Here are 100 books that The Sea Lion's Friend fans have personally recommended if you like
The Sea Lion's Friend.
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I teach writing for children and I’ve analyzed the elements that make a winning story. One of these elements is the magic of three. My idea for Finley Finds his Fortune, was sparked by a desire to write a folk tale with the magic of three and also by my visit to Whitechurch, the last working watermill in England. I was awed by the power and beauty of its water wheel so I wove a water mill into my story. To do this, I had to first study how a mill works. That’s what I love about writing children’s books―that I can explore my own personal interests and passions.
As author John Scieszka himself says he’s sold “bazilions of books” so he sure doesn’t need my endorsement but this is such a funny book I couldn’t resist. Yes, it tells the familiar story of the three little pigs but it does so in a wildly unfamiliar way—from the wolf’s point of view. Alexander T. Wolf tells the reader what really happened and professes his innocence. Despite having a cold, he was baking a cake for his dear grandmother when he needed to borrow a cup of sugar from the neighboring pig. What happens next he declares was not his fault yet he’s gotten a bad rap ever since. This is an offbeat, fractured fairytale that completely reverses the message of the original tale to give a new one: there are always two sides to every story.
We tell stories for many reasons, but one of the best reasons is to teach our kids (or remind ourselves!) how to navigate in the world. We’ve all read Aesop’s Fables and at the end, the moral lesson is spelled out. This ruins the conversations you can have with someone else about what the story was about. Instead of feeling entertained, we feel like we were being told what to think and how to feel. As a writer, I love to include multiple themes in a book so that, depending on the age of the reader, or how many times the story is read, new ideas jump out of the book and into your brain.
I like to chat, and like most other people, whether it’s because I’m thinking about something else, or busy, or just simply not paying attention, sometimes I “listen,” but I don’t “hear.” Wordy Birdy is a fun read with a great reminder about why it is so important to listen to others and pay attention to our surroundings.
Meet Wordy Birdy, a very chatty bird who talks WAY more than she listens! A hilarious new story from Tammi Sauer, beloved author of Nugget & Fang, Chicken Dance, and My Alien.
Wordy Birdy LOVES to talk. “Hello, sunrise. Hello, pink sky. Hello, orange sky!” But does she love to listen? NOPE. One day, while she’s walking through the forest, her gift of the gab gets her into hot water: “That’s a pretty tree and that’s a pretty tree and that’s a pretty danger sign and that’s a pretty tree. . . .” Will this inattentive bird walk right into…
We tell stories for many reasons, but one of the best reasons is to teach our kids (or remind ourselves!) how to navigate in the world. We’ve all read Aesop’s Fables and at the end, the moral lesson is spelled out. This ruins the conversations you can have with someone else about what the story was about. Instead of feeling entertained, we feel like we were being told what to think and how to feel. As a writer, I love to include multiple themes in a book so that, depending on the age of the reader, or how many times the story is read, new ideas jump out of the book and into your brain.
This beautifully illustrated book gently teaches that an act of kindness is always returned ten-fold. While my youngest child may not understand the biggest lesson in this book until he reads it to his own children, he did understand that helping others is always a good deed, and that sometimes we have to delay fulfilling our own wants and put others before ourselves. I read this book to my children over and over again, not only because we loved knights and tales of medieval times, but because the book has so much heart and soul in it, that it begs to be taken off the shelf.
This is the tale of a brave knight who sets out one day to serve his King. But as he rides toward the castle, frightened travelers seek the knight's aid and protection. Though he resists, something inside will not allow him to refuse. He presses on, but his mission is delayed again and again as the knight stops to help those in need.
Has he been loyal to the King by following his heart, or has he been an errant knight after all?
We tell stories for many reasons, but one of the best reasons is to teach our kids (or remind ourselves!) how to navigate in the world. We’ve all read Aesop’s Fables and at the end, the moral lesson is spelled out. This ruins the conversations you can have with someone else about what the story was about. Instead of feeling entertained, we feel like we were being told what to think and how to feel. As a writer, I love to include multiple themes in a book so that, depending on the age of the reader, or how many times the story is read, new ideas jump out of the book and into your brain.
One word: hilarious! In typical tall tale fashion, The Dirty Cowboy teaches a humorous lesson about keeping our body clean. As the mother of 4 boys, it was easy to draw parallels in my children’s lives and the cowboy in the book in order to coax them into the bathtub…even if it would take a good roll in the dirt the next day to get the dog to recognize them again.
After he finds a tumbleweed in his chaps and the numerous bugs buzzing around him affect his hearing, the cowboy decides it's time to head to the river. Once there, he peels off all his clothes and tells his trusty old dog to guard them against strangers. He takes a refreshing bath and emerges clean as corn – but so fresh-smelling that his dog doesn't recognize him! Negotiations over the return of the clothes prove fruitless. A wrestling match ensues in a tale that grows taller by the sentence, climaxing in a fabric-speckled dust…
I have a passion for this topic because I too am a South Asian author. I read these books to stay informed about the latest ideas shaping our understanding of the South Asian young adult, both within and outside of the geographical boundaries of South Asia. I want to see more stories out there with South Asian themes, characters, settings— contemporary stories in particular. I’d like to see South Asians in ordinary life and not stereotypical situations like The Indian Wedding. We have so many stories to tell! I hope you enjoy the books on this list as much as I have!
Being gay is a true challenge in conservative South Asian households, regardless of religion and regardless of how progressive the families purport to be. I love Naz's wit and fast-paced tale of a Queer Muslim boy. And I love the fantasy elements too, with the djinn! In so many ways, Sy and Reggie’s journey reminds me of a modern version of Aladdin.
Sy is a sheltered and timid seventeen-year-old queer Indian-Muslim boy who placed all his bets at happiness on his boyfriend Farouk...who then left him to try and "fix the world." Sy was too chicken to take the plunge and travel with him. Stuck in a dead-end coffee shop job with a Quran-wielding father who's all too liberal with the belt, all Sy can do is wish for another chance...
He never expects his wish to be granted.
When a hot-mess-of-an-heiress slams into (and slides down, streaks of make-up in her wake) the front window of the coffee shop, Sy just…
I live in Madison, Wisconsin, and when I’m not reading my way through a tall stack of library books, I love to exercise and explore the outdoors, particularly in the Northwoods and in the Driftless Area (Google it—it’s the coolest!). My debut novel, Crossing the Pressure Line, is about identifying the lifeboats that have the power to save us during turbulent times. One of my own personal lifeboats is nature. I spend time outdoors every single day, even when the temperature is below zero, because I find deep peace in breathing fresh air, using my muscles, and watching for signs of wildlife.
Red, a monoecious oak tree, narrates this luminous and beautifully illustrated novel. Red is two hundred and sixteen rings old and happily provides shelter for seven opossums, four raccoons, five owls, six skunks, and a witty crow named Bongo. Together, Red and the animals concoct a plan to support Samar, a girl whose family has just moved into the neighborhood. Samar hasn’t made any friends yet, and she’s feeling sad and lonely. Wishtree is about inclusion and community, but at its heart, it’s a love song to the trees and creatures that call urban areas home. Have tissues ready: Samar’s comforting middle-of-the-night visits to Red and Bongo will have readers wiping away a tear or two.
The New York Times-bestselling story of kindness, friendship, and hope.
Trees can't tell jokes, but they can certainly tell stories. . . . Red is an oak tree who is many rings old. Red is the neighborhood "wishtree"―people write their wishes on pieces of cloth and tie them to Red's branches. Along with a crow named Bongo and other animals who seek refuge in Red's hollows, this wishtree watches over the neighborhood. You might say Red has seen it all. Until a new family moves in. Not everyone is welcoming, and Red's…
Horror is my passion and most things I read and everything I write fits neatly into the genre. But I am also passionate about telling stories from a unique perspective, or if not entirely unique then at least one that is underused. My novella A Man in Winter is told from the perspective of an elderly chap with dementia for instance. I have also found that many people think books with child protagonists must be children’s books and it makes me sad to think of all the wonderful work is being missed out on, I hope that my list has convinced you to try one of the above books.
My mum read this book to me when I was little, so I think it will always hold a special place in my heart for that reason.
But even re-reading it as an adult I can say that it is a marvellous story. The imagery is spectacular, Harvey’s night as a vampire especially stays with me due to the vivid imagery. As well as the ‘creatures in the pond’ (trying to not spoil anything too badly here). Overall, it’s a well written, imaginative story that sucks you in and holds you tightly right up to the end.
I have always had a love for the YA Fantasy genre. Something about the fast pacing and the themes that are explored have a way of resonating with me more than any other. I think it’s because they’re centered around that weird but pivotal time in your life when you’re no longer a child but not quite an adult. It’s what keeps bringing me back, and I love immersing myself in that mindset.
I love a good mystery, and this book provided me with that small-town creepy vibe with just a dash of fantasy. No matter how many other things I needed to be doing, I couldn’t put this book down.
It follows a girl named Ellerie as her world slowly falls apart. They’re trying to find the people who went missing from an attack on a supply wagon and are afraid the monsters that once lived in the woods have returned.
Every moment had me guessing, had me suspecting one person or another, and as it neared the end, I wondered how the author was going to resolve and explain everything. I loved it because it was a book that sucked me in but left me unable to figure it out until the very end.
THE INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • From the critically-acclaimed author of House of Salt and Sorrows comes a mesmerizing and chilling fairy-talesque novel about Ellerie Downing, a young woman in a small town with monsters lurking in the trees and dark desires hidden in the shadows—in Amity Falls, nothing is more dangerous than a wish come true.
"Unique, enchanting, and haunting."—Brigid Kemmerer, New York Times bestselling author of the Cursebreaker series
“Sweet, dark, and complex as wildflower honey.”—Hannah Whitten, New York Times bestselling author of For the Wolf
“Small Favors is an eerie fairytale that I couldn’t put down.”—Alexis…
For as long as I can remember, I’ve been in love with books that mix the real world with a bit of magic. I remember devouring novels like A Gift of Magic by Lois Duncan and The Secret Garden and imagining what I would do if my life suddenly became a tiny bit magical. When I became an author, it turned out those were also the sorts of stories I most loved telling. I think for me, the fun part is imagining what “everyday magic” would look like and what problems/opportunities it would create in an otherwise ordinary world.
Kate Messner’s story of a girl who catches a magical wish-granting fish beautifully shows the unintended—and often hilarious—consequences that can come from trying to fix problems with magic. But what I most love about this book is how it explores the types of real-world issues, such as addiction, that are hard to fix—with or without magic. This is a story of wishes gone wrong, but it’s also a story about family, healing, and hope.
When Charlie Brennan goes ice fishing on her town's frozen lake, she's hoping the fish she reels in will help pay for her dream: a fancy Irish dancing dress for her upcoming competition. But when Charlie's first catch of the day happens to be a talking fish offering her a wish in exchange for its freedom, her world quickly turns upside down, as her wishes go terribly and hilariously wrong.
Just as Charlie is finally getting the hang of communicating with a magical wishing fish, a family crisis with her older sister brings reality into sharp focus. Charlie quickly learns…
I have been blessed (or cursed) with a vivid imagination since childhood. Add to that the fact that my first three years were spent on a farm in Maine with nobody around but my mother and my sister, and I grew into a person who is happy alone and making up stories. After my family moved to California, I went to school with all colors, races, and religions and my sense of inclusiveness is abundant. Most of my stories deal with unfairness imposed upon humans by other humans. Nearly all of my books are funny, too, even when I don’t mean them to be. Absurdity is my pal.
This book taught me to love reading when I was in the third grade. Jane, Mark, Katharine, and Martha are suffering the summertime-boredom blues when they find a grimy old coin.
By accident they discover the coin is magic; however, it’s so old it only works part-way. The adventures they have while trying to figure out what’s going on are charming and hysterical. I always laugh when the cat tries to halfway express itself because the children forgot to double the wish they wished.
Anyone with a sense of humor, adventure, and who misses (or missed) the delights of childhood should read this book. It was published in the 1950s, is set in the 1920s, and is still in print! That’s the hallmark of an excellent book.
Book one in the series called "truly magic in a reader's hands" by Jack Gantos, Newbery Medal winner for Dead End in Norvelt.
It all begins with a strange coin on a sun-warmed sidewalk. Jane finds the coin, and because she and her siblings are having the worst, most dreadfully boring summer ever, she idly wishes something exciting would happen.
And something does: Her wish is granted. Or not quite. Only half of her wish comes true. It turns out the coin grants wishes—but only by half, so that you must wish for twice as much as you want.
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