March is Women’s History Month and while the retelling of the Robin Hood legend in the story Scarlet by A.C. Gaughen isn’t strictly history, this is still the Fiction Friday pick.
One of the major reasons I chose to write about this story is that the main character in this Robin Hood legend is a strong woman who makes her own choices in life–not letting anyone, including Robin Hood, tell her what to do.
In this retelling of the legend, Will Scarlet, Robin Hood’s friend, isn’t a boy, but instead is a woman known to most around Sherwood as Scar or Will. Everyone believes she is a male thief and that’s what Scarlet wants them to believe. Only a few folks know most of the truth, including Robin, Little John, Much and Friar Tuck.
Scarlet is a strong, moody character. She has plenty of secrets and a dark past. She’s also torn about her disguise as a man: for example, the religious Scarlet won’t go to church dressed as a man because she wants God to see her as she really is. One of the things I loved about this Scarlet is that she’s multidimensional.
If you’ve seen any movies or read any Robin Hood stories, you’ll recognize some the events of the story. The Sheriff of Nottingham is here and so are the awesome prison escapes.
The story is told entirely from Scarlet’s point of view. This is a little difficult to get into at first, because Scarlet doesn’t speak in proper English. But give it a chance and I think you’ll get used to it.
The author, A.C. Gaughen, wrote that she felt “compelled” to write about Robin Hood. She was interested in the trials and tribulations that Robin faced both at home and on the Crusades and how he dealt with his pain by helping others. In her retelling she chose to rewrite Will Scarlet as a girl because he could have been!
I like to think of history as a very long game of Telephone; it’s never going to come out at the end exactly…to the way it started. (from the Author’s Note to Scarlet p.9)
There will always be people who think a woman–especially a young woman–isn’t capable of all that Scarlet believes she is. I don’t buy it. If history didn’t leave a place for a strong (and yes, sometimes grumpy) young woman to exist, then it is my pleasure and delight to shake things up… (from the Author’s Note to Scarlet p.10)
You can check Scarlet out online or you can find it at your library!
Today the library hosted 93 kindergartners and their teachers from Canutillo Elementary. It was a great program that honored Dr. Seuss since tomorrow, March 2nd, is his birthday. Dr. Seuss, aka Theodor Geisel, changed the way that children’s books were written and enjoyed. Many adults today can remember learning to read with his classic stories. I learned to read from The Cat in the Hat Comes Back!
The theme for this year’s Dr. Seuss party was The Lorax. A film version is coming out tomorrow and like I challenged the students who listened to the story, I hope all of you will look for the differences between the movie and the book.
The book is a solid story on the dangers of over-consumption. It is about ecology and the environment. The Lorax speaks for the trees… but no one in the story listens. At the end of the book, a young boy is charged with renewing the forest with the last Truffula Tree seed. The Lorax encourages everyday people to care about their world and making it a nicer place to live.
At the Seuss party, we sang songs, heard the story and made really cool Lorax masks out of paper plates. Students really seemed to understand the message of the Lorax. When we asked if the Lorax was a good guy, we received a resounding “yes!”
Find The Lorax at your library! EPCC or the Public Library
We’re nearing the end of the February Black History month celebration, so I’d like to highlight one of my favorite books that features an incredible glimpse into life for African Americans during the great depression. The story is by Christopher Pual Curtis: Bud, Not Buddy.
This story is written for a younger audience, but is a great read for just about anyone. It’s a two-time award winner, receiving the 2000 Newbery Medal and the 2000 Coretta Scott King Award. Ten year old Bud is the main character in the story. The most important person in his life, his mother has died, and he has been living in the Home (an orphanage) since he was 6 years old. After some bad experiences in the orphanage and in his last foster home, Bud decides he’ll strike out on his own to find his father.
Bud believes he knows who and where his father is and tries to find him in Grand Rapids, Michigan, but his only clues to finding his dad are memories from his mother, a bag of rocks and fliers he thinks are from his father’s band. As Bud travels looking for his dad, he meets different people, has adventures and lets his rules for living guide him. Everywhere he goes, he takes his suitcase which contains not only secrets of the past, but also hold clues for his future. Set in the Depression era, the story is upbeat rather than sad. Bud’s cheerful attitude and his determination keep him going through all of his adventures.
I loved Bud! He’s funny, fierce and completely lovable. Even if you don’t think historical fiction is your “cup of tea,” you’ll probably love Bud Not Buddy. I enjoyed every minute of this book. Especially funny are Bud’s rules for living. Check them out!
You can find Bud Not Buddy at your library! Check for availability and to place requests online at the El Paso Public Library catalog. You can also check availability on the Community College Catalog.
Caterpillars! What neat little creatures. They start out as cute little worms and then become magnificent butterflies in one of nature’s most dramatic changes. This week, Ready to Read story time at the library focused on these awesome insects. We also made our own caterpillar pictures using cut-out paper. In this way, we mimicked some of the artists who illustrated the stories we read.
We read:
Arabella Miller’s Tiny Caterpillar by Clare Jarrett
The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle
Waiting for Wings by Lois Ehlert
Inch by Inch by Leo Lionni
Of all the stories, Inch by Inch is my favorite. It tells the story of a clever little inchworm caterpillar who is in danger of becoming a robin’s lunch. The inchworm makes himself useful and escapes being eaten by measuring the birds in the forest, but when a nightingale wants the inchworm to measure his song, the inchworm has a clever solution to all of his problems with the birds! Read it yourself to find out what the inchworm does.
Find all of these books at your library and join us for story time, every Tuesday, Wednesday and Saturday at 11 am.
Valentine’s Day is coming up and while we most often associate the holiday with Romantic love, we know that there are actually many other kinds of love. In How to Live Safely in a Science Fictional Universe, Charles Yu explores the love in families, especially love between a father and son. Charles (of Mirror Universe 31), has been barely living since his father time-traveled out of his life. Charles feels that he has disappointed his father, and while they had always had trouble communicating, Charles badly wants to reconnect.
The problem is that Charles isn’t going anywhere. He’s a time-machine technician and he’s given up on his own life. He has no motivation. It isn’t until Charles’ future self appears and a panicked present-Charles shoots himself in the stomach that his life finally starts to move forward–even if it’s into a time loop. The journey Charles takes pulls him backwards in time where he can watch him and his father working on time-machines together. Charles travels many places and through both past and present, but it’s a puzzle to figure out what happened to short-circuit his relationship with his dad (and his mom) and where his dad is hiding out now.
The story never takes itself too seriously, even though the breakdown of a family is serious business. Charles is accompanied on his journey by Ed, a dog that doesn’t exist, TAMMY, a computer program with self-esteem issues and a book that he apparently wrote in the future, or is writing now…
For sci-fi lovers, this book is heartily recommended in time for Valentine’s Day. Read and reconnect with your family!
This book can be downloaded from the El Paso Public Library’s eBook Library. Have your library card and PIN ready.
Happy Valentine’s!
