James Patterson has been all over the media promoting a book, Middle School: How I Survived Bullies, Broccoli and Snake Hill, the latest in his popular Middle School series. Even in his TV commercial for the book, he is taking time to encourage you to get your kids reading. In his interview for public radio’s Marketplace, he said he worries that the popularity of e-books with adults are leaving kids behind. He released both an adult thriller and his newest Middle School book on the same day for that reason. He ended the interview by saying that if your child is not a good reader, you are sending them out into the world with a handicap. That is the issue right there and the purpose of this blog. To find out more about his new book, check out his NPR interview.
Patterson’s website for kids, called Read Kiddo Read has reviews of books for kids from babies to young adults. Scroll on down to the bottom of the home page and read an opinion piece he did for CNN.com. Read Kiddo Read has always been on the Reading Sites We Love blog list on the right hand column of this page.
Jon Scieszka, author of The True Story of the Three Little Pigs, The Stinky Cheese Man and the Time Warp Trio series, has a website devoted to getting boys to read called Guys Read. He has organized his recommendations into categories like, How to build stuff, Realistic kids in realistic situations and one sure to be a hit with my grandsons, At least one explosion. Other categories include Series, Ghosts and Action/Adventure and several more. Scieszka includes comics (Gary Larson’s The Far Side comic books are prominently featured), graphic novels, magazines and audio books. You can listen to a 2005 NPR interview with Jon Scieszka talking about his website.
