It’s never too late to go back.
The Golden Compass by Philip Pullman
I think the mark of a truly great book for kids is that it seems, in retrospect, so rich or subtle or smart that it must have been wasted on your tiny child brain. That's how I felt rereading The Golden Compass (for, I think, the third or fourth time). It doesn't run dry; it always has more to offer than I realized the last time I read it. Pullman's world is magical and gorgeous (The shape-shifting daemons! The hot-ass witches! The father figure who just happens to be a talking polar bear!) and not at all safe. You can't tell exactly who's good or bad, because they don't quite know themselves. Parents lie, children die, and Lyra's reward, in the end, isn't being transported home to live happily ever after. It's just walking alone into a vast, unknowable new universe. I mean, that's deep shit for adults, let alone 11-year-olds. But the thing about 11-year-olds is that they know when they're being told a story that's generous with its goods, and they remember it, and they keep coming back. —Rachel Sanders
Harriet the Spy by Louise Fitzhugh
There is a very good chance that I have read Harriet the Spy 12 or 13 times. I was an obsessive re-reader, especially when I was younger, and I would return to my favorite books the way some people return to their favorite order at McDonald's. This is why I was pretty much floored to see how much I missed during those first dozen or so readings. There's the contextual stuff, for one thing: So much of what Harriet observes is about money and class, even if she herself only faintly acknowledges this in passing. She doesn't yet have the lexicon for it, like so much of her emotional life. Her family owns an entire brownstone on the Upper East Side, employs a nanny and a cook, and sends Harriet to a private school where she is one of something like eight kids in her class. When I was small, this seemed normal, a viable way for someone to live; now that I live here (and, in fact, once sublet a practically windowless basement apartment around the corner from the Welschs' fictional home), it's far more striking, and not at all neutral.
The other thing I missed, that maybe I too didn't quite have the language for at the age of eleven, is that in the book Harriet is still becoming who she is. Her notes to herself change timbre even over the course of two hundred pages; she's not doing any overt soul-searching (the book's lack of proselytizing is, I think, part of why it's stood up so well) but firming up her edges, figuring out what she does and doesn't want to do, how to work well and write well and live well. Maybe when you are young you see everyone who you admire or want to emulate as fully formed. It's only upon revisiting that you realize maybe they have only a glimmer of an idea of what the hell they should do, and that's fine. —Alanna Okun
Matilda by Roald Dahl
Here is a sampling of words that Roald Dahl used in Matilda: skulduggery (pg. 108), parabola (pg. 116), pustule (pg. 120), exalted (pg. 171) and carbuncle (pg. 168). So did I read this book as a child, or did I watch the movie and just *think* that I read the book? I honestly don't remember, but what I do know is I still don't know what "skullduggery" means.
One huge LOL while (re?)reading this book though: Miss Honey — the bright, sensible teacher who ADOPTS Matilda as her child at the end of the book — is 23 years old. Twenty three. Years of age. I literally can't keep plants alive. —Erin Chack
Moominvalley in November by Tove Jansson
Moominvalley in November is my favorite in Tove Jansson's series of whimsically illustrated, perfectly weird books and comics set in the beautiful and imaginary Moominvalley. The books are originally from Finland and in that part of the world (and in Japan), the series is a huge deal — there are theme parks, collectible merchandise, TV and movie adaptations, and they're a part of most people's childhood. How they became such a big part of mine is a little bit of a mystery to me. I think my mom found one of the books at our local used bookstore and once I read one I was hooked.
Moominvalley In November is kind of unusual within the series because the stories usually focus on the Moomin family, but in this book they are at sea, and their house is populated by friends who've traveled to see them. There are six friends in total: the pipe-playing musical vagabond Snufkin, the extremely fussy Hemulen, the conservative Fillyjonk, senile old Grandpa Grumble, Snufkin's mom Mymble, and my favorite — the lonely, reclusive, shy, but secretly magical Toft, who wants desperately to be part of the Moomin family.
I reread this book at least five times as a child and teenager, but it has sat dusty on my shelf for a decade. It is beautiful — moody, evocative, lovingly detailed, and dotted with charming illustrations. I kind of can't believe that I liked this book as a kid, and it makes me give my kid-self and kids in general a bit more credit. It's really a slow moving, thoughtful book and not at all a page-turner. It is mostly about coping with the complex sensitivities of other creatures, learning to live together, and loving the world around you. Everyone in the book is a bit prickly and broken and, together in someone else's house, they learn to spend time together, to make their own fun, and to feel a little like a family. Maybe this book prepared me for adult life more than I ever realized. —Summer Anne Burton
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