Category: Kid Lit

Beverly, Clearly

For a long time I thought her name was Beverly Clearly. That’s because she wrote so clearly. For real: as a kid I would look at the covers of these wonderfully readable books, and “Beverly Clearly” was the author name I saw.

It’s rare that I have a chance to … Read the rest

Read More »

Transformation: The Strange 1925 Wizard of Oz Movie

Wizard of Oz is on again”, I noticed recently while flipping through my favorite classic movie channels. Then I spotted the year on the movie listing: 1925.

Here it was, the early version I’d always been curious to see! This silent-era Wizard came out fourteen years before the great … Read the rest

Read More »

The Harriet Saga

It’s probably the best tween book of the modern era; at least it’s the best one I can think of. Well, hell, everybody loves Harriet the Spy by Louise Fitzhugh, which was published fifty years ago this year.

The anniversary is already getting so much attention — an event on Read the rest

Read More »

Tolstoy Kept It Brief

(Here’s a fresh perspective on a classic writer by Alex Strike, a blogger and an essay writing specialist who can be found on Lifehack, Twitter or Facebook.)

When Vladimir Nabokov read his lectures on literature, he closed all the curtains in the room to make it totally dark … Read the rest

Read More »