Category Archives: Status

300T: Everything made from this wood was cursed

1 Reply

I am searching for a novel I read in the 1980s about a researcher looking into numerous SIDS deaths in several generations of one family. It turns out that the family heirloom cradle was made from the wood from the cross on which Jesus was crucified. There was a curse on the wood and over centuries everything made from this wood was cursed and caused death. I think it had a dark blue or black cover and was in the style of a John Saul thriller. Please help- this has been driving me CRAZY!!!

300S: It was very geometric (Solved)

5 Replies
Hi there! I was born in 1987. When I was a kid (early nineties) I read this book and I LOVED the illustrations. I’m not sure if it was a modern book at the time or not.
It had lots of bright colors and I think very little white space. I remember lots of orange and pinks, and vividly recall one page where a character is walking up stairs, the stairs and the character are just black silhouettes. I think it was very geometric.
For some reason (and I don’t know if this is right at all) I have it in my head that it’s somehow related to a native people, like Aztec or something.
So, it’s definitely a children’s picture book, brightly colored with silhouettes, and geometric. Possibly to do with Aztec or some other native people.

300R: Haunting voice that would sing

6 Replies

As a grade-schooler in the late 1960’s or early seventies, my teacher read the class a mystery book/novel about a little girl who’d gone to stay with relatives. Possibly for the summer. She was mystified by a haunting voice that would sing a song again and again. I remember something about a swing and hollyhock flowers. I’m not sure but I think by the end of the story it turns out to be the ghost of her deceased Aunt who died as a child.

300Q: Nutcracker in the summer (Solved)

4 Replies

The book is juvenile fiction about a young girl, age 9, who dances ballet. She wants to start using toe shoes but everyone tells her she is too young. She goes on a summer vacation to the beach and meets a famous ballerina and her choreographer husband who decide to stage a shortened version of The Nutcracker at the grand hotel where they are staying. The girl is invited to participate even though she is not staying there. The owner’s spoiled daughter makes a fuss and is cast as Clara. She had started dancing with toe shoes but it is causing to much stress on her developing feet and she can’t dance very well. I think her name is April.

300P: Travels the world while floating in a bubble

Leave a reply

I don’t know the title, but I checked it out from a local library in McAllen, TX about 20 years ago. It is a children’s book with pictures on every page about a small animal (like a hamster or gerbil or mouse?) who travels the world while floating in a bubble. I think the cover was dark blue or purple, and I believe one of the places he went was Paris. I apologize if this isn’t enough detail, but its all I remember. I had it checked out the maximum amount of times and want to own it now for my own kids.

Thanks for your help.

300O: 1970s book about baby brother

4 Replies

I’m looking for a book I had in the 1970s. It was about a little girl who was, I think, called Amy.  She was upset her mother had a new baby brother until it ended up that she was the only one who could make him laugh.  The whole book was in orange and white. Pleas help me find it.  It could have been called something along the lines of

A Brother For Amy

Amy’s New Brother

Amy’s Baby Brother

 

Thank You,

300N: The mother who made Dough Soup

Leave a reply

I checked this book out from the library in 1st grade (2006-2007), and it involved the story of a poor mother with many children who couldn’t afford to feed her family. She got a job as a maid at a rich woman’s house, and rather than wash her hands after making dough, she would simply take the dough that was on her hands home and make doughs soup. Eventually she meets these people in a forest or something who give her a pot of gold, and give the mean lady she worked for a pot of snakes.

That’s all I can remember, but I would really appreciate the help.

300M: Footprints mar the beauty

1 Reply

I remember a picture book story from when I was little – I was born 1975 – and was about 10 or so, not sure if the book was old or new at that time – I’d estimate being read the story somewhere around 1985

The story is about a young boy, maybe a prince, who wakes up after a fresh snowfall and looks outside to see a field of sparkle-y, glittery snow. He walks out to see the beauty of it all and realizes his footprints mess up the beauty. So he hires more men to carry him on a chair or table. I don’t remember the ending exactly but eventually all the men make the problem worse and so he ends up just walking himself – or something along those lines. Any clue as to the book title?

Thank you for your time!!

300L: Crystal Dawn (Solved)

2 Replies

In the late 1970s or early 80s I bought what seemed to be a straight-to-paperback science fiction novel in a Safeway grocery store in Honolulu Hawaii. The events of the novel take place in a futuristic society, technologically advanced to the point where people can be reanimated from death but it is very expensive. The novel was about the seedy underbelly of the society, particularly the industry of prostitution wherein the john could murder the prostitute as long as he paid for her reanimation. The bad guy was one of these johns who was terribly sadistic and his evil nature was graphically shown.

It was ultimately a noirish exploitative nasty piece of torture porn complicated by the technologies of reanimation.

But it was also a mainstream Mass Market paperback about three quarters of an inch thick sold in a major grocery chain.

It may be a false memory but I feel like it was called Crystal Dawn or something like that and showed a recumbent nearly nude female with a giant circular crystal blooming behind her. I see the book is predominantly blue.

At the time I got the feeling the Crystal Dawn name and the picture were both somehow exploiting the popularity of the movie of Logan’s Run, which involved crystals in people’s hands.

It was a very good novel and I felt it was written pseudonominally by an accomplished perhaps even famous science-fiction writer who did not want to be associated with the highly transgressive plot and scenes. I have always wondered who the audience possibly could have been for this book and it was probably aimed at the Gor crowd but it was far too transgressive.

I am unsure of the exact time that I purchased the novel but I can say that The Empire Strikes Back was still in the theaters and it was summer.

I am a big collector of books that I read when I was young and this is the one book I can find no evidence that it even existed. Hopefully it was not a dream because if it was I am in need of therapy.

Good luck and thank you.

300K: Secret Garden with a fountain – but with animal friends, not humans

Leave a reply

I read this book about 30-35 years ago when I was 9-12, it was illustrated with cartoony yet cool pictures in color. I have no memory of the cover, I think it may have been paperback. It is the story of some animal friends, one of whom discovers a walled/gated garden that is completely overgrown. It has a fountain that doesn’t work, and while it once was beautiful, is basically unrecognizable because it was abandoned. I can’t remember what animal the main character was, but I think it was a kangaroo or a giraffe and for some reason I think the name was Geoffrey or Jeffrey. Not sure though.

He works in secret to completely restore the garden and fountain, while keeping the exterior appearing unchanged. His friend misses him and worries that they are growing distant since the main character is spending so much time working in the garden.

At the end, there is a birthday party and the protagonist rigs the hedges of the garden in sections and hands a string to their friend having the birthday to pull,  which they do, revealing the transformed garden and splashing fountain to the astonishment and delight of all. I think there is then a celebration with a very special cake, perhaps orange chiffon, perhaps I am making that up.

I read this book over and over and now want to read it to my kids but can’t remember title or author and none of my searches are working. Hope you can help!