100 books like Bud, Not Buddy

This is the middle-grade novel that I so wish I had written. Kate DiCamillo is the best kids’ author writing today, and I devour everything she writes. She really gets kids, and Winn Dixie is my favorite dog in books.

The story of ten-year-old Opal and her found dog, Winn Dixie, makes me laugh, want to snuggle my dog, cry and reach out to hug motherless Opal every time I read it (usually once a year). I love the remarkably imperfect people Opal and her dog befriend, and the language is rich and authentic to the story. This is an unforgettable story about making a home for yourself against the odds.

This is one of my all-time favorite children’s WW2 books set on America’s home front. The year is 1944, and Lily is off to spend another magical summer in Rockaway. The beach and the boardwalk, the swimming and fishing, and her friend Margaret are waiting. But the summer soon begins to fall apart. Margaret and her family are leaving for a town in Michigan where her father has a job in a wartime factory. And her own father reveals that he is about to work as an engineer for the army somewhere in Europe.

Loneliness sets in until Lily meets an orphaned boy named Albert, a Hungarian refugee who is spending the summer with relatives. Albert’s parents have been taken by the Nazis, and his sister, Ruth, is left behind in France. Lily and Albert have much to learn from each other, and much to share. This book tells a… show more.

This fairytale fantasy for young readers is one of the most poignant books I have ever read, in any genre. My best friend, Emma, and I were both fans of Levine growing up. A few months ago, we realized we could both recite the epic poem that concludes this book word for word. Step follows step, hope follows courage. It’s a beautiful story of familial love, growing up and finding yourself, and grappling with the inevitability of illness and loss, all set in a delightfully adventurous fantasy world. The tone is playful and bright throughout, the message ultimately hopeful, but there’s no denying the heartbreak along the way.

My favorite image from my research on New York’s SoHo neighborhood is a photograph of a girl riding her bicycle through her parents’ loft apartment—a former factory transformed into an airy, art-filled home that was spacious enough to serve as an indoor playground.

This book captures what it was like to grow up in one of New York’s most famous artist communities. While few (if any) SoHo children helped to break up an international art forgery ring (like the one depicted in this YA novel), it evocatively captures the sense of adventure that children might have felt living in an industrial area during a time of neighborhood transition.

So what if his worldview never makes sense to anyone but himself? I see Holden Caulfield as the quintessential benchmark for a bad boy, shucking off the last few days at the boarding school that expelled him to wander around Manhattan in a daze. Some readers don’t like him so much that they are personally invested in attacking him and what he represents. 

But what is it that he represents, exactly? When I look beyond the surface of his false bravado, he’s a character deeply affected by the death of his brother and is setting out on a quest to understand how to be a real person in a world of phonies. Many of us, as teenagers, also have moments of feeling misunderstood and alone. I know I did, and so did Holden. 

After I read this book, #1 in a trilogy, I wrote to the author (something I rarely do), enthusing about how much I loved almost-orphan Lucky and her inspiring, tragic, hopeful, and heartwarming story. Ten-year-old Lucky’s greatest fear is that she’ll end up in an orphanage following the death of her mother, leaving Lucky to be raised by her absentee father’s ex-wife, Brigitte.

I was drawn into the lives of each of the splendidly flawed, quirky, and very real people in Lucky’s life, but it’s Lucky herself who I fell in love with because she’s so believably innocent and imperfect, working hard, with the support of her friends of all ages, to find her way in her tiny world of Hardpan, population 43.

Murakami is a magical realist genius, and this book is him at his mystifying, dream-like best. Expect otherworldly portals, sexually voracious ghosts, woodlands afflicted by mysterious fainting episodes, and, of course, an entire cast of talking cats.

What amazes me about Murakami’s writing is his ability to transfuse the mundane with the truly magical and to avoid all whimsy–even when writing about something as inherently whimsical as talking cats.

I’ve been a longtime fan of Tillie Walden, and love everything she creates, but Are You Listening? has a special place in my heart. It follows Bea and Lou, both running from their own grief, as they drive through West Texas together after a chance encounter.

It’s a strange, surreal, and emotionally complex story about the blossoming of an intergenerational queer friendship, and finding what you need on the road.

Walden’s a true master of cartooning, her lines are fluid, both sparse and incredibly impactful. I also can’t help but love that it takes place in my home state of Texas. 

Amazing non-fiction book featuring the real-life voices of homeless youth and the horrors they face from sexual exploitation to drug use, violence, and more.

I used this book for research for Theories. The stories from these kids broke my heart and made me determined to show the need for more resources for homeless youth. Leaves nothing to the imagination.

Don’t be fooled. A Town Called Solace may open with little Clara, and Elizabeth may be the character who speaks in the first person, but neither is the primary protagonist. According to the litmus test for primary protagonist—"Which character is transformed the most?”—it’s Liam Kane. Once a lonely boy unloved by his mother, his wife is now leaving him, and he has retreated to the small town of Solace to care for the estate of a mother figure he barely remembers. Will little Clara and her lost sister and the ordinary people of this rural town be enough to coax him out of his loneliness and back into participation with his own existence? The answer is nuanced and tender and ultimately very satisfying.