Books: From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler

Some of my favorite children's books are Newberry Medal winners, including classics like "The Giver," "Maniac Magee," and "A Wrinkle in Time." I've found that in general, these books hold up even when you read them as an adult, which is a pretty special quality when you think about it. Of all the Newberry winners I've read, the book with the most flat-out fun premise is "From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler" by E.L. Konigsburg.

It's about two children named Claudia and Jamie who run away - but they aren't running away from their home, they're running to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The plan is ambitious, and every detail of their escape is gleefully set to paper by Konigsburg. From their grey-washed underwear, to the coins in the fountain they scavenge, to the cheap sandwiches they buy for lunch...these images are almost guaranteed to stick into a kid's head.

Often children's literature has elements of fantasy or the supernatural (most people, kids included, don't want to read about the real world when they read fiction), but this is one story that's pretty firmly grounded. There are some implausible events and lucky coincidences, but overall, you could almost picture yourself hiding in a museum along with Claudia and Jamie. Of course, that's half the fun.

There have been some film adaptations, with the most recent being a 1995 made-for-TV movie that I remember mostly because the girl who played Jamie looked nothing like the character in the book. Here's a clip from the 1973 film version: