Wondering, Wandering Young Adults

A recent post from John Hornor, writing about his:

...unapologetic love for John Bellairs books. Bellairs was really a precursor to all these magical orphan YA novels you see coming out, the Potter books, the Lemony Snicket. Bellairs, to me, established a tone remarkable for its clarity and quirky characters decades before J.K. Rowling cobbled together Hogwarts from the stones of previous fantastic worlds.

Review: House "Believable And Very Human Characters...Adds Inventive Comical Flourishes"

Book review: The House with a Clock in its Walls

Review: Letter "An Entertaining and Suspenseful Read"

Book review: The Letter, the Witch, and the Ring

Youth That He Cannot Endure In His Age

Ann Downer-Hazell recently shared some thoughts on John's books, which have become part of her evening reading ritual:

Memoriam: George Kell

George Kell, a former third baseman who played for, among other teams, the Detroit Tigers from 1947 to 1952, has died. He was 86.

Shortly after arriving in New Zebedee in 1948, Lewis and his uncle Jonathan discuss Tiger baseball and whether Lewis knows Kell’s batting average that year.

The Runaway Star

The Richard Curtis Agency has negotiated with Lyron Bennett of Sourcebooks Jabberwocky for The Runaway Star, a children’s science fiction series, by Brad Strickland.

Time Capsule: March 8, 1959

March 8, 1959: Tonight’s the night John Bellairs made his television debut – live from Washington D.C. Fifty years ago tonight Bellairs, along with three other students, represented Notre Dame on the G.E. College Bowl program. In a battle of the wits with Georgetown University, these other Four Horsemen from Notre Dame buzzed in their answers but it was Bellairs who made the night memorable.

The Curse of the Blue Figurine Chronology (Part I)

Several years ago, probably as we were putting The Dullard’s Bane version of this website to pasture, I got the wild idea to go through the Johnny Dixon series and identify all the passages of time. When Bellairs noted the date, or a day or week or month passed, I scribbled down the particulars. Part of this was to gauge just how much of Johnny’s life was crammed into the “early 1950s” – the generic setting Bellairs used, and Strickland inherited. Also, if the events had happened chronologically, what year would it have been by the end of The Wrath of the Grinning Ghost? A case of too much time on someone’s hands? Maybe. Anyway, here’s when the initial chapters of The Curse of the Blue Figurine occurred:

Why You Should Never Laugh at a Berserker

Ever wonder why the Lewis Chessmen – specifically the rooks – look the way they do? The Comann Eachdraidh Uig tells the story:

In This Distracted Globe...

Seeing some of Thomas Doyle’s globes reminded us Bellairs’s characters were often fond of the little worlds within globes (and I think we've touched on this before.) Still, be careful you not walk in on the group from 'The Reprisal' (shown here).

To Dim His Hand of Glory

We once read that someone became interested in the works of John L. Stoddard after reading The House with a Clock in its Walls. That made us wonder how much of John’s work has inspired younger readers to explore the works of the different authors that John (and later Brad) mentions throughout his fiction.

Review: Treasure "Wouldn’t Recommend If You’ve Never Read Bellairs Before – At Least Not At First"

Book review: The Treasure of Alpheus Winterborn

Tea Exhibits My Tongue - Most Beautiful

It’s always interesting seeing where John’s name pops up. This time it was at the end of a discussion of tea, specifically mentioning lapsang souchong:

A Dream and Fruitless Vision

Here’s something we though somewhat appropriate for today, the supposed end of analog television here in the United States. On February 17, 1958, Pope Pius XII declared Saint Clare of Assisi (1193-1253) the patron saint of television.

M. R. James and That Which Creep Like Shadows...

An interesting study of the works of M.R. James from the Guardian:

The "ominous thing" in James's stories, written between the 1890s and 1930s, might be a sheeted ghost (Oh, Whistle, And I'll Come to You, My Lad), a corpse crawling from its grave (The Mezzotint), or something grotesque and tentacular (The Treasure of Abbot Thomas). Whichever form it takes it will be malevolent and capable of killing. There are no Caspers to be found here.