Author: mondomolly

I’ve been trying to find a book for years but it’s practically impossible to find. I have a lot of nostalgia attached to this book- it was given to me by a family member at a funeral when I was about 9 and when I moved to the US at 13, I never brought this along with me (aka my biggest mistake ever). I’d reread this all the time as a child but now I haven’t been able to find it at all and I really want to pass it on to my little cousin who shares my love for reading. So anyway about this book, I assume it’s quite old and it’s a chapter book with pictures. I was 9 in 2010 so I’m positive this was published before then or around that time. I was given this book in India but I’m pretty sure the author was British or European because the denomination for currency was not Indian. I think they used tuppence. The chapter book was a collection of different stories and the pictures were devoid of color. It was a children’s book but did not feel as childish as some and I distinctly remember the picture of a bee in there. Some of the stories were pretty unique which I thought would make it easier to find online but I’ve had no luck. Let me describe the stories to you in no particular order.

1. One of the stories was about a little fairy who finds a bee. The bee basically explains that it has pockets to collect pollen. The fairy needed to deliver some packages so the bee offers to store the packages in its knees where the pockets are and gives the fairy a ride. I feel like this story was titled something like “do bees have pockets” or “where do bees keep their pollen”. Something along those lines…

2. One of my favorites: a boy is visiting his extended family. His aunt has a special recipe for black currant tea that she makes only when the kids are sick or hurt. This boy really wants to drink it so he fakes being sick but his aunt sees right though him and refuses to give it to him. He sulks but later notices a cup of what looks like black currant tea on the table. Tempted, he secretly drinks it but is surprised when it tastes horrible.  The family finds out that he drank it and are shocked because it was actually leftover dirty paint water and not actually black currant tea. They laugh about it and the boy is embarrassed but the mom makes black currant tea for him to feel better. 

3. There was a story about talking shoes. Don’t remember the plot but their pictures had faces on them and the girl could talk to them.

4. There was a story about ice cream, and cornetto was mentioned specifically. I vaguely remember something about a girl giving up her ice cream because she sees another girl getting injured so she wanted to cheer her up. She’s sad about it because she had used her pocket money to buy it. Later on when she gets home her mom has surprised her with cornetto ice cream. 

5. There was a spooky story about a witch who lived in a house and she had a black cat. I don’t remember anything else but just that it was spooky and weird in a cool way. 

6. There was a story about dolls. One doll somehow gets lost from her owner and she meets other dolls. Some have horrible owners and in the end she finds the right owner for her. 

I am not sure of title or author, but it was about a young woman, or older teens, who had been kidnapped/taken to this weird house and given names of fruit/vegetables- the main character was given the name “Olivia” or “Olive.” Other young women/teen girls were manipulated to believing their new identity. They were punished if they didn’t go along with the doll-like clothing, names, etc. (and for some reason, I recall their clothing and names were somehow related… maybe by color or pattern?), and I’m not sure how it started or ended, but I believe the “Olivia”/“Olive” character escaped. I think I read it when I was 12. It was terrifying and intriguing and probably why I love various crime & mystery, thrillers, and some of the more intense, darker novels (ex. ‘The Alienist’ and anything similar), whether fiction, based on a true story, or documentary/memoir.

I’m looking for a fiction book about girl falling in love in a logging town. I took it out from the library back when I was in middle school around 2009. The cover has an image of a forest fire on it I believe. It followed the coming of age of a female character who lived in a logging town. She ends up falling in love and moving in with a guy. At some point there’s a huge forest fire and they have to evacuate..maybe the male love interest has to be part of the fire fighting crew? Not completely sure. There’s a scene where she picks berries to make pies, there’s a scene where they walk through town together. It seemed old when I picked it up on 2009 and it was set maybe in the 80-90s? I can’t find it anywhere. I think it’s definitely out of print now and my library got rid of it from their catalogue lol. I think the main character had blonde hair. Ahh I’m trying to remember other details, I feel like there was something about her family or community not approving of her love interest.

This was a horror book with stories from multiple authors First story was about this girl who goes to a party , they have an accident while coming back, she gets buried Another story is about someone getting electrocuted by a radio in the bath Some story about a bog  Another story about someone dragging a man with her car when he gets a piece of clothing stuck in it and the man haunts her

I’m looking for a book I read in elementary school in the early 2000s (03-05). I was most likely in 2nd or 3rd grade but had a high reading  comprehension or whatever they call it to read YA fiction at that age.  The book was a thriller/horror book with black and yellow caution tape designs I believe, that discussed a school shooting and kids surviving it. I feel crazy talking and describing this because all my friends always point towards the One Tree Hill school shooting episode and think I’m conflating the two…I swear in my mind I’m not but this is my last chance to stop feeling delusional. It was a great book from what I remember and one of the first eye openers I had with our sad realities.  

 I am a school librarian in the U.K. who read everything I could find when I was a kid in the 70s and 80s. I have never been able to   track these down.

1. A novel I read around age 10 which I borrowed from a family up the road in 1980ish. All I can remember is the main character was female and for some reason she goes to live on her own in a small cottage in or on the edge of a forest, possibly a meadow, there is a dad at some point.

2. I am sure this one is from slightly earlier and is set in a busy American city, possibly New York. It might have been a picture book and my memory is that the main character lives with many other children (siblings) in some kind of an apartment in which they have many floor to ceiling bunk-beds, possibly several beds high which are kind of built into the walls.

There are 3 books I’m trying to find. The 3rd one is the one I am most lost on. All of these would been read between 2000-2010.

1. Preteen-teenage girl falls in water on a whale watching boat ride. She becomes a whale. When the opportunity to become a human again arises, she doesn’t really want to.

2. Teenage maybe college age girl studies abroad. Not sure where probably Europe. She almost gets SA’d by the man ripping off the button of her jeans, and I think later she tosses that button in a fountain? Cover of the book looked like an envelope.

3. A girl and her family go on a beach vacation (maybe a whole summer, not sure) and there is also another family staying on the beach nearby. I think the other family has multiple boys. The girl likes one of the boys and I think they kiss at some point. There was some kind of significance pertaining to a pebble? Maybe a shell? Something like that.

I have been searching for this book for almost a decade now and have had no luck, and I stumbled upon your blog and thought I might email you to give it a shot.  It wasn’t very long, more of a novella I imagine, and it was about a cat. The main character was a girl or teenager who kept seeing this cat and either she would black out or she would watch the cat destroy and I think even attack people around her, and when she came to awareness the cat was gone and all of the damage was blamed on her. In one instance of this there was a dress that was destroyed. The cat was some representation of the devil or something and there was a scene I think near the end where the girl chased the cat into an alley. The cover was mostly red or at least prominently featured it, and I think the title maybe had the word cat in it or some direct reference to the animal, though I could be wrong. 

I would like to ask regarding two books I’ve read as a young teenager around 5-7 years ago. One is a fantasy novel. I hope i remember the details correctly But it’s A series in fact where a young pig farmer boy was sucked up in an adventure of a lifetime even though he doesn’t seem to care too much. And for some reason people think that the prophecy is about him when it’s not and he’s always desperate to find someone else the prophecy could be about. It’s a good take on a reluctant hero being reluctant throughout the entire series 🤣 and a scene I remember vividly is where he beats the main antagonist of the series using pigs. Or something haha I hope this isn’t too obscure or nonsensical! The other is more of a coming-of-age story about this teenager who doesn’t have much going for him besides bowling. Where the story mainly revolves around his growing up being demotivated in school and has familial issues but eventually wins a bowling trophy. 

theres a book ive spent ten years trying to find but i cant. i got this book when i was 11 and i took it to school the very next day because i was excited to read it and forgot it somewhere (because i never took novels or literature books from home to school normally) and i havent been able to find it since then. i never got to read it properly, i read the first chapter but i dont remember it. what i do remember is the title and cover: it was called champagne (or had champagne in the name) and the cover was a dim yellow with an animated girl with a round face, hair pulled back in a bun, she was wearing a fancy yellow dress as if in a hollwood party, her shoulders, arm and half her chest were bare, and she was probably holding a champagne flute.