Monthly Archives: June 2015

227D: Girl embarrassed by weird family (Solved)

3 Replies


A book from the 1970s, I think. I read it in the late 80s or early 90s. It centers on a teenage girl whose name *might* have been Margaret or Marguerite – not quite sure though. Her parents were super weird, and I think her family was kind of weird too. Her dad I think was kind of bald on top but grew out his hair on the back and sides. I think there may have been very brief black and white sketches too. Weird things I can remember that they did: sing opera in the back yard, have mattresses for furniture instead of real furniture, they also did a backwards progressive dinner one night (where they ate desert first and worked backwards to the appetizers) and brought home some kind of shrimp appetizers for the kids to eat, which was great for the kids because they had accidentally burned the pizza they ordered in the oven because the left it in the cardboard box and almost started a fire. I think she eventually learned to accept the quirkiness. Also, I think her siblings were kind of weird too and that she considered herself the only “normal” one. I don’t think it’s “Mom, You’re Fired,” nor do I think it’s “Me and Fat Glenda.” Neither of those descriptions seem to match. Thanks!

227C: Duck Decoy with a Heart

2 Replies

The story of a carver who made a duck decoy with a heart anchor held by a string. When he’s in the water a fish, or crab or something snips the string and his heart falls to the bottom of the lake. I read it in about the late 1950s. I remember the hunter using the decoy part was disturbing.

Thank you. I hope someone else remembers this book.

227B: The creatures that did not make it onto the ark

2 Replies

I’m looking for an illustrated book, vertical format, that featured all the strange, bizarre, mythical creatures that did not make it onto the ark. There was a looming storm approaching and many of the illustrations show the rising water level of the approaching flood. The artwork was very dark, surreal, and nightmarish, in an unusual style similar to Hieronymus Bosch paintings.

Each page had a different creature and I can remember just a few of them:

• One was two-headed, and for each head was a gun. The two gun-heads were pointed at each other.
• A creature had a body of a glass bottle with long arms and webbed fingers, swimming in the water.
• A creature that had a paddle or oar for a head.

I don’t recall an explicit connection to the story of Noah’s Ark, but instead maybe just a subtle connection.

Hope this rings a bell!

226K: Fantasy/Mythological: Creator deities assign a boy the task to name things in the world

Leave a reply

To begin, there are these gods/deities in the universe that have just finished creating a world, and they are quarreling amongst each other because nothing in the world was named yet. So the deities decide to either A) create a boy, or B) assign a boy in the newly created world the task of naming everything for them. Thus, the boy goes on many adventures traveling to distant places and giving names to everything. It may sound similar to the Little Prince in the fact that the boy does a lot of traveling to distant places (from what I remember). So in a sense, it is like a version of the story in Genesis of the Bible, except Adam is a boy. However, I know for sure it is NOT the Little Prince! Also, it is NOT the Neverending Story.

So for example, if the boy came across an object or creature, he would ask the gods “What is this called?” and they would respond something like “That’s up to you to decide” along those lines.

I wish I could recall character names or author. The author could have had influence or have been inspired by foreign creation stories/myths/legends (Indian/Arabic, possibly Greek/Persian/Chinese?), so the names might have been unusual/unique.

It seemed like a book aimed for children, yet it was fairly thick and was a chapter book. The copy I had was a hardback may have had a dust jacket, color was off-white with decent spine thickness ((roughly 5/5.5 x 8″ dimensions, about .5″ thick). It was published before 1998, and could be from any decade before the 90s. On the cover featured an image of the boy looking down on a cloud, with short black hair, (his eyes are looking downward) with a celestial background – stars, *maybe* moon also. Again, it is definitely NOT the Little Prince or Neverending Story.

I know it exists and it’s out there! If this reminds you of any title, please help!

226J: Robots in a new town

2 Replies

Robot family moves to a human town – this picture book may be a metaphor for racism. The book is about a family of make-shift robots (I’m not sure if they were actually robots, but they were made out of metal parts and somebody’s arm may have been a broom). The family has a mom, dad, children, and maybe a pet. They move to a new town and are very excited at first, but then their human neighbors and classmates are hesitant to befriend them because they are different. Eventually, people begin to appreciate their unique qualities, and they make friends and settle in. I think this picture book is relatively new – it was the favorite book of a girl that I babysat around 2005. I think it’s appropriate for kids age 6-10, but I also loved it. It was somewhat large and may have had a pale yellow cover, but I forget. I’d really appreciate any help in finding it!

226H: Short story collection

Leave a reply

It was definitely published before 1994, possibly published in the 70s/80s.
It was a collection of short stories printed in paperback, my copy was missing the from and back and the first page that normally lists the title and publishing info.
Each story was like 5-10 pages with some detailed black and white drawings on occasional pages.
There were 5 or 6 short stories in it but it’s possible there were some from the front or back missing since I received the book used.
There’s two stories I remember.
One was about a girl who became obsessed with bubble gum trying to blow the biggest bubble ever and she blew one as big as herself and it popped and she got covered in gum.
The other one was about a boy who wished he was invisible so he could sneak out of the house and join the circus.