Category: Name That Book Request

I have one for ya. There is a book I read as a kid, maybe between 3rd and 5th grade, that took place in Mississippi. It was about a little girl from what I remember, and the only plot point I can really recall is that she was trying to hatch some eggs and at some point they got smashed. She might have lived with/had a close relationship with her grandmother or an elderly woman in the book.  We read it in school, so I don’t think it would be super niche but no matter what I search, I haven’t been able to find the book. It gave off a vibe sort of like Because of Winn-Dixie. Hopeful but also melancholy. I hope this is enough information

I just found your website and related instantly to the feeling of not being able to remember a book from childhood. I know you may have a lot of requests right now – I found your website through a viral tweet. I feel like this may bother me forever, so I would love you help. Below I will explain what I remember about the book.  I was born in 1996 and read the book in 8th grade / at age 13. It seemed at the time to be a contemporary young adult book, published probably in the 2000’s or 2010’s. I was living in Canada at the time. I’m not sure if that may effect anything.   The book was about a young girl who was separated from her psychotic mother. It had a present / past jumping back and forth storyline. She ends up going on a road trip to learn more about or maybe find her mother and discovers through revealed memories the mom had drowned three of her siblings in the bathtub. They all had weird names that were short and maybe one syllable.  It was an insane book and I enjoyed it very much. I would looooooooove to find and reread it as an adult. 

There’s a book I read around 5 or 6 years ago. I forgot its name but I recall it being my main fav book, like some peoples’ HP or Percy Jackson. Main character was male teenager, his name was in the title of the book but I forgot what it was. (Jeremy?). Plot involved being plunged into a strange new world and heralded as a chosen one because he was an outsider. He is searching for his father. I recall there being a scene where he is in a boat with sentient rats whom he empathizes with. I remember the author was very popular. That’s all I can remember.

Kia ora (hello) from Aotearoa (New Zealand) I’m 43 and grew up in America. I remember reading a book that I thought for years was Asimov but can’t find it. It’s about a group of teens (I think) who are put in this white room with stairs & platforms and a toilet that continuously flushes. I think they drink from that source?? they figure out they need to dance to get food pellets. I think flashing colored lights were used at some stage to signal them to dance?? there’s a bizarre ending and I think one or two of them are suddenly back in the real world thinking it was all a dream but then they see traffic lights.  I’m pretty sure the last line is “without hesitation, they began to dance.”

I’ve been trying to find this book (potentially a trilogy?) for a solid 10 years. We read it in grade school- so very early 2000s, but knowing my school it was from at least the 80s. The story is set around the life of a young girl in America during the 1800s. All I can remember is vignettes of the story, which are as follows: 1) at one point, she is with another young girl and the two are dying of hunger. The girl attempts to eat plain, raw flour and becomes extremely ill 2) she is ”kidnapped” by an indigenous tribe and married to one of the boys in the tribe. They grow rather fond of eachother and one night on a hunting trip temperatures drop below freezing so they wrap themselves in a fresh pelt. The pelt freezes them inside, and her husbands feet are exposed. Wolves descend upon him and EAT HIS FEET. i do not remember how she gets out of it but he dies. 3) potentially the same book? But i think there was a scene where she and another kid are sledding and end up falling through the snow/are trapped under an avalanche.

I’m looking for three books I read in middle school. I’ve scoured every thrift store and book shop in search of these 😭😭😭😭

1. The cover featured some kind of alley, it may have been garden or Victorian themed, and a gate that implied it went to another world. The authors last name likely started with A – K, probably no further than K. I don’t remember the plot, other than it had to do with the dimension shifting gate! 😭

2. I never saw the cover to this one, it was gone! The plot had to do with a boy who didn’t know how to swim, and a sweet old man taught him how to swim. Their beach side town gets hit by a Storm or tsunami in the climax of the book.

3. A slice of life story, I think the cover featured a bicycle and nothing else. I think the plot involved someone stealing the bike. It was a very simple straight forward story. 

1. What I assume is a children’s horror book or story. Ends with the character seeing scratches on the inside of a coffin and realizing they’d been trapped in there for a long time. They fought something supernatural.

2. A girl who is obsessed with a writer… Either of novels or poetry. A writer who wrote about the arctic. The book cover is white with bits of prose or words from the works of the writer the girl is obsessed with. Can’t remember plot. It was just beautifully written. Writers name in the book might have been Jack. Or been a famous writer from Amherst college. But I could be mixing up books.

 I’ve been looking everywhere for this weird children;s picture book where a boy gets turned into a fish. Perhaps by a magic fish? It’s not the “Rainbow fish” which is something that comes up when I google it.  Though this fish may have been rainbow-ey. It was kind of melancholy, and beautiful and unsettling, with very colorful rich illustrations. The boy ends up in the water still with his human face but with the body of a fish, and maybe he had to found someone to help turn him back into a boy or something?

I read this book when I was very young, and I remember little about it. I am not even 100% sure that it even is a YA book.  It is a horror book about a boy who slowly realizes that he is experiencing a demonic possession. One of the first things he notices is that his feet are filthy and there is dirt and leaves in his bed when he wakes up. He realizes he’s been outside at night for hours, presumably sleepwalking.  He somehow gets some help from a priest, who gives him a cross chain that has been blessed or something, which staves off his demon for a time. He has a friend who I think keeps an eye on him to see if he “relapses”. One day, the chain begins really irritating his skin so he removes it, and shortly after collapses to the ground. I distinctly remember the text describing how the friend opens his mouth to “make sure he hasn’t swallowed his tongue”.  I also remember this one weird line of text. The priest (I think) asks him a question. Something along the lines of “why don’t you like me?” / “why do you hate me?” / “why are you displaying aggression or disdain towards me?” The possessed boy responds: “Because you’re a [“x” almost sure it was a name].” And [X’s] are the enemy.”  The word “enemy” was in italics exactly that way, if that helps. I wish I had more to give you! I know this is so random and disjointed, but I don’t remember anything else about the book other than the fact that it scared the daylights out of me when I was a kid. I’d be supremely impressed if anyone solved this.

I read it in 2001 or so at camp (where I got sick with the flu basically immediately and was confined to the infirmary for like 4 days out of 14. Just my luck). I know the book was NOT a recent publication because it looked like it had been read a million times and had the vibe of late 80s/early 90s publishing.  It was a paperback book about a girl (maybe 14? I remember her being older than I was) who is sent to summer camp. She does not WANT to be at this summer camp. She is going out of her way to intentionally be miserable at camp so she will hopefully be sent home. the camp is owned and operated by a couple who are overly cheerful and own a beverage company called “Yummoo” or perhaps “Yum-moo.” I remember thinking “wow that’s weirdly close to yoo-hoo.” And it was described as a gross, chocolatey drink as well. I believe it was middle grade or perhaps YA—no longer than 200 pages (probably closer to 120-140).  At one point in time, she gets stuck in the shower at her camp with a horse. That’s the cover—it’s done in the kind of Babysitter’s Club realistic-but-still-art style. She is in the shower, with a horse, looking completely miserable. I feel like the book probably talks a lot about how much she hates the horse (and subsequently hates the camp).