80 books like Jim Trelease's Read-Aloud Handbook

I’ve been fascinated by relationships since I was a kid. I grew up a keen observer of the relationships in my own family, mostly focused on the way in which the dynamics were difficult for me. This led me to develop a strong interest in psychology, a passion I pursued in my undergraduate education. I became acutely intrigued by an idea a professor exposed me to early on – that experiences of safety and security within attachment relationships are essential in order for children to thrive, and that without safety/security, they can experience chronic struggles. This early interest paved the way for what developed into my career as a psychology professor and therapist.

I’ve written and spoken on raising children and creating a home environment that supports learning, self-worth, a growing faith, a confident child who has character and creativity. I’ve had a passion for children all my life, and after teaching and working with kids from ages two to eighteen, and college, I began writing to inspire and equip parents to make the most of the fast-moving years of their children’s growing up years. My books like Unlocking Your Child’s Learning Potential, When Mothers Pray, Mothering By Heart, The One Year Book of Praying Through the Bible, have been published in eighty countries because they are inspiring, contain doable ideas, and are applicable to parents in other nations.

I’ve written and spoken on raising children and creating a home environment that supports learning, self-worth, a growing faith, a confident child who has character and creativity. I’ve had a passion for children all my life, and after teaching and working with kids from ages two to eighteen, and college, I began writing to inspire and equip parents to make the most of the fast-moving years of their children’s growing up years. My books like Unlocking Your Child’s Learning Potential, When Mothers Pray, Mothering By Heart, The One Year Book of Praying Through the Bible, have been published in eighty countries because they are inspiring, contain doable ideas, and are applicable to parents in other nations.

I’ve written and spoken on raising children and creating a home environment that supports learning, self-worth, a growing faith, a confident child who has character and creativity. I’ve had a passion for children all my life, and after teaching and working with kids from ages two to eighteen, and college, I began writing to inspire and equip parents to make the most of the fast-moving years of their children’s growing up years. My books like Unlocking Your Child’s Learning Potential, When Mothers Pray, Mothering By Heart, The One Year Book of Praying Through the Bible, have been published in eighty countries because they are inspiring, contain doable ideas, and are applicable to parents in other nations.

As a speech pathologist, as well as a fiction writer and poet, I’ve been fascinated by language ever since I learned how to speak. Once I had kids, I was amazed to listen in on their conversations, which often surprised me in all the ways they were discovering and thinking about the world. I began researching how the adults in their lives could best help them express themselves—and how we can best understand them. Along the way, I realized that having these sorts of conversations can enhance our family lives and let us have more fun. I hope this list starts up some great conversations for you!

I write fiction and nonfiction. I tell the truth, but on occasion, I twist the truth to create entertaining stories to feed your soul like soul food Sunday. I write for kids: for the teeny tots and rebel rousers. Stories both short and long with characters brave, bold, and strong. Settings that transport you to a world so captivating, you don’t want to leave. My stories are like quilts, threaded with themes of love, hope, family, and food. They provide comfort, keeping you hopeful through times of despair. I handle your heart, mind, and soul with care. I love seeing children have agency on the page. I love that they do them, and they are unapologetic about what they do. 

I felt compelled to write this story, not just because the eventful lives of myself and members of my family, but mostly because of its historical content. Until this day the West knows very little of what actually happened in the early 1940s and after 1945 to countries and people who, after the war, finished up behind the Iron Curtain. From Fascism to Communism, they had fallen “Out of the frying pan into the fire.” People in those European countries, who had lived through and experienced those events, are now very thin on the ground.

When I was little, I knew I would work with books in some way, and I did, for many years working for one of the major children’s book publishers. But it wasn’t rewarding in the way I had hoped. Some kids know they want to be a teacher when they grow up. I definitely did not, yet I became one. I love finding ways to make learning fun. In my teaching days I found ways to get the most reluctant students to find something they could enjoy about learning. And now as an author, I find myself doing the same, and as a parent, seeking out books like the ones I recommend here that teach without teaching.

Dinty W. Moore is the author of the writing guides The Story Cure, Crafting the Personal Essay, and The Mindful Writer, among many other books. He has published essays and stories in Harper’s, The New York Times Magazine, The Southern Review, Creative Nonfiction, and elsewhere, and has taught master classes and workshops across the United States as well as in Ireland, Scotland, Spain, Switzerland, Canada, and Mexico.

As a reading educator my mission in life is to give the gift of literacy. Inspiration came from my mother, my first-grade teacher who taught me to read. At 90-plus years old and declining, I dedicated one of my 18 books on teaching literacy to her. She sent me the last letter she would ever write and said, “Oh, oh, oh!”—a quote from Dick and Jane, the book she used to teach reading to three generations of first graders—“I always wanted to write a book but never did. I hope a word of mine is on a page or two of yours.” Her inspiration is on every page.