Recommendations

Too Much Magic by Betsy and Samuel Sterman (Juvenile Sci-Fi/Fantasy)
I checked out this book at my local public library one summer when I was a kid. Years later, when I had forgotten both the title and the author, I wanted to find it again more than anything in the world. I remembered was that it was about a magic cube that seemed to grant wishes to a little boy. I remembered some of the details of the book, right down to a pair of purple sneakers the boy wished for! After searching unsuccessfully for the book on the internet, I gave up trying to pluck the book out of thin air. I went back to my old public library to see if, just maybe, I could find it on the shelf. I started scanning the "alpha-by-author" spines in the Juvenile Fiction Section. To my utter delight, when I got to S, I spotted the book I was looking for sitting there on the shelf just as it had been ten years ago. I did a little victory dance, hoping no one thought I'd gone mad. It is a great book. The end is even better than I remembered.
The Farthest-Away Mountain by Lynne Reid Banks (Juvenile Sci-Fi/Fantasy)
This book is a charming little magical quest story. I value it for its magic elements: talking creatures, invisibility, a happy ending, and some fascinating colored snow. This book is particularly special to me because I re-read it upside-down in high school, just for kicks. It appeals more to the young female audience (and to me) than Banks's more familiar Indian in the Cupboard series, which stars a male protagonist. The Fairy Rebel, another Banks book aimed at young females, didn't suit me at all. It frightened me as a child, and I didn't like it much when I re-read it recently.
The Last Unicorn by Peter S. Beagle (Adult Sci-Fi/Fantasy)
This is one of several books in my collection which I came to know first as movies. The movie is an animated family movie by the same name (1982). I think the reading-level of the book is slightly more advanced than most of the books in my collection, and the book was definitely intended for an older audience than the movie was. I would like to own the movie as well as the book, someday.
The Enchanted Book by Ruth Chew (Juvenile Sci-Fi/Fantasy)
This is Ruth Chew's venture into Arthurian Legend, which is a tangential interest of mine which I will someday explore further. It is like her other books, except for one thing: I didn't think this book existed! I bought one of the three copies that turned up on the internet one day, because I'd never heard of it before, and was afraid it would wink back out of existence! I thought I knew the titles of all of Ruth Chew's books, but I guess I was wrong. There aren't really any online sources for information about Ruth Chew and her books, as far as I can tell, which is a shame. (In fact, if you search for "Ruth Chew" using Google, my website comes up first on the list.)
The Talking Parcel by Gerald Durrell (Juvenile Sci-Fi/Fantasy)
This book drove me nuts for years, because I remembered the story but couldn't think of its title. Finally, I did an online search and came up with The Battle for Castle Cockatrice, the American title. I remembered the story from years ago. I'd seen an animated film version of The Talking Parcel on a public television program. I liked the show and then read the book, incorporating some of its images into my own personal imagined paradise: unicorns, phoenixes, and the like. Throw in a talking parrot, a magician, a sea serpent, werewolves, and three children on a quest, and you've got a magical tale that would make an impression on anybody. The book appealed more to me for its fantastic setting than for its plot: the actual battle for which the American version of the book is named left me decidedly luke-warm. Perhaps this book, or parts of it, anyway, are aimed at the young male audience, and therefore somewhat passed me by. I do genuinely value the book, particularly the British version, which I think has a better title and dust jacket illustration, and I also own the film (1984).
Half Magic by Edward Eager (Juvenile Sci-Fi/Fantasy)
Written in the 50's set in the 20's (when movies don't talk, and nickels don't have Jefferson on them), there's something special about the simple style of this book. Four siblings who love to read about magic complain that magic adventures never happen to them. Until Jane finds the token. Read this book and you will meet a half-talking cat (who would prefer not to talk at all), a camel trader, and a kind bookseller who believes in magic and in love.
The Neverending story by Michael Ende (Juvenile Sci-Fi/Fantasy)
I have a complex relationship with this book. I came to know it years ago as a movie, also called The Neverending Story (1984). I didn't find out until much later that the plot of the movie actually leaves off halfway through the book. The book does split nicely into two halves: the first is the exciting, lighthearted adventure story most people are familiar with, and the second half is a much darker coming-of-age tale. The reading-level of the book is more advanced than most of the books in my collection. The book was definitely intended for an older audience than the movie was. I would like to own the movie as well as the book, someday. (Someone tried to make the second half of the book into a movie, and, in my opinion, utterly failed.)
Strangely enough, I first read the story in Italian while studying abroad in Pisa, Italy. (Ironically, it was originally written not in English or Italian, but in German.) When my family came to visit me, I read the English version out loud to my little brother during our vacation. Our favorite part is the scene in the first half of the book where the protagonist meets Morla, an ancient turtle who speaks v-e-r-y s-l-o-w-l-y, uses the royal we, and remains utterly indifferent to everything, including the imminent destruction of her world. My brother and I thought this was really and truly very funny. For weeks afterwards, whenever I mimicked her somber statement, "It's all the same to us," we would both fall into spasms of laughter.
The book itself is interesting in that each chapter begins with a different letter of the Alphabet, starting with A and going all the way to Z. This feature is somewhat problematic, given that Italian doesn't really have a 26 letter alphabet. I am left to wonder what the original German version was like. Someday I'll probably track down a copy and find out.
The Princess Bride by William Goldman (Adult Sci-Fi/Fantasy)
This is another book which I came to know first as a movie. The title of the movie is also The Princess Bride (1987). The saying "Never Judge a Book by its Movie" usually means that it wouldn't be fair to the book, since the movie is usually worse, but in the case of The Princess Bride, the saying could be turned on its head. I own the movie and have seen it over and over again: often enough to have memorized large chunks of it. But of course, how many 80's kids are there who didn't run around the playground yelling: "Hello! My name is Inigo Montoya! You killed my father! Prepare to die!" Everyone has that bit memorized.
The Ordinary Princess by M. M. Kaye (Juvenile Sci-Fi/Fantasy)
Delightful! The perfect story of a misfit princess who runs away to avoid a distasteful arranged marriage, and finds love in an unexpected way. This story, which is complete with friendly woodland creatures, is set long ago and far away, in a land of fairies, kings, and beautiful princesses. Woven into the story is the nursery rhyme poem: "Lavender's Blue, Rosemary's Green, When You Are King, I Shall Be Queen."
Ella Enchanted by Gail Carson Levine (Juvenile Sci-Fi/Fantasy)
This book reminds me of The Ordinary Princess, just above, and also a little of Robin McKinley's Beauty. It is a charming story that adds depth and personality to the Cinderella fairytale. Ella has been cursed by a well-meaning but obnoxious fairy with a magic obedience which hampers her life. She meets the prince to the accompaniment of pumkins and magic finery, but there are details to the story that are wholly new. It encompasses not only the themes of romance and family, but also freedom, friendship, and maturity. Young girls will enjoy this book and admire its heroine. (Might be a little too mushy for the young male audience!)
The Magician's Nephew by C. S. Lewis (Juvenile Sci-Fi/Fantasy)
From the back cover: "Here is your passport to a most extraordinary excursion into magical lands and enchanted happenings." This sort of approach to the Chronicles of Narnia is one which I have never outgrown. These books were read to me at a very young age, and captivated my imagination before I understood the Christian allegory. A particular favorite is The Magician's Nephew, the prequel to the more widely-read book, The Lion the Witch, and the Wardrobe, required reading for many elementary schools. The Magician's Nephew has a broader scope than the other books, in a way, and weaves everything together with the real world very cleverly.
Beauty: A Re-Telling of the Story of Beauty and the Beast by Robin McKinley (Juvenile Sci-Fi/Fantasy)
Like Levine's Cinderella story Ella Enchanted, this story is built on one we all know and love, and have seen through the eyes of Disney's animators. Although Beauty and the Beast is probably my favorite Disney film, I still think that the story could be told better. McKinley tells it differently, certainly: instead of talking furniture, Beauty is surrounded by whispering servants she cannot see. Also, more time is spent developing Beauty's relationship to her family before she goes to the castle: the end of the story is fairly predictable. Beauty, McKinley's first book, is also only her first attempt at the Beauty and the Beast story. She later wrote a longer version entitled Rose Daughter, which in my opinion is excessively weighed down by the details of rose gardening, apparently a hobby of the author, and by a legend she attempts to weave into the background of the story. Of course, I don't regard either of McKinley's versions as the be-all end-all version, either: I imagine there are many more versions of which I would like to partake. In fact, Beauty and the Beast is the one fairy tale I would claim as my own, the one that I can imagine with the most detail, enthusiasm, and belief. If I were to write a book, this would be my story.
The Jargoon Pard by Andre Norton (Adult Sci-Fi/Fantasy)
Ms. Norton's many books entertained me for two reasons: they introduced me to the world of science fiction, which is not the focus of this collection, and, they built a believable fantasy world that spanned dozens of books and hundreds of characters and creatures found nowhere else. I remember this book in particular: a man living in the relatively normal Dales of Norton's Witch World discovers that he is a shape shifter, or becomes one my magic (I've forgotten exactly which). He is presented with a belt whose clasp is ornamented with jargoon, a kind of yellowish stone. When he wears it, he becomes a pard: a large, wild, hunting cat. He must learn to live with this new identity, and accept the changes it brings. I identified with this book because shape-shifting was always a daydream of mine. The next best thing to being a bird, in my opinion, would be to be a powerful feline. Felines can't fly, but I've always been a cat person.
The Golden Compass by Philip Pullman (Adult Sci-Fi/Fantasy)
Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy was recommended to me by a former bookstore co-worker, and luckily, my brother happened to have a copy of the first book lying around. I'd heard mixed reviews, so I was a little skeptical. Nothing could have prepared me for the story Pullman tells in his trilogy! He creates an exceedingly strange universe in which theology is turned on its head, reality is made of a stranger fabric than you would believe, and where humanity, death, and maturation are all explored in a plot as sweeping and interwoven as any novel could possibly be. When I began reading The Golden Compass, I felt like I was holding my breath, waiting to see whether I would like this strange concoction of things and places and people and events. Above all else, it was interesting. (Apparently, it is interesting enough to captivate young readers to hang on to the end of the 500 page conclusion to the trilogy, although all the books seem a little mature for the 9- to 12-year reader old age range of my book collection.) All in all, highly recommended. Pullman's trilogy His Dark Materials is engrossing, captivating, consuming, enthralling, exciting, fascinating, gripping, intriguing, riveting, and spellbinding, all rolled into one.
The Girl With the Silver Eyes by Willo Davis Roberts (Juvenile Sci-Fi/Fantasy)
This is a favorite story of mine from grade school, when the teacher would gather us into a circle and read a chapter or two to us at the end of each day. Although real-world issues form the base of this tale of a misfit girl, it is the magic elements which fascinated me. The protagonist has silver eyes that enable her to move objects by telekinesis; that is, without touching them. The story tells how she uses and copes with her personal problems and her powers.
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone by J. K. Rowling (Juvenile Sci-Fi/Fantasy)
In the wake of Rowling's amazing success, I'm not sure I have much to add in praise of these charming books. I must say I deplore the reactionist tendency to disparage these books and even avoid reading them just because they gained such mass popularity. I believe that Rowling's popularity reflects the quality of books she has produced, and is wholly deserved.
A Hidden Magic by Vivian Vande Velde (Juvenile Sci-Fi/Fantasy)
This book took a trip to the hospital with me when I cut my hand and had to get stitches: the nurse didn't want me to leave, because she was listening along with me as my mother read the story and wanted to hear the ending! I've since re-read the book in more pleasant situations, and I find that it has important lessons to teach about appearances. It's also a rather humorous story: have you ever made up a tongue-twister that almost killed a dragon? The scene is one of my favorites.
The Authoritative Calvin and Hobbes by Bill Watterson (Comics)
Calvin's antics appeal to a wide range of people since he sometimes acts like a goofy six-year-old, and sometimes spits out words you don't learn until you go to college. He's got an imagination that can turn his teacher into a cruel alien jailer or a sandbox into another planet. He's an annoying kid, a superhero, and a sophisticated means of commenting on the world in general. The visual humor is terriffic, and the dialog is often extremely witty, particularly when you throw in Hobbes, the stuffed tiger who's really real (sometimes). My favorite Hobbes line [don't forget to visualize his eyes rolling]: "Maybe we can eventually make language a complete impediment to understanding."
The Calvin and Hobbes Tenth Anniversary Book by Bill Watterson (Comics)
Offers insight into the creative and business aspects of writing comic strips. Watterson chose these strips as representative or noteworthy in some way. Have you ever noticed, for instance, that the first two panes of a long comic strip often contain a joke that is independent of the main punchline? That's due to the arrangement of the panes in the newspapers: when a writer doesn't know how much space his strip will be given, he sometimes makes a "throw-away" joke in the first couple of panes. This Calvin and Hobbes book provides an experience much different than all the other Calvin and Hobbes books.
Zits by Jerry Scott and Jim Borgman (Comics)
Jeremy's life is the life of the typical teenage male. His parents are the typical parents. Typical can be pretty funny. I especially like the laundry chute jokes (Jeremy's dad always does the laundry, but Jeremy makes it a hassle by rolling up his socks, or putting a month's worth of laundry down the chute at once). I also really like the literalist visual humor in this comic strip. (For example, when Jeremy gets writer's block, his head is pictured as a concrete cinderblock.) The authors of the strip have the same vision as Bill Watterson - they mix imaginaiton with a wry depiction of what's real at a certain age in a kid's life.
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams (Adult Sci-Fi/Fantasy)
If you're looking for odd jokes, non-sequiturs, and a small electronic device that catalogs everything in the universe, this is the trilogy for you. Oh, wait, there are five books. Well, if the fourth book didn't keep it from being a trilogy, the fifth doesn't either. Bring your towel, and remember, the answer is 42.
The Eye of the World by Robert Jordan (Adult Sci-Fi/Fantasy)
Like Tolkien, except that there is less stress in this book. What I mean is, even though you have a group of people who are on a quest and essentially always being chased by evil of one kind or another, the sense of doom isn't overbearing. It really is an epic adventure, where the world and goodness as such are at stake. There are mysteries to be solved, mysterious people to meet, destinies to reveal. Magic, spies, legendary weapons: you'll find them all. The end of the book finishes one quest, only to begin half-a-dozen more: there are still adventures to be had, victories to be won, identities to forge. I want to read the next book in the series!
The Arabian Nights edited by Kate Douglas Wiggin (Literature and Classics)
If you like the magic stories that form a part of the American cultural backdrop, this book will give you the real thing. Here are the story of the Fisherman and the Genie, the story of Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves, and the story of Aladdin. The story of Aladdin's wonderful lamp doesn't match Disney's production at all. In this story, Aladdin is given a magic ring by a man who claims to be his uncle, then sent to fetch the lamp from the cave. When the "uncle" gets angry with Aladdin and shuts him in the cave, Aladdin accidentally rubs the ring, and is saved by a green genie. Once at home, he discovers the nature of the lamp and forgets about the ring again until much later. Oh, and these genies are the real thing: there is no limit on the number of wishes available to Aladdin!
Small Gods by Terry Pratchett (Adult Sci-Fi/Fantasy)
Small Gods convinced me that Pratchett's popularity is deserved: the book is a clever satire on religion itself. (Everyone on the Discworld knows that the Discworld is flat, but a rather queer religious sect insists, against all evidence, that the world is in fact round!) The Discworld rests on the backs of four elephants who stand on the shell of an enormous turtle. It is, as the name suggests, a disc rather than a sphere. It is a world full of erstwhile heroes, magic, and lessons in human nature.
Freedom's Landing by Anne McCaffrey (Adult Sci-Fi/Fantasy)
An enemy alien race has enslaved both humans and aliens, and decides to use its prisoners as test subjects in a colonization experiment. The prisoners are dumped on an uninhabited planet and abandoned to live if they can - or die. Kris convinces the others that Zainal, an outcast of the enemy race, is an asset rather than a danger, and he comes to be accepted as part of the community. Together with other leaders, the two of them (destined to fall in love) discover the mysteries and dangers of their new planet while using their wits to improve the colonists' lives.
The Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Graham (Children's Classic)
This book is very unique. It tells of the adventures of an anthropomorphosized Mole, Water Rat, Badger, and an incorrigible Toad. There are also humans, (who throw Toad in jail for reckless driving). He escapes by dressing as a human washer-woman. And, somewhere in the midst of it all, a mystical creature saves a baby otter(?).
Chocolat by Joanne Harris (Fiction)
Good book, having a slightly different set of main characters than the movie. However, the ending of the movie was definitive, whereas I was a little confused at how the book ended.
Rosencrantz and Guildernstern are Dead by Tom Stoppard (Play)
Tom Stoppard has a very clever sense of humor which plays with words and meanings and rhythms, in this and other works. However, the message of this play is a depressing one: only read it if you can ignore the hopelessness of the overall picture and enjoy the detailed dialogue in and of itself. I've seen this play, and it won't have you smiling at the end, but it will have you in fits of laughter at times. I recommend you read Hamlet for background: these two characters are messengers in that play, and really have no personalities or purpose. The play deals with their attempt to grasp being no-one and nowhere.
Genius by James Gleick (Non-Fiction: Biography)
The life and accomplishments of Richard Feynman, physicist and weirdo. A more serious account than his autobiography, "Surely You're Joking, Mr Feynman," this book has some background information on contemporary physicists and their theories but also does have some amazing anecdotes.
Far from the Madding Crowd by Thomas Hardy (Literature and Classics)
All in all, a good story that retains interest and has a happy ending.
The Professor and the Madman by Simon Winchester (Non-Fiction)
This was a really good book about the making of the original Oxford English Dictionary. It makes me very interested in lexicography. What if I were put in charge of English as a whole, as James Murray was! Now I want to read more about the OED, and I wish I could own one. Expensive...!
The Virginian by Owen Wister (Fiction)
A Western Romance, in more than one sense. The good guy is a hero, and gets the girl, and neither gets killed. There is a respect for independence, and for property; for the best kind of morality there is, irrespective of religious stipulation. There is Bierstadt's wilderness, and manhood, and womanhood which equals it in its own way. There is coming of age and wisdom, there is innocence and knowledge of death. There is a man who fights for what is right, and wins.
Shogun by James Clavell (Historical Fiction)
Long book but worth it. An absolutely amazing novel. A peek at a foreign way of life (Japanese) filled with death, honor, politics, treachery, beauty, victory and love.
The First Man in Rome by Colleen McCullough (Historical Fiction)
I've also read the sequels, The Grass Crown, Fortune's Favorites, and Caesar's Women. Two more books round out the series: Caesar and The October Horse. Long books, but very worth it. They make history come alive. Colleen McCullough is famous for her novel, The Thorn Birds, which I have not read.
Paradise Lost by John Milton (Literature and Classics - Poetry)
A long poem like a myth or a legend, but full of Christian theology as well as classical allusions. And lots of Latin-derived obsolete English vocabulary.
The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupery (International Classic)
This book, incapable of being seen from a literal point of view, teaches the lesson of what should be important in life, what attitude one should take towards loved ones and towards happiness. Pick a language: this book has been published in just about all of them.
The Lords of Discipline by Pat Conroy (Fiction)
This was a very real book. Pat Conroy made me feel as if events happened to me just as they did to the first person narrator, Will McLean.
Of Time, Space, and Other Things, by Isaac Asimov (Non-Fiction: Science)
I never thought astrophysics could be so entertaining. Asimov comments humorously at the same time that he instructs. I learned lots, and was wholly fascinated. A similar book treating some different scientific topics is Please Explain, which I also greatly enjoyed.
The Illiad, by Homer (Literature and Classics)
I read a dinky version of this in 9th grade. We had a joke about the recurring phrase, "rosy-fingered dawn." I think it is a neat work, not as boring as some would have me think. There is a lot going on thematically, structurally, poetically, and historically, to say nothing of the issue of translation. I enjoyed it.
(Of the Lattimore translation:) There were several phrases I liked, though the spelling in this version was abhorrent, as were the punctuation and the page layout and the glossary. "He fell, thunderously, and his armor clattered upon him." "They feasted, nor was any man's hunger denied a fair portion. But when they had put away their desire for eating and drinking..."
(Of the Fagles translation:) I wanted to read two translations because I don't trust the English text to be conveyed very well and I don't know Greek, so I figured between two I would get a better sense of the words' meanings. Translation is a serious issue, especially between two such dissimilar languages. Also, this other version was recommended to me over the required Lattimore. It has the traditional spellings which aren't awkward to read, and has better punctuation and line arrangement, which makes it easier to read. Some of the other aspects of the text are lacking, though, because the repeated phrases were translated differently when repeated, which diminished the effect. My favorite stilted ones from the other version just weren't as grabbing in this text. I can't say which I actually prefer.