Day: August 11, 2010

Vampire Academy – The Movie?

| Tasha

 

Richelle Mead, author of the Vampire Academy series, has sold the film options for the series.  She met with producer Michael Preger of Preger Entertainment to develop the series for the big screen.  They are hoping to create a series of films.  Sounds like a Twilight idea to me!

Mead, who met with Preger and Murphy during the recent Comic-Con event in San Diego, says she’s not presuming anything yet.

"I’m hopeful. I’ve met the guys. They’re great. They love the books. But for me, it’s very easy to put this on the back burner. The options are sold, but it’s not something I’m thinking about most of the time. My focus is the books, because that’s what I do."

Read more at the Kansas City Star, including an interview with Mead.  It gives fans something to do before the final book in the series is released in December!

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Pigs to the Rescue

| Tasha

Pigs to the Rescue by John Himmelman

I loved Chickens to the Rescue which was released in 2006 and this next book is just as winning and funny as the first!  Each day of the week Farmer Greenstalk and his family need help.  The tractor breaks down, the garden needs watering, a shoelace breaks and a kite gets stuck in the tree.  In each case, the pigs launch in to help out, always leaving the situation a bit worse than when they “helped.”  This zany book is sure to have guffaws galore as the illustrations are there to tell the rest of the story, especially the results of the pigs’ frenzied help.  The book ends with a wonderful twist that will have readers laughing all over again.

Himmelman allows his illustrations to really tell the story here.  The text is matter-of-fact, playing the straight man against the wild humor of the illustrations.  The cartoon feel of the pictures works perfectly here with the larger-than-life humor that is mostly physical.  Reluctant readers will enjoy the juxtaposition of the simple text against the vibrant background.

Sure to be a hit, this book will work best one-on-one because the illustrations should be enjoyed close up.  Appropriate for ages 4-6.

Reviewed from copy received from Henry Holt.

How I Made It to Eighteen

| Tasha

How I Made It to Eighteen: a mostly true story by Tracy White

Based on the author’s experiences, this book takes a straight-on look at depression and self-destruction.  Seventeen-year-old Stacy Black checked herself into a mental hospital to help deal with her anger and depression.  She had just put her fist through a glass window.  Stacy hated the hospital but knew that she had to be there to survive, so she stayed.  As she spent time there, she developed new friends who helped her in her recovery and in being honest with herself.  Told in graphic novel format that is more like a journal than manga, this book is honest, blunt and intelligent.  Teen readers will easily see themselves in Stacy whether they are struggling with similar issues or not.

This book appears to be a regular novel until you open it and see all of the illustrations.  Done in line drawings, the illustrations are quirky and have the unedited feel of a real journal.  Readers get to know Stacy as well as her friends both in the hospital and from outside.  This perspective shift, done at the end of each chapter is a welcome view of how outsiders view a teen who enters a hospital.  While they express confusion and concern, all of them realize that it was a necessary step.  It is a brilliant and subtle way to tell teens that they will not be vilified if they get the help they need.

Though heavily illustrated, White’s writing is also a large part of the story.  Stacy is a sarcastic and caustic character.  Readers will realize immediately that she is putting on a front, but it takes time for readers and Stacy to acknowledge what exactly has brought her to the hospital and to this place in her life.  The slow unveiling of the basis of her problems mirrors the steps in her counseling.  This makes the entire book feel organic and honest.

A book that teens will enjoy and relate to, this graphic novel will appeal to a much broader audience than graphic novel readers.  Appropriate for ages 14-17.

Reviewed from copy received from Roaring Brook Press.

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