List: themes:trickster

Joyful is what this book is. Thoroughly joyful, and I'd love to blame it for my anarchist tendencies (but that would probably be unfair).

Probably my first trickster book – I reveled in how clever and witty Tom was. All his tricks, all his deals and feelings felt real and like something to aspire to. I even took his frequent bartering of small items and introduced it at school. It was great fun.

More of the same – never change a running system.

This is the first part of a very German series of books for children. The Sams (from "Samstag", "Saturday") appears the the very dull, very anxious office worker Herr Taschenbier after for a full week every day fulfills its literal name, making the book untranslatable. The Sams has blue dots all over its face, and whenever you make a wish, a dot disappears and the wish comes true.

Mostly funny, sometimes hilarious. Listen to it – it loses half its charm on paper.

While I generally love everything Astrid Lindgren has written, the Pippi books rank lowest among her books for me. Pippi (Pippilotta Viktualia Rollgardina Pfefferminz Efraimstochter Langstrumpf) is strong and wild, has a horse and a monkey and two good friends and does whatever she wants. That's it in terms of plots. The movies are fun and entertaining – I enjoyed trying to spot the tricks they used when I was a child – for example, Pippi can lift her horse, which is very much a real horse! But as a book, it is a bit light on plot.