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Welcome to Stump the Bookseller by Loganberry Books!

Welcome to the new(ish) Stump the Bookseller blog!  If you’ve been here before you will notice things look different. We hope this has solved some of the technical difficulties we have been having!

Stump the Bookseller is a service offered by Loganberry Books to reconnect people to the books they love but can’t quite remember.

In brief (for more detailed information see our About page), people can post their memories here, and the hivemind goes to work. After all, the collective mind of bibliophiles, readers, parents and librarians around the world is much better than just a few of us thinking. Together with these wonderful Stumper Magicians, we have a nearly 50% success rate in finding these long lost but treasured books. The more concrete the book description, the better the success rate, of course.  It is a labor of love to keep it going, and there is a modest fee.  Please see the How To page to find price information and details on how to submit your Book Stumper and payment.

Thanks to everyone involved to keep this forum going: our blogging team, the well-read Stumper Magicians, the many referrals, and of course to everyone who fondly remembers the wonder of books from their childhood and wants to share or revisit that wonder.  Isn’t it amazing, the magic of a book?

Featured post

G Mail Concerns

Hello everyone,

I hope you are all doing well as we approach the holiday season.  It has come to my attention that G Mail often does not let our e-mails through.  For those using G Mail accounts, if you have submitted a Stumper and have not received an e-mail from us after a few days, please check your spam folder prior to contacting us.

Thanks and take care,

Julie

374Z: Children’s book that existed between 1992-2002

Full color picture book. A boys parents warn him not to go into woods. He sneaks out anyway, each page is a separate part of the woods and he encounters a unique type of creature/monster per page. I think one is like a colony of tree people, but at the end of the woods and in the final pages he starts getting chased by a smog creature, for like 4 pages he’s just running as the color pages are filling up with smoke. He barely escaped the forest and gets back into house or bed and thinks to himself “never doing that again”. The big part of the book is the escaping through the forest and running home from the smoke (which looks similar to a dragon maybe) but I think they never reveal what the monster is. This book is probably 14-33 pages. The other identifier is that each stage of the forest is a unique creature. Fantasy vibes. Pretty sure the book as color as well. – I know it’s not where are the wild things, and I know it’s not the tomtins. 

374Y: The Prince’s Love Triangle

Here is my description of the book:
Borrowed from library mid 1990s, a children’s picturebook. It’s title may have the word “love” in it. 
A little prince character called something like “Prince Curlique” (but I’m not sure of the spelling) because of his crazy hair/a curl  (sticks up?) on his head. 
He’s really smart but short or ugly or some unfortunate attribute.
He might get lonely and seek a girlfriend at some point, has sort of a love triangle with two princesses who are sisters trying to decide which one to marry(?)
He’s prone to being a bit harsh and testing his potential love interests if iirc
One princess is called Mira or Myra because she is an admirable yet unattractive genius level smart girl. She is the obvious match but his heart leans in other directions. The other princess is called Dora because she is an adorable hottie, she is however cursed with being clumsy and possibly unintelligent? Or inarticulate?
The ugly little prince curlicue guy and one or other of the princesses are pictured on a swing or seat together maybe on the final page?
The illustrations are very whimsical and to my memory lush and detailed, with historic rococo style maybe.
There is one page with a drapey princess canopy bed i think? The book starts with some of the characters as babies?
It’s kind of inappropriately romantic for kids in a way like that naked squashed fairy book from the same era because it’s about characters falling in romantic love with each other and the relationship stuff.
I think Mira/Myra is in love with Curlicue but I don’t think she prevails because of not being hot like her sister. I think one or other sister is also grossed out by him and that might have had moral repercussions.
There is some witchcraft involved possibly but more like the hand of fate because I don’t remember an antagonist.
I think Dora was Dancing and stepping on people’s toes because she was so clumsy 
Curlicue had red or blond hair.
Any of these remembered details may be somewhat incorrect. 
If I had to make comparisons, the alt love story of “Jane and the Dragon” is a well known one that’s vibe has similar whimsy. I think Myra was quite a roll-up-your-sleeves and get it done person and the art was similarly soft and evocative. The writing was dreamy and aphoristic, possibly why the story has not stayed on the shelves. But also something dark and sad about the characters’ difficulties finding love. 
I know beautifully illustrated kids storybooks are on high turnover in my library now, but they did have it once, would they have a record of decades-back purchased, now cancelled, books? Also I’m not sure if the high turnover was as rapid in the mid to late 1990s as it is today, so conceivably this book was 1980s at the earliest and just hung out on the shelf not getting borrowed much. The style would not have been any earlier based on the production techniques and the fact it was a fresh edition that we borrowed (but now so unknown to the internet that it must not have had many reissues if any)
I think that’s all I can think of that’s relevant. I would have said the book had a square format, normal picture book length  and possibly a soft cover no dust jacket? I’d have said slightly gloss paper rather than matte But I could be wrong about the soft cover.No idea of the publisher. If I had to guess would have thought the author might be American rather than British but that’s not a strong conviction.

I have a feeling the name curlicue is a total red herring and it may have been “Prince Quiff” or similar. But it related to his hair and unfortunate looks. The love interests’ names I’m more confident of because of their in-narrative meanings.

374X: Ben’s Mom on a Business Trip

I am looking for a library book from my childhood. The book is from the 1970s or very early 1980s, and focuses on a little boy named Ben. In the story, Ben’s mom goes on a business trip, leaving Ben and dad at home for a few days. They get off to a rough start with dad being late to pick up Ben from school and some other minor mishaps, but things improve before mom gets home. The entire book is illustrated with black and white photographs of what could be a real family – mom, dad, and son Ben. There are no drawn illustrations, just photographs. I believe there were also one or two more “Ben” books- maybe it was a small series- but the one I remember most centers on Ben’s experience while mom is on work travel.

374U: Gentleman Falls for Horse-Loving Woman

I am an avid classic novel reader and I read a book a few years ago and absolutely cannot figure out what it was. It reads very similar to a Brontë but I don’t think it was very mainstream, since no one else seems to recognize it.
It was set in the 1800s I think somewhere in the United Kingdom.
The plot was about this spunky brunette who was beautiful and unconventional. I remember her riding horses. She didn’t follow social norms and people had difficulty with that back then. Men kept falling for her. The main part of the plot was about a gentleman who falls for her against all his better judgement, proposes, and she declines. He licks his wounds and eventually marries a much more conventional easy going woman and they end up making a great pair, but the girl always wondered how he felt since she was his second choice. Ultimately, the spunky girl does settle down with someone and they are all able to be friends.
It’s not Far From the Madding Crowd or Portrait of a Lady or Age of Innocence or Pride and Prejudice.
If you can figure it out, I will be overjoyed.

354T: War Orphan Adopted by GI

I’m looking for a book I read as a boy in the mid 1970s . It probably was written in the 1950s or 1960s.  My memory says it was titled the journey home or long journey home but having searched for that for years with no luck I’m prepared to believe my memory is incorrect.  It was about a war orphan making his away to America to be adopted or having been adopted by a GI.

354S: Tripping Across the Desert (Solved!)

I don’t have much to go on. It was a book I got from the library in the mid-1990s. It was a children’s book. It was fantasy. My mom didn’t care for it because it was too “weird.” It had a girl who I think was crossing a desert for some reason. I know she came to the edge of the desert and it was a cliff or drop-off, and I think she floated down (or up?) somehow. She might have been on a cloud or holding an umbrella? Honestly, it so frustrating because I remember loving it but can’t remember hardly any of the plot. I just know it was very trippy, like Alice in Wonderland level odd things. Like the person who wrote it was hallucinating. Lol. Thanks for any help you can give! 

354R: Fairies in the Forest

Don’t remember the title but here’s what I recall:

This is a children’s book from the 1960s or even late 1950s with a narrow/slim size. I have attached a photo of a similar book that might even be from the same series.

It has a shiny light blue cover. The content is about signs of fairies in the forest/nature. It’s a series of photos with little text. It shows photos of dew, spider webs, etc. might have an illustration of a fairy on the front of the book.