Beyond Harry Potter: Books Every Curious, Imaginative Child Should Own, Part One

Kids watch too much TV nowadays, and as a teacher of young college students, I can vouch for tht fact that their imaginations suffer for it. When I was a little girl, I read voraciously, and I think it really impacted my life. Here is a list of books that really impacted me when I was a child, and I think it is a good place to start if you are building up a library for a young person. These are all books that will challenge not only a child's imagination, but also her sense of self, her notiosn of morality, and, perhaps most importantly, her personal aesthetic. I will surely post more lists of children's books, but this is a start. I hope to review most of these in time. Children's Treasury of Mythology-illustrated by Margaret Vollund-Smith

• A.A. Milne, When we were very Young
• Barbara Cooney, Miss Rumphius
• Anything by Beatrix Potter
• Paul Goble, The Girl Who Loved Wild Horses
• Dr. Seuss, On Beyond Zebra
• Roald Dahl, The BFG
• Susan Cooper, The Dark is Rising series
• Blanche Fisher Wright, The Original Mother Goose
• Betty MacDonald, Hilary Knight, Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle
• Mitsumas Anno, Anno’s Counting Book
• Geoffrey Chaucer, Geraldine McCaughrean, The Canterbury Tales
• Lewis Carroll, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass
• Lloyd Alexander, The Chronicles of Prydain Series, and the Vesper Holly Series
• Phillip Pullman, His Dark Materials
• The Brothers Grimm, Fairy Tales
• Anything by Jan Brett
• Hans Christian Andrersen, Fairy Tales
• Molly Bang, The Grey Lady and the Strawberry Snatcher
• J. R. R. Tolkein, LOTR, The Hobbit
• Maurice Sendak, In the Night Kitchen
• Pat O’Shea, The Hounds of the Morrigan
• Anything by Edgar Rice Burroughs
• Pamela Dean, Tam Lin