Resource Links History of Children's Fantasy Literature Column - K.V. Johansen Children's Books Author of Pippin and Mabel Series and the Torrie series. Author of fantasy for children and adults. Participant in New Brunswick Writers in Schools and writers in electronic residence

• Essay 1, Oct. 2001
• Essay 2, Dec. 2001
• Essay 3, Feb. 2002
• Essay 4, Apr. 2002
• Essay 5, Jun. 2002
• Essay 6, Oct. 2002
• Essay 7, Dec. 2002
• Essay 8, Feb. 2003
• Essay 9, Apr. 2003
• Essay 10, Jun. 2003
• Essay 11, Oct. 2003
• Essay 12, Dec. 2003

The original column on children's fantasy literature can be found in Resource Links magazine. To obtain a licence to make a limited number of copies of the essays for personal or educational use, please contact Access Copyright. For requests to re-print articles, please contact the author.

Note: These booklists are not intended to be a comprehensive children's fantasy literature bibliography. Penguin/Puffin kept many children's classics in print in paperback through the sixties and seventies, but has fewer now than they used to. Random House's Red Fox imprint has been reissuing many classics lately. If you or your bookstore can't find a book in "Books in Print" or listed on the major on-line bookstores such as Amazon Canada, Amazon USA or Amazon UK, or try searching for used copies.

Essay # 5: A Sudden Flourishing: Recent Children's Fantasy By Canadian Authors

Earlier authors referred to:

John Buchan (1875-1940)
Lake of Gold/The Long Traverse (1941)

Note: The last of Buchan's books featuring his character 'Sir Edward Leithen,' Sick Heart River (1941), is also set in the Canadian wilderness, but is an adult work in part about coming to terms with a final illness, rather than being purely an adventure like much of his other fiction, and as such is less likely to appeal to a younger audience. However, the 'Richard Hannay' series, which includes The Thirty-Nine Steps (1915) and Greenmantle (1917), the other 'Leithen' books, and the 'Dickson McCunn' novels have all always found some quite young readers.
Buchan wrote one other work specifically for children, a fantasy called The Magic Walking Stick, which was published in 1932.

Catherine Clark (1892-1977)
The Golden Pine Cone (1950)
The Sun Horse (1951)
The One-Winged Dragon (1955)
The Silver Man (1958)
The Diamond Feather (1962)
The Hunter and the Medicine Man (1966)

Palmer Cox (1840-1924)
The Brownies, Their Book (1887)
Another Brownie Book (1890)
The Brownies at Home (1893)
The Brownies Around the World (1893)
The Brownies Through the Union (1895)
Brownie Year Book (1895)
The Brownies Abroad (1899)
The Brownies in the Philippines (1904)
Brownie Clown of Brownie Town (1908)
The Brownies' Latest Adventures (1910)
The Brownies' Many More Nights (1913)
The Brownies and Prince Florimel (1918)

•A good website on Palmer Cox's Brownies can be found at: www.toonopedia.com/brownies.htm

Welwyn Wilton Katz
www.booksbywelwyn.ca
The Prophecy of Tau Ridoo (1982)
Witchery Hill (1984)
Sun God, Moon Witch (1985)
False Face (1987)
The Third Magic (1988)
Whalesinger (1990)
Come Like Shadows (1993)
Time Ghost (1994)
Out of the Dark (1995)
Beowulf (1999)

Ruth Nichols
A Walk Out of the World (1969)
The Marrow of the World (1972)
Song of the Pearl (1976)
Left-Handed Spirit (1978)
The Burning of the Rose (1990)

Recent works discussed:

Alison Baird
The Hidden World (Penguin, 1999)
The Wolves of Woden (Penguin, 2001)

Karleen Bradford
www.karleenbradford.com
Dragonfire (HarperCollins, 1997)
Whisperings of Magic (HarperCollins, 2001)

Margaret Buffie
www.buffie.netfirms.com
The Seeker's Quest
   The Watcher (Kids Can, 2000)
   The Seeker (Kids Can, 2002)

Dave Duncan
www.daveduncan.com
The King's Daggers
   Sir Stalwart (Avon, 1999)
   The Crooked House (Avon, 2000)
   Silvercloak (Avon, 2001)
The King's Blades
   The Gilded Chain (Eos, 1998)
   Lord of the Fire Lands (Eos, 1999)
   Sky of Swords (Eos, 2000)

Eileen Kernaghan
www.thistledown.sk.ca
Dance of the Snow Dragon (Thistledown, 1995)
The Snow Queen (Thistledown, 2000)

O.R. Melling
The Chronicles of Faerie
   The Hunter's Moon (HarperCollins, 1993/Puffin, 2000)
   The Summer King (Puffin, 2000)
   The Light-Bearer's Daughter (Penguin, 2001)

J.C. Mills
www.canscaip.org/bios/millsjc.html
The Goodfellow Chronicles
   The Sacred Seal (Key Porter, 2001)

Caryl Cude Mullin
A Riddle of Roses (Second Story, 2000)

Kenneth Oppel
www.kennethoppel.ca
Silverwing (HarperCollins, 1997)
Sunwing (HarperCollins, 1999)
Firewing (HarperCollins, 2002)

Bill Richardson
www.annickpress.com/ai/richardson.html
After Hamelin (Annick, 2000)

Arthur Slade/Arthur G. Slade
www.arthurslade.com
Dust (HarperCollins, 2001)
Northern Frights
   Draugr (Orca, 1997)
   The Haunting of Drang Island (Orca, 1998)
   The Loki Wolf (Orca, 2000)

Linda Smith
www.thistledown.sk.ca
The Freyan Trilogy
   Wind Shifter (Thistledown, 1995)
   Sea Change (Thistledown, 1999)
   The Turning Time (Thistledown, 2001)

Duncan Thornton
www.kalifax.com
Kalifax (Coteau Books, 1999)
Captain Jenny and the Sea of Wonders (Coteau, 2001)

And what was that about baled hay? See my article on writing fantasy and historical fiction "Belief is in the Details: Don't Take the Present for Granted," which originally appeared in Phantastes in May 2001 and is being republished in Canadian Writer's Journal in June 2002.