This week saw the passing of Russell Hoban, an underrated giant of fantasy, experimental fiction, and children's literature.

Generations of readers will remember him for his wonderful children's picture books, including Bedtime for Frances and The Little Brute Family; others, for his 1980 post-apocalyptic masterpiece Riddley Walker, written entirely in a kind of devolved pidgin, and its brilliantly fractured take on British history, any recollection of which has been occluded by catastrophe.

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Calling all teachers -

The SAGE Conference is coming up soon, and do we ever have some goodies for you! First of all, you get an additional 5% school discount on the Thursday and Friday of SAGE - that's 25% in total! (Please note that this discount only applies to in-stock books that have not been put aside for you).

Please join us on Friday, October 21 from 3:30 to 5:00 for our annual SAGE wine-and-cheese party. We even have goody bags for teachers buying books with us (while supplies last).

See you at SAGE!

Take a look at our wonderful new features to your right! Fall is in the air, and with it, Halloween and Books That Go Bump in the Night (but don't worry, these are all appropriate for your own little vampire or ghoul). For the older crowd, we have Teen Fright Night, a feature dedicated to movie monsters and their literary counterparts - read them if you dare!

Deborah Ellis is our author of the month - which is certainly not a coincidence, as we are honoured to be having her at the Grant Park store on October 22 at 11:00 am.

We would also like to present, for your browsing pleasure, newly-expanded categories in the Kids and Teens sidebars on the website. These categories are filled with books that your friendly neighborhood bookseller has chosen specifically for the site, and we hope that this will make it easier for our customers to find what they are looking for.

That's all for now, folks! Until next time, remember - don't feed the monsters under your bed (we hear it only encourages them).

We're going to try something new here on the Kids and Teen pages of the website. Starting this month, we will be posting a monthly write-up bringing all of the new things on the site to your attention.

For the youngest set. The days of sandcastles and Superman swimsuits are rapidly drawing to a close, but featured products Oopsy Daisy night lights and Sophie the Giraffe are handy in all four seasons.

In Kids news, September's Author of the Month is Roald Dahl, author of such favourites as Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, The BFG and James and the Giant Peach. Be sure to stop by for all your Roald Dahl needs - we have plenty of stock to keep you busy!

In Teen news, don't forget to take a look at our new Steampunk feature! Stories of Victorian derring-do with technology the Victorians certainly never had, a history of the sub-genre and books on how to make your own steampunk creations - this feature has it all.

Finally, keep an eye out for some new categories on the sidebars in both the Kids and Teen sections. These will be showing up towards the end of the month and will (hopefully) make it easier to browse our website.

Happy back-to-school - and, as always, happy reading!