The Vine: June 8, 2007
Hi there Sars —
As my kids are getting towards that age when the words begin to matter more than the pictures, I’ve started a collection of my favorite “chapter” books such as The Hobbit, A Wrinkle in Time, Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of Nimh, The Island of Blue Dolphins, et cetera.
However, some of the books I remember with great fondness elude me. I can’t remember the titles or even the names of the characters, only little glimmers of the plots. The three I’m stuck on at the moment all have supernatural/thriller/ghost story themes in them, and I’m hoping that you and/or your readers might recognize them:
1) Two children move to a new home and encounter two phantom-like children who appear to have come to ask them for help — apparently from the past? Can’t remember much more except something about a fire…
2) A young woman/girl has some kind of ghostly encounters the garden of a large home, and there’s something involving a reflecting sphere in the garden…
3) A “tween-age” girl (whose siblings are all exceptional in some way) feels utterly bland and unnoticed, then discovers she has precognition…
Any idea of the titles? I’d appreciate any help I can get!
Regards,
AKF
Dear A,
None of these sounds familiar to me, but the readers can usually help.
Readers, hit it — and please make sure to note the book you’re identifying by number in the comments. Thanks.
Tags: Ask The Readers kids popcult
This has been an awesome thread and has inspired me to look up some of my old favorites. AKF’s description of book #1 got me searching for almost 45 minutes for a favorite of mine, Behind the Attic Wall by Sylvia Cassedy. It’s about one girl, not two children, but also involves people from the past (in doll form, not ghost!) and, I believe, a fire or some other tragedy. Another great book for anyone interested…and I agree that “the Girl with the Silver Eyes” is fabulous too.
I didn’t know any of the books, but the third one sounds like the inspiration for Ordinary Jack, the first book in the Bagthorpe Saga, a series of comic British books by Helen Cresswell. The main character had three extremely precocious siblings and he pretended to be a psychic (with his uncle’s help) to get attention. There were a bunch more books, but it spread out to focus on the family in general and their wackiness.
STONEWORDS! Ever since reading the original letter I’ve been trying to remember what that book was called. Cathryn is my new hero.
You might also try “The Witches of Worm”.
I so not remember the author.
If you’re still looking, another book that came to mind with your description of #2 was “The Court of the Stone Children,” by Eleanor Cameron. I’m pretty sure that one involves girl ghosts and the French Revolution.
Ditto on the Zilpha Keatley Snyder books. I also really liked the Edgar Eager books, which are all fantasy/wishing-related, but not scary.
Had to add another suggestion along the same lines as the books you were looking for: “The Diamond in the Window” and “The Swing in the Summerhouse,” both by Jane Langton. I read both of these so many times when I was growing up, the covers have fallen off of both and pages are missplaced. Excellent reading material for girls or boys.
(hope I’m not breaching protocol here) – All these suggestions have brought to mind two of my favorite, but poorly-remembered, spooky/sci-fi kid books. Maybe you geniuses can help me out? One is about a boy who lives on a planet where everyone goes outside at night to look at the other stars, and he falls into a hole in the dark and winds up on earth.
The second one is about some sisters – six or seven, I believe – who turn into crows, or ravens, or maybe pigeons but probably not; the story might be set in the turn of the century (1899-1900), or perhaps it’s just the house and the sisters. There might be one good sister, or it might just be another character in the book.
Can you believe my mother throws books away??? God, if I still had some of the books I grew up on…
I am definitely going to check out not only the three original books, but several of the others mentioned – trying to get my 12 year old into more reading and less watching.
They’re apparently all been discovered, but just in case, (1) sounds a lot like Time Windows by Kathryn Reiss, which is one of my all-time favorites.
I am not sure of the specifics of the requested titles, but I concur with Caitlan that Zilpha Keatley Snyder’s books are great: imaginative and great characters, give them a try too. My favourite growing up was The Egypt Game, although the Below the Root series are I think her most famous ones.
Elayne, I remember that first book! The boy ends up on earth and learns to make jewelry, I believe? A nice Earth family takes him in and he dosen’t speak at all till he learns English. OMG! What was the name of that book?!
Might I recommend http://www.goodreads.com to you all? The premise is that you and friends sign up and list books you’ve read, books you are reading, and books you want to read. My pal Anne listed the Zilpha Keatley Snyders, and I was suddenly time-warped to 6th grade, “Oh, the Egypt Game!!!” It sparked some memories for me, “The Giver”, The “Wrinkle in Time” series, “The Witch of Blackbird Pond” etc.
Elayne! It’s “The Forgotten Door”! Thanks for pormpting that memory, I am going to get a copy!
A couple of other recommendations since the mysteries have been solved:
Eleanor Cameron has already been mentioned, but I loved her *A Room Made of Windows.*
Scott Corbett’s “Trick” series that begins with *The Lemonade Trick* is a lot of fun, especially for boys.
Everyone knows Astrid Lindgren for *Pippi Longstocking,* of course, but I prefered the *Children of Noisy Village* books.
Sydney Taylor’s *All-of-a-Kind Family* series is terrific, as well as educational for kids who don’t have Jewish friends.
And my very favorite book as a child is the fantastic, splenderific *No Flying in the House* by Betty Brock. It’s about a girl who discovers she’s part fairy, and the miniature dog who’s her guardian. Magical and wonderful. I give copies to all my friends’ daughters when they turn eight or nine.
Dang – you guys beat me to it. “The Girl With the Silver Eyes” isn’t one of the listed, but as a Newberry Award winner, it ought to be on any 7-12yr old’s list (or those of us who just think like they do!).
elayne, I believe the first book you were wondering about is “The Forgotten Door” by Alexander Keys. The boy falls through the titular object and is wormholed to Earth, where he is taken in by a kind farmer and his family who battle the eeeevil Child Protective Services lady and try to reunite him with his proper dimension. I hope that sounds familiar.
I’m afraid I can’t help you on the second one, although now it sounds familiar.
A reply to elayne: The first book you’re looking for is The Forgotten Door by Alexander Key– it’s maybe my all time favorite book!
And this is completely unrelated as well, but another fantasy series for kids, The Dark is Rising sequence by Susan Cooper, five books in all, which were my absolute favourite when I was a kid, re-read them recently and they’re still great!
A few people have recommended “Linnets and Valerians” – I’d also suggest “The Little White Horse”, also by Elizabeth Goudge.
Elayne, I think the book about the pigeons that you’re thinking of is the one I mentioned earlier. (“The Wicked, Wicked Ladies in the Haunted House”). There’s an abandoned house, with all these odd pigeons (who are actually the ladies/sisters mentioned in the title), and this girls goes inside the house, and sees the portraits of all the nasty sisters that used to live there. She falls asleep, wakes up in their time, is bullied by the sisters, and meets up with a little gnome who helps her get back to her own time. Something like that, anyways.
I’ve put together what looks like a fun, nostalgic summer reading list from all of the suggestions people have been making! Can I also add “The Phantom Cyclist and Other Ghost Stories” by Ruth Ainsworth? I won this book in fifth grade, and loved it. I still go back and reread the stories in it; I also do this with “Jane-Emily,” one of my very favorites.
Like Charity, the description of #1 immediately made me think of “Beyond the Attic Wall,” by Sylvia Cassedy. It is one girl, not two, but otherwise it’s spot on. Even if that’s not the one the reader is looking for, I would highly recommend it – it’s one of those books that I adored as a kid, and am still finding new nuances to as an adult. Fantastic book.
elayne: I don’t recognize either of those books, but if you want a good sci-fi suggestion, one of my absolute favorite books growing up (and which I have to admit I still read every couple of years) is This Time of Darkness, by H. M. Hoover. It was out of print for a while but is now apparently reissued.
http://www.amazon.com/This-Time-Darkness-H-Hoover/dp/0765345676/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/104-9378527-5411963?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1181582855&sr=8-1
Dur, it’s Behind the Attic Wall, not Beyond. BEHIND.
Thanks to Suzanne, Kimb, HP, Katie, and Leigh! I have added many of the names in this thread to my wishlist or shopping list. And Katie, the title that you mentioned is what made me think, “Oh, that reminds me about the sisters who were pigeons, I should ask about that one” so I’m sure that’s probably it.
Another good time-travel book is “The Vision of Stephen” by Lolah Burford – I first read it in 3rd or 4th grade. After hunting for it for years, I finally got my hands on a copy, and re-read it every few months. Stephen is a king’s son who teleports himself through time as he’s being tortured to death – by his own father, albeit reluctantly – for refusing to betray the boy he befriended, who happens to be a rival king’s son. When the pain – physical and emotional – become too great, he finds himself physically present in the England of the late 1800s, early 1900s, where he befriends the children of the family who live on the land that once was his birthright.
I’m another great fan of “Linnets and Valerians” and “The Little White Horse”.
On the ghost story side of things, I thoroughly recommend “Tom’s Midnight Garden” by Philippa Pierce and I second the recommendation of Alison Uttley’s “A Traveller in Time”.
The second book AKF was looking for reminded me of Helen Cresswell’s “The Moondial”.
I was so glad to read the description of the first book – I’ve been looking for it for years, had remembered the title, but had never been able to find it. To see that the author is Antonia Barber is amazing – she’s the author of a lot of the books I read my daughter when she was little, and I’d recommend Catkin to anyone. I read it cold aloud to my daughter when we bought it, and (feeble and hormonal as I undoubtedly was) I actually cried when I got to the climactic bit. Excellent author, and Catkin especially was clearly written to be read aloud. (albeit not while weeping. not my fault, though.) Thanks everyone who posted that!
This thread reminds me of so many childhood favorites. Headless Cupid, Court of the Stone Children. Mmm I should reread.
Some that haven’t been mentioned yet:
The Westing Game- Ellen Raskin (my absolute favorite book EVER. I’ve read it something more than 40 times)
Playing Beatie Bow- Ruth Park. It’ll be hard to find, as I think it’s Australian, but it’s lovely and spooky.
Anything by John Bellairs. Not many girls or women are represented in his world, but he does do creepy with a certain amount of British brilliance. Try The Curse of the blue Figurine.
It seems they’ve been identified, but another one you might like if you liked #1 is a book called Behind the Attic Wall.
Oh man, *The Westing Game* — what a fantastic book. I’d recommend reading her others, too, especially *The Tattooed Potato and Other Clues.* Read them first, though, since they’re really good, but not *Westing Game* status.
And how have we gotten so far without a mention of three other favorite authors?
*The Secret Garden* is a classic for a reason. Neither Frances Hodgson Burnett’s other well-known works, *Little Lord Fauntleroy* and *A Little Princess* have aged as well. This one has magic.
*From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler* is practically perfect in every way. E.L. Konigsburg won a second Newberry Award for *The Veiw from Saturday.* She’s also the only person to be a Newberry winner and runner-up in the same year so you really can’t go wrong with any of her titles.
My love of history was probably influenced by Elizabeth George Speare — another double-Newberry winner — namely *Calico Captive* and the better-known *The Witch of Blackbird Pond.* And before she started the “Mrs. Pollifax” mysteries, Dorothy Gilman Butters wrote several children’s books with admittedly old-fashioned sounding names: *Ten Leagues to Boston Town,* *Girl in Buckskin,* *Witch’s Silver.* They were old library books when I read them and are long out of print, but thanks to the great and glorious Internet, you can find them fairly easily.
Book #2 is “The Diamond in the Window” (the gazing globe and transcendentalism nail this one):
http://www.amazon.com/Diamond-Window-Hall-Family-Chronicles/dp/0064400425/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/002-9100454-5407235?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1181664087&sr=8-1
There’s a livejournal community specifically for these kinds of questions:
http://whatwasthatone.livejournal.com
Devin McCullen my first thought was Helen Cresswell as well. Not just because number three sounds so much like Ordinary Jack, but because number two reminded me of Moondial.
For anybody who hasn’t tried them, I can heartily recommend the entire Bagthorpe canon. My favourite bit growing up was always the part where the four kids would break their journey home from school on the last day of term to steam open their report cards and alter each others grades. I have vivd memories of one teacher writing in a particularly unusal green pen and the girl considering it a fun challenge to try and match the exact shade.
Just want to second The Dark Is Rising by Susan Cooper. As a kid who LOVED The Girl with the Silver Eyes and similar works, Cooper’s books were FABULOUS. I still have them and, in fact, am rereading one of them now.
The first is Over Sea, Under Stone, then The Dark is Rising, Greenwitch, The Grey King, and Silver on the Tree. Easy to find in used bookstores, but they’re still in print so you can buy them new.
If you liked those books, some really, really similar ones include:
Stone Words (about a girl and her imaginary best friend, who is a ghost, who she has to go back in time to save from a fire)
and
The Girl with the Silver Eyes (all about a girl with telekinetic powers)
I forget the authors. Good luck!
Thanks to your query I found out about a movie I so when I was a child. Here in Mexico, a public chanel used to put a movie called “La casa de los fantasmas” (“The house of ghosts”) I loved that movie, and I always longed to watch it again. Last night, images from the movie started to haunt me, so I decided this was the day I would found something about it on the web. But, as you might imagine it, lots of queries include “House of ghosts” and I also have the memory that the spanish title was not a good translation of the english version. So I started adding details and your page popped. I read your plot and it totally sounded familiar. I’m still loking for the movie, but now I know it was based on “The Ghosts” by Antonia Barber. Thanks a lot!
I read and loved a ton of these books…another great time travel story is The Root Cellar, can’t remember the author, about a girl who is sent to live with relatives and is taken back to the Civil War. Very moving story. Five Children and It, and a lot of E. Nesbit stories, are also similar but a little more archaic and whimsical than creepy.
I don’t think anyone’s mentioned the “Circle of Magic” by Tamora Pierce, or the sequel quartet “The Circle Opens”. Circle of Magic deals with four teenagers (Tris, Sandry, Daja, and Briar) as they learn about their new-found magical abilities.
The Circle Opens continues their story about four years later, after they’re acknowledged as full-ranking mages (and some of the youngest in years, too). The series follows each one individually (although the books aren’t quite stand-alone), as they go out into the world and acquire students of their own.
The whole of the Emelan series is:
The Circle of Magic:
Sandry’s Book (UK title, The Magic in the Weaving); Tris’s Book (UK title, The Power in the Storm); Daja’s Book (UK title, The Fire in the Forging); Briar’s Book (UK title, The Healing in the Vine)
The Circle Opens:
Magic Steps; Street Magic; Cold Fire; Shatterglass
Stand-alones:
The Will of the Empress (formerly: The Circle Reforged)
There’s also a new one coming out called “Melting Stones”; it’s due to come out next summer.
hi,
i came across this site accidentally, as i was looking to see if there is a sequel to The Girl With the Silver Eyes by Willo Davis Roberts. It is one of my favorites – has anyone heard of a sequel to this?
Also, I loved the series of Ghost I Have Been by Richard Peck. it is about a girl named Blossom Culp who learns she has “second sight” and can see into the past and future. The story takes place in the early 1900’s; she’s poor and her mother is a fortune-telling gypsy. Blossom has to deal with snotty girls at school and a boy she pretends not to like. It is actually a very funny story – the girl is high-spirited and creative at getting herself in and out of fixes. i’d love to hear what you think of this book.