I like "Katy and the Big Snow." Katy is a bulldozer, and the strongest one (they don't send her out for just little snows). Nothing is made of the fact that she's a female bulldozer; it's just taken for granted.

(Mike Mulligan's steam shovel is also female.)

I just got an email from Powells about 30% Mo Willems titles, if that's of interest.

A good friend of mine wrote a vampire book, and I think it's a helluva first novel. It's available free for Amazon download for the next few days; check it out if so inclined! [link]

Here's a snippet of a summary I agree with:

Redlisted is a book that features strange delusions, dreams, forgotten memories, and mind control. It presents an engaging puzzle of plot lines and back stories that the reader gradually deciphers. The vampires in this book are neither depressingly Gothic nor sickeningly romanticized. They're both modern and timeless, and deal with contemporary problems while juggling ancient powers.

Best of all is that Redlisted features a sensible, tough, capable heroine. Though Kate often finds herself in dangerous, disorienting situations she never lets circumstances get the best of her. Though she suffers through some pretty gruesome trials, she never plays the victim.

Thanks for all the suggestions. I'd never really looked at Knuffle Bunny before, and it looks great. I think I've decided on Knuffle Bunny, The Snowy Day, and a The Snowy Day plush. (This is my friend's third kid, and the oldest is just three, so I figured the older two can enjoy the books right away, and the baby can enjoy the plush right away.) I labeled the cards with Knuffle Bunny for the three-year-old girl, The Snowy Day board book for the one-year-old boy, and the doll for the new baby girl, but I'm sure that, with the kids that close in age, pretty much any books or toys will be played with and read by all of them.

I'm still in a book hangover from staying up way too late reading Among Others. It is almost exactly my life as a teenager, minus Wales and magic. Also, I never got through Dahlgren. We read almost all the same books. The protagonist says, "I have books, new books, and I can bear anything as long as there are books." That is me.

Heh, this is what I wrote in my Goodreads review about "Among Others".

The thing I love most about this book is how much the main character LOVES books! She practically lives and breathes them, and they are so important to her! I identified with her so much because of this.

Basically this book is a giant love letter to pre-1980 Sci Fi books with some fairies and magic mixed in (but the fairies and magic were so refreshing compared to what's typically out there these days.)

And the quote you mentioned above is one of my all time favorites! That is also me!

Oh! And this quote too! It's just lovely! “Libraries really are wonderful. They're better than bookshops, even. I mean bookshops make a profit on selling you books, but libraries just sit there lending you books quietly out of the goodness of their hearts.”

"If you love books enough, books will love you back."

Also, she's persuaded to live by the reminder that she's only read half of Babel 17.

There may be stranger reasons for being alive.

There are books....There's interlibrary loan. There are books you can fall into and pull up over your head.

When things were very bad in high school, if I finished a book at night, I had to start a new one to have a reason to get up.

I'd rec Hereville, but I don't what age you are looking for. I think you'd have to be 10 or older to appreciate it (or maybe a really precocious eight). [link]

BTW - NOT "a cross between fiddler on the roof and Harry Potter". I think the review is by someone who does not read much fantasy and who has not watched Fiddler on the Roof in a long time. But the hero is a late 19th or early 20th century Hasid girl who rescues witches and fights trolls. But otherwise I think the review is not a bad representation of the book.

But the hero is a late 19th or early 20th century Hasid girl who rescues witches and fights trolls.

I think it's set much later than that. In the scene where she falls down the hill and ends up in someone's backyard, they're having a barbecue with a propane grill. And there's an automatic coffee maker in the kitchen, and a cordless phone. I think it's the 1980s at the earliest.

Forgot about that. I guess I thought of it as 19th century because so much of the setting sounds 19th century.