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openPicture book about (not so) miracles on a street Literature
A picture book about a street where there are series of termed miracles or something helping people like person having financial problems getting money on their drop stop
The twist is that in the background of the illustrations the strong hints that the the postman is reading the mail of the street residents and helping solve their problems in their letters - like some envelopes hanging over a kettle in his window to presumably steam them open
The book never out right says the postman reading the mail but the last "miracle" is the street residents coming with food and the like to the postman who is in jail
Edited by jormis29openLilliputian-sized people fight horde of goblin-type creatures Literature
Children's chapter book that was read in 90s but possibly older
- The main characters are lilliputian-sized people who live in fortress/castles in (I think) rubbish tip
- They live in a fortress because they come under regular attack from hordes of goblin creatures with green skin and red or orange hair
- There are multiple fortresses and they have an alliance to send aid to each other during the attacks by the goblin creatures
- At the start of the book, the horde attacking is bigger then usual and a group of the main characters are sent to the allied fortress to get help
- The group gets to the allied fortress but finds that the fortress has already been destroyed by the horde
- The group encounter two surviving knights of the fortress. The two knights ride cats - as in domestic cats. The others are shocked at this cause cats are generally seen as a danger to them but the knights raised them from kittens.
- The knights offer to come with the group back to their fortress, saying the cats are worth an army by themselves and the only reason they couldn't save their own fortress was because they were out on patrol at the time.
- They return to the fortress and defeat the horde.
openSci-Fi short story Literature
Many years ago when I was an avid but chaotic reader of science fiction, I read a story about a sort of 'human evolution' that I don't recall in any other story/novel. I think it kicks off with a meteorite landing on earth. But that's the part I am not clear on. Anyway, a couple of men are exposed to something or other, I think from the meteorite, and they go through a transformation process. One well before the other, possibly due to the different times of exposure.
The first guy goes catatonic and becomes completely enclosed in a sort of crust/cocoon, and the doctors are taking samples from him and seeing all sorts of complex biochemistry going on. They start theorizing about what it means, but eventually (a few days I think) he just wakes up and seemingly returns to normal. The other guy is relieved as he is starting the same process.
The end of the story is what I really remember. The first guy says he can't remember anything of his time in the chrysalis/cocoon and he just wants a smoke. He takes his cigarette and goes for a walk. And once he's out in the open well away from everyone else he drops his cigarette and just 'rises into the sky', leaving earth.
That's what I remember, and now I have absolutely no clue who the author was or what the title was.
openVampire short story Literature
I read this during the early 90s. It was part of a collection of short stories. Written in the first person. Narrator was a kid in Catholic school and was asked about considering the priesthood and declined because "sex" essentially. Later in life, the same priest approaches him again and I remember the priest emphasizing the bit about "You can have eternal life." And the narrator asking about if it was all priests or just the Jesuits. Story ended with narrator presiding over communion.
openMute Character Screams? Literature
The character stops talking when they're a young kid. Later in the book, they or someone else is in danger and they have to scream, using their vocal chords for the first time in years. It was most likely a middle grade book.
openCan't remember Literature
I can't remember the title of a short science fiction story, probably from the 1970s' or earlier.
A text containing modern science and theories is translated into ancient Greek and sent back in time by a rogue scientist seeking to make the future better.
There is an organization whose investigators are given the job of investigating the misuse of the time machine.
The linguist who did the translation for the rogue scientist tells them that the scientist actually disclosed what he planned to do. Since the scientist knew nothing about Ancient Greek, the linguist only included the parts of the text where the material could already be found in ancient writings.
The linguist tells the investigators he went ahead and did the work instead of reporting the scientist because "Gentlemen, this is the world where the text was sent back."
It's mentioned by the first-person narrator that the case is marked "?" in the files of the investigating organization. Not solved, not open, just "?".
Edited by CandiopenKids book Literature
I remember a moment when the (teen?) protagonist says that her little sister has been gossiping about her baby brother and the moment involves the baby holding a waffle try ing to give it to her. I know it's a teen book but I don't remember the name.
openBook with child on road trip Literature
A boy is forced on a road trip with his family—two parents, brother, and sister—and he has various awkward experiences like trying Chinese food for the first time, assuming bird's nest soup is just a name but learning it's actually made with a bird's nest, and taking part in a Native American dance where they trick him and his brother into dying their skin to look Native and then it doesn't come off, and a long search for fireworks when the sale of them is highly restricted, ending with a whole bunch of them accidentally being set off at once.
I had this book as a kid but gave it to Goodwill and feel nostalgic for it but have no idea how to find it. I think the name sounded similar to the Bruce Coville book Jennifer Murdley's Toad? Jonathan Something's Bike, maybe? Jonathan Something's Fireworks? Maybe I've just got my wires crossed.
openthree books Literature
Bumping some old YKTSs I posted years ago in a new query.
First two were novels for tweens, read by me in the mid to late 1970s or early 1980s.
1. By Judy Blume or is a Judy Blume "type." It has a male protagonist who is a high school senior (I think) and gets involved romantically with a female teacher. She breaks up with him towards the end of the book. There's a scene where he is having a picnic with her and they're drinking wine; within the context of the scene it's not treated as a big deal but I remember thinking at the time that he's underage and drinking! Or maybe, he goes out alone in a picnic-for-one after she breaks up with him.
2. Girl gets involved (non-romantically) with a rebellious girl. The rebellious girl may be living with the protagonist girl & her family for some reason, but the book starts at about the time the rebellious girl moves in. In the town where they live there's a variety store
which the family calls a "ten cent store" and the rebellious girl refers to as a "five and dime." The protagonist girl picks up this bit of lingo, and at one point mentions the "five and dime" to her older sister. The sister says "do you mean the ten cent store?" (Italics per original IIRC). The sister, who is significantly older & doesn't hang around with the protagonist girl & the new girl, doesn't pick up on her sister having adopted that slang from the rebellious girl.
3. Adult novel from the mid to late 1990s. A lower-class person (possibly American) had earned himself a Rhodes Scholarship and is studying Shakespeare at Oxford. He gets an outside job doing "contract research" for a woman and her father, who have what they believe is a lead to proof that Shakespere didn't write Shakespeare's plays, Francis Bacon [or perhaps another author] did. He is initially reluctant to take the job but he needs the money, and as the story goes along he's sucked into their belief. A couple of plot points I recall:
- A. At one point slightly more than halfway through the book a small bidding war erupts between the woman/father and another couple for a trunk they find in an estate sale: the researcher thinks there is some vital clue in the trunk, and the other couple see their interest and figure hey, if they want the trunk it must be valuable so we'll bid on it too! Our protagonists win the auction and look inside. The important items in the trunk were a letter and a manuscript. The letter says something to the effect of "the manuscript will prove that Shakespeare didn't write Shakespeare." The letter is loose and has survived the centuries, but the manuscript was sealed in the best that the 1700s had to offer so it has crumbled to dust.
- B In the end the researcher has been completely convinced that Bacon (or someone else) wrote Shakespeare's works and is given a dressing-down by one of his professors. The researcher is humbled by the professor. But AIR the professor doesn't really give any reason why the researcher is wrong. I don't know if this was just poor writing on the part of the novel's author or if it was purposely ambiguous.
In my previous query
it was suggested that Chasing Shakespeare is the answer to number three. I dismissed it at the time but I'm having second thoughts and have requested the book from my local library; in the meantime if someone has a good idea of the answer I would be appreciative.
openQuote from book Literature
This is a long shot but I remember reading a book that had a line like "She said I wouldn't know [something] if it stood up in my soup and sang."
open[SOLVED] YA fiction book about a girl adopted by three professors? Literature
I remember a lot about this book but I can't find it online for the life of me. It was a YA fiction book that I read maybe around 2008? It's about a girl who was abandoned as a baby but three professors find her and decide to adopt her. One of the professors is a harpist, and there's some side plot thing about her getting a new harp but it won't reach its peak sound during her lifetime. Anyway the girl has a friend who works with horses, specifically this breed that is famous for its ability to stand on its hind legs and hold the pose for an impressive amount of time. This comes back near the end when he's able to pull it off to save a child who accidentally ran underneath his horse's hooves. The main plot involves the girl befriending an elderly woman who is a relative of a girl who bullies her. The bully's family doesn't care about the old woman so they have the MC care for her instead. The old woman used to have a bunch of beautiful jewels, but had to sell them to get by after her husband died. The pieces were very important to her, so a friend of hers sold them for her and replaced them with glass replicas. It's ultimately revealed that he lied—he didn't sell the originals, but gave them back to her along with the money from "selling" them. After the old woman dies she leaves everything to the MC. An aristocratic woman claiming to be the MC's mother appears, and the MC gets whisked off to live with her and sent to finishing school at some point, where she is miserable. It turns out that the aristocrat is secretly in financial distress and is unwilling to risk her status/mode of living. She found out that the jewels were real and that they'd been left to the MC. When the MC finds out about the jewels, she ends up back with her professors. The aristocrat tries one last "I'm super sorry for using you" and the MC gets on a boat with her, finally her friends discover the full truth and yell at her from shore that " SHE — IS — NOT — YOUR — MOTHER!". She jumps into the water and swims back to a happy ending.
There is honestly more that I remember but this is long enough as it is. Anyone remember this book??
Edited by river2629openReference? Literature
Hi in the benedetto character page it says that there is a musical adaptation of the count of monte cristo where he's a pretty boy tenor type. ¿What version is that?
openI have 2 strange ones Literature
First this book I read in school in the early 2000s, it was a scholastic book about a girl and her dog during some kind of (storm?) natural disaster and her getting separated from the rest of her family. I believe it had a girl and her dog standing in the rain on the cover of the book I lost the book when I was a kid and I've been wondering what it was called for a while.
Second this is a product not a show/movie but again...early 2000s does anyone remember these brand of colorful drinks/juices sold in convenience stores in the US that had the label of a dragon on them? They had kind of a milky taste. I ask because I'm 99% sure these drinks were discontinued as I haven't seen them in years. Wondering about things from when I was a kid today I suppose
openDid I Mandela Effect a Whole Book Into Existence? Literature
When I was a library volunteer in like 2003-2004 ish, I came across this book I've never been able to find again, even though I remember quite a bit about it, so I'm wondering if I misremembered whole chunks of it or just made it up wholesale?
Anyway, it's a paperback romance. It was a platoon of modern day soldiers (Swedish, or some other brand of Nordic possibly) who time travel to the early medieval period to win a historic battle they originally lost. Because patriotism I guess? Nationalism comes before the space-time continuum apparently lol. They accidentally time travel directly into a nunnery. Shenanigans commence and one soldier and one nun(novice maybe?) fall in love. There is a sex scene involving chocolate sauce.
So does this book exist or is it the horny hallucination if a 14 year old? XD
openBook series about spies in a school Literature
So the protagonist has to move to this school for spies after something happens to his parents or something. He's descended from great spies so he has natural talent for it. There were some fantasy elements to it too. Like some sort of knife that never misses a target and the MC's best friend was like a werewolf or angel or something. I remember the title of the first book was an acronym for the school's name. Its been a really long time so my memory of it is really vague.
Edited by ParkwayopenEvil Underwear Literature
I dont remember what it was called. there was a young boy protagonist. he never changed his underwear, so they were all ratty and torn, so his mother took him to a store to get new ones. the pair he tried on were sentient, and decided to use him as a host, and wouldnt come off. so he wore them out of the store and they started controlling his life. thats where the specifics end. anyone else read this book?
openA girl, a boy, a land that is a chessboard Literature
This is the longest of long shots because I can hardly remember any details about the book, but I'm hoping someone can jog my memory.
It's a young adult or middle grade fantasy novel that I'm guessing was published in the 20th century - I want to say it had a 70s, 80s or early 90s vibe for some reason.
The two main characters are a boy and a girl, both teenage or around that age. These two characters do not know each other and are physically separate at the beginning of the book but end up meeting each other during it.
The setting is vaguely fantastic but I can't remember any particular features except that the land they're in has square areas of alternating color, texture, landscape, or what have you. It turns out that if seen from a great height the land resembles (or is) a giant chessboard.
I believe there may have been other chess motifs such as knights in black (or red?) or white armor.
The overall vibe/atmosphere of the book is what I remember most because unlike a lot of children's fantasy it was not extremely plot heavy (that I recall) - instead it had a dreamy, almost somber, mysterious air. For example, I believe it starts in medias res. The characters are approaching each other from opposite directions for different reasons. They may not know how they got to this land. etc. It was such a unique story and written unlike anything I had read previously. This is why I want to say it seems like a 70s novel, because although it was clearly written for young readers and about young people the plot seemed very grown-up. (I sort of want to compare it to Lloyd Alexander except I'm pretty sure it isn't him - the story had far less fantasy trappings than average, it could almost have been scifi-fantasy.)
It's been such a long time since I read this book and I'm sure I've gotten much of it mixed up or forgotten. But I do remember a boy, a girl, and a land that is a chessboard. Thanks for reading and for any help/leads.
Edited by pellycanopenWhat's that short story with the picture that kills you? SOLVED Literature
The story uses a weapons-grade meme that it refers to as a "Basilisk" to kill a bridge full of officers.
Edited by dvorakopenBook - Kid pretends to have "appendatocious" Literature
It's a novel, and a kid tries to play sick by clutching their (I can't remember if it was a boy or a girl, but I think it might have been a boy) belly and saying, "I think I have appendatocious!". Someone else (the kid's father, I think), replies, "That's appendicitis!".

This one might be tough since I only read the first few pages of this book several years ago.
One scene involved the protagonist and several others in some sort of testing facility. One test involved going alone into a room, where a naked individual of the opposite sex asked the protagonist about his childhood.
Later, the protagonist talks with the other group members about the whole experience over lunch. The men say that they talked with a naked woman, while the women talked with a naked man. However, one guy in the group mentions he talked with a naked man instead. Everyone looks at him, and he says something along the lines of, "What? I'm gay."
Edited by shooterboss