Best books of 1951

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.

Poetry
Eleanor Farjeon’s Poems for Children (Lippincott)

Picture Storybooks
Mr. T. W. Anthony Woo written and illustrated by Marie Hall Ets (Viking)
Finders Keepers written by William Lipkind, illustrated by Nicolas Mordvinoff (Harcourt)
The Blue-Eyed Pussy written and illustrated by Egon Mathieson (Doubleday)
The Crumb That Walked written by Charles Norman, illustrated by Margaret Bloy Graham (Harper)
Jeanne-Marie Counts Her Sheep written and illustrated by Françoise Seignobosc (Scribner)
All Falling Down written by Gene Zion, illustrated by Margaret Bloy Graham (Harper)

Fanciful Tales
The Wonderful Farm written by Marcel Ayme, illustrated by Maurice Sendak (Harper)
Little Houses Far Away written and illustrated by Pamela Bianco (Oxford)
The Mousewife written by Rumer Godden, illustrated by William Pène du Bois (Viking)
Prince Caspian: The Return to Narnia written by C. S. Lewis, illustrated by Pauline Baynes (Macmillan)
Centerburg Tales written and illustrated by Robert McCloskey (Viking)
Huon of the Horn written by Andre Norton, illustrated by Joe Krush (Harcourt)
The Story of Serapina written by Anne H. White, illustrated by Tony Palazzo (Viking)

Stories
The Marble Fountain written and illustrated by Valenti Angelo (Viking)
Chariot of the Sky, A Story of the Jubilee Singers written by Arna Bontemps, illustrated by Cyrus Leroy Baldridge (Winston)
Windruff of Links Tor written by Joseph E. Chipperfield, illustrated by Helen Torrey (Longmans)
Five Boys in a Cave by Richard Church (Day)
Ginger Pye written and illustrated by Eleanor Estes (Harcourt)
Eskimo Boy written by Pipaluk Freuchen, illustrated by Ingrid Vang Nyman (Lothrop)
Roman Eagle written and illustrated by Stephani and Edward Godwin (Oxford)
Moon Ahead written by Leslie Greener, illustrated by William Pène du Bois (Viking)
The Defender written by Nicholas Kalashnikoff, illustrated by Claire and George Louden, Jr. (Scribner)
All-of-a-Kind Family written by Sydney Taylor, illustrated by Helen John (Wilcox)
The Lark on the Wing written by Elfrida Vipont, illustrated by Sandra James (Bobbs)
The City of Frozen Fire by Vaughan Wilkins (Macmillan)

Biography and History
Americans Before Columbus written by Elizabeth C. Baity, illustrated by C. B. Falls (Viking)
America’s Robert E. Lee written by Henry Steele Commager, illustrated by Lynd Ward (Houghton)
Of Courage Undaunted: Across the Continent with Lewis and Clark written and illustrated by James Daugherty (Viking)
Leif Eriksson, First Voyager to America by Katherine Shippen (Harper)
Prehistoric America written by Anne Terry White, illustrated by Aldren Watson (Random)
Lonely Crusader: The Life of Florence Nightingale by Cecil Woodham-Smith (Whittlesey)

Nature and Science
Construction Ahead written and illustrated by Henry Billings (Viking)
Let Them Live written and illustrated by Dorothy P. Lathrop (Macmillan)
Patterns in the Sky; The Story of the Constellations written by W. Maxwell Reed, illustrated by D. F. Levett Bradley (Morrow)
You Among the Stars written by Herman and Nina Shneider, illustrated by Symeon Shimin (Scott)