Books in New York Review Books Children's Collection series

The Caldecott medal-winning d'Aulaires once again captivate their young audience with this beautifully illustrated introduction to Norse legends, telling stories of Odin the All-father, Thor the Thunder-god and the theft of his hammer, Loki the mischievous god of the Jotun Race, and Ragnarokk, the destiny of the gods. Children meet Bragi, the god of poetry, and the famous Valkyrie maidens, among other gods, goddesses, heroes, and giants. Illustrations throughout depict the wondrous other world of Norse folklore and its fantastical Northern landscape.

Miss Bianca is a white mouse of great beauty and supreme self-confidence, who, courtesy of her excellent young friend, the ambassador’s son, resides luxuriously in a porcelain pagoda painted with violets, primroses, and lilies of the valley. Miss Bianca would seem to be a pampered creature, and not, you would suppose, the mouse to dispatch on an especially challenging and extraordinarily perilous mission. However, it is precisely Miss Bianca that the Prisoners’ Aid Society picks for the job of rescuing a Norwegian poet imprisoned in the legendarily dreadful Black Castle. Miss Bianca, after all, is a poet too, and in any case she is due to travel any day now to Norway. There Miss Bianca will be able to enlist one Nils, known to be the bravest mouse in the land, in a desperate and daring endeavor that will take them, along with their trusty companion Bernard, across turbulent seas and over the paws and under the maws of cats into one of the darkest places known to man or mouse. It will take everything they’ve got and a good deal more to escape with their own lives, not to mention the poet. Margery Sharp’s classic tale of pluck, luck, and derring-do is amply and beautifully illustrated by the great Garth Williams.

Father has had a long hard day at work. A sorely trying day indeed. He wants to sit down and put his feet up and rest. But what does he find when he arrives home? Commotion, consternation, confusion, chaos rule! How to get to the bottom of it? How to restore some semblance of proper order?The investigation, reluctantly begun, expands in widening circles to take in the whole family, as finger points to pointing finger. Perhaps everyone is to blame? Perhaps to set things straight everyone just needs to sit down, say sorry, and start over again?That family life is just that simple and never quite that simple is the message Russell and Lillian Hoban, the creators of such classics as Bread and Jam for Frances, A Little Sister for Frances, and The Little Brute Family, bring alive in this cleverly fashioned and heartwarmingly illustrated tale of a house in uproar.

A Caldecott Honor Book by the creators of the beloved Story of FerdinandWee Gillis lives in Scotland. He is an orphan, and he spends half of each year with his mother's people in the lowlands, while the other half finds him in the highlands with his father's kin. Both sides of Gillis's family are eager for him to settle down and adopt their ways. In the lowlands, he is taught to herd cattle, learning how to call them to him in even the heaviest of evening fogs. In the rocky highlands, he stalks stags from outcrop to outcrop, holding his breath so as not to make a sound. Wee Gillis is a quick study, and he soon picks up what his elders can teach him. And yet he is unprepared when the day comes for him to decide, once and for all, whether it will be the lowlands or the highlands that he will call his home.Robert Lawson and Munro Leaf's classic picture book is a tribute to the powers of the imagination and a triumph of the storyteller's and illustrator's art.

Tiny Seacrow Island is one of hundreds of islands in the sparkling blue of the Baltic Sea. Though small, it has everything you’d want in an island: woods to wander in, flowers to pick, fish to catch, boats to sail in, all kinds of animals. But it doesn’t have very many young people. So when the four Melkerson kids and their father move into Carpenter’s Cottage one June day, they’re immediately welcomed by the resourceful islanders: Johan and Niklas Melkerson, at twelve and thirteen, are natural companions for adventurous Freddy and Teddy (girls exactly their age); dreamy Pelle, the baby of the family, gets up to trouble with bossy Tjorven and fanciful Stina; and ever-responsible Malin, who at nineteen looks after her scatterbrained father as well as her brothers, catches the eye of all the island’s young men. Before long Seacrow Island and Carpenter’s Cottage (tumbledown and leaky though it may be) have become a real home for the Melkersons. Seacrow Island is a remarkable story, filled with sweetness and sorrow, humor and suspense, and peopled with the vivid, unexpected, wonderfully winning characters we’ve come to expect from the creator of the unforgettable Pippi Longstocking.

"The best book about politics ever written for children." —The Washington Post 50th Anniversary Edition, now in paperbackDO YOU KNOW THE HISTORY OF THE PUSHCART WAR? THE REAL HISTORY? It’s a story of how regular people banded together and, armed with little more than their brains and good aim, defeated a mighty foe. Not long ago the streets of New York City were smelly, smoggy, sooty, and loud. There were so many trucks making deliveries that it might take an hour for a car to travel a few blocks. People blamed the truck owners and the truck owners blamed the little wooden pushcarts that traveled the city selling everything from flowers to hot dogs. Behind closed doors the truck owners declared war on the pushcart peddlers. Carts were smashed from Chinatown to Chelsea. The peddlers didn’t have money or the mayor on their side, but that didn’t stop them from fighting back. They used pea shooters to blow tacks into the tires of trucks, they outwitted the police, and they marched right up to the grilles of those giant trucks and dared them to drive down their streets. Today, thanks to the ingenuity of the pushcart peddlers, the streets belong to the people—and to the pushcarts. The Pushcart War was first published more than fifty years ago. It has inspired generations of children and been adapted for television, radio, and the stage around the world. It was included on School Library Journal’s list of One Hundred Books That Shaped the Twentieth Century, and its assertion that a committed group of men and women can prevail against a powerful force is as relevant in the twenty-first century as it was in 1964.

In this spectacular follow-up to their beloved Book of Norse Myths, the husband-and-wife team of Ingri and Edgar Parin d’Aulaire explore the uncanny reaches of Norse mythology, an enchanted night-world populated by trolls of all kinds—mountain trolls, forest trolls, trolls who live underwater and trolls who live under bridges, uncouth, unkempt, unbreakable, unforgettable, and invariably unbelievably ugly trolls—who work their wiles and carry on in the most bizarre and entertaining fashions. With their matchless talent as storytellers and illustrators, the d’Aulaires bring to life the weird and wonderful world of Norse mythology.

A delightful fantasy tale about family by the author of the internationally best-selling Pippi Longstocking books, now in paperbackNine-year-old Karl Anders Nilsson is the unwelcome foster child of an uncaring couple. Lonely and neglected, he yearns for simple things, things that many children already have: a warm and loving home of his own, someone to share his sorrows and joys with, and, most important, his real father.Then, on October 15, Karl simply disappears. Where has he gone? (Police are searching for him!) But Karl is far away from chilly Stockholm, in Farawayland, where he has found his father, who is none other than the king of that land. And now Karl faces a truly dangerous mission. Prophecies have foretold his coming for thousands of years. He, his new best friend Pompoo, and Miramis, his wonderful flying horse with a golden mane, must travel together into the darkness of Outer Land to do battle with Sir Kato, the cruel abductor of the children of Farawayland. Only a child of the royal blood can stop him...

Captains of the City Streets is another trip into the world of the legendary Cat Club of Greenwich Village. Two adventurous young cats—Sinbad and the Duke—are best friends who share a "trampish love of the free and easy life." They travel together, away from the tall buildings of the north, in search of a home where they can practice the skip and shuffle of their boxing technique. With luck, they find themselves proud residents of their very own home—an abandoned shack in an overgrown garden. Food is scarce until one man, an old sea captain new to the neighborhood, notices them and becomes their "Master of the Supper Nook."When the duo follow their new Master home, they witness one of the first meetings of the famous Cat Club. Sinbad and the Duke decide they don't need the "rules and obligations" of membership in any club; but as they join in its business and frolics, they realize that perhaps the Club needs them.Ready for any challenge, Sinbad and the Duke, the Captains of the City Streets, charm the Cat Club's admirers with their free spirits and "nifty" street smarts, as they grow up and ultimately find friendship and a place where they belong.

Whether you’re entertaining garden sprites, feeding a regiment of toy soldiers, or simply whiling away a lazy afternoon, Mud Pies and Other Recipes is the only make-believe cookbook you’ll ever need. With Marjorie Winslow’s timeless guide on hand, you’ll never be at a loss for something to do in your backyard or by the seashore; you’ll be busy scooping up sand (a filling for Stuffed Sea Shells), hunting for flower petals (they make lovely hors d’oeuvres), and collecting raindrops (essential for brewing up Fried Water). The book is organized by course, and includes a general discussion of yard cookery along with detailed ingredient lists, methods for preparation, and helpful serving suggestions. And on every page, Erik Blegvad’s delightful pen-and-ink drawings ensure that Mud Pies and Other Recipes is a feast for the eyes as well as the imagination.

“This is a story about the last gnomes in Britain. They are honest-to-goodness gnomes, none of your baby, fairy-book tinsel stuff, and they live by hunting and fishing, like the animals and birds, which is only proper and right.” —From the author’s introduction On the banks of the Folly Brook, inside an old oak tree, live the last three gnomes in Britain: Sneezewort, Baldmoney, and Dodder. Before their fourth brother, Cloudberry, disappeared upstream seeking adventure, they lived happily and peacefully among their woodland friends. But now spring has come and the brothers start thinking about spending the summer traveling upstream to find Cloudberry. Before long they’ve built a boat and set off for unknown lands, where they find themselves involved in all kinds of adventures with new friends (wood mice, water voles, badgers) as well as with enemies (two-legged giants). A classic of British literature, BB’s The Little Grey Men has much in common with Kenneth Grahame’s The Wind in the Willows, though as BB acknowledges in his introduction, the talking gnomes are only part of the story. The true plot, which BB, an unparalleled naturalist, brings thrillingly to life is the magic of the woods and streams, the beauty of unspoiled nature and of the great diversity of living things.

A grandfather clock makes a lovely home for a family of mice—if you don’t mind the occasional clang. And here Hickory lives with his parents, his brother, Dickory, and his sister, Dock. But Hickory is a restless, fearless mouse, and he longs to be on the move, to breathe the sweet air and nibble on the wild strawberries of the fields. So one day in early spring, with the smells of honeysuckle and clover guiding him, he strikes out on his own. Soon he discovers that a meadow can be a lonely place, even with all its beetles and caterpillars. It’s not until Hop the grasshopper comes around that Hickory finds a true companion. Hop warns him, though, that when the days get shorter and the goldenrod begins to fade, the “song she sings will soon be done.” How Hickory and Hop confront and eventually accept the end of summer forms the core of Palmer Brown’s poignant story.Hickory is a story of friendship and love on par with Shel Silverstein’s The Giving Tree or E. B. White’s Charlotte’s Web. It is also a field guide to the common plants and flowers of spring, summer, and autumn, all beautifully rendered in Palmer Brown’s most colorful and joyous drawings.