I’m stealing just one question from Ally’s Meme this week.
What books were your childhood favorites?
I have loved books for as long as I can remember. I think my mom probably read to me before I was born. I have this vague memory which probably isn’t a memory of learning to read – I think it’s just my brain trying to make sense of the facts as I know them. But memory notwithstanding, I do know I was reading on my own by 3 1/2. I couldn’t read out loud to save my life and that’s something I still hate to do.
The library was a place of wonder for me. I maxed out every summer reading program – I think until high school when it probably wasn’t cool to be in the summer reading program. I lived at the school library, however, even then. The first thing I do after finding the grocery store in a new town is to find the library.
What I’m saying is – I love books. I love reading. I’ve never not been a reader and I honestly don’t understand people who don’t read for pleasure.
I’ve recently re-read a couple of my favorite books from childhood, ostensibly because I am considering sending them to a young friend of mine. It was a good excuse to buy them at any rate.
Island of the Blue Dolphins is certainly in my top five books from childhood. Depending on when you ask me, it may be number one. Sometimes when you re-read an old favorite, it disappoints. Not so Island of the Blue Dolphins. It’s been so long since I read it that I only remembered the general storyline and it re-captured my imagination and desire to know what happened next. I used to pretend to be Karana, alone on that island and fighting to survive. That’s something I love, too, by the way – crawling into my favorite books and making them real in my mind.
The Search for Delicious was possibly my first encounter with the fantasy genre. I mean, outside of fairytales, this was my first epic story of adventure. And still today, when people around me start arguing about what the most delicious thing in the world is – I think that it must be a drink of cool water when you’re very, very thirsty.
I have re-read A Walk Out of the World many times, even as an adult. It might, I suppose, be consider Tolkien-lite. Another fantasy adventure story of a different world, but this one you get to enter as a person living in the today-world. Oh how I wanted to walk through the woods near my home to find her world and meet the lake people myself.
A Wrinkle in Time makes me think that I must have particularly loved escapist fiction. It’s another story where we find ourselves inexplicably transported to another reality. And in pulling up the link for this post, I discovered that it’s actually a series – what? I’ve never read the rest of the books and perhaps I need to do that.
Okay, so it’s not surprising that The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe rounds out my list of favorite books from childhood. I borrowed this so many times from the library that I’m amazed that I never read the rest of the chronicles of Narnia. I haven’t read this one as an adult – but I saw the movie. 
The story holds up well so I guess I will have to read the rest of the books.
And I’m going to tack on Charlotte’s Web since it popped up while I was looking up links for this post. I loathe spiders but I loved Charlotte – and I guess I would have had to make friends with the spider in order to save poor Wilbur.
What were your favorite books from childhood? Do you still love them today?
Good use of one question. Great idea.
I’ve never heard of the first three books. I read A Wrinkle in Time for the first time this last winter. I’ve seen the movie for The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. And, of course, I know all about Charlotte’s Web [but I've never seen the movie].
I like to read but am not an addict. I go for weeks without picking up a book, but when I do I usually get lost in it. I was the same way as a child.
I wanted to read as a child but books weren’t generally around in our house. It wasn’t until I got old enough to buy my own (or figure out the library) that I got into reading in a big way. So I don’t have any books from childhood to share. When I first got into books I read I Am England by Patricia Wright, which fascinated me as it followed the fortunes of people in one particular place over many hundreds of years, and I re-read it a few years ago. It’s a much easier read than I remember it being, but I still loved it.
I loved reading too–still do. I loved the Anne of Green Gables series, Nancy Drew, A Wrinkle in time and the Little Women series, as well as Little House on the Prairie. There weren’t really YA books back then; it was the classics!
My very first book,two parts in one,was Heidi Johanna Spyri.Heidi is a Swiss fiction novel,written in 1880 by Swiss author Johanna Spyri.As fate would have it,as a teenager I lived a couple of miles away from Maienfeld in Switzerland,where the fiction story takes place.
Ever since I loved to read.I could sit in a corner and get lost in a book and forget the world around me. LOL
Now I walk around with headphones on my head.I never liked to watch a lot TV,except the news and a few good shows,or movies.If I ever have to move out of our house to a single room or care facility,I hope they have a lot of audio books for me !
The Boxcar Children
Loved those books and still do. Got my 59 yo husband hooked on them.
Trixie Belden
I wanted to be her so badly.
Island of the Blue Dolphin
Ah yes….
A Nickel for Alice
Still have a copy of that.
A Knight Came Riding
Still have a copy of that too.
The Tripods
Husband loves those too.
Robin Kane Mysteries
Meg Mysteries.
My Friend Flika
And the others in that I believe were
Thunderhead
The Green Grass of Wyoming
I am sure I will think of more.
Ah, you ladies are reminding me of other favorite childhood books. Ann of Green Gables, certainly. The Meg mysteries – plus the Bobsy Twins, Nancy Drew and the Hardy Boys. Flika and Heidi. These are all the books that set me up for a lifetime of reading. I’m so sorry you didn’t have books around the house, Polly. My folks enrolled me in a book club when I was very young. I gave most of them to a friend’s child when I moved but it started my collecting books. I donate regularly to the library or the volunteers at the hospital where I do rehab and my shelves still overflow.
Thanks Zazzy. Needless to say, things are VERY different in our house now with the little man. I do feel I missed out. Maybe I need to buy all these books now and read them so I know what they are all about. That could be my next project. If you had to pick just one, for me to begin with, which one would it be? Maybe your other contributors would like to make a suggestion too?
I’m thinking your little guy is around 5-ish? Some of these books are for a little older kid but the Search for Delicious would play well with a young child, I think. They’ve actually printed different versions of the Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe for different age levels so that might work. I say introduce him to your library (if you haven’t already) and see what he enjoys. For you? I just re-read Island of the Blue Dolphins and I think adults will enjoy it as much as children.
Tom Sawyer. Really everything by Mark Twain.
How could I leave Tom Sawyer off my list?