Kimberley Reynolds on the Cambridge guide’s US rival

The first general reference work on children’s literature, the groundbreaking Oxford Companion to Children’s Literature, was published in 1984. Inexplicably, it has never been revised or expanded, and for some years it has been showing its age, but until recently it has been the only resource of its kind.

The time has come for several new reference works for children’s literature professionals and enthusiasts. In 1996, Routledge brought out the bestselling International Companion Encyclopedia of Children’s Literature and Continuum’s attractively produced volume appears alongside the new Cambridge guide.

Most schools and individuals buy only one work of this kind. In the UK, the Continuum Encyclopedia is unlikely to be the popular choice. At pound;95 it is almost three times the price of the Cambridge Guide (reviewed left) and doesn’t represent three times the information. And its bias is too American.

Look, for example, at the entry on magazines and periodicals: “The first edited for children - The Children’s Magazine: Calculated for the Use of Families and Schools - appeared in Hartford, Connecticut, in 1789 and lasted four issues.” It goes on to talk exclusively about American publications. There are entries on individuals from elsewhere; British examples include Raymond Briggs, Alan Garner, Rudyard Kipling, Penelope Lively, Helen Oxenbury and, inevitably, J K Rowling. Many prominent contemporary UK authors are excluded: no Melvin Burgess or even Philip Pullman.

The encyclopedia includes useful essays on areas such as Native American literature, sports stories (no ponies!) and music and children’s literature, as well as genres, topics and individuals. The style is clear and concise without being truncated.

In the US, children’s literature is a well-developed and professionally resourced field, and this work offers insights into its concerns and qualities. The speed and ease of obtaining books from the US means that the Continuum Encyclopedia can be used as a guide to exploring some of the American children’s books that are unknown here. It will not be the most used reference book in the UK, but it complements and extends the others in useful ways.

Kimberley Reynolds is director of the National Centre for Research in Children’s Literature, Roehampton Institute, University of Surrey