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361B: Trilogy With People That Absorb Magic Power (Solved!)

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This is a high fantasy trilogy that I read in the early 90’s where the magic system had a very unique requirement that required a person that was sensitive to magic power, who would dedicate his life not to casting/making magic but only with the ability to absorb the magic power around him like a battery and then was able to give that power to an actual mage that could then use it to make magic.  The mage would be useless without having access to this other person who would feed them magic power.

Also by the third book the magical world gets invaded by a world/reality that has modern technology like tanks and guns.

361A: Amazing Looking Witch

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I am looking for what I think was a weekly reader or Scholastic book from late 70s or 80s. It was a Halloween book with a witch. I actually can’t remember a ton about the story but the graphics were amazing. The witch would fly on her broom and there is a distinct image of her in front of the full moon about halfway through the book. I would love to share with my kids!

360Z: Elephant looking for a kite

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I am looking for a children’s book that was a lift-a-flap book. I read it in the 80s. I think the main character was an elephant and he was looking for a his missing kite in his house. He sees small glimpses of things that look like the tail if the kite but when he looks under the flap it’s something different. He looks under a pink bed skirt and to find it was the tail of a toy wind up mouse. He opens a closet but it was a cord to a vacuum. I think I also remember a toy chest and behind a curtain where he looks. I believe there is another book with the same character and I remember a picnic basket full of colorful berries.

360Y: “Lead us to you Sarah!” or “Keep knocking Sarah!”

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I read the book in the late ’90s? I had to have been in the 5th grade. I read a lot of paranormal books around that time! The book itself might have been a collection of ghost stories.  I don’t think it was “Stories to Tell in the Dark,” but I could be wrong.  All I know is that this particular story stuck with me for over twenty-five years.

A family moves into a house with their daughter. Could be just a single mom. The house was purchased after the woman who lived in it before passed. Soon after they move in the daughter starts having nightmares or is getting sick. She starts to talk about the ghost of a girl.

A medium is eventually called in and he holds a seance. The ghost’s name is Sarah (or Sara) and he asks that she knock to answer questions. Eventually, it is discovered that she is in on the property. With the knocks, she leads them to her resting place. “Keep Knocking Sarah!” or “Lead us to you Sarah!” is shouted by the medium. Her coffin is found behind the wall of the closet or the wall of the girl’s bedroom. Sarah is moved and buried next to her mother.

 

360X: Children of Chicagoan Drug Addicts

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I'm looking for book that I thought was called "The Little People". I don't know what year it was published, but I read it somewhere about 1985-86. I thought the book was set in Chicago, but not certain. It was about the children of drug addicts. I don't remember for certain if it was fiction or not. I think I got it from our school library.

360W: Teenage Girl Saves Missing Boy With Horse

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Looking for a book about a teenage girl who lives alone with her father. Her brother was killed when he fell off their horse and she refuses to touch the horse anymore, only going into the barn to feed the horse. She lives in the mountains somewhere, they still have a communal phone line, which she uses to order clothes while her father is away on his sales route.

There is a new family in town, maybe the new mayor or teacher, someone important, there is a parade or celebration of some sort where she sees the young boy be given a piece of candy by an elderly woman that the town thinks is kind of crazy.

Shortly after that the boy is kidnapped. There is an abandoned homestead behind her land and a couple moves in. The man does work for her. She starts to wonder about the couple, goes to investigate and finds the young boy. She then devises a way to get the boy back. She uses the horse because she has no way to get into town without the horse. Describes her home as a shotgun house.

360V: Child Eschews Expensive Toys for Red Balloon

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I teach Intro to Children’s Literature at a small community college in Ontario.
As part of the course, I ask students to tell me about some of their favorite or most memorable books.
I have a student who can’t remember the name of the book,  but he provided me with the following information.
“I can still remember the content of my favorite childhood book….the one with the single mother and son going to the mall. There were six red apples, there was four orange carrots”. I remember the mother and son would essentially go window shopping after collecting the groceries, they would explore the other thriving sections of the mall for more educational opportunities before eventually ending the story at a  children’s toy store. At the end, and this is the most important element, the child was given the choice of buying a wooden airplane or a wooden train or a plethora of other enticing things., Instead of being lured into buying something expensive, the child however settled on an inexpensive temporary red balloon.”
Thank you

360U: Prehistoric fiction book from 5th grade

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My book was read to our 5th grade class on 1989-1990 It is set in prehistoric times in either North America or Europe. The protagonist is a girl. She is somehow separated from her hunter-gatherer tribe and survives on her own, basically developing the historical advances that made it possible for humans to settle in one place, such as planting crops. I think she befriends a boy partway into the story but she’s mostly on her own. At the end her tribe is passing through and they meet. The tribe is starving and she invites them to join her, with the last line in the book somewhere along the lines of “Come in. We have fire, and food in plenty.”
There is no romance, no science fiction, no fantasy element. It seemed to be geared towards children and possibly published for use in a classroom setting to teach prehistory, but it was fictional. A novel or novelette. I have asked my elementary school library, my elementary school principal, my city library, Google, reddit, Facebook, a list of over 300 prehistoric fiction books on Goodreads, Name That Book, and Amazon. I also tried the Scholastic archive, but the one I found doesn’t go back far enough.
I’m really desperate by this point and want to find this book to read to my own kids.

360S: Truly Scary Stories

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I’m looking for a book from my childhood that I can’t remember the name of. It would have been 2000’s most likely 2001-2004. It was a compilation of scary stories that were actually scary. It’s a book for older kids. It is NOT scary stories to tell in the dark, or any of the Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark series.

The cover had a skeleton on it and he was sitting in a rocking chair and it looked like he was maybe in an old attic. I think there were books and candles around him. Maybe a cat or a spider, or both. The cover was a blue - grey color.

Each story had an illustration that went with it in black and white.  I remember there being a story about a dog being under a girls bed licking her hand.

I can’t be certain, but the book may have come from a scholastic book fair.