last year, links the trend to Downham's Before I Die - "I still haven't been able to bring myself to read [it]; I'm such a wuss" ? and to Zevin's Elsewhere. But her own book, she says, stemmed from a very personal experience. "Years ago friends of mine were killed in an accident much like the one that kills Mia's family and one member of that family, a little boy, held on a little longer, and I always wondered: did he know? Did he choose to go with the rest of his family? So it was from years of obsessing over that question that Mia, a totally fictional character, popped into my head and took me on a journey to answer it," she says. "As I was writing the book, it did occur to me that there were similarities to The Lovely Bones (a book I love) in that the narrators were both out of body, but other than that, I see them as quite different: one narrator is dead and in heaven and omniscient; the other is out of body and aware only of what's going on around her, and still has some agency over her life."</p><p></p><p>Like Forman, Asher says his story stemmed from his own experiences ? he hadn't even read The Lovely Bones when he began writing it. "For me, I had a close relative attempt suicide when she was the same age as the girl in my book. So the issue of suicide had been important to me for several years," says Asher. "It was a very happy time in my life when I came up with the idea for my book. I simply stumbled upon a new way to discuss some very common teen issues. In fact, when death is presented in teen novels, it's often as a way to discuss issues and questions many people have at that age."</p><p></p><p>The popularity of these books, believes Forman, isn't necessarily because teenagers are drawn to the morbid ? more that they are attracted to dramatic stories with stark moral choices. "When you're at this age, you tend to be experiencing so much for the first time ? first love, first time away from home, first heartbreak ? so life is imbued with extra intensity," she says. "I think teens are drawn to books that reflect that drama, or which evoke feelings that match the emotional rollercoasters they're riding in their own lives. So, while I don't think a story necessarily has to be all sturm und drang, it needs to stir something up."</p><p></p><p>Cate Tiernan isn't so sure: she does perceive a certain yearning towards the macabre among teen readers. "Traditionally, teenagers tend to be fascinated by morbid topics," she says. "The Lovely Bones probably spurred an interest in a dead teenager narrating a compelling story ? you know it will be dramatic, because she's already dead. The storyline and impetus are in-built." Her new book, Immortal Beloved, out in September in the US and next January in the UK, follows the life of immortal teenager Nastasya who, says Tiernan, "can look forward neither to the dread nor the release of death: she's forced to continue living in the world day after day, forever".</p><p></p><p>Teenagers, Tiernan points out, are going through an enormous growth period ? the greatest they've experienced since they left infancy for toddlerhood. "I see 'morbid' topics as a way to safely explore extreme, even threatening emotions, to vicariously experience hard, even shocking events from the safety of one's own room," she says. "I remember being intrigued by death, as a teenager. Some of my friends died in high school, either by suicide or from stupidity, and while it was horribly final, it was also surreal. There was definitely a feeling of 'it couldn't happen to me.' Even dangerous situations didn't seem that bad. I look back on dumb stuff I did and wince."</p><p></p><p>The dead-narrator trope also works because it gives the protagonist almost superhuman powers, Tiernan believes. "The worst thing that can happen to someone is to die ? that's what your parents are desperately trying to protect you from all the time. If you're already dead (or dying), the worst has happened. You have nothing worse to fear. It frees you up, in a way," she muses. "If you're dead, you're untouchable. You can't be harmed. And you can step back and observe the world around you (as teens often do), without having to interact with it; without having much responsibility to change anything, without having to make hard choices or take a stand. Nor do you have the typical responsibilities that are the bane of every kid's existence: homework, chores, siblings, parental expectations."</p><p></p><p>At Hodder & Stoughton, editor Kate Howard is capitalising on the trend. She's publishing Oliver and Tiernan's novels over the next 12 months, as well as bestselling US novelist <a href="http://www.amazon.com/My-Name-Memory-Ann-Brashares/dp/1594487588" title="Amazon: My Name is Memory">Ann Brashares's My Name is Memory</a>, in which hero Daniel can recall his past lives, and recognise the souls of people he's previously known, in June. Howard believes that teenagers' fascination with the genre stems from their desire to push the boundaries. "Teenagers are at the stage in life where they feel invincible," she says. "Death seems so far away for them that it is something they can comfortably explore through books. Books offer teenagers a safe way of exploring the world, and many of the questions they have about life in general are confronted and dealt with in books such as these."</p><p></p><p>Lisa Schroeder, whose 2008 novel I Heart You, You Haunt Me sees a teenage girl's dead boyfriend come back to haunt her, agrees. "I think teens read about the dark stuff because they often feel like their lives are pretty dark. I get notes every week through my website from teens who tell me they are having a hard time," she says. "They tell me they can relate to Ava, the main character in my book. Most haven't experienced the death of a loved one recently, but the more general feelings of pain and isolation, they know well. I think there is something very cathartic in reading about another person's troubles."</p><div class="related" style="float: left; margin-right: 10px; margin-bottom: 10px;"><ul><li><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/booksforchildrenandteenagers">Children and teenagers</a></li></ul></div><div class="author"><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/profile/alisonflood">Alison Flood</a></div><br/><div class="terms"><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk">guardian.co.uk</a> © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our <a href="http://users.guardian.co.uk/help/article/0,,933909,00.html">Terms & Conditions</a> | <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/help/feeds">More Feeds</a></div><p style="clear:both" />
Michael Morpurgo's rules for writers
<div class="track"><img alt="" src="http://hits.guardian.co.uk/b/ss/guardiangu-feeds/1/H.20.3/52652?ns=guardian&pageName=Michael+Morpurgo%27s+rules+for+writers%3AArticle%3A1363023&ch=Books&c3=GU.co.uk&c4=Michael+Morpurgo+%28Author%29%2CChildren+and+teenagers+%28Books+genre%29%2CFiction+%28Books+genre%29%2CBooks%2CCulture+section&c6=Michael+Morpurgo&c7=10-Feb-23&c8=1363023&c9=Article&c10=Feature&c11=Books&c13=Rules+for+writers&c25=&c30=content&h2=GU%2FBooks%2FMichael+Morpurgo" width="1" height="1" /></div><p class="standfirst">We asked some of the most esteemed contemporary authors for any golden rules they bring to their writing practice. Here are Michael Morpurgo's</p><p>1 The prerequisite for me is to keep my well of ideas full. This means living as full and varied a life as possible, to have my antennae out all the time.</p><p>2 Ted Hughes gave me this advice and it works wonders: record moments, fleeting impressions, overheard dialogue, your own sadnesses and bewilderments and joys.</p><p>3 A notion for a story is for me a confluence of real events, historical perhaps, or from my own memory to create an exciting fusion.</p><p>4 It is the gestation time which counts.</p><p>5 Once the skeleton of the story is ready I begin talking about it, mostly to Clare, my wife, sounding her out.</p><p>6 By the time I sit down and face the blank page I am raring to go. I tell it as if I'm talking to my best friend or one of my grandchildren.</p><p>7 Once a chapter is scribbled down rough ? I write very small so I don't have to turn the page and face the next empty one ? Clare puts it on the word processor, prints it out, sometimes with her own comments added.</p><p>8 When I'm deep inside a story, living it as I write, I honestly don't know what will happen. I try not to dictate it, not to play God.</p><p>9 Once the book is finished in its first draft, I read it out loud to myself. How it sounds is hugely important.</p><p>10 With all editing, no matter how sensitive ? and I've been very lucky here ? I react sulkily at first, but then I settle down and get on with it, and a year later I have my book in my hand.</p><div class="related" style="float: left; margin-right: 10px; margin-bottom: 10px;"><ul><li><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/michaelmorpurgo">Michael Morpurgo</a></li><li><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/booksforchildrenandteenagers">Children and teenagers</a></li><li><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/fiction">Fiction</a></li></ul></div><div class="author"><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/profile/michaelmorpurgocontributor">Michael Morpurgo</a></div><br/><div class="terms"><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk">guardian.co.uk</a> © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our <a href="http://users.guardian.co.uk/help/article/0,,933909,00.html">Terms & Conditions</a> | <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/help/feeds">More Feeds</a></div><p style="clear:both" />
An epic excuse for violence | Imogen Russell Williams
<div class="track"><img alt="" src="http://hits.guardian.co.uk/b/ss/guardiangu-feeds/1/H.20.3/13324?ns=guardian&pageName=An+epic+excuse+for+violence+%7C+Imogen+Russell+Williams%3AArticle%3A1362709&ch=Books&c3=GU.co.uk&c4=Books%2CChildren+and+teenagers+%28Books+genre%29%2CSociety%2CChildren+%28Society%29%2CCulture+section&c6=Imogen+Russell+Williams&c7=10-Feb-23&c8=1362709&c9=Article&c10=Blogpost&c11=Books&c13=&c25=Books+blog&c30=content&h2=GU%2FBooks%2Fblog%2FBooks+blog" width="1" height="1" /></div><p class="standfirst">Are gruesome scenes in books for young people OK if they have an epic or mythological pedigree?</p><p>According to the Daily Mail, the children of today's Britain see violence everywhere and are raring to emulate it. <a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1169946/Celebrity-culture-fuelling-violence-sex-children-says-schools-tsar.html">Footballers' antics</a>, films and <a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-338269/TV-violence-u-does-u-make-child-aggressive.html">videogames</a>, even <a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1159766/Cartoon-violence-makes-children-aggressive.html">Saturday morning cartoons</a> are all conspiring to warp our bright-eyed youth into slack-jawed knife-wielders. Surely these young persons should turn off the telly and X-box and sit quietly, reading a book, before it's all too late? Oh, <a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1101971/Childrens-books-violent-need-health-warning.html/">wait</a>. </p><p>Violence in children's books is not a new trend, although it's an increasingly high-profile one. Gore and guts are no longer confined to the slightly shameful <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/booksblog/2008/may/07/whendidpointhorrorloseits">Point Horrors</a> on the back shelf; now they feature heavily in the titles shortlisted for the most prestigious children's writing prizes. To me, this isn't a bad thing, although I've realised I have a weird way of justifying it.</p><p>I recently reread Melvin Burgess's <a href="http://www.melvinburgess.net/Bloodtide.htm">Bloodtide</a> (1999), definitely the kind of book to provoke an apoplectic reaction from Ned Flanders. If you pick up a Burgess novel, you should know you're not about to enjoy <a href="http://lcweb2.loc.gov/cgi-bin/ampage?collId=rbc3&fileName=rbc0001_2003juv05880page.db&recNum=10">A Little Pretty Pocket-Book</a> ? Bloodtide, however, is wince-inducingly violent, even for <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2009/jun/08/melvin-burgess-controversial-publisher">Mr Controversial</a>. Three young men are staked out, shackles welded to their seared wrists, to be devoured by a huge genetically modified pig. One of the protagonists is hamstrung with wire-cutters ? the "horrible slack sensation" running up her thigh as her leg collapses into uselessness makes me queasy just thinking about it. And I imagine the Mail would have some sympathy with Conor the tyrant's approach to law and order ? dissidents run the risk of being nailed up by one heel, dripping black blood to the ground through a livid open mouth, <em>pour encourager les autres</em>. </p><p>Although I tend to be squeamish about on-page violence, I loved Bloodtide. But I quickly realised, surfing a little wave of shame, that the book's grisliness justified itself to me because it's a retelling of the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/V%C3%B6lsungasaga">Volsunga Saga</a>. I unconsciously made the same justification while reading the controversial <a href="http://jaeger_ayers.tripod.com/Borribles/book_summaries.htm">Borribles</a> trilogy for the first time. Having been a bit lukewarm about the grubby, light-fingered Borribles, when I detected Homeric notes in the great set-pieces ("a hopeless groan came from the Rumbles; their greatest warrior was slain", "eyes, teeth, bone and brains; and all of it slippery with a fast-thickening blood") Michael de Larrabeiti could do no wrong. It's epic, innit?</p><p>Realising that grim, wrist-deep violence in books for children and teenagers seems OK to me if it comes with an epic or mythological pedigree doesn't make me proud of myself ? it's a perspective as reductive and unhelpful as the Mail's kneejerk reaction to books with "knife" in the title. One day I'll wake up all salt-and-peppery, steel-rimmed as to pince-nez, and start two-year-old Tarquin on the Iliad in the original Greek before locking myself in my study with hard liquor and <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/booksblog/2009/aug/11/bad-bad-books">Robert Muchamore</a>. But I still feel that classically epic violence in books for children ? loosed knees, starting eyeballs, gouting blood and the like ? can be justified and balanced by epic scope. Bloodtide, Bloodsong, and the Borrible trilogy encompass the huge themes of human (or halfman or Borrible) existence ? love, betrayal, loss, destiny, death ? and, in that context, to pad the books with cartoon violence devoid of consequence, or to leave it out altogether, would be to let your readership down.</p><p>By contrast, reading Andy Mulligan's <a href="http://www.ribblestrop.co.uk/">Ribblestrop</a>, which gets shelved under "boarding-school romp", not a stone's throw from Angela Brazil and Eleanor M Brent-Dyer, in my mental library, I got very uneasy reading about kids incurring head-wounds, being stitched up with coarse thread and raw spirit, getting exposed to biological agents, losing their toes and excoriating themselves with ground glass. The farcical, Trinian-esque setting, peopled with characters no deeper than a desk-top caricature, jars with such realistic depiction ? it's a bit like watching a Tom and Jerry cartoon morph into an anti-visisection poster. </p><p>Do you feel violence is justified in writing for children and teenagers, or is there too much of it? Or, like me, do you have "blind spots" where anything goes?</p><div class="related" style="float: left; margin-right: 10px; margin-bottom: 10px;"><ul><li><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/booksforchildrenandteenagers">Children and teenagers</a></li><li><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/children">Children</a></li></ul></div><div class="author"><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/profile/imogenrussellwilliams">Imogen Russell Williams</a></div><br/><div class="terms"><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk">guardian.co.uk</a> © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our <a href="http://users.guardian.co.uk/help/article/0,,933909,00.html">Terms & Conditions</a> | <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/help/feeds">More Feeds</a></div><p style="clear:both" />
Michael Foreman: 50 years of picture books
<p><strong>Michael Foreman</strong>'s first picture book, The General, was published in 1961. In the half-century since he has become one of the best-known British writer-illustrators, with more than 300 titles for both adults and children. His acclaimed autobiography War Boy: A Country Childhood, which combines photographs and adverts with watercolours and pen-and-ink drawings, is now being exhibited at the National Army Museum</p><br/><p style="clear:both" />
Waldo Hunt obituary
<div class="track"><img alt="" src="http://hits.guardian.co.uk/b/ss/guardiangu-feeds/1/H.20.3/99995?ns=guardian&pageName=Waldo+Hunt+obituary%3AArticle%3A1360363&ch=Books&c3=Guardian&c4=Children+and+teenagers+%28Books+genre%29%2CBooks%2CCulture+section%2CUS+news&c6=Jan+Pienkowski&c7=10-Feb-17&c8=1360363&c9=Article&c10=Obituary&c11=Books&c13=&c25=&c30=content&h2=GU%2FBooks%2FChildren+and+teenagers" width="1" height="1" /></div><p class="standfirst">Entrepreneur and producer of brilliantly clever pop-up books</p><p>'Is anybody in?" were the first words that Waldo Hunt, who has died aged 88, spoke as he walked through my green front door, which became the cover of our Haunted House, one of the many pop-up books he created. It was 1979 and the publisher Judith Elliott, at Heinemann, had arranged a meeting to show Waldo the dummy I had made of the book. As he looked at it, he immediately began to see possibilities, such as the saw coming out of a wooden crate in the house's attic. "I can make this audio," he said ? and, indeed, the resulting book did make convincing sawing noises. Whatever was inside the crate was now trying to get out.</p><p>Our next meeting was in Los Angeles. The windows of Waldo's offices looked over LAX airport and, as we sat working with his paper engineer, Waldo locked us in so that we would not be disturbed. We worked on ? not even distracted by a hijack drama on the airport's main runway.</p><p>Waldo would swoop down on his collaborators without warning, making acute and sometimes devastating comments. Once, he picked up the dummy of a book by the slender beak of a mechanical bird in the centre spread, and whirled it around above his head. The paper engineer said stoically: "He's going to do that for five minutes, because that's what a five-year-old is going to do to it. If it survives, he'll let us go on to the next stage." It survived.</p><p>Waldo was born in Chicago; his father was a minister and his mother a music teacher. He grew up in California. After a short spell at Stanford University, California, he joined the army as a young officer. Curiously enough, his unit was involved in liberating my family in Bavaria, where my parents were working on a farm.</p><p>After the war, Waldo started an advertising agency in Los Angeles. He sold the agency to Compton Advertising in New York and then began to work for them. In New York, he saw a pop-up book by the Czech artist Vojtech Kuba?ta. It set him off on his life's work in revitalising mechanical books. Nobody was doing pop-ups in the west by then ? it was considered too costly, as it had to be done by hand. Waldo picked up the challenge.</p><p>In the early 60s, he founded the company Graphics International, which produced pop-up advertisements in magazines and pop-up greetings cards. He carried his samples in a handsome but battered leather case with brass corners ? throughout his career he never travelled without it, even when the weight of the case and the paper samples took their toll.</p><p>In 1965, Waldo began to create books for Random House. He had to find skilled handworkers to assemble the books' intricate mechanics. He developed partnerships with high-quality companies in the far east and South America. Waldo was indefatigable. His staying power was legendary and he was often the last to leave the office. He sold Graphics International to Hallmark in the late 60s, and formed his next company, Intervisual Communications, in 1974. Waldo was generous with his time and knowledge. He was a good boss and salesman, able to transmit his enthusiasm to hesitant publishers and conservative editors.</p><p>Most importantly, he had a flair for finding talented paper engineers and creative young people who invented new ways of making their books fresh and alive. He had a keen and boisterous sense of humour and bubbled with high spirits ? for example, in the saucy but irresistible adult book The Naughty Nineties, animating the Gibson Girl drawings. The minimalist elegance of the counting book How Many Bugs in a Box?, which started Waldo's collaboration with David A Carter; the ingenious detail of Jonathan Miller and David Pelham's The Human Body; and the bold and simple mouth mechanics of my Dinner Time show the skill of Waldo's paper engineers, combined with brilliant production.</p><p>Waldo's charm and aplomb can be illustrated by a typical bit of lateral thinking. He was negotiating a deal with a Colombian printer. Hours passed and they could not reach agreement, when suddenly Waldo rose to his feet and circled the table singing a popular romantic Spanish ballad. The deal was struck. He had a good voice; his ability must have been in the genes, as his niece, <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/2006/jul/06/guardianobituaries.usa" title="Lorraine Hunt Lieberson">Lorraine Hunt Lieberson</a>, became a world-class operatic soprano.</p><p>Waldo thought of his authors, artists and paper engineers as part of his family. Possibly that is why, as competition grew, he found it even harder to relive the successes he had enjoyed in his heyday. While it lasted, it was great for those whom he included in his magic circle.</p><p>Waldo retired in 2002. He is survived by his wife, Patricia, their daughters, Kimberly and Jamie; a daughter, Marsha, from a previous marriage; and his brother, Randy.</p><p><em>? </em>Waldo Henley Hunt, pop-up books maker, born 28 November 1920; died 6 November 2009</p><div class="related" style="float: left; margin-right: 10px; margin-bottom: 10px;"><ul><li><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/booksforchildrenandteenagers">Children and teenagers</a></li><li><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/usa">United States</a></li></ul></div><br/><div class="terms"><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk">guardian.co.uk</a> © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our <a href="http://users.guardian.co.uk/help/article/0,,933909,00.html">Terms & Conditions</a> | <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/help/feeds">More Feeds</a></div><p style="clear:both" />
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