Category Archives: 1990s-

376P: Potion makes you beautiful outside, ugly inside

I would like to find a children’s picture book checked out from library in the early 90’s (most likely published then but possibly in 80’s), about a woman who was ugly/plain and wanted to be beautiful so the prince would marry her.  A little old man with a raisin looking face peddled her a potion but told her only to take it sparingly and it would make her pretty.  She did and then got vain and took it all, and became beautiful but ugly on the inside.  She was mean to the raisin face man and I think he turned out to be the prince under a curse and she didn’t end up with him after all.   Was a colorful picture book. 
Not the book titled Sleeping Ugly.  

376L: Spooky 90s picture book w/ Ichabod Crane vibes

My younger brother and I used to regularly borrow this spooky picture book in early-mid 90s (could also be from the 80s). I remember rich illustrations and a main character with an Ichabod Crane nervousness about him. Can’t remember any of the plot except that at the climax of the book he is in a dark church and he believes there are ghosts all around. My brother’s memory is that the main character was an organist/pianist and that another character dresses up as a ghost and chases him off. I don’t *think* this is a version of Sleepy Hollow. But given how vague my memory is, anything is possible. Even if it is, I would love to figure out which version it is specifically. My brother and I have been trying to figure this out for years.

376K: Teens with Powers

If I had to classify it, Young Adult fiction would be the genre, but it may just be broader fiction with a mostly teenage main cast.
I don’t remember much about the main character but he has some sort of power that I believe awakens, and he ends up on the run. He eventually comes across a mysterious girl and her relative (grandfather, I think) who rescues him and comes along with him. This girl seems to be able to see the future, and knows about him and that they will eventually be married.  I also believe that she can talk to animals, though this may not be the case. Her grandfather has trained her to fight and specifically talks about fortifying the house they were staying at with steel embedded in the door, before the government( or some evil corporation potentially) comes to get them.
I believe neat the end they find yet another youth who has powers, and end up infiltrating some sort of cult compound.
I’m pretty sure that it’s a relatively recent book, maybe 5 years old at most, because the sequel hadn’t been released yet, or it may have been a one off, I’m not sure.

376D: Farm Book

The book is about a family living on a ranch/farm in the American West, sometime between 1970 and 2000. I remember three key details about the book: 

A. The families father was killed by a bull during a rodeo. He was gored to death.

B. At one point in the book, a member of the family is in the hospital with a boy who lost his leg to a lawnmower accident. His siblings visit in the hospital and say they are not allowed anywhere near the lawnmower. The boy is in the hospital to get a larger prosthetic leg attached. 

C. The children live on a ranch/farm and often play in a pasture near the house. They go there to hide at one point, but I do not remember why. 

375Y: Magic that costs its user

I’m looking for a book I had read back between the years of 2007-2011. I believe it was part of a series but I only had found the one book at a used book store. The premise was the main character was a woman who was a private investigator or detective type who worked by herself. There was magic she was able to use but she mentioned many times throughout the book that using magic came at a cost to the user and would take memories or something like that every time it’s used. I believe her father was also rich and or powerful but they had no to little contact.
If it helps at all I vaguely remember the first chapter or so had her getting a call from an older lady who was calling in to ask the detective to help a family member being hurt or missing.
I believe it was an orange cover with a girl doing the turn around pose. I hope you can help me find this!

375U: A children’s book about cousins

It was a book my sister and I owned when we were children and we were born in 1990 and 1992. The copy we owned had the cover ripped off so we can’t remember anything based on that. From our memory it was a children’s picture book – the images we specifically remember are a tire swing and a blue minivan. We can’t remember if the character had a cousin or a friend that came to visit or if she went to visit them. But what we remember is that during this visit (most likely with a cousin but possibly a friend) she had all these plans for what they would do together and then nothing turns out as expected and she’s disappointed. I think there is something about her being annoyed about her little sister and wanting to exclude her and then in the end she realizes her little sister is actually great. My sister thought that maybe something was culturally different between the two girls, but it could be getting mixed up with another book. When we googled, it seemed similar to the book “When the Cousins Came” but it’s not that book and that one was published too recently as well. It definitely takes place in the summer or in warmer weather. My Mom remembered that the girl might have had red hair, but my Mom’s memory isn’t always the greatest so I wouldn’t say that is definitely a part of the book, but figured I’d add it just in case. I know this is pretty obscure but hopefully you can help!

375J: Fire Sprite and Water Nymph (Solved!)

I had the book as a child in the early ‘90’s.
The book was brown and had pictures in the centre of the front and back, embossed. Collection of stories, one about a fire sprite and water nymph trying to be together. Illustration of them with a glass window between them. One of the last stories in the book had to do with a stone walled off orchard and a giant keeping the children out. Something about the stigmata. 

375G: Darker Harry Potter-Like Novel Series I read in the early 2010s

I have been racking my brain trying to figure out the name of a young adult fantasy series that I read in the early 2010s. From what I remember, there was a male protagonist (probably teenaged?) who was extraordinarily skilled in some magical system that revolved around basic elements (fire, earth, water, etc). I feel like the series may have begun with some sort of entrance exam, that was repeated at the start of every book/school year. There was always some dark force acting as an antagonist, but the protagonist wasn’t very well liked with classmates (I think they had all had a lot more training than him, some kind of elitist thing). All that’s to say that other students may have been minor antagonists as well. This one is a total shot in the dark but I believe the main bad guy wore a mask of some sort. It wasn’t actually super reminiscent of Harry Potter, besides the basic plot of a super talented kid appears out of nowhere and isn’t well liked. But, I can’t think of a better title so I’m sticking with that. The cover was a dark brown, maybe maroon-leaning, with a simple icon on the front I believe. This is the detail I’m least sure about since, during my search, I found a copy of Swann’s Way that looks a lot like what I’m describing and I may be conflating mental images here. I understand that none of this is super specific, or concrete for that matter, but any help whatsoever would be greatly appreciated!

375E: Very dark YA, MC teen boy dies saving girl he kidnapped

Published date2002-2007 at least that is when we had it in Australia
Story– MC is a teen boy who doesn’t have any friends and is in high school, he is “good” however he is timid and very unsure of himself – he has a crush on a beautiful popular girl from school but she doesn’t know he exists- he makes friends with a boy who is nice to him and a little weird who has a group of friends outside of school so he introduces MC to them- the friends are all boys and they have extreme views and want to act out violently, however MC doesn’t care about this as he doesn’t think the boys will act on it and it’s better than being alone- one day the leader of the group devises a plan to kidnap someone from school to hold them hostage (for reasons I cannot remember sorry), the leader has a car and weapons and makes MC get involved as he is a weak character- it turns out the leader of the group wanted to kidnap the girl from MCs school who he has a crush on and he feels very conflicted about this but doesn’t know how to voice this and get out of the group or tell the police- they kidnap the girl and hold her hostage in a friend’s house but the kidnapping makes the news and it becomes a full blown investigation which escalates the situation quickly- MC had thought that they would just release the girl after the leaders demands are met however due to the kidnapping becoming breaking news he realises there is no way out- he tries to come up with plans to help her escape and make her feel less distressed without getting caught by the leader but it doesn’t work- the leader of the group decides that because his demands are not taken seriously by the police he will take the girl into the woods at night and kill her by hanging her- they tie her up and take her into the woods and put a noose around her however something happens and i think she slips and she suddenly becomes hung – at this point the police have found them and they all run away except MC who desperately tries to cut her free- he manages to save her however there’s a siege and the police find him and start shooting at him and so he runs- the story ends quickly after this chase as he is shot dead.
As you can see this is an incredibly dark story and I was super surprised that it was YA and in my school library! The book absolutely wrecked me for weeks when I was 15. I think it must be out of print as I can’t find it anywhere on google/goodreads.

375D: Poetry Anthology Including “If” (Solved!)

I am looking for what I think is an anthology of poetry, illustrated, that contains an extremely cleverly illustrated version of Rudyard Kipling’s poem “If”. Black and white line drawings I believe. I remember seeing it in a bookstore in Ithaca circa 2012 it might have been newly published then. There were other poems in the book, possibly also short stories? And authors besides Kipling?