Sometimes you head to the library to look for books for your geography lessons, and you find this amazing list. Sometimes you head to the library and you find some okay books. Then there are times like what happened with the Nebraska book list, and you find an epic story that your family talks about forever. So, with that in mind to add to our collection of books lists, I give you the Nebraska book list.
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And don’t worry, you’ll be able to figure out which one became the epic story that we are still talking about months later.
Nebraska book list- Fiction
- Arbor Day Square– I loved this book, it was such a cute story of how Arbor Day started.
- Going North– Sadly this book was checked out when I went by the library, but I’m hoping to go back and check this book out to read about a story of an African American family moving North and the struggles of traveling through segregated South.
- The Huckabuck Family and How They Raised Popcorn in Nebraska and Quit and Came Back– This book made us all laugh so much. It’s hilarious and in the same vein as American Tall Tales.
- Elsie’s Bird– I love Jane Yolen books, while she’s probably most famous for her “How Do Dinosaurs” series, before that became an insane hit, she wrote amazing lyrical books like this one. Elsie struggles with her move to the Nebraska territory, but her bird helps her cope, until one day something happens to her bird.
- The Schoolchildren’s Blizzard– A fictionalized event of a real storm that happened in Nebraska and how the children survived it.
- Prairie Friends– I love stories like this of people adapting to a new home, it’s a great book to read for kids who’ve recently moved to see others have gone through the same thing
Nebraska book list- nonfiction
- Beaver Steals Fire– This is the story we were laughing at so much. I love folk tales and if I can find some I’m going to get every single one of them out of my library. This story explains how the animals all worked together to steal fire for man. The thing is, there’s this whole other side story of how Snake eats Frog, and the entire time Frog is telling Snake, “Quit. Quit.” Until he’s completely swallowed. It weirded all of us out, and I had the hardest time keeping a straight face as I read it out loud to the kids. It was made even worse as my kids reacted to the story
- Mammoth– If we hadn’t had the Beaver Steals Fire story, this would be the book my kids would still be talking about. The book follows a mamoth family until they die suddenly because of the ice age, and then fast forwards thousands of years when the frozen mammoth was found. It’s a great story, and I think if the kids were younger and just went with the explanation, it wouldn’t have thrown them so much, but it did
- Nebraska– Nice general information book
- Pioneer Girl: Growing Up On the Prairie– We did not read all of this, but it’s in the same vein as Litle House on the Prairie
- This Strange Wilderness: the Life and Art of John James Audubon– Again it was a longer book than I wanted to read all of, but the illustrations are amazing (not too surprising given the topic)
- In the New World– I love this style of book, where two different time periods are compared
Custer’s Last Battle: Red Hawk’s account of the Battle of the Little Bighorn– I LOVE Paul Goble’s artwork and pretty much everyone of his books I’ve read, this was no exception> Sigh, this should be over on Montana….
So the epic story was Beaver Steals Fire? Sounds like something that would be in “weirded out” category here 🙂