Tuesday, November 29, 2011

Top ten books about tiny people

Conn Iggulden is a bestselling author of historical fiction for adults and co-author with his brother Hal of The Dangerous Book for Boys. His Tollins books, about the adventures of tiny creatures with wings who aren't fairies and are about as fragile as a house brick, are his first foray into children's fiction.

One of his top ten books about tiny people, as told to the Guardian:
Gulliver's Travels by Jonathan Swift

Yes, you will hear that it's all a clever satire on politics, but this readable classic is a great story as well. Classic books for children are not often read in the original any longer, because what was once considered normal vocabulary is now surprisingly difficult. Thank you, education experts. Yet somehow, old Gulliver survives. Swift gave us the word "Lilliputian" and another I like even more: "Brobdingnagian".
Read about the other entries on the list.

Gulliver's Travels appears on Antonio Carluccio's list of his six favorite books and John Mullan's list of ten of the best vegetables in literature; it is one of Neil deGrasse Tyson's 5 most important books.

--Marshal Zeringue