Fuse 8 n' Kate

It's not quite October yet, so we didn't want to start handing Kate the scary stuff immediately. This 25-year-old spider tale collaboration of Spinelli/Dyer seemed like a good intro to the season instead. It features a creature associated with the fall, but who appears in a story that's anything but scary. Unless you can't take any tale about spiders, that is. Then you might be up a tree. This is our second Eileen Spinelli (we did Somebody Loves You Mr. Hatch in 2022 for Valentine's Day). But Jane Dyer? This is the first book of hers we've done on this podcast. We compare this title to fellow spider book The Spider and the Fly, talk about how strange this boarding house may be if you always have to check your slippers for spiders, and discuss how non-judgemental the book is about the book's single mom situation. For the full Show Notes please visit: https://afuse8production.slj.com/2026/09/28/fuse-8-n-kate-sophies-masterpiece-by-eileen-spinelli-ill-jane-dyer/

Betsy was so very, entirely certain that we had covered this old title by Patricia C. McKissack on our podcast already. And yet, AND YET, we have never read it. That ends today. Originally published in 1986, we dive into this book's roots in oral storytelling, Isadora's career, and why it is that foxes always get a bad break in picture books. Just looking at our past podcast episodes, we have never done a Rachel Isadora, but we've definitely done McKissack (Goin' Someplace Special and Mirandy and Brother Wind). Today we consider this tale of tricking the trickster with a good old-fashioned existential crisis. For the full show notes please visit: https://afuse8production.slj.com/2026/09/21/fuse-8-n-kate-flossie-and-the-fox-by-patricia-c-mckissack-ill-rachel-isadora/

We had two people recommend today's book for podcast consideration, and I'm awfully glad that they did. It's been a day or two since I last read this odd little 80s creation. Now you would not think, looking at this book's cover, that you would find a title so chock full of title details as this. But you know what we're talking about this episode? Clowns! Misspellings! And guns guns guns. Read the full Show Notes here: https://afuse8production.slj.com/2026/09/14/fuse-8-n-kate-whatever-happened-to-the-dinosaurs-by-bernard-most/

“If you’re going to Lower Trainswitch / Be sure to wear flowers in your hair…” Today we talk Tootle. Ever read him? No? Well, in 2001 Tootle was the all-time third best-selling hardcover children’s book in English. He’s not as famous now as he was twenty years ago, but that fact made us curious. Why is he so forgotten? Should he be brought back? Is this some lost gem of children’s literature just aching to be rediscovered? We discuss how this 1945 release came out after Ferdinand, but seemed to cast the idea of frolicking with flowers in an entirely different light. For the full Show Notes, read on here: https://afuse8production.slj.com/2026/09/07/fuse-8-n-kate-tootle-by-gertrude-crampton-ill-tibor-gergely/

"How do you say, 'You don't start nothin' there won't be nothin' in Seuss?"

So Betsy promised Kate that for her birthday they'd do a book that published in 1984 (the year of her birth)... and then she promptly forgot. So on the day of this recording (which was Kate's ACTUAL birthday) Betsy found one they hadn't done before. Written during Seuss's strange didactic era (your Lorax, your Sneetches, and now your Butter Battle Book era) we've never really tackled this one. But we're sure kids today totally get... uh... the arms race. Determining how well this book has aged, one cannot separate this book from its context. But what happens when the context doesn't really apply so well anymore? As Betsy tells Kate, "This is kind of the MOST 1984-y book I could find." For the full Show Notes, go here: https://afuse8production.slj.com/2026/08/24/fuse-8-n-kate-the-butter-battle-book-by-dr-seuss/

Suggested alternate title for this text: No Good Deed Goes Unpunished.

Our very first Brian Pinkney! Are you surprised? So am I, quite frankly. Even thought we've done multiple Jerry Pinkney books at this point (Mirandy and Brother Wind, John Henry, Little Red Riding Hood, Goin' Someplace Special, etc.) I thought for sure we might have at least done Sukey and the Mermaid or something, but nope! Not as such. Today, then, we tackle our very first Brian P. text, and we're not starting small. This book? It's a doozy. For the full Show Notes please read on here: https://afuse8production.slj.com/2026/08/17/fuse-8-n-kate-the-adventures-of-sparrowboy-by-brian-pinkney/

"Distinctive and it always looks like this." That's Betsy discussing the artistic stylings of Jack E. Davis. Published in 2000, this book is pretty quintessentially early 00's. Now we have never done a Margie Palatini OR a Jack E. Davis on this podcast to date. Neither of these two have any currently operating and working websites either, so in some ways we're flying by the seat of our pants in this episode. Happily there is MUCH in this book to capture Kate's attention. An oddly mysterious little title. For the full Show Notes please visit: https://afuse8production.slj.com/2026/08/10/fuse-8-n-kate-bedhead-by-margie-palatini-ill-jack-e-davis/

Upon hearing that Jon Klassen was hugely affected by this book as a kid (fascinating when you consider how opposite it is from his latest title The House with Nobody In It), we felt it was time to revisit this old 1972 easy book to see how it stands up. Truth be told, we're less interested in the Seuss connection than by the outdated terminology in a supposed book for early readers ("bureau drawer"?!?). "Seuss knew what he was doing with Cat in the Hat. I guess he sort of lost it at this point." We talk about how the book is, at times, "adorably dated," and how this is different from The Cat in the Hat because, at least in that case, the Cat cleans up after itself!!! For the full Show Notes, please read on here: https://afuse8production.slj.com/2026/08/04/fuse-8-n-kate-in-a-people-house-by-dr-seuss-ill-roy-mckie/

Dreamlike and surreal, it may not be as well remembered as some of the other 1980s picture books that typify the era (particularly those written by Chris Van Allsburg) but there's something luminous about this cult classic picture book. Will Kate be drawn to its gentle peculiarities or dislike them entirely? We talk about how gutsy it is to do three wordless two-page spreads, murder hornets, and what Berger owes to Magritte. For the full Show Notes please visit: https://afuse8production.slj.com/2026/07/20/fuse-8-n-kate-grandfather-twilight-by-barbara-berger/

When you've worked for a system quite as large and vast as New York Public Library, it can be difficult to ascertain scope. Was Library Lion the massive nationwide hit Betsy thought it was when it premiered in 2006, or did her workplace like it only because it featured a library and a lion (two very NYPL-ish things)? To get to the bottom of the matter she brings in Kate, and together they plumb the depths of this sweet tale of feline bibliographic appreciation. This marks our second Kevin Hawkes title on the podcast (the first being Weslandia) and our first Michelle Knudsen.