Top Ten Tuesday: Books for Our Younger Selves

This week’s Top Ten Tuesday focuses on Books for Our Younger Selves.  We could draw on books we wish we had read as a child, books we could have really learned something from, books that meshed with hobbies/interests, or books that could have helped with life events/changes in our young and impressionable lives.

TTT is hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl.

I started thinking about books I read during my adolescence.

1. Paul Zindel’s works.  I remember checking out My Darling, My Hamburger from the local library.   I seriously can still see, hear and smell that day.   I always felt like I was reading something I shouldn’t be reading even though Zindel is totally appropriate for young readers.
2. The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton.  I know this book is/was loved and adored by many during their formative years.   Just an Oklahoma plug here—Hinton is a home-grown author, the film adaptation was filmed in Tulsa, and the original house from the film is being restored by Danny Boy O’Connor.
3. Are You There God, It’s Me Margaret by Judy Bloom.  My friends and I passed this one along for a while.
4. From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler  by E. L. Konigsburg.  I’ve mentioned this book before in TTT: Books I Loved But Never Reviewed.
5. Jacob Have I Loved by Katherine Paterson.  This is another book that I dearly loved and was also featured on TTT: Books I Loved But Never Reviewed.   I don’t know what it was about this one that resonated with me.   I guess it was the feeling of being over looked and left out (as every adolescent experiences in some form or another).
6. To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee.  It’s a classic.  Not anything else needed here.
7. Shel Silverstein’s works.   Loved his poetry as a child.   Our “troupe” even recited and acted out selections from his works for a talent show.
8. Little House on the Prairie books by Laura Ingalls Wilder.   My grandmother got me started with this series and there was a time period that I knew what I was going to get for every birthday—the next book in the series.
9. Speaking of my grandmother—she lived in a house that held four generations of accumulated stuff.   Much of that stuff included books.  She also was an elementary school teacher so there were lots of books for children and young adults.   She gave me a book that was set (and probably written) in the 1950s  and involved an Arabian horse-raising family who shows horses and has a teenage daughter.   The plot revolved around a real Arabian princess that comes to live with them.  The two teenage girls both ride and compete in shows and on the show circuit they both find some very innocent romance.   I also remember there was a lot of discussion about their fashion choices.  This was probably not the  most literary thing I ever read, but I do remember reading it a couple of times and loving it.  I cannot for the life of me remember the name.  I tried a couple of different Google searches and came up with nothing.   If anyone has a clue, please leave a comment below.  (It might have been entitled Pretty As a Princess but I still cannot find anything about it.)
10. Childcraft set.  There were whole volumes that I am sure I only cracked open when I had a report or project to do for school, but I loved the Poems and Rhymes, the Stories and Fables, and whatever volume had the anatomy overlays.

I wish I still had a set.

Hope everyone had a wonderful Labor Day weekend.   Fall is nigh.