About Gena Greene's Recycled Dolls

I've not received any e-mails or pictures yet, but in this week's e-mail I did receive a link to a hilarious LJ community dedicated to adult (ironic) appreciation of the hugely successful Baby-Sitters Club series by Ann M. Martin.

Ann M. Martin is still alive and blogging here...so I suppose, if this site distributes Gena Greene's Recycled Dolls, we should send her a dollar for each book too. But instead of trying to review a book, let me quickly post a few words about the Recycled Dolls.

These are 6" to 12" fashion-type dolls (male, female, and child shapes) who were found naked, sometimes with hair damage, at charity stores. Each doll was cleaned up and paired off with a book a child might read. It seems our Gena was a precocious reader who's defended the choice of at least one (tasteful) adult novel with "I read this five times in grade four!", but most of the books are children's favorites such as the Baby-Sitters Club, Mandie, Little House on the Prairie, and even a few by Dr. Seuss. The doll was then dressed to match an illustration, usually on the front cover, in hand-knitted outfits made of leftover yarn from clothes and blankets.

Each doll costs $5 cash in real life when they're displayed at craft shows and markets, or $15 when they're sold online...and yes, we will try to track down living authors and send them their dollar per book sold. We are serious about the need for writers to receive adequate compensation.

Adult book and doll collectors may particularly enjoy Recycled Dolls, but they're good holiday presents for primary school children who have preliterate siblings, since most of them are free from hard plastic bits a younger child would be likely to swallow.

And in the "Sure, why not?" category...I know Gena takes requests for characters in real life, so I'll go ahead and say that if you buy one of these dolls online, you may nominate a book and request a matching doll via this web page. (To request anything via this web page, although I hope eventually to get Paypal "purchase" buttons here, you click on the e-mail address at the top of the screen or paste it into your browser, and send a message in care of Saloli: salolianigodagewi@yahoo.com.)