Gifts to reopen. Books!

For the past couple of hours I've been reading. Instead of cooking something up in the kitchen, like I usually do each afternoon, I decided to take a literary vacation. But now I'm taking a break from that, at least until I can find another book. I'll be finished with The Center of Everything in just a matter of hours; it's been an entertaining read, thanks to barnesandnoble.com. They're the source of my good book discoveries, and I guess I should also give credit to Amazon.com. So I'm back on their site (B&N), searching for another good find and reading reader reviews one at a time.

I've found a couple of books worth dedicating future Spring afternoons to, but sometimes I get tired of reading constrained adult fiction. When this happens, I head on over to the kiddie lit section where I'm sure I'll find a treasure, usually among the award winners. After flying through about 20 books in the Children's Lit course I took in college, I quickly realized that kiddie lit can be a lot more enlightening and sincerely heartwarming than a few of the adult reads that make it onto bestseller lists. But I think most adults don't really consider reading books with kiddos as the main characters, unless they have children of their own, but I don't see why they don't.

Below is a list that includes a few books I've thoroughly enjoyed reading. Even if you don't take your Flinstone vitamins and leave cookies out for Santa anymore, you'll still get something out of these delightful page-turners that will most likely keep you up past your bedtime.

• Stargirl By Jerry Spinelli
• Hope Was Here by Joan Bauer
• Because of Winn-Dixie by Kate DiCamillo
• Bridge to Terabithia by Katherine Paterson
• The Giver by Lois Lowry
• Number the Stars by Lois Lowry