Fudge-a-Mania

Fudge-a-Mania is a 1990 children's novel by Judy Blume and the third in the "Fudge" series (fourth if Otherwise Known as Sheila the Great is counted as part of the series).

Plot

The Hatcher and Tubman families decide to spend their summer vacation together in Maine, not next door to each other, but in the same house, much to the disgust of Peter Hatcher and his arch-rival Sheila Tubman. They are related at the end of the story because their grandparents, Muriel and Buzzy, get married. Peter's brother, Fudge, no longer plans to be a bird when he grows up, but instead a bird breeder, or as he misprounounces it, "bird breather", to which Sheila immediately corrects him by saying he cannot breathe for birds. Other subplots include Tootsie accidentally helping Mr. Fargo's art business when she toddles across his work and Fudge being chosen as a team captain in a baseball game sponsored by a retired player of the Boston Red Sox, Big Apfel, much to Peter's dismay. He also plans to get "married" to Sheila. Peter develops a crush on a librarian called Isobel. There is also a slight romance hinted between him and Sheila, although at the end of the book, they agree that they will always hate each other.

Television adaption

A television movie based on the book was released on January 7, 1995 in the USA, starring Florence Henderson, Eve Plumb, Shirley Knight, Alex Karras, Luke Tarsitano, and Darren McGavin. It was directed by Bob Clark. The show also inspired a half-hour Saturday morning TV series, Fudge, which aired from January 1995 to fall 1996 on ABC-TV, and then on CBS-TV. The show featured stories taken from the Fudge series (mainly Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing), as well as original stories.

External links

• Judy Blume's website
• Fudge-a-Mania at the Internet Movie Database