{"product_id":"the-very-persistent-gappers-of-frip-isbn-9780812989632","title":"The Very Persistent Gappers of Frip","description":"\u003cb\u003eFrom the bestselling author of \u003ci\u003eTenth of December\u003c\/i\u003e comes a splendid new edition of his acclaimed collaboration with the illustrator behind \u003ci\u003eThe Stinky Cheese Man \u003c\/i\u003eand\u003ci\u003e James and the Giant Peach\u003c\/i\u003e! Featuring fifty-two haunting and hilarious images, \u003ci\u003eThe Very Persistent Gappers of Frip\u003c\/i\u003e is a modern fable for people of all ages that touches on the power of kindness, generosity, compassion, and community.\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cb\u003e \u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e In the seaside village of Frip live three families: the Romos, the Ronsens, and a little girl named Capable and her father. The economy of Frip is based solely on goat’s milk, and this is a problem because the village is plagued by gappers: bright orange, many-eyed creatures the size of softballs that love to attach themselves to goats. When a gapper gets near a goat, it lets out a high-pitched shriek of joy that puts the goats off giving milk, which means that every few hours the children of Frip have to go outside, brush the gappers off their goats, and toss them into the sea. The gappers have always been everyone’s problem, until one day they get a little smarter, and instead of spreading out, they gang up: on Capable’s goats. Free at last of the tyranny of the gappers, will her neighbors rally to help her? Or will they turn their backs, forcing Capable to bear the misfortune alone?\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e Featuring fifty-two haunting and hilarious illustrations by Lane Smith and a brilliant story by George Saunders that explores universal themes of community and kindness, \u003ci\u003eThe Very Persistent Gappers of Frip\u003c\/i\u003e is a rich and resonant story for those that have all and those that have not.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cb\u003ePraise for \u003ci\u003eThe Very Persistent Gappers of Frip\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e “In a perfect world, every child would own a copy of this profound, funny fable. . . . Every adult would own a copy too, and would marvel at how this smart, subversive little book is even deeper and more hilarious than any child could know.”\u003cb\u003e—\u003ci\u003eEntertainment Weekly\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003ci\u003e \u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e “Saunders’s idiosyncratic voice makes an almost perfect accompaniment to children’s book illustrator Smith’s heightened characterizations and slightly surreal backdrops.”\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e—Publishers Weekly\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003ci\u003e \u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e “A riveting, funny, and sly new fairy tale.”\u003cb\u003e—\u003ci\u003eMiami Herald\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cb\u003ePraise for George Saunders\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e “No one writes more powerfully than George Saunders.”\u003cb\u003e—Michiko Kakutani, \u003ci\u003eThe New York Times\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e “Saunders makes you feel as though you are reading fiction for the first time.”\u003cb\u003e—Khaled Hosseini\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e “George Saunders is a complete original. . . . There is no one better, no one more essential to our national sense of self and sanity.”\u003cb\u003e—Dave Eggers\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e “Not since Twain has America produced a satirist this funny.”\u003cb\u003e—Zadie Smith\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e \u003cb\u003ePraise for \u003ci\u003eThe Very Persistent Gappers of Frip\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e “In a perfect world, every child would own a copy of this profound, funny fable. . . . Every adult would own a copy too, and would marvel at how this smart, subversive little book is even deeper and more hilarious than any child could know.”\u003cb\u003e—\u003ci\u003eEntertainment Weekly\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003ci\u003e \u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e “Saunders’s idiosyncratic voice makes an almost perfect accompaniment to children’s book illustrator Smith’s heightened characterizations and slightly surreal backdrops.”\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e—Publishers Weekly\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003ci\u003e \u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e “A riveting, funny, and sly new fairy tale.”\u003cb\u003e—\u003ci\u003eMiami Herald\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cb\u003eGeorge Saunders\u003c\/b\u003e is the author of eight books, including the story collections \u003ci\u003ePastoralia \u003c\/i\u003eand\u003ci\u003e Tenth of December, \u003c\/i\u003ewhich was a finalist for the National Book Award. He has received fellowships from the Lannan Foundation, the American Academy of Arts and Letters, and the Guggenheim Foundation. In 2006 he was awarded a MacArthur Fellowship. In 2013 he was awarded the PEN\/Malamud Award for Excellence in the Short Story and was included in \u003ci\u003eTime\u003c\/i\u003e’s list of the one hundred most influential people in the world. He teaches in the creative writing program at Syracuse University.\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e \u003cb\u003eLane Smith\u003c\/b\u003e is a four-time recipient of the \u003ci\u003eNew York Times\u003c\/i\u003e Best Illustrated Book award and a two-time Caldecott Honor recipient. In 2012 the Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art named him a Carle Artist for “lifelong innovation in the field of children’s picture books,” and in 2014 he was awarded the lifetime achievement award from the Society of Illustrators. He is the illustrator of many books, including \u003ci\u003eThe Stinky Cheese Man,\u003c\/i\u003e and the author\/illustrator of\u003ci\u003e It’s a Book, Grandpa Green, \u003c\/i\u003eand \u003ci\u003eJohn, Paul, George \u0026amp; Ben,\u003c\/i\u003e among others. He is married to book designer Molly Leach.\u003cb\u003eEver Had a Burr in Your Sock?\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eA gapper's like that, only bigger, about the size of a baseball, bright orange, with multiple eyes like a potato.  And gappers love goats.  When a gapper gets near a goat it gives off a continual high-pitched happy shriek of pleasure that makes it impossible for the goat to sleep, and the goats gets skinny and stop giving milk.  And in towns that survive by selling goat-milk, if there's no goat-milk, there's no money, and if there's no money, there's no food or housing or clothing, and so on, in gapper-infested towns. since nobody likes the idea of starving naked outdoors, it is necessary at all costs to keep the gappers off the goats.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eSuch a town was Frip.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eFrip was three leaning shacks by the sea.  Frip was three tiny goats-yards into which eight times a day the children of the shacks would trudge with gapper brushes and cloth gapper-sacks that tied at the top.  After brushing the gappers off the goats, the children would walk to a cliff at the edge of town and empty their gapper-sacks into the sea.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe gappers would sink to the bottom and immediately begin inching their way across the ocean floor, and three hours later would arrive again at Frip and split into three groups, one per house, only to be brushed off again by the same weary and discouraged children, who would stumble home and fall into their little beds for a few hours of sleep, dreaming, if they dreamed at all, of gappers putting them into sacks and dropping them into the sea.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIn the shack closest to the sea lived a girl named Capable.Author of Tenth of December; Illustrated by Lane Smith","brand":"Random House","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":46299737784549,"sku":"NP9780812989632","price":22.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1842\/7735\/files\/9780812989632.jpg?v=1767742065","url":"https:\/\/k12savings.com\/products\/the-very-persistent-gappers-of-frip-isbn-9780812989632","provider":"K12savings","version":"1.0","type":"link"}