Storybook season

Perfect gift for a special child? Bookstores have it covered

Wednesday, Dec. 14, 2005

Click here to enlarge this photo Rachael Golden⁄The Gazette Turn the page: Hot books on display at Olsson’s Books & Records in Bethesda include works by C.S. Lewis, Christopher Paolini and Robert Sabuda.

‘‘Books are always gifts that parents and grandparents want to give — and that kids want to give each other,” says Beverly Horowitz, vice-president and publisher at Bantam Delacorte Dell, a division of Random House Children’s Books. ‘‘No one’s going to deny technology, but if you give a kid a book, they use their imagination. On a certain level, books are seen as old-fashioned, but look what a book allows a kid to do: enter another world and interact with characters that resonate with them emotionally.

‘‘You’re giving a kid an emotional experience, letting him ‘live’ and experience what he may or may not have in his life.”

And, she adds, the experience can be shared easily.

‘‘A great thing to do, if you’re a parent or a grandparent is to say, ‘I’m giving you this book and I’m reading it, too. We’ll read it together.’ It’s sort of like going to the movies together.”

If that sounds like a plan, the key is to find children’s books adults will want to read.

Some of the books Horowitz recommends are reissued favorites from years ago, like Sydney Taylor’s ‘‘All-of-a-Kind Family” series.

‘‘It withstands the test of time,” she says, and what could be more fun than revisiting a childhood favorite with children or grandchildren?

Other titles are brand new, but sound irresistible, like Anne Fine’s ‘‘The True Story of Christmas,” which Horowitz says ‘‘puts the ‘fun’ in the word ‘dysfunctional.’”

Looking for material for a mother-teenage daughter book club experience? ‘‘Rebel Angels” by Libba Bray is what Horowitz calls ‘‘a big, fat juicy girl novel” that takes place in Victorian England and the India of the Raj. And there’s ‘‘The Orange Trees of Versailles” by Annie Pietri, set in pre-Revolutionary France that centers around a young lady-in-waiting to the royal court of the Sun King and her heightened sense of smell.

‘‘It’s a mystery,” says Horowitz, ‘‘but at the same time, you really get the flavor of another time period.”

Other novels teens love include ‘‘The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants” and its two sequels, all by Ann Brashares; and teen author Christopher Paolini’s ‘‘Eragon” and its sequel ‘‘Eldest.”

‘‘And look at [Louis Sachar’s] ‘Holes,’” she adds. ‘‘It doesn’t go away. Books with staying power never go away!”

Pop fiction

You want staying power? Try Santa.

‘‘Anything religious, and anything to do with Santa,” says Joyce Edelin of Brookeville. ‘‘And with Chanukah coming right on top of Christmas this year, Chanukah books are selling really well.

Edelin is the assistant manager at B. Dalton in the Westfield Montgomery Shopping Village in Bethesda, and she see the trends firsthand.

‘‘Pop-up books are really big,” she says. ‘‘Robert Sabuda’s ‘Winter’s Tale,’ that’s selling really well.”

‘‘They’re meant for children, but Edelin says that ‘‘adults buy pop-up books for themselves.”

Likewise the ‘‘Harry Potter series by J.K. Rowling.

‘‘Harry Potter always sells,” says Edelin, ‘‘but people like to buy the gift sets.”

What they also like to buy, she says, are bargain books. Edelin has noticed that customers linger by the ‘‘marked down” books — and most find a few must-haves.

‘‘If they come in here to look for one book, they end up with 20,” she says. And they often walk away with more than just books.

‘‘Games and puzzles are big this year — the ‘scene-it’ games; any of the puzzles that have to do with Disney; Monopoly and Chutes & Ladders in an old-fashioned case. And travel games — they come in a zipper pouch, with magnets, so they won’t move around in the car.”

Asked her picks for this season’s hot children’s books, Edelin notes that the ‘‘teen” books might not be appropriate for the pre-teens that crave them, and she urges parents to look over their youngsters’ selections before buying.

With that caveat in mind, she says, ‘‘The ‘Gossip Girl’ series [Cecily von Ziegesar] is a brisk seller for teens, while ‘‘the ‘Clique’ series [Lisi Harrison] sells really well and is more appropriate for pre-teens.”

For her own 11-year-old granddaughter Edelin chooses ‘‘The Cheetah Girls” by Deborah Gregory, the ‘‘Lizzie McGuire” series and Phyllis Reynolds Naylor’s ‘‘Alice” books.

‘‘But if you’re dealing with the ‘itty-bitties,’” she says, ‘‘‘Good Night Moon’ [Margaret Wise Brown] never stops selling.”

Moon over Montgomery

Yes, but why ‘‘Good Night Moon?” It’s one of those titles that’s ‘‘reliable, perennially given, according to Joe Murphy of Silver Spring.

‘‘‘The Grinch’ is reliable. ‘Babar’ is still alive and kicking; he never really went away.”

For Murphy, head buyer for Olsson’s Books with its locations in Bethesda, Silver Spring, the District and Virginia, it’s all about the books.

‘‘The philosophy is we are very passionate about books,” he explains, ‘‘and we want to share that with our customers.”

Murphy started with the independent bookstore 15 years ago as a Catholic University undergraduate. Last spring, he earned a doctorate, and his passion for the written word is obvious.

‘‘We don’t sell shelf space — ever,” he says. ‘‘And we’re independently owned — [by] Mr. Olsson. We really get a feel for who are customers are.”

And what they want to buy. Murphy says that for young readers, ‘‘what’s selling now is fantasy — Christopher Paolini’s book ‘‘Elder.” [The author] is a teenager, [yet] it’s well-written fantasy. People compare it to ‘Lord of the Rings’

‘‘The one that won the Newbery Award a few years ago was ‘‘A Parrot in the Oven” [Victor Martinez]. Once they win awards, these books are considered prestigious.”

Those are books with male main characters; on the other hand, says Murphy, ‘‘Chick lit knows no bounds!

‘‘It’s being written for all ages.”

Like Edelin, Murphy cites Robert Sabuda: ‘‘He’s a brilliant paper engineer, which is what they call the authors of pop-up books.”

He also recommends ‘‘How Do Dinosaurs Eat Their Food” by Jane Yolen and ‘‘Zathura” by Chris Van Allsburg — ‘‘he’s the one who did ‘Polar Express.” And he has spotted a ‘‘crossover trend”: adult authors writing books for younger audiences, like ‘‘Where’s My Cow” by Terry Pratchett and ‘‘Flush” by Carl Hiassen. The latter, he says, features ‘‘more whimsy, less corruption” than the author’s books for adults.

Hot stuff

So what’s hot this winter? Murphy says that Caroline Kennedy Schlossberg has done her bit to spotlight poetry this holiday season, wowing the crowd during a recent visit to Olsson’s in Arlington. Her book, ‘‘A Family of Poems: My Favorite Poetry for Children” has done brisk business.

‘‘Poetry is a tough category for kids,” concedes Murphy. ‘‘People think Shel Silverstein and that’s the end of the line, that and ‘A Child’s Garden of Verses’ [Robert Louis Stevenson].”

The allure of ‘‘A Family of Poems” is the way it connects past and future generations.

‘‘Reading is a very private act,” says Horowitz, ‘‘but it becomes a very social situation when you talk about it.

‘‘There’s an incredible energy of interaction.”

And finding the perfect book is a great way to boost that energy.

‘‘If you’re with a group of adults and ask them, do you remember a book you loved as a kid? There’s always a memory.

‘‘Imagine if you are the one who gives a book that resonates in a kid’s life!”

Choosing the right one takes a bit of thought, according to Horowitz, who suggests a practical approach to book buying:

‘‘If you were buying a coat, you’d think: ‘What season is it? What size is the child? What does [he or she] usually wear?’”

Use your knowledge of a kid’s favorite hobbies, school subjects, plus a sense of their reading fluency to pick perfectly.

‘‘You should pick out a book that appeals to your own eye,” says the publisher. ‘‘Find a funny book, one that makes kids laugh — they love that.”

On the funny offering list: ‘‘Nicky Deuce: Welcome to the Family,” a fish-out-of-water tale by Steven R. Schirripa of ‘‘Sopranos” fame, and ‘‘Girl, 15, Charming but Insane” by Sue Limb.

A more poignant pick: ‘‘The Penderwicks” by first-time author Jeanne Birdsall. And especially for girls in the D.C. area: ‘‘Lucy Rose: Here’s the Thing About Me” by local author Katy Kelly.

If the children on your list are not yet reading, pick a book that will appeal to those who will be doing the bedtime story honors.

What tickles Horowitz’s fancy? This holiday season, it’s ‘‘Jerusalem Sky: Stars, Crosses and Crescents” by Mark Podwal.

‘‘[Noted children’s author] Maurice Sendak said it was one of the most beautiful books he’d ever read,” she says. ‘‘It has to do with the fact that Jerusalem is the place where all three religions started.

‘‘We all share the same sky.”