I Heart Mo Willems

Mo Willems, author and illustrator was in Dublin week before last for a flying visit. There is a quick run down on his own blog and his interview with Ryan Tubridy is available here. Go to the show on Friday 13th June and Mo’s interview is in the last fifteen minutes. Mo also managed to squeeze in a quick chat with Sarah Webb as she was guest presenting on East Coast Fm.

I’m gutted that I missed a chance to meet the man when he was signing in Eason’s but I am glad that missing him prompted me to go back to his site and find this gem- Willems advice for budding writers and illustrators is -

Remember, your job is to think ABOUT your audience, not FOR your audience

I can’t think of a better piece of advice for anyone interested in engaging young readers!

Laughing Len and Live Literature

For some time now, I’ve been thinking about Live Literature and where it fits in the wider arts landscape. By live literature I primarily mean an author reading. The truly outstanding Leonard Cohen may me think on it further when I was lucky enough to see him play last Friday evening in Kilmainham. During his set 12,000 people listened intently as he spoke a poem You Came To Me This Morning (For Sandy 1945-1998), also known as the lyric to A Thousand Kisses Deep

It did allow me to make a very obvious comparison between song and word. I can’t think of a writer who could draw more than 10,000 out on a Friday evening. Is the experience of the spoken word more particularly a personal private one or can it connect with a stadium crowd? Is an author speaking their words enough or do we inevitably wait for Q&A and ‘added value’? In the world of children’s books it seems authors and illustrator must possess a bag of tricks to deliver their words – from Eoin Colfer’s Stand Up routine to creative writing workshops and I’m not sure it’s fair – we don’t expect visual artists to juggle their paints do we?

The rise and rise of Book Clubs

Picador publishers have a really interesting piece about book clubs over on their site – and they are certainly a phenomenon that just keeps on growing. Caitriona Row from Picador writes that there are “now an estimated 20 million book club members in the USA, a number which has doubled in size in the last eight years.“

Closer to home – The Tubridy Show on Rte Radio has played a part in spreading the book club message and increasingly libraries are using book clubs with younger and older readers.

I’ve been lucky enough to meet Trim Library children’s book group over the past two months as we work on a children’s charter together- more of that to follow next month – and it is inspiring to see a group of young readers so energised by a shared reading experience that they are literally all jumping up and down to contribute an opinion. What I underestimated before I met them was how divergent their opinions would be – they rarely all like the same book and we’ve had some great discussions about the CBI Bisto Shortlist and Winners of late. They have also shown me just how aware young readers are about what persuades them to make certain reading choices – and just how gender divided much of the books for young readers are! By that I mean that the readers in Trim often struggle to find a book that works for both boys and girls.

Edited to add – if you scan the comments for Caitriona’s piece you’ll see that this gender divide is not just confined to our reading group in Trim!

anyway stay tuned to the blog to hear more about the charter development process and this very talented bunch!

Amazon.com’s Head Honcho explains the Kindle

Amazon have certainly made an impact with the Kindle, the portable electronic book device. In the Wall Street Journal article, Jeffrey P Bezos outlines the rationale behind Amazon’s new move. They are reluctant to admit how many Kindle’s have been sold but Bezos makes some interesting points.

“Over some time horizon, books will be read on electronic devices. Physical books won’t completely go away, just as horses haven’t completely gone away. But there is no sinecure for any technology. If you think about books, it’s astonishing. It’s very hard to find a technology that has remained in mostly the same form for 500 years. And anything that has stubbornly resisted improvement for 500 years is going to be hard to improve.

That is what we’re trying to do with Kindle. We see this as an effort to improve upon the book, even though it’s resisted change for 500 years.

To do that, you have to capture the essential element of a book, which is that it disappears when you get into the flow of the story. None of us when we’re reading a book think about the ink and the glue and the stitching. All that fades away, and you get into the author’s universe.

Sometimes big, heavy hardcover books do break you out of the flow because you get hand fatigue. Or turning pages can be loud if you have a spouse sleeping next to you. There are things about physical books that we’re accustomed to but that actually aren’t very good.

But you also can’t ever out-book the book. You need to look for a series of things that you can do with an electronic device like Kindle that you could never do with a physical book.

Some of them can be pretty simple, like dictionary lookup. I find I don’t know what lots of words mean, and I used to guess because — am I really going to get up off of the sofa and go find a dictionary?

Changing the font size, a very simple thing that’s much appreciated.

And then some whoppers. The big whopper is wireless delivery of books in less than 60 seconds. You don’t have the cognitive overhead of thinking about your monthly wireless bill. You don’t have to know who the wireless carrier is. We’re hiding all of that complexity.”

He goes on to make a strange analogy between books and horses -

I’m sure people love their horses, too. But you’re not going to keep riding your horse to work just because you love your horse. It’s our job to build something that is better than a physical book. The reason we love physical books is because we have had so many great experiences with that object in our hands that we have nice associations with it.

We’re not trying to displace people’s love of that physical object that is the book. It’s a hallowed invention. The thing to keep in mind is what’s really important is not the container, it’s the narrative. Long-form reading is important for our society.”

Full text of the interview is available on the Wall Street Journal Site

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB121261272441346269.html?mod=e-commerce_primary_hs

Seattle’s Public Library

Ted.com has a host of interesting topics that you could loose yourself in – particularly useful for a train journey if you subscribe to the podcasts – but this one is a really interesting look about how architects and librarians worked together to design new library space.
http://www.ted.com/talks/view/id/49

It’s obvious the social role of the library proved a difficult point to reach consensus on but the finished building really does look incredible. I particularly like the book spiral. Would be good to know more about the children’s area though.

While you’re on the Ted site you might also like to see the Ken Robinson piece about creativity in schools. I’m not sure I agree 100% with him but his delivery style is so engaging that it barely seems to matter by the end.

http://www.ted.com/talks/view/id/66

Kate Thompson

Niall MacMonagle gave Kate Thompson a very favourable review in the book section of Saturday’s Irish Times. It really is a terrific read which showcases Kate’s great skill in blending the fantastical with ordinary family life. David Maybury has an interesting review  also

For those who are interested in hearing more about Creature of the Night, CBI will present Kate in conversation with Robert Dunbar and Scottish author Keith Gray, in the National Library on Monday June 30th from 6.30pm

Tickets are free but should be booked in advance by contacting CBI – 01 8727475/info@childrensbooksireland.ie

Ps Kate Thompson for Aosdana anyone?

The age banding debate

There has been something of a kerfuffle among authors, illustrators and publishers in recent weeks concerning the inclusion of age guidelines on the cover of books for children. Publishers argue that adults need some guidance when choosing books for young people, authors and illustrators are countering that fundamentally what is best for the child should prevail.

Young readers are notoriously diverse, in interests, in ability and in enthusiasm for reading. It is likely that whatever age range might be attached to a book will be inaccurate for about 40% of the readers. A 7 year old who is a strong reader might be enjoying the same book as a 10 year old who isn’t so strong. And there in lies the problem… a one age range fits all will never fit all. If you are a poor reader aged 9, your confidence is not going to be helped by realising most of your reading material is branded 7+.

Equally confident readers may find there material curtailed by an over enthusiastic adult, librarian or bookseller. Darran Shan is convinced this will go one step further and end in publishers controlling more and more what ends up in books for young people. Darren put up a spirited opposition to the new idea on George Hook’s show on Newstalk last week. He has also been busy commenting on Achuka’s Blog and The Bookseller.com and Publishing News

Many of the heavyweight UK authors have signed up to www.notoagebanding.org including Michael Rosen, Michael Morpurgo, Jacqueline Wilson, Anne Fine and Melvin Burgess. Meg Rosoff seems to be a lone dissenting voice, among the authors certainly, over on the Guardian’s Book Blog.

I’ve a feeling that we are heading towards patchy age ranging with some publishers going ahead with age banding and others bowing to pressure from their authors and not proceeding. What yet may be the most interesting aspect of this is when age branded and non age branded titles go head to head in bookshops…..

Hello world!

Right so – this is the first post from Very Hungry Caterpillar. This blog will be dedicated to all issues around children’s books and reading in Ireland. In my role with  www.childrensbooksireland.ie I am constantly unearthing little nuggets of information about children, books, reading, libraries and authors and illustrators. Recently I’ve realised that I am constantly sending links to different people and I thought it would make more sense to organise this information into something more coherent.

And so Very Hungry Caterpillar was born. I intend to keep this blog updated and active, provided CBI doesn’t get in the way too much. I’ll also try to keep the focus Irish and International at the same time. If you have suggestions for inclusion in the Blog or the Blog roll, do please send them in. I’ll include anything that seems relevant but be warned I won’t just copy and paste your press release to fill space……..

Thanks for visiting and do please keep updated with VHC