Old Children's Book Poll

[rachelmanija]

Here are some old children's books I have acquired. Please vote for which I should read next (or which I should avoid.) If you've read any of them, what did you think?

Poll #26528 Old Children's Book Poll

Open to: Registered Users, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 129

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Which books should I read next?

View Answers

Understood Betsy, by Dorothy Canfield Fisher. A girl is sent to rural Vermont and experiences country life.
32 (24.8%)

Building Blocks, by Cynthia Voigt. A boy time-travels and meets his father as a boy.
22 (17.1%)

Juniper, by Monica Furlong. A princess studies with her wise-woman aunt.
50 (38.8%)

Mossflower, by Brian Jacques. Martin the Warrior vs en evil cat queen.
24 (18.6%)

Castaways in Lilliput, by Henry Winterfield. Three shipwrecked kids land in Lilliput.
17 (13.2%)

Midsummer, by Katherine Adams. Two New York kids are sent to Sweden & experience Swedish life.
20 (15.5%)

Orphan Island, by Laurel Snyder. Kids live alone on an island.
23 (17.8%)

Mariel of Redwall, by Brian Jacques. Finally a heroine.
25 (19.4%)

The Fairy Caravan, by Beatrix Potter. A miniature animal traveling circus.
19 (14.7%)

A Room Made of Windows, by Eleanor Cameron. Teenage Julia wants to be a writer.
18 (14.0%)

When Hitler Stole Pink Rabbit, by Judith Kerr. Anna and her family are refugees in multiple countries.
30 (23.3%)

Hyddenworld, by William Horwood. Two kids find a civilization of tiny people and magic.
23 (17.8%)

Assignment in Alaska (Kathy Martin), by Josephine James. A stewardess has an Alaska adventure.
9 (7.0%)

Talargain, by Joyce Gard. Northumberland selkie fantasy.
45 (34.9%)

Comments

[rachelmanija]

Which are the other five?

[starlady]

Oh, just the first seven in publication order--after Outcast of Redwall fully exposes the inflexibility of Jacques' moral order, the series as a whole jumps the shark and descends into self-parody. (As a kid I hung on until like book ten, and I should have bailed sooner.) As a bonus, those first seven hang together fairly coherently--the original trilogy, the Martin the Warrior prequel, the Mariel duology, and Salamandastron to finish it off with a really good yarn showcasing the series' best features that is close in time in-series to Mariel.

[copperfyre]

I kept going until Loamhedge, which was book 16, for some reason, but the first seven are definitely the best! There are good moments in a couple of the later ones but, yeah, and as an adult I think I would have much less patience for how formulaic they became, too. But Mossflower and Salamandastron I read so many times that my copies of them fell apart.

[starlady]

I remember paging through the last or second to last one in a bookstore when it came out and they had degenerated into self-parody, just feasts and songs with a filler plot between them. The first seven are great, though! And the Redwall feasts bot on Twitter is very good.