Here are 100 books that Arctic Lights, Arctic Nights fans have personally recommended if you like
Arctic Lights, Arctic Nights.
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I have loved reading my whole life. So when I became a mom, I started reading to my kids pretty much as soon as they came home from the hospital. They absolutely love to have books read to them, and we have shelves full of picture books. My favorite picture books to read out loud are ones with eye-catching illustrations, witty stories that spark imagination or learning, and rhymes that flow rhythmically. As a bonus, if the characters lend themselves to fun voices, those are always winners. I hope you enjoy reading these books to your kids as much as I do.
Honestly, I read it to myself just for the fun of it. But every child I read it to loves it as well.
Chris Van Dusen (my all-time favorite illustrator) hits all the marks of a great picture book: wonderfully imaginative, absolutely beautiful retro 50’s style artwork, and his rhyming text has such perfect rhythmic timing.
It’s a joy to read, and each page is so full of hidden wonders. After you read this one, you will definitely want to check out his other “If I Built” books and see what a house and a school could be like with a little, or a lot, of creativity.
Young Jack is giving an eye-opening tour of the car he'd like to build. There's a snack bar, a pool, and even a robot named Robert to act as chauffeur. With Jack's soaring imagination in the driver's seat, we're deep-sea diving one minute and flying high above traffic the next in this whimsical, tantalizing take on the car of the future. Illustrations packed with witty detail, bright colors, and chrome recall the fabulous fifties and an era of…
Twelve-year-old identical twins Ellie and Kat accidentally trigger their physicist mom’s unfinished time machine, launching themselves into a high-stakes adventure in 1970 Chicago. If they learn how to join forces and keep time travel out of the wrong hands, they might be able find a way home. Ellie’s gymnastics and…
I have loved reading my whole life. So when I became a mom, I started reading to my kids pretty much as soon as they came home from the hospital. They absolutely love to have books read to them, and we have shelves full of picture books. My favorite picture books to read out loud are ones with eye-catching illustrations, witty stories that spark imagination or learning, and rhymes that flow rhythmically. As a bonus, if the characters lend themselves to fun voices, those are always winners. I hope you enjoy reading these books to your kids as much as I do.
This is the epic tale of how rock, paper, scissors came to be such a famous trio, and it is the book to read if you want to laugh out loud with your kids.
I don’t want to give away the funniest moment, but let me just say that my kids and I busted up laughing when we got to page 7. Even now, after countless times reading it, they can’t contain their giggles as we approach their favorite line.
It is a fun book to read melodramatically (“Are you not entertained?!” on page 11) and you won’t be able to help creating your own character voices.
A laugh-out-loud funny new children's book from the author of The Day the Crayons Quit. The Legend of Rock Paper Scissors reveals the epic tale behind everyone's favourite playground game!
You've played the game...now read the book.
Long ago in the Kingdom of Backgarden lived a fearsome warrior named ROCK. ROCK was undefeated in battle, and yet, he felt unfulfilled. So he went in search of a worthy opponent. Little did he know that at that very moment two more warriors were setting forth with the very same idea. When ROCK collides with SCISSORS from the village of Junk Drawer,…
I have loved reading my whole life. So when I became a mom, I started reading to my kids pretty much as soon as they came home from the hospital. They absolutely love to have books read to them, and we have shelves full of picture books. My favorite picture books to read out loud are ones with eye-catching illustrations, witty stories that spark imagination or learning, and rhymes that flow rhythmically. As a bonus, if the characters lend themselves to fun voices, those are always winners. I hope you enjoy reading these books to your kids as much as I do.
I can’t think of this book without picturing my own little girl when she was 3 years old with pigtails sticking out, just like Amy Wu.
She and I read this over and over again to the point that she could quote the whole book. It is such a sweet story about family traditions and pushing through the challenge it can be for little hands to learn how to do something new.
The story is precious and the illustrations are delightful.
Twelve-year-old identical twins Ellie and Kat accidentally trigger their physicist mom’s unfinished time machine, launching themselves into a high-stakes adventure in 1970 Chicago. If they learn how to join forces and keep time travel out of the wrong hands, they might be able find a way home. Ellie’s gymnastics and…
With three kids, bedtime at my house is usually nuts. When we strike gold with a great bedtime read that’s funny or cozy, or better yet, BOTH, it becomes part of our permanent rotation. I love finding books that make my kids excited about story time (and just maybe encourage them to get through their bedtime routines a little faster). As a children’s picture book author, my own books are inspired by my kids’ everyday lives, and sleep, or lack thereof, is a topic that I always find so very relatable!
To me, this book has a great combination of sleepy and silly elements. The illustrations are warm and cozy, and throughout the book, Bear snores happily in the background.
My kids and I love that while Bear sleeps, a party starts forming in his cave. We love seeing the party grow until Bear wakes up to discover what’s going on.
It seems like Bear can sleep through anything. As a succession of animals enter his cave to escape the fierce storm, he continues to snore. Mouse makes a nice warm fire, Hare cooks popcorn and Badger brings treats... They are having a great time. But when Bear wakes up and realises he's missed out on the fun, his visitors fear the worst.Can Bear be persuaded to join the party? This read-aloud rhyming story has fun, suspense and a happy ending - with Jane Chapman's beautiful, captivating illustrations and Karma Wilson's absorbing, lyrical words perfectly depicting the companionship of the warm,…
As an avid trail-runner and mountain-biker who’s done a ton of outdoorsy things, from sailboat racing on the Chesapeake Bay to rockclimbing to backpacking in the Pacific Northwest, I’m convinced that nothing gets you closer to someone’s experience than a well-told first-person account. The best personal narratives make you feel the cold, glow with the exhilaration, and burn with ambition to go, to do, to see for yourself — and can even make you look at the world, and yourself, in a new way. These books, different as they are, have all done those things for me.
The oldest of my choices, published in 1920, this classic account of an epic 2,000-mile dogsled journey in northern Alaska, written by an Episcopal missionary, still makes lists of the best books about the 49th state. A masterpiece of adventure and ethnography, with lyrical descriptions of nature, A Winter Circuit is the work of a man not only deeply and widely read about polar exploration and the history of the Far North, but also keenly aware of the social forces bearing down on Alaska’s Native peoples, and eager to support and defend their time-honed way of life.
This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it.
This work is in the public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work.
Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. To ensure a quality reading experience, this work has been…
I grow bored reading the same thing over and over, so I don’t. My favorite books challenge me, teach me, blow the walls out, and expand my horizons. I want books to take me to unexpected places and show me worlds existing and otherwise that I never dreamed could be out there. I’ve never been a fan of genre literature that strictly “follows the rules” for that reason. Some of the books on this list are from genres, but they still differ from the predictable. I want to be surprised, and then you’ll hold my attention for the entire novel, and I’ll refer back to it for years.
James Michener is my favorite author. What can I say? I’m a sucker for epics: narratives that fully explore characters, families, historical eras, and locations, both exotic and ordinary. Michener chooses a location and fully explores its history and people; those people don’t always behave as expected.
They interact in unexpected ways, making decisions that are not always what they “should” and marrying (or otherwise) lovers (and otherwise) across cultures and ages. We see how history truly is, humankind ravaging the unknown in discovery and survival.
I chose this book because it was the first one of his I read, and I lost myself in a world of wilderness, a gold rush, and a fight for statehood. It taught me most of what I know about the 49th state, as well as looking beyond the history books to see the human aspect of the past.
In this sweeping epic of the northernmost American frontier, James A. Michener guides us through Alaska’s fierce terrain and history, from the long-forgotten past to the bustling present. As his characters struggle for survival, Michener weaves together the exciting high points of Alaska’s story: its brutal origins; the American acquisition; the gold rush; the tremendous growth and exploitation of the salmon industry; the arduous construction of the Alcan Highway, undertaken to defend the territory during World War II. A spellbinding portrait of a human community fighting to establish its place in the world, Alaska traces a bold and majestic saga…
Every book on my list has a personal connection. I’ve either been to these locations, have had similar experiences, or have met the authors. The connecting threads of my list are perseverance over incredible odds, survival in a harsh landscape, and the courageous and undefeatable spirit of the characters. I love all these books because they tell great stories about amazing people in the land and environs that I have made my home for my entire life.
This is an inspiring memoir depicting life in the arctic, living the traditional substance way of the Inupiat people. Kanter’s writing is top notch and he describes the arctic life as only one who has truly lived it can. I’ve traveled and worked in the land he loves and calls home. He nails the brutality and the rawness and the beauty and the wonder of that vast and harsh land. This book is personal and emotional and depicts a lifestyle, a land, and a culture that’s not often honestly portrayed in literature. I devoured this book and was left wanting more. I’ve met Seth and he is a great guy and a hell of a writer, in my opinion.
Seth Kantner's Ordinary Wolves told the story of a white boy raised in a sod igloo on the Arctic tundra. A heartbreaking vision of a vanishing world, it established Kantner as one of the nation's most original and authentic writers. Here, he returns to the setting of his debut novel with an autobiographical account of his own life in a rapidly changing land. Beginning with his parents' migration to the Alaskan wilderness in the 1950s and extending to his own attempts to balance hunting with writing, Kantner recalls cold nights wrapped in caribou hides, fur-clad visitors arriving on dog sleds,…
There’s nothing like personal experience. You have to read the literature, it’s true. That’s how we’ve all met here at Shepherd. But you have to roll up your sleeves and get down to visiting, too, if you want to write about travel. I first approached the Arctic in 1991 and I return above sixty degrees north every year, although I must confess to a secret advantage; I married a Finn. We spend summers at a little cabin north of Helsinki. I know the region personally, I keep coming back, and I invite you, whenever you can, to come up and join us!
Barry Lopez was a nature writer and environmentalist.
He died on Christmas day 2020, and although we are fortunate to have his valedictory book Horizon, published when his traveling days were pretty well behind him, Arctic Dreams is the real deal, with Lopez as raconteur, but practitioner too, thoroughly in his element.
Lopez writes about exploration and the aurora, animals and the weather, ice and myth and survival and joy. He’s effortless. You’ll learn more than you knew there was to know about the high north, and the pleasure is in the learning.
If you must cut to the chase with these five books, Arctic
Dreams is the book, because Barry Lopez got things right.
'A master nature writer' (New York Times) provides the ultimate natural, social and cultural history of the Arctic landscape.
The author of Horizon's classic work explores the Arctic landscape and the hold it continues to exert on our imagination.
WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY ROBERT MACFARLANE
Lopez's journey across our frozen planet is a celebration of the Arctic in all its guises. A hostile landscape of ice, freezing oceans and dazzling skyscapes. Home to millions of diverse animals and people. The stage to massive migrations by land, sea and air. The setting of epic exploratory…
One way I bring lightness and wonder to my life is through the joy of observing something new around me in this world. The new thing might be the forty Heavenly Blue morning glories that bloomed one morning for my father and me, finding an ancient fossil shell in a skirt of fallen shale at the bottom of a cliff or hearing Balinese gamelan music for the first time. But each time one of these wonders lights up my day, I am reminded of how limited our ability to observe is. Each of these books gave me a view into a world I had not even dreamed about.
I love a story that tells it straight, right from when the person was a know-nothing beginner and was trying and failing, and trying and failing…and oh, the failures that Paulsen somehow survived! The drive and obsession that kept him going all the way to the big one, the Iditarod, shows me the beauty of what an individual can do, even all alone, unwitnessed and unhelped, in the middle of the freezing winter night, with a pack of dogs that doesn’t even care about him a little bit yet.
In reading this book, I feel I have witnessed how a person starts from nothing and then becomes an expert at something. In this case, it’s more than 10,000 hours, Anders Ericsson.
An incredible, breathtaking true adventure of Alaskan dog-racing and of the mesmerising Arctic landscape
Gary Paulsen was in his forties, an internationally famous children's writer. Then he was overtaken by his passion, a passion for Alaskan dog-racing and a passion for the wild, beautiful landscape of the Arctic. WINTERDANCE is the story of this passion. It is a powerful, almost unbelievable adventure, told with humour, pathos, vitality and excitement.
I was born and raised in Northern California, right on the banks of the Sacramento River. While I didn’t realize it growing up, it was an epicenter for outdoor adventures. Along with skiing, snowboarding, hiking, wakeboarding, and camping, I always read a lot. My dad was worried that I would have no sense of direction because I was always in the back of our van or RV reading a book. That led to writing…and I had my first article published in a wakeboarding magazine when I was 15 years old. Traveling always took a backburner to reading, but now it’s front and center of my writing.
I was fortunate enough to join a writers group that this author was the founder of, and he had just released Refraction.
I read one of his other pieces of writing and was quite impressed by his ability to pull a story together so eloquently, so I went out and bought this. And I was blown away…it was well-written, had a nice flow, and covered themes such as the impact the oil industry had on native Alaskans, working in a harsh environment, and how Bruce was able to go back and forth between these diverse worlds.
I think anyone who is concerned about the environment would enjoy this book.
Refraction recounts the experience of working in Prudhoe Bay, Alaska, a remote Arctic outpost and home to the largest oilfield in North America. It's the story of one person's journey, told in a series of reflections on a time spent living in a frozen wasteland. Justifying the endeavor as a modern-day gold rush or a romantic odyssey could otherwise be viewed as another distorted image hovering above the horizon-another refraction.
