Myra here.
Our offering for this month’s Carnival of Children’s Literature (thank you to Just Children’s Books for hosting) is a list of Circus, Carnivale, and Paranormal themed books for children and young adults that we have reviewed for our bimonthly theme which ended during the first week of March.
Picture Books
It was great to discover quite a number of picture books that dealt with the paranormal: from banshees, to vampires, to monsters. Click on the thumbnails to be taken to our detailed review of the books.
The Banshee by Eve Bunting and Illustrated by Emily Arnold McCully
Gershon’s Monster as retold by Eric A. Kimmel and Illustrated by Jon J Muth
Dracula as adapted by Nicky Raven and Illustrated by Anne Yvonne Gilbert
Cthulhu by Neil Gaiman as inspired by H. P. Lovecraft
We were also glad to (re)discover quite a few picture books that celebrated the strangenesses and beautiful oddities of the carnivale and the circus people as can be seen in the following:
Leon and the Place Between by Angela McAllister and Grahame Baker-Smith
If I Ran the Circus by Dr. Seuss
The Secret Circus by Johanna Wright
Circus Girl by Jack Sendak and Illustrations by Maurice Sendak
Sidewalk Circus by Paul Fleischman and Illustrated by Kevin Hawkes
Dad Runs Away With the Circus by Etgar Keret and Rutu Modan
Olivia Forms a Band by Ian Falconer
Olivia Saves the Circus by Ian Falconer
Little Rabbit and the Meanest Mother on Earth by Kate Klise & M. Sarah Klise
We even found a few picture book biographies of actual circus people as you can note here:
Stand Straight, Ella Kate: The True Story of a Real Giant by Kate Klise & M. Sarah Klise
Sawdust and Spangles: The Amazing Life of W.C. Coup
Paranormal or Circus-themed Poetry Books
Circus Carnivore by Mark Svendsen and Illustrated by Ben Redlich
Hist Whist by e.e. cummings with Illustrations by Deborah Kogan Ray
The Monsterologist, a Memoir in Rhyme by Bobbi Katz and Illustrations by Adam McCauley
Circus! Circus! Poems Selected by Lee Bennett Hopkins and illustrated by John O’Brien
Middle Grade/ Young Adult Fiction
Skary Childrin and the Carousel of Sorrow by Katy Towell
A Monster Calls by Patrick Ness
The Entertainer and the Dybbuk by Sid Fleischman
When the Circus Came to Town by Laurence Yep
Adult Literature
The Circus in Winter by Cathy Day
The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern
Modoc: The True Story of the Greatest Elephant That Ever Lived by Ralph Helfer
Winner of the AWB Reading Challenge for March
Drum roll, please. This month’s winner for the Award-Winning-Books Reading Challenge is Grace from Books without Any Pictures for her review of Isaac Asimov’s Second Foundation. Congratulations, Grace!
Please choose between Jennifer Egan’s A Visit from the Goon Squad or China Mieville’s The City & The City. Book prizes are courtesy of Pansing Books. For those who have not yet signed up for the AWB Reading Challenge, do join us!
Gathering Books 
Pingback: A Touch of Darkness in Bradbury’s “Something Wicked This Way Comes” «
Pingback: The Circus is Where It’s At: Oddballs and Misfits in Henrik Drescher’s Klutz and Maira Kalman’s Roarr Calder’s Circus |