I have been trying to track down a copy of Worms of Kukulima and also but haven’t had any luck. If you guys have any leads I would be greatful if you could let me know. Thanks.
Hmmm. Sales of old-and-rare are suspended during a period of being too busy. So, searchers are at the mercy of the professionals. I had hoped to get WORMS reprinted, but haven't found a publisher yet.
I couldn’t agree with you more. Auntie’s Bookstore in Spokane (a fabulous openspaced bookstore to be in, in case you do a book tour) just opened an Islamic kosher cafe. When I mentioned this to my son, he said he’d be nervous to eat there because of the Jihad. My response was to assure him that a goodly share of the world is Islamic, and most of them have nothing but good feelings towards us Americans.
The point of my Islamic fundamentalist extremist zombie joke lay in the nuances of the awkward statement of the journalist, which would lead one to believe that the leader was protected by people who had already died (thus zombies).
I do feel that fundamentalist extremists of all religions need to lighten up a bit…I’m glad you visited my site. Although I have no poetry tips, a few poems do reside in my world of literature page.
If I figure out how to evict them, the world may be a better place.
Brad Sondahl
Yes! Let's put the _fun_ back into fundamentalism!
Dear Mr Pinkwater,
There may well be a Snellville in Iowa, but the one I live near is just east of Atlanta GA. The Atlanta area NPR outlet is WABE-FM, continuously bragging that this is their 50th year of operation. I have e-mailed them to be a member and suggested they carry Chinwag Theatre, heard nothing as yet. I will have to ask where they got the name – from Alice?
Twas brillig and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe
Somewhere it is explained that a “wabe” is the plot of grass around a sundial.
Right, it's Spillville, Iowa. Anyway, what you need to do is get nine other people...it wouldn't hurt if some of them were librarians and/or teachers...to address themselves to the program director at WABE. Call him/her up on the phone as well as emailing--responding to the needs of listeners is an important part of the job. And here is the argument that makes program directors love Chinwag Theater: It's free. No charge to stations. If you don't get results tell us at chinwag@iastate.edu .
Dear Mr. Pinkwater,
I don’t know if you’ll remember me or not. I’m an elementary school teacher (and a fan of your books, but that goes without saying) and I wrote you about two years back suggesting that you try to get a copy of the animated movie “My Neighbor Totoro” by the Japanese animator Hayao Miyazaki. You wrote back saying you wanted to wait since you too were thinking about writing a story about a “tree spirit” and didn’t want to mess up your story by accident by watching his movie. Anyway, I’m writing with a new suggestion. Disney has now bought the video distribution rights to *all* of Miyazaki’s movies and the first one, “Kiki’s Delivery Service” will be released on Sept 1. If you get a chance, you really ought to watch it (unless you’re working on a story about witches).
Although Disney has redubbed it into English, they’ve left the rest of it alone. It’s so unlike anything Disney does that it’s going to surprise people. It’s more of a series of sketches and character studies than a fully plotted story. In order to become a full witch, 13 year old Kiki has to leave home and make it on her own for one year. She settles in a Scandinavian style coastal town, but since she doesn’t have any magic other than flying, so sets up a delivery service. Through this she meets various people and builds up a surrogate family in her new town. And she never once bursts into song to wonder “who am I?” :^)
Seriously, there is more heart and soul in this one film than in half a dozen of Disney’s features, and I really think that within a year you’ll start hearing critics and parents asking “Why can’t Disney make a movie like Miyazaki’s?”
If you are interested in it, there is a great website that tells a lot about with some interesting background information at
www.nausicaa.net/~miyazaki/kiki/
I hope you’ll take my suggestion and, if you do, I hope you’ll like it.
Thanks,
Rebecca Hairston
What a great idea! Disney stops making movies, and just distributes good ones instead! Have you emailed the studio with this breathtaking notion? Not only would they still be able to make vast sums of money, they'd save all the production expenses, and quit polluting the culture. Maybe there could be a massive letter-writing campaign...stickers and buttons: Disney: Just say NO to movie-making!
Where do I send my five dollars?
I was listening to an NPR reporter recently, who explained that the purported mastermind of the embassy bombings was difficult to attack, because he was surrounded by militant Islamic fundamentalists, including some who have given their lives to the cause. Is this scarry or what? How can you fight militant Islamic fundamentalist zombies? I thought you’d better hear of this, since you mentioned a possible zombie addition to the Snark books. Glad to hear about the upcoming Robert Nifkin book. The title echoes The Education of Little Tree, an interesting book you may be unfamiliar with. Also, I’ve noticed that actual email addresses and websites included in these mailings get deleted. This is unfortunate, since part of being a Pinkwater fan could be going to sites of fellow devotees. For instance, at my site, I have the text for a novel I wrote called The Dorkelson’s Tabloid Vacation. However, if no Pinkwater fans ever read it, how can I be unfavorably compared with you?
I don't know what you're talking about. I visited your website. I read some of your pottery tips, (thinking at first they were poetry tips--which they might work as); I read the first page of your novel; all very nice.
Some of the finest people I have met are Muslims. Imagine how embarrassing for them, those relatively few terrorists. Complicated.
Dan,
I have read your five novel book, and I thought it was very interesting. My favorite one of the books is Alan Mendolson, Boy From Mars, but I enjoyed the other ones. I liked the idea of real estate agents being possesed, and how the kid won several thousand bucks off he horse race. I think the best part in Allen Mendolson is when they force the 3 men to surrender at Waka-Waka. That’s it.
Sincerely,
Eric Sayre
Realtors aren't possessed, they're extraterrestrials. Cool post, Eric, and the page is too wide for my screen. Keep reading!
Sunday night was pretty routine at first. I didn’t watch the X-Files. I went to AM/PM for a pint of Ben & Jerry’s. Read for a while. Went to bed. Couldn’t sleep. Got up. Read, put on a CD. Fell asleep. I was finally sleeping pretty contently. At 2:45 AM I was jolted awake by the sound of an explosion. I felt the rumble of the shock wave roll over me, more than I heard it. It was steady, deep, & lasted about 3 seconds. In the moment after I switched directly from beta sleep to full consciousness I was completely positive that everyone in Seattle was about to be killed by nuclear fallout. Every hair on my body stood on end as I felt the first wave of deadly radiation. I layed in bed for a few minutes, reasoning things out. My original thought, that there had been a nuclear explosion, wasn’t rational. I peeked through my blinds, moving as little as possible (in case there was a sniper). Everything seemed normal. I went into the kitchen & poured myself a glass of water. I couldn’t hear anyone else walking around the house. How could everyone have slept through the explosion? There was no one around to discuss this with; no one to help me figure out what was happening. I called the non-emergency police number & asked a vague question. “Did something happen about ten minutes ago? Maybe an earthquake?” (I knew that it wasn’t an earthquake.) “I was just jolted awake by . . . ?”
“Nothing that I was informed of,” said the voice on the phone. I watched TV. There were no news reports about the explosion. I considered calling the person who was working the early shift at work. But instead, I went back to bed, figuring that it would be better to find out what horrible thing had happened after I’d had a full night’s sleep. The next day, before going to work, I talked to my roommate Jon. He had heard the explosion, he told me, and had considered going outside to find the source. But he had fallen asleep before making a firm decision to check it out. I found no reports of the explosion in the papers or on the internet. The sound remained a mystery. I heard the noise again the next night at about 2:00 AM. It was much quieter, like it was coming from farther away this time. There were whirring sounds accompanying. There were more explosions, & other sounds that weren’t exactly explosions, some closer to me than others. Just when I thought they’d stopped, I’d hear another sound in the distance. I faded in and out of sleep for the rest of the night, hearing every sound.
The next morning a shower didn’t shake my sleepless paranoia. I stepped outside to go to work, squinting my bleary eyes at the sunlight & cursing the morning.
I’d walked about a block before I realized that I was still hearing the sound. It had become a background noise. I stiffened my soldiers a little bit more each time I heard it. I swivelled around and ran in the direction the sound was coming from. I was going to hunt this thing! I was going to destroy it! I dodged around a corner into a parking lot & came face to face with the source of my misery. A garbage truck drove carelessly over a curb, sending its cargo crashing. An aluminum can flew from the back of the truck. Its mighty claws flung the contents of a dumpster into its back. The truck fitfully crashed the empty dumpster into the pavement, nearly capsizing it. Briefly, as the truck lurched into the street, I caught the garbage man’s eye. I shot a grief-filled look, fuelled by sleep deprivation, in his direction. He looked at me blankly & drove through an intersection; ignoring the stop sign.
More self-publishing by visitors. You are welcome, Jeff-- and a nice little piece of writing it is. Of course anybody who has lived in NY is apt to say, ""Yeh? So?"" The sound of the garbage men at night is reassuring and comforting to many. I have heard of people who hang a microphone out the window to make a recording of the trash noises so they can take it with them on a rural vacation, lest they get no sleep.
Dear Mr. Pinkwater – I didn’t read any of your books until I was past 40 – if you had been writing when I was a kid in the 40s, my whole life might have been different. But anyway I have almost all of your books (to date, may there be many more!) now (I think I am missing Fat Elliot and Ducks, but I can’t tell for sure as my books aren’t unpacked yet, I just moved to a new house a couple of miles down the road from Snellville). I enjoyed The Education of Robert Nifkin (hope you now have a copy!) and was glad to see a return to the `young adult’ sort of novel. I thought it was a bit darker in tone than the Snarkout books. I will bug the local NPR outlet to carry Chinwag Theatre, but I will probably lose track of the program time and miss it. You should get them issued as tapes. I have reviewed some of your books briefly in an amateur magazine I do called It Goes On The Shelf, could send you copies if I had your address. I have put one issue up on the Web (home.sprynet.com/sprynet/nedbrooks). I learned about your wonderful website from the 343rd mailing of the Slanderous Amateur Press Association, or Slanapa as we call it.
Best wishes!
Ned Brooks
Isn't Snellville in Iowa? Am I mistaken? If not, doesn't WOI-AM go practically all over Iowa, (plus there are other stations, repeaters, etc.)? And since Chinwag Theater originates at WOI-AM, all you'd have to do is find out when it airs, and write the day and time down on a slip of paper, which you could then tape to the stereo, or superhetrodyne, or crystal set. Thanks for your kind words.
Dear Mr. Pinkwater,
Two questions. First, you mentioned in an earlier message that you had managed to find something good to say about Rochester, New York. I married someone from Rochester, and have to go there frequently for family events, so I can appreciate just how difficult that must have been. It might help my meager appreciation of Rochester if I could read the good story you wrote – perhaps I could imagine various inlaws as characters in a new & expanded version. Which story was it?
Second question. We visit Duchess County every October, and have yet to stumble upon any of the transcendant restaurants you occasionally mention in your NPR commentaries. Is the Bangall Country Store still worth finding? Do you have any other suggestions? The best we have found so far is Pongo’s in Tivoli (gotta love any place named for a dog). We’re willing to travel anywhere in the north or east part of the county, the Millerton to Tivoli to Poughkeepsie triangle. Or further for a really good place. Thanks for any enlightenment you can give on either topic.
The book is ""Yobgorgle, Myster Monster of Lake Ontario."" Quite rare. You might find a copy somewhere--check the links on this site.
The Bangall Country Store is still great, as of this morning when I stopped in on my way home from the dentist. It's in Bangall, which is right next to Stanfordville. Very funny, your suggestion that there might be someplace safe to eat in Poughkeepsie.
Hello. I have just read some books you wrote, Alan Mendelsohn the Boy from Mars, The Education of Robert Nifkin, two Snarkout Boys. They all seem to be in the same genre, with a certain kind of protagonist. Did you or anyone else write similar books with a female protagonist? What? Thank you for answering my question.
What is Rat, in the Snarkout books, but a female protagonist? I've written some books for younger kids with strong female characters, (Mush, A Dog from Space; and the yet-to-be-published Potato Kids books). And Jill Pinkwater has written a number of novels like Buffalo Brenda. Hope this is of interest.
hey, wow! i didn’t know i could actually attempt to contact the honorable Daniel Pinkwater! this is amaizing, i have a billion questions but dont know which ones to ask. lets see…
in alan mendlsn, boy from mars is it just me or is that a sort of metaphoric story? eric vondocton refferences and a bunch of other stuff that i cant remember now sort of tipped me off, if i remember what it was i’ll send it to ya.
uhh…there seem to be lost chapters to the young adult novel in ” 5 novels” (and the other pressing i last read) i could swear on everything chicken there was a part where they go to college. whats the deal with that?
Ok, let me try to get this right...Young Adult Novel was first published as a hardcover (T.Y. Crowell, publisher). The people at T.Y. Crowell hated the book, and thought it was perfectly obscene. It didn't help that the NY Times book review hired a guy who had previously written only about golf, and he said it was perfectly obscene. The editor who worked on it was fired, but before she left she wrote me a contract for another book. I handed in Dead End Dada, but they flatly refused to publish it. About this time, David Hartwell at Tor Books approached me about reprinting YAN. He advanced me enough money to buy back my contract with Crowell, and talked me into writing a third piece, which turned out to be The Dada Boys in Collitch. There were also Macintosh cartoons, and an afterword by Ken Kelman. Then Tor brought out the book without the cartoons, (or the afterword, I think) as a mass market paperback. When Farrar Straus and Giroux agreed to do the 5 Novels anthology, they were willing to publish YAN but not DED or DBAC. No idea why.
Dear Mr. Pinkwater,
You are my favorite author! My parents got me your 5 Novels book for my birthday. I have only read one book that you didn’t write ever since (I’m only about 40 pages through it anyway)! My favorite book that you wrote was Alan Mendalson, the Boy from Mars. I’d also like to thank you.
At my library we have a summer reading program and every book on my list ended with “…by Daniel Pinkwater”. The librarian was very impressed with my list. Oh, and just one more thing. Did you write any more Snarkout Boys books other than The Avacodo of Death and the Baconburg Horror. I hope so! Well, I guess that’s it. Bye!
Cool posting, Bruce. I get excited when I hear about someone who got excited about stuff I have written. No, there are only two Snarkout books. What people don't always realize is that authors like me don't just get to do whatever they want. I had another Snark book in mind, ""I Snarked with a Zombie,"" and might have done more yet, but publishers often come up with something like, ""We're making 8% more money on picture books, so we won't give you a contract for a novel.""
Publishers are often on the stupid side. Meanwhile, have a look at ""The Education of Robert Nifkin,"" a novel. It's a little bit like the Snark books, in some ways, maybe.
I am a school librarian in California. Last year my workload had increased to the point where the school actually agreed to hire someone to help me out part time. I was trying to decide if I should offer the job to one of my loafing friends or actually try to find someone who would work for the low wages when I had the following conversation with an interviewee:
Me: “Who is your favorite author?”
Him: “Daniel Pinkwater.”
Me: “What’s your favorite book?”
Him: “Young Adults”
Me: “You’re hired!”
Me: “Wait, do you know anything about working in a library?”
Him: “No, nothing.”
Me: “Don’t worry about it, you’ll do fine.”
And in fact that’s just the way it has turned out!
One more thought:
As the Republican convention gets ready to start, has it occured to anyone else that Bob Dole may in reality be an iguana wearing a Bob Dole mask?
You're one of those librarians. You are going to be blamed, not me. (See my post above).
My nine year old son, for reasons I will never understand, selected Lizard Music as a book to do a book report on for his fourth grade class. As I was helping him outline his report I could not understand what on earth he was talking about … things like the Chicken Man, and Claudia, and a Lizard Band. I thought perhaps he had lost his mind. To satisfy myself he had not I read the book, whereupon I immediately realozed why he was having so much trouble explaining it in his book report.
I should have had him staple a copy of the book to the report form with a note saying “Here, you figure it out!” Unfortunately, his teacher has little appreciation for such suggestions. So he wrote his report as best he could. It must have been ok … he got a 97 on it. He tells me he really likes your writing.
He now has to write another book report. But I don’t know if I will let him select another of your books because I will have to read it too! See what you have done to an already too busy parent!
You're from Benton Harbor, right?
I other day I visited some friends, and after several hours had to make use of the “facilities”. I am a believer in the old Utah proverb, ” A fool goes when he has too, a wise man goes when he can.” There was an 18 month old copy of the Smithsonian conveniently placed for those whose like to go and read. On the last page was your article about “Sheriff Bob”. I loved Col. Tim McCoy.
Colonel Tim McCoy had an afternoon show in Los Angeles on Channel 5, KTLA. He was truly a living legend. He and his faithful Indian companion Iron Eyes Cody were to me the pure gold. I loved and lived for westerns. Col. Tim was who I wanted to be like and look like. There wasn’t a villain alive who could stand up to the steely gaze of the Colonel.
I also got a bike, my dad got it for me. It helped me compete with the skinny kids who could run fast. My Schwinn, “ol’ Blacky”, and I could out distance the fleetest of the fleet. And we were much better at going downhill than the runners. Col. Tim went off the air without much notice from me. I was now delivering papers and making “big, big money”.
Years later and I mean years, I moved to Idaho, married and had two sons. One day there was a poster, “Col. Tim McCoy ” was coming to town. The boys and I went. It was only one show and not very well attended. The ticket taker, the refreshment seller, and the Indian assistant were all the same guy. Col. Tim looked old and some what frail. His voice had lost a little of the commanding resonance, and he did tricks with an Australian stock whip, not much gun play. The boys thought is was so-so, I thought he was too old.
After the show we got the obligatory souvenir program and a couple of “authentic Australian stock whips”. We had parked in back of the theater and had to pass the stage door to get to the car. As we walked by the door opened and there stood Col. Tim McCoy. He had his huge white hat, pants tucked into his boots, and a gun belt could be seen under his leather jacket. What a magnificent sight. I had been wrong! This was the real Col.Tim McCoy, not the other guy on the stage.
I introduce myself and the boys. We “parleyed” for almost 20 minutes about the past, indians, bad guys, good guys, and Gen. Custer. The Col. lead a part in the early 1900’s to the Little Big Horn. He talked with indians who had been in the battle. The kids and I were spellbound. He was no longer the old man trying to regain past glories, but the dignified, and as you said, hansom teller of Indian tales, and western lore.
He died a few years later, but my boys, now 30 and 33 both remember Col. Tim McCoy. Thank you for your article.
Bob Sullivan Salt Lake City, Utah
Your post here is better than my article. I forget if I mentioned his book, ""Tim McCoy Remembers the West."" Reading it, I learned he was a real Colonel, a real Cowboy--in short, the Real McCoy. Also an early and first-hand ethnologist, expert in Indian sign-language, and married to an accused Nazi spy. I got the book on inter-library loan, and enjoyed it quite a lot.
