My parents bought me only academic books at the book fairs. I missed out on reading classics like Animal Farm, Little Prince, series like Famous Five and even the Alchemist, which was a bestseller back then(books that pique your mind and imagination). Can you all suggest some books on these lines, preferably those published before the 2000s?
by Every-Insurance-4409
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Goosebumps was a really popular children’s book series. Excellent intro to the Horror/Thriller genre for kids.
Babysitter’s Club
Island of the Blue Dolphins
The True Confessions of Charlotte Doyle
Anne of Green Gables
Animorphs
Hmm… 90s “late teen and young adult” is me. My favorite books when I was a bit younger than that were The Babysitter’s Club series, VC Andrews books, Dean Koontz, Stephen King, and whatever they made me read for school, because I was a nerd like that 😉
The Boxcar Children (the first is a classic, the rest are very basic mysteries) by Gertrude Chandler Warner
The first Harry Potter book was published in 1997! if you want to read them.
A Little Princess by Frances Hodgson Bennet
The Mixed-up Files of Ms. Basil E Frankwiler
The Westing Game
Do you want bestsellers or classics? They aren’t the same thing.
The Never Ending Story
The Chronicles of Prydain by Lloyd Alexander
I was a super into Christopher Pike and RL Stine horror books in the 90s. Also Anne Rice was huge then and I read all of the vampire and Mayfair witch books multiple times. A friend stood outside in a snow storm to get her signature on a couple books. (We were teens by then.)
if you liked the idea of Famous Five and Secret Seven, def check out the full Enid Blyton catalogue beyond just those — her “Faraway Tree” series and “Mallory Towers” were everywhere at Indian book fairs too lol. Also Roald Dahl is a must, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Matilda, James and the Giant Peach… honestly don’t know how those aren’t mentioned more. And if you want something that’ll genuinely mess with your head in the best way, Phantom Tollbooth by Norton Juster — slept on classic imo
My favourites were The Water Babies (re-read as an adult and found it quite shocking), Watership Down, all Roald Dahl books, Lambs Tales (Shakespeare’s plays simplified for children), and sci-fi books by William Sleator.
Happy reading!
The secrets of droon series!
I was obsessed with the Sweet Valley High series