Category Archives: Childhood Reading

Incest and Arsenic: I Reread “Flowers in the Attic” so you don’t have to.

Posted on January 18, 2014 by kara

SPOILER ALERT: if you’ve managed to avoid this book for the past 35 years. Because of Lifetime’s new movie adaptation of Flowers in the Attic, I got to thinking about this ridiculous book. V.C. Andrews’ best-selling “novel” of bad parenting, greed, … Continue reading →

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Why I Wanted to be Poor, Sick, Crippled, or Dead.

Posted on January 10, 2014 by kara

Carol Bird, the dying Christmas Swan I really became a bookworm around the age of 8, and the books I read then lodged themselves in my brain forever. Primarily because I read them over and over and over again. Between … Continue reading →

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Great Snacks in Literature

Posted on September 6, 2013 by kara

Harriet the Spy’s Tomato Sandwich When I was a kid, there were exactly three girl sleuths on American bookshelves. Nancy Drew, with her sweater sets and ladies who lunch, Trixie Belden, with her horse and her “Moms”, and Harriet M. … Continue reading →

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I Wanted a Pony.

Posted on September 2, 2013 by kara

for Elli – for whom I will buy a pony someday I wanted a pony so bad. And I didn’t have one. So I compulsively read books about girls who DID have ponies. There’s no big secret to the “pony … Continue reading →

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Twin Spell

Posted on July 5, 2013 by kara

Bad twins, good twins, identical twins, evil twins, separated at birth twins, mystery solving twins, warring twins, misunderstood twins, twins that are not twins, Romulus and Remus, Artemis and Apollo, and Castor and Pollux, I loved books about twins. I wanted … Continue reading →

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Posted on May 21, 2013 by kara

I hate all crocodiles, except for one. Loveable Lyle was first spotted lounging in a bathtub. The Primms have moved into their new Upper East Side brownstone. Mrs Primm hears strange noises from the bathroom and makes the horrifying discovery … Continue reading →

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RIP

Posted on April 22, 2013 by kara

Children’s book author E.L. Konigsburg, died at 83 in Falls Church, VA. The first book I read of hers was her first book:  “Jennifer, Hecate, Macbeth, William McKinley, and Me, Elizabeth.” It’s about the friendship of two girls, Elizabeth and … Continue reading →

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13 Books that Ruined my Childhood.

Posted on October 28, 2012 by kara

  Growing up, my siblings and I were allowed to watch: cartoons, H.R. Pufnstuf, Batman, and  Little House on the Prairie. I was prone to nightmares, so this was probably a good thing. When it came to books, on the … Continue reading →

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Bad to the Bone: The Worst Children in Literature

Posted on May 24, 2012 by kara

by Scott Laming via abebooks Children can be innocent, inquisitive and the embodiment of hope.   But those characteristics make for boring stories.  Sometimes authors enjoy creating a fictional child that is just plain nasty. Draco Malfoy might be a bigot … Continue reading →

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Fifty at Eleven.

Posted on June 12, 2011 by kara

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