Little Beaver Illustrator Shares Her Sketchbook

Sarah Fox-Davies, illustrator of Little Beaver and the Echo as well as the just-out (in England) Little Beaver and the Big Front Tooth, shares some of her process in illustrating the new book. Read about it here.  Several sketches and a finished illustration are below…

Image:

Image

Thanks, Sarah! It’s a beautiful book!

Rest in peace, Maurice Sendak

Readers of this blog know how much I adore Maurice Sendak and his work. (See previous post, and the one linking to a very moving Terri Gross NPR interview on death and children’s literature.) He was wise, funny, and biting, right up until the end, and in honor of that, I now post a link to  his interviews with Stephen Colbert in which he speaks his mind (sadly prophetically) about e-books and many other things. (Warning: salty language, bleeped out!!)

Mainers and the 100 Best Children’s Books

People are always publishing “Best” lists, and today Scholastic has announced its “100 Greatest Books for Children,” as compiled by its magazine Parent and Child. Such lists are always a little bit suspect and a lot bit controversial, and this one will be no different, I’m sure. (“Captain Underpants” at #97? Really, Scholastic? Might that have anything to do with the fact that you publish it?) By contrast, I hasten to assure you,  the lists I’m on (the N.Y. T. “10 Best” and Dillon’s  “Best of the Century”) were all exceptionally well compiled, and not at all self-serving or controversial.

But there’s something else interesting about Scholastic’s list (or anyone else’s “Best” children’s book lists): the disproportionately large number of Maine books included there. In fact, the top two places–“Charlotte’s Web” and “Good Night Moon”–are both held by authors that Maine has a strong claim to. E. B. White fled New York City as a young man to live in Brooklin. Margaret Wise Brown bought a summer house (the only house she ever owned) on Vinalhaven Island,  where she did much of her writing.

Brown is also the author of #32, Runaway Bunny.  The #25 book is “The Giver,” by Lois Lowry, who lived in Falmouth for many years. And #87 is the Newbery-honor winner”Rules” by Cynthia Lord of  Brunswick.

Thus 5 of the 100 books are by Mainers. Considering that the list draws from books published not just in the US but in the UK as well, that’s a pretty heavy percentage for our little state (population 1 million)  versus the rest of the English-writing world (population 370  million).

Even stranger, three of the five books were written by neighbors of mine (I have a house on Vinalhaven near Brown’s, and in Falmouth near Lowry’s).

Can anyone explain this? Does it have something to do with the magnetic pull of the ocean? Or of my magnetic personality?