{"title":"Animals, Museum Culture and Children's Literature in Nineteenth-Century Britain: Curious Beasties by Laurence Talairach (review)","authors":"C. Tarr","doi":"10.1353/chq.2021.0053","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/chq.2021.0053","url":null,"abstract":"Book Reviews cult to map onto characters of African descent” and because vampire stories are often about taboo sexual desires), this chapter highlights the significant differences between how the Black, American Bonnie Bennet and her White, Irish book counterpart, Bonnie McCullough are treated (113). By tracing TV Bonnie’s dark fantastic cycle, Thomas demonstrates how “the imperatives of commercial teen television and fan responses limit the liberating possibilities of characters of color” (127). The final sections of the chapter discuss the following: how social media activism raises awareness against injustice; the increased number of Black girls and women advocating for better representation in mainstream speculative fiction; and fan fiction as a way to rewrite the stories of marginalized characters. The final chapter in this monograph, “Hermione Is Black,” is most compelling as it moves from literary criticism to audiences’ responses to the lack of representation—or even misrepresentation—in popular literature. Recounting her experiences as an avid reader of the Harry Potter novels and as a writer of Harry Potter fan fiction, Thomas discusses the contemporary audiences’ use of social media to construct meanings from texts independent of or contrary to authorial intent. She goes on to offer the practice of “restorying”—which describes how young readers “reimagine the very stories themselves” as they “imagine themselves into stories”—time and place, identity, and across modes as some ways of decolonizing the imagination (159, emphasis original). To say that The Dark Fantastic does important work in the fields of critical race theory, young adult literature, and media studies would be an understatement; its impact is both dynamic and far-reaching. One reason this book is such as an important resource for decentering whiteness in academic settings and beyond is because it uses critical counterstorytelling to bring historically marginalized voices to the forefront. Another reason is that Thomas’s incorporation of autoethnography and reader responses increases the text’s accessibility (and teachability) so that readers—regardless of their backgrounds—might learn new ways of seeing.","PeriodicalId":40856,"journal":{"name":"Childrens Literature Association Quarterly","volume":"46 1","pages":"437 - 440"},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2022-03-17","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"43419994","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"At Arm's Length: A Rhetoric of Character in Children's and Young Adult Literature by Mike Cadden (review)","authors":"C. Mills","doi":"10.1353/chq.2021.0051","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/chq.2021.0051","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":40856,"journal":{"name":"Childrens Literature Association Quarterly","volume":"46 1","pages":"433 - 435"},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2022-03-17","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48406307","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Out of Solitary Confinement: Representations of Youth Incarceration in Young Adult Literature","authors":"Caitlin R. Murphy","doi":"10.1353/chq.2021.0048","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/chq.2021.0048","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":40856,"journal":{"name":"Childrens Literature Association Quarterly","volume":"46 1","pages":"401 - 413"},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2022-03-17","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"41551994","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Mapping Fairy-Tale Space: Pastiche and Metafiction in Borderless Tales by Christy Williams (review)","authors":"Elissa Myers","doi":"10.1353/chq.2021.0055","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/chq.2021.0055","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":40856,"journal":{"name":"Childrens Literature Association Quarterly","volume":"46 1","pages":"443 - 445"},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2022-03-17","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42027730","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Baseball, Blue Jays, Bracelets, and Barbed Wire: Picture Books and the Visual Iconography of Japanese American Incarceration","authors":"G. Halko","doi":"10.1353/chq.2021.0049","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/chq.2021.0049","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":40856,"journal":{"name":"Childrens Literature Association Quarterly","volume":"46 1","pages":"414 - 431"},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2022-03-17","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44654963","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Beyond The Snowy Day: The Politics of Ezra Jack Keats's Seven Peter Books","authors":"M. Sasser","doi":"10.1353/chq.2022.0004","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/chq.2022.0004","url":null,"abstract":"of something","PeriodicalId":40856,"journal":{"name":"Childrens Literature Association Quarterly","volume":"47 1","pages":"64 - 85"},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2022-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47087742","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Ambivalent Childhoods: Speculative Futures and the Psychic Life of the Child by Jacob Breslow (review)","authors":"Kenneth B. Kidd","doi":"10.1353/chq.2022.0008","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/chq.2022.0008","url":null,"abstract":"Book Reviews an age when teenagers often grapple with identity. Cummins also had access to relatives and friends of Taylor, and to their own letters and memoirs. But most impressive is the additional deep and extensive research she conducted into the social history surrounding Taylor’s life and work. Because June Cummins suffered from ALS in the last few years of her life, she enlisted the aid of her friend, the scholar Alexandra Dunietz, to complete the interviews and final editing. Cummins herself was able to finish a draft of this outstanding biography before her death. In an odd coincidence, Sydney Taylor similarly corrected illustrations for her final book in 1978, while in the hospital dying of cancer. Cummins closes her story of Taylor’s life with words from the eulogy by Taylor’s brother: “We are very proud and grateful that Sydney Taylor will be remembered by readers of the past as well as the future, as the charmingly winsome Sarah, the middle sister in the All-of-a-Kind Family” (319). June Cummins’s biography deftly extends the memory of Sydney Taylor to a new generation.","PeriodicalId":40856,"journal":{"name":"Childrens Literature Association Quarterly","volume":"47 1","pages":"111 - 114"},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2022-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"41968275","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Young Adult Gothic Fiction: Monstrous Selves/Monstrous Others ed. by Michelle J. Smith and Kristine Moruzi (review)","authors":"Tiffany Morin","doi":"10.1353/chq.2022.0013","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/chq.2022.0013","url":null,"abstract":"Children’s Literature Association Quarterly between the perceived requirements of mass audiences and the promise of additional credibility and cachet associated with cult cinema” (145). This chapter considers The Nightmare Before Christmas, Corpse Bride, Coraline, ParaNorman, Frankenweenie, The Boxtrolls, Fantastic Mr. Fox, Isle of Dogs, Rango, 9, and Kubo and the Two Strings, which generally challenge the doll-like conformism depicted in mainstream animation. One interesting pattern Brown considers that is especially prevalent in horror is a type of psychological diversity often excluded from discourses focused on race and gender. These films challenge the notion of innocent or idealized childhood via their engagement with death, trauma, and violence, all of which are mostly excluded from mainstream animation for children, despite being a real part of many children’s lives. Further, the child characters in these films celebrate individualism, as these characters do not socialize with popular cliques. In other words, these films likely cater to audiences outside of the mainstream, both socially and stylistically, the latter of which, as Brown demonstrates, often increases the movie’s appeal on the international market (176). Throughout this review, I have mostly avoided including the specific films Brown uses to support his claims, and this decision is only because he includes so many. Brown’s use of primary sources is meticulously balanced, never relying solely on one or two films for support. Instead, he discusses more than 100 movies throughout his text, proportionally balancing his analysis across the major studios he introduces in the first chapter: Disney, Pixar, DreamWorks, Illumination, Blue Sky, Sony, Paramount, and Laika. Although Disney and Pixar do receive much critical attention, a major strength of the text is Brown’s discussion on how the business practices of these studios influence tone, style, diversity, and narrative.","PeriodicalId":40856,"journal":{"name":"Childrens Literature Association Quarterly","volume":"47 1","pages":"124 - 127"},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2022-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"46316941","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Contemporary Hollywood Animation: Style, Storytelling, Culture and Ideology since the 1990s by Noel Brown (review)","authors":"M. Sasser","doi":"10.1353/chq.2022.0012","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/chq.2022.0012","url":null,"abstract":"Book Reviews of Arthurian legend and of cinema. While Woller does analyze the brief songs in the film, her extended study of the film’s score fascinated me. Even though Neil Innes composed a score, the film’s creators opted to use stock music from a catalogue to purposefully construct “a classic bad Hollywood medieval soundtrack” (142). Citing the work of John Haines, Woller discusses the film’s soundtrack in relation to popular culture’s conception of medieval-sounding music (such as chants and trumpets). This context helps prove Woller’s claim that the score makes certain scenes feel cliché, musically heightening the film’s parodic intent. The final chapter tackles Spamalot, the popular 2005 stage musical that both adapts and expands on Monty Python and the Holy Grail. Woller usefully presents the musical as containing two key elements: the Arthurian parody already present in the film and the added parody of musical theatre. Spamalot is a musical that knows it’s a musical, and many songs are parodies of common musical song types. Woller analyzes two main additions to the musical: the diva character of the Lady of the Lake (who, in the end, turns out to be Guinevere and marries Arthur) and the love story between Sir Lancelot and Sir Herbert. But I would have appreciated a fuller engagement with the briefly mentioned critiques of Monty Python’s “misogynistic and homophobic tendencies” (184). I admire the scope of this book, spanning from medieval texts to the twenty-first-century musicals inspired by them and addressing both stage and screen. Through her case studies, Woller certainly proves that the “purpose and uses of the legend have changed” in different retellings and that these “Arthurian musical retellings contribute to the continuation of the legend” (189, 191).","PeriodicalId":40856,"journal":{"name":"Childrens Literature Association Quarterly","volume":"47 1","pages":"121 - 124"},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2022-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44809496","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"War as a Posthuman Force: Anthropomorphic and Zoomorphic Representations in Nathan Hale's Treaties, Trenches, Mud, and Blood","authors":"Krista M. Turner","doi":"10.1353/chq.2022.0003","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/chq.2022.0003","url":null,"abstract":"I n 2014, Nathan Hale published Treaties, Trenches, Mud, and Blood , the fourth book in Nathan Hale’s Hazardous Tales , an Eisner-nominated and bestselling comics nonfiction series for middle grade readers. The premise of the series is to tell “the neatest, grossest stories that history has to offer” in an attempt to “entertain more than educate” (Hale, Interview). The title of the series is a pun on the shared name of both the author-artist, whom I will refer to as Hale, and one of the frame narrators, the historical figure Nathan Hale, a Revolutionary War hero, who is the subject of the first book of the series, One Dead Spy . In this energetic account of his service as a spy to General Washington, Nathan Hale is captured by the British and sentenced to hang. Standing on the gallows about to die, he is swallowed by a giant history book and then spat out with a comprehensive knowledge of all events in history, both the past and what is to come. He uses this knowledge in a Scheherazade-like manner to stall indefinitely his execution, overseen by the British Provost and a hangman. This trio of somewhat fictionalized characters is the central narrating voice throughout the book and the unifying thread of the series. The first three books are biographies that follow a central (human) historical figure or group of figures, but Treaties departs from this format, embarking on an explanation of the causes and notable events of World War I, such as the assassination of Austria’s Archduke Franz Ferdinand, battles on the various fronts, and the development of modern weaponry. The most notable point of departure, however, is the use of animals to depict the various national players in the war, a move that alerts Hale’s readers to the possibility that this is not a typical war story, but one that offers an alternative, posthuman reading and reconceptualizing of war and its participants. 1 Using posthumanism as a lens, this essay examines Hale’s use of anthropomorphism and the comics medium as they Anthropomorphic Zoomorphic Representations Blood 57 Anthropomorphic and Zoomorphic Representations in Treaties, Trenches, Mud, and Blood","PeriodicalId":40856,"journal":{"name":"Childrens Literature Association Quarterly","volume":"47 1","pages":"44 - 63"},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2022-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48339979","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}