Sparrow tells a great story about a child’s book lust leading to theft and injury, and then she asks for a list of our favorite children’s books. I’m going to give you an abbreviated list here because I like lists and because I need to start a list of the 100 best children’s books ever. But I don’t really have time. So here are ten in no particular order.

1. Eight Cousins by Louisa May Alcott. As I said in my List of 100 Best Authors of Fiction, I like Eight Cousins even better than Little Women. It’s the story of an orphan girl, Rose, who comes to live with her bachelor uncle/guardian. She’s about 12 or 13 years old, and she has eight boy cousins who all live in the same neighborhood with her uncle, on a hill called by the family “Aunt Hill” for obvious reasons. The story tells how Rose grows up, how she gets to know her cousins, and how she guides theml and helps them to grow up, too.

2. Charlotte’s Web by E.B. White. So much has been said about this book. It’s just a perfectly balanced book about life and death and friendship and joy and sorrow and . . .

3. The Hobbit by JRR Tolkien. Bilbo Baggins goes on an adventure. Before the movies, before LOTR, came The Hobbit. More fun, less serious, still classic.

4. The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe by CS Lewis. I won’t let the popularity of Lewis spoil his books for me. I loved them when I was a kid of a girl, and I still do.

5. Ballet Shoes by Noel Streatfield. Pauline, Petrova, and Pansy are the Fossil sisters. They work together to help provide for their upkeep and attend ballet school and decide how to grow into their own gifts and talents.

6. A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L’Engle. I know all the objections just as I know all the objections to Harry Potter. The difference is that I enjoy Madeleine L’Engle’s books immensely, while I can’t bring myself to read HP. I instinctively react negatively to bandwagons.

7. Anne of Green Gables by L.M. Montgomery. Anne is such a winsome character—strong, independent, yet feminine to the bone. I loved Anne’s adventures.

8. Heidi by Johanna Spyri. Did you know that there are sequels to Heidi, Heidi Grows Up and Heidi’s Children? The last two are out of print, but available from used booksellers. I haven’t read the sequels in a long time, but I remember loving all three books.

9. Winnie the Pooh by A.A. Milne. Not Disney’s version, although it’s OK with me that Mr. Disney knew a good book when he saw one, but rather the stories about Pooh illustrated by Ernest Shepard are the real thing. Winnie the Pooh surely speaks to everyone–preschoolers, children, teenagers, young adults, and even us silly old bears.

10. The Saturdays by Elizabeth Enright The premise of this book, about four siblings who pool their money each week so that one of them can take his turn to go on a Saturday adventure, was intriguing to me as a girl. It would still be fun to go on a Saturday adventure all by myself.

I won’t say these are my ten favorites, but they are ten of my favorites. What a nice start for that list of 100.