Showing posts with label classic children's books. Show all posts
Showing posts with label classic children's books. Show all posts

Read for Free: PDF Chldren's Classics

Monday, April 6, 2020


If you want to encourage your children or grandchildren to read but would prefer that they read a paper copy or don’t want the Kindle version for some reason, there are a number of websites where you can download a free copy as a PDF, plain text, or versions for other types of ebooks. Some of these sites, such as Project Guttenberg, may even have free Kindle versions that you couldn’t locate on Amazon.

Planet eBook has a limited selection of PDF books and no search function but offers some of the best children’s classics, including:

The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain
Aesop’s Fables by Aesop
Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll
Andersen’s Fairy Tales by Hans Christian Andersen
Anne of Green Gables by Lucy Maud Montgomery
Grimm’s Fairy Tales compiled by the Grimm Brothers
The Jungle Book by Rudyard Kipling
Kidnapped by Robert Lewis Stevenson
Little Women by Louisa May Alcott
Pollyanna by Eleanor H. Porter
The Tales of Mother Goose by Charles Perrault
Treasure Island by Robert Lewis Stevenson

Or do your own search for one of your childhood favorites at one of these sites:

Project Gutenberg at www.gutenberg.org
Internet Archive at https://archive.org
Full Text Archive at www.fulltextarchive.com 
Freeditorial Publishing at https://freeditorial.com

These resources can also be used to find adult classics.

You now have access to plenty of reading material, so make the most of your time indoors.

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The picture is an illustration John Tenniel drew for the original edition of Alice in Wonderland. It is in the public domain because of its age.
Kathryn
Posted by Kathryn Page Camp at 12:00 AM 0 comments
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Read for Free: Kindle Chldren's Classics

Monday, March 30, 2020


With sports and other extra-curricular activities cancelled, children have more time to read for fun. This is a good chance for them to explore some of the old classics that their parents and grandparents read at their age.

But the libraries are closed and money is tight, you say. I can’t afford to buy them any more books.

While it is true that physical library locations are closed, some libraries are still “open” for patrons who want to borrow ebooks or audiobooks. Check yours out.

Another option is to “purchase” Kindle books that are offered for free, which is often the case with older publications that are in the public domain. If you don’t have a Kindle, you can download the free Kindle app for your other devices.

A few cautions, however. Free versions may have typos or formatting errors, and some of them are abridged from the original. They are generally worth the price, although you may want to look at the one-and-two-star reviews first. Collections can be the exception, however. Before downloading a free collection, make sure the table of contents has links to locations within the book. I downloaded a Mark Twain collection, only to discover that I had to “guess” at the location of a particular book. The trial and error was frustrating and more trouble than it was worth.

Here are a few suggestions for free Kindle books you can get for your children or grandchildren on Amazon. (Another caution: they were free when I looked them up, but that could change.)

·       Hans Brinker or the Silver Skates by Mary Mapes Dodge


·       The Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame


·       The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett


·       Heidi (Gift Edition) by Johanna Spyri


·       Black Beauty (Young Folks’ Edition) by Anna Sewell


·       Five Little Peppers and How They Grew by Margaret Sydney. This is the first in a series, and the others may also be available for free.


·       A Little Maid of Old Maine by Alice Turner Curtis. Many of her other Little Maid books are also available for free.


Then there are the lesser-known books written by well-known authors. For example, some middle-grade girls have read Anne of Green Gables by Lucy Maud Montgomery and Little Women by Louisa May Alcott but nothing else by those authors. The following are available as free Kindle books.

·       The Story Girl by Lucy Maud Montgomery


·       Chronicles of Avonlea by Lucy Maud Montgomery


·       Little Men by Louisa May Alcott


·       Eight Cousins by Louisa May Alcott


But maybe you would rather print off a paper copy or don’t want a Kindle version for some other reason. Next week’s post will provide additional resources.

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Frank T. Merrill drew the picture for the original edition of Little Women. First published in 1868, the illustration is in the public domain because of its age.
Kathryn
Posted by Kathryn Page Camp at 12:00 AM 0 comments
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What Did They Read?

Monday, February 3, 2020


Last week I talked about reading recent books in my genre and targeted age range in order to understand what my audience is looking for. But I also read classic children’s novels or, more accurately, books read by children in former times. Writing for children didn’t become popular until the later part of the 19th Century, so older girls often read novels written for women.

The protagonists in my historical fiction read a lot. I name actual books that were published in America before the year in which my novel is set, and I prefer ones that are still available today so that a reader can find a copy of the book if it piques her interest.

On the other hand, I try to avoid books that are likely to frustrate my readers. For example, Robin Hood is packed with the type of adventure boys like, but the original version is also filled with archaic language. The Elsie Dinsmore series was written for girls and was popular in its day, but the sermonizing is hard to take. But I wouldn’t know about those issues if I didn’t read the classics myself.

Reading the books my protagonists read also allows me to use them to move the story along. One of my protagonists reads Jane Eyre and decides to write her after-the-fact journal in the same style, giving me a believable reason for using that format. Another protagonist wants to do something her parents have forbidden, and a scene from Pride and Prejudice helps her come up with a successful argument. Again, I wouldn’t have known enough to use these devices unless I had already read Jane Eyre and Pride and Prejudice.

According to Stephen King, “If you want to be a writer, you must do two things above all others: read a lot and write a lot.” Reading anything is good.

But reading what your characters read is even better.

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Frank T. Merrill drew the picture at the head of this post for the original edition of Little Women by Louisa May Alcott. First published in 1868, the illustration is in the public domain because of its age.
Kathryn
Posted by Kathryn Page Camp at 12:00 AM 1 comments
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