A Post About “BOOKS ABOUT BOOKS”………and an announcement

Hello RAoR Readers! Today we’re sharing the final post on this Random Acts of Reading Blog–we’ll be transitioning over to the blog run by our amazing Random House Children’s Books Marketing Team. You can look forward to MORE book information, author features and thematic content, and you may even see us over there posting regularly.

We have thoroughly enjoyed writing this blog, working with our authors, editors and marketing team for the last three years and it’s bittersweet to be writing this last official RAoR post for all of you. It seems only appropriate to bring you this special post about “books about books”, both fiction and non-fiction, today.

For many of us “it all begins with books”, and that’s where Bob Staake’s Look! A Book! takes off:

Look! A book! A hook! A cowboy cook!
Weird and kooky things that go!
Some go fast and some go slow! 
Can you find the squawking crow?

Filled with wacky fun and hidden visual treats, this is the perfect book for reading together, it’s truly got something for everyone young and old. And don’t miss the sequel Look! Another Book!. And we are very excited about Bob Staake’s new book that will be published by Random House in 2014 My Pet Book!

Louise Yates has written and illustrated a book for all of the book and bookstore lovers! In Dog Loves Books, our hero indeed loves books so much that he opens his own Independent Bookstore. Initially business is a bit slow, and people come in looking for everything except books, but once Dog spends some time re-discovering the joy of books and stories, the customers flow in and all is well.

It’s a Book by Lane Smith is fun, funny and topical. Two friends, a jackass and a monkey are reading, one an ebook and the other a traditional paper book. The spare dialogue and art makes this the simplest ode to print books and their relevance. Great for kids and parents!

Miss Brooks is the teacher every kid would love to have, clever, creative and costumed for every story hour. In Miss Brooks Loves Books (and I don’t), this amazing teacher helps all of the kids in the class to find just the right book, except Missy, who just doesn’t think she likes to read. But with the help of her mother, and the patience of Miss Brooks, and an assist from William Steig’s Shrek! Missy finds the right book too.

Mo Willem’s familiar characters Elephant and Piggie are the stars of We Are in a Book! and are hilarious when they realize that they are not only in the book but the reader can see them. The pressure is almost too much for them, until they realize that there is as much pleasure in being read as in reading.

Odilon’s Dad owns a bookstore, heaven on earth, right? Until the day he sees the strange man with a straw “drinking” the stories out of the books. He’s fascinated and soon finds himself drinking from the books too. The Ink Drinker is quirky and charming, and is followed by two more equally quirky volumes A Straw for Two  and The City of Ink Drinkers.

       

“The Books of Beginning” trilogy by John Stephens is a book lover’s dream, starting with The Emerald Atlas we meet three orphan siblings, Kate, Mike and Emma, who have found themselves in the latest of many “homes”, but in this one there is a book, a magical book. Of course they must first learn to harness the power of the book’s magic, and maybe save the world. Followed by The Fire Chronicle and the forthcoming (2014) The Black Reckoning this is a grand adventure.

One of my favorite middle grade/YA books is Endymion Spring by Matthew Skelton. In an Oxford Library a young boy picks up a book which only he can open and in which words appear only to him, and there are dark forces who would love to get their hands on this very old and very valuable book. A terrific story with an unlikely hero, and a magical book.

When Meggie’s father reads from the book Inkheart, in the book Inkheart, a villain steps out of the pages and into their home. Thus begins Meggie’s adventure to figure out how to use magic to save her world. A wonderful tale about the power of magic, imagination and books.

For older readers The Unbearable Book Club for Unsinkable Girls by Julie Shumacher is just the book for book lovers.  Four girls are thown together by their mothers who think they need to have a Mother-Daughter Book Group, and well , let’s say they’re not happy about it. Somehow they muddle through, viewing their lives in the light of the books they are reading, and maybe evening forging new friendships. A perfect choice for your real-life Mother-Daughter Book Club, too!

And of course, we must include the book of all books about books The Book Thief by Markus Zusak. The extraordinary and unforgettable story is about the ability of books to feed the soul. Beloved by readers young and older, book clubs around the world, and soon to be a major motion picture. Read it before you go!

And for those of you who are interested in a non-fiction look at books about books, here are a few of my favorites:

In Everything I Need to Know I Learned from a Children’s Book, renowned children’s book expert Anita Silvey presents “Life Lessons from Notable People from All Walks of Life” in this marvelous collection of remembrances of the children’s books that inspired them and had an impact on their lives.

A Family of Readers by Roger Sutton & Martha B. Parravano, editors of The Horn Book Magazine, is filled with recommendations, discussion and debate from children’s book authors–the perfect guidebook to finding the right book for any young reader, and getting them started on the path to a lifetime of reading.

Anita Silvey’s Children’s Book-A-Day Almanac is one of my favorite books about books (when I was a child I had a book called 365 Bedtime Stories and I think this is my grown-up version)–Every date features a book that ties in with a historic event that took place on that day, and it included birthdays of authors and illustrators, holidays, and fun facts about that day in books too. So addictive you’ll surely want to read more than one a day.

Another favorite, possibly because “Golden Books” were such a part of my childhood, is Golden Legacy by Leonard Marcus, an amazing look at the history of Golden Books and how they “Won Children’s Hearts, Changed Publishing Forever, and Became an American Icon Along the Way”. The complete history of these books that have been in every household since 1942, the artists and authors and executives, is a remarkable look at the times of our lives through the evolution of children’s books. I dare you to open this book and not get lost in it.

And last but certainly not least is the just published Everything I Need to Know I Learned from a Little Golden Book by Diane Muldrow. Fun and nostalgic, and the perfect gift for your grownup friends.

Thank you to all of our readers and contributors for reading, commenting and inspiring us at RAoR. You’ve all made blogging truly fun!

Please share your thoughts one last time in our comments section , and please follow us to the Random House Children’s Books Blog here.