Books for Children and Their Parents June 3, 2012

MediaMonday for June 4, 2012: On Censorship, by Salmon Rushdie, drawn from his Arthur Miller Freedom to Write Lecture given May 6, 2012 as part of the PEN World Voices Festival.

C.S. Lewis once said, “I am almost inclined to set it up as a canon that a children’s story which is enjoyed only by children is a bad children’s story. The good ones last.” Reading adults don’t have trouble remembering the books that affected them most as a child. When readers become parents, they relish the reading of these same books to their children, creating unbreakable ties between parent and child. Every generation produces new classics of children’s literature and on Wednesday we’ll discuss some of the old and the new. Then on Friday, we’ll visit with John Claude Bemis, author of The Prince Who Fell From the Sky.

The Prince Who Fell From the Sky features an animal cast set in an earth reclaimed by the powerful forces of nature. Something apocalyptic has happened, killing off the humans and wiping out the cities, factories, farms and roads built my their hands. The skeletons of skyscrapers still exist and the legend of mankind as tyrant and destroyer is ever-present in the culture of the animals who survived the cataclysmic fall. In this forest now dense with mighty trees, vines and undergrowth untouched by man’s need to carve and corral, the animals have a Kiplingesque society with laws and punishments, tributes and alliances. Enter into this “post-mordial” diorama a rocketship crashed into the forest with only one survivor, a lone young boy.

An inspiring speaker and entertaining performer, John Claude Bemis brings his passions for music, folklore, and spinning exciting tales to his novels and presentations. The first novel in his Clockwork Dark trilogy, The Nine Pound Hammer, was nominated for the North Carolina Children’s Book Award and was selected as a New York Public Library Best Children’s Book for Reading and Sharing. The trilogy continues with The Wolf Tree and The White City and has been described as “original and fresh” and “a unique way of creating fantasy.” His latest novel is The Prince Who Fell from the Sky. A musician and educator, John lives with his wife and daughter in Hillsborough, NC.

Follow John Claude Bemis on Twitter: @JohnClaudeBemis