The Invention of Hugo Cabret (2007)

Part Picture book, part novel, part dreamy Chris Van Allsburg-esque adventure.

While you're reading it to your kids at night, following the streaming pages of illustrations flow past you like it's got some cinema DNA in there too. ( )

A very unique story that is told completely through detailed pen and ink illustrations. So different from other books it just need to be experienced. captivating.

Juvenile Fiction
Grades: 3-8
Age: 8 - 13
Themes: creativity & imagination, death/grief/loss, film & animation, friends & friendship, intergenerational relationships

I love the way Selznick switches between text and art to tell the story, not blended as with a graphic novel, but entire segments told only in art and others only in text. In particular given the role art and films play in this story, it is appropriate.

Lovely as the images were, the story didn't quite catch me. However, I think I'd have felt differently at a younger age. Some tales can be enjoyed equally at all ages, this one is best at the appropriate time of life. ( )

The most memorable thing about this book is how written work and graphic novel style meet to tell a story. Very clever. The drawings alone are amazing. When I read the inspiration part at the end of the book, a former professer of mine from UWT was mentioned as helping with some of the more technical filmography mentions. ( )

I first read this book as a galley proof when it was first released in 2007 -- without all of its pictures finalized. The big was thick at over 500 pages -- but it was a first of its kind (that I remember) being partially full of pictures (like a comic book) with each picture taking up a two page spread. This was way before graphic novels became popular. I also took note that this thick chapter book won the coveted Caldecott Medal for children's book for best illustration -- again the first that I can remember happening because it usually went to a children's picture book. -- I recently watched the movie HUGO which was based on the book. I decided I needed to read the book again.

A book like no other -- 1st of its kind -- the Introduction tells the reader how to interact with the pictures herein (beginning t0 page 45) -- beautiful design of the pages in black and white with a bold border to look like an old movie screen based around the real images produced by Melies.

SUMMARY: The main character of Hugo looses his father at the early age of twelve. He is very much like his clock making father and tinkers with mechanical things -- especially the neglected little man (the automaton) that his father finds in the attic of the museum where he works and brings it home to repair and bring it back to life. When his father dies in a tragic fire at the museum, Hugo is taken in by an uncaring uncle who stays intoxicating and only wants Hugo to train as an apprentice so the uncle doesn't have to work too hard. Hugo's new home is in the secret passages and apartment behind the walls of the train station in Paris where he learns to take care of the clocks. His world changes when gets caught trying to steal a clockwork mouse from the toy booth at the train station and he enters the world of Georges Melies -- magician, filmmaker, and creator of dreams.

Georges Melies was a real person -- magician and filmmaker -- one of the first to quickly realize how to capture dreams to show on the movie screen. The author got the idea for the story from a book he read and created this unique story (p354-355; 360)

Difference between the book and the movie -- #1) in the book Hugo hurts his hand and Isabelle injuries her foot (in the movie Hugo is the only one I remember with an injury) -- #2) the movie has a little more focus on some of the other people that work in the train station including the Station Inspector (which is given a much larger role) who is a wounded war veteran -- obsessed with catching all the thieving, homeless orphans hanging out in the train station. -- #3) Mama Jeanne's role is bigger in the book and it shows her role in the making of the early movies -- she was an actress in everyone of them #4) the book has an additional chapter that shows an additional ending showing Hugo's discovered purpose #5) Georges Melie's response when shown that one of his movies did survive and that there are people that remember him and his work.

Features an Automaton -- sole purpose of the machines was to fill people with wonder, and they succeeded (p115)

I learned a new word -- horologist -- means clock maker -- there are many scenes in the book that compare what is happening to a working machine with cogs and wheels that turn -- for example: ...he could feel the cogs and wheels in his head spinning in different directions (p165)

CAUSE AND EFFECT: Georges Melie didn't like to hear the sound of shoes echoing off the flooring -- do you remember why?

The title of the book is elusive until the final chapter.

NOTE: The book and the movie make a great companion set -- the movie is a little on the long side -- there are a few things that I don't like about the Station Inspector and two of the adult conversations were not necessary and could have been left out of the movie. ( )