If you’ve ever seen stiff Victorian photographs of children, you understand the creepiness some of them engender. Whether it’s the photographic process and film of the period that manage to accentuate visual oddities, or the length of time the subject is required to remain still for the photo to develop, there’s no denying the large eyed, overdressed kids can cause uneasiness in today’s view. In the film, The Others, one of the worst moments for me was when the protagonist finds an old Victorian photo of inhabitants of the house she lives in–dead! Yet, downstairs they are alive, in the here and now, working at their domestic jobs! EEK!
A new young adult novel “Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children,” by Ransom Riggs
plays upon these photos and creates an entire life around them. I find the premise and the fact the author uses real photos as illustrations, intriguing. And if I was a young adult, I’d be grabbing a copy ASAP. Oh what the heck, I’m young in spirit!
Here’s an article about the author and his idea for the book:
You know, I don’t know just how I feel about Meghan Cox Gurdon’s article. I’m anything but an expert on Young Adult fiction. Oddly enough, I have several older YA books (1930’s & 1940’s)and I have been researching them for my website. In that process I always read the books or at least scan them well for topic and content. Some of them are quite entertaining! Of course the older ones are pretty tame in comparison to our current editions, still I would want to take a close look before making such a sweeping comment as Ms. Gurdon’s. I have nine children and 26 grandchildren. I’m also the type of Book Dealer that feels responsible to indicate the type of content my customers are purchasing. I listen to my older (read: Young Adult) grandchildren for their tastes and ideas about what is on the market. As an avid “Vampire” fan, I don’t get too freaked out over the genre unless I read just too much sexuality and gore involved. A good plot doesn’t require all that and a good writer knows that. I’ve read all the old Victorian evil bad guy novels I could lay my hands on and I’ve turned out alright (all things considered). This is certainly a book I will have to look into. It clearly touches my “peculiar” Victorian soul.
This is not quite the same thing, but the link below is to my bookshop’s newsletter. It is about some photographs I have, from 1961 and a murder that took place then…very creepy
http://www.quaggabooks.co.za/Newsletter/QuaggaJune2011.html
Wow!! That’s fascinating–do you mind if I feature it on the front page of bookshopblog.com with a link to your wonderful research? What an amazing amount of time you put into this!
The book sounds wonderfully creepy; I have to find a copy! And Quagga Books’ post and info is incredible, so glad they added their link.