And why not? This was Salem, Massachusetts where the Puritan populace knew anything was possible. When 9-year-old Betty Parris and 11-year-old Abigail Williams began to twist and turn in the home of the Reverend Samuel Parris there was only one possible reason for it: witchcraft.
Then I’d pull out my secret weapon: Witches! The Absolutely True Tale of Disaster in Salem. And not any of those Childhood of Famous Americans books either, missy thang. I mean like straight up facts about a moment in history. Nonfiction? You mean like the latest edition of The Guinness Book of World Records, right? Nope. “So what,” I might say, “would it take to get you to read nonfiction?” Even from a distance of twenty-three years I can feel the resistance to such a notion. From there we’d give praise to good Apple paperbacks like The Girl With the Silver Eyes or pretty much anything with a ghost in it (does anyone even remember Ghost Cat?) but eventually I’d have to start pushing myself. We’d chat about the improvements that will come to fashion someday (I think 10-year-old me would really appreciate knowing that 1988 was America’s low point), the delight to be found in School House Rock and eventually I’d turn the conversation to books.
Sometimes I wish I could sit down with my 10-year-old self and have a conversation. (Aug.Witches! The Absolutely True Tale of Disaster in Salem Careful attention to comic detail and visual echoes of the genre's hallmark exaggeration (Crockett, for instance, has the chiseled-jaw and popping muscles of a Disney hero) frame this zesty slice of Americana admirably. Schanzer's lickety-split pace and picaresque prose are equal parts swagger and sass, and her vibrant, color-drenched paintings extend the spirited tone. In the end, a triumphant Crockett gets both the girl and his coonskin cap (to cover what's left of his comet-singed hair).
Once Crockett finds out he's needed, he's off "like a high-powered hurrycane," climbing to the top of a high mountain and leaping onto the comet. Deep in the woods with his pet bear, Death Hug, Crockett is bent on wooing "purty" Sally Sugartree, unaware that the president has advertised for his help to reign in the comet. Assuring readers that "every single word is true, unless it is false," she spins a rollicking yarn of how Crockett (who could "whip ten times his weight in wildcats and drink the Mississippi River dry") saves the world from a disastrous collision with Halley's Comet. Schanzer ( Gold Fever!) raids the annals of American history once again, emerging with a feisty tall tale inspired by the Davy Crockett almanacs published in the 19th century.
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