The new novel Cutting Teeth, by Julia Fierro, had me as soon as I saw the cover: a Raggedy Ann and Andy doll clinging to each other for dear life, looks of quiet desperation plastered across their fabric faces.
Now this, I thought, is a story about parenting after my own heart.
The debut novel, which came out a little over a week ago, follows the story of four Brooklyn couples who spend a weekend at a Long Island beach house with their young children. There'a the mom who's hiding her OCD and the mom who's hiding her financial ruin, and the mom who's hiding her yearning to escape the sometimes oppressive weight of parenting to return to her art. There's a sexy mom, and a stay-at-home dad, and lots of children, of all varieties. Throw them all together in one house for a weekend and let the drama unfold. Secrets will be revealed, relationships will fall apart - which is great because, let's face it, what's more fun than witnessing personal ruin, especially in fiction?
I cracked open the book and was instantly hooked by an opening chapter in which Nicole (no relation), pushes her four year-old son in a swing while descending into an obsessive spiral of anxiety related to a recent outbreak of swine flu. I'm a big believer that books have to grab you from the get-go (I have three kids and very little time for leisure reading, so if you don't have my attention in a viselike grip from the start, you're out, aug wiedersehen!, as Heidi Klum would say) and this book passed my better-make-it-good-and-do-it-fast test with flying colors.
The book is funny and sexy and thought-provoking and beautifully-written and it's honest, which is pretty much the number one quality I look for in a book these days. I don't have time for bullshit. I want the human experience laid bare, and I want to be enriched, and entertained in the process. Cutting Teeth delivers, shedding light on the extraordinary experience, both harrowing and joyous, that is parenthood. If I was sand-bound this summer, you bet your sweet ass I'd be slipping this baby in my beach bag.
What with my three wild children and all, I don't get much time to read, and even less time to read for pleasure. Over Spring Break though, having just met a big deadline, I gave myself permission to take a few days off and enjoy some "me" time, which took the form of a lot of soaks in the tub reading a brand-new, fantastic novel by Kimberly McCreight, Reconstructing Amelia. I'm lucky enough to call the lady a friend so I got to sneak a peek at an advance copy: me and Entertainment Weekly who called the novel one of the best books of 2013 The highest praise I can give the book is to say that I'd almost finished it by the end of our Tennessee trip and that is high praise indeed, seeing as it usually takes me a month or two to finish a magazine article. I was actually sneaking in reading time whenever the baby was asleep or the kids were busy watching TV -- something I haven't done in years.
Here's the synopsis from the back of the book:
"When Kate, single mother and law firm partner, gets an urgent phone call summoning her to her daughter's exclusive private school, she's shocked. Amelia has been suspended for cheating, something that would be completely out of character for her over-achieving, well-behaved daughter. Kate rushes to Grace Hall, but what she finds when she finally arrives is beyond comprehension.
Her daughter Amelia is dead.
Despondent over having been caught cheating, Amelia has jumped from the school's roof in an act of impulsive suicide. At least that's the story Grace Hall and the police tell Kate. In a state of shock and overcome by grief, Kate tries to come to grips with this life-shattering news. Then she gets an anonymous text:
Amelia didn't jump.
The moment she sees that message, Kate knows in her heart it's true. Clearly Amelia had secrets, and a life Kate knew nothing about. Wracked by guilt, Kate is determined to find out what those secrets were and who could have hated her daughter enough to kill. She searches through Amelia's e-mails, texts, and Facebook updates, piecing together the last troubled days of her daughter's life."
The book blends the best parts of a mystery -- that compulsive readability. those exciting plot twists-- with the best parts of a woman's fiction book -- intricately-woven characters who you grow to really care about, a rich and developed sense of place and time and relationships that resonate deeply. As a mother, the issues this book grapples with - growing up in the age of cyber bullying, falling in love for the first time, what it means to be a "good" mother -- are close to my heart, and I found them explored in a nuanced and affecting way. But most importantly, it was insanely fun to read. Because if there's one thing I don't have time for at this point are books that bore me. Those were one of the first things to go after having kids, right along with working out regularly and putting on makeup. So, if you're looking for a good read on the subway or plane or during your "me" time soaking in the tub, consider yourself informed.
A year or two ago, someone gave us the first three Diary of a Wimpy Kid books, and at that time, Primo was still struggling through Frog and Toad and a 200-page volumes, liberally sprinkled with the word "moron" seemed as appropriate for Primo as True Blood or Merchant of Venice. What a difference a year makes. A few months ago, Primo unearthed the Wimpy Kid books and devoured them, spending hours on end at bedtime reading them. So passionate was he for the fine literature that we were getting into arguments at 10pm when I realized he was still awake and tried to wrest the books from his anxious fingers.
"I just want to finish the book!" he'd protest, "I only have sixty more pages!"
In this way, he finished all six books in about two months.
It was sad to see it end because the Wimpy Kid books were the first that really hooked Primo on reading, and I got a little nervous that without anything comparable to dig into, he'd lose interest in the act of reading. So I posted on my handy, local list serve, Park Slope Parents, for recommendations of books like the Wimpy Kid series, which would galvanize the hearts and minds of seven year-old boys -- just in time for Christmas. Here's the list I culled:
Geronimo Stilton
Ellie McDoodle
Dork Diaries
Secrets of Droon
The Zack Diaries
My Weird School
Magic Tree House
Boxcar Children
We checked out a bunch of these last week and Primo was vaguely interested in them all but nothing life-changing. Then we happened upon Dear Dumb Diary, by Jim Benton, who Primo has been smitten with after devouring all the Franny K. Stein books he penned. A perfect choice! Acerbic, edgy, gross, with lots of drawings to make the pages fly. I guess for some parents the protagonist might come across little mean-spirited, and I might not let very impressionable Seconda read it but for Primo, who wouldn't use the word "idiot" without flagellating himself about it, I'm not too concerned. It got him hooked all right. And there's a bunch of installations too - enough to bring us to the next craze.
I have the best babysitter on earth.A lot of people say that, but I think it’s true in this case. I’m sure not everyone would consider her the best, particularly if you are the kind of parent who wants your house clean when you come home to it. Forget doing dishes or laundry. The girl doesn’t so much as pick up an overturned basket of Barbie brushes. But what she lacks in tidiness, she makes up for in kick-ass-ness.
I should note, too, that she’s my cousin. So I’m biased. But she is pretty amazing.
First, she introduced my 5 year-old to Gothic literature and inspired him to read Mary Shelly’s Frankenstein by the end of first grade.
Then, last week, she took the kids to Barnes and Nobles. When Sec goes to Barnes and Nobles, she heads right for the Disney princess section. This is not hard to do as basically, the entire children’s section is one large Disney Princess section. They’ve sprinkled a few of those aggravating Ariel books that play music and those magnetic Cinderella dress-up dolls into every display, just so you never have to walk two feet without being bathed in the glow of commercialism.
I loathe reading the Disney princess books to her. I don’t so much mind playing with the Disney princess Barbies or watching the Disney princess movies but something about having to pretend the crap I’m reading is literature makes my stomach churn. Still, reading about Belle and her new pony is better than not reading at all. So, I suck down my dignity and read “A dream wedding for Cinderella!” and other noxious titles. Lately, Sec’s been into the Easy Reader Princess books which is a double whammy of horror, being both easy readers (need I remind you of my distaste for Mittens?) and about princesses.Mind you, she doesn’t want to read them herself, in which case, I’d turn a blind eye. She wants me to read them.
“Belle has sweet ballet dreams. Will she wear a tutu or a gown?”
“Aurora loves to spin and twirl. Prance, princess, prance!”
I feel dirty afterwards.
But last week, my cousin was watching the kids and took them to Barnes and Nobles and Primo had a GLOWING report afterwards, boasting about how my cousin had made the awful princess stories funny and unexpected.
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“She didn’t read what was on the page, but made it BETTER,” he clarified, “So they aren’t such bad influences on Seconda.”
Who knows WHERE he comes up with this stuff? It’s not like I brainwash the kid.
“Like, she was reading this Snow White book and said, ‘Snow White was in medical school and so she taught the dwarves the value of proper hygiene.’”
“What else?” I asked him.
“Tiana knew she had a bond with the prince but she still didn’t want it to mess up her MBA.”
“Cinderella was very beautiful but she knew that science was more important.”
“Beauty was polite but she was also independent and thought for herself.”
“Sleeping Beauty enjoyed fashion but her true love was politics.”
Genius, I think. And it had the double virtue of not only giving princess-crazed Sec what she wanted as well as what she needed but entertaining Primo to no end.
Want to read a flat-out freaky kids' book? I highly recommend The Marzipan Pig by Russell Hoban. We inherited this book from my cousin's collection and one day were curious enough to open it. What awaited us was nothing short of children's literature of the absurd. It is such strange shit, so creepy and unsettling yet delightfully funny and lyrical - a total gem, and adding to its gem-ness are the illustrations by Quentin Blake, whose name and whose effortless-looking line drawings you'll recognize if you're a Roald Dahl fan.
Here's the storyline:
A sentient marzipan pig falls behind a couch and is left there to rot, bemoaning the loss of his potential to bring sweet happiness to someone. Then a mouse stumbles upon the pig, gobbles it down and becomes stricken with a kind of love sickness. Instantly, the mouse falls in love with a grandfather clock, but sadly this love is unrequited, and though the clock does give the mouse the time of day, that's about the extent of it, so the mouse gives up on love, goes for a walk outside and promptly gets devoured by an owl, who instantly falls head over heels for a taxi meter.
Yeah, a taxi meter.
The owl thinks the fare is a measurement of the taxi's love and urges it on, "Love me more! More!" with which the taxi seems to comply, by raising the fare as it continues to drive.
Primo has been on a huge Dahl jag lately, which frankly, could not please me more. In fact, I admit to enabling his addiction. I never read Roald Dahl as a kid, but now I’m making up for lost time. We’ve read about 2/3 of the canon are now down to the ones that are too old for Primo, like Matilda and The Witches. My all-time favorite was James and the Giant Peach which I found to be the all-time best children’s chapter book ever. Ev-ah. I defy you to challenge me. Coming in second was Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. Third goes to George’s Marvelous Medicine, which I’ve never heard of til a good friend of mine recommended it to us. It’s about a little boy who has a grumpy grunion of a grandma – she says stuff like “Growing is a nasty childish habit!” – and George tries to make a potion out of stuff he finds under the kitchen sink and in the garage to “cure” her. Results are, of course, totally unexpected. I think it was Primo’s favorite Dahl, actually.
Our most recent Dahl was The BFG, also recommended by my Dahl-loving friend who remembers reading it when she was knee-high to a grasshopper. The BFG easily ties with George’s Marvelous Medicine for 3rd place, but is much darker and more menacing not to mention three times as long, making it less suitable for young readers. Primo was a bit young for it; in fact, I admit to having changed some of the mean giants’ names (sorry Roald, but a mom’s gotta do what a mom’s gotta do). Primo has enough trouble going to sleep without visions of the “Bonecruncher” and “Fleshlumper” and the “Bloodbottler” dancing in his head.
The story’s about a big, friendly (and not very well-educated) giant that “kidsnatches” a little orphan girl one night when she catches sight of him.He turns out to be a vegetarian and not a “cannibully” but the other brutes that live in Giant country, who he despises, do eat human beans, lots of them, so the BFG and Sophie have two problems. A. How to keep her hidden and alive and B. How to stop the giants from guzzling dozens of little children every night?
The reason I bring up the BFG is that I’d like to recommend not only that you read it to your child, but that you read the voice of the BFG exactly, and I do mean precisely, as though he were Rocky Balboa. I think you’ll find, as I did, it is wildly pleasurable, and you’ll want to keep reading for hours on end. Here are some excerpts so you can give it a try:
“You is welcome to go and search my cave from frack to bunt . . . You can go looking into every crook and nanny. There is no human beans or stringy beans or runner beans or jelly beans or any other beans in there.”
“Every human bean is diddly and different. Some is scrumdiddlyumptious and some is uckyslush.”
I’m telling you, we flew through this book because I couldn’t stop reading once I hooked into the Rocky Balboa thing.
But that’s perfectly tame compared to his Cinderella, which is completely R rated. He has the Ugly Stepsister cook up a trick to make her foot fit into the slipper, locking the Prince into marriage, and sending him on a serial killer spiral:
He muttered, 'Let me out of here,'
'Oh no you don't! You made a vow!
There's no way you can back out now!'
'Off with her head!' The Prince roared back.
They chopped it off with one big whack.
This please the Prince. He smiled and said,
'She's priettier without her head.'
He chops off the other stepsister’s head and by the time Cinderella comes out, he’s done gone crazy:
Poor Cindy's heart was torn to shreds
My Prince! she thought. He chops off heads!
How could I marry anyone
Who does that sort of thing for fun?
The Prince cried, 'Who's this dirty slut?'
'Off with her nut! Off with her nut!'
Yes, you read it right, The Prince calls Cinderella a "dirty slut." You'd have to bleep that out. In fact, I don't recommend reading the story to your kids at all. But its a jolly good laugh for grownups.
And I hope that the next time you’re watching Disney’s honey-haired mouse-loving rags-to-riches princess, the words “dirty slut” pop up in your mind, and you just can’t get ‘em our of your head. I think that would be a hoot.
If the thought of reading another Dora the Explorer book makes you want to yak, you need a literary antidote. Thank the Lord I wrote about just that, in the current issue of TONY Kids.
Its a review of some fantastic picture books for children, written by literary heavy-weights, like Woolf, Wilde, Thurber. Honestly, I adore these books. I brake for Barthelme. Kushner keeps me keeping on. Let me know what you think, or if you've stumbled upon other kids' books penned by writers who write mostly for adults.
I don’t have many fields of expertise and certainly very few that are useful to anyone. But if you and your child love Halloween or spooks generally, and if you and your child want to see these spooks appear in spoofs of famous children’s literature, than doggoneit, I’m your woman. Primo and I have read so many of these spooky spoofs that I wrote a short article about my favorite ones for Time Out NY Kids which you can read by clicking here. All of them are one hundred percent amomamok-approved for quality. Just in time for Halloween. . .
So I know I slammed princesses yesterday, and today I’m feeling a little penitent. I mean, not all princesses suck. There are a lot of cool, kick-ass princesses who are pretty and have a good personality, so to speak. The whole package. And I’ve been slowly amassing an “unconventional princess” picture book collection to combat the Disney brigade. Here’s what I’ve got:
The Paper Bag Princess by Robert Munsch
Classic Munsch, as they say on the cover. Girl outsmarts dragon to rescue her prince only to find out he’s a superficial “bum.” Man, Munsch is good. A real delight.
Princess Smartypants by Babette Cole
This is a funny one that appeals as much to my son as my daughter because of the various gross trials and tribulations Princess Smartypants puts potential suitors through, to win her hand. No one succeeds until Prince Swashbuckle who passes every test with flying colors; he doesn’t think the princess is too smart. But guess who gets the last laugh when Princess Smartypants gives him the kiss he’s been vying for and turns him into a big fat frog.
The Princess Knight, by Cornelia Funke
Violet is the younger sister of a bunch of boys, all of whom were raised to be knights but are pretty worthless. They mock her since she’s small. Never underestimate the little ones, I always say. She trains to be a knight, by night, with the help of the gardener’s son, and then enters herself, in disguise, in the contest for her own hand in marriage. She wins, of course. And then she runs off with the gardener’s son.
Princess Pigsty, by Cornelia Funke
Princess Isabella, sick of being pampered, starts the book off with a bang by tossing her crown in the fishpond and refusing to retrieve it. Her dad sends her to the kitchen as punishment, but as it turns out, she is happy doing chores down there and still won’t fish out her crown. Then he sends her to the pigsty, which is just about her favorite place ever. In the end, the King concedes to live and let live, and Princess Isabella gets to be exactly who she is.
Pirate Girl, by Cornelia Funke
Although not technically a princess tale, this is my favorite grrrrl power picture book. The illustrations are amazing and Funke is really at her lyrical best describing Captain Redbeard and his motley crew, the terror of the high seas, who one day capture a little girl who they really should have left alone. They bring Molly on board and try to collect a ransom for her, but can’t get her to divulge her mother’s name. Then one day, they find out who her mother is when Barbarous bertha and her harrowing crew of uber-tough pirate ladies easily overpower Redbeard’s team. My favorite line is when Barbarous Bertha asks her little girl, “What should we do with these piratical nincompoops?” We quote it often chez moi. I think I just identity very keenly with Big Mama Bertha,with a knife stashed in her garter and a mane of flaming hair. Raaaaar!
Atalanta, in Free to Be You and Me, is an oldie but a goodie . . . and I'm out.
As you may recall, my son is obsessed with spooks, specifically Dracula and Frankenstein. So we’re always on the lookout for literature which addresses this subject, but in a light-hearted and non-terrifying way, since, after all, my boy is literally scared of his own shadow most days.
If your kid is over the age of 4 or 5 and you want to read a picture book that you will enjoy as much, if not more, than they will, you must run, don’t walk, to your local bookstore and get Frankenstein Takes the Cake. Or hell, go on Amazon, and see if they give you one of those “Buy this title with this other title and save!” and then grab Frankenstein Makes a Sandwich, too -- Rex’s first Frank book.
The premise is simple – Rex just plops these spooks down in modern day society and lets the madness unfold. Like, for instance, what problems might face the caterer who works the Frankenstein/ Bride of Frankenstein wedding, or what issues might pop up if Medusa were to go to Kindergarten.
Rex had me from the inside flap where his author photo shows a hulky Franken-guy with hipster glasses, underneath which is printed "A haiku about Adam Rex":
“He knows Frankenstein’s the doctor, not the monster. Enough already.”
But when I really started to swoon is when we got to the modern-day story of the Headless Horseman, told through his blog which is titled: “Off the Top of My Head,” We follow the Horseman through his trials and tribulations, as chefs making pumpkin bisque ogle his head and crows go all Hitchcock to peck out the seeds from his eyes. But the best part is when the inevitable happens and the Horseman is forced to go shopping for a new head-fruit to replace the current one that has decayed: “I just can’t hide the funk in/ side this sad and sunken/ pumpkin.”
“He’s like Eminem!” I shouted to David.
“Why don’t you marry him already!” was his reply.
“Is he single?”
I’ll tell you this much. Primo would go nuts to have Adam Rex as a step-dad. He is totally, one hundred percent infatuated with the books, harboring particular affection for a story entitled “Count Dracula doesn't know he's been walking around all night with spinach in his teeth.” He also loved that the Headless Horseman’s blogroll featured the site: “I Vant to Suck Your Blog.”
“That’s funny because it’s like instead of blood he wants to suck up somebody’s computer!!!!!” shrieked Primo.
Up- fricking-roarious. And you haven’t even gotten to “The Invisible Man Gets a Haircut” yet. What can I say? Me and the boy have found a new level of kid lit nirvana.
It’s the sort of thing that you know is coming, especially when you have an older child, but you just can’t quite believe that it’s time for it already. I mean, Seconda’s not even two and a half yet and I thought we had a good year at least of peaceful early afternoons before us. My son was at least 3 before he gave up his nap, and with him, it was a gradual process; he’d skip his nap for a couple of days, but I’d persist with our naptime ritual and he’d eventually cave in to sleep since there was nothing better to do, in the dark, in his crib.
Well Seconda has found plenty of better things to do in the dark. Not in her crib of course. That wildcat leaps out of her crib before I’ve even closed the bedroom door behind me. Most of the better things she’s found to do are highly destructive.
What I mean is, she likes to tear shit up. Literally. And the easiest thing to tear is, of course, books, Which in our house is tantamount to hurling the family’s crystal against the wall. I mean, I am willing to accept that my children do a lot of bad shit but tear up books?
“What did this book ever do to you?” I ask her, “All it wanted was to make you HAPPY and you’ve destroyed it!”
There was one time that Primo tore up his very beloved, very fancy, very expensive pop-up Wizard of Oz book. I don’t know if it was a masochistic thing or what, but it occurred during the tail end of the losing-the-nap period when he was stuck in his room for two hours with nothing to do. When I opened the door to release him from nap captivity, I saw all these beautiful bits of glimmering EmeraldCity and yellow bricks and pieces of poppy field scattered everywhere and I’m not going to lie to you, it hurt. I gave him such a stern talking-to then that he kind of has post-traumatic stress disorder about the whole episode. In fact, a year later, we were just sitting in the kitchen one morning talking and he told me that he had a horrible dream the night before.
“I dreamt that I tore up the Wizard of Oz pop-up book,” he said.
“That wasn’t a dream,” I informed him, “That happened.”
“No, no, that’s not right,” came his reply.
My stern reprimand scarred him enough that he hasn’t so much as dog-eared a page since.
Seconda, on the other hand. could care less about my little lectures or my time-outs or my yelling or my forcing her to read only board books until she proves that she deserves paperback again. During my stern talking-tos, she regards me with this bored kind of expression that is so awfully adolescent, I fear for the future.
“Whatever, lady, keep flapping your lips,” her eyes seem to say, “As soon as you turn your back, I’m ripping Puff’s face right of his magic body while Jackie Paper watches, then I’ll shred that sucker too.”
P: What’s the difference between a cat and a pussycat? M: There is no difference. They are both just cats. P: Wrong. A pussycat is a bad cat.
I’m not quite sure what to make of the fact that my four year-old has come to understand that pussy = evil. I don’t even know where to begin. Is this a fear of woman sort of thing or a misogyny sort of thing or just a misreading of the classic tale Puss in Boots? Either way, there’s no hope of me correcting him because I eschew the word “pussy” at all costs, in any circumstance where children may be present. Which is actually not as easy as one might think.
For instance, I was at the pediatrician’s office a few weeks ago, waiting for the doc to examine a strange series of bumps on Primo’s leg (turns out its nothing more than molluscum contagiosa. “Contaga-what?” you ask, likely feeling relieved you are reading this rather than hearing it as I sit across from you, my molluscum-ridden child by my side. It just means a wart, that’s all.) So I was there with both kids and we were waiting 15, 20 minutes, then 30 minutes, then 40, and by this point, we’d read every single children’s book in the waiting room and the examination room.
Except for one especially grimy and germ-infested book which has been buried under the others.
“Read this one, Mommy,” said my son, handing me a copy of “The Owl and the Pussycat.” So I read it, of course, but I had to steel myself every time that dastardly word came up. It wasn’t that I felt weird reading it to my kids, it was that I felt weird having other people listen to me read it to my kids, like a parent in the waiting room might hear just that one word, out of context and think, “What kind of a madwoman is this! Someone call Social Services!”
Because it wasn’t just like, ok, you’ve got an owl and a pussycat, and they have some adventures. Edward Lear was clearly working through some shit when he wrote this, because on the first page, the word “pussy” appears like five times, with no “cat” or any kind of suffix attached. You try reading this to your two young children in public:
'O lovely Pussy! O Pussy my love, What a beautiful Pussy you are, You are, You are! What a beautiful Pussy you are!'
Today is Thursday which means taking my daughter to toddler music class at the Y. It is literally Seconda’s only scheduled activity or engagement all week -- neglected second-born that she is -- but it’s a good class, very low-key, very affordable, and taught by these really nice, not-at-all-annoying early-twenty-something guys who have a kid’s band called Rolie Polie Guacamole. Although they each have their own normal names, Seconda refers to them together and individually as “Guacamole.” As in, “I love you Guacamole!!!!!!” whilst she throws her dirty socks at them, the way an off-kilter fanatic would toss her thong at The Boss’s head during “Thunder Road.”
So today, Guacamole was singing one of their story-book songs. This particular song sets the words of Bill Martin Jr. and Eric Carle’s Panda Bear, Panda Bear, What Do You See? to music. Lovely, really. A nice, repetitive soothing ballad which gives parents the opportunity to sit down and relax as one Guacamole turns the pages of an oversized copy of the book while the other Guacamole plays guitar.(I know the names of both Guacamoles by the way, just in case you’re beginning to think I’m the sort of person that thinks toddler music teachers are interchangeable and calls for my check by yelling, “Waiter!”).
If you’re not familiar with Panda Bear, Panda Bear, What Do You See? it is exactly and I mean precisely like Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See? except that it features endangered species rather than run-of-the-mill animals. If you’re not familiar with either, well, you’re not missing a whole hell of a lot. I mean, its good stuff, but its no Very Hungry Caterpillar or anything. You start by asking the panda bear, “What do you see?” and when you turn the page, well, there’s your answer. “I see a whooping crane looking at me.” Then you ask the whooping crane what does he see? Bam. Bald eagle looking at me. If a two year-old can catch on to the pattern, I imagine you have by now too.
So I’m just sitting there on a yoga mat, totally zoning out and halfheartedly singing “Spider monkey, spider monkey, what do you see?” when Guacamole turns the page and lo and behold, instead of an animal, it is a child. And I swear to God, I thought I heard Guacamole sing, “Demon child, demon child, what do you see?”
So I am sitting there, criss-cross-applesauce, with Seconda on my lap, singing “Demon child, demon child . . .” and wondering how Bill Martin Jr. came to pen such a controversial line, how the book made it to press, trying to decide how I felt about this surprise ending to what I imagined was just another predictable, (let’s-be-honest) pedestrian board book, and concluding that in fact I rather enjoyed how refreshing the reference to the demon child was when I realized that everyone else in the class was singing, “Dreaming child, dreaming child, what do you see?”
Sure enough, there, very clearly drawn by Carle’s competent brush, was a child lying down with closed eyes and moons swirling around his head, almost in the shape of a halo, the very antithesis of a demon.
Figures.
I guess I’m the only parent with demon-like children . . .I’m fishing here. Tell me I’m not. Tell me your kids have been so bad lately you might make the same Freudian slip.
You may be wondering, why these awards, why right now? Well, readers, I’ll give it to you straight. I woke before 6am again (thanks, Primo), have a deadline today, and have both my children at home (thanks Montessori, for making your spring break TWO FRIGGIN WEEKS long) so my mind is in no shape for long-form musings. Thus, today’s post will be short, sweeeeeeet and very much to the point. So, without further ado, for the first time ever . . .the AMAMS!!!!!!!!
Best Depiction of Grrrrl Power:
Pirate Girl, by Cornelia Funke, illustrated by Kerstin Meyer
I have sought out and read lots of these subverted-princess type tales, and nobody does it better than Funke. She’s funny as hell, lyrical, and empowering. I now use the phrase, “piratical nincompoops” as a term of endearment for my kids.When it comes right down to it, we’re all Barbarous Berthas, when it comes to protecting our kids.
Best Book About the Fallibility of Parents, Which Also Features Vampires:
My Mama Says There Aren't Any Zombies, Ghosts, Vampires, Demons, Monsters, Fiends, Goblins or Things, by Judith Viorst, illustrated by Kay Chorao
You have to be deaf, really dumb and blind not to like Judith Viorst and though this isn’t as well-known as her Alexander books, it features the Alexander character and his brothers. This one addresses a profound conundrum: how do you believe your mother when she says there’s no such thing as zombies, when she’s so woefully wrong about so much? It is true, guys, “even mamas make mistakes.” A must-read for kids who are obsessed with Halloween spooks, like my guy.
Most Galvanizing Moral:
Brundibar, by Tony Kushner. Illustrated by Maurice Sendak
If this was a movie preview, the screen would just have big white letters on black, which read: KUSHNER, and then SENDAK, and then BRUNIDBAR. I am a total fanatic of both these guys and the marriage of the two is just what you want it to be – discordant, unpredictable, funny. A brother and sis with a mama who is sick in bed set off on a quest to get her the milk she needs to make her better, encounter the force of pure evil, and beat him down with the help of 300 other children. United we stand!
Best Crying Scene with a Turtle:
How Little Lori Visited Times Square, by Amos Vogel, illustrated by Maurice Sendak
Being a New Yorker who rarely leaves the city, I don’t really need to read books about NYC . . . but I WANT to. What is better than watching Sendak’s little Lori figure (they all looks like Max to me) end up at South Ferry, Macy’s, IdlewildAirport and Queens? Plus, Lori’s bawl-a-thon with the turtle is hilarious. So I featured Maurice Sendak twice, so sue me. Better yet, take this.
Best Children’s Book of All Time and Forevermore:
Where the Wild Things Are, by Maurice Sendak
I still have the edition of this book which I read as a little girl, yellowed pages, broken cover and all. It was my favorite back then, the ‘rents say, and it has been one of Primo’s favorite, too. He even dressed up as Max for Halloween one year, the little imp – see picture above. I could write a whole book about this book but as I’ve got a deadline and not enough coffee, I’ll just say this: He found his supper waiting for him. And it was still hot.
And it is -- it is still hot, this book. Getting hotter by the minute with Spike Jonze’s movie about to touch down. David, the kids and I watched the trailer like 10 times this week and we are so there on opening day. Judge for yourself. Watch the trailer.
Let me first say that this is not a picture of my son. I would never let my child read in a window, especially one without bars on it. It is a hazardous location for a reading nook and I neither condone nor recommend it. Now that we’ve established that, please enjoy the feeling of tranquility this picture inspires. Children. Books. Cooooooozy.
One of the great perks of your child growing older is that he and you, too, graduate to more sophisticated children’s literature. This is a huge deal for me because -- I’ll admit it -- since having my son, I have pretty much stopped reading adult books. Please don’t judge. Don’t act like the cashier at City Lights Bookstore in San Fran, when I was purchasing the three novels my husband had picked out for himself, along with the three children’s books I had picked out, who said: “Oh, I’m so glad to see you buying books for yourself. So many parents come in and just buy books for the kids and it’s so . . . sad.”
That’s the worst. The pity from non-parents (I can only assume this 20-something with a faux hawk was a non-parent). The pity for my brain-dead, no-life-outside-my-kids, last-contemporary-work-of-fiction-I-read-was-the-Corrections, miserable existence. Except I was spared the pity because he thought I was my husband, who does read, voraciously so, both legs of his commute and for a full hour during his lunch break.
I have a statement of defense prepared, if you’re interested.
I was the bookiest, literature-loving-est devotee of the written word you can imagine, the kind of kid who walked down the street with my nose in a book, bumping into things. I used to literally breathe in the scent of old encyclopedias at Sterling Memorial Library in my college years. Even when I was preggo, I read constantly, finishing up my masters in English Lit.
Then the baby touched down and I was obliterated by an exhaustion which frankly, has not let up yet. It sounds like a paltry excuse, I know, but if you are still waking with your kids 3, 4 times a night, and then starting your day of manual labor at 5:30am, I think you’ll buy it. The past few weeks, I’ve been falling asleep while telling the kids their bedtime stories at 7:30pm.
“MOMMY!” Primo yells, “You are saying nonsense! WAKE UP!”
So I may not read books intended for an adult audience but I do read to the kids all the time. We load up on new material at the library at least once a week. Seconda’s only two so her attention span is still limited but Primo’s shaping up to be a bookworm himself which makes his mama proud.
A few months ago, we tentatively made a foray into chapter books and let me tell you, there is no looking back. It is sublime. Don’t get me wrong, I brake for Mo Willems, I swoon for Sendak, I am totally tickled by Kevin Henkes and his deliciously precocious rodent characters. But Primo and I am now entering the hallowed halls of serious literature here. Our starter book was Pippi Longstocking, a hit because of the broad comedy and short chapters. Once he’d been baited with Pippi, I slipped in a little E.B.White. When was the last time you read Charlotte’s Web? That shit is INTENSE. During the last chapter I broke down and cried, though Primo didn’t get what the big deal was. Now we’re onto Stuart Little, a lyrical little gem that’s much funnier than you’d expect.
But the crowd pleaser, no question, is Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. Witnessing my son get swept away by the irresistible force of Dahl’s fantasy – Primo’s drive to rehash what we’ve just read, to tell the story to his friends, the thrill of speculating what might unfold in the next chapter, and the sweet, sweet sadness of knowing the end is soon to come – it’s kind of breathtaking. And how cool is it that I get to feel this awakening all over again myself, this sweet love affair with other peoples’ imaginations?
Ahhh . . . .motherhood. What bliss! What divinity!
(This message has been brought to you by the League of Little Literati and Foundation for the Furtherance of Dahl Dotage and Devotion.)
OK, your turn. Picks for best first chapter books? Tried and true favorites as well as more recent work, all welcome.
Nicole is a parenting writer who contributes essays and articles for magazines like Parenting, Parents, American Baby and Babble. She lives in Brooklyn with three children, one husband and a morbidly obese goldfish.
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