Thanks for mentioning the danny Dunn series…God, I haven’t thought about those in YEARS. DANNY DUNN AND THE ELECTRIC HOUSE, man, I’d love to read that again from a 1999 perspective!
Daniel Pinkwater. EVERYONE HERE who has not yet read Daniel Pinkwater should go out now and read Daniel Pinkwater. Daniel Pinkwater is not just for kids. His YOUNG ADULT NOVEL, just read it to my daughter…we were both on the floor laughing.
(Gives you an excuse to explain the Dada art movement, too. There is NO nine-year-old in the world who is not charmed and delighted by the concept of Dada.)
**Sunbear ** I was going to email you so as not to throw the rthym off on this great thread, but you don’t have an email listed in your profile.
Carsten does not have a nickname. We picked it so it could not really be broken down to something like Robert to Bob syndrome.
All indications point to Baby X being a Girl and naming her Bentley would really be an eyebrown raiser. We haven’t decided on a name yet. That will be a thread in the future when/if we get desperate for suggestions.
When I was very young I liked the “Big Little Books” … about 4 inches square and an inch thick; IIRC they had illustrations on every other (or maybe every fourth) page, and there were dozens if not hundreds of them on all kinds of topics. Mostly they were sort of longish stories about popular cartoon characters (for instance, I remember one where Tom and Jerry were detectives, and there were lots where Mickey Mouse went on some adventure or another).
Another set, again for the very upper limit of that age range: Heinlein’s “juveniles”. Rocket Ship Galileo, Between Planets, Tunnel in the Sky, “Red Planet” (I’m not positive about that last title, but it’s something close to that). Red Planet is interesting to read or remember after reading “Stranger in a Strange Land” … though I would NOT recommend the latter book to kids under 13.
Star Bridge, by Williamson and Gunn.
I’d be a little wary of the McCafferey books too. Some of them are fine but some have a bit more sexual content than some parents would be comfortable with for preteens.
My grandparents had a book I liked called something like “Hurlburt’s Stories of the Bible”… more narrative and less “so and so begat so and so, who moved to this place and changed his name to that before begetting this other guy.” It was kind of like Cliffs Notes for the Bible. If you’re very nonreligious (or religious, but not Christian) you might want to skip this one.
The Twenty-One Balloons–I can’t remember the author but it’s about a retired professor who sets off for a year in his balloon and then crashes on Krakatoa right before it blows up–great story
The Little Witch??? The Little Broomstick??? Can’t remember the author but it’s about a little girl in England who goes to witch school (they’re good witches)
The Wolves of Willoughby Chase
The Katie John books
The Cherry Ames series–does anyone else remember this? I know, I know, it sounds like a porno movie but it’s actually about a girl who goes to nursing school right before or during WWII and all her adventures–it’s basically Nancy Drew as a nurse.
And finally, I hope someone can help–I remember reading these great books about a girl in Fond du Lac, Wisconsin–she’s in high school and then goes off to college–they must have been written in the 50s and that’s all I can remember (this was more the 11-14 age group).
I can’t believe how many of the same books we share.
In order of appearance:
The Little Big Books
Nancy Drew
Encyclopedia Brown
Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing
Superfudge
Anastasia
Prydain Chronicles by Lloyd Alexander
Westmark
The Little Princess
A Wrinkle in Time
A Wind Through the Door
A Swiftly Tilted Planet
A Light in the Attic
The Sidewalk’s End
Peter Pan
And tons, tons more.
In sixth grade, I discovered comicbooks. I read X-Men, Spider-Man, and Fantastic Four religiously.
Now here’s my “name that book”. In sixth grade, I came across a book that I loved, but I can’t remember the title of the book or the author. It was compared to Lord of the Flies. The story centered around a young girl and her little brother. A plague had swept through, killing all the adults, and the kids were on their own. No one over the age of twelve had survived. The girl eventually rallied all the children of her neighborhood. They created a fortress at the local school, and she became their leader. Does this ring any bells?
My other favorite from that time, The Missing Persons League, is out of print. Don’t suppose I’ll get a chance to re-read it.
A Wrinkle in Time, A Wind in the Door, and A Swiftly Tilting Planet and others by Madeline L’Engle, especially A Ring of Endless Light.
The Great Brain Series
Sprockets the Runaway Robot (OP) A. Key
The Shades (Betty Brock? not sure, but that name comes to mind)
Curous George was always a fave.
Beverly Cleary’s books.
Note to Yankee Blue… I grew up with the My Book HOuse series, too. I believe the 12 volume set accompanied the purchase of a set of Encyclopedia Americana or some such. The set we had when I was a Kid was from 1965, and I hadn’t seen them in years. Recently I found a FULL set (publ. 1971)at a yard sale for $3. They are all in perfect condition, save for a scribble or two in the nursery rhyme one. I just had my first child, so I was ecstatic!
CanadianSue: Interestingly, Little Black Sambo was in the 1965 set of these books. In the 1971 version, though, the story is renamed Rama and the Tigers (An Inidan Tale.
Funny what are considered kid’s books and what aren’t. Numerous people have mentioned the Tolkein books… man, I couldn’t get through those as a kid, I can’t even get through them now. I must have some allergy to Tolkein because I like virtually everything else in that genre, but for the life of me I can’t read one of his books.
OTOH, I think I read Jane Auel’s Clan of the Cave Bear when I was 13 or 14. I still think this is an excellent book, even if the other ones in the series turned into some sort of prehistoric soap opera.
The little witch… I think that’s the name of it. I read that one, too!
Yay, Smeggy. You’re the first person in forever who not only heard of Book House but loved it as much as I did. Our set was a hand-me-down c. 1948 or so and was several fat volumes. I’ve seen much thinner single volumes since in used book stores, I think they split the original volumes up.
I can’t believe I forgot the Misty of Chincoteague books - <smacks self in forehead> we went to the bloody island every summer when I was growing up.
Reading the lists here I was reminded of one called What the Witch Left about a couple of little girls discovering some magical items. Ring any bells out there?
Does any one remember The Littles series. Much like the Borrowers, they were little people who lived inside the walls of a house, but they had furry tails.
Winnie the Pooh
Beatrix Potter (Tale of Tom Kitten, Mrs Tiggywinkle etc)
Rudard Kipling (but only the animal stories - The Jungle Books, Just So Stories)
Sherlock Holmes, especially the scary ones, like the snake that used to crawl down the bell-pull in the night
Babar the Elephant
Rider Haggard (there are a lot, most of which I think are even better than King Solomon’s Mines)
The standard fairy stories - Grimms, Han Christian Andersen
The Hobbit, but not the Lord of the Rings until we were in our teens
Alan Garner (perhaps he hasn’t travelled - but really worth reading - The Weirdstone of Brisingamen, The Owl Service and there must be others too)
and anything by Agatha Christie
I cd never ever read school stories or war stories, though, not even Biggles - I cdn’t ever get into them
I almost forgot Alice
Your lists are wonderful - there are lots of books I’ve never heard of, which I’ll order a few at a time from the library.
i have a mystery book as well - apparently, before I cd read for myself, my favourite book of all time was sth about Squidgy the Lazy Watervole, who was eventually nearly drowned by the great flood - my grandmother used to tell me about it because she had to read it over and again until she was totally sick of it - never been able to trace it since
Stone Soup–I still remember when Captain Kangaroo read that (and when I met him, I told him just that)
101 Dalmatians–it’s 101,101,100 times better than either one of the Disney movies.
Mike and his Steam Shovel–not sure if that’s the title, but I saw it recently in a “Signals” catalog.
I’m impressed at how many people read Encyclopedia Brown. I devoured those books as a kid. It was the first book I read with a smart kid as the hero.
Was my family the only one in the world that read My Father’s Dragon? An absolutely wonderful book that no one, and I mean no one, I have mentioned it to has ever heard of.
Clearly these are not right for all pre-teens. But the sexual content in the book can also serve as a starting point for discussions about sex, and choosing partners, and respect, and all the things that the 5th grade “health” class doesn’t have time for, what with all the discussion of the relative merits of lambskin and latex condoms, and spermicides with Nonoxyl-9 ::sigh::
As for the long descriptive passages, my kids were pretty adept at skimming past the descriptions of sedgegrass.
derf, thanks for reminding me about My Side of the Mountain.
I don’t know how that got left off my list.
Jean Craighead George wrote it, as well as On the Far Side of the Mountain
Also in the same vein
[ul][li]Julie of the Woods, same author[/li][li]Hatchet, Gary Paulsen[/li][li]The River, " "[/ul][/li]
Now some books more obscure
[ul][li]The Boy who Lost his Face, Louis Sachar[/li][li]Seven-Day Magic, Edward Eager[/li]
Before there was Harry Potter, ther was Nita of
[li]So You Want to be a Wizard and its two sequels, all by Diane Duane[/li][li]The Black Cauldron Lloyd Alexander’s, not Disney’s[/li][li]The Fudge series, by Judy Blume I think[/li][li]Sugar Bee, Rita Micklish[/li]and finally the most influencial literary work in my life:
Calvin and Hobbes, Bill Watterson[/ul]
Oh yeah,
[ul][li]The People Could Fly, Virginia Hamilton[/li][li]Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry, and others by Mildred Taylor[/li][li]Half Magic, Edward Eager[/ul][/li]I could remember my dad saying, “Please, don’t order so many books!!!”
When the orders came every month, I’d have these huge piles of literature on my desk.
This is a wonderful thread! Made me a little misty eyed. In these days of video everything and the five-second atttention span, this is very refreshing.
And it kicked off a memory . . . of the very first stories I ever read for myself . . . after I had them read to me.
My mother loved the Raggedy Ann and Andy stories . . . and the first books I ever owned for myself.
I still smile when I see the books in the store.
your humble TubaDiva
Don’t forget, she has “I love you” written on her heart.
