Favourite books as a kid

[dadevvtsvre]

I was an avid book reader as a kid, probably much more so than I am now. Back when I was around ten years old, I probably read at least three or four books a month. I read a heck of a lot less now, but my tastes have changed a lot and I'm a lot pickier about what I read.

I went into a bookstore yesterday and browsed the ages 9-12 section for a bit, and started feeling really nostalgic about the books I read as a kid. (I was actually tempted to pick up a sequel in a series I stopped reading when I was 12!)

So what were your favourite books you read when you were a kid? Talk about them, and tell us what kind of impac they had on you while you were growing up. :D

In no particular order...

Deltora Quest, by Emily Rodda

I was a big fantasy nut as a kid ( :specs: ) and these were some of my favourites. They were simple to read and none of the books were particularly long, but I loved the adventure and the puzzles in them, and I think I read each book at least twice, maybe three times. I think I read these when I was 9 or 10.

Bone, by Jeff Smith

It's a graphic novel, not a book. Close enough. I didn't really start reading bone until I was 10 or 11, but from then on I was hooked. The humour and writing are superb; the art is beautiful and done with skill. The series is a little on the short side (nine graphic novels, which I suppose is fairly lengthy) and you can read them all in a day or two, but they're still really great.

A Series of Unfortunate Events, by Daniel Handler

These books were friggin' depressing, but I read the hell out of them. They're not very long books either, but for kid's books they definitely deviate from the norm, which I thought was really cool because it broke out of the typical children's book formula and brought something entirely new to the table. It's still one of my favourite series.

Harry Potter, by J.K. Rowling

I don't think I have to say anything here. :p

Goosebumps, by R.L. Stine

I was a kid that grew up in the 90's. Give me a break. There were practically dripping with cheese, and I guarantee you won't find a campier series than this, but for an eight year old kid they were entertaining as hell. Only a few I found were remotely scary, but for the most part their plots were very different from each other (aside from the sequels, of course) and the author wrote dozens of these things. I used to spend hours in my basement, reading four or five of these suckers in a row. (I still own at least forty of them :O )

I should also mention that these books made me really want to write my own series, and I actually did try once! The series was called The Fear is Near (I was NINE YEARS OLD OKAY) and them first book was about a family who stayed at a crappy hotel in the Everglades that was infested with man-eating plants and insects! :shock:

The Magic Treehouse, by Mary Pope Osbourne

These books were really short - you could easily read fifteen or twenty in a day - but they were educational, and I loved them. I think I read the ones about a tornado in Kansas and the Pompeii eruption half a dozen times each. When I was eight or nine, I'm pretty sure I tried to write my own Magic Treehouse story, which I was actually really proud of. DON'T JUDGE ME.

I feel like I'm missing something. I'll post here later if something comes to mind. Now get sharin' :3

 

[moog]

ahhhh dude bone is fucking ace, i loved that shit

i hate goosebumps though, that and animorphs sucks balls. my fav book as a kid were prolly those wayside school books, really fucking random but a good read everyonce in awhile, and it sucked cause they were always checked out. i even think they made a cartoon of it on nickelodeon a while back

 

[Venetia]

I read so many of those goosebumps books when i was a kid :x

also i read the shit out of Choose Your Own Adventure books. I loved them so much in 6th grade I wrote one. It was so bad :D

 

[moxie]

Bone

Hell yeah! One of my absolute favorites. I've never even met people outside of the local comic book store that's even HEARD of Bone.

I was introduced to Terry Pratchett because of Mort when I was eight-nineish, and ever since then he's been a favorite author. That's how I got into various fantasy books in general, too.

I was also big into Charles Dickens for some reason I can't really understand, since I can't even muster up the will to read any of his books for extended periods these days, but from the age of 8-10 Great Expectations was pretty high on my list. :x

 

[Guest]

;D

 

[Ellie]

I own every Horrible Histories and Horrible Science book, but bought them all like a couple of years ago. I used to get them from the library as a kid and wanted the whole set to myself later on ;x

I was a huge fan of Unfortunate Events until book 13, which I hated so much that I immediately sold my entire collection on eBay for £35. -.-

I have always been a Harry Potter fan - read the first book when it came out (what, 1996? 1997?) and pretty much grew up with it. I guess it's different when you've never really read them like that, but reading them as they came out, having something to look forward to, and like... growing up with them, was special, you know?

I was a big fan of anything I could "collect" :x like Horrible Science and Horrible Histories. I'd read them, sure but... :x



As a little kid I had all of the "Animals of Farthing Wood" books, and all the disney books of course.

Oh and er... Spot. Hairy McLary from Donaldson Dairy, Slinky Malinky from Donaldson Dinky, and Meg and Mog.



I tried to get into Goosebumps, but the library never had any and they were £1 more than Horrible Histories :x

 

[dadevvtsvre]

The Goosebumps books were good in a "so terrible, you HAVE to read them" kind of way. Each chapter ended with a cliffhanger and idk if they were meant to be serious or not but they were incredibly cheesy. But that's why I liked them :D

 

[Venetia]

i liked them because of their superior literary prowess and their powerful introspective on human psychology & morality

 

[Daxis]

i liked them because of their superior literary prowess and their powerful introspective on human psychology & morality

*Dies from laughing.*
*Then comes back from the dead to sue you from killing me*(Hey, we're in america)

I literally checked out the entire series of animorphs from the library, up to about 36 or so. Besides the occasional goosebumps, I read every animorph book(until 36, never finished the series). That's the one childhood's series I read that I can think of besides unfortunate events or whatever. I never started reading ANYTHING until about 7th grade, not a word, but once I realized that it's the only escapism I've got from my house(and that the library has computers with internet), I started devouring books. Even now, I check out 5 to fifteen novels every 2 weeks.

 

[regi]

Ah I remember reading some of those. I liked Goosebumps as well, our elementary school library had tons of those books. I found the choose your own adventure ones pretty cool too.

I enjoyed a lot of series too; Redwall was a good one. It was cute and interesting and appealing to my childhood sense of adventure. I actually really enjoyed the riddles part, and the entire animals thing was pretty creative.

The Bartimaeus Trilogy and Artemis Fowl were also pretty good. They were fantasy, but not so outrageous enough to be confusing. They were both pretty humorous and man I loved the author's styles (the former books' footnotes especially awesome). Sure the characters in the latter are pretty exaggerated, but the plot had plenty of interesting twists and enough adventure to keep me enthralled.

 

[bacon]

Magic Tree House brings back some memories. I remember the tornado one, the mummy one, and the roman one. They were really entertaining.

Series Of Unfortunate Events were really good at the time. I do still sort of appreciate the writing style the author used. It was something different and unique in my opinion. o:

I never read Harry Potter because they were intimidating. I also never read Goosebumps because I saw the Goosebumps episode with the masks and got scared, so I refused to get even close to those books.

I remember reading this book when I was around 11ish. It dealt with mature topics such as abusive parenting, but it was written so that a child could read it. Basically, it came down to understanding it or not, and was meant for those pre-teeners.

But god-damn was it the most depressing book ever written. ):

 

[dadevvtsvre]

The Bartimaeus Trilogy and Artemis Fowl were also pretty good. They were fantasy, but not so outrageous enough to be confusing. They were both pretty humorous and man I loved the author's styles (the former books' footnotes especially awesome). Sure the characters in the latter are pretty exaggerated, but the plot had plenty of interesting twists and enough adventure to keep me enthralled.

I tried reading Artemis Fowl when I was 10 or 11 but I really didn't like it that much. I thought the whole "kid genius" thing was pretty cool but unless I was just stupid I could never understand what the hell was going on. By the end of the first book I was confused as hell and only got halfway through the second before I decided to stop reading. :/

 

[Venetia]

I also never read Goosebumps because I saw the Goosebumps episode with the masks and got scared, so I refused to get even close to those books.

You IRL are actually a magically talking/typing stuffed rabbit living inside a magician's magic hat right

because you're too cute to be real

 

[Perihelion]

Man, I read all kinds of shit as a kid. I loved Tamora Pierce's stuff especially--the Circle of Magic series was great, and the Alanna books, and Wild Magic, all of those. I read a ton of the American Girl books when I was in third grade--I'd just burn through three or four of 'em in a school day instead of paying attention in class. I grew up with Harry Potter, so that holds a special place in my heart. I read a lot of Redwall, too, and The Dark Is Rising by Susan Cooper is the shit. There was some trilogy about dragonriders I can't remember the name of that I loved--the first one was about the son of a king who went to live with some talking otters when the kingdom was taken over by an evil dude or something. Did anyone read that? It's bothering me now that I can't remember what it's called. Man, I wanted to be a dragonrider when I was a kid. I wanted to be lots of things when I was a kid, though. Like a Sailor Scout. And a ballerina. Yeah.

 

[Tindy]

I'm gonna take it the Devvy way - with pictures! :D

The Cul-de-Sac Kids series, by Beverly Lewis

Goddamned I loved the hell out of these books. I think at one point I must've read the ones I had like twelve times each. I haven't read them in a good many years now, but I seem to recall plots revolving around "Oh no, he has low blood sugar!" and "I see shadows, there must be a burglar!"

My Teacher is an Alien and My Teacher Glows in the Dark, by Bruce Coville

I actually don't remember much about these two books, other than 1) I had them, 2) I loved them. I remember My Teacher Glows in the Dark moreso, though. (maybe I should read them again...)

Almost anything by Beverly Cleary

No, seriously. Was it written by Beverly Cleary? If I haven't read I probably wanted to. Runaway Ralph? Ramona Quimby, Age Eight? Good times.

Little House in the Big Woods and the rest of the Little House series, by Laura Ingalls Wilder

True story: When I was seven years old I asked for a flashlight for Christmas, and I got it. Why did I want a flashlight? Because in my dad's room, there was a crawlspace underneath the stairs where he put his unused blankets and hung his "good" shirts. When I was seven that was my absolute favorite place to read, but my grandpa's flashlight was too big and heavy. The day I got my flashlight (it was blue!), I crept down there with Little House in the Big Woods and stayed there for hours. (wish I still had that drive.)

The Adventures of the Bailey School Kids series, by Debbie Dadey and Marcia Thornton Jones

Ahhhh the cheese. Santa Clause is a janitor? The coach of the soccer team is a zombie? What what whaaaaaaat? Again, it's been so long that I don't really even remember the plots, just that there was ~something amiss~ with the new teacher/janitor/coach, and they had to prove (or not) that it was actually a zombie/vampire/werewolf. I'm prety sure I read 4/5ths of the series or so.

Babysitters: Little Sister series, by Ann M. Martin

Yeah, I was the age group this was aimed at. Again...the plot? Don't really recall, except one book when Karen (the..."protagonist", I guess) went to a carnival and found a unicorn. Was is a real unicorn? Never explained. Also I seem to recall more plot points about ~low blood sugar~ (we were really hyped on dia-beetus back then, weren't we?)

Sideways Stories from Wayside School, by Louis Sachar

Man. Just doing this makes me want to go to the bookstore and buy *all* of these books. 2+2 doesn't always equal four? There are dead rats living in the basement? I haven't even touched these books in easily 10 years and yet I still remember them pretty clearly. <3

Ok, I was going to end this pictorial list with just a few more mentions, but this one really deserves a picture, too.

The Boxcar Children series, by Gertrude Chandler Warner

Holy shit. These books? There's dozens, and it's still being produced today (though by a different writer). There's 121 now, plus 2 extras and 21 specials! I got up to, I think, around #89 before stopping. You can use the back of a waterfall as a refrigerator? You can live fairly comfortably in an abandoned train car? Awesome!

In addition to these, I also read Animorphs (though I stopped before it really got weird), Bunnicula, any book written about the X-Files, and I think I've read every single Eyewitness book up to 2003 or so. I miss being so voracious in my reading habits.

 

[Venetia]

outside of Goosebumps and other misc. pop-lit books I mostly read non-fiction. school always ruined fiction-reading for me. I ESPECIALLY read books about ancient egypt and greece.

 

[coyotecraft]

I remember the very first book I check out from the school library. It was "The angry Moon". It was about this little Indian boy who's friend is kidnapped by the moon so he shoots the sky with arrows to make a ladder and climbs up to rescue her.

I was obsessed with the Animorph series when I was in 5th grade. My teacher had this rack with prizes you could buy with stickers you got with good grades. Every month there was a new Animorph book. I remember racing my friend to the tunnels on the playground during recess where we would read. During school basketball and football games I would wander around under the bleachers and through the school pretending I was hiding from the alien invasion. Good times.
I read most of them but never finished the series.

 

[candle]

I was beggining to think nobody else knew about the Boxcar Children. I loved those books. I also read animorphs up to about 38, then I couldn't find anymore books (i know it went up to 52 or 54), I also read Everworld and the Mayflower Project series by the same author. I grew up on Harry potter, and I loved almost anything by RL Stine.

Goosebumps? read them, Goosebumps 2000? those too. Give yourself Goosebumps, Fear Street, Fear Street Saga (the story about how it became Fear Street), Fear Street Sagas (fear street stories set in the 1800s and early 1900s).

I also loved and still have many of the Redwall books by Brian Jacques. I read Tamora Pierce's Circle of Magic, and the Cirlce opens quartets in high school, but I read Piers Anthony's Xanth books when I was ten.

By 11 or 12, I was reading his Apprentice Adept and Incarnations of Immortality series. I was also reading the Lord of the Rings and the Robot City books (based off of essays written by Issac Asimov).

Throughout high school I read a lot of books, but my favorites were Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time saga and Goodkind's Sword of Truth series. I also read a lot of Star Wars books and several Heinlein books including Starship Troopers, Farnham's Freehold, the Door into Summer, JOB: a Comedy of Justice, and Time Enough for Love.

I still read a shit ton today. seriously, I've got like 200 books in my room, and the only ones i haven't read are the ones i got for Christmas.

 

[coyotecraft]

outside of Goosebumps and other misc. pop-lit books I mostly read non-fiction. school always ruined fiction-reading for me. I ESPECIALLY read books about ancient egypt and greece.

There's something wrong with you. The only non-fiction books I could read as a kid were picture books.

I was watching this game show "Are you smarter then a 5th grader". One of the 5th grade literary questions was asking who the author was of "Lord of the Flies". I don't believe that's grade school reading material. I mean its a book about boys stranded on an island, turning savage and killing each other.
Then again, I remember reading these horror story books with graphic illustrations.

nightmare fuel

 

[Venetia]

ohhhh yeah!!!! i remember those! I loved those. The illustrations were always so fucking cool.