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I'm looking for a book I read in the 2000's about a girl who gets kidnapped to find herself on a under construction space station that's big enough to have field in it that the kids have to plow. They wear special thermal clothing. It turns out that when they are through, the bad guys plan to just space them/throw them in the Sun. It's probably a ya or children's chapterbook.
openNo Title Literature
There is this children's series that I used to really enjoy. It was about these three kids who would get transported to a magical land and get caught up in all of its wars and drama and such. The books were each about 100 pages long, with about 100 words to the page (so fairly thin and were smaller than a half sheet of paper). I don't remember the characters' names, but the main villain had a name that started with S, and the evil, long-dead kingdom they were fighting against in some of the books was called Gol. Any ideas?
EDIT: Just remembered: The 10th book in the series had one of those alliterative titles and it included the queen's name (Regna), and the covers all had the same thing at the top and bottom, with the picture and title changed within the frame for each book.
EDIT 2: Never mind, I found it.
Edited by CalligraphyopenNo Title Literature
A children's book set in Australia where these kids had to find three seeds of a fig tree (I think) which had landed in different locations in time, because if they didn't the seeds would grow and choke the entire city or something. I remember that they went back in time to Sydney in the 1800's (or, basically way before the kids were born) and picked up another searcher there, and then they went forward in time to the distant future and got shocked by how different technology had made everything. It's been a long while since I read it, so my memory isn't exact, but I'm pretty sure it was seeds they were looking for.
openNo Title Literature
I'm trying to remember a book I borrowed from the library when I was a child. I think it was a children's book, in English, and I think it had a few illustrations, perhaps by Quentin Blake? I did look at a list of children's books he's illustrated, but none of the title/covers rang a bell and google turns up nothing. I read it in England, probably around about the late 90s.
I think the protagonist was a girl who had to get glasses. However her glasses kept going missing and so her parent (probably a mother?) had to keep buying new ones. Her parent was very annoyed and thought the girl was carelessly losing the glasses, but I think it was actually that there was some monster/creature stealing her glasses for some reason, along with other things from the house - I'm pretty sure it also stole some chocolate bars. I think maybe the girl found out about the monster and befriended it (it wasn't an evil creature) and there was a happy ending where it stopped stealing and she brought it things instead (not 100% sure of that though). Also, she got a pair of glasses with a chain so she could keep them round her neck instead of putting them down and losing them.
openNo Title Literature
Saw this recently at the outlet mall. Children's book. Big, hardcover, looked like it had more than a few pages. On the cover was a very anthropomorphic female elephant, so anthro that she had breasts. The art style seemed kind of painted and detailed like Graeme Base, but it wasn't his "Eleventh Hour" book.
openNo Title Literature
Okay, this is a long-shot, but I've gotten pretty desperate. At some point when I was in high school (~2006-07) I came upon a book of Christmas-themed romance short stories. I started reading it on Boxing Day, so I decided to set it aside and finish it when Christmas came around again. I think for a couple years I kept seeing this book around, but never got around to reading it; when I finally resolved to sit myself down with the thing, my copy disappeared.
I can't for the life of me remember the title or the author's name. I don't even remember whether it was all stories by one author, or by several different authors, or what. What I can remember is this; it was a paperback collection of romantic short stories with a Christmas theme, the cover was somewhere between red and pink with a big green and gold Christmas ball in the middle, which was oddly shaped and had a big chunk cut out, revealing a red center. The first story (the only one I read at all) was about a woman attending an office Christmas party, and there was some offhand mention of an Elvis impersonator and mistletoe.
openNo Title Literature
Two books I read a few years back and am trying to find with my somewhat hazy recollection.
The first is a fantasy book about a boy and a girl - I think brother and sister - who discover an entrance to a magical world in their basement. The girl discovers she has magical abilities and the boy gets jealous, until he discovers he has 'anti-magic'. One scene I remember is where the boy realises this and makes a wardrobe or a desk that the girl created with magic cease to exist. Other than that, I can't remember anything.
The second is another fantasy book, the title had something to do with spiderwebs and/or ice. Both spiders and ice are also a big focus of the story (I think...). Again, magic. All I can remember is that it opened (or at the very least, was near to the beginning of the book) with someone walking down a dungeon corridor, however the person in the actual dungeon was the hero, not the villain.
I know, not much to go on, but help? Thank you!
openNo Title Literature
There's this book I heard about, where a recurring phrase is "Stay golden." I'd google that phrase, but I'm afraid of spoilers. Anyone know what book it is?
openNo Title Literature
I remember reading a short story (Based on a True Story) about the Ireland Troubles. A family just heard the racket outside and stayed inside their house. One distinctive part I remember is that they were close to moving to the US, and the mother always regretted not cleaning the kitchen after the shootout once they moved. Edit: I think it touched the subject of Internment briefly, though I'm not sure. It definitely took place in the 60s-70s.
Edited by FawfulsteropenNo Title Literature
So there was a story, maybe a fairy tale, about a girl being sent to collect eggs from a hen house, and there were normal, gold, silver and jeweled eggs inside. She was only supposed to take the normal ones, and I believe something happened if you tried to take the others. I can't remember the name of this story or where I read it and it's driving me nuts! Can anyone help?
openNo Title Literature
I'm trying to find a book I read as a kid. What I remember of the story is that this family had a talking dog. The reason the dog was able to talk was because she ate alphabet soup (yes, it does run on nonsensoleum. But it was a fun "justification" without resorting to A Wizard Did It or Hand Wave).
Everything's fine one day when one morning, the dog can only bark and say gibberish. The family looks into the brand of alphabet soup they buy their dog and find it has "come under new management". Unfortunately, said new manager is a bit of a Corrupt Corporate Executive, and basically fires half the workers because of "budget cuts". Even more unfortunately, said alphabet soup company only had 26 employees in the first place (because 26 letters = 26 workers, with each worker focusing on one letter), so now the soup only has half the letters it used to.
The dog travels to the A worker's house (I think it was an apartment, but I'm not sure. The A Worker had things starting with the letter A all over his living space, like a bowl of apples, a picture of Africa, etc. so maybe it was an apartment) and tries to tell him to get together with the other letters who were laid off. Tries being the operative word here. The A Worker correctly guessing her plight, makes her a bowl of pre-new-management alphabet soup, the kind with all the letters in it, so the dog can speak properly again.
I forget the rest of the plot. It was like 15 years ago I last read it.
openNo Title Literature
SOLVED: It was the Icemark Chronicles! Thank you!
So there's this book I read in fourth or fifth grade in the school library, but I cannot, for the life of me, remember the name. I remember a lot of details though, so hopefully one of you can help me out! This was one book from a series, and it had those "soon to be a major motion film" stickers on it, but I never saw a movie with this plot so I'm guessing it didn't go through? Anyway...
1. It is a high fantasy work with fictional kingdoms and magic. Talking wolves had their own land, I believe. 2. The protagonist is a warrior princess with red hair 3. Her love interest is a boy who could perform magic very well for his young age 4. They go on a quest, with the talking wolves described above, to negotiate with another country 5. The place they go to is very snowy, eternal winterland 6. There's an epic battle in the climax. I don't remember too much about it, but the mage boy gets burned from lightning, and he has to heal with the blessings of the book's equivalent of a Crystal Dragon Jesus. He miraculously recovers. 7. Everyone feasts and parties and the princess and boy marry to the surprise of no-one. 8. (I'm assuming the book I read had an excerpt of the next book because this was clearly a whole new plot altogether) They have children and one child is a mage like her father but she hates her mother and consequently becomes evil
... Aaand that's about all I remember.
Edited by skadydksskopenNo Title Literature
I read this book in about 2007, I think. I got it from the Library, in either the teen or the kids' chapter books section. It was sort of fantasy with a female protagonist who was the Chosen One for some prophecy or something. I think her name maybe started with an A. There was a castle, I think, and a library or a labyrinth or both. And the girl had a friend who was, like, a little gremlin sort of thing. She had to find something in the library and it had something to do with her dad, I think. There was another girl who rode a horse and some chapters were about her. She went to a castle and took a bath. I remember that she liked girls, because that was the first book I remember reading with a lesbian in it. The main part of the book was about the library, though. I think it was under the castle. I think the title was a combination of "Library" and "Labyrinth" I've tried googling it, but there were no results that sounded anything like it and I'm beginning to think I made it up. Sorry if this is confusing. I tried to write down everything I can remember. I hope someone can help. Thanks.
openNo Title Literature
Youth book, read in the late 1970s/early 1980s but written probably in the early 1970s or possibly even the 1960s. A teen boy starts hanging out with another boy who wears a black leather jacket and is a bad influence on him. The protagonist teen gets his mother to buy him a black leather jacket too. At one point in the story the guys buy a baby allagator from a magazine ad; they keep it for a while and eventually flush it down the toilet.
openNo Title Literature
I read a book in Year 4 (around 2010) about these kids who for some reason have to hide somewhere semi-underground because they either don't have parents or because there are aliens going after them. Sounds very irrational but at the time I thought it was very good. It was a teenage dystopian novel, written pre- 2000. EDIT: Oops! I forgot to add that the main character was a twelve year old boy and there was no hot water where they were hiding.
Edited by Who?openNo Title Literature
Youth book, the first book in a short series, but I only read the first one. A boy is obsessed with getting "free stuff" and he finds a coupon to fill out to enter & win, but the scrap of paper doesn't show what it is he's entering for. A little while later, a Gentleman's Gentleman shows up on his door, saying that the grand prize is his services for a month.
Read in the 1970s, bought through Scholastic book services. ISTR that the Scholastic version had a different title than it was originally published under.
Edited by randomsurferopenNo Title Literature
I remember reading this book in elementary school, around 2003 or so. It was a longer book, but the writing was in the vein of Goosebumps. I can't remember its full title, but I do remember that the villain's name was part of it: I. M. Fine. It was about a popular book series written by the villain, which becomes really popular with elementary and middle school aged kids. She hid words and phrases in the books that triggered odd effects in the people who read them, like causing a bunch of kids to suddenly drop to the floor and start writhing and hissing like snakes. I also remember her ultimate plan was to make the whole world illiterate as part of some revenge thing. It was a really interesting book, and I want to read it again, but I haven't been able to find a trace of it since I first read it years ago.
openNo Title Literature
A book, probably for children. The main character is a young boy. At some point in the story he meets an eccentric homeless woman who lives in a subway tunnel. She shows him that coins that have hit the live wire on the tracks have magical properties. Something about a vending machine?
openNo Title Literature
This is a children's picture book that I read many years ago. The plot I can remember almost vividly, but the title and author escape me completely. It is reminiscent of the animated film "The Little Troll Prince" in some ways, but different in such respects that I'm almost certain the two aren't related.
The story deals with a troll who is very unhappy actually being a troll. His brethren howl and act wild, and he does so as well, albeit reluctantly. One day, he overhears a human father and son talking, and overhears the father saying that to be human is to be kind to others; if you're not kind, then you might as well be a troll. Inspired by this advice, the troll starts doing small measures of kindness to people and creatures around him. One person he is especially kind to is a young human woman, to whom he does many acts of kindness without showing himself to her (in one instance, he drives away a bear from her).
While the woman doesn't see the troll, she knows someone is protecting her and calls out to the forest to ask if there is someway she can repay his kindness. The troll calls out and asks her to, during church service on Christmas, to breathe on the frosty windows until her breath melts the ice. She woman agrees to do this strange request.
Winter has arrived, and after doing many acts of kindness, the troll's appearance has morphed into a more human appearance. He appears so human in shape that the other trolls are disgusted by him and drive him away. Cold and alone, the troll goes to the church, where service is being held and the girl is doing as she was requested. When the frost on the window is melted, she sees the troll's face outside. The troll is welcomed into the church by the woman and the rest of the congregation, in effect welcoming him to the human race and humanity.
If this story rings a bell for anyone and can they can provide a title and/or author, I would greatly appreciate it, thanks.

This was an edition of a comic book from the late 1970s. It was in one of those comics with horror stories, some of which had a surprise twist at the end. I can remember a few of the stories, but they may have been from different editions and possibly different titles. This one is kind of a long shot, but I have pretty good luck on this page with my questions, so it's worth a shot.
One story is about two families that have a decades-long feud, kind of like the Hatfields and Mc Coys. After all the fighting, one of the families goes to a witch who puts a spell on them so they will turn into monsters on the night of the big showdown, which gives them an edge and they win the big fight because of their monster strength. The family that was defeated faded into the background of society for several years until they were sure they could get revenge on the other family. They planned a sneak attack on the other family on the anniversary of the original fight, but when they showed up, the other family turned into monsters again. The twist was, the witch had cursed them. Every year, on the anniversary, the family turned into monsters again, so the family seeking revenge had chosen the exact wrong date to pick a fight.