My Favorite Children's Books

Heather Idoni's personal recommendations for the best children's books ever written.



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Top 25 Books for Girls ages 9-12 and Up

By Heather Idoni

Updated Thursday, April 24, 2008

These are my best recommendations for girls' reading.  You will see some of the books are also on my boys' list.  If you were to come into my bookstore in Michigan, these are some books I would direct you to!  No particular order -- they are all wonderful.  :-)

  1. The Good Master by Kate Seredy
  2. The Singing Tree by Kate Seredy (sequel to The Good Master)
  3. Understood Betsy by Dorothy Canfield Fisher
  4. Blue Willow by Doris Gates
  5. Miracles on Maple Hill by Virginia Sorensen
  6. The Saturdays  series (The Melendy Quartet - 4 by Elizabeth Enright)
  7. All-of-a-kind Family books by Sydney Taylor
  8. Island of the Blue Dolphins by Scott O'Dell
  9. Strawberry Girl by Lois Lenski (and others by her)
  10. Little House on the Prairie books by Laura Ingalls Wilder
  11. Baby Island by Carol Ryrie Brink
  12. Caddie Woodlawn (and Magical Melons, the sequel) by Brink
  13. Ballet Shoes (and other 'Shoes' books) by Noel Streatfeild
  14. Misty of Chincoteague (and other true horse stories) by Marguerite Henry
  15. The Ruth Fielding Books by Alice B. Emerson  
  16. The Moffats (and sequels) by Eleanor Estes
  17. The Railway Children by E. Nesbit
  18. Snow Treasure by Marie McSwigan
  19. Twenty and Ten (AKA The Secret Cave) by Claire Huchet Bishop
  20. Pippi Longstocking by Astrid Lindgren
  21. Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH (but not the others in this series)

More to come!

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I have several customers at Beloved Books whose daughters love the Trixie Belden series.  Here is a quote I read recently from a mom who remembers reading them as a child:

"Trixie Belden wasn't the smartest, prettiest, most athletic or most elegant Bob-white, but she was clever, courageous and kind to friends and strangers alike. She just amazed me."




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