Category Archives: Status

379Q: Obscure 1970s-80s YA: Boy’s strange adventures, betrothed/young married kids (maybe cousins/gypsies), family secrets, reunion at Kentucky Derby with girl in polka dot dress & ‘My Old Kentucky Home’ playing

Leave a reply

This has bugged me for years—posted about it on Library Thing back in 2018 (link: https://www.librarything.com/topic/292966#6515048) with no solves, but adding more details now in case it clicks for someone.

I read this book in England in the late 1970s/early 1980s (probably on a shared bookshelf at my dad’s work—likely a US import or British edition). It was a quirky/strange YA (young adult) book, from a boy’s perspective, more mystery/adventure with family secrets than straight romance (though maybe light romantic elements or betrothal tension).

Key bits I remember:

  • Two children (boy protagonist + girl) who were either betrothed young, arranged to marry early, or possibly cousins (that part’s fuzzy/weak).
  • Strange adventures happen to them.
  • Possible gypsy/Romani/traveler family background (one or both sides—maybe adding outsider secrets, wandering, or cultural quirks).
  • The story builds to a climax/reunion near the end: They find each other again at the Kentucky Derby (or a Derby-related event). He spots her in the crowd (possibly amid race horns or excitement), she’s wearing a polka dot dress, and “My Old Kentucky Home” is playing (or tied to the scene somehow).
  • Not primarily a romance; more YA adventure/mystery with a poignant, symbolic ending.

No idea on title/author/cover—it’s obscure, maybe small-press or regional. Anything ring a bell? Even partial matches or similar books would help!

Thanks in advance—it’s one of those that pops into my head every few years.

379P: Contagion

1 Reply

I am looking for a book that I read 25-30 years ago, but may be older. It is about how Parkinsons, MS, and cancer are contagious in the sense that they have the same viral cause, but manifests differently for each individual. Author may have been an M.D.

379O: Man goes Walkabout

2 Replies

My mother is trying to remember a book she read years ago.  Here is everything I know about it:

  • She read it in the early 90’s, had checked it out from the library
  • The premise is a man just up and leaves his job one day and ends up in Australia.  He has one close friend who knows where he is and what he’s doing. This friend is how the man accesses his finances (he seems to have been either well off, or his finances were well organized).  
  • The book is of average length – not super long, not super short.  
  • My mom thinks is had a brown or maroon cover. 

This is from my mom: “I think he spent some time with the indigenous.  He was a white male who got on a plane and flew to Australia.  He had one male confidant who knew his whereabouts and could access his bank account to send him money.   Maybe married but not sure.”

379N: Funny Farmer

Leave a reply

I’m looking for a children’s book I’m thinking 1940’s it’s about a farmer that buys his wife a white cat with blue eyes named Candy. The cat keeps running away to another farm to be with another animal. The other farmer calls him on the phone to tell him and the 1st farmer says funny things like “well turnips and potatoes! ” or ” rutabagas and peas!” Color drawings

379M: Looking for a storybook from 1970s

1 Reply

I am looking for a large, oversized children’s picture book that I read between 1973 and 1976. It was an anthology containing many stories. One story I remember clearly featured two zebras — a father and a son — who would race each other. The young son could never beat his father, until one day he finally did. The book may have been published in the 1950s or 1960s. Any help identifying either the specific zebra story or the anthology it appeared in would be greatly appreciated.

379K: Lost in the Word Factory

2 Replies

What I recall: 

-Children’s picture book, read in the 90s, but could be from 60s/70s/80s

– Illustratons were very simple, like James Stevenson or Jules Pfieffer

– Plot about a boy who visits some sort of factory or construction site where words are made- very similar to Charlie and the chocolate factory, but with concepts around stuff like words (and maybe some numbers/math too?)

– I recall a section where a kid gets stuck to a balloon (maybe a speech bubble) and floats away, and has to be rescued by an older gentleman who throws some sort of dart to deflate it. The man runs? The factory and gives the boy a tour.

379J: Pre 1990s Children or YA fantasy, plot similar to Wizard of Earthsea

2 Replies

I read it in 1989, so published in the 80s or earlier, in a UK primary school library (aged 11). Similar to A Wizard of Earthsea, but a bit shorter and easier to read maybe. Plot detail I remember: -boy working in a castle or manor house, has some restriction on his senses due to a stone or charm (it makes him deaf or dumb maybe?). He can do magic natively, and lights a fire using magic, maybe by running his fingers along it. He wears a charm of some sort, which an older magician spots and removes, ‘freeing’ him, after spotting him doing magic -he becomes an apprentice to the magician, and can do powerful magic that other magicians can’t. Some kind of war or battle to win. -he meets a girl along the way -it ends with him defeating the enemy — and I think taking his boots off and putting back on fur slippers, and being with the girl.

379I:  Nefertiti with Glasses (Solved!)

3 Replies

I’m searching for a teen/YA mystery novel from the 1960’s or perhaps the late 1950’s set on a college campus. Two students, along with their archeology professor, try to solve a mystery of a missing artifact. The one detail I distinctly recall is the male student nicknames the female student Nefertiti with glasses. As a very awkward fourteen year old with glasses, that stuck with me, leading me to believe there was hope yet for me! I’m sorry my description is sketchy after 60 years, but I do remember enjoying the story and would love to re-read it once again.

379H: YA Book set in Russia… I think?

Leave a reply

I am trying to think of a book that we purchased at a homeschool conference when I was a kid (early 2000s). I seem to remember the setting being an aristocrat Russian household, and my vivid memory is of a boy (maybe a servant) trying to get rid of warts by using a frog at midnight… this is perhaps in the setting of a prank? But I think the main protagonist was female. I’d love to figure this out!