Day 13!
(a little late today; I slept in!)
My sister has an Ugly Sweater Christmas party EVERY year.
I think I went once?
(we live on opposite coasts!)
I remember having such a fun time looking
for the most HIDEOUS sweater imaginable.
Now, if I only would have known Lester,
I would have been ok 🙂
I met KG Campbell at SCBWI LA.
He also won a Golden Kite for this book.
Finally, I have a soft spot in my heart for the name Lester.
My brothers and sister and I were raised in an at home daycare.
The people who took care of us were an old married couple
who we called “Mim and Pip”
and who quickly became like our grandparents,
since our actual ones lived so far away.
Pip’s real name was Lester 🙂
I’ve got a manuscript that’s all polished and ready to go
featuring both of them, so soon everyone will know
about all the awesome fun we had with them.
ANYWAY…the book!
Title: Lester’s Dreadful Sweaters
Published by: Kids Can Press, 2012
Written by: K.G. Campbell
Illustrated by: K.G. Campbell
Word Count: 799
Pages: 32
In one word: Remarkably-unique.
In one sentence: What’s a boy to do when his Aunt makes him ugly sweaters….where them and get creative about the solution!
Favorite pages:
Likes:
- Awesome use of words! consumed, suspicious, unsavory, clickety-clack, smothered…and that’s only in the first few pages!
- Lester’s character is super quirky, but I love that he’s not quirky enough to appreciate the sweaters! (is anyone really?)
- Lester’s change and how he documents it.
- It’s a character after my own heart…the boy has a notebook for everything.
Learns:
- A grown up can be a great arch-enemy to a kid!
- You can get a little dark! (I love the scene when Lester’s cutting up sweaters with an evil look on his face!)
- Sweaters=great topic for a kids book! Who would have thought?
Any ugly sweater nightmare stories out there?
Hope everyone is enjoying their Sunday!
Until next time,
KE and SS
Learns:
I read about Lester and his sweater dilemma, but didn’t realize it was a Golden Kite book. I’ll have to go back and take another look.
I’m so glad to finally have read LEONARDO THE TERRIBLE MONSTER by Mo Willems, 2005, Hyperion Books for Children, 263 words. The book’s physical size is about 9×13, larger than average, and it’s size plays an important part in the story. Leonardo tries to prove his monster-worth in his very big world. The vastness of the pages with a relatively small Leonardo set off in the bottom left corner illustrates this well, especially when the right pages are filled to the edges with other characters (adult humans and monsters). Kids will empathize with and relate to Leonardo.
The text tells the story of Leonardo’s wish to be a terrifying monster. He tries again and again, and is quite pleased with himself when he finally makes a boy cry. Until…
You didn’t expect me to give it away, did you?
Your Mim and Pip manuscript sounds very interesting!
I read ‘Chowder’ by Peter Brown. I liked the character and plot. Illustrations were wonderful, especially the various doggy expressions.
Today I read “Chloe” by Peter McCarty. This is the sequel to “Henry In Love” that focuses on Chloe, the feisty bunny rabbit whom Henry, a shy kitty cat, falls in love with. We get to know Chloe, her parents, and her multitude of brothers and sisters. They have a lot of fun together, until her parents buy a TV. How will Chloe keep this device from ruining her family fun? Read and find out!
This here’s a new purchase. Me read The Pirate Cruncher written and illustrated by Jonny Duddlle. All ye landlubbers would sure be delighted by the band of scallywags in this tale. Thar’s treasure to be found and their greed be leadin’ them to a deadly adventure on the high seas. Me be lovin’ this book!
I’m enjoying the posts!
Today I read “City Dog, Country Frog” by Mo Willems. Jon J Muth illustrated this one.
Lester’s Dreadful Sweaters sounds like a fun book! I’ll have to look that one up. Today I re-read THOSE REBELS, JOHN & TOM by Barbara Kerley. I re-read this one a lot. I LOVE Barbara’s voice for biographies. I’m polishing a NF book myself, and I strive for a similar, casual tone as Barbara, so I check out her books many, many times.
That’s a terrific book Debra!
I love all her books as well – and Shana Corey!
Today I read Red Hat by Lita Judge. It is an almost wordless picture book and it’s adorable. I love use of color (or no color) in order to make the red hat stand out. Now I want to go read her other one – Red Sled.
RED SLED is great!
I read “Polar Bear Night” and “Polar Bear Morning” by Lauren Thompson and illustrated by Stephen Savage. I wanted to read them after “Morning” was featured here! Polar Bear Night is a lovely quiet story and the sequel is a playful lively book. I enjoyed comparing them to learn how the author’s choice of words guided the mood of the story. Of the two, I liked Night better- but I am interested to read both to my kids and see what they think! The liked the illustrations quite a bit.
I don’t think I would ever have thought of writing a picture book about ugly sweaters, and now I need to read this one! The hardest part about going to an ugly sweater party is knowing who wears ugly sweaters but figuring out if they’d be insulted if you asked to borrow a sweater for a party.
Continuing with Adam Rex, I read FRANKENSTEIN MAKES A SANDWICH, which makes me want to read more kids’ poetry. This book showcases Adam’s range of art and variety of writing voice, almost like it was an anthology of poems from different authors and illustrators. But the brilliance and humor, of course, is all his own.
I read Sandy’s Circus: The Story of Alexander Calder, a historical fiction pb.
Our church has an ugly sweater Christmas party, too.
My book today was THE BONES OF FRED McFEE by Eve Bunting. This book is 435-words and it is written in rhyme. It is a cute story about a plastic skeleton two children tied high in their sycamore tree. The skeleton is there until Halloween night it disappears. Cute Story!
I read “Mooncakes” by Loretta Seto. It is about the Chinese Mooncake festival, which just took place.
This was in the “new” section in the library. I dropped off a bunch of books today and picked up a bunch more.