Haunted Week 2012: Back from the Grave

[Learn more about my HAUNTED WEEK meme here.]

We're halfway through Haunted Week today! Hopefully you haven't been scared out of your skin yet, because there's much more spooky to come!

Today, I'll be resurrecting some old favorites: books I read and loved when I was younger.

1. The Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler
by E.L. Konigsburg

I knew right away that this book would make the list—I adored this book when I was little. If you haven't heard of it, it's about a sister and brother who, because of the unjustly acts they're living through (chores and minuscule allowances—how dare!) run away and live in the Metropolitan Museum of Art. It's an adorable adventure and I'd read literally dozens of times—the characters were practically friends of mine.

2. Frindle
by Andrew Clements

I think this is probably the most well-known book on my list in the little kids to MG books area—but it really was one of my favorites. And I have a story to prove it: when I was about ten, I decided I loved it so much I was going to memorize the entire book. While probably impossible, I actually memorized an entire chapter of it before giving up, and to this day, I can still recite the first two paragraphs completely from memory. 

3. Ella Enchanted
by Gail Carson Levine

I have no idea why, but out of all the books on this list, just thinking about this one makes me so nostalgic. I think it might be because it's a classic fairytale retelling—it's something pretty much all little girls adore. While I don't think I actually ever owned a copy of the book, but I checked it out from the library so many times, it was practically like the same thing. It will definitely go down in history as one of my favorite childhood novels.

4. Sideways Stories from Wayside School
by Louis Sachar

This book is absolutely ridiculous. From kids who can only read when standing on their heads to teachers and classrooms that don't actually exist, this book is just filled with the most ridiculous stories of a skyscraper school where logic is completely thrown out of the window. I loved it, and the two other books about Wayside School, just for their absolute ridiculousness in every chapter.

5. Letters from Camp
by Kate Klise

It was actually hard to pick this one, because I love a lot of the books Kate Klise has written because she uses a really unique writing technique. The entirety of Letters from Camp is written in letters, postcards, camp schedules, newspaper ads, and even initials carved in trees, and they're used to help a group of kids at camp solve a huge mystery. The whole idea is so original and the book so good that it was one of my favorite books for years. 

So those are some of the many, many books I loved when I was younger that I brought back from the grave for you guys. Would you bring back any of the same ones? What books would you go grave-digging for?