Peter Brown

• George and Martha, George and Martha

• I can't overemphasize how perfectly James Marshall balances sweetness and absurdity in these stories.

• Everyone Poops

• Everyone Poops is a continuous source of 'inspiration.

• James and the Giant Peach

• Witty dialogue, fantastical adventure and a wonderfully dark sense of humor seem to effortlessly flow from Roald Dahl's pen.

• His Dark Materials

• This series is perhaps the most unique, thoughtful, and provocative fantasy I’ve ever read.

• 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea

• I was mesmerized by the way Verne describes the science and logic of the world in which this story takes place.

Michael Buckley

• The Outsiders

• A timeless story of outcasts versus the privileged. Exciting and heartbreaking — Hinton should be applauded for understanding the mind of a guy so well.

• All Star Superman Books 1 and 2

• Lex Luthor finally finds a way to kill Superman and the Big Blue Boy Scout prepares for his death with a shocking ending no one could have seen.

• Lord of the Flies

• A ship full of children from an all boys' school crashes on the beach of a deserted island. Unfortunately, it isn't long before the kids stop working together and break up into tribes with dark and deadly results.

• Pinocchio

• Most people have seen the movie but few have read the book and that’s a shame. Pinocchio is a walking nightmare and hilarious.

• An adaptation of the Jungle Book but instead of a boy being raised by wolves, he's reared by ghosts in an abandoned cemetery. It's chilling and dark, yet a powerful lesson on how a boy becomes a man.

Mo Willems

• The Complete Peanuts
• Charles M. Schulz

• The gold standard of comic strips. Fun for everyone; except Charlie Brown, who seems a little down on his luck.

• The Complete George and Martha
• James Marshall

• Lessons learned include: just because you've got a best friend doesn't mean you have to pour pea soup in your shoes. I try to re-read this before I start making new book.

• The Complete Calvin and Hobbes
• Bill Watterson

• When Hobbes is wise, Calvin is a stinker. When Hobbes is hungry, Calvin is in trouble.

• Go, Dog, Go!
• Philip D. Eastman

• A dog party in a tree? Wait for me, I’ve got to get my hat!

• Cul De Sac, This Exit

• The best comic strip you've never heard of. Alice and her family walk in the footsteps of Peanuts and Calvin and Hobbes, only sideways.

• Children at Play, A Cul-de-Sac Collection

Micol Ostow

• The Haunting of Hill House
• Shirley Jackson

• "The ne plus ultimate haunted house story, I like to think of Amity's Gwen as sort of a modern spin on Eleanor, a young woman seeing and experiencing ghostly things, whose mind and perceptions can't be trusted."

• We Have Always Lived in the Castle
• Shirley Jackson

• "A slow-burner filled with atmosphere. Merricat is the platonic ideal of an unreliable narrator."

• The Shining
• Stephen King

• "A suggestible man, prone to violence, isolated in a hotel that exerts evil force over his will... Jack Torrance is to Amity's Connor as Hill House's Eleanor is to Gwen."

• Tighter
• Adele Griffin

• "A modern take on The Turn of the Screw, Griffin draws from chilling source material and makes it her own for today's teen readers."

• To Die For
• Joyce Maynard

• "A dark and twisty thriller (the movie's great, too) that serves up multiple POV's on a platter. I spent a lot of time poring over the many distinct voices of that book."

• The Maddaddam trilogy
• Margaret Atwood

• "Epic and sprawling, boldly visionary, and still she manages to tie all of her narrative threads together by the series' conclusion. To spend ten minutes in that woman's head!"

• Dangerous Girls
• Abigail Haas

• "Pacing, pacing, pacing. Totally un-put-downable."

• The Amityville Horror
• Jay Anson

• "(That one probably goes without saying.)"

• We Were Liars
• E.Lockhart

• "The pages turn and the ending twists!"

David Yoo

• The Last Picture Show
• Although it takes place in a tiny, dusty Texas town that's nothing like the New England town I grew up in, this is easily my favorite coming-of-age story, ever, period.
• Then Again, Maybe I Won’t
• Given the fact that I asked for a pair of binoculars for Christmas (for "bird watching"), too, this was the teen novel that spoke to me when I was 13.
• The Postman Always Rings Twice
• My favorite noir writer, this is one of the best plotted stories, ever, in my opinion, with one of the most satisfying endings to a story to boot.
• Rats Saw God

• This was the first recent(ish) YA novel that got me excited to write about teens, because it made me think I was reading about, well . . . me.

• Rosemary’s Baby
• This horror story is just about perfect in every way, and I've read it maybe 50 times in my lifetime. The movie's one of my favorites, too.
• Franny and Zooey
• A decidedly strange little novel that for the life of me I can't quite describe why it's one of my favorites, but it just is.