One more poem.

Another couple spine poems

Since all the cool kids are doing it, I tried a few spine poems at home before coming to work this morning.



Here's one using one of the same titles as Rachael's from yesterday.



Because the London book is about boxing, I like to imagine Lady Audley here as a character from Mike Tyson's Punch-Out!

The last title, which is hard to read, is "What's a place like this doing to a nice girl like me?"

Spine Poem, a la Travis Jonker

My first attempt at a book spine poem, as suggested at 100 Scope Notes.

The Winner's Circle: The Slave Dancer, by Paula Fox (1974)

"It pretty much just borrows the ending from Moby Dick," I said.

"Don't tell me! I don't know yet how Moby Dick ends," was Rachael's answer.

"You don't know how Moby Dick ends?"

"No, although I get the feeling they don't catch the whale."

 So...um...consider this your spoiler alert, Rachael?

                                *****

For those of you still reading, Moby Dick more or less ends with the destruction of the vessel on which most of the novel has taken place. Ishmael, the narrator, is the only survivor of the wreck. The Slave Dancer comes to a climax with the destruction of the vessel on which most of the novel has taken place. Jessie, the narrator of the book, is one of only two survivors of the wreck. (Ras, one of the slave boys, is the other.) Now, obviously, very few members of the target audience for The Slave Dancer are going to be familiar with the ins and outs of Melville's plot (even though the author is on the record as saying she didn't think of it as a children's book at all), but it points out the greatest flaw with Paula Fox's 1974 Newbery winner, which is a failure of imagination.

To go back to Moby Dick for just a moment, the reason that book ends the way it does is that there isn't any other way it can end. Captain Ahab's monomania has so consumed him that he's quite willing to sacrifice anything, everything, up to and including his ship, his own life, and the lives of everyone depending on him for one more shot at the white whale -- and no one is willing to step in and really stop him. It's a direct result of the way the entire book has been plotted. No other ending would suffice.

On the other hand, there isn't any particular reason The Slave Dancer needs to come to a similar dénouement. The slave ship on which Jessie has been impressed is almost home, they're spotted by an American vessel and have to flee -- and toss the slaves overboard -- and then suddenly a huge storm sweeps up, kills everyone else on board, and then sinks the ship. It's a deus ex cumulonimbus that saves the author the trouble of having to deal with the rest of the characters. You could make the argument, I suppose, that it's the result of the Captain's having trusted Benjamin Stout, who misidentifies the American ship as English until it's too late, but I don't think it flows all that organically from the rest of the book.

But then again, I don't think the book has a plot, so much as it has a series of events that happen in sequence. The passages that deal with Jessie having to play his fife for the slaves to dance, and the descriptions of the horrific conditions of the Middle Passage are certainly powerful, but they're not connected to a story of particular interest. Jessie doesn't have the resourcefulness or personality of a Jim Hawkins, and most of the crewmembers who aren't Purvis and Stout blend into each other. Ras also doesn't emerge into an important character until he's almost out of the book, and the part where he and Jessie are rescued by an escaped slave named Daniel seems rushed and forced, a coda that happens for no reason other than that Jessie has to get back to New Orleans somehow. The book does cover Big Issues, important issues, but it's not much of a novel, really.

It would be one thing if 1974 had been a weak year, but in fact, it was more than a little crowded. That year's committee somehow only selected one honor book -- Susan Cooper's The Dark is Rising, and gave nothing to Socks, by Beverly Cleary; Summer of My German Soldier, by Bette Greene; A Day No Pigs Would Die, by Richard Peck; and The House with a Clock in its Walls, by John Bellairs. (Interestingly, Cooper, Cleary, and Peck would later end up winning the Newbery for other books, and Greene was given an Honor the very next year.) You could argue that The Slave Dancer grapples with the weightiest subject matter out of that group, but when one evaluates a book based purely on its message and neglects the artfulness of execution, one ends up making mistakes. Like, for instance, giving The Slave Dancer a Newbery.

2013 Contenders: Mr. and Mrs. Bunny - Detectives Extraordinaire! by Polly Horvath

Ursula K. Le Guin recently wrote an excellent post about literary awards. The whole thing is thoughtful and thought-provoking, but this passage in particular caught my eye:

"I wish we gave literary prizes freely, the way they used to give prizes at the Pet Show at Codornices Park in Berkeley when I was a kid. Every kid in the neighborhood brought their pet, and every pet got a prize, an ad hoc, unique prize: for Soulfulness — for Loud Meowing — for Unusual Spot Placement — for Being the Only Skink…. There was no Best of Breed (in those days there were many mongrels and few breeds), and certainly no Best of Show."

I very much doubt that Mr. and Mrs. Bunny is going to win the Newbery Medal (though I could be wrong - I used to think there was an upper limit for Newbery weirdness, but then a little book about funeral homes, Hell's Angels, and geriatricidal octogenarians made the cut). If there were a literary equivalent of Being the Only Skink, though, Polly Horvath would have it in the bag.

And that gets at the heart of my ambivalence about literary awards. I disagree with Le Guin when she says that in "declaring a book as `the best,' a literary award serves that book. It does not serve literature." When Frederic Melcher and the Children's Librarians' Section created the Newbery award, their explicit intent was "to encourage original creative work in the field of books for children." To that end, I think it has met its goal. It has encouraged excellence in writing (and publishing) for children by rewarding excellence in writing for children (with prestige and increased sales).

In that sense, maybe literary awards are most effective within ghettoized genres. If no one believes there's such a thing as aesthetic greatness within children's literature (or science fiction, or romance), the establishment of an award can create a change in perception on the part of both publishers and readers. 

On the other hand, this is the age of shrinking shelf space and vanishing bookstores. Awards encourage publishers to give riskier titles a chance in the first place, but if they don't garner the Big One, how long do the books stay in print? There will always be a place on the library's shelves for Polly Horvath, but she'll be in and out of Barnes & Noble in the space of a month, if they ever stock her at all. I guess we'd better hold on to our libraries and our children's librarians: loyal defenders of Only Skinks and other oddities.

But I digress. A lot.

Mr. and Mrs. Bunny is really freaking weird, even for Polly Horvath. The fact that she is listed, on the cover, as having translated the book "from the Rabbit" should tip you off. The plot, such as it is, concerns a sensible little girl whose hippie parents have been kidnapped by some evil foxes (who also own Fox Entertainment, naturally). She enlists the help of Mr. and Mrs. Bunny, who have recently taken up detective work (mostly as an excuse to wear fedoras).

I described Polly Horvath to Sam as "Daniel Pinkwater meets Kate DiCamillo," but this one obviously has a pinch of Beatrix Potter, and possibly Kenneth Grahame, thrown in. It's hilarious, surreal, and good-natured (with a touch of bite). I will also note that it's so, so nice to see a woman writing unabashedly in the darkly humorous vein. We need more of that.

Sophie Blackall's illustrations complement the text perfectly. They make me want to buy an illustration from her etsy shop. I do worry, though, that the cute bunnies on the cover will put off the weird little boys who will otherwise love this book. Skink defenders, do your work! 

Published by Schwartz & Wade - on shelves now. 

2013 Contenders: The One and Only Ivan, by Katherine Applegate

I'm having some trouble figuring out how to write about The One and Only Ivan.

I finished the book two days ago in a little torrent of tears, so I dutifully put off writing my review for a day, in order to give my emotional reaction a chance to subside. When I looked at it again yesterday, however, the whole story was still bathed in the kind of glow that resists critical analysis.

Now it's today, and... I still can't find anything bad to say about the darned thing. So let's start with the good.

Ivan is a gorilla with an artist's soul, held captive in an incredibly depressing - and increasingly unprofitable - roadside mall-cum-circus. In order to survive, he actively suppresses his gorilla nature and refuses to fully comprehend the tragedy of his own situation. When the circus owner brings in a baby elephant to boost business, Ivan's protective silverback instincts are aroused, and he is moved to act on her behalf. 

The prose is so stark, especially for a children's book, that this almost reads as a verse novel. In fact, you could make the argument that some of the short chapters - all written from Ivan's first-person point of view - are actually prose poems. This restraint, along with the quiet dignity of Ivan's voice, focuses the story and keeps it from straying into melodrama.  "Humans speak too much," he says, on the second or third page. "They chatter like chimps, crowding the world with their noise even when they have nothing to say." The same cannot be said for Applegate's novel. Each word is essential, and deliberately chosen.

The double meaning of the title is a perfect example. It's taken from a billboard outside the mall, which advertises "The One and Only Ivan, Mighty Silverback!" Of course, Ivan is also the one and only gorilla in his strictly circumscribed world - cut off from the rest of his species since his twin sister, Tag, died shortly after their capture. Even the name of his stuffed gorilla toy - "Not-Tag" - is a poignant reminder of his solitude, and of the artificial nature of his environment.

I don't think it's giving too much away to mention that The One and Only Ivan has a happy ending. My cynical mind might have found that implausible without the author's note, which assures us that the real Ivan is now living happily in Zoo Atlanta. And I might have criticized Applegate for sugarcoating zoos themselves, but she carefully reminds us, in Ivan's voice, that "This is, after all, still a cage." Humans aren't perfect, even when we try to make amends.

The moral complexity doesn't start or end there. I refer you to Fuse 8's review, which does an excellent job of explaining why Mack, the villain, is so well-drawn. 

Even the cover is impressive. Ivan and Ruby (the baby elephant) are in the spotlight, but Ivan, our self-effacing protagonist, is facing away from the viewer, gazing sadly and defiantly back over his shoulder at us. And maybe I'm reading too much into it, but isn't it Ruby, after all, who teaches him to look backwards - to remember his animal nature?

So, yes. If I were on an official committee, I would need someone else to point out the shortcomings of this book. Because I just love it a whole bunch. With its fast pace, non-cutesy animal characters, and thorny moral questions, I think kids will love it too.

Published by HarperCollins - on shelves now.

2013 Contenders: Three Times Lucky, by Sheila Turnage

Three Times Lucky reads like a soap opera, and I mean that in the nicest possible way. It's a novel unafraid to go completely over the top, and one has to admire its courage. An orphan washed up in a hurricane, miraculously unharmed? Check. An eccentric man who can't remember his life before a car crash? Check. Kidnapping, robbery, blackmail, murder? Check, check, check, and check.

The result is a book that's almost compulsively readable. The pacing is excellent, and I found it difficult to put down. It was wild, crazy, thrilling, and any number of other book-jacket adjectives. I'm not generally all that interested in small-town books with an ensemble cast of "quirky" characters, but this one grabbed me and didn't let go, despite my reservations about such things.

The last chapter was a bit Now We're Going To Wrap Up All The Loose Ends for me, but I suppose by that point, the reader is just about ready to finally get all the answers. According to her blog, Sheila Turnage has a sequel set for publication next year, and I'm curious to see where she goes with these characters now that many of them (though not, interestingly, the heroine, Mo) have their mysterious backstories revealed.

I had one serious reservation about this book. It's set in a Tupelo Landing, which, though it's fictional, can be placed with some accuracy on a map of North Carolina, roughly between Winston-Salem and Greensboro. And yet, as far as I can tell, the only non-white character is Mr. Li, the karate instructor, who's a very minor figure in the book. I could possibly have missed something, but unless I did, this is a book set in small-town east-central North Carolina that doesn't have a single African-American character in it -- something so unlikely as to stagger the imagination. I noticed this on several occasions, and it stuck out like the proverbial sore thumb.

At any rate though, this is a good book, and one that I expect will attract kids. It's getting excellent reviews from other sources, and I'd keep my eye on it as the year goes on.

Publication in May through Dial Books for Young Readers / Penguin