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[ SECRET POST #5489 ]

⌈ Secret Post #5489 ⌋

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What were your favorite books growing up? Inspired by me remembering the Diane Duane Young Wizards series and how awesome it was.

The Time-Travelling Cat series by Julia Jarman

I know it is painfully outdated, but I checked Enid Blyton's Valley of Adventure out of my local library at least once every couple of months well into my teens. It was a gateway drug for the whole genre of hidden world fantasy fiction.

Ohhhh man, I read the entire children's section at the library, I'm not even joking, but there were some that I came back to over and over. I can't remember some of the names or authors because my memory was shot to heck by trauma in my tweens. :P

I've previously mentioned Zilpha Keatley Snyder, especially The Egypt Game (I was so into ancient Egypt as a kid too) and The Changeling (which is honestly even a better read as an adult where I know what I'm reading).

There was a lot of stuff in that vein, children's fantasy or sci-fi. I remember a book called Half Magic that I read over and over, about some kids who could make wishes but would only get half of what they wished for, that was a lot of fun. And I remember there was this fascinating story about a girl who ordered a concoction that would give her wings, and it did, but then she started turning into a bird for real and had to go to the lab where the stuff was created and find the antidote. The author had another book I liked but that's all I remember now.

The Oz books and Madeleine L'Engle are no-brainers of course.

...I just googled because I remembered another one (and actually the title too!), Out of the Dark World, which I actually bought (didn't have much money so mostly I didn't own books). Apparently by Grace Chetwin, and a really odd but somehow workable blend of fantasy, slightly-future-tech, and Welsh folklore (could this be any more up my alley?).

And of course I read all the standard stuff. Sweet Valley Twins/High, Babysitter's Club, Beverly Cleary. A couple non-standard things that I'm sure I didn't fully comprehend at such a young age like Watership Down and the Lord of the Rings trilogy. And when I was very very young and just starting out, I had about a hundred vintage Bobbsey Twins books. (Which were apparently horribly racist, I recently learned. o_o I was like 4-5, I didn't know.)

And then around age 13-14 after having already been dealing with years of chronic illness holding me back, I picked up Dragonlance after a classmate mentioned it and oh my dear boy Raistlin understands exactly what I'm going through. XD

Edited 2022-01-15 23:26 (UTC)

OMG, The Changeling!! One of my top favorites, still have it!
Also Black and Blue Magic! :D

Re: Favorite Childhood Reads

pantswarrior - 2022-01-16 00:04 (UTC) - Expand

Re: Favorite Childhood Reads

tabaqui - 2022-01-16 00:09 (UTC) - Expand

Re: Favorite Childhood Reads

pantswarrior - 2022-01-16 00:30 (UTC) - Expand

Re: Favorite Childhood Reads

tabaqui - 2022-01-16 00:36 (UTC) - Expand

Re: Favorite Childhood Reads

pantswarrior - 2022-01-16 00:39 (UTC) - Expand

Re: Favorite Childhood Reads

tabaqui - 2022-01-16 01:43 (UTC) - Expand

I loved the Oz books and Beverly Cleary too!

tbh I'm still so mad she updated the books and changed things like the tech/tweaked scenes to bring them closer to modern. I still have the originals and I stick with them because... IDEK. It feels like a tragedy to me to change a book to bring it in-line with modernity.

My fav. childhood reads were probably the babysitter's club books though I really don't remember much about them except the one where Mary-Anne wins the lottery (I think it was her) and they all go one a ~fancy trip~.

I actually really respect that she listened to feedback from autistic readers and rewrote Darryl's character and arc in A Wizard Alone so that Darryl wasn't a stereotype and wasn't "cured" of his autism in the end.

And while I can take or leave the tech updates, I feel like at least she knew what she was talking about on the tech front since I think she does/did her own website coding and stuff.

There are authors out there that would've sprinkled in some smartphones and misapplied "modern" slang and called it a day.

Re: Favorite Childhood Reads

(Anonymous) - 2022-01-16 03:04 (UTC) - Expand

Re: Favorite Childhood Reads

(Anonymous) - 2022-01-16 05:16 (UTC) - Expand

I read a bunch of the Babysitter's Club books, but the only ones I remember clearly are Kristy's Big Day and Claudia and the Mean Janine.

I read and re-read The Jungle Books, The Secret Garden, A Little Princess, the Laura Ingalls books, Tom Sawyer, The Changeling, Black and Blue Magic, Socks, Summer Pony and Winter Pony, A Horse for XYZ, Captains Courageous....

I had a lot of favorites, heh.

The Seventh Princess by Nick Sullivan
The Dancing Cats of Applesap by Janet Taylor Lisle (though I will say I think the title is part of the reason it sticks in my memory so well)
And You Give Me a Pain, Elaine by Stella Pevsner
The Alfred G. Graebner Memorial High School Handbook of Rules & Regulations by Ellen Conford
The House on Hackman's Hill by Joan Lowery Nixon
The Girl with the Silver Eyes by Willo Davis Roberts
The Dollhouse Murders by Betty Ren Wright
The Egypt Game by Zilpha Keatley Snyder
Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs by Judi Barrett
Bunnicula by Deborah Howe and James Howe (and a few of the sequels)
From the Mixed-up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler by E.L. Konigsburg
The Westing Game by Ellen Raskin
The Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle books by Betty MacDonald
Beverly Cleary books (generally, the Ramona books, but a few others too)
Lois Duncan books (The Third Eye and Down a Dark Hall were probably my favorites)
Christopher Pike books (Weekend, Remember Me, and The Final Friends trilogy, in particular)
Beverly Cleary books (generally, the Ramona books, but a few others too)
Ruth Chew's witch books

I didn't think anybody but me remembered From the Mixed Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler! I loved that book!

Re: Favorite Childhood Reads

(Anonymous) - 2022-01-16 06:41 (UTC) - Expand

Treasure Island by Stevenson is by far my absolute favourite childhood book. I have very fond memories of it because it's one of the books my mother read to me before bed. Even now that I'm 32 years old I regularly reread it every couple of years.

I also loved White Fang and The Call of the Wild by Jack London, Little Women by Alcott, The Secret Garden by Burnett and The Tigers of Mompracem and The Black Corsair by Emilio Salgari.
I was really into adventure books!

Those are ALL good reads! And ones I've read several times, too.... Can we have 'all the books' as favorites?

I remember really liking Diana Wynn Jones. Archer’s Goon was definitely my favourite, but also The Chrestomanci Chronicles and Howl’s Moving Castle.

I adored Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking-glass . I had this huge and densely annotated version that I read and re-read.

Some others were Mary Poppins and the various Winnie the Pooh books.

I love the Annotated Alice Books! I also love Mary Poppins and Winnie the Pooh (the ORIGINAL versions of these, NOT the Disney ones!)

Eagle of the Ninth.

I loved the Dear America books when I was a kid and I still have a few that I reread every year. Same with the American Girl books.

History books for kids with pictures. My gran also read me Dickens and Jane Eyre. And something about kid detectives.

The Jedi Apprentice series by Jude Watson.
So salty they retconned it, I read Master and Apprentice recently from the new canon and hated the changes.

Oh man I was super into that series. I'd bring the books to school with me every time a new one came out and would read them during free time. I remember them being surprisingly dark for what they were. They definitely helped foster a greater love for the Star Wars franchise at the time that eventually petered out after going strong for two or three years - to the point that I burned myself out until TFA came out.

the Anne of Green gables series, Star Wars Legends, the Hobbit, Harry Potter books (the ones that were out when I was growing up), The Time Quartet by L'Engle, anything about volcanoes, the Wizard of Oz books, and A Little Princess.

I also read the Sweet Valley and Babysitter club books and The Secret Garden a lot as well as a lot of the Goosebump books.

Re: Favorite Childhood Reads

greghousesgf - 2022-01-16 06:32 (UTC) - Expand

Re: Favorite Childhood Reads

philstar22 - 2022-01-16 15:47 (UTC) - Expand

I was absolutely obsessed with Jacqueline Wilson books as a kid - my favourites being The Illustrated Mum, The Bed and Breakfast Kid and Bad Girls.

Enid Blyton - Naughtiest Girl, Secret Seven, Magic Faraway Tree, Malory Towers etc
Trixie Beldon Mysteries
The Three Investigators mysteries
Choose your Own Adventure
Point Horror
Christopher Pike novels
Sweet Valley High by Francine Pascal
Z for Zacharia by Robert C. O'Brien
Displaced Person by Lee Harding
*cough*V C Andrews*cough*

Re: Favorite Childhood Reads

greghousesgf - 2022-01-16 06:33 (UTC) - Expand

Re: Favorite Childhood Reads

starfleetbrat - 2022-01-16 07:03 (UTC) - Expand

I absolutely adored the Cat Who mystery series by Lilian Jackson Braun. I found a bunch of them at a thrift store a while back and bought them all. Also enjoyed the shivers series. Secret of Fern Island scared me to death lol. Ofc read babysitters club and goosebumps too. Boxcar children was good too. But I only enjoyed the first book.

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