Ten North Frederick by John O’Hara wins the National Book Award.

Andersonville by MacKinlay Kantor wins the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction.

Juan Ramón Jiménez wins the Nobel Prize for Literature.

C.S. Lewis’s The Last Battle wins the Carnegie Medal, not his best, but it was about time.

Published in 1956:
Imperial Woman by Pearl S. Buck. A fictionalized biography of Ci-xi, aka Tz’u Hsi, the Last Empress of China. I have this book on my shelves, and it’s not just fictionalized—it’s Fiction using the names and circumstances of historical characters. But it’s a good story and it does give a flavor of China in the latter 19th century.

Till We Have Faces by C.S. Lewis. I have so many favorites when it comes to C.S. Lewis, but Till We have Faces is such a wonderful re-telling of the Cupid and Psyche myth. There are so many layers to the story. I must re-read this one soon.

Palace Walk by Naguib Mahfouz. This book is the first in Mahfouz’s Cairo Trilogy, and it’s a possible read for my North Africa Challenge this year.

The Silver Sword by Ian Serraillier (also called Escape from Warsaw). I love this children’s novel set in the aftermath of World War II about refugee children from Poland who manage to be reunited with their father in Switzerland despite many obstacles.

Dead Man’s Folly by Agatha Christie. I remember this one in which Poirot and mystery writer Ariadne Oliver arrange a murder hunt on a large estate, and the whole thing turns truly deadly. The character of Ariadne Oliver, possibility Agatha Christie’s alter-ego, adds a lot of fun to the story.

Might as Well Be Dead and Three Witnesses by Rex Stout. More Nero Wolfe. THere’s never too much Nero Wolfe, even at 300+ pounds.

Eloise by Kay Thompson. My urchins love Eloise, but I think she’s a brat, especially in the movies that are based on Thompson’s stories about this six-year old girl who lives on the top floor of the Plaza Hotel in New York City. We disagree.

Martin Gardner begins his Mathematical Games column in Scientific American magazine. Have any of you ever looked at the classic collections of math games and puzzles by Martin Gardner? Classic fun for math geeks like my Engineer Husband.