The Sword in the Stone

The Spoon in the Bathroom Wall is a spoof of The Sword in the Stone by T.H. White, a book "about a young boy named Wart who befriends a magician named Merlyn. As we suspect all along, but only find out for sure at the end, Wart is actually the future King Arthur. The title refers to a sword that was magically embedded in a stone so that only the future, true-born king of England would be able to remove it." (Wikipedia article "The Sword in the Stone") Disney made an animated movie version in 1963 which is loosely based on the originally story. The sword is called Excalibur but in The Spoon in the Bathroom Wall, the spoon which Martha (Marthur) pulls from the wall thereby making her the king of Horace E. Bloggins school has been renamed X-Cauliflower.

The stories of King Arthur, Excalibur and The Sword in the Stone are fascinating - come in to the library and check them out. It will make your reading of The Spoon in the Bathroom Wall that much more enjoyable!

Fantasy Literature for Kids

Hello! I hope you are all enjoying our November book, The Spoon in the Bathroom Wall. So far I've heard from a few of you and it seems to be a hit! Spoon is our first adventure into the world of fantasy literature (a type of fiction where magic and the supernatural are important to the plot) so I thought I would take this opportunity to recommend some other fantasies you might like. There are LOTS and LOTS of great fantasy books out there right now (Harry Potter, Eragon, Inkheart, Chronicles of Narnia, just to name a few) but here are a few that are similar to Spoon that you should try...

Golden & Grey by Louise Arnold (art by Brett Helquist - we know all about him!)

When a downhearted ghost becomes the "invisible friend" of an eleven-year-old boy who is an outcast in his new school, the two help each other find their place in their respective worlds.

The Secret Order of the Gumm Street Girls by Elise Primavera

In order to save the town of Sherbet, four girls with very little in common become involved with some people and events that seem to bear a resemblance to "The Wizard of Oz."

May Bird and the Ever After by Jodi Lynn Anderson

Lonely and shy, ten-year-old May Ellen Bird has no idea what awaits her when she falls into the lake and enters The Ever After, home of ghosts and the Bogeyman.

Artist Brett Helquist

Brett Helquist is the amazing illustrator who did the cover art for The Spoon in the Bathroom Wall. He has illustrated many popular children's books including Chasing Vermeer, The Calder Game, Golden & Grey, A Series of Unfortunate Events and James Howe's Tales from the House of Bunnicula among many others.

Check out his BookPage interview as well as his How I Draw feature on the Scholastic website.

Author Tony Johnston

Tony Johnston is the fantastic author of our November book, The Spoon in the Bathroom Wall. She has written many books for children including Any Small Goodness and the Mole and Troll books. She lives in Southern California. For more about her, visit Penguin Publishers.

Also check out this Harcourt Publishers interview with Tony Johnston in which she talks about writing The Spoon in the Bathroom Wall and her life an an author.

November Book: The Spoon in the Bathroom Wall

Our November book selection is The Spoon in the Bathroom Wall by Tony Johnston. We will be meeting a week early this month because of the Thanksgiving holiday. Our November meeting will be Monday, November 17th at 3:30pm in the Children's Program Room. Copies of The Spoon in the Bathroom Wall are available at the Children's Desk or through the Ocean State Library Catalog. If you are new and want to join our club, please send me an email so I can get you registered. I like to know how many people are coming so that I can prepare enough snacks and craft supplies. My email is cantonio@newportlibraryri.org.

Things have taken a bizarre turn at Bloggins School: misbeahving dragons, dastardly principals, dancing eggs (with shoes - and attitude). Then there's the giant glowing tongue (or could it possibly be a...spoon?) that appears one day, stuck in the wall of the bathroom. What could a spoon (or is it a...tongue?) in the bathroom wall mean?

Splat in the middle of the hullabaloo is Martha Snapdragon, the boiler room-dwelling, bacon-eating, bully-tolerating daughter of the loopy but lovable janitor. Not that Martha has a clue of what to do about the all-around weirdness. She can't even get that rotten bully to stop calling her - ugh - Marthur. Surely she has not chance of thwarting the disaster that is bounding toward Bloggins.

Or does she?

Author Interview: Marlane Kennedy

The Book Buddies Book Club had the unbelievable priviledge of speaking with the author of our October book, Marlane Kennedy. We called her at her home in Ohio and had about 15 minutes to ask all of our questions about her wonderful book, Me and the Pumpkin Queen, and her life as a full-time author. The book club members came up with some fabulous questions and Ms. Kennedy was so kind and gave us very thoughtful responses.

The club members wanted to know if she writes everyday and where she does her writing. She writes on her couch with her laptop and she doesn't write every day. Some days she has a harder time feeling inspired to write and other days she can't stop! Her favorite part of being an author is hearing from her readers. It makes her feel good to know she has written something that someone else has enjoyed. She has a degree in teaching but never taught as a career and now she is enjoying visiting classrooms and having the opportunity to speak with her readers.

We wanted to know if she's anything like Mildred and she told us that part of her is a lot like Mildred - she was shy and loved animals growing up - but she had her mother with her and did enjoy things like clothes and shopping.

One of our club members wanted to know if she had ever grown a giant pumpkin of her own and up until this past summer she hadn't! But this year she decided to try and although it was a lot of work her family helped and she grew a 250 pound pumpkin which is sitting on her front porch and which she will carve into a jack-o-lantern for Halloween.

We all wanted to know if there would be future books about Mildred and at the moment she does have some ideas but nothing is definite. She told us a very interesting story about how when her publisher, Greenwillow Books, bought the manuscript for Me and the Pumpkin Queen, she originally had an epilogue as the ending where Mildred was age 16! Her editor didn't like the idea of Mildred at age 16 and asked her to change it. And now she is thrilled that she did because if she had left Mildred at age 16 there wouldn't be any need for another book!

Ms. Kennedy shared that it took her about a year to write Me and the Pumpkin Queen and that besides wanting to be an author (which she decided in 4th grade) her other career aspiration was to be a jockey because she loves horses!

Finally, we wanted to know what inspired Me and the Pumpkin Queen. Ms. Kennedy grew up in Pickaway County, Ohio and went to a lot of pumpkin shows. But the idea came to her out of the blue one day. She thought of a 5th grader and she started asking herself questions like, why is she growing pumpkins and what are her problems? This all eventually turned into Mildred's story.

We had such a great time talking with Ms. Kennedy. She was so nice and we so appreciated having the opportunity to ask our questions. Thank you to Ms. Kennedy for her time and her willingness to be involved with our book club. Authors are the best!

October Meeting Wrap-Up

The Book Buddies Book Club met yesterday to discuss Me and the Pumpkin Queen by Marlane Kennedy. It was a jam-packed meeting and lots of fun! We had special Halloween cupcakes as well as our regular snacks and we made foam pumpkins for our craft project. The highlight of the meeting was our phone call with the author, Marlane Kennedy! But more on that in the next post....

We had a wonderful discussion of Me and the Pumpkin Queen. Everyone really liked the book and all agreed that they would recommend it to a friend. We started by talking about our own hobbies (Mildred is obsessed with growing pumpkins and I wanted to find out what our club members were interested in) Our club member's hobbies include swimming, cooking, reading, arts and crafts and animals and all of our members agreed that their families are supportive of their hobbies (unlike Mildred's Aunt Arlene). We talked about why Aunt Arlene was not supportive of Mildred's pumpkin growing and decided it was because she wanted Mildred to be like her and to be more interested in clothes and shopping.

I asked the group why it was so important for Mildred to grow the pumpkin on her own and we decided it was because she wanted to prove she could do it and also it was her personal connection with her mom.

Mildred isn't at all concerned with fitting in at school and our club members felt that that was okay, because everyone has to be different and it's more important to be yourself than to fit in with others.

Our favorite parts of the story were when Mildred won the pumpkin growing contest and when she met her cousin Amanda. Our least favorite parts were when Grover started spreading the rumor that Mildred hadn't grown the pumpkin on her own and when Aunt Arlene forced her to do things she didn't want to do, like go shopping and go on vacation to West Virginia.

Overall we really liked this book. The author, Marlane Kennedy, sent us autographed bookmarks and real Atlantic Giant pumpkin seeds so that we can try to growing our own giant pumpkins! I'll keep you posted if any of us have success!

It was a fantastic meeting and a BIG thank you to Marlane Kennedy for sending us the seeds and the bookmarks and for talking with us on the phone. More on the phone interview in the next post.....