From the 1950s onward, however, their popularity was somewhat affected by the availability of inexpensive paperbound books sold in thousands of outlets outside the regular book channels.
Scholastic also mined the channels that children's publishing relies on to create buzz about a book, channels that in some cases are far different from those for adult fiction: school presentations, advance copies to teachers and librarians, and getting copies into the hands of media personalities whose children are in the target age group for the book.
Author Robert Clyde Allen in his book Channels of Discourse compared the video with that of "Material Girl".
Some marvellous talking heads – talking, reading – in Roald Dahl's Most Marvellous Book (Channel 4).
Blackballed in the industry, he's headhunted for the top job at King Cable, a small network in the fictional seaside town of New Bedlam, R.I., run by a floridly dysfunctional family and boasting three unpromising channels, including the Comic Book Channel and a "classic TV" channel specializing in reruns of "Petticoat Junction" and other boomer favorites.
If only someone had taken me aside to break the bad news, or at least pointed me to the Pronunciation Book channel on YouTube, where a man, speaking in a clear, matter-of-fact voice, breaks tricky words down to their component parts.
What can we expect from their new book channel?
It's full of details about his process, about how he wrote his books, channelled his demons and overcame his challenges.
"We have serious concerns that our previous e-book policy, selling e-books to libraries in perpetuity, if left unchanged, would undermine the emerging e-book ecosystem, hurt the growing e-book channel, place additional pressure on physical bookstores, and in the end lead to a decrease in book sales and royalties paid to authors," the company said in a statement.
From Buddy's perspective, which this fast, funny book easily channels, Mr. McGrory is one alpha male too many in a blended-family home.
"I don't think American boys really go for girls that look like rich men," she quips in a perfectly pitched book that channels the angst of the self-conscious, self-loathing immigrant teen.
