(Part 3) Top products from r/tipofmytongue

Wow, I'd totally forgotten about these books, but I remember liking them a lot too.

Be a Perfect Person in Just Three Days!

Make Four Million Dollars by Next Thursday!

Be a Perfect Person in Just Three Days?

I loved this book as a kid. The story also involved a broccoli necklace and drinking weak tea in a quiet room.

Moral of the story is that being perfect is boring :)

Could it be Through the Ice?

It fits your description pretty well, but I was pretty sure I was the only person in the world who had read it.

The Island series by Gordon Korman? It's three books (Shipreck, Survival, and Escape) that are fairly short that are geared towards middle school kids. There is a girl who is amazing at gymnastics. One of the kids is really smart and makes this thing that catches steam from boiled sea water so they can have fresh, salt-less water. Only thing is that it's only about 11 years old.

Is it Shadows by John Saul?

I searched yahoo answers for the query "book boy goes to a school for students brains kill".

There was someone else trying to figure out a book similar, and here's what they remembered:
>...A really smart boy is sent to a special school. All the students there are prodigies. Turns out the dean of the school is using the children to harvest their brains to use as part of a super computer...

Here is the book on google book search at the exact page (81) where Josh tells Amy that he thinks he flunked the test, and she responds that she didn't even finish half of it.

Found it! The princess is actually named Sylvie.

The Great Good Thing by Roderick Townley

http://www.amazon.com/Great-Good-Thing-Roderick-Townley/dp/0689853289

The Great Good Thing by Roderick Townley

Sounds like this:

>Another learning adventure game on disc from DK, Castle Explorer takes you into (at times quite literally) a 3-D animated, 14th-century European castle. There are cross-sections galore, with pop-up windows explaining archaic terminology and videos of live actors. It's a combination of DK's The Way Things Work and (yet again) Myst, letting you explore the castle as a spy for the King and carry out an important mission. Along the way you'll assume a disguise, interact with other characters, and collect pieces of a vital map as well as coins (to bail you out when, inevitably, you end up being thrown in the dungeon). All of this is executed superbly and believably in typical DK fashion.

Castle Explorer

http://www.amazon.com/Castle-Explorer-DK/dp/0789408910

Sounds like this book. The family name is Herdman.

The Best Christmas Pageant Ever - Barbara Robinson

https://www.amazon.com/Best-Christmas-Pageant-Ever/dp/0064402754

Ok, I had also been looking for this forever... I did a little more digging today and I think I found it! It’s called “Be a Perfect Person in Just Three Days!” here’s a listing for it

Invitation To The Game by Monica Hughes. It's one of my favorite YAs and I reread it every couple years :)

The Best Christmas Pageant Ever? Or maybe its sequel?

Was it The Herdmans from The Best Christmas Pageant Ever (and various other books with similar titles)?

Pretty sure you're thinking of a series called Diadem, particularly the Book of Names, though you've got the characters switched around.

Was it a DK game? I remember something like this. There was a butt crack of a guy sitting on a chamber pot. http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0789408910?pc_redir=1414274813&robot_redir=1

Is it The Truth Trap? Alternatively, it might be one of the other books in that series.

A Taste of Blackberries sounds like it.

Sounds like the Internet Detectives series:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Bandits-Internet-Detectives-Michael-Coleman/dp/0553486209

One of the reviews mentions the coded messages.

Not sure how you didn't find this.

I'll have to take a look at it when I get home, but could it have been Animalia? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Animalia_%28book%29

there is a "look inside" on Amazon if you're not sure: http://www.amazon.com/Animalia-Picture-Puffins-Graeme-Base/dp/0140559965/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1347342717&sr=8-1&keywords=animalia#reader_0140559965

Look at the book on Amazon. It's got an option to see some of the pages. Link here

The cover isn't green, and the book came out in the 90s, but it still kind of sounds like "Even more short and shivery"
https://www.amazon.com/Even-More-Short-Shivery-Spine-Tingling/dp/0440418771

A Taste of Blackberries

Count Zero or The Internet Detectives?

Internet Detectives?

http://www.amazon.com/Bandits-Internet-Detectives-Michael-Coleman/dp/0553486209

Possible answers:

Logic Quest 3D: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cMndtSeZZ0E

Encarta Mind Maze: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qLmudzYWY94

DK Castle explorer: http://www.amazon.com/Castle-Explorer-DK/dp/0789408910

(Links got from previous TOMT post replies to similar questions)

The Color of Distance

Might be "Through the Ice"
http://www.amazon.com/Through-Ice-Piers-Anthony/dp/0671721135/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1426231858&sr=8-1&keywords=through+the+ice

It's not exact but is similar.

The Color of Distance is a book? Don't know about a movie?

Invitation to the Game, maybe?

I think it might be The Color of Distance

Singularity maybe?

One of the Diadem books maybe?

Maybe Animalia by Graeme Base?

http://www.amazon.com/The-Forgotten-Door-Apple-Paperbacks/dp/0590431307

You remembered correctly!

http://www.amazon.com/Timequake-Robert-C-Lee/dp/0664326986/ref=sr_1_22?ie=UTF8&qid=1371583457&sr=8-22&keywords=timequake

Timequake, by Robert C. Lee

From Google Books -
>After an earthquake briefly disrupts their canoe trip in the Ozarks, Randy and his cousin Morgan travel into the future where, depleted and overpopulated, the country has lapsed into medieval society.

Invitation to the Game?

This?

Could it be Through The Ice?

Could it be The Farthest-Away Mountain by Lynne Reid Banks?

At least one version of the book cover shows a mountain with multi-colored snow and a girl wearing a red cape.

Is it Shadows by John Saul? The description sounds right.

The Farthest Away Mountain, by Lynne Reid Banks.

Even More Short & Shivery: Thirty Spine-Tingling Tales by Robert D. San Souci.

https://www.recordedbooks.com/title-details/9781419372636

http://www.amazon.com/Animalia-Picture-Puffins-Graeme-Base/dp/0140559965/ref=cm_lmf_tit_1

or a book similar?

The Forgotten Door by Alexander Key

Is this the book you're looking for:
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0140375988/adamcadreac
Singularity:
Harry and Barry are twins. Their parents have gone on a trip and sent them to an isolated farm out on the prairie. (Missing parents!) Barry's the dominant twin, so much so that even though they're identical, people remark that Harry acts like he's the little brother. When they meet a girl, Harry isn't the one she goes for.

Out on the farm is a shed. One day Barry steps inside and the door slams behind him. Harry immediately opens the door again to find Barry asleep and in need of a shave. He thinks he's been locked in overnight. It turns out that inside the shed is a singularity which distorts time. For every second that goes by outside the shed, an hour goes by inside.

Possibly Gordon Korman's Island series?

https://www.amazon.com/Shipwreck-Island-Book-Gordon-Korman/dp/0439164567

Titles of the individual books are Shipwreck, Survival, and Escape

Shipwreck: Being on a sailboat in the warm waters of the Pacific with a bunch of kids the same age could sound like a vacation dream come true. However, when this month-long trip is part of a strict program called Charting a New Course, and each participant--or inmate--is there for disciplinary problems, things don't look quite as rosy. And then, of course, when a big storm strikes, and the captain and first mate disappear, and the boat seems to be sinking... the whole idea becomes less and less appealing. Still, for Luke, Will, Lyssa, J.J., Ian, and Charla, this is the way the cards have been dealt, and whatever problems they may have with each other, however much they don't want to be there, it's time to start working together to save their own lives.

Survival: Six kids are stuck on a desert island. They have no food. No shelter. Nobody knows they are lost. They must take from the island in order to survive. But what if they're not alone?

Escape: Having survived for so long on the deserted island, Luke, Charla, Will, Lysa, J.J., and Ian realize that their enemies are closer than they had expected and soon discover that they will have only one chance at an escape.

Is it one of the Short & Shivery books?



Short & Shivery: Thirty Chilling Tales (Turtleback School & Library Binding Edition) https://www.amazon.com/dp/0613857046/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_p30zxb7P4C81D



More Short & Shivery: Thirty Terrifying Tales https://www.amazon.com/dp/038532250X/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_L30zxb505ZX1H



Even More Short & Shivery: Thirty Spine-Tingling Tales https://www.amazon.com/dp/0440418771/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_d20zxb1B3VCVE


A Terrifying Taste of Short & Shivery: Thirty Creepy Tales https://www.amazon.com/dp/0385322550/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_m40zxbRE16R5G

It could be the Matt McKendrick series, by Frances A Miller. Matt is accused of raping and killing his baby sister, but later is taken in by the cop who arrested him. He runs, a lot, and in the final book Losers and Winners he competes, and his main competition is a former gang member who's gang goes after Matt and beats the living daylight out of him.

Every second word in the book seems to be Bull, or Bullshit... there are a few fights and a drug deal that takes place in the locker room, and the books are set in LA where there are gang problems.

From the cover description it's likely The Truth Trap which is the first book in the series.