To ask what your favourite children's book is/was

[LaVieEstBelle159]

The book or books that bring back comforting and happy memories.

Mine are Magic Faraway Tree, Mallory Towers and St Clares, all by Enid Blyton.

What are yours?

Faraway Tree and Famous Five as a child

Anne Frank's Diary/story of

Mine are Enid Blyton too 🙂

Loved Famous Five, Secret Seven, the Find Outers, Mr Pinkwhistle and the Magic Faraway Tree!
Anne of Green Gables too, still love the book and want to visit Prince Edward's Island where the 80s TV version was set, even now as an adult! 🙂

I loved the Witches by Roald Dahl when I was small and then as I got to age 9 or 10 I was mad about the Sweet Valley Twins books. I read nearly every one in the series. Enjoyed the Point Horror books too around the same time.

Probably Little Women. First read it when I was 9 or 10 and then reread it a million times.

Also loved the Harry Potter series but most of them came out when I was a teenager rather than still at primary.

Tom's Midnight Garden by Phillipa Pearce. A timeless classic.

Love the number of times this thread has been revived!! (If revived is the right word- I just realised I'm not sure when a thread becomes a zombie thread!)

Anyway I loved lots of the books mentioned

Roald Dahl - though not all had been written by the time I moved on from children’s books, so I missed out on some.

Enid Blyton - with a few exceptions, where I really dislike particular books of hers.

Paula Danziger's books.

Others such as Goodnight Mister Tom, Back Home, Charlotte's Web, December Rose, Carrie's War and so on.

There was one book I recall called The Runaways (by Ruth something I think) that I really loved and hoped would be made into a TV drama (i was hopeful I think because it had a photo cover!!)

I had a Noel Streetfeild book - The Circus is Coming. Didn't realise she was a woman until recently!

Scrolled through the whole thread and i'm amazed at the number of mentions for Enid Blyton. I wonder if it's fair to assume it's a certain generation (1970s kids and back) mainly answering these as that's when she was at her height. Her work to me is of its time, plus it's quite tame. The biggest reading poll to date was done in 2003 and only one book by her made it into the top 200.

I'm not surprised. For a start off this thread is about favourite children's book, and the poll you talk about is "Best loved novel".
EB was the most prolific writer for children - she wrote over 700 books. And they're a wide variety. Many authors stick to fairly similar genre. She wrote: picture books, early readers, chapter books, middle grade, plays, poetry, fantasy, school stories, mystery stories, animal stories, country life... and that's off the top of my head.
So there's something for everyone here. Many children have discovered a love of reading through Enid Blyton-and that is true today as much as in the "1970s and back". However if you're looking for one specific book to mention then it means that votes get far more spread than if she'd written fewer. I suspect now that JKR wouldn't get more than 1-2 mentions either.

I'm more surprised that Ballet Shoes (Noel Streatfield) didn't make the list-and perhaps that Flower in the Attic did. Maybe that is something to do with the demographic doing the survey.

Yes, I love 'The Runaways', by Ruth Thomas. Also wrote other good books: 'The New Boy'; 'The Secret'; 'Guilty'. Should be better known.

@MargaretThursday , I am surprised too that Ballet Shoes didn't register. i LOVED it at 8-ish, and all her other novels too. The Painted Garden was possibky my favourite, because I loved the Secret Garden too.

Magic faraway tree by far 😍

Loved 'A series of unfortunate events' as a teen!

One of my favourites now with my children is Hairy Mclary!

Teeny-Tiny and the Witch-Woman