Walton Ford's Pancha Tantra is now being released by Taschen in a much more affordable edition (from the $1,000 limited to $70 general - cheaper even at amazon) so anyone (like me) who is fascinated by his unusual animal portraits will be able to enjoy their lushness in their own home. You can also get a peek at Ford's book filled studio at You Tube. (It's worth the three minutes to watch this and hear how much research he puts into his paintings.)

I was sorely tempted the other day to buy the new issue of Elle solely to read the article by Lorrie Moore on writing (of course it is not online). But Jennifer Aniston is on the cover! I just can't put my hard earned dollars towards more crap about Jennifer Aniston! I will likely succumb however just to read about Moore (unless it's at the library - I'll have to check this week). Jezebel has a tiny excerpt on what the author had to say.

Peter Sis fans take note - he has a new book with Pam Munoz Ryan due out from Scholastic next spring, The Dreamer. It's not up online yet, but here's some of the catalog copy:

Much to his father's disappointment, Neftali is not like other children. Frail and painfully shy, he spends most of his time alone: collecting treasures, reading, writing, and daydreaming. While his father plans to build him into a robust doctor, Neftali has other longings stirring inside him. The natural world in his native Chile and the painful injustices he witnesses there move him equally. How Neftali reconciles his own dreams with his father's is at the heart of this inspiring, radiant, and profoundly moving story of self-discovery.

I know generally we are supposed to take catalog copy with a grain of salt - of course every book is the best book ever!!! - but this is Sis and Ryan so I don't see how it won't be wonderful.

Also in the Scholastic catalog, Barbara Kerley and Edwin Fotheringham have teamed up again for The Extraordinary Mark Twain (According the Susy) a bio of the writer in the same vein as their fabulous What To Do About Alice that provides a perspective of Twain from his daughter. Kerley is one of my longtime favorite picture book authors and I love that she tackles biographies. It's easy for me to recommend this one without even looking at it - Kerley truly does no wrong. (Read much more on Fotheringham at Seven Imps.)

A new candidate for most cliched book description ever comes from Flux: "Sixteen-year-old Morgan lives in a hick town. Her mom was killed in a car accident when she was two, her dad drinks, and her stepmom is a non-entity. Her boyfriend Derek is boring and she can't stop staring at her coworker Rob's cute butt. Then there's the kiss she shared with her classmate Tessa . . . But when Morgan discovers a devastating secret about the one person she completely trusted, her entire world crashes and she must redefine her life and herself."

So let's see - dead parent, drunk parent, useless step parent, boy crazy, or maybe girl crazy and BONUS - a secret is revealed that brings about the end of everything our heroine has ever believed in!

The book could be perfectly lovely but selling it with so many sensational plot points jammed into one paragraph is really hard to take. I think I have the literary equivalent of a sugar high just from reading this.

And let's see - what am I reading now? Operation Yes by Sara Lewis Holmes (for the Nov column - cool teacher, kids dealing with parents at war, timely, quirky and smart); The Affinity Bridge by George Mann (for the Oct column - a very engaging Victorian London steampunk mystery with zombies, a near robotic Queen Victoria and brilliant deducing that would put Holmes to shame. SO MUCH FUN to read!); Pilgrims to the Wild by John O'Grady (western book research); Family Sentence by Jeanine Cornillot (for Booklist) and The Horizontal World by Debra Marquart (western book research). Hmm, the Marquart is from the library and the O'Grady I bought. The other three are ARCs sent by pubs. Expect to be hearing a lot more on the western book research in the coming weeks as the book begins to unfold.