Springfield-Greene County Library District discussion

Hello everyone,

Our February ReadUps topic is: Children's Books! In the comments, let's discuss:

What are your favorite children's books of all time?
What are some newer children's books that you've enjoyed as an adult?
If you read a children's book this month, we'd love to hear about that too.

If you need some ideas, take a look at the Library's Kids page, where you can find booklists by age group, reading level and awards!

My favorite children's book of all time is The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry.

I was obsessed with it as a kid and I still love re-reading it. It gets more bittersweet every time I read, as I get older and further away from my childhood.

I was obsessed with children's horse books as a kid. I read every series I could get my hands on: Saddle Club, Thoroughbred, Phantom Stallion, etc. Last month I read one of my favorite Saddle Club books, "Wagon Trail" and it was a funny time capsule of 90s kid culture. From there I got sucked back into the Phantom Stallion series by Terri Farley (I actually met the author at one of your programs years ago!) and although it wasn't my favorite series as a kid, the drama and distinct rural Nevada setting makes it more enjoyable for me now. Although none of the books are in our library system, they just started publishing the series as audiobooks which are slowly appearing on Hoopla.

I think the things drawing me to children's books lately is that they are fun, easy to read, and can be read quickly. Plus the nostalgia factor, which is strong.

I'm sorry to say that I have never read The Little Prince! It's one that I hear about every once in a while and then forget that I need to read it. I'll probably wait and read it with my daughter (now age five) in a couple of years.

Christina, I loved horse books, too! The Saddle Club was my absolute favorite, though I'm sure there were many others that I read back then and have forgotten. I wonder why horses were such a popular topic for kids in the 90s? Or are they, still? I don't think I've seen new ones come out, or any kids reading them, for quite a while, but I might be wrong.

This month, I read The Wild Robot and The Wild Robot Escapes by Peter Brown with my daughter, and we LOVED them. They're about a robot who ends up on a deserted island after a plane crash and learns to communicate with the animals there. They're funny, heartwarming, beautiful stories about family and friendship. We were both bawling by the end! They are great family read-alouds, but I think many adults reading on their own would enjoy them.

Oh man, I loved the Thoroughbred series and I totally forgot about that! Good stuff.

This month I read the first book in the Enola Holmes series by Nancy Springer. I thought the book was okay, something that I probably would have liked as a kid. There were fun historical facts and word puzzles built into the narrative. I think the later books in the series probably have better stories, since this one was more focused on introducing the character and world/time period. I’ll probably pick up at least a couple more since they are nice quick reads.

I chose this book because in addition to fitting the ReadUps topic, it also covered a Book Riot Read Harder challenge category: middle grade mystery. Anyone else doing that???

I didn't realize that there's an Enola Holmes book series; I'd just heard of the movie. That sounds like a fun, quick series to escape into! Do you think Nancy Drew fans would like them? I loved those as a kid.

I have thought about doing the Book Riot Read Harder Challenge but I've always chickened out! How is it going for you, Miranda? Have you discovered any good new books by doing the challenge?

Heather wrote: "I didn't realize that there's an Enola Holmes book series; I'd just heard of the movie. That sounds like a fun, quick series to escape into! Do you think Nancy Drew fans would like them? I loved th..."

Yes the Enola Holmes series would be a good suggestion for someone wanting to read something similar to Nancy Drew! There's a distinctive feminist approach; Enola breaks a lot of gender norms during her adventures. It's historical fiction and features Sherlock & Mycroft Holmes, so Sherlock fans would dig it too.

Honestly this year's Book Riot challenge is super-duper particular so I've had to do some extra digging around to find books that I might like and that also fit the categories. Usually what I do is read whatever I want most of the year, and I usually luck out and get several categories covered doing that. And then I'll spend November and December reading only what Book Riot tells me to (lol). It's a little bit unnecessarily stressful for me, but I keep doing it anyway.

One book that I read for the Read Harder Challenge last year was Rafe: A Buff Male Nanny for the "romance featuring a single parent" category. It's a great little steamy romance that didn't include any arguments or misunderstandings between the two main characters so it was a nice, easy, fluffy story that was pure enjoyment. The next one in the series, Xeni, works for one of this year's categories: read a fat-positive romance.