For my children's literature class we were assigned The Invention of Hugo Cabret to read this week and last. However, I read it in about 3 hours. From the introduction I was hooked, and this novel is like none I have ever encountered before.Brian Selznick writes a story about a french boy who because of hard circumstances finds himself living in a trainstation in Paris. His name is Hugo and his story is told through text as well as beautifully drawn black and white pictures. The themes of time, art, writing, and film are all tied together in the black and white pictures, which at times span 10 pages or more in continuous sequence. This is a coming of age story, a finding identity story, one you can get lost in. Whenever someone interupted me while I was reading it, looking up was like coming up out of the water for a breath of air. 
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We loved this book when we read it to the Little Guy last year. Even Kindergarteners can enjoy it. And go on Youtube and watch Melies' From the Earth to the Moon -- it's delightful and so influential as to be already familiar. It's like the first time you read Hamlet or see Casablanca or Sunset Boulevard and realize that you already know this through the traces of intertextuality.
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