Madeline L'Engle's A Wrinkle in Time: The Graphic Novel by Hope Larson

- are there any characters that you feel are similar to you?
- calvin.  i just feel that i had to say that.  i get the same feelings.  i feel things before they happen and after they happen.

- by the end, did you feel like most of the mysteries were answered, or were you still confused?
- only some of the mysteries were answered.  i still have questions about the black thing and about IT.

- speaking of IT - let's say for a moment that you were in the room with calvin, meg, charles wallace and mr. murry.  how would you resist IT?
- i would say some of my weekly memory verses and sing some of the junior choir songs that i learned.

- would you trust mrs whatsit, mrs who and mrs which if you met them today?
- yes.

- if they were staying in charlottetown, where would they be?
- the holiday inn.  they wouldn't even have to pay.  they could just tesser into a room and everybody would suspect that they had already paid.

- why do you think meg and calvin are falling in love?
- because i just think it was meant to be.  and i think mrs whatsit, mrs who and mrs which, since they are magical creatures, they just made it happen.

- dennys and sandy get left out of the whole adventure, seemingly because they do not have the special abilities that meg and charles wallace have.  is this fair?  would you have sent them?
- why were they even in the book if they didn't even go on any crazy adventure?????????????????????????????

- how do feel about the pictures?  is there anything you would have drawn differently?
- meg looks too young for her age.  and i think calvin should look more like me - just a teenage version of me.

- aunt beast thinks that vision, or the sense of sight, is very limiting.  do you agree?
- i do not agree.  i think vision is the most important sense of all.  why would there be figurines, decorations or anything without vision.  the world wouldn't be anything.  everything would be grey and dark with no colour at all.  you wouldn't even need colour.  why would you even have a pet?  if you don't have sight a pet is useless.

- pretend that i don't get the book at all.  describe for me the man with red eyes.  what is he?  why is he important to the plot?
- his function is helping you understand that IT is very powerful.  he is a zombie, basically, but he never died.  he just doesn't have a brain.

- the book makes a big deal out of a verse in the bible that talks about God using the foolish and the weak things in the world to defeat the wise and powerful.  does this happen in real life?
- yes.  it does.

- would you recommend this book to others?
- i would recommend it to everybody in the whole world who likes mysterious, magical, serious books.

- do you think you will eventually read the novel, without the pictures?
- probably not.  maybe when i am the kind of person that doesn't need any pictures anymore.

Oz [graphic novel series] by Eric Shanower and Skottie Young

Oz - Nomes from the Nome King's palace.

Cowardly Lion, Toto and Dorothy from Wonderful Wizard of Oz.

Jim and Eureka in the land of the Mangaboos, from Dorothy and the Wizard.

We usually don't do interviews about shorter books or comics. But I felt we needed to make a special exception for the Oz comics. Why do you think that is?
- Because the Oz comics are adaptations of chapter books. Novels, actually. And they aren't called graphic novels for nothing. They are pretty long.
It takes us at least eight hours to read an Oz novel, but right around three hours to read a comic, even with all the extra discussion and explaining. Do you think we are somehow missing out?
- No, because I think we should read both of every one.
So far we've read The Wizard of Oz, Ozma of Oz and Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz. Which was your favourite?
- Ozma of Oz, the one with the Nome King. The pictures were particularly exciting - and the nomes were pretty cute. One of my favourite parts is when everyone has to guess what objects everyone got transformed into and they they guess wrong and they all get transformed. Then I loved how Billina the chicken was the hero.
I'm happy that Soleil is able to read graphic novels with us. She just doesn't have the attention span for chapter books.
- I like it too.
Next on our list is the The Road to Oz. Should we read the novel or the comic first?
- The comic.
The illustrator has made some bold choices. Which characters have surprised you, in a good way?
- Scarecrow. I love the Tin Woodman, but I wish he would have done him like in his first sketches - more robotic. I love the nomes. And Ozma.
Has the illustrator made any mistakes?
- Denfinitely with the Hammerheads. They should be bigger, with grass skirts instead of skin-clothes, have longer necks and more rectangular heads. They don't have arms!
How much do you think Oz can teach us about the real world?
- Two percent. I mean six percent. First of all, the characters had lots of courage and brains and heart before they got all that stuff from the Wizard. Like that kind of learning.
Pretend you are thinking of working together with a team to create a graphic novel version of something we've read. What is it?
- The Dog Who Wouldn't Be by Farley Mowat. Because it is one of the funniest things I've ever read.
Of the four main jobs (writer, illustrator, colorist, letterer), which would you pick?
- I'd take three of the jobs - illustrator, colorist, letterer. Somebody else can come up with the script.

the dog who wouldn't be by farley mowat

what would be a more accurate title for this book?
this book should actually be called "my life while we had a dog" because it is not all about the dog. in fact it is mostly not about the dog.

what was your favourite part?
when the man went camping with the family and stayed in farley's tent, where farley was starting his own zoo.

this book is advertized as a comic novel rather than a true story. how much do you think is just made up?
less than half of a quarter. it all seems pretty real to me.

it took us quite a while to make our way through this novel, because there was so much to learn and discuss. what was the most interesting thing we learned about?
the difference between shotguns and rifles. it was funny how he fell back into the pit of stinging nettles when he shot the gun.

do you want to go hunting?
i would rather try shooting clay pigeons. i just don't think i would know which birds were right enough in season.

are you more excited about camping now, or less?
more because i know that all those ridiculous things would never happen to me.

are you interested in sailing?
yes.

what kind of pet are you interested in next? would you ever capture a pet from the wild?
i would definately not want a pet baby cormorant for a pet because they vomit fish guts in your face. but i would certainly like to try a great horned owl.

all of farley's great memories in this book are of time spent outside in nature. what do you feel about that?
well, i like to spend a little more time inside than he does.

legend of super smash brothers

daddy helped me make a stop motion video.

legend of super smash brothers from jenny josh forest soleil on Vimeo.

mountain treasure hunters

i made my own board game called 'mountain treasure hunters'. here are the rules.

mountain treasure hunters
a board game for two or three players

included:
board
three micro-figures
three power-ups [wands]
twelve monsters
one crystal

first mission - retrieve the crystal
place your microfigure on your camp at the edge of the mountain. youngest player goes first. on your turn, roll the die, and go the rolled number of spaces in any direction except diagonal. you do not have to follow a straight line. players race to the top of the mountain to get the crystal. if you land on a monster, you roll the die again in battle mode. if you land on a power-up, add it to your camp.

battle mode
here is what each number means in battle mode with a monster.
1 or 2 = monster is defeated and removed from the board.
3 or 4 = monster wins, go back three spaces.
5 or 6 = monster is defeated but you are wounded. go back two spaces.

power-ups and player battle mode
you can only land on another player if you have a power-up. if you have a power-up and the other player doesn't, you automatically win and they must go back to their camp. if both players have power-ups, they must both roll. highest number wins, lowest must go back to their camp.

second mission
once a player gets to the crystal, they must race back down the mountain to their camp. while they are doing that, the other players attempt to defeat as many monsters as possible. game ends when the player with the crystal makes it back to camp.

a mouse called wolf by dick king-smith

what was your favourite part of this book?
- the part where he becomes a composer. he learned so much music and then he made his own. that's very special for a mouse.

you read this book two years ago, when we first moved. have your feelings about it changed?
- no. but i thought it was way longer than it is.

if you were writing a piano piece, what would you call it?
- "robots". that's it. just robots.

wolf was a very brave mouse who did something completely new. what makes someone brave?
- well, they aren't afraid to do something. no, but it is someone who faces their fears.

what completely new thing would you like to try next?
- there's a lot i want to try. i want to build a completely new robot.

this author also wrote one of your favourite books, mr. ape. what makes these books similar?
- well, they are both about lots of animals.

i want to be an astronaut.

today i went on a tour of the international space station. you can too. click here to watch the videos.

winter wonderland

warning - it was snowy and windy when we made this video. the loud horrible monster sounds are the wind.

snow hill from jenny josh forest soleil on Vimeo.

learning about prince edward island

art gallery from jenny josh forest soleil on Vimeo.

make your own protective samurai

this is a little funny friend who will come alive when you are not looking, or even at night. he will guard your house. you will be free of bad dreams. try making your own. look at the picture below.

escape from planet x

i made my own game again. check it out! i'll tell you how to play. use spacebar to attack, up to jump, left and right to go left and right, down to crouch. to use your jetpack, press c. have fun!

Make a Free Flash Game

the tin woodman of oz by l. frank baum

what was your favourite part of this book?
i'm thinking about two things at once. let me just meditate on it. i liked when the giantess captured everybody and turned them into different animals.

if you captured me, what would you turn me into to improve me for your entertainment?
ummm. uhhh. don't forget to write that. i've got it! a robot that looks like donkey kong. and your foot would be as wide as our house. that should give you a good idea of how big it is. then i would make you take off your underpants and say booga-booga ten times outside.

which character in the story is most like you?
the tin woodman, probably. just because i like going on adventures.

where would you like to travel in oz?
the emerald city. because i like emeralds. but i wouldn't want to live there. instead i would live in munchkin land because i would like to try out being a munchkin. i like that they are tiny.

was it right of ku-klip to make a new person out of the cast-off parts from captain fyter and the tin woodman?
no. because those parts still belonged to them even though they weren't using them anymore.

do you think nimee amee and chopfyt are truly happy?
no. because chopfyt is usually always grumpy. but they should be happy. i don't really know what they should do differently. i don't think about stuff like that. that's not my kind of question.

if you could ask the author anything about oz, what would you ask?
could you make a straw woodman please?

it's for you to know and me to find out

at beavers we went to the art gallery. my three favourite parts were:

1. i got new button and a card that proves that i went to the exhibit.
2. lionel stevenson's photos of giant rocks.
3. seeing the scissor lift behind the scenes in the sub-basement.

click to try.

these are the best videos i have ever seen.

what do you call a live-action movie with serious injuries?

trauma drama.

smash crash double bash

i made my own video game on sploder. try it now!

Make a Free Flash Game

star track two

when i grow up i am going to have my own movie studio and make full-length movies [not shows] called star track two. these will be computer-animated movies. take a look at the pictures below.

this is fighter squad one. they are the heroes. from right to left this is t-91, penguin droid, hummingbird-bot, bud-bot and flame crystal.

this is fighter squad two. they are the villains. from right to left we have general pecker, iron troll, hypno-crystal-beard, junk punk, and disc-club-tongue.

i don't have the plot yet, but i am working on it. i think i will start with a stop-motion animated video for a sneak peek.

the bfg by the big friendly giant

what was your favourite part of this book?
- the ending.  not the fact that it was over, but the trick at the end where the book is actually written by roald dahl but the story pretends that it was written by the bfg himself.

if you were a people-eating giant, what would your name be?
- bonecruncher.

the idea of giants sneaking around at night and snatching dozens of children from their beds and chewing them up is probably the most horrid thing i can imagine.  were you ever scared or grossed out?
- no.  if it was real i would be scared, but no.   i can't remember anything that grossed me out.  except when the butler said that "maybe there is still a bit of dried blood left on that sword" so they had to clean it before the bfg used it as a breakfast knife.

do you think a place like giant country could exist?
- yes.  i would get there by asking the bfg.

other characters seemed to have a hard time understanding the bfg when he talks,  did you?
- no.  because i knew a lot of words already and i knew how they really went.  like how he says gnat instead of cat.

pretend i'm someone who hasn't read this book.  convince me to read it.
- hey!  there's this awesome book!  you should read it.  it is about a big friendly giant.

i don't know that i'm convinced yet.
- well, they stop evil giants from eating, as the bfg would call it "human beans".  which are actually human beings.

yuck.  are you sure i'm going to like it?
- yes!  because it is great and really funny.

i just made up a tongue twister

say this five times fast: "foiley boiled a coiley" isn't that a sick joke?