make a list of books starring Girls!

Picture Books

• This Rabbit Belongs to Emily Brown by Cressida Cowell – great story! Emily Brown is wonderful!
• The Charlie and Lola books – Lola is such a real little girl.
• Blueberries for Sal by Robert McCloskey
• The Dot by Peter H. Reynolds

• Stargirl
• The Penderwicks – 4 girl protagonists = A real girl for everyone to identify with.

so I’ll add to it as I find more, but I’m finding my goal list too full right now so marking this as done – though it’s really done-ish!

This is a goal that’s a little too long-term to ever call done officially. So I’m going to say, good enough for now!

The Girl who Loved the Wind by Jane Yolen

The fairy tales of Gail Carson Levine – especially Ella Enchanted and The Two Princesses of Bamarre in which the heroine seriously kicks dragon butt among other extremely heroic acts

The Westing Game Have reread this too many times!

To Kill A Mockingbird

Charlotte’s Web Yay, Fern!

The Egypt Game actually a lot of the books of Zilpha Keatly Snyder

with a few favorite chapter books – though some may have already been mentioned.

• The Shoes books by Noel Streatfeild most specifically ballet Shoes and Dancing Shoes
• The Sorcery and Cecelia or The Enchanted Chocolate Pot and its sequels by Patricia C. Wrede and Caroline Stevermer
• Little Women, Eight Cousins, and Rose in Bloom by Louisa May Alcott
• The Little House books
• The Anne books
• A Little Princess and The Secret Garden

By Sara Pennypacker and illustrated (delightfully) by Marla Frazee. This is a new book to me (published Sept 2006) that I sat and read at the library while Q played with a big kid. Fabulous, funny and sweet. An early chapter book (for an average 2nd or 3rd grader) in the vein of Ramona the Pest and Pippi Longstocking.

She’s written several good books starring girls in Appalachia in the 1940s (I think that’s when they’re all set), but her most recent kept me (sleep deprived and all) reading till 12:30am the other night: Way Down Deep.

The Secret Garden, by Frances Hodgson Burnett

Island of the Blue Dolphins, by Scott O’Dell

Eloise, Kay Thompson

Cherry Ames books

Little House books (Laura Ingalls Wilder)

Also a couple of links with lists:

http://www.wnba-books.org/anniversaries/80women.html

http://www.randomhouse.com/rhpg/promos/greatbooks/booklist.html

The Oz Books. Dorothy Gale is the heroine of the first one, but there are lots of great women and girls all through the stories.

Adar’s reference to Nancy Drew got me thinking about a great mystery series about a girl in middle school: The Sammy Keyes mysteries by Wendelin Van Draanen. The newer Nancy Drew books, well, she’s a lot more shallow than she used to be. Sammy Keyes is awesome. (Though maybe too real?)

Van Draanen is a good author in general for preteen/teen girl books.