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All Summer in a Day by Ray Bradbury Short Story Analysis
All Summer in a Day is a short story by American writer Ray Bradbury, first published in 1954. Find it in Ray Bradbury Stories Vol. 1. It’s interesting to see how science fiction evolves alongside our increased understanding of other planets. “All Summer In A Day” is a story of its time, written in an […]
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The Hundred Dresses by Eleanor Estes Novel Study
The Hundred Dresses is a middle grade American novel by Eleanor Estes, first published 1944. I consider this story a children’s literature sister of Katherine Mansfield’s short story “The Doll’s House“. The Hundred Dresses remains resonant with young readers today, and is happily still in print after winning a Newbery Honor. (The medal was awarded […]
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Sucker by Carson McCullers
“Sucker” has been called Carson McCullers’ ‘apprentice story’. It is thought that the young cousin in this short story is the precursor to Bubber Kelly in The Heart Is A Lonely Hunter. Written at the age of seventeen, McCullers naturally demonstrated more sophisticated writing later on, though I believe this is still a great story […]
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Comedy Techniques In “This Country”
This Country is a fly-on-the-wall mockumentary sitcom with two series so far (2017-2018). The story centers the misadventures of two cousins marooned in a small village in the Cotswolds. Most of their peers have moved on. Kerry and Kurtan are stuck in adolescence. They behave like typical Year 10s, despite being in their late 20s, […]
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Uncanny by Paul Jennings Hi-Lo Short Stories
Uncanny is a hi-lo short story collection by Australian author Paul Jennings, first published 1988. The original ‘uncanny’ stories were by British writer May Sinclair (1863 – 1946). I read a collection of Sinclair’s uncanny short stories (1923) a few years ago and wasn’t really moved by them. This is because so many writers have […]
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Unbelievable by Paul Jennings Hi-lo Short Fiction
Unbelievable is a short story collection by Australian author Paul Jennings, copyrighted 1986. These are tall tales for eight-year-olds. Australia has a long history of tall tales, and Jennings very successfully adapted the techniques for a child audience. The 1980s was the decade of the irreverent male children’s author. Roald Dahl was the stand-out giant […]
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Unreal by Paul Jennings Hi-lo Short Fiction
Unreal is a collection of 8 short stories, first published 1985. This was the book that really kicked-off Jennings’ career as a children’s author.
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Stephen King’s IT Storytelling Techniques
IT is a 1986 horror novel by Stephen King, first adapted for screen in 1990, and most recently in 2017. This blog post is about the storytelling of the 2017 film. After filming ‘IT’ (2007) Bill Skarsgård had daily nightmares of Pennywise. In these nightmares, he would battle Pennywise just as the characters in the […]
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The Chocolate War by Robert Cormier Novel Study
The Chocolate War by Robert Cormier was not written with a young adult audience in mind, but class sets of the book found their way into English departments all over the world. Though this is not my favourite Cormier novel, it remains his best known. Heavy in symbolism and discussable themes, The Chocolate War also makes for […]
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Bullying In Children’s Literature
Aggressiveness is culturally induced: where it is not valued, it is not strong. Marilyn French “Middle school wasn’t much fun for me. We had some bullying going on, and the best thing to do was to stay out of their way.” Jeff Kinney, author of Diary Of A Wimpy Kid WHAT IS BULLYING? Bullying is […]
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Child Moves House Trope In Children’s Fiction
Child moves house and starts at new school. This trope is hard to write well because it has been done so many times before. But it’s very useful, because many children’s stories are about friendship, and all stories about friendship must start from a point of loneliness. Everyone is lonely when they move to a new place.
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Carrie by Stephen King Film Study
I want to talk about the 1976 movie based on Stephen King’s 1974 (breakout) novel, Carrie. Critics don’t like the new one much. The criticism is mostly that the remake was unnecessary because the first adaptation was so good. The original has a slower, more sinister pace and the main thing the reboot did was […]
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What Is A “Coming-of-age” Story?
Coming-of-age is a type of story in which a young person becomes an adult, or heads in that direction. There are many children’s stories (or stories about children) about a child losing their innocence. When that character is a bit older (adolescent) then it’s called a coming-of-age story. Sometimes people think they know you. They know […]
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Wolf Hollow by Lauren Wolk Novel Study
Wolf Hollow (2016) is a middle grade novel by Lauren Wolk. This mid-20th century story is chock-full of symbolism which makes it great for a novel study. Here I focus instead on the writing techniques, for writers of middle grade. Though moons tend to be massive in children’s books, the moon on this cover would […]