About the National Book Awards.....and Harry Potter wins Nobel Prize! (sort of)

[Lenona]

http://collectingchildrensbooks.blogspot.com/2009/10/sunday-brunch-with-assorted-scarecrows.html

Oh, and check out "Conservapedia" about halfway down.

And later, some amazing scarecrow photos.

Excerpt:

Ask any group of kids what kind of books they prefer and one of the
most frequent responses will be “funny books.” Yet humor remains one
of our least-respected genres of fiction. Take a look at any list of
award-winning titles and you’ll notice very few humor books; Beverly
Cleary published more than a dozen laugh-out-loud volumes for kids but
didn’t win the Newbery until she added a slightly more serious edge to
her writing in DEAR MR. HENSHAW. Cleary is one of thirteen authors
interviewed by Leonard S. Marcus in FUNNY BUSINESS : CONVERSATIONS
WITH WRITERS OF COMEDY, a volume that examines the role of humor in
writing for children. The Q&A format features the usual questions
(each profile begins with the question “What kind of child were you?”)
before moving on to wonderfully specific questions about the author’s
work (it’s clear that Marcus is a fan of these writers and knows their
books inside-out) and going off on some fascinating tangents with
queries about family relations, theater-going, and childhood holiday
celebrations. Some of the authors, such as Jon Scieszka, reveal
humorous anecdotes from their past, but there is also poignancy in
Daniel Handler (Lemony Snicket) recalling how the Holocaust affected
his perspective (“Things...can happen...not because you’re a bad
person, but just because they sometimes do”) or Dick King-Smith
remembering World War Two (“Even a bad joke is better than nothing.”)
Judy Blume (who admits that her work often makes her laugh out loud
while writing it), Carl Hiassen (who never laughs at his own writing),
and Anne Fine (who believes “Humor is a healing art, both for the
reader and the writer) are among the authors profiled in this
insightful and engaging volume. Photographs, letters, and manuscript
pages accompany the text. The often heavily-edited typescripts
illustrate just how difficult humor-writing can be.

(snip)

Lenona.