My stumper is a children's book, British, circa 1990s. An orphaned boy and his butler escape his evil uncles Caligula and Nero and Aunt Agrippina. Includes joining the circus and visiting a mattress factory. Illustrated throughout.
When I was a young girl in the 70s, there was a chapter book that my mother used to read to me. This book stayed at my great grandmothers home, and we would read it when we visited. It was probably written for young adults. I think it was written before the 30’s or 40’s. All I can remember is the story was about this gypsy girl’s adventures. I remember a picture of a Romani style wagon, and the color red. I loved it, but can’t recall the title or the plot. Please help. I would love to revisit this book.
Not sure if this is one book or a series. Earth’s first colony loses touch with Earth. Without supplies they’d counted on from Earth (food, building materials, vehicles, weapons), the colonists struggle, mostly because the planet’s wildlife (plants and dinosaur-ish animals) are all deadly 24/7. The main female character is the Sheriff, who, at the beginning, has to rescue a female friend in the badlands from a large dinosaur-ish thing. Half-way through the book, the female Sheriff crash lands in the middle of the deadly wilderness. The main male character, who she doesn’t like, goes to rescue her. After a week or so and lots of peril and at least one broken leg (hers), they end up getting back safely by making a canoe out of the shell of a huge animal (and in love).
The colony has major political and leadership issues, some gun-fueled, and then Earth shows up and wants to take over everything. There’s also a creepy guy who starts a brothel and a gambling establishment and schemes to be get elected the boss. Somebody starts a stampede of the dinosaur-ish wildlife down the town's main-street in the middle of the night, and also traps the main male character in his house with a big dinosuar-ish animal by blocking the door with a programmable excavating machine.
I'm looking for an illustrated children's collection of stories. The story I remember most vividly is that of a girl that always wears a ribbon around her neck (I think it was yellow), and eventually her husband removes it and her head falls off. It is NOT from the book "In a Dark, Dark Room." The illustrations were simple black (or blue?) and white, with pops of color (kinda similar to Robert Bright's). The book also had a story about a young man that only had a couple hairs on his chest, and he was trying to grow more to prove that he was brave (my memory of this plot line is pretty fuzzy though). I borrowed it from the library as a child in the 90s (I was 5ish?), and it was pretty beat up then so maybe published significantly earlier? I attribute this book to my lifelong irrational inability of wearing anything around my neck (necklaces, scarves, turtlenecks, etc.) and would love to prove that this book exists.
I'm looking for a book that I believe is fiction. I read it in the 90s, and it's about a mother and daughter that are pregnant at the same time. The mother would always save little things like rubber bands, and this annoyed the daughter. I was thinking it was by Barbara Kingsolver, but couldn't find it. Thank you so much!
This was a favorite book of my children in the 70’s and 80’s and I made the motherly mistake of giving it away, so would dearly love to find a copy. I don’t think Russell’s name was in the title.
It’s a children’s book, I think middle grade level? Not sure though, but I don’t remember it having pictures. A girl wants a horse for her birthday, but her parents get her a model horse instead. Girl is disappointed (I would be too!). She climbs a tree with the model and puts it on a branch, but is mad at it and flicks it down to the ground. It comes to life (full sized) and talks. She rides it around. I don’t remember how it ends. I probably read it in the early 90’s.
I’m looking for an early-to-mid-90s “American Girl”-style series of short illustrated chapter books about girls living in different periods of world history, each with their own 18-inch doll.
I am definitively NOT remembering Pleasant Company’s own “Girls of Many Lands” series. Believe me, that comes up every time I try to Google this series and it’s not the one I’m thinking of.
The line may have launched with one book for each doll, then gone out of business before publishing more books; I only remember the first book for each character, most likely obtained through the Scholastic Book Fair.
The characters and books were, as well as I can recall:
– An English girl in the 1100s who was into falconry. Name may have been Elinor/Eleanor. Vivid recollection of the cover: a blond girl in a dull blue dress reaching out to touch a falcon.
– An African (I want to say Igbo?) girl from the 1400s. Vivid recollection of her helping her older sister put on makeup before her wedding, including interior illustration of her applying the makeup. (I remember being surprised that they had makeup way back then. For some reason, that’s what stuck with me.)
– A French girl in the 1700s who wanted to be a ballet dancer. Name may have been Marie, or Marie-Something, or Something-Marie. Cover showed her dancing on a Parisian street.
– An Irish immigrant girl living in San Francisco in the late 1800s. Name may have been Bridget or some other extremely Irish name. Cover may have featured her holding a book to her chest and gazing meaningfully off into the distance. She had curly red hair because of course she did. I believe she also had a Chinese immigrant friend or potential friend who barely showed up and whom I hoped I’d read more about in later books. Vivid recollection of one scene in which she and another girl bond over how much they loved “Little Women” and cried over “the part with Beth.”
There may have been more; those are just the four I remember. On the last page of each book was a perforated card with a photograph of the dolls on it. You could tear out the card and send it away with a check to order a doll. They looked very much like American Girl dolls, so much that even as a child I could tell right away, “Oh, these people are totally ripping off American Girl.” But I could forgive them because hey, history’s a lot bigger than just America! Someone’s gotta fill that niche!
Seeking a personalized kid's picture book made '90 to '97. Had kid's name and possibly friends/family names. Had a teddy bear in it, either lost or on an adventure and there is a picnic or party at the end.