picture books?

[heidi tandy]

No: HPFGUIDX 721

FFA wrote

> All our talk about darkening and more adult themes in the Harry 
Potter
> books, plus the New York Times' daft decision to put the books on 
the
> children's bestseller list, makes me wonder whether there 
> will be moves to
> release children's versions of the future HP books. I'm sure 
> this must have
> been done before, but can anyone think of an example of a 
> book or series in
> which the adult-level content was cut or changed in order to 
provide a
> 'children's version'? I think there will be considerable 
> pressure on the
> publishers to do something like this, having created such a 
> huge demand
> among younger readers, but knowing that the content may be 
> increasingly
> adult in flavour.  

I can remember at least 2 VERY different circumstances where this has 
been done recently.
1. Star Wars Episode 1 The Phanton Menace
	I've seen 24 or so page versions of the podrace scene and the 
Anakin Blowing Up The Robot Control Ship scene, with photos from the 
movie - they're an easy way for littler kids to enjoy the movie 
while, say, in a car or on a plane, and the kids can read them on 
their own, whereas the "adult" version fo the book is about 400 pages 
long, and not as easily transportable.
	Check out 
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0375800115/ref=sim_books/002-
4807228-4988832 or http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ts/book-
similarities/0375800271/ref=sim_m_books/002-4807228-4988832 for 
examples.
2. The early Little House on the Prarie books
	They take 3-4 stories from the earlier books (little house in 
the big woods, on the prairie, on the banks of plum creek) and put 
them into illustrated storybook form. I've bought them for my 
husband's cousin, when she was 4, and she really enjoyed the stories, 
but she's probably not going to be ready for one of the chapter book 
versions until she's a late 6 year old.
	Check out 
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0064420604/ref=sim_books/002-
4807228-4988832 or 
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0064420841/ref=sim_books/002-
4807228-4988832 for examples.

I actually expect them to do something like this for the HP books - 
part of me is thinking, "is there a 5 year old out there who won't 
love to read an illustrated version of one of the Quidditch matches" 
and another part of me is thinking - those quidditch matches can be 
pretty violent - and another scene which, intheory might make for a 
nice picture book thing would be Harry's First Time On A Broomstick - 
but the altercation with Draco, and the circumstrances surrounding 
Neville's injury, might be hard to, um, simplify.

I'm wondering what some of the writers & fanfic-ers here think - is 
there a way to "simple down" one of the scenes without eviscerating 
it like the blast ended skrewts seemed to do to each other?