Peter Cameron Interview
October 11, 2007The online edition of Publisher’s Weekly just published an interview with Peter Cameron about his first novel for young adults, Some Day this Pain Will Be Useful to You (Frances Foster/Farrar, 2007).
In the interview, he reveals that his favorite children’s books were It’s Like This, Cat by Emily Cheney Neville and Leo the Lioness by Constance C. Greene. I had never heard of that second book, but the title was intriguing enough to send me to the nearest library to check it out.
I remember Leo the Lioness! I read it at summer camp; it belonged to another kid in the same bunk, and was passed from one camper to another because there was nothing else to read. I was so desperate for books and liked it so much that I got up early every morning so I could read it ahead of my turn.
Amazing. I hadn’t thought about that book for decades.
Now I want to read that book by Peter Cameron!
/comment hijack
Yeah, it looks like a pretty groovy book. I love the Peter Max-inspired cover.
I loved Leo the Lioness! I checked it out approximately 800 times from my hometown public library. I will have to reread it to see how it holds up.
I’m really pleased to see you’ve picked up on my mention of Constance Greene’s Leo the Lioness. It’s a pitch-perfect book, and the voice of Tibb, the 13-year-old narrator, still rings true.
It sounds like Leo has a lot of fans. I’ve added it to the stack on my bedside table, and am looking forward to it.
Like you, I am also a fan of “It’s Like This, Cat.” It’s another book with a distinctive teen voice — so distinctive, in fact, that a parody of it was printed in Horn Book magazine after it won the 1964 Newbery Medal. “It’s Like This, Kid” by Professor David Davis attacked realism, which was an emerging trend in children’s fiction at the time.
Actually, it was authors like Emily Cheney Neville who paved the way for GLBT teen literature a few years later. She only published a few books, including one of my childhood favorites, “Berries Goodman.” I wonder what ever became of her.