I just read about your bookstore and the Book Stumper in today’s New York Times. Amazing! And I have a book: written perhaps in the 1970s or early 1980s, it concerned two kids, an old house, and a crystal or other glass ball on a pedestal in the yard of an old house, and the kids used transcendental meditation to perhaps travel into the ball, maybe solve a crime or something.
A book bought in late 70s Australia (possibly UK published) picture book about a kingdom in black & white & wizard. Under the direction from the king who decides to make it colourful, first turns blue and everyone is miserable, then red and everyone is angry, then yellow everyone becomes ill. Eventually the magic goes crazy and the colours mix to give full pallet and all ends well.
I was born in 1965 and remember this book from when I was around 5-7.
It was about a painter that lived on a houseboat and painted abstract paintings. For some reason he broke the painting up into a bunch of small paintings and a buyer flew to his houseboat by seaplane to buy them I think the houseboat was near San Francisco. It was a large book, hardback, and illustrated.
I read this book in the 1980s. I remember for sure that the girl’s name was Drucilla, spelled with a “c” not an “s.” I think she had long black hair and was tall and thin, and she was possibly magical, like a young witch. I think she was an outcast; maybe the story was about her finding a friend? Definitely NOT from The Worst Witch series. I remember it being kind of moody, with Edward Gorey-style ink illustrations.
This is a little (about 4-5″) square green book. I read it in the mid 1970s in the UK. It is about someone who goes around visiting. They visit a giraffe who is beating her rugs on a line with an old fashioned carpet beater. They have homemade lemonade.
I’ve been trying to find this book for years! I read it as a kid in the 80s and it was about a little girl and, I think, her father moving to a new house that seems at first to be haunted and scary but turns out to be homey and cosy. What made this book stick in my mind was the illustrations: really hauntingly beautiful large, rich watercolours. The new house was drawn on a hill and somewhat isolated and the little girl had long dark straight hair, looking perhaps Spanish. At first the new home is drawn very dark and spooky, but by the last page it is lit up and warm and the little girl is hugging her father, having come to love their new home.
When I was in second grade around 1980-1981, my teacher read a book to the class, and I’m 99 percent sure it was called Run for Your Life. It was scary and suspenseful and it was a chapter book. It took at least a week if not longer for her to read.
I’ve never been able to find this book. Can you help?
I’m looking for a small bright blue hardcover book, at the end there is an illustration of a boy in a churchyard with a yew tree. Printed before 1980. Not sure if it’s an ABC book for children but the yew tree illustration is definitely at the end of the book. It’s a book for young children; there are only a few lines of text on each page. The boy is standing in the yard with the yew and there is also an old man in the illustration. The boy may have been lost or looking for something. Maybe the book is British because of the mention of the yew tree?
I am looking for a book I read somewhere around 5th grade. The year was 1977-78ish. Everyone was reading Judy Blume. The book I’m looking for was about a girl who went to summer camp. I think the girl was overweight. My recollection is that the girl was shy for some reason, or maybe that’s how I saw myself. Maybe the girl just wasn’t happy with the way she looked. Perhaps Judy Blume or another author popular at the same time?
The book I’m looking for is a chapter book. It was in my elementary school library in the late 1970s but it was an old book. The cover was purple. The story was a girl who had to stay with an uncle and aunt. She goes to an auction and buys a bundle of rags for a penny. When she gets home she discovers an antique China doll in the rags. She loves the doll but in the end returns it to the lady who owns it and gets another doll in exchange.