Fiction

The Social Aspect of Reading OR Books & Friends

By on May 22, 2015   /   Book Lists, Fiction, For Kids, For Librarians, For Parents, For Teachers, For Writers  

We usually think of reading as a solitary activity. Reading a book is so very lovely when we can curl up in our cozy armchair or under a blanket, sipping tea – or Dr. Pepper – and fully immerse ourselves. Shutting out the real world. Being transformed by the experience. 

Even the author who wrote the book disappears when the story is enthralling and the writing transports us to a whole new world.

But this post is how reading is a social experience, too.

First, let me tell you a story.

Childhood-friend-250712I met my childhood best friend in Kindergarten. Her name was Starr and we instantly hit it off. From Kindergarten through 6th grade, Starr and I were inseparable.

One of the things we both had a passion for was a love of books. We read ferociously, taking trips to the library together and purchasing stacks of Scholastic Book Club titles. We talked books constantly and laughed and cried over books for the next seven years. The first picture taken of us in Kindergarten is the two of us sitting together, our heads bent over a book. (I wish I knew what book it was, but alas, the picture keeps this little tidbit a secret).

Every afternoon we were either at my house or her house (although we had to learn how to cross a very busy street), and we spent a great deal of our time together bringing stories alive by dressing up and creating adventures and characters from the worlds of the books we’d read. (Kind of like dramatic fan fiction loooong before the term fan-fiction was coined.)

We especially loved The Little House books and loved to pretend that we were living in the Olden Days. During Friday night sleepovers we talked endlessly, ate brownie dough raw, squealed when our big brothers teased us and made fun of our “characters” when they caught us acting out our stories.

By age 9-10 we began to create our own stories. My first official “novel” was authored by the two of us. My favorite books were historicals, contemporary, and magic elizabethmagical realism , but for some reason Starr and I wrote a science fiction book about two girls kidnapped by aliens and taken to the misty world of Venus far across space. It was full of danger and daring as we hijacked the spacecraft to get back to Earth.

Whenever Starr and I were writing stories we used pen names; our middle names of Elizabeth and Anne respectively. Of course. Because we loved our middle names more than our first names, and they sounded so much more grown-up.

I’ll never forget the power that reading Harriet the Spy had on me. I imprinted with that book. I became Harriet. For many wonderful summer afternoons Starr and I armed ourselves with our notebooks and proceeded to spy on her family. She had a marvelous backyard with a big weeping willow tree, a play house, and a big tree-house with a fire station type sliding pole for quick getaways when *enemies* AKA brothers and sisters came lurking. These various locales – so close to the safety of the back door of the house! – were perfect for surreptitious eavesdropping.

Harriet the SpyWhat followed were many happy years of reading a book a day and pounding out “novels” on my father’s typewriter in his garage office.

High school brought lots of changes and, unfortunately, Starr and I never once had a class together or activity. We drifted apart due to different extracurricular activities and making new friends through our different churches.

College and then marriage took me out of state from where I grew up in the Bay Area. I haven’t seen or corresponded with Starr in over 30 years. I attended my 20th high school reunion hoping to reunite with her there, but she did not attend and nobody seemed to know how to contact her. But I fondly remember the power of our friendship, our closeness, our loyalty—and the power of books that welded us together.

I’ve had close friendships since my childhood days, but none that have been as close or as strong (not counting my husband!) as the one with Starr. Would I be the writer I am today without our live-action fan fiction, story-writing, and endless imagining?

The desire to create my own books and see them published was borne deep within me at a very early age. But I think Starr gave me the courage to begin, to not hold back, to try. I was horribly shy and Starr had much more self-confidence than I did. With Starr, I believed that the magic was real. Because it was so much less scary and overwhelming to dream together, to brainstorm together, and to put those ideas down on paper together. It was a true gift of our friendship.

Thank you, Starr, wherever you are.

Today there are dozens of places online and in the Real World where reading has become more social than ever before. Goodreads, Facebook, Twitter, Book Blogs, Book Clubs, Literacy nights, or Author book launches are all places readers converge to discuss and enthuse about books.

Book ClubWe discuss books in public and in the privacy of our homes in a more expansive way than I’ve ever seen before. We bond over books, don’t we??

I personally love the fact that public awareness of books, especially children’s books, is at a higher rate than ever before. Statistics show that children’s books are selling at twice the rate they used to just 10 years ago.

In the comments, please tell us about your childhood book friendships, your adult book friendships and any book clubs you participate in. How have they influenced your reading life? The good, the bad, and the enlightening!

Cheers!

Kimberley

Kimberley Griffiths Little’s best ideas come when taking long hot baths, but instead of a sunken black marble tub with gold faucets and a dragon-shaped spigot, she has New Mexico hand-painted tiles in her adobe home along the Rio Grande.

Her seven Middle-Grade novels with Knopf and Scholastic have won several awards and Forbidden, the first of a Young Adult trilogy recently published with Harpercollins. Find Kimberley on Facebook. and Twitter @KimberleyGLittl. Teacher’s Guides, Mother/Daughter Book Club Guides, and fabulous book trailers “filmed on location” at Kimberley’s website.

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Chicken!

By on May 20, 2015   /   Book Lists, Common Core & NGSS, Fiction, MUF Contributor Books, Nonfiction  
Photo from http://commons.m.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Buff_Orpington_chicken,_UK.jpg by Pete Cooper

Photo from Wikimedia by Pete Cooper. Used by creative commons license.

No, I’m not calling you a chicken. I’m just really excited to talk about live poultry. Isn’t everyone?

Wait, that’s just me?

Oh. Oops.

In all seriousness, I am a farm girl at heart. As a child I spent my summers on my grandparents’ small farm in Idaho, and though today I live in the suburbs, I look back fondly at the rural lifestyle I was lucky enough to live three months out of the year while growing up. Nowadays I love working in my many flower beds, I take care of a big vegetable garden every year, and I have recently added a small orchard to my growing list of backyard horticultural accomplishments.

And, yes, I’ll admit, I have been contemplating purchasing a few chickens as well. But I’ve only be thinking about it.  I haven’t actually, you know, done anything yet….

Okay, fine, I confess.  Last month I did take a little field trip to the local ranch store, but just to look at the cute baby chicks they had for sale. (You don’t really need to know that while I was there I priced out everything I’d need for chickens,  including the little cluckers themselves, so I’d have a very good idea what this new venture would cost me. I didn’t actually buy anything, so that’s the same as not doing anything, right?)

Since chickens have been on my mind a lot these past few weeks, this has led to talking chickens with my middle-grade-age kids, too.  And I thought it would be good to fuel any budding interest with some age-appropriate chicken literature.  I was pleasantly surprised to find several titles I could give them.

And since we all could use a little more chicken literature in our lives (don’t laugh!), I’m sharing my list with you today.  Note that some of these titles are targeted for younger kids ages 6-9. All descriptions are from Indiebound unless otherwise noted:

FROM A MIXED-UP FILES ALUM:

The Map of Me by Tami Lewis Brown

Summary: The note Momma left on the fridge says only: “I HAVE TO GO.” But go where? Twelve-year-old Margie is convinced that Momma’s gone to the Rooster Romp at the International Poultry Hall of Fame, in search of additions to her precious flock of chicken memorabilia. And it’s up to Margie to bring her home. So she commandeers her daddy’s Faithful Ford, kidnaps her nine-year-old sister, Peep, and takes to the open road.

As she navigates the back roads of Kentucky with smarty-pants Peep criticizing her every move, Margie also travels along the highways and byways of her heart, mapping a course to help understand Momma–and herself.

CLASSIC TITLES:

The Hoboken Chicken Emergency by Daniel Pinkwater

Summary: When Arthur Bobowicz is sent out to bring home the family’s Thanksgiving turkey, he returns instead with Henrietta — a 266 pound chicken with a mind of her own. Feathers fly when this colossal clucker descends upon Hoboken, New Jersey. Thus begins the hilarious hen-tastic tall tale that has kept readers in stitches since Henrietta first pecked her way onto the scene in 1977.

Whittington by Alan Armstrong

Summary: This Newbery-Honor winning tale introduces Whittington, a roughneck Tom who arrives one day at a barn full of rescued animals and asks for a place there. He spins for the animals–as well as for Ben and Abby, the kids whose grandfather does the rescuing–a yarn about his ancestor, the nameless cat who brought Dick Whittington to the heights of wealth and power in 16th-century England. This is an unforgettable tale about the healing, transcendent power of storytelling, and how learning to read saves one little boy.

NON-FICTION TITLES:

A Kid’s Guide to Keeping Chickens by Melissa Caughey

Summary: Chickens make wonderful pets, and Melissa Caughey (author of the award-winning blog “Tilly’s Nest”) provides all the information kids need to raise healthy chickens and have tons of fun doing it. Caughey shares her advice in an engaging way so that kids understand what it means to keep chickens and what kind of housing, food, equipment, and care the chickens will need to thrive. She also suggests lots of creative activities sure to spark enthusiasm and imagination, such as speaking chicken, creating a veggie piñata for the flock, and making a chicken fort in the backyard. She even offers ten egg-centric recipes that kids will love to make and eat, including egg drop soup and Mexican egg pizza. Includes a colorful pull-out poster.


ChickensChickens: Hens, Roosters, and Chicks by Lorijo Metz

Summary: Kids who visit farms are often charmed by the clucking, crowing, and chirping of chickens. This fun book is full of interesting facts about the worlds most common bird.

Chicken Games & Puzzles by Patrick Merrell and Helene Hovanec

Summary: This collection of 100 chicken-themed challenges is really something to cluck about Kids ages 6 to 9 will love these adorably illustrated mazes, codes, brainteasers, logic puzzles, word searches, jokes and riddles, tongue twisters, and picture puzzles. It’s a barnyard of fun that will make you cackle.

How to Draw a Chicken by Jean-Vincent Senac

Summary: Anyone can draw a chicken, right? Follow Jean-Vincent Senac’s attempts to draw one as he has to contend with runaway beaks, sleeping eggs, and hungry hens. The entertaining characters and witty text in this book of simple outline drawings, much like a flip-book, will charm readers of all ages and encourage children and adults alike to draw with humor and imagination.

Illustrated throughout in Senac’s unique style, this little book will encourage drawing while making readers laugh out loud.

FICTION TITLES:

Unusual Chickens for the Exceptional Poultry Farmer by Kelly Jones

Summary: Fans of Polly Horvath or Roald Dahl will love this quirky story of a determined girl, and some extraordinary chickens.

Twelve-year-old Sophie Brown feels like a fish out of water when she and her parents move from Los Angeles to the farm they’ve inherited from a great-uncle. But farm life gets more interesting when a cranky chicken appears and Sophie discovers the hen can move objects with the power of her little chicken brain: jam jars, the latch to her henhouse, the “entire” henhouse….

And then more of her great-uncle’s unusual chickens come home to roost. Determined, resourceful Sophie learns to care for her flock, earning money for chicken feed, collecting eggs. But when a respected local farmer tries to steal them, Sophie must find a way to keep them (and their superpowers) safe.
Told in letters to Sophie’s “abuela, ” quizzes, a chicken-care correspondence course, to-do lists, and more, “Unusual Chickens” is a quirky, clucky classic in the making.

Chicken Boy by Frances O’Roark Dowell

Summary: Meet Tobin McCauley. He’s got a near-certifiable grandmother, a pack of juvenile-delinquent siblings, and a dad who’s not going to win father of the year any time soon. To top it off, Tobin’s only friend truly believes that the study of chickens will reveal…the meaning of life? Getting through seventh grade isn’t easy for anyone, but when the first day of school starts out with your granny’s arrest, you know you’ve got real problems. Throw on a five-day suspension, a chicken that lays green eggs, and a family feud that’s tearing everyone to pieces, and you’re in for one heck of a ride.

The Chicken Doesn’t Skate by Gordon Korman

Summary: What do a scientist, a screenwriter, and a hockey team all have in common?
A chicken!

Milo has a problem. He’s trying to do a project on the food chain, so he charts the growth of a baby chick, and makes arrangements to serve his specimen to the judges at the science fair. But he’s baffled by the rest of his class. They name the chick Henrietta. They sign up to take her home on weekends. They claim that she’s a good luck charm, a friend, even the new hockey team mascot!

Milo just wants to win the science fair to impress his dad. But when the class finds out that Henrietta will be cooked and eaten for Milo’s project, everyone panics!

Prairie Evers by Ellen Airgood

Summary: This charming, coming-of-age story is perfect for fans of Joan Bauer and Sheila Turnage.
Prairie Evers is finding that school isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. She’s always been homeschooled by her grandmother, learning about life while they ramble through the woods. But now Prairie’s family has moved north and she has to attend school for the first time, where her education is in a classroom and the behavior of her classmates isn’t very nice. The only good thing is meeting Ivy, her first true friend. Prairie wants to be a good friend, even though she can be clueless at times. But when Ivy’s world is about to fall apart and she needs a friend most, Prairie is right there for her, corralling all her optimism and determination to hatch a plan to help.
Wonderful writing and an engaging narrator distinguish this lively story that celebrates friendship of every kind.

The Great Chicken Debacle by Phyllis Reynolds Naylor

Summary: May all your chickens come home to roost. If they had only known what trouble lay ahead, maybe, just maybe the Morgan children and their friend Deeter wouldn t have agreed to mind No-Name, the world’s ugliest chicken. Maybe they could have avoided camping out with it; confronting its archenemy, the fox; grappling with its abductors. But then again, maybe the whole madhouse caper was inevitable.

The Chicken Dance by Jacques Couvillon

Summary: On his birthday, Don Schmidt spends the day waiting patiently for his big surprise–“a cake, presents, maybe a Chinese clown” . . . . But instead, his batty parents get into their monthly argument. This time it’s because his mother has to feed the chickens. It ends with her shouting the same thing as always about their Louisiana chicken farm: “I hate it here.”

What follows is Don’s journey from obscurity to fame and back again, when he becomes the youngest kid to ever win the Horse Island Dairy Festival chicken-judging contest. Gradually, his mom notices that something strange is going on–everyone knows her son –but once she realizes that Don has become the town celebrity, she sees that there may be benefits to living on a chicken farm. What she doesn’t seem to see are the benefits of having a son like Don.

For Don, the contest is the beginning of a big, big adventure. It involves trips to New Orleans and Baton Rouge, fair weather friends, a missing sister, and one big secret. Readers will cheer for Don, who goes out of his way to see the good in everything.

Quinny & Hopper by Brad Schanen Adriana

Summary: Quinny has a lot to say. Hopper gets to the point.

Quinny has one speed: very, very, extra-very fast. Hopper proceeds with caution.

Quinny has big ideas. Hopper has smart solutions.

Quinny and Hopper couldn’t be more different. They are an unstoppable team.
But when summer ends, things suddenly aren’t the same. Can Quinny and Hopper stick together in the face of stylish bullies, a killer chicken, and the brand-new Third Grade Rules-especially the one that says they aren’t allowed to be friends anymore?

Kate Walden Directs: Night of the Zombie Chickens by Julie Mata

Summary: Night of the Zombie Chickens is supposed to be Kate Walden’s breakout film. But her supporting actresses-her mother’s prize organic hens-are high maintenance, to say the least. Thank goodness Kate’s best friend Alyssa is the star. She’s great at screaming and even better at killing zombies in creative ways.
But when Alyssa turns into a real-life soulless zombie and ditches Kate for the most popular girl in seventh grade, Kate suddenly finds herself both friendless and starless. Now, thanks to Alyssa’s new crowd, Kate is the butt of every joke at school and consigned to the loser table at lunch.

If movies have taught Kate anything, it’s that the good guy can always win-with the right script. And her fellow social outcasts may be the key to her own happy ending. Kate hatches the perfect revenge plot against her former best friend, but even though her screenplay is foolproof, Kate soon realizes that nothing-in filmmaking or in life-ever goes exactly as planned. Especially when there are diabolical hens out to get you.

Love, Ruby Lavender by Deborah Wiles

Summary: When Ruby’s grandmother, Miss Eula goes to visit her new grandbaby in Hawaii, Ruby is sure that she will have a lonely, empty, horrible summer without her in boring old Halleluia, Mississippi. What happens instead? She makes a new friend, saves the school play, writes plenty of letters to her favorite (and only) grandmother . . . and finally learns to stop blaming herself for her grandfather’s death. Not too bad, for a nine-year-old.

The Secret Chicken Society by Judy Cox

Summary: When Daniel’s class hatches chicks as a science project, he adopts them. After he finds out that his favorite bird, Peepers, isn’t a hen but a rooster, and therefore illegal to keep in the city of Portland, the Secret Chicken Society is quickly formed to save Peepers.

CHICKENS IN A SERIES:

Hank the Cowdog: The Case of the Falling Sky by John R. Erickson

Summary: When Hank hears a rumor that the sky is going to fall from the ranch’s resident rooster, he is naturally a bit skeptical. But then a report from Pete the Barncat and a strange dream seem to support the theory, and Hank realizes that he’d better take the threat seriously. So Hank decides that he’ll do whatever it takes to prevent the sky from falling on his beloved ranch. Even if it means getting into trouble with Sally May (again)…

Also check out The Case of the Tender Cheeping Chickies in the Hank the Cowdog Series.

Kung Pow Chicken: Let’s Get Cracking! by Cyndi Marko

Summary from Amazon: Kung Pow Chicken is the superhero everyone has been waiting for!

This series is part of Scholastic’s early chapter book line called Branches, which is aimed at newly independent readers. With easy-to-read text, high-interest content, fast-paced plots, and illustrations on every page, these books will boost reading confidence and stamina. Branches books help readers grow!

In this exciting full-color series, Gordon Blue transforms into Kung Pow Chicken, an avian superhero who fights crime in the city of Fowladelphia. The first book in the series kicks off when Gordon’s birdy senses lead him to a festival. Suddenly, POOF! Feathers fill the air and shivering naked chickens are everywhere. Why have all these chickens lost their feathers? Forced to wear wooly sweaters, the city itches for a hero. Kung Pow Chicken hops into his Beakmobile to save the day!

Also check out the other titles in this hilarious series: Bok! Bok! Boom!; The Birdy Snatchers; and Heroes on the Side.

Supernatural Rubber Chicken: Fowl Language by D.L. Garfinkle

Summary: Meet the world’s first superpower-granting, smart-alecky, supernatural rubber chicken!

It all starts when ten-year old twing Nate and Lisa Zupinski discover a rubber chicken lying in a pile of their brother’s dirty laundry. “Dudes,” Dave says, “It’s a supernatural rubber chicken. He’s, like, magic. He’ll give the first person who touches him a superpower. And you guys get to pick which power.” Lisa and Nate don’t believe a word their airhead brother says, but then the chicken starts talking!

“Get me off of Dave’s dirty underwear!”

Lisa decides to ask the chicken to turn her shy friend Ashley into a charming speaker. But when big bully Hulk Paine gets his hands on the chicken, super charm turns into super trouble! From acclaimed author and humorist D.L. Garfinkle comes a new series so silly, so slapstick, it’s supernatural!

Also check out the other titles in this series: Poultry in Motion and Fine Feathered Four Eyes

AND TWO MIDDLE-GRADE PICTURE BOOKS:

A Chicken Followed Me Home!: Questions and Answers about a Familiar Fowl by Robin Page

Summary: Why did the chicken cross the road? To follow you home! Learn all about a not-so-basic bird in this delightful nonfiction picture book.

What’s that? A “chicken” followed you home? Now what do you do?

Celebrated author-illustrator Robin Page leads a step-by-step, question-and-answer-style journey through the world of chickens. Along the way you’ll explore different breeds, discover different types of coops, and learn everything there is to know about chicken reproduction and hatching.

Gorgeous, playful, and filled with facts, this engaging nonfiction picture book shines new light on a very familiar fowl.

One Hen: How One Small Loan Made a Big Difference by Katie Smith Milway

Summary: Inspired by true events, One Hen tells the story of Kojo, a boy from Ghana who turns a small loan into a thriving farm and a livelihood for many.

—

Elissa Cruz finds chickens interesting.  She writes fiction for kids and teens and her current middle-grade work-in-progress does have some chickens in it, but they only show up occasionally.  She lives with her husband and five children in Utah, and together they own a dog and a fish but no chickens…at least, not yet, anyway.

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Blue Birds: Insights from Caroline Starr Rose

By on May 18, 2015   /   Author Interviews, Fiction  

BlueBirds_CVCaroline Starr Rose is a former history teacher and author of the starred novel in verse, May B. Her new historical middle grade novel Blue Birds (G.P. Putnam’s Sons/Penguin Group USA, 2015) is set in 1587. It’s the honest and gripping story of Alis, one of the unwelcome English settlers on Roanoke Island. Kimi, a member of the Roanoke tribe, has lost both her father and her sister to violent attacks from the colonists. Despite language and mistrust, the two girls find friendship.

MUF: History clearly inspires you. When do you turn from research to story?

CSR: I am not an author who is oozing with plots and characters. Instead I start with an era or event that I want to explore, and I trust ideas will start to grow out of what I’m learning and from the “what if” questions I pose. I need to immerse myself in my study until I feel confident with the material. By the time I start thinking of story, it feels like a natural outgrowth of the history I’ve learned.

MUF: Alis is a brave girl, but also of her time, with chores and children to watch. And yet she is drawn outside of the protection of the settlement to the friend she has made. Tell me about building the tension Alis feels between the two worlds.

CSR: A large part of Alis stems from my exploration of my own experiences as a girl and teen. I moved back to the U.S. at the age of six, after three years in Saudi Arabia. I knew little about my own country or culture and was very much an outsider. My fifteenth year I spent on exchange in Australia. Again, when I came home, what was supposed to be familiar was actually foreign. I wanted to watch a similar tension grow in Alis, wanted her to be drawn into a new world but also come to see her own culture as an outsider might.

MUF: You really capture Alis’ joy in the natural world. I loved the wood carving and learning the word for blue bird, iachawanes. What was your inspiration?

CSR: Author Lucy Maud Montgomery was the inspiration behind Alis’s love of nature. Readers will know her as the author of the Anne Shirley and Emily Starr books. While both these characters deeply love nature, I would argue L.M. Montgomery was even more under its spell. (I’ve read her five-volume journal twice now and plan to do so every ten years. They’ve become a huge part of my writing and reading life.)

Iacháwanes was tricky. I wanted to find an animal indigenous to the Outer Banks that both girls might have encountered and that also had a known Algonquian counterpart. Because the Algonquian dialect the Roanoke and Croatoan spoke is now dead, there were a limited number of words to pick from. The eastern blue bird — iacháwanes — is actually the third bird I picked! When I found Governor John White’s beautiful watercolor (see here), I knew this was the bird my girls connected over.

MUF: You remain true to the terrible and violent history of what happened to both Native people and the white settlers but in a way that won’t frighten young readers. Did you struggle with that?

CSR: An unvarnished picture of history, one that doesn’t try to explain the ugly parts away, is always most impactful. I was worried some of these heartbreaking events might frighten young or especially sensitive readers, but at the same time I knew I couldn’t hide from what really happened. These young characters couldn’t, and I couldn’t do that to my readers, either. That said, I’m happy my publisher chose to label the book as “10 and up” rather than the typical middle grade 8-12.

MUF: There is a demand for diverse books, and yet it’s hard to write across cultures. How did you address describing the Roanoke experience?

CSR: Honestly, it was a very challenging, sometimes scary experience. I’m a non-Native author. I’ve written about two tribes that no longer exist, groups who left no written record and are the subject of very few reference materials. Have I gotten things wrong in some places? I’m almost positive I have. But I tried my very, very best to work with what I knew, as was absolutely my responsibility. It was also important to find a reader from the Lumbee tribe (possibly the modern-day descendants of the Croatoan) who was able to vet my work.

Ultimately, I had to trust my life experiences — I’ve been a girl, I know how profoundly friendship can shape a person — gave me a measure of authority to write about a character far different from me. Writing is a risky endeavor. There’s no room for playing it safe.

MUF: Verse expresses beautifully the connection between Alis and Kimi, especially when there are so few words they share in common. Why did you choose to write in verse?

CSR: I knew from the start this book would be in verse, partly because that’s what I’m comfortable with, partly because I find it such a great way to write historical fiction. Verse gives a reader immediate access to a character and her world. The extraneous is stripped away.

Once I realized the story needed to be told in both girls’ voices, verse added another layer of communication through stanza and line placement on the page. As the girls are drawn together, the words are, too. Verse is magical this way.

MUF: You have a picture book out soon too! Will you continue to write novels in verse?

CSR: Yes! Over in the Wetlands releases this July. Though my next historical novel, a story about the Klondike Gold Rush, is written in prose, I definitely will write verse again. I’m learning to listen to the best way a story can be told. Ideally I figure this out before I begin drafting!

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