I’ve written many times about my love for children’s and young-adult literature, and my three kidlit reading groups. A source of great happiness for me! Be Gretchen.

For some reason, in the last few weeks, I’ve seen a spike in requests for suggestions about how to start a group or about what books to read.

The specific model followed by my three kidlit groups is: we take turns meeting for dinner at each other’s apartments; we meet every six weeks; we read one or two books for discussion; people can attend even if they haven’t read the book; we choose books by group enthusiasm. In one group, we alternate among classic (Peter Pan), modern (A Wrinkle in Time), and contemporary (The Hunger Games). In the other groups, we just pick what we want.

If you want some ideas of books to read, here are some reading suggestions in children’s and young-adult literature for a group or just for yourself. It pains me to list so few! But this is a good start.

Because they’re already so widely known, I’m not going to list some very obvious ones, like the Harry Potter books, the Narnia books, the The Lord of the Rings books, or my beloved Little House books.

The Golden Compass, Philip Pullman
The Silver Crown, Robert O’Brien
The Secret Garden, Frances Hodgson Burnett
Half Magic, Edward Eager
The Second Mrs. Gioconda, E. L. Konigsberg
Black and Blue Magic, Zilpha Keatley Snyder
Gone-Away Lake, Elizabeth Enright
Graceling, Kristin Cashore
Someday This Pain Will Be Useful to You, Peter Cameron
Greengage Summer, Rumer Godden

This list represents a big range — some are meant for ten-year-olds, some for seventeen-year-olds. But they are all so good that they can be enjoyed by an adult.

I could go on, and on…

What books would you add to this list? So many books, so little time.

From 2006 through 2014, as she wrote The Happiness Project and Happier at Home, Gretchen chronicled her thoughts, observations, and discoveries on The Happiness Project Blog.