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Eve Tushnet

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Last updated on: September 7, 2005 at 6:50 pm by Eve Tushnet

2005-09-07T18:50:00-04:00 Eve Tushnet

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BLOG/RELIEF: CHILDREN’S BOOKS FOR GENE BRANAMAN. Gene’s second request (see below for the first one) was for “five children’s books you haven’t read (but you should!).” I did picture books for David Ross, below, so these are chapter books; and I found that I could not limit myself to five. So… there are more.

This list doesn’t include all the really well-known great stuff–The Phantom Tollbooth (wow, I remember so much of this book–Faintly Macabre and “Silence is golden”! Dischord and Dynne–“No noise is good noise!” Conducting the sunrise… In the Doldrums… rescuing Rhyme and Reason… walking to Infinity… eating Subtraction Stew…), the Little House books (I only read one, but I have it on good authority that everybody–especially freedom-loving Amurricans–should read more), the Ramona books, The Secret Garden (for all the little girls who didn’t quite feel up to the challenge of being Sara Crewe–though A Little Princess is also a wonderful book). Everyone should read Diana Wynne Jones–sure, Howl’s Moving Castle is a fine place to start, but better far are Power of Three, Time of the Ghost, Dogsbody, Witch Week, Witch’s Business (published in the UK under the far better title Own Back Ltd.), and the incredibly powerful The Homeward Bounders. I read The Count of Monte Cristo fairly early, and loved it. Edgar Allan Poe can be read from a very early age. (…Am I revealing something about myself, with that little tidbit?!) I have no idea if other kids would react to The Man Without a Country as strongly as I did, but it’s worth a shot–I re-read it a couple years ago and still choked up. And I think every kid should read at least one old-fashioned “school story.” I’ve heard great things about the Chalet School series; the one I read, though, was a (perhaps deservedly) obscure book called Maxie at Brinksome Hall. In this Jewish World Review column, which is really about homeschooling and partial homeschooling, I talked a little about why boarding-school stories are so appealing to kids.

There are other wonderful books that won’t be on this list because I’m not sure how well-known they are. The Blossom Culp books; Bunnicula and at least the first couple sequels (yes, it is about a vampire rabbit–and the family that takes him in, and their two other pets, the world-weary dog Harold and the paranoid cat Chester); The Westing Game (Ellen Rankin writes wonderful, poignant puzzle-stories–if you like TWG, definitely check out The Tattooed Potato and Other Clues, and The Mysterious Disappearance of Leon (I Mean Noel). I don’t remember if All Figgs Go to Capri is also a mystery–I think it is–I should re-read that… I suspect it has only gained in poignancy with time); Daniel Pinkwater’s utter weirdness (favorites are probably the Snarkout Boys books); John Bellairs’s Catholic Gothic mysteries; and William Sleator’s creepy, creepy kids’ science fiction (of which House of Stairs is both the best and the creepiest–Singularity and Interstellar Pig are also really good).

And Susan Price’s Ghost series, set in Lapland, won’t be on this list because although these are powerfully-written books, they’re also relentlessly nihilistic. I’m totally serious. So although you should read them if you read children’s fantasy… well, I wouldn’t give ’em as Christmas presents, you know?

I wrote about Price’s books, and several others from the list below, here.

OK. Let’s see how short I can make this list. In no especial order:

1. Jean Merrill, The Toothpaste Millionaire and The Pushcart War. Totally fun little-guy stories: the kid who figures out how to make a mint selling toothpaste, and the pushcart peddlers who finally get fed up with being pushed around by the big trucking companies. I wrote about TTM and the “entrepreneurial imagination” here.

2. Ottfried Preussler, The Satanic Mill. Dark, rigorous fantasy about a boy who becomes an apprentice at a mill run by a man who has sold his soul to the Devil. A frightening book, but also a beautiful portrayal of friendship and love; many striking images and memorable characters. Deeply Catholic.

3. Margot Benary-Isbert, The Wicked Enchantment. A lovely confection; also quite Catholic in both message and setting, but sweet and buoyant rather than wrenching. Features spunky girl protagonist who (like Blossom Culp) is everything that most S.G.P.’s wish they were.

4. Deborah Brodie, Stories My Grandfather Should Have Told Me. Maybe just a sentimental favorite; but I think Cacciaguida, at least, would love this book. Vignettes of Jewish life, mostly (entirely? must check) in and around New York.

5. The Bruno and Boots series, by Gordon Korman. More boarding-school hijinks, with the usual stock characters (Elmer Drimsdale = The Socially Awkward Genius; Sidney Rampulsky = The Clumsy One), but made incredibly compelling due to the believable and lovable portrayal of the friendship between Bruno Walton and Melvin “Boots” O’Neal. Tons of inventive stunts and pranks. Just fun, fun books–and with an inherent, un-pushy sense of decency and honor. Series starts with This Can’t be Happening at Macdonald Hall!, but my favorites are Go Jump in the Pool! and Beware the Fish!. Korman also writes for teens; of those books, my favorite is the bizarre, oddly resigned Son of Interflux, about a corporate scion at art school.

6. Louis Sachar, Sideways Stories from Wayside School. Stories from a school where everything is weird. Not sure how to describe this. Best effort: This book has no redeeming social value. Go read it!

7. The Great Brain books by John Fitzgerald–with illustrations by Mercer Mayer! Growing up in Utah in the early part of the 20th century, with a genius older brother and an adopted younger one; horse thieves, Jewish peddlers, water closets, Jesuit academies, Mormon vs. Gentile tug-of-war, terrible accidents, how to catch a fish…. These books show the dangers of that life, but also the joys. Someday I’d like to read Fitzgerald’s autobiography for adults, Papa Married a Mormon. I think fans of the Little House books would definitely love these books.

Okay, I have more (Jan Mark! The Borribles! Arabel and Mortimer!) but I am stopping now…. That should keep you reading for a while!

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