The Great Brain by John D. Fitzgerald. First in a seven-book series about young boys growing up in late 19th-century Utah (Catholics rather than Mormons, if you’re wondering), and specifically the adventures of an intelligent, indeed devious young boy and his little brother (who narrates). What is particularly great about these books is that the Great Brain, as he is called, is first and foremost a con artist; he isn’t especially malicious, but like most people he’s self-interested and uses his intelligence to get himself ahead in life, and often in unethical ways. This makes him more realistic than your average Encyclopedia Brown. However, because he’s not a bad person at heart (his cons, like the cons of most con-artist protagonists, are designed to play off the greed of his marks and therefore he can always justify the con to himself), when his adventures inevitably lead to something more threatening than rooking schoolkids out of their stuff, he makes an excellent hero – again, moreso than your average Encyclopedia Brown. The Great Brain books are smartly written and bring the 19th-century Utah setting to life remarkably well, and because of the period setting haven’t aged even slightly.
The Wacky World of Alvin Fernald by Clifford D. Hicks. The Alvin Fernald books have aged slightly (written in the 60s and set contemporaneously), but pair off as a nice comparison with the Great Brain books because both series are about smarter-than-average kids (Alvin frequently refers to his “Magnificent Brain”) who have adventures as a result of their smarts. Alvin is a more conventionally likeable hero than the Great Brain; most of his books feature Alvin getting into a situation by dint of his smarts – becoming mayor for a day, starting up his own TV newscast, and so forth – and then getting into an adventure as a result of that. The Wacky World veers away from that model by being a collection of shorter stories, mostly inspired pranks dreamed up by Alvin, some of which are quite sophisticated (an early instance of identity creation, for example, which seems eerily prescient and relevant now) and serves as a decent entry point for the series as a whole.
The Seventh Princess by Nick Sullivan. A brilliant little pageturner wherein a young girl finds herself transported from her schoolbus to a magical kingdom where she is informed she is now the princess of the kingdom. Except she’s the seventh princess – and nobody seems to want to tell her what happened to the first six. A self-driven female protagonist, some really great writing and a clever plot make this a must-read for any kid so far as I’m concerned. I’ve been told once or twice that this was the first book in a trilogy, but can find no trace of the other two even existing.
Below the Root, And All Between, and Until the Celebration by Zilpha Keatley Snyder. Snyder (still writing in her eighties) is nowadays best known for The Egypt Game and The Witches of Worm, both of which won her Newbery Awards, but these were always my favorites of her books: her biggest venture into science fiction, a trilogy about a future where humans escaping a war-torn Earth settled a new, low-gravity world with gigantic, enormous trees – and then couldn’t agree on how to proceed. The fallout from that decision seeds the entire story, which is uniquely nonviolent in its handling of conflict. At some point, some enterprising producer (probably Pixar) is going to realize that these three books are a megablockbuster children’s movie waiting to happen, so I advise everyone to get in on the ground floor and read them before that happens so you can get the literary experience first.
The Westing Game and The Mysterious Disappearance of Leon (I Mean Noel) by Ellen Raskin. Speaking of film, The Westing Game has been adapted into a film – and disappointed, which is a shame because a good adaptation of it would be simply cracking. Both of these books are mysteries as well, but epic mysteries. Westing features a large cast, most of whom are the heirs of a murdered tycoon, trying to solve the mystery of who murdered him in order to claim his estate. Leon (Noel) is a quest-mystery as the heroine searches for her missing husband – whom she has never met – over the course of many years. Both novels play expertly with language and words, both to stimulate a young mind and to teach it about language. and both are entertaining; Leon (Noel) is a comedic farce and Westing a more serious thriller, but neither one anything less than engaging at every moment.1
The War Between the Pitiful Teachers and the Splendid Kids by Stanley Kiesel. The original cover of the book does it a terrible injustice, making it look like some dreadfully boring bog-standard kidslit. This is not that book; this is a deeply weird and highly dystopic novel about a literal war between teachers and kids, with actual battles and everything. An Orwellian vibe permeates the whole novel, and Kiesel ramps the absurdity up to twelve (eleven is for pussies) with each new chapter, as a gorilla-like sixth-grade girl jousts against the ultimate evil gym teacher in the climax of the book. And then Kiesel gets truly brave and has the kids lose. A sequel, Skinny Malinky and the War for Kidness, eventually got written in order to provide the requisite happy ending, and it’s good too, but I almost prefer the tiger-ending of the first book, as the hero learns what’s happened to his closest friends. Dark, dark, dark. And wonderful.
I Want To Go Home! and No Coins, Please by Gordon Korman. Both of these were written before Korman was out of high school, which should make you deeply jealous of Korman’s abilities. Korman’s early kidslit tends to be wildly farcical, but these two of his books are his most engaging because the farce emerges in each case from a wildly competent non-POV character, which for me makes the point that if Batman were to really exist he would bring us high comedy all the time. In I Want To Go Home!, the Batman kid is so good at absolutely everything camp-related that the only thing at camp that gives him any pleasure is escaping it repeatedly; in No Coins, Please the Batman kid is a wildly brilliant entrepreneur with a talent for bending laws, so that he ends a junior-kids auto-tour about a million dollars ahead of where he started. Korman has a gift for writing slapstick and making it resonate on the page, and for making ludicrous situations seem plausible; these are valuable talents given his plots.
Bone by Jeff Smith. Christ, how many times do I have to tell you people to read Bone before you do it already?
- Raskin also had a fondness for footnotes that was positively Pratchettian, and my love of footnotes in fiction stems from her rather than Sir Terry. [↩]
Related Articles
41 users responded in this post
The only thing I see as missing from this list are the works of William Sleator, particularly Duplicate, Singularity, Strange Attractors, The Boy Who Reversed Himself, and Others See Us. If you haven’t read him, he had a nice line in horror-tinged sci-fi that followed its premises through to their logically grim conclusions, often stemming from a plausible reaction of human nature to the main idea. (As in, given telepathic powers or a cloning device or a time-dilation phenomenon, nothing particularly nice happens as a result.)
One thing about the Great Brain books that always stood out for me (aside from John Fitzgerald’s excellent writing) was Mercer Mayer’s wonderful illustrations. They brought the books to even more vivid life.
Man, I devoured the Gordon Korman library as a kid, let me tell you. Although “Who Is Bugs Potter?” was always my favorite.
I’ve never been able to get past that Great Brain story where he tricks a tomboy girl and sissy boy into conforming to their assigned gender roles.
Unless I’m thinking of another character; its been a while since I read it.
Below the Root… wow, that brings back memories of the adventure game that was on the C64.
I feel old.
It’s a tragedy to mention Below the Root without mentioning its canonical, Snyder-penned, groundbreaking sequel video game (Wiki has a good article http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Below_the_Root_(video_game) ).
While a Pixar (or whatever) version of the books would be great, the real victory out of it would be a chance at a faithful remake of the video game with modern gameplay and graphics. It’s kind of weird to think that the game’s attitude is still essentially unique among commercial video games, a quarter-century later.
Great Brain, The War, and Westing were two of my favorite books as a kid. Throw in the Borribles trilogy by Michael de Larrabeiti and maybe some Daniel Pinkwater and you’d pretty much have a perfect shelf of books.
Haven’t thought about The Great Brain books in years — I remember very little about them other than the fact that I enjoyed them quite a bit.
The only other book on your list I’ve read was the excellent The Westing Game, which I read multiple times in my youth, and again in college while taking a Young Adult Literature class. Was pleasantly surprised at how well it held up, and have gladly recommended it time and again. And yes, the live-action adaptation was horribly disappointing.
Oh my God I *loved* the Gordon Korman books growing up. I have no idea how I even came across ’em, since the only other people I know who have heard of them are all Canadians, but I read the four Bruno & Boots that I had unto destruction.
Have you actually re-read those Gordon Korman books lately? I read both I Want To Go Home! and No Coins, Please within the last year and they were *horrible*. Both are badly written junk that even teens would probably roll their eyes at. Really, really shocked that you’re recommending these.
I must have read Alvins Secret Code 25 times in elementary school. Would have loved to find other books in the series at the time.
Personally I got a ton of mileage out of the Encyclopedia Brown series.. and the Tom Swift Jr books. One for your basic mystery short story and the other for Sci-fi from a VERY 50s perspective.
What I know about Below The Root is mostly from the really good video game for the Commodore 64. Gameplay video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zWKpgpHa2Mo
The Great Brain was always honestly a jerk, which made him somewhat unsympathetic and his occasional comeuppances delightful. He did con people, constantly, and rationalized his thefts to himself in sometimes infuriating ways. I think what made the books enjoyable was that they were written from the POV of his younger brother, thus allowing a perspective that could show how ingenious his schemes were without endorsing his behavior. Also, the characters–kids and adults–were distinct, had personalities and such beyond ‘assigned singular trait’ which was another failing of the Encyclopedia Browns.
I’d add Howl’s Moving Castle and A Tale of Time City to that list, and probably some others. Still, there’s nothing I’d subtract among the ones I’ve read (all but Alvin and Princess) as they were all books I enjoyed as a kid.
Daniel Pinkwater, man. Alan Mendelsohn, the Boy from Mars, Young Adult Novel, featuring the adventures of the Wild Dada Ducks, Yobgorgle: Mystery Monster of Lake Ontario, The Snarkout Boys and the Baconburg Horror, Lizard Music, Borgel….
Incredible stuff, all of it, and it all holds up very well indeed. Alan Mendelsohn alone is probably one of the greatest works that Western literature has ever produced.
I’d like to add anything from Lloyd Alexander’s fantasy series, and anything from Bruce Coville’s sci-fi books, as both authors are responsible for getting me into the respective genres. And for older teenaged readers, I’d really recommend Korman’s Jake, Reinvented. When I started it, I had no idea that it was essentially the Great Gatsby set in a high school, but by the time I finished it, I had to conclude that the switch works really, really well.
@Rog – I think its a little beside the point if the adult version of myself found the Korman books to be dreadful. As a 10 year old, I devoured them, and I’m reasonably sure that my kids will when they get a little older. They were more than just entertainment, too – they were inspiration. I was blown away that a teenager could write a full-length book (let alone get it published), and that was really encouraging to me…
Got the Bone omnibus edition. BEST STORY EVERY. It now holds a special place on my shelf next to my full collection of Gaiman’s Sandman and all my classic lit.
I would add A Wrinkle In Time, A Wind At the Door, and A Swiftly Tilting Planet to the list.
Wot, no John Bellairs?
The House With a Clock In Its Walls was entertaining, creepy, and also got me hooked on the art of Edward Gorey (why recent editions dropped his cool cover art is completely beyond me. Idiots!).
Yes to the Gordon Korman-loved both of those! Also, the first three or four Bruno & Boots.
Hell yeah. I grew up on the Great Brain books and loved them to death. The Alvin Fernald stories likewise stick in my brain, and I’ve always loved the War Between The Teachers and the Kids. Such a freaky book, it floored me to discover there was a sequel some years back.
And I’m a huge Gordon Korman fan – Who Is Bugs Potter, Son of Interflux, A Semester in the Life of a Garbage Bag, Don’t Care High….
Man, if you get me started on kids books, we’ll be here all day. I have bookcases full of good stuff in need of re-reading from my childhood.
But let me toss out two other overlooked, underrated series:
T*A*C*K* by Nancy K. Robinson, and The Mad Scientists Club, by Bertrand R. Brinley and Charles Geer.
[…] MightyGodKing, Christopher Bird reveals his guide to children’s literature. It includes Stanley Kiesel’s The War Between the Pitiful Teachers and the Splendid Kids, […]
I see I’m not the only one who felt driven to comment on the Below the Root game. I really ought to find the books at some point …
The Great Brain stories are some of the greatest books ever written!!!!
I read a couple of Alvin books (Alvin’s Secret Code, which taught me a lot of cryptography, and one or two others). Wasn’t Mayor For A Day made into a Disney movie?
But most important here is The Mysterious Disappearance Of Leon (I Mean Noel). One of the greatest books I’ve ever read, and until now, one I’d never heard anyone else mention. That book was brilliant, with all sorts of strange clues and different layers to the story. It’s also the first place I ever encountered the idea of wearing clean underwear in case you get hit by a truck (which does happen to someone in the story).
To make things even better, the illustrations were made up almost entirely of words– the only exceptions being faces, and Mrs Carillon’s famous flower-print dresses.
To correct one minor error here, though, Mrs Carillon did know her husband Leon/Noel briefly when they were young children, when they were first got married for trademark purposes. (If anyone is confused by that statement, Read The Book!!)
I absolutely *loved* the Great Brain novels when I was that age.
Incidentally, John Fitzgerald generally based the narrator charactor in The Great Brain books on his own experiences as a kid–and his own family’s religious history is one of the topics discussed in his lesser-known non-fiction biographical book about his family, “Papa married a Mormon”.
If I’d been making this list, I would’ve also included the Soup books by Robert Newton Peck; Sid Fleischman’s novels, including “Ghost in the noonday sun”, “Mr. Mysterious and Company”, and “By the great horn spoon” (and the McBroom books for younger readers, but that age range obviously isn’t covered by this list); Homer Price, by Robert McCloskey; at least one of Mary Downing Hahn’s ghost stories; the Prydain series by Lloyd Alexander; Holes, by Louis Sachar; L. Frank Baum’s Oz books; and that’s just the first several I thought of off the top of my head.
No Coins, Please was my fave book of primary school. Something about Canadian literature that translates really well for us Aussies. It’s the post-colonial mindset, methinks.
Seconding Daniel Pinkwater – I found the Neddiad in a hostel in Austin last summer and swapped the Discworld book I’d been carrying for it just so I could reread it over and over. So good.
The War Between the Pitiful Teachers and the Splendid Kids is the only one of the books that I read, but I have good memories of it. The cartoon Kids Next Door reminded me of it.
I read the shit out of Gordon Korman in grade school. I Want to Go Home was always my favorite, but Son of Interflux and Don’t Care High were close seconds.
Shark custard.
Before my niece could read, I bought her the following:
The Phantom Tollbooth
The Search for Delicious
I may skip getting her “How to Eat Fried Worms”
Lack of Roald Dahl makes me sad.
I recall reading “Don’t Care High” at some point when working thru as much of some school library as possible…
Definitely Lloyd Alexander, John Bellairs, and The Phantom Tollbooth were books that all were a big part of my elementary-school reading. I remember scaring myself silly reading John Bellairs late at night on the couch and being afraid to walk from the living room to my bedroom. But I loved them! I actually got my eight-year-old cousin three of them for his birthday–and made sure to track down copies with the Gorey illustrations.
I also really liked Susan Cooper’s quasi-Arthurian series (and was seriously bummed when they botched it with The Seeker movie), as well as Robin McKinley’s The Blue Sword and its prequel, The Hero and the Crown.
WORD to Great Brain, Westing Game + Leon(Noel), Gordon Korman!!
I’d say you might as well make Ellen Raskin a trilogy and add “The Tattooed Potato”, which is again a mystery, but this time a riff on a modern-day Sherlockian character and his assistant, our narrator, Dickory Dock. Layers upon layers of puzzles and for me it’s right up there with the other two.
My children’s must read list is:
1. Bridge to Terabithia – Sad but very Imaginative.
2.Naria, tho my favorite was the Lion, the witch and the wardrobe.
3.Charlie and the Chocolate factory
4. The Hobbit
5. Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing.
6. Swallows and Amazons
7. Fabulous Five.
8. Owls in the family.
9. Bone
10. The Isis trilogy
I loved Seventh Princess! It was a random pick-up … I’m so happy to know someone else loved it this much.
I’d add Edgar Eager’s Half-Magic … wonderful, fun, story about British children who find a coin that grants you half a wish. Hilarity and moral lessons ensue. It’s a bit Roald Dahl-ish, although probably not quite as dark.
Just wanted to say I picked up Bone based on your recommendation. I hadn’t really read comics much since I was young–mostly due to geography and poverty–but had started to read them again. I wanted to find something to share with my 5-year-old daughter, but everything was uber-violent or uber-stupid. Then I came across your post on comics for new readers. (It’s also how I found your blog that I now read religiously). I read the entire epic to her over the course of a year. I even bought us commemorative T-shirts. Thank you so much, MGK.
This post made my do some checking on Amazon, and finding that the Mad Scientist Club books are still in print fills me with such happiness you cannot imagine.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mad_Scientists%27_Club
Myself as well, Joe.
Westing Game was eh, should have put Maniac McGee.