Big Fat Little Lit (Picture Puffin Books) |  | Creators: Art Spiegelman, Francoise Mouly
Publisher: Puffin
Category: Book
List Price: $14.99
Buy Used: $0.22
as of 9/7/2010 14:03 CDT details
You Save: $14.77 (99%)
New (35) Used (33) from $0.22
Seller: Blue Cloud Books
Rating:  6 reviews
Sales Rank: 629857
Media: Paperback
Reading Level: Ages 9-12
Pages: 144
Number Of Items: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.2
Dimensions (in): 10.9 x 7.6 x 0.6
ISBN: 0142407062
Dewey Decimal Number: 741.5973
EAN: 9780142407066
ASIN: 0142407062
Publication Date: September 7, 2006
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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| • | ISBN13: 9780142407066 | | • | Condition: New | | • | Notes: BUY WITH CONFIDENCE, Over one million books sold! 98% Positive feedback. Compare our books, prices and service to the competition. 100% Satisfaction Guaranteed |
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Product Description
New in paperback for the very first time comes the New York Times bestselling Little Lit series! Choice comic stories culled from the three bestselling comic collections edited by Art Spiegelman and Françoise Mouly: Little Lit: Once Upon a Time, Little Lit: Strange Stories for Strange Kids, and Little Lit: It Was a Dark and Silly Night. The gorgeous paperback features flaps and beautifully reproduced full-color interiors. Hilarious and charming, the collection contains comics from such award-winning and bestselling authors and artists as Harry Bliss, Daniel Clowes, Ian Falconer, Jules Feiffer, Neil Gaiman, Crockett Johnson, Barbara McClintock, David Sedaris, J. Otto Seibold, Maurice Sendak, Lemony Snicket, and Art Spiegelman.
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Showing reviews 1-5 of 6
There's No Knocking This Pup's Pedigree December 16, 2006
E. R. Bird (Manhattan, NY)
5 out of 6 found this review helpful
Let's say that you've heard of the "Little Lit" books, edited by Art Spiegelman and his wife Francoise Mouly, but that you've never actually gone so far as to pick one up. Let us also say, while we are at it, that you are aware of the massive loads of talent that have gone into the series, but that this was still not quite enough to draw you in. Well, my lovelies, I have an answer for you. Like yourself, I somehow managed to catch a snatch of a comic strip here or a lovingly drawn panel there without actually sitting down and reading the "Little Lit" books cover to cover. Then, out of the bright blue sky, "Big Fat Little Lit" falls into my lap. So I read it through with not a little skepticism. Truth be told, I've always suspected that the books were written for adults rather than children. You can cast a book in a childish shell and claim your artists are working with the younger set in mind but will kids actually read what you create? Slowly I've come to the conclusion that yes, there is definitely an audience for this series that is under the age of 21. Still, if you're gonna hand them a "Little Lit" collection, better to go for the best. Give them a compendium of selected past works. Give them "Big Fat Little Lit", the best of the best, and save yourself some time.
Behold before you thirty-six comics created by thirty-three "of the world's most beloved authors and artists", or so says the backflap. Compiled from parts of the three "Little Lit" collections already in existence (with some extra goodies for spice) "Big Fat Little Lit" has it all. Ghouls and fools and fables both traditional and with a twist all working together to fill this 144 page beauty. You'll find old classics like Crockett Johnson's, "Barnaby" alongside all new tales by people as varied as Daniel Clowes or David Macaulay. The result is eye-popping jaw-dropping assortment of stories of varying styles and macabre natures. Puzzles too pop up between comics that can range anywhere between one to nine pages.
The sheer weight of celebrity is both a boon and an drag on enterprises like "Little Lit". On the one hand, adults like me are bound to go gaga over the luminaries who've worked on this puppy. Where else can you find David Sedaris working with Ian Falconer (outside of The New Yorker, of course)? Neil Gaiman and Gahan Wilson? Heck, forget the pairings. They have two William Joyce offerings, Maurice Sendak unleashed, Jules Feiffer, and God knows who else. Illustrators that work primarily in the realm of children's books like Barbara McClintok pair with kid-only authors like Lemony Snicket (as opposed to Daniel Handler, of course). Most impressive to my eyes (and proof that I never examined the original collection it appeared in closely enough) is a Walt Kelly piece. Publishers out there might do very well if they were to republish Kelly's non-Pogo related fairy tales in a compendium, seeing as how they work so nicely here and all. So that's on the one hand. On the other hand, it's sometimes hard not to get the feeling that child readers sometimes come across as a secondary concern. Since Spiegelman and Mouly founded "RAW", the alternative comics magazine, is it fair to think of this as a slightly watered down version of that magazine's material? Or is it its own separate beastie? I can answer the question of whether or not any kid is reading this collection, but nothing's simple.
I once worked in a Greenwich Village library where I would proudly display the first collection of "Little Lit" on the top of my bookshelves where it was easy to pluck and check out. No takers. That book sat solitary and untouched for weeks on end. At the time I blamed the publication itself. Then I moved to a different library branch. In my new location I created a Graphic Novel shelf and put the exact same publication there, visible for all to see. Within mere minutes that puppy flew off the shelf. What I deduce from all of this (aside from the average Greenwich Village native's reluctance to disturb book displays) is that if you put "Little Lit" out there without any explanation, the viewing public isn't going to know what to do with it. They've slowly been acclimated to the idea of what a graphic novel is, sure. But thrust something with pages the size of dinner mats in their face and they go all to pieces. Is it a picture book? A comic book? Fairy tales? So my advice to you is to make it crystal clear to people that this is a beastie like no other. No, it's not really a graphic novel. But if you put it under that heading then at least people will have some kind of a context to work with.
But do CHILDREN read it? I direct you, in this case, to a conversation I had just today. I spoke to a homeschooler and her mother who were recently in my library, and the subject of graphic novels came up. When I mentioned "Little Lit" in passing, the two lit up. Apparently the girl was given the first collection when she was two and has been read them ever since at bedtime. Hearing this I was, to put it mildly, stunned. Then a co-worker informed me that her son likes the books because he likes fairy tales and he likes comics. Apparently the only way he can justify reading the one is if it is combined with the other. It bears some thought. I think that another reason that "Big Fat Little Lit" succeeds where its predecessors merely did okay is that due to the sheer volume of twisted puzzles, games, and I Spy-like ventures, this book can sit down and seriously court fans of "Highlights" everywhere.
The collection doesn't contain all the past "Little Lit" ventures, which is logical. I was very very sad, however, to see that Chris Ware didn't make the cut. His "Fairy Tale Road Rage" board game is not included, much to the chagrin of my Ware-lovin' heart. Still, I was able to come to terms with his disappearance. Then I was perturbed by the reduced size of the individual comics in this book. Overall I think it was a very wise choice to reduce the size of "Little Lit". The large size of the earlier collections, while they evoke the comic pages of our youth, are bulky and hard to fit on personal and public bookshelves. Unfortunately with this new size we now face a problem that comic artists face nationwide whenever a newspaper wants to fit in more copy. Small panels can sometimes crush otherwise perfectly nice reading matter rendering it difficult to see. In general this isn't a noticeable problem until you come to Barbara McClintock's, "The Princess and the Pea". McClintock's delicate lines and meticulous details have been scrunched and shrunken down so far in this book that the reader definitely loses something in the process. Ah well.
Now if your child/neice/nephew/grandchild/what-have-you already owns one of the "Little Lit" collections (or all of them, for that matter) then perhaps this gift might come across as a tad repetitive. Then again, there is new material to be found here that you could not locate elsewhere. Did I mention to you that the talents of Martin Handford are utilized here? Don't know who Handforth is? Does the name "Where's Waldo" mean anything to you? Aw yeah, baby. He's here and he is, as the blurb on the back of this book states in general, "in top form". By and large, I'm a skeptic when it comes to this many sophisticates pooling their talents to bring small children joy. All that aside, this is undoubtedly my favorite "Little Lit" of the lot and is undoubtedly THE best way to enjoy the series. If you're gonna give a kid some comics, make `em read "Big Fat Little Lit". I seriously doubt it'll take much prodding.
Easy intro to comics for kids December 20, 2006
Anne B. Levy (Chicago, IL)
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
This collection--culled from three previous Little Lit anthologies--is, of course, literary and brilliant and oh-so-eclectic, and if you know nothing about the genre, it's an easy intro. Fairy tales nestle comfortably next to horror stories and folklore, and my four-year-old easily adapted to the diverse narrative styles and voices: after all, he could SEE the differences.
Looking at the big picture, pardon the pun, I was struck by how many were told with forceful moral underpinnings. More than a few protagonists must face the gloomy consequences of their misdeeds and I didn't spot a single story where evil prevailed. Naughtiness, maybe, but not genuine eat-your-family badness.
That's not to say it's all goody-two-shoes fluff. Like the original Grimm's Fairy Tales, many of these tales venture into nightmare territory, where mothers-in-law try to devour grandchildren, stuffy noses explode with dopplegangers and cute kitties come from alternate worlds, and little that seems comfortable and safe turns out to be so.
I get the distinct impression these are stories written by actual parents who have braved the wild terrain of a child's imagination to chart both its twisted roads and startling flora.
Only Cool Kids Need Apply February 20, 2009
Miriam Bookey (Santa Monica, CA USA)
What a great comic book for kids and grownups alike. I recommend the whole series. Please don't just buy for your kids and let them read them without, perhaps, a bit of "let's read this together" oversight. There are some mature (not inappropriate, but good lessons to be learned...) themes.
Wonderful!! March 24, 2010
B. Flatt
I really loved this book. I found it in my favorite used books store. The book was in excellent shape--by the way. I was looking through the graphic novel shelf, and came upon this treasure. It says it is for children grades 3 and 4..but I think an adult would love it as much as I have. It will stay in my graphic novel collection. I will be looking for more Big Fat Little Lit books.
I hope you enjoy the book as much as I did/do.
:)
He who laughs last thinks the slowest -- this will make sure that's not you August 6, 2008
Jesse Kornbluth (New York)
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
"Big Fat Little Lit" is a greatest hits collection. It's advertised as appropriate for ages nine to twelve, but you have to wonder about that. ("Our audience is all ages --- even though children's book publishing doesn't like that," says Mouly.) Some of it is just dandy for our six-year-old. Most of it will delight any media-savvy `tween. But its greatest appeal is surely to adults, who may buy it as an ultra-hip coffee table book, only to discover it is the Fountain of Youth.
In this world, attitude counts. Which isn't to say the morals of these little tales are negative in any way. They're just... twisted. Not surprising when the contributors include David Sedaris, Gahan Wilson, Maurice Sendak, Jules Feiffer and the cream of the alt-comix set.
For example: "The Hungry Horse" is the sad tale of a critter that will work so long as it isn't fed --- of course, after a decade, a farmer tosses the nag a crust of bread. There is a "Hasidic parable" and a story of a "fairy godfather". In a retelling of "The Princess and the Pea", after the prince rejects 1,628 princesses, someone comments, "Perhaps he can't make a commitment." A creepy face becomes frozen in the backwards world of "Pretty Ugly". A gingerbread man escapes every pursuer but a fox, who catches him by pretending to be deaf. When Jack's beanstalk grows, someone says, "There goes the view."
And there are bonus pages. A picture asks you to identify "22 odd things." Another challenges you to "Find the Twins". And there's a "Joke page", with a moral that our little one might have devised: "He who laughs last thinks the slowest."
Be swift.
Showing reviews 1-5 of 6
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