This is London: Travel Books For Kids

Last summer, I fell in love with the ethnic food book series for kids that I discovered in Whole Foods.  Now a new set of children’s travel books have stolen my heart.  You MUST check out Miroslav Šašek’s ”This Is …” series.

This is London, New York, San Francisco, Paris … and the list goes on and on.

Czech architect, Miroslav Šašek, began his career in children’s literature in the late 1940′s — just before the coup d’état in his home country.  After emigrating to Germany and trying his hand at radio, he returned to writing. Then in 1959, Šašek published “This is Paris”, the first in his beloved 18-book series. For more than 50 years, children everywhere have been able to sample the world’s greatest locales through his works.

Even though the books have won numerous awards over the years, I’ve never heard of them until today! (Yes, I’m still trying to figure out how I could have possibly missed this!)   What’s exciting is that Random House has reissued many of the books in the series during the past few years. I guess the old adage is true …  ”What’s old is new again!”

Here’s the full list of the books in Šašek’s “This Is” series ….  The coolest thing about it?  GILT has them on sale for the next few days.  (BTW, GILT’s also offering a deal on the “Larry Gets Lost” book series which will be our next reading list post on kids books.)

Book Cover	Book Title	Published	Reissued
	This is Paris	1959	2004
	This is London	1959	2004
	This is Rome	1960	2007
	This is New York	1960	2003
	This is Edinburgh	1961	2006
	This is Munich	1961	—-
	This is Venice	1961	2005
	This is San Francisco	1962	2003
	This is Israel	1962	2008
	This is Cape Canaveral later This is Cape Kennedy now This is the Way to the Moon	1963	2009
	This is Ireland	1964	2005
	This is Hong Kong	1965	2007
	This is Greece	1966	2009
	This is Texas	1967	2006
	This is the United Nations	1968	—-
	This is Washington, DC	1969	—-
	This is Australia	1970	—-
	This is Historic Britain now This is Britain	1974	2008

The world has changed in the half-century since Šašek penned his first book in the series.  If he was still alive today, which cities would you want him to add to the mix?  I’d totally ask for:

Africa:  Accra, Addis Ababa, Cairo, Capetown, Johannesburg, Lagos, Marrakech

Asia:  Bangkok, Beijing, Dubai, Mumbai, Tokyo

Australia: Sydney, Melbourne, Great Barrier Reef

Europe: Amsterdam, Barcelona, Berlin, Helsinki, Istanbul, Lisbon, Madrid, Milan, Prague, Stockholm, Venice

North America:  Chicago, Los Angeles, Miami, Toronto, Vancouver

South America:  Bogota, Buenos Aires, Rio de Janeiro, Sao Paulo

Are there children in your life that you want to introduce to the world? Even if there aren’t, this is still a great series to get — especially if you’re a sucker for good visual design and illustration like me.

Stay Fly!
-Chelle