Welcome to Lizard Motel: Protecting the Imaginative Lives of Children [Paperback]

Barbara Feinberg (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 7, 2005

Welcome to Lizard Motel is one of the most surprising books about reading and writing to come along in years. Not only does this rich and wonderfully readable memoir explore the world of children and stories, it also asks us to look at how our children are growing up. Barbara Feinberg suggests that we have lost touch with the organic unfolding of childhood, with that mysterious time when making things up helps deepen a child's understanding of the world. This book will reacquaint readers with the special nature of children's imaginations and why they need to be protected and fostered.

Editorial Reviews

Review

Fresh and wonderfully readable . . . perfect for parents eager to cultivate their kids' fantasy lives and foster a passion for literature.--Michelle Green, People

"The implications of this small book are quite large. Parents will want to read it, as will writers, publishers and educators."--Publishers Weekly, starred review

"I loved this book. Feinberg is a brave woman to challenge every shibboleth of the schools of education."--Diane Ravitch, author of The Language Police

"Welcome to Lizard Motel turns out to be more than a diatribe against the dark subject matter of YA problem novels . . . Only a reader as attuned to realism as Feinberg could have puzzled out so nuanced a defense of imagination in children's lives."--Laura Miller, New York Times Book Review

"When we place the steady diet of 'problem' novels in the context of the hours children spend being electronically bombarded by graphic, unremitting trauma, Feinberg's concerns . . . become not just comprehensible, but urgent."--Susan Linn, Boston Globe

About the Author

Barbara Feinberg is the originator of Story Shop, a creative arts program for children ages three through fourteen. She has won awards for her writing, including a grant from the New York Foundation for the Arts. Feinberg lives with her husband and two children in Westchester County, New York.

Product Details

• Paperback: 216 pages
• Publisher: Beacon Press (September 7, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0807071455
• ISBN-13: 978-0807071458
• Product Dimensions: 5 x 0.6 x 8.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,555,837 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Why kids (esp. boys) hate those YA novels they're assigned in school, June 27, 2006

By 

Ellen Etc. (Northern California, USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: Welcome to Lizard Motel: Protecting the Imaginative Lives of Children (Paperback)

What a remarkable book, one with a fresh perspective toward the young adult novels that are assigned in middle school English classes. Barbara Feinberg's central question is, when and why did books for preteens get so grim? In an extended essay mixed with personal reflection, Feinberg examines the YA "problem novel," the books that more or less began with Paul Zindel's "The Pigman" and which some librarians call "Doom and Gloom" books. The "child" protagonists in these novels face abuse, abandonment, incest, trauma, loss, and lots of death, as if the child needs to suffer and someone needs to die to make the child grow up, accept reality, and be a resilient, self-reliant survivor. In the meantime, most adults in these books are useless for helping the kids to cope, and imagination and play are completely sacrificed, as the kids in these books are expected to grow out of such hindrances.

As the founder of a long-running children's program in New York called Story Shop, Feinberg knows and talks to real children and gives them places for play and imagination. In the book she also writes extensively about her children, 12-year-old Alex (the victim of this dismal school summer reading) and Clair, age 7. This gal knows and loves kids, and her book is an impassioned defense of childhood from an adult who has worked through her own issues.

I heard a sermon several years ago by the Rev. Mary Harrington, a Unitarian Universalist minister and mother at the time of similar-aged children to Feinberg's, talking about environmental education programs for young children. In standard environmental education programs, children were given the message that the world was going to hell in a handbasket and they needed to save it. Interestingly, these children did NOT grow up into environmentalist adults. Instead, they became environmentally apathetic adults. The children who became environmentalists as adults were taken into nature and allowed to enjoy it, look at bugs, take hikes, NOT scared to death and given adult responsibilities to shoulder. As Rev. Harrington pointed out, children can't even make their parents recycle, much less can they save the world, and it is our duty as adults to take those actions, not foist it onto vulnerable, helpless children.

Feinberg makes a similar point about the spate of young adult problem novels currently on schools' required reading lists. By and large, 12-year-olds hate them when they are required to read and analyze them in school. These books -- the same books they could love if they found them on their own at age 15 -- are depressing and demoralizing. Who are they trying to teach with these fake "child" narrators, who have an adult perspective in the guise of a child? Is it the adult's "inner child," a wish to protect our lost child selves by giving our own "past" selves a context for the suffering of life, and also trying to toughen ourselves by toughening up the kids? If so, do the books they are required to read help the actual children, right now, or are they taking childhood away to reassure overwhelmed adults? I remember hating "The Red Pony" in 8th grade. They assigned this Steinbeck novel because it has a young protagonist and the pony dies. So it wasn't until years later that I tried Steinbeck again and was surprised to find that it wasn't all just Faulknerian trauma; why didn't they give us the fun Steinbeck novels to read, like "Cannery Row"?

Feinberg's sacred cows include the whole list of Newbery winners. I work in an independent bookstore, and when a 12-year-old comes in asking for a good book, I would never recommend "Bridge to Terabithia," although author Katherine Paterson writes so beautifully; the book is just too stark and depressing, with a bleak and devastating surprise ending that gives only one chapter for resolution.

The writing in "Lizard Motel" is lovely as well. Memoir is certainly more popular right now than educational theory for preteen readers, so I understand why she wrote the book this way. Teachers, librarians, booksellers, YA authors and readers, and parents should all consider Feinberg's perspective. Memoir writers can also take inspiration from her skillful weaving of personal history and essay.

I'm rather sorry I've given 5-star book reviews so often, because when a book like this comes along, one wants to put in extra-credit stars!

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars The first half of this book is powerful. Buy it for this reason!, March 17, 2009

By 

Russian Friend (Plainfield- New Jersey) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Welcome to Lizard Motel: Protecting the Imaginative Lives of Children (Paperback)

Feinberg deserves praise for bringing forth the troubling emphasis that current curriculums intended for the adolescent age, have placed on the "problem novel". Yet she is not dogmatic enough in her important argument. Instead we are led off track in the 2nd half of the book on a self absorbed meandering with no clear cut themes... that ends up focusing on her daughter's need for several surgeries relating to ear infections. How did we get here?! To presume a connection between the 2 parts of this book, one would need to do as the subtitle suggests and truly "make things up". Nonetheless, the assertions in the 1rst half, as well as the footnotes, make those parts of the book quite a compelling read. Its worth the price of the book for the sake of those first arguments. Then save yourself time and confusion by skimming or avoiding entirely, the author's self indulgent off-topic stuff in the 2nd half.