Best books of 1983

Chosen annually by our editors, Fanfare is The Horn Book Magazine’s selection of the best children’s and young adult books of the year.

Picture Books
The Baby’s Catalogue written and illustrated by Janet and Allan Ahlberg (Atlantic-Little)
The Best Town in the World written by Byrd Baylor, illustrated by Ronald Himler (Scribner)
Ten, Nine, Eight written and illustrated by Molly Bang (Greenwillow)
The Silver Cow: A Welsh Tale retold by Susan Cooper, illustrated by Warwick Hutton (Atheneum/McElderry)
The Guinea Pig ABC written and illustrated by Kate Duke (Dutton)
Round Trip written and illustrated by Ann Jonas (Greenwillow)
The Railroad Book written and illustrated by E. Boyd Smith (Houghton)
What’s Under My Bed? written and illustrated by James Stevenson (Greenwillow)
The Wreck of the Zephyr written and illustrated by Chris Van Allsburg (Houghton)

Fiction
The Wish Giver: Three Tales of Coven Tree written by Bill Brittain, illustrated by Andrew Glass (Harper)
Dear Mr. Henshaw written by Beverly Cleary, illustrated by Paul O. Zelinsky (Morrow)
A Night in Distant Motion by Irina Korschunow, translated by Leigh Hafrey (Godine)
Ronia, The Robber’s Daughter by Astrid Lindgren (Viking)
A Parcel of Patterns by Jill Paton Walsh (Farrar)
The Sign of the Beaver by Elizabeth George Speare (Houghton)
Dan Alone by John Rowe Townsend (Lippincott)
A Solitary Blue by Cynthia Voigt (Atheneum)
A Little Fear by Patricia Wrightson (Atheneum)

Poetry
The Highwayman written by Alfred Noyes, illustrated by Charles Mikolaycak (Lothrop)

Nonfiction
Queen Eleanor: Independent Spirit of the Medieval World by Polly Schoyer Brooks (Lippincott)
Sugaring Time written by Kathryn Lasky, illustrated with photographs by Christopher G. Knight (Macmillan)
Oak & Company written by Richard Mabey, illustrated by Clare Roberts (Greenwillow)
Mill written and illustrated by David Macaulay (Houghton)
The Glorious Flight: Across the Channel with Louis Blériot July 25, 1909 written and illustrated by Alice and Martin Provensen (Viking)
The Luttrell Village: Country Life in the Middle Ages written and illustrated by Sheila Sancha (Crowell)

Of Interest to Adults
For Reading Out Loud! A Guide to Sharing Books with Children written by Margaret Mary Kimmel and Elizabeth Segel, illustrated by Trina Schart Hyman (Delacorte)