Childrens Literature

"Eureka!" - Jonah (ten seconds ago)

I think everybody has a favourite children's book that they had read to them a million times when they were young 'uns right? Well share them here.

The Henry and Mudge series by Cynthia Rylant

Anything written/illustrated by Arnold Lobel, but especially Owl at Home and the Frog and Toad series

The Little Bear series by someone Minarik (I own them so I could check who, but I'm too lazy right now)

The Oliver and Amanda Pig series by Jean Van Leuween (I think that's how you spell it)

More later, when I can think of it. Hopefully much more, with reviews.

- Naela, the children's literature freak.

I was and still am a huge Curious George fan... my parents used to make up stories for me using Curious George. I had a bazillion Curious George books when I was little. Mousepaint was also a favorite book, as was Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs ....my all time favorite picture book is Where the Wild Things Are, Max is possibly my most favorite character in literature ever. I also liked all the Babar books. -eira

I loved (love) Caddie Woodlawn by Carol Ryrie Brink, A Little Princess by Frances Hodgson Burnett, and my Random House Book of Fairy Tales. Elizabeth

Father Christmas Letters by Mark Twain Dysk

The Enchanted Forest Chronicles by Patricia Wrede, all four books: Dealing with Dragons, Calling on Dragons, Searching for Dragons, and I'll be if I can remember the last one's name. It'll come to me.

• It's Talking to Dragons.
• I read those books a couple years ago, and Patricia C. Wrede is still one of my favorite authors. :-) I also love Magician's Ward by her. Elizabeth

The Norby Chronicles by Isaac and Janet Asimov

Wonders, Inc., A short storybook that's very punny and I don't know the author of.

• Vivian Van Velde.

Winnie The Pooh and The House at Pooh Corner! My dad says I had these memorized so well I would correct him if he accidentally said "an" instead of "a" or anything like that.

Blueberries for Sal and One Morning in Maine

Make Way For Ducklings

Roxaboxen

The Wind in the Willows

Little House on the Prarie

The Polar Express (for Christmastime)

Brambly Hedge definitely rocks (the illustrations are gorgeous), but I didn't discover those until I was older.

Grandfather Twilight and When The Sun Rose are BEAUTIFUL.

Redwall and its companions aren't quite children's books, but they are still wonderful.

- Emma

• One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish by Dr. Seuss
• Mom and dad had to read this to me every night before I went to bed. Once they got so sick of it that they hid it, and I cried so hard that it magically became "found" again. Hehe.
• Goodnight Moon by Margaret Wise Brown
• ...In the great green room, there is a telephone and a red balloon... and a picture of the cow jumping over the moon...
• Sparky's Rainbow Repair by Max Haynes
• Hysterical... the rainbow gets broken, and they have to go fix it... but this little penguin dude gets left behind during the storm (they have to have the rainbow fixed by the time the storm ends, or else... I dunno... something bad will happen), and he keeps getting, like, struck by lightning... and stuff like that. It's got puzzles and riddles to solve... and and and and and
• Farmer Duck by Martin Waddell
• "How goes the work?"...."Quack" It's about this little duck that has to do all the work on this farm, and none of the animals think it's fair, so they revolt and in the middle of the night, they steal the farmer out of his bed... and....
• Ferdinand the Bull by... ?
• It's entirely in German (at least the one that we had was), and it's a really cute book about this bull that just wants to sit and smell flowers all day long
• The Runaway Bunny also by Margaret Wise Brown
• The first book I ever read all on my own
• Green Eggs and Ham by Dr. Seuss
• Need I say more?

Sad thing is, I could probably "read" you all of these from memory, I read them so many times.

• The Clown of God by Tomie De Paola
• One of the most beautiful (both aesthetically and poetically) and sad stories that I have ever had the pleasure of knowing
• Zoom at Sea (and other books about Zoom the cat) by Tim Wynne-Jones
• Different stories about a cat who's imagination and curiousity combined enable him to have fantastic adventures...beautifully illustrated
• All books by Robert Munsch (a Canadian children's book super-author) including The Paper Bag Princess, and Mud Puddle

Jonah-

These are just a start...

• The Oz books by L. Frank Baum (many of the countless sequels by later authors are good, too, but the original Baum stories are the best). By the time I was 7, I'd read all fourteen. Twice.

That's the important one... I'll add more later.

-Emerie

• Corduroy by Don Freeman

A wee bear who lives in a department store and takes wee adventures at night, but dreams of the day when a wee friend will take him home and love him weely (or something along those lines)

• Curious George Goes To The Hospital by Margret and H.A. Rey

I still get all sad when the Man in the Yellow Hat leaves George at the hospital and it says "George just sat there and cried" and there's a picture. Heartwrenching stuff. Another classic is Curious George Takes A Job, in which George breaks a leg and injests ether at some point.

• My grandparents bought Curious George Takes a Job for my brother when he broke his leg when he was about 2.

• Brambly Hedge by Jill Barklem

Whimsically illustrated series about mice who live in trees and have all sorts of adventures.

These are all I can think of at the moment, will add more upon remembering!

-Gabrielle

The Napping House -About a grandma, a boy, a dog, a cat, a mouse, and a flea all sleeping at night. One piles on top of the other until the top one gets mad and..... domino effect! The illustrations are so marvelous. We have a recording of me "reading" this book from memory when I was about 2 or 3. I'm even turning the pages in the right places.

Raggedy Ann Books -These are some of the most bizarre children's books I've ever read. My mom read me all of them at least three times. My favorite scenes from this book:

 *Raggedy Ann and Andy go to the underground popsicle world. Andy drinks
some soda from a natural soda fountain, sits down for too long, and gets
frozen to the ice. Luckily, a group of evil-appearing ice skating gnome
people comes to save him, since Ann's magic heart and Andy's magic stick
don't seem to be working.
 *They find themselves in gingerbread land with the gingerbread family,
after they accidently break the gingerbread dad in half at the door in to
the world and have to glue him back together with icing. After a dinner of
ice cream, cookies, and cream puffs, the family gives the dirty dishes to
the gingerbread dog outside, who eats them. (They're made of cookies.)

-Mel

The Phantom Tollbooth by Norton Juster. It has lots of great wordplay that flew right over my head when I was eight or nine, but is absolutely hilarious now. Plus it's just a good story.

Everything by Shel Silverstein, but most particularly Where the Sidewalk Ends. I used to carry that book around with me everywhere I went. We're talking about the god of children's poetry here.

The Neverending Story by Michael Ende. I'm not gonna say anything about it. Just read it and find out for yourself.

Haroun and the Sea of Stories by Salman Rushdie. I didn't technically read it when I was little, but I know that if I had, I would have loved it even more than I do anyway.

Wow... people have already put up some of my alltime favorites... I guess I'll just list those really quick. The Pooh books of course, Grandfather Twilight, The Napping House and King Bidgood's in the Bathtub by the same people, I just forget who exactly... Don and Audry Wood? Anyway. The Raggety Ann books are great, The Phantom Tollbooth and The Neverending Story are still two of my very favorite books ever.

Let's see... what else...

Caddie Woodlawn

The My Father's Dragon books

We have this wonderful picture book of The Odddessy by Peter Oliver

D'Aulaire's Book of Greek Myths which I suppose is technically not children's liturature... or maybe it is... hm. It's good anyway.

• You are so right, I totally had that book and dug it. - Jonah

All of Shel Silverstein's stuff, especially Lafcadio

The Search for Delicious

This list isn't even including children's liturature that I just happened to read and like after I was about 11, like Tamora Pierce and J. K. Rowling.

Franny's favorite picture books.

• All the Doctor Suess book.
• Seven Brave Women by Betsy Hearn
• Ragina's big Mistake
• The Polar Express
• The year of the Perfect Christmas Tree
• A Chair For My Mother
• Storries For Five year olds
• Sybil and the Blue Rabbit
• Winnie the Pooh

i can't remember the rest!

Burgler Bill, by Janet and Allan Ahlberg (the same folks who did The Jolly Postman.) Largely responsible for the development of my moral character. Sadly, it's out of print now. Check your local library.

Robyn's List....

• Anything by James Stevenson - the Grandpa and Wainey books, the Emma books...
• The Bear's Toothache- I can't remember the author, but it's got such loverly pictures, it's about a bear who comes to a little boy at night complaining about a toothache...
• Anything by Babbitt Cole, like Doctor Dog, Prince Cinders, etc etc etc... she has a great book about sex ed, by the way.\
• Anything by Chris Van Allsburg. He wrote Jumanji and The Polar Express, and those are his most famous, but he writes the weirdest books with the most beautiful pictures.

I'll think of more later....