Childhood nostalgia poll

[rachelmanija]

Please reminisce, fondly or not, about any of these, or other books read in childhood, especially if they seem to have, deservedly or undeservedly, vanished from the shelves. I'd love to hear about non-US, non-British books, too.

[Poll #1720139]

Comments

[smillaraaq.livejournal.com]

I reread them both (but especially Mara over and over for years, and would have kept it up if I hadn't changed schools and lost access to the library that had old copies of them; so I spent decades hunting for copies of my own until they came back into print. Those books, and Barbara Mertz's non-fiction, were pretty much the major basis of my childhood obsession with ancient Egypt; discovering as an adult that Mertz had written a lengthy series of mysteries about Victorian Egyptologists filled me with utter delight, all the more so as I read them and recognized some of the hobbyhorses from her non-fiction.

I've never laid eyes on any of McGraw's adult Egypt books -- are they as wonderful as the juveniles?

[flemmings.livejournal.com]

I kept my hardback of Mara but stupidly lent The Golden Goblet to someone who never returned it so I too had to hold out for the reprint in paperback.

I was kerblonxed when I found out, eighteen months ago, that Elizabeth Peters was Barbara Mertz, whom I also reread obsessively Back Then. Always wondered what had happened to her.

(I'd never read Elizabeth Peters before that. She annoyed me for years because she sat next to Ellis Peters on the crime shelf, and every time I thought 'Hey great a new Ellis Peters!' no-it-wasn't. OTOH her prejudice against Ramses II seems to have waned just a teensy bit in the intervening years.)

'Pharaoh' is about Hatshepsut and I vaguely recall it, across a half century, as plotty and long and not as congenial to my 11 year old tastes as Mara. Can still remember a line from the preface: 'I don't say 'it happened like this', or 'it might have happened like this', but 'what if it had happened like this?' Otehrwise all I recall is naive young Thutmose coming back from a military expedition to find his aunt sitting on the throne and himself suddenly stripped of all power, which appealed to the melodrama lover in me.

[smillaraaq.livejournal.com]

Oh oh oh! Did you have the 50's hardcover with the four-color printed cover? That's the version I kept dragging home from the library, somewhat worse for wear as it was about 25 years old by the time I glommed on to it. I'm happy to have the paperback just for the sake of readability, but if I ever come across the hardcover in decent shape I don't think I will be able to resist snapping it up for nostalgia's sake.

The Amelia Peabody books I'd picked up at some point in my teens, I think, without knowing it was Mertz writing under a pen name; I don't think I found out they were the same person until I stumbled across something about her online, and then I laughed for days at how perfectly it all made sense.

And waaah, plotty long Thutmosid melodrama sounds like an utter delight! DO WANT. ;_;

[flemmings.livejournal.com]

That's the copy of Mara I own, a bit battered after all these decades but with slipcover intact. This (http://www.amazon.com/gp/customer-media/product-gallery/B0007DENE4/ref=cm_ciu_pdp_images_all) is the Golden Goblet I owned. And could again if I were willing to deal with amazon.

Oh look! (http://www.amazon.com/Pharaoh-Eloise-Jarvis-McGraw/dp/B0007E2NJU) A library copy of Pharaoh for a mere 74.50, in rather tattered condition.

[smillaraaq.livejournal.com]

I *think* that's the same version of Golden Goblet my school library had -- it looks vaguely familiar, but I didn't reread that one often enough to have the image permanently burned into my brain like that old copy of Mara.

Only $74? *weeps*

[flemmings.livejournal.com]

Plus amazon's shipping and handling costs. And I think, well hey it's not *that* much, two dinners out with wine... and then in a month I look at my VISA statement and weep.