Deluxe Librarian Action Figure

Librarian and iconic action figure Nancy Pearl was immortalized by Archie McPhee.
Now they have updated her look and given her a computer. She is beginning to look more and more like me. As one of my students asked as I demonstrated her amazing "shushing" action, "Mrs. P., is that YOU?"

School

School has started. Let the stories commence!
The NYPublic Library has wonderful photo archives .

The clothes look a little different but the look on kids' faces as they listen to a story has not changed.

The Nameless Novel

The Lady Rona has pointed me to the site for the "new" Lemony Snicket book. The book is due October 18th. My lovely niece will rejoice! Here's your heads up, Lauren!! If anyone can figure out the puzzle, you can!

A New Ibbotson

Big A Little a has pointed me to a new book by Eva Ibbotson, The Beasts of Clawstone Castle. The Sunday Times describes Ibbotson's books well.

Eva Ibbotson is known for two kinds of books — substantial historical adventures about faraway places and other times (Journey to the River Sea and The Star of Kazan), and shorter, fantastical tales of ghosts and magic. This sparky and humorous new book is of the second kind. It is the story of a brother and sister staying with eccentric relations in a decaying castle that does not cut the mustard as a tourist attraction.

Series: Nancy Drew

Here are several fun Nancy Drew websites.

Nancy Drew website by MysteryNet
Nancy Drew
Nancy Drew: Girl Sleuth, Girl Wonder

I owe my love of reading to this girl detective. I was also lucky enough to live overseas where television programming was only available for a few hours at night. If I had been overwhelmed with computers and video games and cable television at that formative age, I may never have acquired the reading bug.

I believe series readers become lifelong readers. You need to practice reading to become good at it.

So, thank you Stratemeyer Syndicate and Dav Pilkey and Walter Farley and Lemony Snicket and Brian Jacques and R.L. Stine and Mary Pope Osborne and ... You are drawing children to reading through your use of humor, adventure and thrills.

Series: The Hardy Boys

The Scout Report features:
Hardy-Boys.com
http://www.hardy-boys.com/

Seemingly ageless, Frank and Joe Hardy have been solving a host of
mysteries since 1927. Despite the rather formulaic nature of their
book-length adventures, they remain immensely popular, a fact that this website makes quite plain. On the site, visitors can learn much about the history of the series and its many incarnations in such media formats as LPs, television series, graphic novels, and so on. The site also contains hundreds of images of the book covers through the years, including a
number of international editions. Those who remember the different television series based on the boys' adventures will want to take a look through the television series section of the site, as they will no doubt enjoy seeing that oh-so popular 1970s teen "squeeze" Shaun Cassidy as Joe
Hardy.


You knew in every book, poor Joe was going to get hit on the head. It is a wonder that he did not suffer brain damage from the concussions. I was a Nancy Drew reader but would read the Hardy boys when I could not find any new Nancy Drews.

Daughter no. 1 loved the "Supermysteries" which had Nancy & co. and the brothers working together to solve mysteries.

Movie: The Brothers Grimm

I'm thinking this movie looks like fun.

Author: Jane Yolen

Newsweek has an interview with "Writing Dynamo" Jane Yolen (best viewed with Internet Explorer.)

Yolen keeps an online journal which is very personal at times. Even when she is just writing about simple things her writing shines. Your heart goes out to her family because her husband is battling cancer. Her descriptions of the World Science Fiction Con in Glasgow were great fun. She got to sit next to her friend, Alan Lee at dinner. Lucky to count him as a friend and lucky she got to talk to him about LOTR and New Zealand.

Author: Anthony Horowitz

I love the Alex Rider books. While I was looking at author Anthony Horowitz's website I realized he is the writer for one of my very favorite television series, Foyle's War.That is so much fun to know.

Michael Kitchen is wonderful as Foyle. The entire cast is great. I hope there will be a fourth series. On another site Kitchen discusses the extensive research Horowitz does and how they create the character.

Michael worked closely with writer Anthony Horowitz to create the character of Christopher Foyle, a quiet yet driven detective given the task of fighting crime on the 'home front'.

"Foyle is the product of Anthony's original scripts and whatever I bring to them by adding, rearranging or taking out - both of us concluding perhaps that less is more.

"Some writers are very tight about what they've written and it can be restricting. Anthony was very easy, very loose and we worked to get a draft which was going to get the best out of me and which also flowed. Anthony and Jill Green are great to work with and seem happy to accommodate what I've suggested."

Horowitz has a report on his visit to the Stormbreaker movie set on his site too.

Librarian and Iconic Action Figure: Nancy Pearl

Librarian and iconic action figure, Nancy Pearl is profiled in CSMonitor.com. She is a regular on NPR and is the author of Book Lust and More Book Lust. I can really identify with this:

When Nancy Pearl meets somebody new, she always asks, "What are you reading?" The retired librarian and self-professed "readaholic" cheerfully admits that she doesn't spend much time talking about gardening, housework, or the weather. "Books are really all I can talk about."

So true, so true. You can take the girl out of the library but you can't take the library out of the girl.

She is working on a Book Lust for children. I appreciate her 50 page rule. I have a couple of books on the proverbial nightstand that I am going to get back to someday.

She expounds what she calls the "50 page" rule: If a book doesn't grab you in the first 50 pages, put it down and try something else. Life is short, and there are many books to read. (She often returns to finish books she set aside. Reading enjoyment is as much a matter of the reader's mood as it is the style and content of the book, she says.)

A kid is not going to give the author 50 pages to make good, they MIGHT give them to the end of page 2 and then that book is history. That is why children's books are so good and I enjoy them so much.