The Crossover Novel: Contemporary Children's Fiction and Its Adult Readership (Children's Literature and Culture)

280 Pages·2008·3.32 MB·English

by  Rachel Falconer

THE CROSSOVER NOVEL
Children’s Literature and Culture Narrating Africa
Jack Zipes, Series Editor George Henty and the Fiction of Empire
by Mawuena Kossi Logan
For a full list of titles in this series,
please visit www.routledge.com Reimagining Shakespeare for Children
and Young Adults
White Supremacy in Children’s Literature edited by Naomi J. Miller
Characterizations of African Americans,
1830–1900 Representing the Holocaust in
by Donnarae MacCann Youth Literature
by Lydia Kokkola
Ways of Being Male
Representing Masculinities in Children’s Translating for Children
Literature and Film by Riitta Oittinen
by John Stephens
Beatrix Potter
Retelling Stories, Framing Culture Writing in Code
Traditional Story and Metanarratives in by M. Daphne Kutzer
Children’s Literature
by John Stephens and Robyn McCallum Children’s Films
History, Ideology, Pedagogy, Theory
Pinocchio Goes Postmodern by Ian Wojcik-Andrews
Perils of a Puppet in the United States
by Richard Wunderlich and Utopian and Dystopian Writing for
Thomas J. Morrissey Children and Young Adults
edited by Carrie Hintz and Elaine Ostry
Little Women and the Feminist Imagination
Criticism, Controversy, Personal Essays Transcending Boundaries
edited by Janice M. Alberghene and Writing for a Dual Audience of
Beverly Lyon Clark Children and Adults
edited by Sandra L. Beckett
The Presence of the Past
Memory, Heritage, and Childhood The Making of the Modern Child
in Postwar Britain Children’s Literature and Childhood in the
by Valerie Krips Late Eighteenth Century
by Andrew O’Malley
The Case of Peter Rabbit
Changing Conditions of Literature How Picturebooks Work
for Children by Maria Nikolajeva and Carole Scott
by Margaret Mackey
Brown Gold
The Feminine Subject in Children’s Milestones of African American Children’s
Literature Picture Books, 1845-2002
by Christine Wilkie-Stibbs by Michelle H. Martin
Ideologies of Identity in Adolescent Fiction Russell Hoban/Forty Years
by Robyn McCallum Essays on His Writing for Children
by Alida Allison
Recycling Red Riding Hood
by Sandra Beckett Apartheid and Racism in South African
Children’s Literature
The Poetics of Childhood by Donnarae MacCann and
by Roni Natov Amadu Maddy
Voices of the Other Empire’s Children
Children’s Literature and the Empire and Imperialism in Classic British
Postcolonial Context Children’s Books
edited by Roderick McGillis by M. Daphne Kutzer
Constructing the Canon of Soon Come Home to This Island
Children’s Literature West Indians in British Children’s Literature
Beyond Library Walls and Ivory Towers by Karen Sands-O’Connor
by Anne Lundin
Boys in Children’s Literature and
Youth of Darkest England Popular Culture
Working Class Children at the Heart of Masculinity, Abjection, and the
Victorian Empire Fictional Child
by Troy Boone by Annette Wannamaker
Ursula K. Le Guin Beyond Genre Into the Closet
Literature for Children and Adults Cross-Dressing and the Gendered Body
by Mike Cadden in Children’s Literature
by Victoria Flanagan
Twice-Told Children’s Tales
edited by Betty Greenway Russian Children’s Literature and Culture
edited by Marina Balina and
Diana Wynne Jones Larissa Rudova
The Fantastic Tradition and Children’s
Literature The Outside Child In and Out of the Book
by Farah Mendlesohn Christine Wilkie-Stibbs
Childhood and Children’s Books in Representing Africa in Children’s
Early Modern Europe, 1550-1800 Literature
edited by Andrea Immel and Old and New Ways of Seeing
Michael Witmore by Vivian Yenika-Agbaw
Voracious Children The Fantasy of Family
Who Eats Whom in Children’s Literature Nineteenth-Century Children’s Literature
by Carolyn Daniel and the Myth of the Domestic Ideal
by Liz Thiel
National Character in South African
Children’s Literature From Nursery Rhymes to Nationhood
by Elwyn Jenkins Children’s Literature and the Construction
of Canadian Identity
Myth, Symbol, and Meaning in by Elizabeth A. Galway
Mary Poppins
The Governess as Provocateur The Family in English Children’s Literature
by Georgia Grilli Ann Alston
A Critical History of French Children’s Enterprising Youth
Literature, Vol. 1 & 2 Social Values and Acculturation in
by Penny Brown Nineteenth-Century American
Children’s Literature
Once Upon a Time in a Different World Monika Elbert
Issues and Ideas in African American
Children’s Literature Constructing Adolescence in
by Neal A. Lester Fantastic Realism
Alison Waller
The Gothic in Children’s Literature
Haunting the Borders Crossover Fiction
edited by Anna Jackson, Karen Coats, Global and Historical Perspectives
and Roderick McGillis Sandra L. Beckett
Reading Victorian Schoolrooms The Crossover Novel
Childhood and Education in Contemporary Children’s Fiction and Its
Nineteenth-Century Fiction Adult Readership
by Elizabeth Gargano Rachel Falconer
THE CROSSOVER NOVEL
Contemporary Children’s Fiction
and Its Adult Readership
RACHEL FALCONER
NEW YORK AND LONDON
First published 2009
by Routledge
270 Madison Ave, New York, NY 10016
Simultaneously published in the UK
by Routledge
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN
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Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
Falconer, Rachel.
Thecrossover novel : contemporarychildren’sfictionand itsadult readership / by
RachelFalconer.
p. cm.—(Children’s literature and culture ; 57)
Includes bibliographical referencesandindex.
1. Children’s stories, English—Historyandcriticism. 2. Englishfiction—21st
century—History and criticism. 3. Children—Books and reading—Great Brit-
ain—History—21stcentury. 4. Booksand reading—Great Britain—History—
21st century. 5. Reading interests—Great Britain. I. Title.
PR481.F352008
823'.914099282—dc22
2008009225
ISBN0-203-89217-8 Mastere-bookISBN
ISBN10: 0-415-97888-2 (hbk)
ISBN10: 0-203-89217-8 (ebk)
ISBN13: 978-0-415-97888-0 (hbk)
ISBN13: 978-0-203-89217-6 (ebk)
For my mother
Charlotte Elisabeth Ann Falconer
With a tale forsooth he cometh unto you, with a tale
which holdeth children from play, and old men from
the chimney corner.
(Sir Philip Sidney, A Defence of Poetry, 1595)
Contents
Series Editor’s Foreword xi
Acknowledgments xiii
Introduction A Decade of Border Crossing 1
Chapter 1 Kiddults at Large 11
Chapter 2 Harry Potter, Lightness and Death 43
Chapter 3 Coming of Age in a Fantasy World: Philip Pullman’s
His Dark Materials 73
Chapter 4 Seeing Things Big: Mark Haddon’s The Curious
Incident of the Dog in the Night-time 95
Chapter 5 Adolescence and Abjection: Geraldine McCaughrean’s
The White Darkness 113
Chapter 6 The Search for Roots: David Almond’s Clay 129
Chapter 7 Rereading Childhood Books: C. S. Lewis’s
The Silver Chair 153
Conclusion Crossing Thresholds of Time 187
Notes 191
Bibliography 237
Index 255
ix