Oh, the Little House books! I loved those, too! Still do!
I'm looking for a link for A Tree Grows... Oh, try this page from amazon.com.

Ooh, yeah, I liked the Choose-Your-Own-Adventure books a lot. I didn't always care for the stories, but I enjoyed trying to find every single possible path to each ending (some paths led to the same one), and seeing how many there were, which ones were longest, etc. Would it show how much of a nerd I am if I commented that, looking back on it, I realize that this was my first introduction to depth-first-search algorithms?

Then I got really thrown when there was one that had a time-warped cave or something in it. One of the possible exits from the cave page would take you back to a set of paths that would send you right back into the cave page again. That was when I first learned about cycles in directed graphs!

And yes, I very much enjoyed The Monster at the End of this Book.

I read a lot as a kid. I loved Tolkien very much - read the hobbit and LoTR when I was 7, love Ursula LeGuin still, Diana Wynne Jones is my repeat children's books and Arthur Ransome. And also some Margaret Mahy (New Zealand writer) had a good imagination.
I regret reading Blyton when I was very young though!
Very much disliked the book Little Women
Liked The Chronicles of Narnia except for the last one which was thinly disguised and was mean't to be where they all died and went tot heaven or something. It kind of spoilt the series.

Eeesh. I'd apply for an amended ending. Maybe we should post him the proper forms?

I guess all the usual suspects. I still have some of my old Blytons that I re-read. Ok I know they're not politically correct, but sod it! There's a small part of me that still wants to go to boarding school and play hockey! ;)

I'm delighted to see the Dark is Rising series in here - was starting to think i was the only person who'd ever read it! Also not very happy about the film casting - the fact that they're virtually all American is a problem for me. The whole book series is set in England, Cornwall and Wales and I really don't see that it would translate. I'm prepared to keep an open mind though on the grounds that Christopher Ecclestone is in it!

Kipling's Just So Stories and all the Roald Dahl stuff - I also still enjoy Dr. Seuss - I particularly enjoy introducing my nephews and nieces to the books.

From a more up to date perspective, the Septimus Heap books, both series by Garth Nix and of course anything by Eoin Colfer - a writer who is totally wasted on children I feel...........

Famous Five (Oh, how I identified with George, no dresses or ribbons), Bobbsey Twins, Black Beauty, Little Women, the Secret Seven, I Capture the Castle, What Katie Did etc. I never had my nose out of a book, used to get told off for not paying attention. Wouldn't ever read any of them today, it would spoil the memories...except for Dodie Smith maybe. Ah, nostalgia

after thinking a bit..

I also read most of the little house on the prairie series and Anne of green gables..both series I never finished because I lost where I was in the which books and didn't want to re-read what I had already read.

as for Eoin Colfer, I read him now...though I do think his Artimis fowl series has ended.

I actually read the last book of the Chronicles of Narnia first, got the book in a book exchange at middle school (why do I remember that?!) Your right about the ending. after that I wasn't ever inclined to go back and read the rest.

I made the mistake of trying to reread them a while ago. Got so over them that I only read Prince Caspian and The Magician's Nephew. Decided the rest could live in memory.

__________________________________
'We're all mad here. I'm mad, you're mad." [said the Cat.]
"How do you know I'm mad?" said Alice.
"You must be," said the Cat, "Or you wouldn't have come here."
- Lewis Carroll, Alice's Adventures In Wonderland

I reread them a while ago too; ended up ditching the last one because by then the excessive Christian imagery was getting to me. Can't think why it didn't bother me as a child - maybe as a 9 year old I didn't notice it?

Famous Five - that was probably the first series I consciously started collecting. Haven't read them in years though.

xmorpheus, me too! I'm not alone!!

Philip Pullman, the author of His Dark Materials has stated that they did an amazing job of adapting his book for the film, and that gives me hope.

As for Eccleston in Dark Is Rising, he's playing the Dark Rider.

Not so much a book as a collection of children's rhymes - but I loved "Tootles the Taxi" as a small kid and I am still regularly reminded by my older brother \& sister of the tape recordings I used to make of the rhymes.

Made the fatal error of letting my nephew look at it who proceeded to completely destroy it and as far as I know it's long since out of print ......... just another lost part of my childhood <sob>

Fear not - Amazon to the rescue!!!!!

[www.amazon.co.uk]

Besten Dank morpheus! Methinks I should perhaps acquire a copy and allow myself to drift longingly back into those days of childhood bliss (or something like that anyway!) :-)

Another helpful site for out of print and difficult to find books, though some I've seen can get a bit pricey (eg final book in the Chalet School series, several hundred £s, I guess there aren't many copies around...), is www.abebooks.com. Managed to track down a book for my sister about Edith Cavell, several Modesty Blaises for my mother, as well as replacing my cousin's copy of Dancing on My Grave after one of her dalmatians ate it. This same dalmatian has a penchant for dance books, as she also tried to eat my Nijinsky biography (also out of print). Abebooks has come to the rescue too many times to count. As far as I can gather, it's a consortium of sorts of second-hand booksellers.

Thanks for that too Arisv. What heplful people you all are :-)

So many great children's books mentioned here.

I still read the Anne books from time to time. I love them. Other favourite books were Ballet Shoes by Noel Straetfield, Carrie's War and The Peppermint Pig by Nina Bawden. I read the Dark is Rising series too and lots of Alan Garner books (Weirdstone of Brisingamen and the Owl Service have been mentioned on another thread but he wrote quite a few more).

I was definitely an Enid Blyton junkie and re-read all the St Claire's and Malory Towers books with my 10 year old niece! Though, they weren't really as good as I remembered!

On a slightly more unusual note I loved the Moomin books by Tove Jansson - forget the TV series, the original books are really quite philosophical and dark in places. Definitely more suited to adults than children - I love them. (her books for "grown ups" are pretty good too!)

Blyton was fun. I liked her stuff.

And Dahl's. His has not aged as badly though.

__________________________________
'We're all mad here. I'm mad, you're mad." [said the Cat.]
"How do you know I'm mad?" said Alice.
"You must be," said the Cat, "Or you wouldn't have come here."
- Lewis Carroll, Alice's Adventures In Wonderland

Talking of Blyton, I am currently reading the Enchanted Wood series of books to my six year old son as his bedtime story.

I know that there have been a number of revisions made to Blyton books over the years due primarily to reasons of political correctness, but was still mildly surprised to see that in the new versions of these books (I still have the ones from my childhood) the characters' names have been amended: Gone are Jo, Bessie, Fanny and Dick and in come Joe, Beth, Frannie and Rick - a sign of the times I guess!

Loved "There's a Monster at the end of this book"
Read "A Tree Grows in Brooklyn" and loved that as well.
My favorite series for a long while was the Lloyd Alexander books. Too bad Disney trashed "The Black Culdron".
Also remember the "Encyclopedia Brown" Books.
Still have all my Dr. Suess and Shel Silverstein as well.
Does anyone remember "Little Black Sambo"? They will not sell in stores here. They made my sign something before they would even order it...sheeze..

Aww, memories!
The first book I read by my self was the Enormous Turnip - it will always have a place in my heart!
I loved the Malory Towers books, Saddle Club, Goosebumps, the Jill books, Narnia, The Hobbit and of course Roal Dahl! The book I used to always read over and over was the Starlight Barking which was the sequal to the One Hundred and One Dalmations - soo good!
Books that I will read still would be the Worst Witch for an amusing 1/2 hour and I am lookign forwards to reading Katie Morag with my very own wee class who I will be meeting in just over a week! Yay!!! I don't know if anyone else has ever read the Katie Morag books?