Hugo+Cabret

Title: The Invention of Hugo Cabret Author and Illustrator: Brian Selznick ISBN: 978-0439813785 Publisher: Scholastic Corporation Date: January 30, 2007

Book Summary: Hugo is a child who lives inside the secret tunnels of a train station. He was living with his uncle, who kept the clocks in the tower on time. His uncle one day disappeared, but the people did not notice he was gone, because Hugo kept up with the clockwork. He also makes a friend named Isabelle. They explore the together, but they keep a couple secrets from each other. Hugo has to live on his own, so he steals from the stores in the station. He once gets caught. Eventually, he makes friends with the store owner, because the store owner gives him pieces of a 3D puzzle. The puzzle ends up to be something that has to do with the movies and his father. There is a huge twist in the end about who Hugo’s father is, what the puzzle is, and how they all relate. It is an amazing adventurous story.

Book Review: This book is physically huge, which is a turn off to many students and people. Once you open the book though, it is mostly pictures, all grey etch like style. The amount of words ends up being a “normal” sized book. The story keeps you guessing, and the relations between all the characters, as well as the character development, are nicely done. The illustrations go well with the story, and helps to explain things like how the clocks work, and the puzzle, and the making of the first movies. You learn a lot about the making of the first movie as well. You can tell that it captured you because at first you don’t care how clocks work, and you don’t care about the making of the first movies, but in the end you are interested, or at least appreciate them more. The book has been made into a movie, but the movie is only called “Hugo”.

Literary Element: The best element is the illustrations. They are beautiful, and are the perfect fit for the book and for the story. They are all grey and look like they are done with pencil only. This style fits the fact that the story takes place in the tunnels of a train station. The illustrations were sometimes right in a row, so they almost doubled as a mini animation. For example, there was a 3D puzzle, which ended up being a person with a pencil in his hand. Instead of the author telling us what the machine man wrote, it showed us through a couple pages of back-to-back pictures, revealing what the man wrote.

Author Bio: Brian Selznick was born on July 14th, 1966 and grew up in New Jersey. He received the 2008 Caldecott Medal for U.S. picture book illustration for “The Invention of Hugo Cabret”. This is a quote from him talking about the book: "not exactly a novel, not quite a picture book, not really a graphic novel, or a flip book or a movie, but a combination of all these things." This explains the book perfectly. He also says that one of his inspirations was the illustrations for “Where the Wild Things Are”. The author also has done illustrations for other children’s books, such as “Frindle” and “Doll Face Has A Party”.

Related Link: http://www.theinventionofhugocabret.com/index.htm