Welcome to another installment in my attempts to build the perfect children’s library for my niece and, in so doing, guide others to great books for young people. Indeed, this post is being published as I depart to visit Emily – carrying three of the books mentioned below! (See if you can guess which three.) Jim Averbeck and
The “new” Seuss book (due out tomorrow) is attracting a lot of notice – some of it, unfortunately, in verse. Â It is possible to write great ersatz Seuss. Â But it’s not easy. For faux Seuss, you must know Seuss. Â It helps, too, if you’re a poet. Michiko Kakutani’s metrical mess offers an excellent caution to
upgrade vortex, n. The hidden temporal, cognitive, and/or financial costs of getting a new electronic device (tablet, smart phone, computer, etc.). We need a term to describe the experience of obtaining a new technological item, and then the (guaranteed but never mentioned) troubleshooting and cost that inevitably follows. I propose “upgrade vortex” – upgrade both
I think music is everything. Without music, I don’t think there’d be life; there would be no world left, then. Everybody’d be downhearted. Don’t you think so? – unidentified plumber, on opening track of Tony Schwartz’s Millions of Musicians (1956) Whether you have young people in your life or simply like light-hearted music, here are five songs
For America’s Independence Day, here’s a little-known chapter in the history of American anti-racism. Following the Second World War, progressives founded a dozen planned integrated communities across the country. While working on my biography of Crockett Johnson and Ruth Krauss, I learned about one of those communities – a section of Norwalk Connecticut directly adjacent
Jim Averbeck and Yasmeen Ismail’s One Word from Sophia (2015) was published this month. Here are for reasons you should get (buy, borrow, barter) the book for the young people in your life –Â or for yourself. (Grown-ups can read children’s books, too, you know.) It’s funny. Sophia wants a giraffe for her birthday. So, of
In response to concerns expressed by some members of my family, I have removed this blog post. This marks the first time that I’ve removed or changed something for reasons other than finding an error or a typo. This post will not reappear here. Â But nor will it completely disappear. Â I plan to revise and
Emmylou Harris has that catch in her voice. When she sings, the lyrics seem poised perfectly, uneasily, between her beautiful, glistening tone and a deep well of intense emotion – often, pain or longing. Her voice says: the world is broken, we are broken, but this music will keep us afloat… for now. When First Aid
Wills offer unique insights into people’s lives – what they value most, how they see themselves, how they hope to be remembered. Ruth Krauss left most of her estate to homeless children, a fact which floored Maurice Sendak, when I told him: she died the same year that We’re All in the Dumps with Jack
The best picture-book debut of 2015 is Rowboat Watkins’ Rude Cakes. Yes, I know it’s only May 7th. And I don’t claim to have read every picture book published thus far. But it’s going to be hard to top this one. (Spoiler alert! There are spoilers below! Lots of them!) The notion of an ill-mannered,