The outside world doesn’t always get kidlit and YA lit. Children’s books are cute and easy and anyone with a vague sense that children are charming can write them, right? And anyone can write silly fluff for young adults. Especially anyone with a famous name.
That’s a common attitude, anyway. But there are celebrities who don’t think that way. Like Stephen Colbert.
Back in 2012, Colbert interviewed the late, great Maurice Sendak on his old show Comedy Central show, The Colbert Report. Going in, I figured that interview would be amusing, but I also figured some of the amusement would stem from a celeb’s typical ignorance of everything that goes into creating a children’s book. Boy, was I wrong. The whole point of the two-part “Grim Colberty Tales” segment was to parody the very attitude I’d expected to see. It’s also a great interview, and it resulted in Colbert’s spoofy picture book, I Am a Pole (And So Can You!) (Grand Central Publishing, May 2012), which was coincidentally released with Sendak’s blurb (“The sad thing is, I like it!”) the same day that Sendak passed away. Highly recommended if you need a good laugh. Warning: Colbert Report-style silliness; Sendak-style crotchetiness; NSFW.
“Grim Colberty Tales” made another appearance or two with other authors before Colbert left the Report for CBS’s Late Show with Stephen Colbert. But the change in venue doesn’t mean Colbert’s become too cool for books for young people (or books in general, for that matter). On the contrary, his new show has a recurring segment firmly rooted in YA: the Hungry for Power Games. As candidates have dropped out of the presidential election, Colbert has bid each “tribute” farewell with his best Caesar Flickerman impression. (Warning: contains politics.)
And of course, the man is a certified Tolkien nerd. This, right here, is what it looks like when someone cares about a story. Not a bad thing to show on TV.
I still think Ellen would be a perfect interviewer for the Newbery and Caldecott winners. But if Stephen beats her to it (ALAYMA 2017, anyone?), that’d be pretty cool, too.
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Mac Barnett and Jon Klassen’s latest, Sam & Dave Dig a Hole (Candlewick, October 2014), has been getting quite a bit of buzz (including Caldecott buzz) and has appeared on several best-of-year lists (including Horn Book’s own Fanfare).
With all that talk, I can’t be the only person to accidentally call it “Sam & Dean Dig a Hole.” Right?
The Winchesters at work
Especially given that “Sam & Dean Dig a Hole” is a major plot point in a significant number of Supernatural episodes.
Any illustrators out there want to draw me a mash-up? 
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As we fans know, the Netflix original Orange Is the New Black is set in Litchfield Penitentiary, a federal prison for women in upstate New York. This prison is clearly underfunded. It’s falling apart. Its limited resources are being siphoned off by despicable assistant warden Fig. The sewers are backing up into the drains in the bathroom, and they can’t afford to fix it. As Caputo puts it, they can’t even afford two-ply toilet paper.
Unsurprisingly, the books in the prison library all look old and dull. I’m guessing somewhere in the neighborhood of zero dollars allotted for the Litchfield library annual budget? And yet look at what the inmates are reading — books, presumably, not obtained from the musty old prison library. Brand new YA novels, novels whose shiny covers stand out in stark relief against all the drab prison orange and gray. Where did these books come from? Why was Red reading a new hardcover copy of We Are the Goldens by Dana Reinhardt (well before its May 27 publication date, by the way)? And where did Vee get a shiny copy of The Fault in Our Stars to wave around in front of terminal cancer patient Miss Rosa?
Is this product placement, or book promotion, or a little of both? Does somebody in the industry have an “in” with the show’s producers? What’s going on? I’d sit through one of Healy’s “Safe Place” therapy sessions to find out.
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Codenamed ‘Buffy,’ the fabled Facebook phone (is going to be a reality in a year or so, and like its vampire-slayer namesake, it’s out to slay the smartphone competition. The phone will be manufactured by HTC and reportedly will... Read the rest of this post
I should not be allowed to watch late-night TV or daytime basic cable. Because when I watch that, it's live. I can't use my DVR to flick through the commercials.
Which means I watch the commercials. More specifically, I watch the commercials for Stuff. Stuff I didn't know existed. Stuff I NEED.
And then I buy the stuff. Oh, not right away--I have never actually called one of those 1-800 numbers to indulge my curiosity in the Most! Amazing! Product! Ever! Instead, it percolates. I think I've forgotten my desire for that Stuff, and then I cruise down the "AS SEEN ON TV" aisle in CVS and boom. I must have it. And if it's on sale, even for just fifty cents off, I am a goner.
You'd think the Topsy Turvy Tomato Planter ($4 off at CVS last May!) would have cured me, this summer. I treated it to about a gallon of water each day, and it yielded three measley, and mealy, tomatoes. At least it had very impressive foliage. It looked like I was really, seriously gardening for the first time in my life.
But I'm sort of glad it didn't stop me. Because then I bought the Swivel Sweeper, as I am far too lazy to actually drag my big vacuum out of the closet--and it's light enough for my kindergartener to use, which he does enthusiatically if sporadically. And I LOVE it. I even bought one for my Mom.
Now I'm fighting temptation: I think I NEED the Gyro Bowl. It never tips, never spills! And it looks so groovy. But the $25 cost with shipping has stopped me COLD... so far. Wait 'til I see it in CVS.
And then there's that car seat slingie thingie. I saw an ad for it and now I can't find it ANYWHERE, online or in a store. Basically it's a big tube of stretchy fabric that slides down the front passenger seat in a car. You use it to hold onto your purse so it doesn't tip and slide off the seat. They also show it holding one of those 4-cup cardboard coffee holders. I am so entirely tempted. But maybe it's best that I can't find it.
The universe is trying to save me from myself!
