Wild and Wacky (Picture Book Roundup)

I’ve been home sick this weekend with a sore throat and a bad cold. I’ve been getting raging headaches and have been sneezing incessantly so I haven’t been able to read anything full-length, but picture books have always made good bedside reading for me, hence this picture book roundup.

In today’s lineup are: A Day With Wilbur Robinson, Guild Geniuses, Pignapped, The Hair Scare, Klutz, The Lady with the Ship on her Head, Flotsam, and Swine Lake — books #155-162 for 2010

I hope this flu passes soon, I’ve got a lot to read for November!

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Halloween Roundup!

Halloween’s coming up, so I’ve been pulling down the scary reads from my TBR shelves. I’ve been alternating novels and picture books since the month started (and Pillars of the Earth in between!), and I’m having a lot of fun scaring myself with these Superhero costumes.

Here’s a (mostly) picture book roundup, with the following books: Faust, The Dark Goodbye, The Diary of Victor Frankenstein, Les Fantomes a la Cave, The Book that Eats People, The Wolves in the Walls, Kate Culhane: A Ghost Story, Eccentric Epitaphs, and The Canterville Ghost, books #139-147 for 2010.

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All about Eloise

 

 

Eloise is one of my favorite children’s book characters, although not one I know from childhood (unlike Babar, Madeline, Curious George, or Tintin). I only discovered Eloise when I saw the old movie (with Julie Andrews as Nanny) on Disney channel when I was in college and learned that it was based on a book.

Eloise is a feisty six-year old girl living at The Plaza Hotel in New York City (hahaha, like Grandmere in The Princess Diaries, also played by Julie Andrews but in the movie she has a state home on the Genovian embassy grounds) in a book series by Kay Thompson illustrated by Hilary Knight.  If you’ve seen Eloise, you’re bound to remember her forever, with the wild hair adorned with a flouncy bow, and the ruffled blouse and jumper ensemble (and pink knickers underneath!).

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Picture Book Roundup: letters, numbers, and apostrophes


I’ve missed doing picture book roundups, and I don’t think I’ve done a proper one yet this year so here’s a bunch of picture books I’ve enjoyed recently: Stephen T. Johnson’s Alphabet City, its companion book City By Numbers, and The Girl’s Like Spaghetti (Why, you can’t manage without apostrophes!) by Lynne Truss (illustrated by Bonnie Timmons).

The books were shamelessly scavenged, as usual — I’d been wanting a copy of Alphabet City for a long time and finally got it via BookMooch, and shortly after found a copy of City By Numbers for a very cheap P40 (less than $1) at a bargain bookstore. Then a few weeks back, I found Girl’s Like Spaghetti for P35! Wonderful additions to my ragtag picture book collection, none of which I buy brand new or full-priced, tee hee hee.

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Edward Gorey

Edward Gorey is one of my favorite writer-illustrators. I love his lyrical and wickedly macabre stories — like a twisted Edward Lear or Lewis Carroll) and his equally macabre pen and ink illustrations!

I’ve blogged about acouple books of his in the past — Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats (illustrations) and The Curious Sofa (story and illustrations), and I’ve got a couple more to show you in this post: The Iron Tonic and the pop-up book The Dwindling Party, both rummaged in bargain bins in two separate occasions, at P20 (US$0.5) and P95 (around US$2) respectively.

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