readallthenewberys | Mock Newberys of the Past

All right, over half these Newberys are a slog, and I'd like this blog to be a bit more interesting for me to do. So! Introducing:

THE MOCK NEWBERYS OF THE PAST.

Which is to say: I am adding things to the list! I started with the other Little House and Dark is Rising books, because I am informed that "Dark is Rising" will make more sense if I read them all, and if I'm going to re-read the Little House books I am jolly well going to have Mr Edwards in there. ^_^ (I first read those books when I was actually four, so I am well fond of them from a nostalgic viewpoint.)

But then I thought: why not add lots of good books to whatever year they're eligible for? So - please, recommend me some books! This post will focus especially on books from 1925 (where I have reached) to 1940, but if you have something more recent, feel free to throw it in. I'll be doing another rec-me-stuff-please post at the beginning of every decade.

Criteria: book must have been published first in the US (or in US/UK concurrently) - or if you can't find that out they must have a US-based author or lead character - and must appeal to some age level included in "fourteen or under". And you must think it's awesome. That's it. :D

Lay on, Macduff! ;-)

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Yes, it definitely makes sense to read the rest of the "Dark is Rising" books for context.

On the same principle, you should fill in the rest of Lloyd Alexander's Chronicles of Prydain - it's a five-book series, and the Newberys went to book 2 and book 5. The others are "The Book of Three" (1965), "The Castle of Llyr" (1967), and "Taran Wanderer" (1968).

Also, the 1972 Honor Book "The Tombs of Atuan" by Ursula K. Le Guin is a sequel to "A Wizard of Earthsea" (1969), and is followed by "The Farthest Shore" (1973).

And the 1973 Honor Book "Frog And Toad Together" by Arnold Lobel is a sequel to "Frog And Toad Are Friends" (1971). In this case, they're both short story collections and context isn't so important, but "Frog And Toad Are Friends" is a lovely book and well worth reading.

The 1981 Honor Book "A Ring of Endless Light" by Madeleine L'Engle is the fourth book in a series, but I haven't read any of them so I have no opinion on whether reading the rest of them would be rewarding.

[NB: All dates in this comment are year of Newbery eligibility, not year of publication, to help you fit them into the reading list.]

I've added those - thanks so much! :D

The Ordinary Princess, by MM Kaye, which was published in 1980 in New York. And I also do recommend at the very least A Wrinkle In Time, which is the first book in the series that A Ring of Endless Light is the fourth in. It's science fiction and quite a lot of fun.

"A Wrinkle in Time" is already on the reading list; it won the Newbery in 1963.

But "Meet the Austins" is the first book in the series of which "A Ring of Endless Light" is the fourth; Madeleine L'Engle wrote two different series, and "A Wrinkle in Time" is the first book of the other one.

Oh, is it really? Shows how much I know; I genuinely thought it was in A Wrinkle In Time's series. Oh, well. Thanks for the correction!

They cross over. The two series meet via The Young Unicorns and Arm of the Starfish (which I assume Pedanther is counting as one of the four - and which I wouldn't, as I read it as part of the Canon Tallis series) so they do all interconnect in the end. It's possible someone's issued them as a single series at some point. (Between us we're covering 3 countries who might all have issued them slightly differently, given the ambigious nature of the books and the divisions between them!)

And I don't think you'd (J_T, I mean :-D) need to read the other two, to get into Ring of Endless Light. Meet the Austins and The MOon by Night (?) from what I remember both felt a bit younger and family-adventure in tone, whereas Ring of Endless Light is more teenage and about religion and science and is generally sort of more mystical.

Arm of the Starfish is part of a different series (or that's the way it was packaged in the UK) and I found it harder going and you don't need to read that first, either. It's part of the Canon Tallis series, which intersects with both the Murray-O'Keefe stories and the Austin trilogy. Actually, I found all the Canon Tallis books harder going, though I did quite like them.

Unless there is another book I don't know about that makes up the fourth.

(I don't have any actual suggestions here, but I'd agree with all the ones people have mentioned.)

The packaging I'm familiar with doesn't seem to acknowledge the Canon Tallis series as a thing; all his appearances are counted as Murry-O'Keefe books or Austin books according as to which family he appears with. So "The Young Unicorns" is counted as the third Austin book and "The Arm of the Starfish" as one of the Murry-O'Keefe books.

Ordinary Princess - added, thanks! You might have recced that to me before, but I didn't have it noted down if so.

Mock Newberys of the Past

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