Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs
Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs is an American children's book written by Judi Barrett and illustrated by Ron Barrett. It was first published in 1978 by the Simon & Schuster imprint Atheneum Books, followed by a 1982 trade paperback edition from sister company Aladdin Paperbacks.
From Simon & Schuster publishing:
| “ | An imaginative story of amazing food weather that inspired the hit movie, Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs is a favorite of grown-ups and children everywhere.
But it never rained rain and it never snowed snow and it never blew just wind. It rained things like soup and juice. It snowed things like mashed potatoes. And sometimes the wind blew in storms of hamburgers. Life for the townspeople was delicious until the weather took a turn for the worse. The food got larger and larger and so did the portions. Chewandswallow was plagued by damaging floods and storms of huge food. The town was a mess and the people feared for their lives. Something had to be done, and in a hurry. |
” |
A sequel, Pickles to Pittsburgh, was published in 2000 by Atheneum Books; a hardcover edition followed in 2009.
A cookbook special, Grandpa's Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs Cookbook, was released with a variety of fabulous cooking ideas.
A Third Installment in the 'Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs' book series was released as: Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 3, Planet of the Pies.
Plot
Grandpa telling Henry and his granddaughter (the narrator) the story of Chewandswallow
The book details a bedtime story narrated by a grandfather to his grandchildren. The grandchildren Henry and his younger sister (named Kate in the sequels starting with Pickles to Pittsburgh) chronicle the daily lives of the citizens of an unordinary town called Chewandswallow. This town and city was characterized by its strange daily meteorological pattern that provides the townsfolk with all of their required daily meals by raining food. With the devoid of malls and grocery stores, this was a much better arrangement.
Life in the town of Chewandswallow was delicious for the town's residents. But after a couple of millenniums had passed and when all the excitement (from the food in the weather) had died down, the townspeople (about the food in the weather) began to realize that they were not happy about it as they thought. Every day, too much unappetizing food rained and/or snowed down from the sky.
At last, the job was too feasible. So the service (the Sanitation Department of Chewandswallow) shut down service operations forever. And the townspeople were forced to deal with the giant unappetizing food.
Their lives endangered by the threats of the storms, they relocate to a different community of average meteorological patterns, safe from the hazards that once were presented by raining meals. However, they are forced to learn how to be used to obtaining food the normal way. (That is, by getting used to buying food from shopping malls and supermarkets.) Nothing came down from the sky, except for rain and snow. And they (the people) are also forced to learn how to learn that it is going to rain regular rain and snow regular snow. No one ever got hit by a hamburger again. And no one ever dared to go back to Chewandswallow to find out what happened to it. They were too afraid.
After the grandfather finishes his story, it goes back to Kate. (That is, as Kate narrates the line, "Henry and I were awake until the very end of Grandpa's story. I remember his goodnight kiss".)
The following morning, the man's grandchildren awaken to discover snowfall. After bundling up and hurrying outside to play, the granddaughter, in first-person narration, describes the scent of mashed potatoes (pretending that it snow mashed potatoes) detected while romping with her brother, implying that the grandfather's story might not be purely fictitious. (That is, as they pretended like the sun was a pat of butter and the snow was mashed potatoes.)
Development
One of author Judi Barrett's earliest ideas for the book was one sentence: "Henry walked outside and got hit in the head with a meatball."[1][2] Acting on that idea, she began to list food that could also work as weather, including nods to eating habits she had as a child, such as lamb chops with peas and ketchup.
The illustrations by Ron Barrett were created in pen and ink with "tiny, tiny" nibs for the fine details.[1] The level of detail added a sense of realism to the town of Chewandswallow, allowing parents and children to find new details with every read.
The Grandpa is designed after Ron Barrett's uncle Eli.[1]
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