Following a link over at Chicken Spaghetti today, I found myself at the blog for the Endicott Studio, looking around with great interest. As well as the blog, there is an online Journal of Mythic Arts, the summer edition of which is now online. From the blog: this issue is "focused this time on mythic fiction for Young Adult readers. What's special about this issue is that it contains thirteen short stories, rather than our usual two or three, along with our regular mix of nonfiction, art, and poetry." Read more about it here (the blog) or go straight to the journal where you can read new stories by Holly Black, Gwenda Bond, and many others.
Since everyone is saying that Harry Potter has made fantasy the hot book genre for the young etc etc, I find it a little dispiriting that the lovingly selected cluster of such books displayed in advance of HP 7 at my library didn't get checked out in meaningful numbers (2 books is not meaningful, especially since I took one of them). However, ever the optimist I have changed the sign from "While you're waiting for Harry, check these out!" to "Now that you've read Harry..."
In fairness to the patrons of my library--they had already checked out many of the books I had planned to put in the display. The Dark is Rising seems to be going out like hot cakes; likewise the Charlie Bone series by Jenny Nimo. But why will no one check out The Game (Diana Wynne Jones) or The Thief (Megan Whalen Turner) or The Safe Keeper's Secret (Sharon Shinn)?
You know, that's interesting about people not checking out the other fantasy books. I noticed that the local Borders had a huge non-Potter fantasy section set up just previous to the sale date of the Deathly Hallows. I wonder if those books sold...
ReplyDeleteI think some people love HP because of the quirky-fun narrative voice. Also, Harry Potter is unique from other fantasies in that he is neither a completely ordinary child nor is he completely of the magical world. Rather, Harry is a half-breed, a multicultural character torn between the normal world and the magical subculture, and that is a new trend in fantasy. See Shen's Blog for my comments on other magical multicultural series.
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