Obscure children's books that you used to love

[LadyPlumpington]

Mine is 'The Island of the Skog' by Steven Kellogg. The DC love it too :)

What are your old obscure favourites?

Was the Nicholas Fisk one The Living Fire? Or something. A collection of sci fi short stories. One was about a girl who went into space on a journey with her family, got bored, cloned herself, had a great time until they started annoying each other. Also one about fools gold and tempus fugit, and a cat alien.

One of mine was Gerard Durrell's The Talking Parcel.

Ooh MrsSnufkin I remember that! I think it was called Glory Hole. And I have now found my unknown book is either Space Hostages or Starstormers also by Nicholas Fisk. Whose real name was David Higginbottom, Wikipedia tells me.

Little Richard - can't remember who wrote it but it starred a rabbit and his parents and porcupine friend. All sorts of adventures ensued - tracking paw prints, sack races and pillow fights. Plus all sorts of creatures living in the cracks and crevices of the Rabbit family's house! Loved it!

AFlorrick yes someone else has read it! Yes she spent most of her time by her mother's grave. That book haunted me, I hated all the adults in it! I lost my copy years ago but I read it so many times I remember it so well.

Demented, I loved the Kingdom of Carbonel too :).

Loved (and DD loves) The Giant Jam Sandwich and Mrs Honey's Hat.

I used to read a book called Lester and the Unusual Pet which was fabulous.

Trebizon a firm favourite, as is Melling. I loved First Team at Tennis.

I'm hoping someone can help me identify this book - been trying to remember it for YEARS.

It was half A5 size - landscape. There was an arched border around the cover. It was basically about some children who painted a shed. ONe had yellow paint, one red etc etc. They each painted a different side a different colour then it rained and the shed happily turned brown. (Not to be confused with the Munch Bunch book where Sally Strawberry paints Spud's portrait all different colours)

Someone please help

I still have this well loved copy of Flossie Teacake's Fur Coat.
The fur coat turned her into a teenager called Floz and she got into all manner of scrapes.

Loved Trebizon and Paula Danziger! I had a book of poems by Michael Rosen called Quick Let's Get Out Of Here. I could still probably recite most of them. I adored that book - it was mostly about the exploits of his late son, Eddie, who I think died of meningitis quite young. When I went to uni I ended up working weekends in a gift shop with Michael's daughter. We became friends and I went round to the family home for a cup of tea. I shamelessly took my well-thumbed book with me and Michael wrote a lovely dedication in it. Such a lovely man and so passionate about children's literature. It's still one of my most treasured possessions.

Oh Chocky is fab but my favourite John Wyndham is The Chrysalids.

Glad to have udentifued Annerton Pit. I remember it was really scary.

dementedma and AFlorrick I'm so pleased! Not a single person I've ever spoken about 'not now, Bernard' has ever heard of it!

Also had haffertee hamster!

Ah, that's it,Smarties! I half remembered it. I had forgotten about her fur coat. Thanks for posting a picture.

This thread is lovely :-)

misslemonsfilingcabinet we have that!

Not a memory from childhood but have just read When Marnie Was There by Joan G Robinson. Anyone who has loved Tom's Midnight Garden or Charlotte Sometimes or Marianne Dreams would also love this.

Loved chocky and the tripods.

Does anyone remember these?

The adventures of holly hobbit
Patches
The fate of Jeremy Visick?

niminypiminy I described it to DH as 'this little blind boy gets trapped in a disused pit and some kind of spirit that never speaks but is kind of THERE helps him to escape' and he looked at me like this

It was for kids, apparently!

My favourite book aged 6 was Tikki-Tikki-Tembo. Everytime I got to choose a story at hometime that is what I picked.

I also loved my Dad reading Wonk and the Fireworks and The Story Of Mr Prettimouse,

I had an old book from a jumble sale called Drina Dances in New York that I used to love.

At the moment DS and I are reading Tottie - The Story of a Doll's House. I remember it from TV when I was little and DH tracked down the book for me.

Meant to say Hollie Hobbie!

What a lovely thread, so many amazing memories. I loved the Flossie Teacake books and loads of others mentioned. A MASSIVE thank you to whoever mentioned the Cynthia Voight books where the children are abandoned by their mother. I have been trying to track them down for years but couldn't remember anything but the plot. They have them on Amazon! I'm so thrilled to have finally found them.

I was a total bookworm as a child so have memories of loads of random books I read. Did anyone else read Semolina Silkpaws? That was an unusual book, I got it when they were selling off old books at the library and read it loads. All of the characters were cats.

Eloise by Kay Thompson, it's about a French girl who lives in a hotel and has a tortoise called Skipperdee and a pug called Weenie; I used to pretend I was her! DD age 13 still loves it and has my very worn original copy on her bookshelf.

I also read everything by Cynthia Voigt when I was a teenager and will be retrieving my collection from my parents house on my next visit

I read When Marnie Was There as a child and have always associated it with Marianne Dreams, funnily enough.

I had the grown up Holly Hobbie book, something to do with the Incas? Was brilliant.

Tottie was highly traumatic, I seem to remember, both the book and the TV series!

There were loads of Drina books thumcat - I had lots of them, and all of the saddlers wells books which thankfully I kept. They're probably the only childhood books I've got, we moved house a lot and my mum was ruthless damn her!

I've got a copy of Not now Bernard as well, thankfully still in print.