from the School Library Journal blog, excerpt, with thanks

Top 100 Children’s Novels #27: Bread and Jam for Frances by Russell Hoban, illustrated by Lillian Hoban

June 5th, 2012 #27 Bread and James for Frances by Russell Hoban, illustrated by Lillian Hoban (1964)

The Irish Times Reviews Russell Hoban's Posthumous Novel, Soonchild, excerpt with thanks

The Irish Times - Saturday, April 7, 2012

Going for a World Song

Poignant coda: Russell Hoban's Soonchild

YOUNG ADULT/TEEN FICTION: ROBERT DUNBAR has the pick of the latest young-adult novels

WITH THE DEATH, last December, of Russell Hoban, we said farewell to one of the most original voices in contemporary fiction. Whether in his picture books, his children’s novels or his writing for adults, Hoban never failed to challenge his readers with his imaginative narratives or his stylistic inventiveness, even if at times he may have seemed almost wilfully eccentric or obscure. His final picture book, Rosie’s Magic Horse, will be published in the autumn, but in the meantime we have Soonchild (Walker, £9.99), a short novel for young adults that acts as a poignant coda to the body of work that preceded it.

The notion of a coda is appropriate here, not just because this is a novel with its own haunting musicality but also because it takes song and singing as one of its central motifs. Set in the snowy landscapes of the Arctic, and imbued with numerous resonances of indigenous myth and legend, the narrative focuses on the situation confronting a shaman, known as Sixteen-Face John, and his pregnant wife, known as No Problem, when their imminently expected baby makes it clear from her mother’s womb that she will not be leaving there until she hears the “World Songs”.

John’s response is to embark on a hazardous quest to find this elusive music, a quest that takes him on a magical, mystical tour through a land of creatures great and small, of the living and the dead. Fear and darkness are everywhere, waiting to be overcome, in this wonderfully timeless and atmospheric story. Its pencil-sketch illustrations by Alexis Deacon and its extremely high production values make this a book as attractive to look at and handle as it is to read.

Comment on Russell Hoban's New YA Novel Soonchild

Hoban himself said several times that all his work is about looking at the world and finding it strange. That's what children and young people do, and what the best books do for them. Every adolescent should have a copy of this one. Trust me, nobody will be writing stories quite like this any more.

– Tony Bradman

Tony Bradman review, Russell Hoban’s Soonchild

Russell Hoban's new YA novel, Soonchild, reviewed, The Guardian, reprint

This is a novel I'll be reading in a few weeks with my Adolescence in Literature students. I think it's one of Hoban's best, but he's a quirky writer. If you're reading the book, let us know what you think.

A.A.



Soonchild
By Russell Hoban (author) and Alexis Deacon (illustrator)

Hardback : 144 pages
Imprint: Walker Books Ltd; (1 March 2012)
ISBN-13: 9781406329919


Synopsis
Somewhere in the Arctic Circle, Sixteen-Face John, a shaman, learns that his first child, a soonchild, cannot hear the World Songs from her mother's womb. The World Songs are what inspire all newborns to come out into the world, and John must find them for her. But how? The answer takes him through many lifetimes and many shape-shifts, as well as encounters with beasts, demons and a mysterious benevolent owl spirit, Ukpika, who is linked to John's past...Legendary storyteller, Russell Hoban whisks his readers across frozen landscapes, to the edges of cliffs, into tiny rocky crannies, and down into the belly of a great swallowing demon - and has them laughing and weeping by turns along the way. Lyrical illustrator, Alexis Deacon meets the spirit of Hoban's vision head-on, and brilliantly captures the dark magic that lies at the heart of this fable.

Russell Hoban Quotation Event site

SA4QE 2012 - Celebrating 10 years of SA4QE

On 4 February 2012 the Slickman A4 Quotation Event celebrated 10 years of sharing Russell Hoban quotes, with many fans across the world posting their favourites in public places both real and virtual. This site is being updated daily with these quotes.
See all 2012 quotes

Russell Hoban Birthday Quotation Roundup Report, from The Kraken

http://sa4qe.blogspot.com/2012/02/sa4qe-2012-10-years-of-russell-hoban.html

*Today the Slickman A4 Quotation Event (SA4QE) celebrates 10 years of
sharing quotes from the much-loved writer Russell Hoban.*

We can't quite believe it's been a decade since our friend from Chicago,
Diana Slickman, came up with the wonderful idea of celebrating Russell
Hoban's birthday each 4th February by writing our favourite quotes from his
work on pieces of paper and leaving them in public places. Since then SA4QE
has grown every year, with over 350 quotes distributed by nearly 100
recorded participants from Argyll to Ypsilanti, who these days also share
their quotes on social networking sites as well as in the real world.

Russell Hoban of course sadly passed away last December, but fans are
continuing the tradition in his honour. Today we'll be watching the web for
quotes shared across various media and this site will be updated as quotes
are found or sent direct. You can do this by emailing details of your quote
(and the book it comes from), your name, location and any photos etc to
sa4qemail (at) gmail (dot) com or by leaving those details on the comments
box of this post, below. If you are tweeting your quotes, use the hashtag
#sa4qe or mention the @sa4qe account. If you're posting your quotes to
Facebook and you're a fan of the official Russell Hoban or SA4QE pages
there, you can tag your post with "Russell Hoban" or "SA4QE" and the post
should appear on the walls of those pages. We can't promise to post here
all quotes sent or found today, but will be adding more in the coming days.

Meanwhile, we have two new things for you to enjoy - firstly, Olaf
Schneider's brand new animation:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B_xroCgts3s

This features a never-before-heard recording of Russell Hoban reciting one
of his own poems,* Rivers In Your Mind* from *The Last of the Wallendas*,
which he made expressly in 2002 for Olaf to turn into an animation.

Secondly we are publishing today the results of our December/January
Russell Hoban reader survey to which scores of fans responded with their
favourite books, quotes and characters here:

http://sa4qe.blogspot.com/p/russell-hoban-reader-survey-2012.html

Enjoy!

Richard pp Gombert
SA4QE Admincer

RUSSELL HOBAN'S BIRTHDAY--The Quotation Tradition

February 4 is Russell Hoban's birthday.

Although he passed away recently, his global fan club, The Kraken, will continue its years-old tradition of posting quotations from his scores of books hither and yon in places like libraries, trolley stations, universities, parks, wherever someone might pick up some Hoban writing and be as entranced as those of us in The Kraken.

Russ wrote his drafts on A4 yellow paper, and we scatter his words on yellow paper as well.

So, if you come across a sheet of yellow printed with some beautiful language, take a look. It might be quotations from Riddley Walker, The Mouse and His Child, The Medusa Frequency, How Tom Beat Captain Najork and His Hired Sportsmen, or Bread and Jam for Frances.

Much information about Hoban can be found at The Head of Orpheus web site.

We miss Russ very much-- glad we still have the words and stacks of yellow paper....

A.A.

Last Chance for Survey on Russell Hoban's Books, from The Kraken, reprint

The survey I started on 28th December has had an excellent response, so
much so that I've had to create a duplicate....

I will be closing the survey in one week's time (28th January) so if you
haven't already taken it, don't miss out - go here pronto:

http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/BKDRJXG

Here also is the link to the duplicate survey should you be unable to
access the original link:

http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/NS63CHQ

As I say, the second survey is exactly the same as the first one, so
there's no need to take it again. In fact please don't, as that would just
be cheating :)

Also, I hope you're all busy thinking up quotes to share and fun ways of celebrating SA4QE's 10th birthday on the 4th February!

[Febuary 4th is Russell Hoban's birthday, when his readers place their favorite Hoban quotes from any of his writings in spontaneous places around the globe, for other readers to chance upon.]

Yours...,

Richard

Much Missing Russell Hoban

Dec. 22, 2011

I am much missing Mr. Hoban. Just two remembrances of mine:

First is a Thank You to Professor Peter Neumeyer, still my friend, in whose first SDSU Children's Literature class in the then new (1978) field of study I was introduced to Russell Hoban's The Mouse and His Child. I read the first chapter glued to the prose: an author whose words--style, content, quirkiness-- were just perfect for me. I even remember where I was sitting in the classroom in Storm Hall that day. One of those intense moments only great art (and a few others things) can so impress on the mind.

I have been reading Russell Hoban ever since.... and he wrote a lot.

As he often commented, either you like Russell Hoban’s writing or you don't. The litmus test is whether you get not only through but really jaw-droppingly into the first chapter of Riddley Walker. Sometimes not: I gave a copy to a friend for her birthday and she gave it back to me for mine.

Russ' books made me laugh out loud, marvel, and notice fleeting moments and associations. He was 85 when he wrote his forthcoming Soonchild (Walker Books, March 2012), writing right up to the end, and it is one of his best. So, thank you, Russ, for leaving a library we can keep returning to as our lives change, since you wrote for toddlers as well as for philosophical, myth-minded, word-play-loving adults. What you wrote is deep and full of culture.

But, wait! Here's the other memory, without the context, just the nub. Russ and I were on Interstate 10 just passing Cabezon, California, 1991, on our way for one of his talks. We stopped for gas. Inside the snack shop, he spun the rack of SoCal postcards: booby, beautiful blonds; surfers; sunsets to die for; sandy beaches. The one he bought? It was a new slogan then: the post card just said "Shit Happens."

When Russ was at San Diego State, over 600 people came for his talk on his kids’ books. For hours he charmed us. He began by unwrapping the actual Mouse and His Child wind-up toy he had carried all the way from the U.K., along with Mr. Punch, a glossy reproduction of the St. Eustace wall from Canterbury Cathedral, many other props,and a bottle of scotch for me. For this audience, he read aloud the entire first chapter of The Mouse and His Child, the one I had loved long ago. And yes, my professor, and by then colleague, Peter Neumeyer was there, too.

Hoban liked words like “palimpsest” and “tawny.” He wrote passages of stunning lyrical beauty and, with his painter’s eye, envisioned scenes that were, in their scope, like palimpsets (the battle of the shrews in The Mouse and His Child; the Crusaders' battles in Pilgermann) . He used the music and art he surrounded himself with as the ins and outs of plot devices in his writing, glimpses of melodies intertwined characters. Voices from famous statues or manhole covers motivated protagonists. Orpheus reappeared; Eurydice, too. On the same page, Hoban could also time a joke with the best of them: one-liners straight from the Borscht Belt. Kleinzeit, Hermann Orff, Pilgermann, Fremder; these characters have a Jewish sensibility and a Yiddish sense of humor.

I hope a lot of people read Soonchild. Many of Hoban's novels focus on a father-son relationship; Soonchild is a father-daughter story. I hope a lot of people read The Mouse and His Child and Riddley Walker and Pilgermann and The Medusa Frequency and Turtle Diary and Fremder and so many more. And The Sea-Thing Child, the Marzipan Pig, the Frances books, How Tom Beat Captain Najork and His Hired Sportsmen, The Dancing Tigers, Emmet Otter’s Jug Band Christmas, Hester Mouse Who Became a Writer, Ponders, Monsters, and so many more. And “The Raven” and “The Man with the Dagger” and “Dark Oliver” and “The Ghost Horses of Genghis Khan” and so many more. Many of his best short stories and his intricate, rich essays are collected in The Moment under the Moment.

Russell Hoban affectionately called his fan club,The Kraken, with its on-line members from all around the world, "weirdos." Many Krakenites met in London to celebrate his 75^th birthday, people who'd never met before drawn together on Hoban's frequency for three vivid days. We've been communicating a lot this last week and draw comfort from each other. The same people and many new ones will continue the growing global tradition of scattering A4 yellow paper (Russ’ favorite), covered with our favorite quotes from his 80+ books/stories/ and/essays, for weird people to encounter in places like classrooms, bookstores, hospitals, museums, park benches, computer screens, and the Underground.


We miss him.

Alida Allison