Which ones?

Numbers 28 and 32 -- I'd have to go look up the titles. (They were all so nonspecific and similar -- The Invasion, The Threat, The Getaway, whatever.)

The first one was an Ax (the alien) book, and the second was the one where Rachel got split in two. The Ax one was more fun.

When I was writing them, Jake was nearly eight, so he was very impressed.

Yay! Thanks for sticking up for my man Pike.

(banging head against desk)

NO ONE WAS DISSING PIKE.

Please to read my lips, OK? I do not diss writers I have never read; I rarely diss writers, period.

Not. What. I. Was. Saying. Am I speaking martian, or something? This is pretty straightforward.

Put bluntly, I'm having some difficulty in believing that all you guys were little critical geniuses at age ten, or whatever. And that goes for the deep, earnest, initial soul-searching I am not for one second believing in about the choices in ice cream, either.

Maybe everyone in this thread was in fact that kind of prodigy. If so, congrats, and I'm sorry I'm doubting you. But honestly, take my word for it: when handed two flavours of ice cream to choose from, most little kids lick their lips, point at the one they like better and say "That one! Two scoops, please." The reasons for why they preferred one over the other come way later in life.

PERIOD. OK? Not "attacking" your man Pike. Are we clear? Please? Because I honestly don't know how much clearer I can possibly be.

Jesus. Frustrating.

Are we clear? Please? Because I honestly don't know how much clearer I can possibly be.

Clear.

The reasons for why they preferred one over the other come way later in life.

And this is the bloody thing. Why can't one have reasons at a young age? Why can't a kid say, "Mom, I like this book better because it has aliens and this one has no aliens"? Or, "Mom, I like this book better because this other one was boring and I wanted to watch TV instead"? It feels like you're dismissing the existence of any thought processes at all in children until what, age twenty? When do you think we know why we think something is better? I'm sorry is I'm misinterpreting your stance, but yes, it is frustrating when your judgment of something is dismissed as, "Oh, you just liked him cause he had Indian things."

I've not read any of that stuff. But I do remember it took me a lot of Nancy Drew books to learn it was always the caretaker with the weird accent.She had me going for the longest time. As I'm writing this book now, I'm sad that I've strayed away from writing that allows me to villainize caretakers with funky accents...it would make my "job" so much easier.(Although I could have a little fun with that...make one of the attendants foreign in some way, just for the "Psych!" red-herringness of it.)

I'm sad that I've strayed away from writing that allows me to villainize

"It's the sullen guy with the wooden leg! Turn around already before he hits you in the head with the shove!"

Darn the modern requirements for plausability. It would have worked if it weren't for those rotten kids and their dog.

Okay, yeah, I think I've still got your meaning all wrong. I'll stop now. Sorry I got so defensive. I understand you have no opinions on the authors.

Why can't one have reasons at a young age?

Of course we have reasons at a young age. I can't imagine anyone with a heart or soul NOT having the reasons. What I am having difficulty believing is the concept of almost any ten year old, new to the wonders of being allowed to read whatever they want, greedy to gobble down stories and feeling their minds and their spirits expand, having the connective skills or, honestly, the inclination, to track down some sort of justification for whatever the initial reaction might be.

Why can't a kid say, "Mom, I like this book better because it has aliens and this one has no aliens"? Or, "Mom, I like this book better because this other one was boring and I wanted to watch TV instead"?

I've never met a kid who didn't do exactly that, and that's speaking as a parent of a very precocious kid who had a shitload of friends over, most of the time.

It feels like you're dismissing the existence of any thought processes at all in children until what, age twenty?

Whatever the age is when any given human being starts feeling a deeper need to justify the first hit of pleasure they get, whether it's physical or cerebral. No specific age. However, the number of people I've met who fall into that category at age ten or twelve is - huh. Zero.

When do you think we know why we think something is better?

See above; when you hit the age, emotionally, spiritually, whatever, to ask yourself that question. I think - lest I apparently devolve into Martian again -that anyone with a heart or mind does exactly what you're talking about. And there is a big difference in the culmination of the thought processes, between the one that starts "This one's less boring, Mommy!" and the one that begins "It has to do with the quality of his research - his take on (insert whatever) is poorly thought out and relies on surface shock value." If you did the latter at ten, more power to you.

I'm sorry is I'm misinterpreting your stance, but yes, it is frustrating when your judgment of something is dismissed as, "Oh, you just liked him cause he had Indian things."

Um, P-C? YOU responded that way. I've never read the books, remember? I had no idea there were Indian themes in there. YOU told me that - and, in your original post about, it was the only completgely short-form (and therefore believably initial, or younger) reaction I saw.

Wrod, Connie.And I'm all in love with that urban drama thing so I totally can't do that. Like the Homicide detectives wishing they could pin their murders on Professor "Murray" from Sherlock Holmes.

Speaking of Holmes, the BBC commissioned 5 stories in celebration of the Great Detective.

[link]

Put bluntly, I'm having some difficulty in believing that all you guys were little critical geniuses at age ten

I know I wasn't, but I also know I could feel--viscerally--the difference between a good book and a bad book. I knew Sendack was more fun to read than the cheap (though more brightly colored and shinier) books at the grocery news stand. I have huge respect for kids' taste and I think they are even LESS swayed by "crit" mind than adults are. A kid likes a book because they like it, not because it won a Caldecott. Classics of children's literature become that way because kids respond to them over and over.

I was very surprised on scoping out books that stayed with me--that I remembered and missed from my childhood--on the internet, that so many of them were classics and written by excellent authors. They stayed with me (as opposed to the other bookjs of the dozen or so I gobbled down a week) because they were good. That's why the authors were well-regarded, because they wrote books which could do that. I may not have known WHY I responded to them, I just knew I did.