Category Archives: Solved

193B: little vacation girl (Solved)

9 Replies

I remember very little about this book. I must have been 4 or 5 when i saw it so i couldn’t read! All i remember are the pictures…

I’m guessing it was from the 50’s, it wasn’t a big book, maybe the size of the golden books? It is about a little girl going through all the seasons. What stands out in my mind is the pictures of her on the various vacations so there is one of her next to the Christmas tree and her with the pumpkins at Halloween, the same at Easter. There is also a page about her birthday with a picture of her with cake. The pictures and really warm and soft and the little girl who is about 5 years old is always wearing really pretty dresses.

Not much to go by i know but i now have a little girl who i know would just love those illustrations and i would be so delighted to have a copy for her!

192C: little girl travels back in time and meets older ladies in a Victorian style house (Solved)

8 Replies

1970s or 1980s children’s book or possibly short story, little girl travels back in time and meets older ladies in a Victorian style house and era, they use a warm brick called a “pig” between her blankets to warm her feet on cold nights. The ladies seemed strange to me at the time but I can’t recall why. She might have gone through a secret door in her own house to get to them but I’m confusing it with Coraline and Narnia perhaps!

191G: Scary UFOs, Nice Paintings (Solved!)

4 Replies

The book I’m after was a spooky children’s book picked up at a R.I.F. book fair in the early 80s. It was from a UK line of books and I believe was titled, simply, “UFOs.” It was perfectly square, tiny (a bit larger than a piece of toast), softcover, short (maybe 24 pages or less), and had realistic and creepy paintings of supposedly true UFO case files. Lots of art, light text. The cover was entirely midnight blue, and either had no art at all, or perhaps just a small clip of art from within, probably a “grey” alien face if anything. I had another book from the line that I believe was called “Dinosaurs,” and followed the same format, but had a vivid green cover. It was definitely an entire line of small books. Oh, and I remember the UFO book was the first place I ever heard of the Men in Black, though they seemed a lot creepier in the book than in the movie. I think the entry on their mysterious origins (it was acknowledged no one knew if they were extraterrestrial or government agents) mentioned one of them putting his fingers in a cup of coffee as if he didn’t understand it. Or something like that!

191D: traveling poet who sells his rhymes (Solved)

2 Replies

The book is about a traveling poet who sells his rhymes. He meets a king or ruler of a town who wants everything to be the biggest and the best. So king is building a hill bigger than any hill, but the hill collapses every day. The colors on the book were very muted so I think it was pre-1980s. I think a part of the book was “the sun is a sun a star is a star i am who i am you are who you are” and something about walking on his feet and following his nose. I would be forever grateful if you could find the name of this children’s book!

190D: Girl Moves in to a Family Full of Boys (Solved)

6 Replies

I am searching for a book I read when I was a teenager, so it would have been in the 1960’s or 1970’s. I cannot remember the name, and the details are a bit foggy. But, it was about a girl whose parents died or were gone or something like that. She was living with a family that had a number of boys. She fell in love with one of the boys, and another of the boys hated her. She was trapped in a cellar, and almost died, but did recover. The boy she was in love with died, and the boy who hated her eventually fell in love with her. I wish I could remember more! I hope you can identify this book for me!

190C: Girl starts Babysitting to Buy Christmas Presents (Solves)

6 Replies

I’m looking for a book I enjoyed as a child around 1995, although I believe it was published well before then, probably around the 50s. It is about a girl who starts her own babysitting business because she wants to buy Christmas presents for her family. It details her escapes with the children along the way…she eventually gets her mother a set of orange (or maybe apricot?) scented bath products…bubble bath etc. Can you help with this? I’d so love to have this book for the holidays.

189D: British Children’s Short Story Treasury from ‘80s or ‘90s (Solved!)

6 Replies

This was a large, white-bound treasury of short stories and craft ideas, likely published in the 1980s or very early 1990s. The stories were all in British English, but took place around the world. One story was about a brother and sister exploring Montreal’s Underground City during the winter (I believe the brother’s name may have been Sean, with an accent on the e). Another story was about a girl named Tracey who had a pair of silver sandals that never got used. The sandals were sad when they saw her wear all her other shoes day after day, but they finally got worn for a fancy party. I would love to find this collection again! Thanks for your help!

189B: Children Abandoned on farm (solved)

11 Replies

Oldest sister (story is her perspective) of I think 3 siblings keeps up appearances – keeps everything running so they can stay together. Careful not to let neighbors know they are alone, they make excuses why their mom has not been seen. They stretch the money they have, sell what they can, order clothes from Sears Catalog. The Story ends when the mom comes back. And although oldest is angry, she is relieved she is back in the end.
Young adult / teen coming of age fiction book, I read in the mid 70s.