So he puts out a new book and has children spooning right on the cover.

The kids do kind of get their act together by the end of the second book though, just in time for the story to go completely off the rails. 

So, exactly the opposite of His Dark Materials.

So many people raved about how great that was, I forced myself through The Golden Compass (bzw. Northern Lights) and halfway into The Amber Spyglass, but I couldn’t take the constant pattern of – children flail about aimlessly for a while – children hide as knowledgeable adults show up – adults have a long exposition-y discussion – children flail aimlessly some more.

From http://sallypommeclayton.com/blog/?p=927:
“The programme had come to the conclusion that no one tells Grimm’s fairytales any more. They also seemed to think there is no difference between reading a story and telling it. In fact Grimm’s fairytales are a staple part of a storytellers repertoire all over the world, tellers translate and translocate the stories, making them their own. Last year I had a dialogue with a group of storytellers in South India who were performing Grimm’s fairytales. Many of the stories in the Grimm’s collection are not unique to Germany, versions of them can be found in other cultures. I often compare different versions of a story, then stitch together my own.”

There’s nothing wrong with re-interpreting Grimm tales, but  if you don’t understand the telling of the tale, you’ll miss their essence.