Category Archives: 1970s

248B: He dreamed of pheasant hunting

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I am looking for book I read back around 1970 at our local library-already checked with them.

It is a short hardcover bound youth book written probably for ages 8-12. I suspect it was probably written no earlier than 1950 and no later than 1970, by I suspect a minor author.

The short story, as I recall, is about a young boy who obsessively thinks and dreams about going pheasant hunting, he eventually does go pheasant hunting, gets all scratched up in the thickets chasing the elusive ring necked pheasant and after a long unsuccessful day of hunting I believe his father ends up buying some pheasants to take home so his son does not feel unsuccessful.

As I recall the book had a blue cloth cover with black impressed line drawing of a pheasant or two and perhaps a shotgun.

I would like to buy this book, not really concerned about the price-want to give it to my son.

It is for sure not “Danny the Champion of the World.”

Thanks

248A: Woodland Creatures’ Christmas

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I am looking for a book that was given to my brother in the late 70’s possibly very early 80’s. It was a beautifully illustrated children’s book, similar to Jan Brett. Woodland creatures in a snowy forest, including a hedgehog or porcupine, celebrating Christmas. The end of the book has them finding a candle lit carousel in the woods. Those are the only details that I remember! Have been looking for this book for a long time!
Thank you!

247F: Peccaries in the Rain Forest

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This was a book for littler kids, ages 8 and under, more or less.  This book was read between 1972-1980.  I vaguely remember it being a thin but large paperback.

The main characters were rain-forest animals and the book took place in a rain forest and at least part of it was set at night.  There were peccaries as characters.  Something was happening in the jungle, at night, that the animals were preparing for. The peccaries were really funny characters.

 

247D: Beautifully illustrated, cobwebby witches: Agatha and Hecate (Solved)

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This was a paperback, and I was born in 1974 so I would have read this sometime between, day, 1980 and 1988.  Probably suited for ages 6-12.

There were beautiful spidery-looking line drawing illustrations –  almost like Edward Gorey’s but a bit more complex and not so cartoony.

 

There were witch sisters, Agatha and Hecate.  They were not good witches.  There was a misguided/bad man who worked for the witches named Oswald.  The main characters were (maybe) siblings and the other main character was a girl they met who knew her way around the magical world where the witches were, and the lot of them got out of troublesome situations by stomping three times on a manhole cover.  when they did that, they would instantly be whisked out of the place and land somewhere else.  They used this at least once to escape the witches and Oswald.

247C: A tiny dwarf/gnome who wears a gold ring as a belt (Solved!)

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My sister remembers this from our school library when she was little.  She would have seen this between ~1976-1986.  It was illustrated, a book intended for 10-and-under children.

She remembers there was a character who was very small, a dwarf of gnome-like creature who wore a gold ring intended for a human, as a a belt. I’d love to find it for her and her kids!

247B: Girl in the Mirror/Night Carnival

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In this short story/book a girl finds herself in a night carnival.  The climax in this story is very similar to the, Come Back Lucy by Pamela Sykes.

This short story, however, I found it at a library a library and was never ever to re-find the story on the shelves or in its database.  I believe the story was in an anthology of short stories.

The story is centered in an almost 1950s style where a little girl interacts with another girl in a mirror.  The girl (main character) mysteriously falls into her mirror and finds herself in a dark somewhat spooky place.

As I recall, she sees a carnival in the distance. I believe the carnival is a type of ethereal place and is ghoul like.  My favorite excerpt, “she found herself on a path dimly lit by the dancing of fireflies.”

I recall she sits down and cries.  She tries to get back into the mirror that she fell out of and it appears she cannot escape the dark, Gothic world in which she landed. Her sobbing countenance becomes the reflection that a new girl sees in her mirror.  This temporal/spatial rift that the girl finds herself in is somehow a trap that is now the main character’s punishment for her self-obsession.

What was most intriguing about this story was that it was dark, twisted and yet eerily beautiful. Strong visuals paint the story and it was from the late 1960s to early 1980s.  That is, within the time frame of the Reader’s Digest short story anthologies.

 

 

246F: Children’s Book about How to Drive a Car

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My dad said he used to read a book that “taught him how to drive a car.” He was born in 1959, so I imagine this book was published in the 60s or maybe early 70s. It was a children’s book. That’s all I have to go on for now, as I hope to get him this as a surprise Christmas gift. I may ask him to provide more details if this doesn’t ring a bell with anyone.

Thanks!

246D: Two jaunty fellows

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I read this children’s book in 1977. It was about two men (I think they have beards and old fashioned clothing) that drive around the countryside in a locomotive that has a miniature Victorian Queen Anne style house on the top of it. The book is illustrated with black ink line drawings. At one point the two men “save” a woman tied to railroad tracks who looks about to be run over by a train, only to find out that they ruined a flat set-piece train because the woman is an actress and was filming a Western.

I hope you can help! I would like to find the book and get a copy to read to my two year old twin boys.

Thanks, Austin

246C: A malicious forest (Solved)

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I read this book in the 1980s and it was almost certainly a children’s book, but a real novel. It was set in Europe I believe.

Long ago a boy lost his parent in a nearby forest. The forest is malicious and very difficult to walk deep into. As you walk into the forest, the placement on trees you had to walk around would gradually turn you back so you exited. Several years after the lost parent the boy has grown up and is determined to enter deep into the forest. He hires an airplane to take overhead photos but winds blow it away. Eventually he does make it to the center and there’s some kind of mystery. I felt it was very well written, a thriller, and scary, too. It seemed to have been set in the 1950s. I hope that’s enough. I’d love to rediscover this book and was glad to pay the fee! Thank you! 🙂

246B: An award winner with a Polynesian theme

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Searching for a children’s book printed no later than the 1990s. The cover featured an illustration of a Hawaiian girl in the foreground, with a volcano in the background. I think the book title may have included a Hawaiian girl’s name, but I’m not sure about that. I believe it had received an award; I think there was a gold seal featured on the cover as well. Hope you can help identify the book title and author!!!