Kids books that made you cringe

<p>Racist books: As a child, I lovedlovedloved the Noddy books, and Little Black Sambo. As a father . . . ummm, no. My children did encounter them, but with LOTS of framing discussion.</p>

<p>My D LOVED the Noddy books! But yes, there were a few discussions…</p>

<p>Yes, the Noddy books are hard to take. My younger brothers were big fans, I was too old - though I probably read them all anyway. </p>

<p>I don’t think Little Black Sambo is racist in the story - it just has appalling illustrations. There was a nice new telling of it called The Story of Little Babaji illustrated and slightly rewritten by Fred Marcellino. There’s also a version that goes a bit further afield by Julius Lester and illustrated by Jerry Pinkney (love him) called Sam and the Tigers.</p>

<p>Mathmom, as far as I can tell you and I are exactly the same age, and the Noddy books were old when I first read them (or at least I thought they were). By 1964 (or so), when I first stumbled on them, I don’t think anyone was writing books quite like that. (I just checked: the Noddy books I read were all published in the early '50s. Thanks again, Wikipedia! Apparently Noddy is still going strong, the golliwogs replaced by goblins.)</p>

<p>I agree with several posters about Richard Scarry. Never really did get it. Son read the Little House Books and liked them, daughter hated them, I don’t think she ever got past the first one. D used to like a book called “A Bad Case Of Stripes” which I know a lot of people found freaky. It was about a little girl who can’t be herself. She likes Lima Beans but none of her friends do and she wants to fit in. She starts taking on the characteristics of everything around her. For example, her skin turns into primary colored stripes when she puts on a striped dress. The front of the book has a girl with striped skin with a thermometer sticking out of her mouth. Of course there’s a happy ending when she learns to be herself.</p>

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<p>What books are you thinking of? I can think of a few, but I wouldn’t have considered it the prevailing theme in YA.</p>

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<p>Yeah, if someone doesn’t agree with your taste, it means they’re “unsophisticated”. I loved The Giver (though I think it’s more middle than high school level). I also loved Number The Stars (a book that manages to deal with very serious themes without being depressing, incidentally), but it’s written more for younger kids.</p>

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<p>Didn’t she have a boyfriend, at least in some of the books? :wink: Not that that means anything…but I don’t remember any indicators that she preferred girls.</p>

<p>JHS, I read the Noddy books between 1964 and 1967 when we lived in Somalia. I read a lot of British kids books then. And I read a lot period, since we had no TV and movies (once a week at the ex-pat club) were iffy. I’ve read tons and tons of books by Enid Blyton - I was totally addicted to her boarding school stories. Every once in a while an American girl would attend school - talk about cringeworthy!</p>

<p>Parp! parp!;)</p>

<p>Let’s see…</p>

<p>The Giver (and the other one set in the same world…Gathering Blue)</p>

<p>Goodnight, Mr. Tom</p>

<p>The Book Thief</p>

<p>Higher Power of Lucky (won Newberry last year I think…start out with Mom’s electrocution and goes on merrily from there). </p>

<p>That’s just five of course, but my daughter’s in high school now and she reads very quickly so I’m not sure what she’s been assigned at the moment. I know she read that Pi book about the boy and the tiger earlier in the year. She liked it. Not my cup of tea.</p>

<p>my younger daughter liked the Giver- we listened to that every night after her Really Rosie phase. She was 6 or so- and we had started listening to it in the car with her older sister.</p>

<p>Lots of dark books- Bridge to Terabithia come to mind but I know there were many others.</p>

<p>My Ds didn’t get into Goosebumps- but they sure liked Choose your own Adventure books & Bad News Ballet ;)</p>

<p>When my son was a first grader, he loved Curious George! One book he brought home from the school library featured Curious George on a “boring” school field trip to a natural history museum. In order to spice the field trip up, George began climbing on the dinosaur skeletons to the cheers of the students! What were they thinking??? I insisted that they remove the book from the school library and was told, “Sorry, they could not” , but I volunteered there for years and never saw the book again…</p>

<p>My son still gets upset about The Giver and he read it in 6th or 7th grade and now he is a junior - but he is not a big reader. My D, who is a big reader hated Sounder, she still complains about it - the only D she made in middle school or high school, the Sounder test, she never finished reading the book.</p>

<p>I didn’t like the Berenstain Bears, too long and namby-pamby, no big Curious George fans in our house either, parents or kids.</p>

<p>I also don’t like the Golden Compass/Dark Materials series - I just don’t think it should be marketed as children’s books - older teens is much more appropriate. The whole religion angle aside, I thought they were quite mean spirited, and as someone said, violent, more appropriate for adult or same as adult fantasy readers.</p>

<p>My D’s 6th grade year was the low point, they changed up the curriculum before DS got to 6th grade. They read 5 or 6 novels that year, each covered a different social ill or source of angst - to give you an idea, Sounder and The Outcasts were the light-hearted books in that group. By the end of the year my D was begging for harry Potter, anything.</p>

<p>Someone gave us a book that I think was called “The Dumb Bunny.” My kids were always forbidden from using the word “dumb” (they called it "the bad D word), so that was the wrong book to introduce into our house.</p>

<p>The worst books were the ones my SIL would get the kids. Picture books with lovely illustrations put out by some Christain publishing house, with HORRIBLY written stories about little girls whose lives were fullfilled by helping Mother with the chores…etc.</p>

<p>I never understood why people liked The Giving Tree - the tree is not the bad one - the boy is the selfish, unappreciative one!</p>

<p>I do love the Shel Silverstein poetry tho!</p>

<p>Written by Mrs. Duggar, no doubt. (Referencing #92)</p>

<p>Jemima Puddle-duck by Beatrix Potter has got to be the all time worst. I remember starting to read this book out loud to my daughter and I had to stop mid way and say l “let’s pick another book”. Jemima befriends a fox and two hound dogs who are nice to her just to get at her unhatched eggs. They eventually rush into her hiding place and EAT THE EGGS!. Then, Jemima lays some more but only some of them hatch. Really, just a terrible story!</p>

<p>Oh, yeah, Sounder. Yipes. There’s one to bring a smile to the lips of an indifferent reader. </p>

<p>As for the badly written Christian books, I wonder if anybody here’s ever run into the Lurlene McDaniels books, where <em>somebody</em> always had a fatal disease. </p>

<p>But the worst of all have to be the V.C. Andrews novels. I’ve known girls as young as 10 to be reading these. No redeeming qualities at all. I usually recommend that mom or dad read one. The parents are usually so happy that their daughter is reading something that they never look between the covers. I’ve had parents refuse to let their daughters ever own another one after a read-through. Talk about morbid and dwelling on the worst in human nature…</p>

<p>Note: V. C. Andrews only wrote 4 or 5 of the books before she passed. The rest – and there are a lot – were written under her name by other writers contracted to do so. Regrettably, in that case, the baser elements of a writer’s vision become the predominant ones because ‘that’s what sells.’</p>

<p>*Someone gave us a book that I think was called “The Dumb Bunny.” My kids were always forbidden from using the word “dumb” (they called it "the bad D word), so that was the wrong book to introduce into our house.
*</p>

<p>[That</a> reminds me of the Stupids](<a href=“http://www.kafejo.com/libroj/stupids.htm]That”>The Stupids)
I loved them</p>

<p>“Stupid” is also forbidden at our house…they used to call it the “bad S word.”(The “bad SH word” was “shut up.”)</p>

<p>My mother loved “The Runaway Bunny,” but my oldest sister still shudders if it comes up in conversation. No matter how the baby bunny tries to get away and have a separate adult life, his mother will be there in some supernatural form, watching over him. Not a good outcome in the eyes of an independent-minded kid.</p>

<p>Stupids!!! Yay!!!</p>

<p>Runaway Bunny: I agree with your sister some, Hanna. I always thought it was a little over-the-top. </p>

<p>A rabbi friend seriously maintains that it’s more about the deity – a very maternal conception of the deity, Shechinah – than actual mother-child relationships. There is something Jonah-like about that book.</p>