Review: Invention of Hugo Cabret

Written and Illustrated By Brian Selznick

Scholastic; 2007; 533 pages

Juvenile Fiction; Realistic Fiction; Caldecott Award

Grades: 3-6

ISBN: 978-04-39813-785

Hugo's father has been killed in a fire, and his uncle has disappeared. Left on his own to take care of the train station clocks, Hugo embarks on a journey of discovery. While repairing a clockwork figure that is his only link to his father, Hugo makes connections with a filmmaker, a fellow orphan, and the world around him.

My Thoughts
This was a very interesting book. It is definitely not a picture book, yet it won the Caldecott Medal...and rightly so. The artwork, though black and white, is amazing. There is depth and detail that is almost photo-realistic. Also, towards the end of the book, the drawings are intermingled with actual stills from old silent films. The pictures are also integral to the text. They are not illustrations, they are the text. I would be reading along, and then there would be a series of 4 or 5 full spread pictures that would pan across a scene, or zoom in on important actions. Each set was like a single frame of a film. It was amazing. Then the text would pick up again, only it wouldn't pick up where it left off, it would pick up where the pictures left off. It was innovative, unique, and totally enthralling.

I think that kids will love this book. The story line is interesting. Since it has a male protagonist, it will appeal to both boys and girls. Also, movies are such a huge part of modern culture that a book that addresses their beginnings will intrigue children. As will the whole notion of clockwork and mechanisms in our technological, micro-chip society. The writing is well done, the pictures are flawless. It will challenge younger readers lexically, but the pictures won't hinder older kids. (The size of the book alone will make any reader, young or old, feel like they have accomplished something upon completion.) I heartily, and without reservation, recommend this book to everyone...child and adult.

*Sidebar: I saw this at my library as an audiobook. Which literally shocked me. I am normally a huge proponent of audio and e books, but in this case I am not. DO NOT GET IT AS AN AUDIOBOOK. The pictures are integral to the text. You will not get the same experience.

The Thoughts Of Others:
Publisher's Weekly's 2007 review found the book to be "an artful blending of narrative, illustration and cinematic technique, for a story as tantalizing as it is touching." They appreciated the use of movies both in the plot and in the illustrations. They saw the book as more of an experience than merely a read.

Kirkus also reviewed the book in 2007. They drew comparisons between the book and silent films, seeing the illustrations as they pan and zoom as traditional film storyboards which often told the story better than text alone ever could have. They also liked that the book was "an homage to early filmmakers as dreammakers."

Maid Marian finally Made

I recorded (many moons ago) an online storytelling session that included me telling one of my Robin Hood stories. This was intended to count as one of my stories in front of a live audience. The problem was that I was the last story told in a storytelling/chat session that lasted nearly an hour. Also, if the viewer was not a UW student, I couldn't figure out how to get the story onto my blog.

I have been meaning to rerecord the audio, resync it to the powerpoint, and upload it here to the blog with a link to the original live telling. But I kept putting it off.

Finally, tonight, I had a great idea...why not test out my new video camera's voice recorder? I went to the original live session, recorded the audio while it played on my computer, imported it into Window's movie maker...along with the images from the powerpoint, saved it as a movie, and uploaded it onto Vimeo.

I prefer this method to using pointecast, because I don't have to use up space on my UW account. Also, vimeo will let me embed the video without having to link to it. Yay!

So, the video is posted to the left. It is an oral adaptation of a literary adaptation that I wrote of a historical/traditional Robin Hood ballad for my Honor's Capstone as an undergrad. The only major changes from the written version have to do with point of view and length. Originally I had the story written out as first person narrative.

I have put a link up to a very good resource: The Robin Hood Project. It is an online compendium of almost every extant Robin Hood legend...many in middle english. I also highly recommend the Howard Pyle version of Robin Hood...it is a classic, and a good introduction to the legend.