By Jenny Bullough, Manager of Digital Content for Harlequin and Carina Press, Carina Press acquisitions team member, and book-loving mom
I had the best time shopping for Christmas gifts for my 7 year old daughter this year. She’s finally reading chapter books – devouring them, in fact, at an incredible rate – so I decided it was time to gift her with some of the books I loved at her age. My original copies had already been passed down to my younger sisters, so I got to shop for brand-new books for my little bookworm!
I can’t remember the last time I had so much fun shopping for books. (Actually I can’t remember the last time I shopped for print books!) Each shelf brought back a flood of memories, of afternoons whiled away immersed in a book, of worlds visited, characters loved, stories read and reread and reread again. Little House on the Prairie. Tuck Everlasting. The Railway Children. Harriet the Spy. These books and others firmly entrenched my lifelong love of reading. I can’t wait to see those worlds open up for my daughter, and revisit them through her eyes! And I can’t wait to find out which books will become her beloved favorites to be read and reread.
Which made me wonder if there are other classics out there that I somehow missed. What are the favorite books that you remember from youth and childhood? What are the “must-read” classics that you’re passing on to your kids or younger relations? And what are the “new classics” that your kids are devouring?
I’d forgotten all about Tuck Everlasting! I also enjoyed The Eyes of the Amaryllis.
My kids are only 3 1/2 and 2 months, but I can’t wait for them to read The Phantom Tollbooth, Judy Blume, Beverly Cleary, and 101 Dalmatians (even if only to teach them that it was a book before it was Disney).
I was a horse fanatic growing up, so my favorites were Black Beauty and all of the Black Stallion books by Walter Farley. My kids haven’t shown the same interest, but I have a very tattered copy of The Boxcar Children that we’ve all enjoyed and treasure very much!
Wendy – Ooh, I forgot about Judy Blume! Do you think 7 is too young for that?
Joely — I was a horse fanatic too, and the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree
Black Beauty is a classic for sure!
You’ve hit so many that my kids adored. The oldest also loved the Redwall series, while the youngest soaked up Shel Silvrestein’s poetry.
I made a project of refinding all my favourite books from childhood and I recently managed to complete it with “Pagan the Black” which sadly wasn’t as good as i remember.
My favourites are off the top of my head–these are the books I could never be without:
The Borrowers Saga (only 4 books, the 5th wasn’t written until I had grown up)
The Narnian Chronicles
White Boots
Ballet Shoes
The Treasure Seekers
The Little Princess
The Secret Garden
The Paddington Series
The Mary Poppins Series (SOOO different from the film)
Wow, all these titles are bringing back a flood of great memories! How could I have forgotten Ballet Shoes or A Little Princess!
Erastes – I’m inappropriately excited about the upcoming Borrowers-based movie, the Adventures of Arietty. Can’t wait to take my daughter to see it!
The Secret Garden – -YES!
Jenny, I can’t remember how old I was when I started Judy Blume, maybe 8 or 9? I think my nieces started reading her around 7 though.
Some of my favs ..
* The Boxcar Children (is this what they call the Railway Children in the US?)
* Trixie Belden mysteries
* Nancy Drew (the early versions – recently they have rewritten some of them to actually make Nancy less independent, argh)
* The Westing Game (an absolute favourite)
* From the Mixed Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler (another must read!)
* A Wrinkle in Time
* All of a Kind Family
I never read The Phantom Tolbooth but hear that everyone loves it. It’s a big anniversary of it this year, I think.
I’m w/ Kate on most of her list w/ a few additions.
*Island of the Blue Dolphins
*Pippi Longstocking
*Willie Wonka and the Chocolate Factory
*Freckles
*Little Women
*Little Men
*Eight Cousins
and all the comic books my uncle bought weekly!
One book I remember loving as a kid was Silverwing by Kenneth Oppel. I always intended to read the rest of the series but never managed to get around to it. It might be a bit scary for a 7 year old (there is a creepy vampire bat), so maybe in a year or two would be better.
Choose your own adventure! i had one my sister and I loved for years trying to work out how many different combinations there were in it. I cant remember the auther but it was very Rould Dahl or RL Stein.
I will admit that in my youth it was Nancy Drew and the Hardy Boys.
Nancy Drew and the Hardy Boys. Those were in my pre-teen age. Loved those series.
I’m with Kate and Ivy, plus the Anne of Green Gables series, Caddie Woodlawn. Rosamund du Jardin, Anne Emery, and Janet Lambert got me through junior high.
All of a Kind Family (and all the books in that series), Strawberry Girl, all the Beverly Cleary books, Harriet the Spy, Trixie Belden, Pippi Longstocking, Nancy Drew, Cherry Ames (a mystery-solving nurse!), the Cricket in Times Square, Daddy Long Legs, Judy Blume books. I read anything I could get my hands on!
My childhood favorites:
Little House
King of the Wind
Black Gold
The Walter Farley books
The Chronicles of Narnia
So far, I’ve only been able to get my 7-year-old interested in Narnia out of all of those. She’s just not as horsey or history-mad as I was. But she loves the early Harry Potter books, the Catwings series (lovely books by Ursula LeGuin), and Peanuts and Calvin & Hobbes.
After going to University, I suddenly lost the urge to read books….go figure! But looking at the list of the wonderful childhood books makes me remember that I did, in fact, enjoy reading when I was young. I remember my mom reading to me and then I would read to her. It was something we did together and is a very special memory for me. The books I loved the most were;
-Pippi Longstocking
-Heidi
-Little Women
-Nancy Drew
-The Three Golliwogs (I know…loved it, can’t remember the story though???!!)
-Johnathan Perciville Pinkerton Junior
-Little House on the Prairie
-The Borrowers
-All the Dr. Seuss Books (which I love to this day!!…especially because they have pictures 8)
-Paddington
-Any books about horses…love horses!
-The Hardy Boys
-The Prince and the Pauper
-The Little Prince
Thanks for the trip down memory lane, Jenny !!
So many fantastic memories! Yes, Ivy, Little Women! Oh, Jodie, forgot about Cricket in Times Square! And so many others I’d heard of but never read. I see a trip to a used bookstore in my future! So glad you all posted!!
Misty of Chincoteague, the Little House books, Trixie Belden–all my favorites as a kid. I’d read all the Little House books several times by the time I was in 4th grade, but I don’t think I was 7. My class likes the Magic Treehouse books and Judy Moody and ANYTHING with a ghost on the cover.
Most of mine have already been mentioned. I’ll add one series, the Mrs. Piggle Wiggle books by Betty MacDonald. These are stories about dealing with difficult children that young kids find hilarious and the grown ups who read to them will get a big kick out of too. I reread them all often after I could read to myself.
See the boxed set here:
http://www.amazon.com/Mrs-Piggle-Wiggle-Boxed-Set-Piggle-Wiggles/dp/B0013ZAEYI/ref=sr_1_8?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1326731994&sr=1-8
Wow, reading all these comments is a lovely walk down memory lane. You all reminded me of so many wonderful books I’d read and somehow forgotten about — and told me about so many books that are new to me! I predict many, many books for my girl’s next birthday
Thanks everyone!