Category Archives: Unsolved

299J: An Illustrated Cinderella

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I’m searching for information on an illustrated version of Cinderella that I had when I was growing up in the 1990s and early 2000s.  It was a small book, maybe 3 or 4 inches in height, hardcover.  Here are the details I can remember:

-I think the cover’s background was black.

-The scene at the ball is illustrated with the two stepsisters wearing black beauty marks on their faces, I think in the shape of a heart and a star.

-Some of the pages had borders around them, maybe vines and glass slippers?

-It was a colored line drawing style– fanciful, but not cartoon-ish.

299I: Social insect lifecycle in cartoons

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I had this book in the 1950s. It was almost certainly British, though I got it from family who left India after the war when Indian independence made the British no longer welcome. It is a nonfiction children’s book describing the life cycle of wasps and ants, and possibly other social insects. It is illustrated with line drawings of the insects, rather in Aubrey Beardsleys style. I remember the picture of a newly hatched queen holding a dagger (looking rather like Cruella de Ville) as she kills all the other grubs so that she rules the nest. Also the rather foppish drones returning to the nest after the nuptial flight and being denied access by the workers.

 

299H: A Child Sees Each Petal

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[Private role=”author”]Amanda Williams, hopper3us@gmail.com[/private]

I have a Book Stumper from my aunt. She received a book in 1970 for a baby shower gift. She was told it could be for her or the child, called The Wonder(?). It was basically about comparing how grown ups see the world vs a child. She used an example of how an adult might see a whole flower as pretty or ugly, but a child sees each petal.

299G: They grow young as they age

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I am looking for the name of a book I read close to 20 years ago as a child. It’s one of the books that made me fall in love with reading and I’ve never been able to find it. Some of the details may be off as it was so long ago but- a brother and sister somehow end up on a far away island. And while they’re there they realize everyone has great respect for the children and the children are very well spoken and wise. But these people it turns out are born out of caves old, and they grow young as they age. That’s about all I can re-call. Thanks for your help!

299E: Pre-Revolutionary War historical fiction trilogy read in the early 1970s

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As I remember this trilogy it starts shortly before  the French and Indian War and follows the generations of the family through the war of 1812.  I think the main character in the first book is named Adam.  The family owns a farm.  A key scene I remember is when someone is dying of a fever and their family member takes pity on them and gives them water to comfort them even though it is strictly against the doctor’s orders– the medical practice being so wrong really made an impression on me.  I took these three books out of the Park Ridge, IL public library when I was in junior high and read them several times.   I think they were written in the early sixties but it could be earlier.  There are a lot of descriptions of colonial life and the generational tensions about fighting in wars.  They were longer and more advanced reading than Johnny Tremain.

299D: An illustrated non-fiction book of dog breeds from the 70s or 80s

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This was a perhaps slightly oversized paperback book with illustrations of different dog breeds.  I believe the cover had a green border. I’ve been been poking around online to see if I could find an old copy with no luck.  So far the closest thing I’ve found that’s similar are the illustrations from How Why Wonder Books Dogs Wild Animals Irving Robbin Martin Keen, 1962.

The illustrations were grouped in a certain way on the page, similar to these (but it wasn’t these books):

 

It’s not impossible that our paperback was a reprint of a 1960s book.  There were no photographs in the book, and very little (if any) information about the care of dogs.  It wasn’t very wordy.  We got it at a garage sale in Michigan in the 1980s.

299C: He sucked up all the water with his mouth

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I would like to find a children’s book I read around 1965.  I was born in 1956. I do not recall the title.  It was hard cover, I think it had a book jacket. The dominate color was red.

The subject was Chinese fishermen, about 20 of them, trying to catch fish in a lake with no luck.  One of the men decided to suck up all of the water with his mouth, and his belly expanded immensely.

The fishermen were then able to run out into the dry lake bed and pick up all of the fish which were just lying there.

 

298Y: Wee Beastie

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The book is a children’s book, found in Denmark in 1965, possibly originally Japanese, if so then published somewhat earlier.

A tiny Scotsman encounters Nessie the Loch Ness Monster. Far from being afraid be becomes her friend and calls her “Wee Beastie.”