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May 2, 2025

Start Planning Now for Kids’ Summer Reading!

Yes, we’re sure that’s what they have in mind…

By Ed Goldman

Ever since the current administration successfully monetized the annual Easter Egg Hunt on the White House lawn, it’s been rumored that it has its eyes on re-messaging summer reading for kids.

We got an advance look at 20 possible title and concept changes in store.

  1. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has revised the kid-lit classic “If You Give a Mouse a Cookie” as the cautionary “IF YOU GIVE A SOUSE A PENTAGON.”
  2. There’s a re-lo in the works of Robert Louis Stevenson’s timeless “Treasure Island.” It now takes place on Greenland and has been renamed “STRATEGIC ISLAND.”  
Edgy Cartoon

America, the dutiful

  1. “The Adventures of Tom Sawyer” will be re-released as a joint memoir by no fewer than 27 attorneys who’ve represented or are currently representing America’s chief executive: “THE ADVENTURES OF DON’S LAWYERS.”
  2. “Black Beauty” is being retold as an advisory tale for government spokespersons: “FLACK DUTY.”
  3. Mark Twain’s identity-switching fable “The Prince and the Pauper” gets a contemporary twist as “THE PRINCE AND THE PLOTTER.” Meghan Markle is said to be interested in acquiring the TV rights.
  4. The President’s social-media posts, and he himself, are being packaged as “LITTLE-READ WRITING HOOD.”
Looking for a Great Gift?
  1. The beloved “Charlotte’s Web” gets a post-modern lift as “CHARLOTTE’S WEBSITE.”
  2. The delightful fantasy of what would have happened if the newly anointed Pope had been Jewish is being published as “THE VELVETEEN RABBI.”
  3. Along those lines, a political monograph aimed at pre-teens discusses how the G.O.P. will try to hang onto the Jewish vote come the 2026 midterm elections. As an homage to the aforementioned Robert Louis Stevenson, the work will be dubbed “YIDNAPPED.”
  4. To explain former president Bush’s seeming to be in a daze during recent public appearances, the American Psychiatric Association has compiled a book of essays as “CURIOUS GEORGE W.”
  1. Updated takes on Dr. Seuss’s wonderful “Green Eggs and Ham” and “Oh, the Places You’ll Go!” have pending release dates. Look for mid-June launches for “GREEN CARDS AND SPAM” and “OH, THE PLACES YOU’LL GO ONCE DEPORTED.”
  2. Word comes from his New York City jail cell that disgraced Hollywood mogul Harvey Weinstein is going over final proofs for his Louisa May Alcott-inspired memoir, “LITTLE-RESPECTED WOMEN.”
  3. As a public service, the HHS is revisiting P.L. Travers’ everlasting “Mary Poppins” as a warning about the danger of using recreational drugs: “SCARY POPPERS.”
  4. Bowing to seniors who supported his reelection, the President has given the nod to a children’s book that explains why elder relatives don’t wish to play extreme frisbee with eight-year-olds. Set for what publishers and pharmacists are calling a “time-release capsule” is “THE CHRONIC AILMENTS OF NARNIA AND GRAMPIA.”
Looking for a Great Gift?
  1. “Where’s Waldo” gets a new protagonist in the ironically clueless “WHERE’S IVANKA?”
  2. In related news, Maurice Sendak’s ageless “Where the Wild Things Are” has been reimagined as a Secret Service guidebook, “WHERE THE NUCLEAR CODES ARE.”
  3. Antoine de Saint-Exupery’s time-tripping “The Little Prince” is now a police procedural about how a certain short-fingered Leader of the Free World gets implicated for being naughty with girls in “THE LITTLE PRINTS.” 
  1. Not wishing to be accused of playing favorites with the media, the POTUS has approved the reissue of “A Wrinkle in Time” as “A WRINKLE IN NEWSWEEK.”
  2. Capitalizing on politicians’ constant use of the non-attributed phrase, “I’ve been hearing…”,  a sequel to Suzanne Collins’s “The Hunger Games” is reportedly in the works: “THE RUMORMONGER’S GAME.”
  3. Adapted from Rudyard Kipling’s “The Jungle Book,” a new graphic novel will attempt to explain to advanced-placement teens and surprisingly mature lemurs how the White House has handled tariffs in “THE BUNGLE BOOK.”

Don’t forget! A new Goldman State Podcast drops every Friday!

Ed Goldman's column appears almost every Monday, Wednesday and Friday. A former daily columnist for the Sacramento Business Journal, as well as monthly columnist for Sacramento Magazine and Comstock’s Business Magazine, he’s the author of five books, two plays and one musical (so far).