My friend Mrs. Darling from Dishpan Dribble recently posted a recommended reading list for children at her site. Inspired by her effort, I went back through the records of some of the books the children read when they were little. This is a greatly abridged list of the most cherished books, and doesn’t include much of the nonfiction that they read. Were some of these books your children’s favorites as well?:
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Adler, David |
The Cam Jansen series |
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Alcott, Louisa May |
Little Women (and other books) |
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Alexander, Lloyd |
Time Cat (and other books) |
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Arnosky, Jim |
Crinkleroot’s Book of Animal Tracking |
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Barrett, Judi |
Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs |
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Bemelmans, Ludwig |
The Madeline books |
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Boston, L.M. |
The Stones of Green Knowe |
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Brink, Carol Ryrie |
Caddie Woodlawn |
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Brink, Carol Ryrie |
Winter Cottage |
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Brink, Carol Ryrie |
Two are Better Than One |
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Burstein, Chaya M. |
The Mystery of the Coins |
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Chenault |
Parsifal Rides the Time Wave |
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Chute, Marchette |
The Wonderful Winter |
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Coatsworth, Elizabeth |
Five Bushel Farm |
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Coatsworth, Elizabeth |
The Wanderers |
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Cohen, Barbara |
Molly’s Pilgrim |
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Cole, Joanna |
Magic Schoolbus series |
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Colver, Anne |
Bread-and-Butter Indian |
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Cooney, Barbara |
Island Boy |
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Day, Alexandra |
Good Dog, Carl |
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de Angeli, Marguerite |
Petite Suzanne |
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de Angeli, Marguerite |
Henner’s Lydia |
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de Angeli, Marguerite |
Skippack School |
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de Angeli, Marguerite |
Black Fox of Lorne |
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de Angeli, Marguerite |
Copper-toed Boots |
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de Angeli, Marguerite |
Bright April |
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de Brunhoff, Laurent |
The Babar books |
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DeJong, Meindert |
Puppy Summer |
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Dicks, Terrance |
The Case of the Cop Catchers |
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Dicks, Terrance |
The Case of the Blackmail Boys |
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Dicks, Terrance |
The Case of the Ghost Grabbers |
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Dicks, Terrance |
The Case of the Crooked Kids |
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Dicks, Terrance |
The Case of the Cinema Swindle |
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Dixon, Franklin W. |
The Hardy Boys series |
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Doyle, Sir Arthur Conan |
The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes |
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Farley, Walter |
The Black Stallion Challenged |
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Field, Elsie Kimmell |
Prairie Winter |
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Fitzgerald, John |
The Great Brain series of books |
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Foreman, Michael |
War Boy: A Country Childhood |
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Freeman, Don |
Corduroy |
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Friedman, Ina |
How My Parents Learned to Eat |
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Fritz, Jean |
What’s the Big Idea, Ben Franklin? |
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Fritz, Jean |
Traitor: The Case of Benedict Arnold |
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Fritz, Jean |
Will You Sign Here, John Hancock? |
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Fritz, Jean |
Who’s That Standing on Plymouth Rock? |
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Fritz, Jean |
Make Way for Sam Houston |
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Fritz, Jean |
What’s Next, Paul Revere? |
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Fritz, Jean |
Can’t You Make Them Behave, King George? |
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Fritz, Jean |
Early Thunder |
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Fritz, Jean |
The Cabin Faced West |
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George, Jean Craighead |
My Side of the Mountain |
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Grahame, Kenneth |
The Wind in the Willows |
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Gray, Elizabeth Janet |
Adam of the Road |
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Gurney, James |
The Dinotopia books |
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Haywood, Carolyn |
B is for Betsey |
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Henry, Marguerite |
King of the Wind |
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Henry, Marguerite |
The White Stallion |
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Henry, Marguerite |
Misty of Chincoteague |
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Henry, Marguerite |
Mustang, Wild Spirit of the West |
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Henry, Marguerite |
Five O’Clock Charlie |
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Herge |
The Adventures of Tintin series |
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Herriot, James |
Only One Woof (and many other stories) |
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Holling, Holling Clancy |
Seabird |
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Holling, Holling Clancy |
The Book of Indians |
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Irving, Washington |
Rip Van Winkle |
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Kipling, Rudyard |
The Jungle Book |
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Kipling, Rudyard |
The Cat That Walked by Himself |
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Krementz, Jill |
A Very Young Rider |
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Krensky, Stephen |
Who Really Discovered America? |
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Kurelek, William |
They Sought a New World |
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Kurelek, William |
A Prairie Boy’s Winter |
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Kurelek, William |
A Prairie Boy’s Summer |
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Lawson, Robert |
Mr. Revere and I |
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Lawson, Robert |
They Were Strong and Good |
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Lawson, Robert |
I Discover Columbus |
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Lawson, Robert |
Capt. Kidd’s Cat |
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Lenski, Lois |
Houseboat Girl |
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Lenski, Lois |
To Be a Logger |
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Lenski, Lois |
Boom Town Boy |
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Lenski, Lois |
Indian Captive: The Story of Mary Jemison |
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Lenski, Lois |
Little Sioux Girl |
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Lenski, Lois |
Prairie School |
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Lenski, Lois |
Texas Tomboy |
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Lenski, Lois |
Blueberry Corners |
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Lenski, Lois |
Ocean-Born Mary |
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Lenski, Lois |
Blue Ridge Billy |
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Lenski, Lois |
Bayou Suzette |
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Lenski, Lois |
Berries in the Scoop (and many other books) |
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Lewis, C.S. |
The Chronicles of Narnia |
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Lippincott, Joseph Wharton |
The Wahoo Bobcat (and other books) |
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Lovelace, Maud Hart |
The Betsy-Tacy books |
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MacDonald, Fiona |
A Medieval Castle |
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Mahy, Margaret |
The Seven Chinese Brothers |
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Marryat, Frederick |
The Children of the New Forest |
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Martel, Suzanne |
The City Underground |
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Mason, Miriam E. |
Becky and Her Brave Cat, Bluegrass |
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McManus, Patrick F. |
Never Sniff a Gift Fish (and other books) |
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Meadowcroft, Enid LaMonte |
Holding the Fort with Daniel Boone |
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Meddaugh, Susan |
Martha Speaks (and other books) |
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Meltzer, Milton |
Rescue: The Story of How Gentiles Saved Jews in the Holocaust |
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Moody, Ralph |
Come On, Sea Biscuit! |
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Moody, Ralph |
Little Britches |
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Moody, Ralph |
Man of the Family |
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Moody, Ralph |
The Home Ranch |
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Moody, Ralph |
Mary Emma and Company |
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Moody, Ralph |
Shaking the Nickel Bush |
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Moody, Ralph |
The Dry Divide |
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Moody, Ralph |
Horse of a Different Color |
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Morey, Walt |
Kavik the Wolf Dog |
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Nesbit, Edith |
Five Children and It (and other books) |
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Nixon, Joan Lowery |
If You Say So, Claude |
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Oakley, Graham |
The Church Mice in Action |
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O’Brien, Jack |
Silver Chief, Dog of the North |
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Orton, Helen Fuller |
Mystery in the Apple Orchard |
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Parin D’Aulaire, Ingri and Edgar |
Children of the Northern Lights (and other books) |
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Paterson, Katherine |
Jacob Have I Loved |
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Peet, Bill |
No Such Things (and many other books) |
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Potter, Beatrix |
The Tale of Two Bad Mice (and many other stories) |
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Pyle, Howard |
Otto of the Silver Hand |
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Rawls, Wilson |
Where the Red Fern Grows |
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Roop, Peter and Connie |
Keep the Lights Burning, Abbie |
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Sewell, Anna |
Black Beauty |
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Sharmat, Marjorie Weinman |
Nate the Great series |
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Sobol, Donald |
Encyclopedia Brown series |
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Spier, Peter |
The Erie Canal |
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Stanley, Diane |
Peter the Great |
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Stevenson, Robert Louis |
The Black Arrow |
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Streatfeild, Noel |
The Family at Caldicott Place |
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Sutcliff, Rosemary |
Knight’s Fee |
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Sypher, Lucy Johnston |
The Spell of the Northern Lights (and other books) |
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Taylor, Sydney |
All of a Kind Family |
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Taylor, Sydney |
All of a Kind Family Uptown |
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Travers, P.L. |
Mary Poppins in Cherry Tree Lane series |
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Warner, Gertrude Chandler |
The Boxcar Children series |
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Wilder, Laura Ingalls |
The Little House books |
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Williams, Jay |
Danny Dunn series |
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Williams, Margery |
The Velveteen Rabbit |
What a great list! You must have worked a bit on that one!
I see lots of familiar friends there, but also some we haven’t tried. I’ll have to print it off. I love book lists.
I thought of the Madeline books too. Anothe rone I loved on a little bit more of a reading level was Hans Brinker and The Silver Skates.
Wait a minute! Did I see Skippack School? Was the little boy in there Eli? I have never met anyone who has read that book! My sisters and I use to pour over it!
Thank you, Kerri and Mrs. Darling, for your comments. 🙂
I don’t remember the details about Skippack School, but that’s neat that the book was one of your childhood favorites, Mrs. Darling.
I should have my children make up lists of some of the books they have read as they have gotten older, too. Most of the fiction books I have read in recent years have been recommended to me by my children.
Remember the Carl books, by Alexandra Day? I checked out one called Carl Makes a Scrapbook today. It has pictures of the real Carl with Madeleine (the baby)! There are also a bunch of new books, well new since we were kids anyhow. I bet you’d enjoy looking at them 🙂
Thanks, Laura! I love the Carl books; I’ll be sure to check them out at the library. 🙂
The ones that I like are The Magic Schoolbus, I had the whole collection, Black Beauty and at one stage I liked the Velveteen Rabbit.