#firstbooks

First novels: do we like them or love them? 🤔 Interestingly, I read the first novels by my favourite authors only after I’d read some other books of the said authors, which is an absolutely unconscious move 🤷‍♀️ Look here: “Player Piano” by Kurt Vonnegut “Poor Folk” by Fyodor Dostoevsky “Sense and sensibility” by Jane Austen “A Confederate General from Big Sur” - by Richard Brautigan …to name a few. I like all of them but I love ❤️ other books more 🙂 My recent read, “The Broom of the System” by David Foster Wallace, is a great book. It’s funny, very postmoderny (ticks all the boxes: a confused heroine, a strange drug/medicine/plot going around, drawing all kinds of weird people (there was a man who at some point was consuming a building 😅😬), etc.); it’s stuffed with some little charming tricks only DFW can pull and the anticipation and the subsequent discovery of such things make you smile. That being said, it is nothing like “Infinite Jest”, has not a single moment of sadness or revelation in it. Also, it’s short. I decided to pair this book with “V.”, the first novel by Thomas Pynchon, also the first postmodern novel which made me realize it’s not easy to read books of this genre, what with nonlinear narrative and so many characters you have to write them down not to forget who is who (it was more difficult to keep track of them in this particular book). The book makes you feverish, you search - like the characters of the book - for V., the elusive femme fatale. Anyway, I enjoyed the chase 😉 What do you think about first novels, their charms and imperfections? #bookstagram #bookstagrammers #instabooks #instabookstagram #firstbooks #postmodern #postmodernism #davidfosterwallace #thebroomofthesystem #thomaspynchon #v #americanliterature #americanauthors (at Tallinn, Estonia) https://www.instagram.com/p/CTIUsCLLRh8/?utm_medium=tumblr

Some of my first books! #firstbooks #childrensbooks #childrensliterature #brazil #brasil🇧🇷 #brasileiras (at Brighton, Colorado) https://www.instagram.com/p/B_BaUiSJIiq/?igshid=154k1uoghdrsh

So obviously I’m now spending slightly longer than I should looking at all of the amazing baby books that are out there - I still love these brilliant @laurencekingpub art gallery cards! . #tellingtalesshop #tellingtales #theshopforillustratedbooks #babybooks #firstbooks #babygifts #babyflashcards #londonkidsbookshop #shoponline #shopindependent #hackneykids (at London Borough of Hackney) https://www.instagram.com/p/By8Bn4iFsan/?igshid=531cjp10gk84

So I should have shared this last week for #teacherappreciationweek but wow, things got crazy, between book launch stuff and freelancing and . . . Anyways, back to the point. 🙄 When I was in the second grade, I had a teacher who was a writer. Never made it big (as far as I can tell), I think he just had a few small press or maybe even indie titles out. But he wrote a book (I think maybe every year?) with all the kids in the class in it. It was silly and fun and, as you can see, had lovely hand-coloured art 😅 but he went above and beyond to put that together for us, and as a result, at the age of seven I knew that real people wrote books. 🖋📚 He wasn't the teacher that made me want to become a writer (that came later), but he normalized it, led by example. Teachers, parents, family, grown ups who take an interest in kids, read to them, read with them, give them books and make them books and keep a straight face and say encouraging things when they try to write books, it all matters. Everyone doesn't have to become a writer. But we can all be readers. Change the world with books, y'all. 📚🎉 . #teacherappreciation #canadianauthor #kidsbooks #firstbooks #debutauthor #indieauthor #childrensliteracy #raiseareader #bookstagram #bookworm #bookaddict #kaiespace

Make your own board book. Toddlers love looking at books especially when they feature themselves or their family, toys or pets. Mount photos onto Blank board books, add simple wording and some repetition and you have a keepsake which will also help your child to develop pre-reading skills. #reading #toddlerfun #toddlerlearning #boardbooks #firstbooks #prereading #funbooks #makeyourownbook #makeyourown

“I Have Got To Stop Loving You,” Ai, from CRUELTY (1973). Ai was one of the first poets to show me how to be fearless inside of a poem. Poetry, in the farm-burbs where I grew up in Virginia, was always & only the white male canon (with a handful of Dickinson & Marianne Moore thrown in--no one even dared teach Plath). When I went to college & signed up for a poetry workshop, there was no textbook, so I went to the university bookstore & bought a handful of collections off the shelf by names I’d never heard of, starting at the beginning of the alphabet, where I met Ai. In the forest of words & works my brain has since become, these last two lines are still sharply carved into one of the strongest trees.

Back in stock and a sneaky new one! Milo is great with his clear and stylish illustrations everyone will love him (even in the bath!) . . #tellingtalesshop #childrensbooks #littlelearner #bathbooks #babybooks #firstbooks #kidsbookstagram #kidsbooks #learnathome #shopsmall #bookshop #londonkids #londonfields #broadwaymarket (at Andrews Road Hackney)