Top 100 Children S Books Quotes
#1. I didn't read children's books when I was a child. The only books in our house were ration books.
Michael Foreman
#2. For some reason, when people meet me and find out I'm a writer they always ask if I write children's books. Um ... please don't let your kids read my books. Well, unless your kids are in their 30s or something ... then yeah, they're old enough. LOL
Michelle M. Pillow
#3. If you are writing children's books, you need to be a ruthless killer.
J.K. Rowling
#4. Adult novels are as ephemeral as newspapers. Children's books stay in print for decades.
Sid Fleischman
#5. I grew up reading 19th-century novels and late Victorian children's books, so I try for a good story full of coincidence and error, landscape and weather. However, the world was radically changed during my lifetime, and I tell of that battering as best I can.
Fanny Howe
#6. People are usually surprised to hear this, but I don't really read children's books.
Beverly Cleary
#7. I'm also very hopeful to continue my literary journey into the realm of children's books. To be able to read my kids a children's book that was inspired by them would be everything!
Trista Sutter
#8. There's something nice about out-and-out children's books with no sex and a happy ending - Ransome, Streatfeild, that kind of thing.
Jo Walton
#9. Children's books are often seen as the poor relation of literature. But children are just as demanding as adult readers, if not more so. I should know. I'm a children's writer myself.
David Walliams
#10. I like working in children's books because it gives rise to such a variety of jobs. One month it may be a picture book, the next a retelling, the next a play, a short story or the start of the next novel.
Geraldine McCaughrean
#11. Writing children's books gives a writer a very strong sense of narrative drive.
Helen Dunmore
#12. I don't really read children's books or deal with children's books, so I don't have any relationship with them other than my own.
Michael Ian Black
#13. I've always loved children's books - it's not that I didn't like them, I just didn't think I wanted to do that. But then I suddenly realized I did ...
Brian Selznick
#14. Top 3 favorite books? I love finding really great children's books. My daughter was given "Pickle Chiffon Pie" which is so fantastic. We also love "Tacky the Penguin", and I love "Guji Guji" - all because they teach great life lessons without being teachy.
Abbie Schiller
#15. Children's books do not exist in a vacuum, unrelated to literature as a whole. They are a portion of universal literature and must be subjected to the same standards of criticism as any other form of literature.
Lillian H. Smith
#16. To tell the truth, I don't read children's books. I'm an adult. I just write them.
William Steig
#17. The thing is, 'Discworld' had been going on for a very long time, and I've written children's books as well. Usually when people have a really big series they franchise it, which I thought is a bit of a no-no, so I thought what I'd do is I'd franchise it to myself.
Terry Pratchett
#18. I've never written a children's book, but when people meet me for the first time and I say I write books, they invariably reply, 'Children's books?' Maybe it's something about my face.
Sophie Kinsella
#19. I've written 16 children's books and five unpublished novels. Some of the latter were breathtakingly bad.
Mark Haddon
#20. Originally I had planned to write just a couple of children's books and then, return the focus on adult literature. A funny thing happened along the way - I kept having new ideas, and then I looked up one day, and 30 years had passed!
Nikki Grimes
#21. Children's books are written to be read, adult books are written to be talked about at cocktail parties
Lloyd Alexander
#22. In a television interview, I said that diversity in our children's books should include the adventures of disabled children, travellers and gipsies, LGBT teens, different cultures, classes, colours, religions. It shouldn't be a token gesture, nor do such stories need to be 'issue-based'.
Malorie Blackman
#23. I feel sometimes that in children's books there are more and more grim problems, but I don't know that I want to burden third- and fourth-graders with them.
Beverly Cleary
#24. I like to read fiction, and I particularly enjoy reading young adult fiction. But I also read children's books, adult books, current authors, and classics, but I like fiction the most.
James Howe
#25. In England, there is a dividing line between artists and illustrators, who are thought inferior to painters. Well, that's absolute rubbish. Some of the most creative work is being done in children's books. In Japan, everything is art. They don't say painting is better than ceramics or dress design.
Brian Wildsmith
#26. I gave up writing children's books. I wanted to escape from them as I had once wanted to escape from 'Punch': as I have always wanted to escape. In vain.
A.A. Milne
#27. I didn't start working on children's books until I got a job at a book warehouse on the children's floor. When I started reading some of the books, I was so impressed.
Kate DiCamillo
#28. I actually started an adult book, worked on it for about two years, and then decided it just wasn't coming together for me, and thought I'll go back to children's books, and almost immediately I started 'Holes,' and it just seemed to take off on me.
Louis Sachar
#29. It is surely significant that the adults who feature in children's books are rarely, if ever, Regional Sales Managers or Building Services Engineers.
Alain De Botton
#30. I don't read young adult or children's books, now that my grandchildren are beyond the age of my reading to them. I read reviews, and so I'm aware of what's out there. But I tend not to read the books.
Lois Lowry
#31. You can't write a children's book that takes more than five or six minutes to read, because it will drive the parents batty. It has to be compact. Nobody thinks about the parents when they write these stupid books. I could write longer children's books, but it would actually be bad if I did.
Michael Ian Black
#32. The most difficult book I wrote was the fourth in a series of linked children's books. It was like pulling teeth because the publisher wanted exactly the same but completely different. I'd much rather just do something completely different, even if there's a risk of it going wrong.
Mark Haddon
#33. Life isn't so complicated for children. They have more time to think about the really important things. That's why I occasionally moralise in my children's books in a way I wouldn't dare when writing for adults.
Nina Bawden
#34. With a few exceptions, the critics of children's books are remarkably lenient souls ... Most of us assume there is something goodin every child; the critics go from this to assume there is something good in every book written for a child. It is not a sound theory.
Katharine Sergeant Angell White
#35. A nice thing about children's books, though I'm probably alone in this opinion among other people who write and publish them, is that they did get to be in this unrecognized ghetto for a long time.
Daniel Handler
#36. In the early stages of writing children's books, an experienced lady editor said that while girls read boys' books, the converse was not true, and I may have been influenced by that.
John Christopher
#37. There's a series of children's books called A Series of Unfortunate Events, which is like an incredibly dark version of Roald Dahl. I hope to start directing it.
Barry Sonnenfeld
#38. My best ideas come to me at unexpected moments, like when I'm reading children's books to my kids (the pictures inspire me), shopping, driving somewhere, seeing different things.
Mary Engelbreit
#39. Children's books aren't textbooks. Their primary purpose isn't supposed to be "Pick this up and it will teach you this." It's not how literature should be. You probably do learn something from every book you pick up, but it might be simply how to laugh.
J.K. Rowling
#40. People think children's books are about teddy bears and little flowers. I realize people sometimes don't know what to do with my books because they say, 'Is it a children's book, and what age group?'
Peter Sis
#41. I discovered writing children's books was a way to keep living in my imagination like a child. So I wrote a number of books before I started 'Magic Tree House.' Then, once I got that, I never looked back because I could be somewhere different in every single book.
Mary Pope Osborne
#42. I didn't write with a target audience in mind. What excited me was how much I would enjoy writing about Harry. I never thought about writing for children - children's books chose me. I think if it is a good book anyone will read it.
J.K. Rowling
#43. There is a very big difference between writing for children and writing for young adults. The first thing I would say is that 'Young Adult' does not mean 'Older Children', it really does mean young but adult, and the category should be seen as a subset of adult literature, not of children's books.
Garth Nix
#44. I've illustrated many children's books and I feel awfully lucky to be able to do something I love so much, and yes, to be able to pay the rent, but there was a yearning to do something more grown up, and something where I didn't have to cater to anyone; I was just waiting for the material.
Sophie Blackall
#45. My freshman English professor at Kent State University in 1984 told me I was a good writer, and she loved all the silly pictures I drew in my notebook. She said I should try writing children's books, and so I did.
Dav Pilkey
#46. I guess I never grew up. I was still reading kids' books in high school and college. I was always interested in writing or illustrating children's books, and I started collecting out-of-print books when I was about 10 years old.
Michael Patrick Hearn
#47. I came from a family of incredible storytellers, but I didn't start writing children's books until I was 41 years old.
Patricia Polacco
#48. I do not remember any proper children's books in my childhood. I was not exposed to them.
Maurice Sendak
#49. The trick in writing children's books is to set up danger, mystery and excitement on page one. Force the kid to turn the page ... Then in the middle of each chapter there's a dramatic point of excitement, and at chapter's end, a cliffhanger.
Jerry West
#50. The secret of keeping young is to read children's books. You read the books they write for little children and you'll keep young. You read novels, philosophy, stuff like that and it makes you feel old.
John Cheever
#51. While most people had moved on from children's books, Jake still loved them. They felt cozy like hot chocolate with mini marshmallows or a new jumbo box of Crayola crayons.
Carolyn Mackler
#52. It seems to me that not only the writing in most children's books condescends to kids, but so does the art. I don't want to do that.
Chris Van Allsburg
#53. Many, if not most, of the best and most lasting children's books have multiple levels, some of which are not fully accessible to their most likely readers ... at least, not on their first read-through at age eight or ten or fifteen.
Patricia C. Wrede
#54. There aren't many funny bits in Mr Tolkien either,' Matilda said.
'Do you think that all children's books ought to have funny bits in them?' Miss Honey asked.
'I do,' Matilda said. 'Children are not so serious as grown-ups and love to laugh.
Roald Dahl
#55. I'm not putting my faith or life in anyone's hands. All that ever got me was screwed, and my ass is currently sore from it. (Wren)
Nice imagery there, tiger. Graphic. Ever think of writing children's books? (Fury)
Sherrilyn Kenyon
#56. I read a whole lot as a child, and, of course, I still read children's books.
Rebecca Stead
#57. Fifty percent of all meaningful education takes place in the home. What do you share with your child? You share your interests. I was a book person. I read with my son. My wife is an artist. She dragged his little butt around to museums. He's an illustrator of children's books.
Walter Dean Myers
#58. Childhood is the time and children's books are the place for powerful emotions, powerful language, powerful art ... There is no room for cutesy books, dull books, or books that talk down. Children are not inferior. They may be small in stature but not in what they feel, think, listen, and see.
Betsy Hearne
#59. I keep writing children's books, I keep making children's books, because I still have them inside of me.
Oliver Jeffers
#60. I was taught that in this country if you work hard, you can do anything, and I don't see a lot of those principles in children's books today.
Allen Covert
#61. Authors are known to have fiendishly clever minds, and the authors of children's books are more fiendishly clever than most. What
Alan Bradley
#62. We read a lot of books. Children's books mostly, because they're always much more truthful than adult books. And much more entertaining, said Mrs. Bunny.
Polly Horvath
#63. With the adult ones, I feel I need to get as deep inside the psychology of a character as I can, and that needs to be first-person. In the children's books, I feel I need some distance. I don't want to be the nine-year-old at the center of the story. I need to have some type of narrative voice.
John Boyne
#64. I don't think I'm essentially interested in children's books. I'm interested in writing, and in pictures. I'm interested in people and in children because they are people.
Margaret Wise Brown
#67. Russell Brand has announced that he plans to write a series of children's books. First up: 'Horton Hears a Heroin Dealer.'
Joan Rivers
#68. I'm wondering what to read next." Matilda said. "I've finished all the children's books.
Roald Dahl
#70. There are all kinds of writers. The best writers write children's books.
Richard Scarry
#71. Children's books, even good picture books, are much richer than ordinary home or classroom conversation,
Jim Trelease
#72. Artists paint pictures. The best artists paint pictures for children's books.
Richard Scarry
#73. Who is my role model and how long can I keep this going? I just move around and do different things and come back to music, try making films and come back to music, write children's books and come back to music.
Madonna Ciccone
#74. I love picture books. I think some of the best people in children's books are the ones who create their own picture books. I wish I could say I'm one of them, but I'm not.
Judy Blume
#75. I think I work much harder on the children's books. I suppose I enjoy that. I find it interesting that although there are more than 30 books in the Discworld series, it is the four that were written for children which have won the awards. I've never been quite certain why this is.
Terry Pratchett
#76. Not all of E. Nesbit's children's books are fantasies, but even the most realistic somehow seem magical. In her holiday world, nobody ever goes to school, though all the kids know their English history, Greek myths, and classic tales of derring-do.
Michael Dirda
#78. I tend to be known for different things. I mean, there are a lot of comics or sci-fi fans out there who sort of think of me doing that kind of work, but there are just as many people who like the CD covers I've done, or the children's books I've done. So different people like different things.
Dave McKean
#79. I always wanted to be a children's author, and I have a really big library of children's books. All the ones from when I was little, they are just so beautiful. I read kids' books, and they calm me down.
Jenny Slate
#80. I have written a few children's books. The first book that I wrote was for children. It was called 'The Package', and it was a mystery story in pictures. It had no words.
Laurie Anderson
#81. Dostoyevsky was her brother, Victorian children's books her passion and though she lived, when in funds, mainly on avocado pears, she took her bath each night with a different cookery book.
Eva Ibbotson
#82. I was never allowed to read the popular American children's books of my day because, as my mother said, the children spoke bad English without the author's knowing it.
Edith Wharton
#83. I would love to write more children's books. There is such a high standard out there for children's books; there are really amazing writers. It is a fantastic creative outlet and such an amazing teaching tool. The thing I love about kids, too, is it is so imaginative and poetic.
Jewel
#84. You write not for children but for yourself. And if by good fortune children enjoy what you enjoy, why then you are a writer of children's books.
Arthur Ransome
#85. My process is surprisingly straightforward. I find myself with little to do over a stretch of time and I say, "I should write children's books today." Then I sit down and write a children's book, and if it takes more than, realistically, three hours, I feel like I've done something wrong.
Michael Ian Black
#86. If we weigh the significance of a book by the effect it has on its readers, then the great children's books suddenly turn up very high on the list.
Laura Miller
#87. I was inspired to write children's books, but without blood and gore.
Stanley Williams
#88. He [an earnest young reporter] seemed to share the view of many intelligent, well-educated, well-meaning people that, while adult literature may aim to be art, the object of children's books is to whip the little rascals into shape.
Katherine Paterson
#89. I think that children's books should be censored not for references to sex but for references to diseases. I mean, who didn't think after reading 'Madeline' that they were going to get appendicitis?
Roz Chast
#90. I wondered if that was true: if they were all really children wrapped up in adult bodies, like children's books hidden in the middle of dull, long adult books, the kind with no pictures or conversations.
Neil Gaiman
#91. He was distressed to learn that the Pottery Barn Kids gift registry did not extend to children's books in Italian or Yiddish.
Sylvain Reynard
#92. The usual run of children's books left me cold, and at the age of six I decided to write a book of my own. I managed the first line, 'I am a swallow.' Then I looked up and asked, 'How do you spell telephone wires?
Bruce Chatwin
#93. I read a lot of books to my children, and they all seem really good. I think people have gotten really good at children's books.
Penn Jillette
#94. I think what makes good children's books is putting the same care and effort into it as if I was writing for adults. I don't write anything - put anything in my books - that I'd be embarrassed to put in an adult book.
Louis Sachar
#95. All good children's books, I think, address metaphysical issues in some kind of way.
Duane Michals
#96. Writing for children can be completely honest in non-cynical ways. In adult books you're required to be cynical. It embarrasses us to say positive things. You can have affection and hope in children's books, but that is out of fashion in adult fiction.
Lloyd Alexander
#97. In my experience, adults rarely bother reading the reviews of children's books and almost never read the books themselves - particularly if they don't have children.
Meg Rosoff
#98. Then one day I thought it would be wonderful to make a whole book, to make my text and my drawings together, and that's how I started doing children's books.
Dick Bruna
#99. My children's books are written on the belief that every child has a talent and a passion. Each story unfolds into an adventure of nurturing that confidence until a passion blooms.
Masiela Lusha
#100. I got hit by the bug of reading - not via a person, but via the one-room library in our small town. I remember that the children's books were in the right-hand corner near the floor. Often when I went there, I was the only visitor.
Anita Shreve
