more children's books
Continuing my book recs from my Swedish list of books, here are 20 non-Swedish children's authors I think you should read if you haven't already. Like before, they're ordered by debute date.
Edith Nesbit
I would like to put Edith Nesbit in the "oh, you've all heard of her" pile, but that's definitely not true in Sweden; I'm not sure what the situation is in other countries. Nesbit wrote, among other things, pre-fantasy fantasy: kids finding a Phoenix egg in a rolled-up carpet, or going back in time with the help of a heraldic animal. Her stories are often socially aware (Dickie Harding is quite Dickensian in nature, only with, y'know, magic) but also entertaining, with a great sense of adventure. Many later children's fantasy books owe her a great deal (for instance Diana Wynne Jones's The Ogre Downstairs). Several of her books are available through Project Gutenberg, though I hope several more are available in your local library.
Ethel Turner
I've mentioned Ethel Turner before (spoilers!); she's the author of the Seven Little Australians series as well as other books. I love old-fashioned children's novels, and SLA stands out to me for being so instantly relatable and seemingly genuine. The chapter where Meg over-corsets herself, for instance, could easily have shown up in a modern YA novel, although there of course she'd be starving herself instead. And of course there's Judy, who's only in the first book but remains one of my favourite old-children's-books heroines. A couple of Turner's books are also available on Project Gutenberg. And drat, reading the quote from SLA in my LJ I started crying. *wipes face*
Eric Linklater
One of the very few children's authors I've ficced ( in a crossover with Supernatural). I've only read two books of his - The Wind on the Moon and Pirates in the Deep Green Sea - but they're both delightful, so I fully count on his other work to be the same. TWOTM is about a couple of sisters called Dinah and Dorinda, who have a most interesting year after ”a wicked wind has blown into their hearts”. Among other things, they turn themselves into kangaroos, bullies a judge into letting the prisoners out (which also taught me the important lesson that never changing one's mind is just as disgusting as never changing one's underwear *g*), and save their father from a horrible tyrant. Timothy and Hew in PITDGS travel under the sea, where they make friends with long-named octopi, are taken into slavery by rivalling undead pirate captains (Dan Scumbril and Inky Poops - "scoundrels and nincompoops"), and in general have lots of fun. Both books are pretty surreal without quite being what I'd call fantasy; just the sort of delightful tales where anything can and does happen.
Michael Ende
Ende did write actual fantasy, though his most fantasy-like - and most well-known - book The Neverending Story (which is long, but not that long) isn't really my favourite. That honour goes to Momo, a tale about a young girl who has to save her friends and the world when little grey men have started stealing time. No one who has read this book will ever trust ”time-saving” things ever again. It's a haunting and delightful tale, and my favourite bit is the clairvoyant turtle Cassiopeia, who spells out messages on her shell. Other great Ende books are Ophelia's Shadow Theatre (a picture book) and The Night of Wishes: or, The Satanarchaeolidealcohellish Notion Potion (come on, how can you not love a book with that title?)
K.M. Peyton
My friend nfalkestav and I are both fans of K.M. Peyton, though in radically different ways. She likes the Pennington books (and would like fic for them, if anyone knows of any) and doesn't give a rat's ass about Flambards. I like the Flambards books and never really got into Pennington (though I did read the first book with Ruth Hollis in it). Anyway. Flambards with sequels are slightly romantic, very British books set in the early 20th century. They have everything: The well-bred young orphan girl sent to live with a tyrannical uncle, the dashing cousins, the adoring stable boy, the impending war, the fox hunts, the new airplanes... and yet they avoid the bombastic and stay remarkably sane and down-to-earth. When I bought the books as a kid, only the three first ones were available in Swedish; I've never read the fourth one, which as I understand it is quite different and even a bit controversial among fans. Yes - these books have an actual fandom and quite an active one! I'm not a part of it, but I probably would have, as a kid. (And I suspect I'd not have been very happy about book 4 either; not considering which single Flambards character made it into my long-term fantasy life.)
Rosemary Harris
My first semi-obscure author on this list. Like Peyton (and many others on this list), Harris came to my attention through the children's book club. She wrote a lovely trilogy about ancient Egypt in Noah's time, only the first of which having anything to do with the Biblical story. There are supernatural elements, particularly in the first book (the description of angels making plans for the flood is hilarious), but mostly it's a straightforward adventure tale, sometimes dipping into character development or romance. The books do have a tendency towards racism in places, but they have so many engaging characters and such a sense of fun and compassion that personally, I can overlook those bits and concentrate on the good parts.
Diana Wynne Jones
Not obscure to anyone reading my LJ *g*, but I couldn't very well skip her, nor did I feel that she quite fit into the "you'll already know this" list. She is my very favourite author of children's and YA fantasy, and I love how versatile her books are. I've already mentioned the Nesbit-like The Ogre Downstairs, but there's also the melancholy Dogsbody, the parodic Howl's Moving Castle (for those of you who've seen the film - the first half is more-or-less like the book, though less parodic, and the second half nothing whatsoever like the book), the complex Fire and Hemlock, the straightforward-adventurous Chrestomanci books, the dark Time of the Ghost, the rauncy A Sudden Wild Magic - and let's not forget the delightful way she describes a fantasy convention in Deep Secret. All so different, and yet recognizably part of the same brain. She has so many memorable books (I haven't even mentioned all my favourites) and memorable characters. And for those of you who like Neil Gaiman, the two of them have a strange in-book flirtation going on, where she even includes his morning habits in the character of Nick in Deep Secret. Seriously, I can't even describe why you have to read DWJ. You just do.
Eva Ibbotson
Yet another one of those fantasy authors I read as a kid. Ibbotson's main appeal is her vivid and imaginative approach to ghosts, witches, and other peculiar creatures. My favourite among her books is Which Witch, where a wizard arranges a pageant for evil witches in order to find himself a bride. What I love about the book is in part the hilarity of the idea, and in part that even though the witches (except the saintly protagonist Belladonna) and the wizard are evil, this is not particularly held against them. Even the nastiest piece of work among them gets kind-of a happy ending when she falls in love with a similarly homicidal ex-ghost. You're left to wonder which one of them will kill the other first. :-) The bad guys in her books are usually ordinary people who hate anything that so much as smells different and will do anything to eradicate it; that, or people who are exceptionally greedy and all about the money. There's a hilarious bit in Not Just a Witch where she explains that "evil" doesn't mean anyone who's ever battered their bank manager to death: "Battering your bank manager to death with a hammer is not good, of course, but anyone can lose their temper, and some bank managers are very annoying." Many of the books also contain bits about animal rights, directly or metaphorically. Her main downside, to me, is that her protagonists are often such upstanding, scout-like children and that there's sometimes an air of "how could any right-minded child not find giant spiders adorable?" Ibbotson also writes romance novels, which escape the most mind-numbing stereotypes by being as tongue-in-cheek as the rest of her stuff.
Lois Lowry
If I was a rich woman, I would instantly buy all of Lowry's Anastasia books. As it is, I've only read the three that were available in my library when I was a kid, but I adored those three. Anastasia is a girl with a very funny view of life, who always manages to get herself into very peculiar kinds of trouble. Even I, who have such a huge embarrassment squick, am usually more amused than mortified by her problems. She gets these bizarre ideas about life, like when she's trying to write a detective story about her family in one of the books (found the quote on a website since I don't have the book handy, least of all in English): "'The tall bearded stranger sipped thoughtfully at a beer, with his eyes closed, listening to Mozart.' In an Agatha Christie book, Anastasia realized, there had always been at least one murder by Chapter 4. So she wrote ominously: 'Mozart was dead.'" The Anastasia books alone would have been enough for her to qualify on this list, but she's also written haunting sci-fi story The Giver and tragic A Summer to Die, both beautiful, and so different from the Anastasia books and each other that I'm thoroughly impressed.
Niki Daly
Sticking Niki Daly up here feels a bit odd, since he's one of the authors I've discovered lately rather than read as a child, but since it's the date of writing the first book, not the date of me reading it, that matters, here he is. :-) Daly illustrates picture books as well as writing some of his own. I especially like his Kwela Jamela books, about a very plucky little girl who has small, everyday adventures. (Like in the book where her family moves and she falls asleep in a moving carton - they keep wondering where she is, and why the carton is so heavy, but don't figure it out.)
Lynne Reid Banks
Back to the childhood favourites. Banks is most well-known for The Indian in the Cupboard, but I never really cared much for that one. She's on the list mainly for Maura's Angel, one of the most interesting books with mythological/religious elements I've seen. The angel of the title questions God's motives and as a result is sent to Earth to live a human life in the war-torn city of Belfast. This isn't a preachy book - as I understand it, Banks is an atheist - but a view of spirituality, humanity and the theodicé problem that, as I said, is very interesting. I'm also fond of Melusine, which mixes ordinary family life with supernatural elements and a tragedy of abuse in a way that should be jarring but really works well.
Michelle Magorian
As a child, nearly every summer I'd listen to radio theater in the mornings, children's books remade into radio serials. The one that made the biggest impression was Peter Dickinson's Annerton Pit, but the runner-up, and the one that made me discover a new favourite author, was Goodnight Mister Tom. I laughed, cried, and lived with the people of the story, and I still do every time I read the book. (I just wish those radio plays were available to be bought.) The heartbreakingly deferential Will(ie), the gruff but loving Tom, the cheeky Zach... they're all so very real people to me. And then I searched out the library and found Back Home, and later Deep Water, A Cuckoo in the Nest and others, and the thoroughly amazing A Little Love Song, about a teenage girl's road to self-discovery, which now rivals GMT as my favourite. Most of Magorian's books take place during or right after WWII, and they're all very believable and compassionate, while also having some very fun moments.
Cynthia Voigt
Cynthia Voigt is best known for the Tillerman books, starting with a very good story about the tough teen Dicey Tillerman who leads her siblings the long way to their grandmother after their mother dies. (I remember as a kid talking about Dicey, and my sister tried to correct me: ”"It's pronounced Daisy." "D-I-C-E-Y," I said, and she had to admit I was right. *g*) The best thing about these books isn't just that they're well written, but that they eventually bransch out so that Dicey's two best friends, as well as her uncle (who's dead by the time the first book starts) get books of their own, making the world even more well-rounded than before. I also have a soft spot for Izzy Willy-Nilly, in part because - you know me - I can't resist well-written disability stories, but also because it features such a kick-ass baby dyke in the protagonist's friend Rosamunde. (No, it never says she's a baby dyke. That's just my interpretation.) Voigt also writes stories in a sort of history/fantasy setting, but despite my love for the genre those never really worked for me - On Fortune's Wheel a little bit, maybe. Voigt still writes books, though I haven't read the most recent ones. (She's a tad too difficult for most of the kids at school, so I haven't bought them for the library.)
Roddy Doyle
Doyle is best known for his adult material, which I haven't read (though I've obviously seen The Commitment), but I mention him here for his trilogy of books about the Mack family: The Giggler Treatment, Rover Saves Christmas, and The Meanwhile Adventures. They're bizarre stories mixing slapstick with witticism, and requires quite a bit from the reader - I recommended the first book for a teacher to read aloud to 8-year-olds, but that proved too difficult; only the most advanced pupils enjoyed the story. But for older kids and adults, I still wholeheartedly recommend them. I love the beginning of book number 3, where the imagined reader forces the author to restart the story several times because it's too boring.
Jørn Jensen
Jensen is hands-down the most popular writer at my workplace. The kids soak up his books en masse. He writes short, simple stories especially designed to suit beginner readers. The most popular among the kids are the Kasper books, about soccer, though my favourites (not being into soccer) are the Palle books, about a boy and his whimsical dad. Jensen has also written "horror" stories for the beginning reader (there's always a logical explanation), as well as simplified (in vocabulary, not content) fairy tales.
Russell Stannard
If you want to understand what the hell Albert Einstein was on about while still reading on a 10-year-old's level, Stannard is the go-to guy. He's written three fun, interesting books about the girl Gedanken and her "Uncle Albert" who explains the laws of physics to her - often by letting her pilot his imaginary space ship. I have no idea how well these books hold up from a scientific perspective (though he's a professor emeritus in physics, so I'd imagine fairly well), but they're certainly very entertaining. He has also written Here I Am, about a boy who meets God, but I remember not liking that one as much - an author providing answers from God to ten-year-olds is bound to hit some ground that is, to be frank, trite.
Hilary McKay
The first Casson family books were already in the library when I started working. By the time the third one arrived (requested by kids) I got curious and started taking them home. I waited for #4 as eagerly as ever the fifth-grade girls. The Cassons are one of those quirky bohemic families which sometimes come off as just a tad negligent, but make up for it by permitting their kids to grow into loving, free-spirited individuals. I can't say one of the characters is a favourite before another - for one thing, several years pass between books, so they're not always exactly the same - rather, it's the dynamic between them that captures my heart. While mostly light, the books also touch more serious emotions and subjects, without letting them take over.
Ian Falconer
Ian Falconer is a nutter. Which is good. :-) He's written a series of picture books about the little pig girl Olivia, adventurous, sometimes ill-behaved, and very imaginative. The pictures are delightful, in red, white and black, and the stories highly amusing. I particularly fell hard for Olivia Saves the Circus, like the scene where a humourless teacher questions Olivia's sincerity about her adventures in the circus: "Was that true?". "Pretty true". "All true?". "Pretty all true". "Are you sure, Olivia?". "To the best of my recollection" (Silly teacher. When the kid can spin a tale like that one, who cares if it's true or not?)
Randa Abdel-Fattah
There are only two books by this author so far, but I'm putting her on this list as an encouragement for you to read her and makes her write more. Imagine Meg Cabot writing about Australian Muslim girls trying to find their place in the world, and you get very close to Randa Abdel-Fattah. The protagonist of her first book, Does My Head Look Fat in This, is very sure of herself and her religion, but when she decides to wear a hijab after watching a certain episode of Friends, she has to fight to make others accept her choices too. The protagonist of Ten Things I Hate About Me is much more insecure and leads a double life - the Muslim Jamilah at home and the blonde Aussie Jamie in school. It's a tiresome situation, and obviously it can't hold throughout the whole book. The books treat serious subjects in a fun, entertaining, and caring way, and the first one in particular is a delight to read. (The second one has horrible mistranslations in the Swedish version, so Swedes on my flist, read the original if you can.)
Kirsten Miller
I'm finishing off with an author I've only read one book by, and that only a week ago. Kiki Strike: Inside the Shadow City is a Blytonesque (but much better!) story about a gang of New York girls (”The Irregulars”) determined to find out the city's secrets. It's engaging, fun, and sometimes informative - the person who tipped me of the book said you're dying to go to NYC after reading it, and I must agree! The narrator of the story is 12 (later 14) years old Ananka Fishbein, whose parents inherited money that could only be used for education, which means Ananka goes to a fancy school but can't afford a decent haircut. She's intelligent (though not very interested in school), well-read and curious, and her curiousity is rewarded when she meets the mysterious Kiki Strike, who wants to be ”dangerous” when she grows up and who quickly assembles the other girls to help her in her quest: the master of disguise Betty Bent, the inventor wiz Luz Lopez, the chemist DeeDee Morlock, and the hacker Oona Wong. They're all memorable characters, and it wasn't until I'd finished with the book that I realized that they're also all female, as are the other important characters in the book. (And hey, pretty culturally diverse too.) And of course, the fact that Kiki's real name is Katarina is an extra bonus. :-) I'll be very eager to read the next book as soon as it's available in translation so I can buy it to the library - it's not like I can afford buying books for just me right now.
That's all, folks! Obviously there are heaps and heaps of other authors I love - consider this a morsel. Sorry that so many are from English-speaking countries, but that's kind of what the market looks like in Sweden. The stuff that's not our own tends to be either translations from English, the Nordic countries, or German. Oh, and the Japanese and Korean manga translations, of course, but I'm really no expert on manga.
I fully expect you to already be familiar with these writers: Mark Twain, LM Montgomery, Lloyd Alexander, JK Rowling, Roald Dahl, P.L. Travers, Lewis Carroll, Maurice Sendak, H.A. Rey, and S.E. Hinton. If you're not, pop me a comment and I'll be happy to talk about them too.
I'd also like to semi-recommend Erlend Loe - the reason it's only semi is because I haven't had time to read his books from cover to cover (just a few pages here and there), because I already had 20 writers on the list, and because he's not translated into English. He's an absolutely hilarious Norwegian writer whose books about the truck driver Kurt really warm my heart.
Edith Nesbit
I would like to put Edith Nesbit in the "oh, you've all heard of her" pile, but that's definitely not true in Sweden; I'm not sure what the situation is in other countries. Nesbit wrote, among other things, pre-fantasy fantasy: kids finding a Phoenix egg in a rolled-up carpet, or going back in time with the help of a heraldic animal. Her stories are often socially aware (Dickie Harding is quite Dickensian in nature, only with, y'know, magic) but also entertaining, with a great sense of adventure. Many later children's fantasy books owe her a great deal (for instance Diana Wynne Jones's The Ogre Downstairs). Several of her books are available through Project Gutenberg, though I hope several more are available in your local library.
Ethel Turner
I've mentioned Ethel Turner before (spoilers!); she's the author of the Seven Little Australians series as well as other books. I love old-fashioned children's novels, and SLA stands out to me for being so instantly relatable and seemingly genuine. The chapter where Meg over-corsets herself, for instance, could easily have shown up in a modern YA novel, although there of course she'd be starving herself instead. And of course there's Judy, who's only in the first book but remains one of my favourite old-children's-books heroines. A couple of Turner's books are also available on Project Gutenberg. And drat, reading the quote from SLA in my LJ I started crying. *wipes face*
Eric Linklater
One of the very few children's authors I've ficced ( in a crossover with Supernatural). I've only read two books of his - The Wind on the Moon and Pirates in the Deep Green Sea - but they're both delightful, so I fully count on his other work to be the same. TWOTM is about a couple of sisters called Dinah and Dorinda, who have a most interesting year after ”a wicked wind has blown into their hearts”. Among other things, they turn themselves into kangaroos, bullies a judge into letting the prisoners out (which also taught me the important lesson that never changing one's mind is just as disgusting as never changing one's underwear *g*), and save their father from a horrible tyrant. Timothy and Hew in PITDGS travel under the sea, where they make friends with long-named octopi, are taken into slavery by rivalling undead pirate captains (Dan Scumbril and Inky Poops - "scoundrels and nincompoops"), and in general have lots of fun. Both books are pretty surreal without quite being what I'd call fantasy; just the sort of delightful tales where anything can and does happen.
Michael Ende
Ende did write actual fantasy, though his most fantasy-like - and most well-known - book The Neverending Story (which is long, but not that long) isn't really my favourite. That honour goes to Momo, a tale about a young girl who has to save her friends and the world when little grey men have started stealing time. No one who has read this book will ever trust ”time-saving” things ever again. It's a haunting and delightful tale, and my favourite bit is the clairvoyant turtle Cassiopeia, who spells out messages on her shell. Other great Ende books are Ophelia's Shadow Theatre (a picture book) and The Night of Wishes: or, The Satanarchaeolidealcohellish Notion Potion (come on, how can you not love a book with that title?)
K.M. Peyton
My friend nfalkestav and I are both fans of K.M. Peyton, though in radically different ways. She likes the Pennington books (and would like fic for them, if anyone knows of any) and doesn't give a rat's ass about Flambards. I like the Flambards books and never really got into Pennington (though I did read the first book with Ruth Hollis in it). Anyway. Flambards with sequels are slightly romantic, very British books set in the early 20th century. They have everything: The well-bred young orphan girl sent to live with a tyrannical uncle, the dashing cousins, the adoring stable boy, the impending war, the fox hunts, the new airplanes... and yet they avoid the bombastic and stay remarkably sane and down-to-earth. When I bought the books as a kid, only the three first ones were available in Swedish; I've never read the fourth one, which as I understand it is quite different and even a bit controversial among fans. Yes - these books have an actual fandom and quite an active one! I'm not a part of it, but I probably would have, as a kid. (And I suspect I'd not have been very happy about book 4 either; not considering which single Flambards character made it into my long-term fantasy life.)
Rosemary Harris
My first semi-obscure author on this list. Like Peyton (and many others on this list), Harris came to my attention through the children's book club. She wrote a lovely trilogy about ancient Egypt in Noah's time, only the first of which having anything to do with the Biblical story. There are supernatural elements, particularly in the first book (the description of angels making plans for the flood is hilarious), but mostly it's a straightforward adventure tale, sometimes dipping into character development or romance. The books do have a tendency towards racism in places, but they have so many engaging characters and such a sense of fun and compassion that personally, I can overlook those bits and concentrate on the good parts.
Diana Wynne Jones
Not obscure to anyone reading my LJ *g*, but I couldn't very well skip her, nor did I feel that she quite fit into the "you'll already know this" list. She is my very favourite author of children's and YA fantasy, and I love how versatile her books are. I've already mentioned the Nesbit-like The Ogre Downstairs, but there's also the melancholy Dogsbody, the parodic Howl's Moving Castle (for those of you who've seen the film - the first half is more-or-less like the book, though less parodic, and the second half nothing whatsoever like the book), the complex Fire and Hemlock, the straightforward-adventurous Chrestomanci books, the dark Time of the Ghost, the rauncy A Sudden Wild Magic - and let's not forget the delightful way she describes a fantasy convention in Deep Secret. All so different, and yet recognizably part of the same brain. She has so many memorable books (I haven't even mentioned all my favourites) and memorable characters. And for those of you who like Neil Gaiman, the two of them have a strange in-book flirtation going on, where she even includes his morning habits in the character of Nick in Deep Secret. Seriously, I can't even describe why you have to read DWJ. You just do.
Eva Ibbotson
Yet another one of those fantasy authors I read as a kid. Ibbotson's main appeal is her vivid and imaginative approach to ghosts, witches, and other peculiar creatures. My favourite among her books is Which Witch, where a wizard arranges a pageant for evil witches in order to find himself a bride. What I love about the book is in part the hilarity of the idea, and in part that even though the witches (except the saintly protagonist Belladonna) and the wizard are evil, this is not particularly held against them. Even the nastiest piece of work among them gets kind-of a happy ending when she falls in love with a similarly homicidal ex-ghost. You're left to wonder which one of them will kill the other first. :-) The bad guys in her books are usually ordinary people who hate anything that so much as smells different and will do anything to eradicate it; that, or people who are exceptionally greedy and all about the money. There's a hilarious bit in Not Just a Witch where she explains that "evil" doesn't mean anyone who's ever battered their bank manager to death: "Battering your bank manager to death with a hammer is not good, of course, but anyone can lose their temper, and some bank managers are very annoying." Many of the books also contain bits about animal rights, directly or metaphorically. Her main downside, to me, is that her protagonists are often such upstanding, scout-like children and that there's sometimes an air of "how could any right-minded child not find giant spiders adorable?" Ibbotson also writes romance novels, which escape the most mind-numbing stereotypes by being as tongue-in-cheek as the rest of her stuff.
Lois Lowry
If I was a rich woman, I would instantly buy all of Lowry's Anastasia books. As it is, I've only read the three that were available in my library when I was a kid, but I adored those three. Anastasia is a girl with a very funny view of life, who always manages to get herself into very peculiar kinds of trouble. Even I, who have such a huge embarrassment squick, am usually more amused than mortified by her problems. She gets these bizarre ideas about life, like when she's trying to write a detective story about her family in one of the books (found the quote on a website since I don't have the book handy, least of all in English): "'The tall bearded stranger sipped thoughtfully at a beer, with his eyes closed, listening to Mozart.' In an Agatha Christie book, Anastasia realized, there had always been at least one murder by Chapter 4. So she wrote ominously: 'Mozart was dead.'" The Anastasia books alone would have been enough for her to qualify on this list, but she's also written haunting sci-fi story The Giver and tragic A Summer to Die, both beautiful, and so different from the Anastasia books and each other that I'm thoroughly impressed.
Niki Daly
Sticking Niki Daly up here feels a bit odd, since he's one of the authors I've discovered lately rather than read as a child, but since it's the date of writing the first book, not the date of me reading it, that matters, here he is. :-) Daly illustrates picture books as well as writing some of his own. I especially like his Kwela Jamela books, about a very plucky little girl who has small, everyday adventures. (Like in the book where her family moves and she falls asleep in a moving carton - they keep wondering where she is, and why the carton is so heavy, but don't figure it out.)
Lynne Reid Banks
Back to the childhood favourites. Banks is most well-known for The Indian in the Cupboard, but I never really cared much for that one. She's on the list mainly for Maura's Angel, one of the most interesting books with mythological/religious elements I've seen. The angel of the title questions God's motives and as a result is sent to Earth to live a human life in the war-torn city of Belfast. This isn't a preachy book - as I understand it, Banks is an atheist - but a view of spirituality, humanity and the theodicé problem that, as I said, is very interesting. I'm also fond of Melusine, which mixes ordinary family life with supernatural elements and a tragedy of abuse in a way that should be jarring but really works well.
Michelle Magorian
As a child, nearly every summer I'd listen to radio theater in the mornings, children's books remade into radio serials. The one that made the biggest impression was Peter Dickinson's Annerton Pit, but the runner-up, and the one that made me discover a new favourite author, was Goodnight Mister Tom. I laughed, cried, and lived with the people of the story, and I still do every time I read the book. (I just wish those radio plays were available to be bought.) The heartbreakingly deferential Will(ie), the gruff but loving Tom, the cheeky Zach... they're all so very real people to me. And then I searched out the library and found Back Home, and later Deep Water, A Cuckoo in the Nest and others, and the thoroughly amazing A Little Love Song, about a teenage girl's road to self-discovery, which now rivals GMT as my favourite. Most of Magorian's books take place during or right after WWII, and they're all very believable and compassionate, while also having some very fun moments.
Cynthia Voigt
Cynthia Voigt is best known for the Tillerman books, starting with a very good story about the tough teen Dicey Tillerman who leads her siblings the long way to their grandmother after their mother dies. (I remember as a kid talking about Dicey, and my sister tried to correct me: ”"It's pronounced Daisy." "D-I-C-E-Y," I said, and she had to admit I was right. *g*) The best thing about these books isn't just that they're well written, but that they eventually bransch out so that Dicey's two best friends, as well as her uncle (who's dead by the time the first book starts) get books of their own, making the world even more well-rounded than before. I also have a soft spot for Izzy Willy-Nilly, in part because - you know me - I can't resist well-written disability stories, but also because it features such a kick-ass baby dyke in the protagonist's friend Rosamunde. (No, it never says she's a baby dyke. That's just my interpretation.) Voigt also writes stories in a sort of history/fantasy setting, but despite my love for the genre those never really worked for me - On Fortune's Wheel a little bit, maybe. Voigt still writes books, though I haven't read the most recent ones. (She's a tad too difficult for most of the kids at school, so I haven't bought them for the library.)
Roddy Doyle
Doyle is best known for his adult material, which I haven't read (though I've obviously seen The Commitment), but I mention him here for his trilogy of books about the Mack family: The Giggler Treatment, Rover Saves Christmas, and The Meanwhile Adventures. They're bizarre stories mixing slapstick with witticism, and requires quite a bit from the reader - I recommended the first book for a teacher to read aloud to 8-year-olds, but that proved too difficult; only the most advanced pupils enjoyed the story. But for older kids and adults, I still wholeheartedly recommend them. I love the beginning of book number 3, where the imagined reader forces the author to restart the story several times because it's too boring.
Jørn Jensen
Jensen is hands-down the most popular writer at my workplace. The kids soak up his books en masse. He writes short, simple stories especially designed to suit beginner readers. The most popular among the kids are the Kasper books, about soccer, though my favourites (not being into soccer) are the Palle books, about a boy and his whimsical dad. Jensen has also written "horror" stories for the beginning reader (there's always a logical explanation), as well as simplified (in vocabulary, not content) fairy tales.
Russell Stannard
If you want to understand what the hell Albert Einstein was on about while still reading on a 10-year-old's level, Stannard is the go-to guy. He's written three fun, interesting books about the girl Gedanken and her "Uncle Albert" who explains the laws of physics to her - often by letting her pilot his imaginary space ship. I have no idea how well these books hold up from a scientific perspective (though he's a professor emeritus in physics, so I'd imagine fairly well), but they're certainly very entertaining. He has also written Here I Am, about a boy who meets God, but I remember not liking that one as much - an author providing answers from God to ten-year-olds is bound to hit some ground that is, to be frank, trite.
Hilary McKay
The first Casson family books were already in the library when I started working. By the time the third one arrived (requested by kids) I got curious and started taking them home. I waited for #4 as eagerly as ever the fifth-grade girls. The Cassons are one of those quirky bohemic families which sometimes come off as just a tad negligent, but make up for it by permitting their kids to grow into loving, free-spirited individuals. I can't say one of the characters is a favourite before another - for one thing, several years pass between books, so they're not always exactly the same - rather, it's the dynamic between them that captures my heart. While mostly light, the books also touch more serious emotions and subjects, without letting them take over.
Ian Falconer
Ian Falconer is a nutter. Which is good. :-) He's written a series of picture books about the little pig girl Olivia, adventurous, sometimes ill-behaved, and very imaginative. The pictures are delightful, in red, white and black, and the stories highly amusing. I particularly fell hard for Olivia Saves the Circus, like the scene where a humourless teacher questions Olivia's sincerity about her adventures in the circus: "Was that true?". "Pretty true". "All true?". "Pretty all true". "Are you sure, Olivia?". "To the best of my recollection" (Silly teacher. When the kid can spin a tale like that one, who cares if it's true or not?)
Randa Abdel-Fattah
There are only two books by this author so far, but I'm putting her on this list as an encouragement for you to read her and makes her write more. Imagine Meg Cabot writing about Australian Muslim girls trying to find their place in the world, and you get very close to Randa Abdel-Fattah. The protagonist of her first book, Does My Head Look Fat in This, is very sure of herself and her religion, but when she decides to wear a hijab after watching a certain episode of Friends, she has to fight to make others accept her choices too. The protagonist of Ten Things I Hate About Me is much more insecure and leads a double life - the Muslim Jamilah at home and the blonde Aussie Jamie in school. It's a tiresome situation, and obviously it can't hold throughout the whole book. The books treat serious subjects in a fun, entertaining, and caring way, and the first one in particular is a delight to read. (The second one has horrible mistranslations in the Swedish version, so Swedes on my flist, read the original if you can.)
Kirsten Miller
I'm finishing off with an author I've only read one book by, and that only a week ago. Kiki Strike: Inside the Shadow City is a Blytonesque (but much better!) story about a gang of New York girls (”The Irregulars”) determined to find out the city's secrets. It's engaging, fun, and sometimes informative - the person who tipped me of the book said you're dying to go to NYC after reading it, and I must agree! The narrator of the story is 12 (later 14) years old Ananka Fishbein, whose parents inherited money that could only be used for education, which means Ananka goes to a fancy school but can't afford a decent haircut. She's intelligent (though not very interested in school), well-read and curious, and her curiousity is rewarded when she meets the mysterious Kiki Strike, who wants to be ”dangerous” when she grows up and who quickly assembles the other girls to help her in her quest: the master of disguise Betty Bent, the inventor wiz Luz Lopez, the chemist DeeDee Morlock, and the hacker Oona Wong. They're all memorable characters, and it wasn't until I'd finished with the book that I realized that they're also all female, as are the other important characters in the book. (And hey, pretty culturally diverse too.) And of course, the fact that Kiki's real name is Katarina is an extra bonus. :-) I'll be very eager to read the next book as soon as it's available in translation so I can buy it to the library - it's not like I can afford buying books for just me right now.
That's all, folks! Obviously there are heaps and heaps of other authors I love - consider this a morsel. Sorry that so many are from English-speaking countries, but that's kind of what the market looks like in Sweden. The stuff that's not our own tends to be either translations from English, the Nordic countries, or German. Oh, and the Japanese and Korean manga translations, of course, but I'm really no expert on manga.
I fully expect you to already be familiar with these writers: Mark Twain, LM Montgomery, Lloyd Alexander, JK Rowling, Roald Dahl, P.L. Travers, Lewis Carroll, Maurice Sendak, H.A. Rey, and S.E. Hinton. If you're not, pop me a comment and I'll be happy to talk about them too.
I'd also like to semi-recommend Erlend Loe - the reason it's only semi is because I haven't had time to read his books from cover to cover (just a few pages here and there), because I already had 20 writers on the list, and because he's not translated into English. He's an absolutely hilarious Norwegian writer whose books about the truck driver Kurt really warm my heart.