As I process new books for the children and young adult departments I cannot help but notice certain trends in publishing. Last year brought with it an iceberg-sized pile of books about polar bears and penguins. 2010 ushered in a swarm of bug and insect books and now sheep appear to be the latest graze, I mean craze in kids’ publishing.
For teens (and adults) all things supernatural are extremely popular. It is probably no surprise that vampires, vampires, vampires (Marsha, Marsha, Marsha) continue to dominate storylines due to the Twilight series phenomena. I’ve seen an onslaught of angel related romances emerge and it may be that angels are looking to become the new vampires, but they’ll have to contend with zombies and werewolves on the bookshelves. Werewolves have the upper hand though because a new theme taking off in both kids’ and young adult literature is Red Riding Hood. That’s right, Red is making her big comeback.
New teen titles spinning the Little Red Riding Hood & Big Bad Wolf motif include Cloaked in Red by Vivian Vande Velde, Sisters Red by Jackson Pearce, and Red Riding Hood by Sarah Blakely-Cartwright (paperback release date: Jan. 25, 2011). The latter title has been adapted for film (tagline: Believe the legend. Beware the wolf.) The new Red Riding Hood movie starring Amanda Seyfried will debut March 2011 and if it turns out to be any good, will help boost Red’s overall ratings.
Authors and illustrators have also been busy reworking the tale of Little Red for younger audiences such as Gail Carson Levine's Betsy Red Hoodie. Here are some links to other Red Riding Hood titles:
http://classiclit.about.com/od/booklists/tp/aatp_redridingh.htm
http://www.surlalunefairytales.com/ridinghood/books.html
If Red doesn't make it as the next big thing, what topic or character do you wish would come in vogue?
No comments:
Post a Comment