Parents, motivated by nostalgia, frequently buy the children's books they remember from their own childhood -- and often shy away from new authors. Timeless classics, like Margaret Wise Brown's "Goodnight Moon" and Maurice Sendak's "Where the Wild Things Are," continue to sell millions of copies each year. Because of this phenomenon, publishers have come to rely on their backlisted titles to generate most of their profits. But with its own bestseller list, the children's book industry can promote its new generation of writers better than ever before.

Even Oprah Winfrey has given a nod to the current hoopla surrounding children's literature. The woman who has helped transform 37 books into bestsellers by including them in her book club devoted a part of her Aug. 3 show to kids books. But for now, she's not likely to make much of a mark on the children's bestseller list: Nineteen of the 21 books she named were backlist titles (no Harry Potter), which render them ineligible for the Times bestseller list, and of the two frontlisters, one was the Newberry winner "Bud, Not Buddy," which appeared on the adult list until it found a new home on the children's list, weeks before she recommended it.

One undeniable casualty of the new list is young adult fiction. "It's a sad fact that YA gets lost in the fray," sighs Cotler. "In children's publishing, unlike adult publishing, we publish books for 6-month-olds and we publish books for kids going to college. The range is so huge -- how can that be possibly covered in one list?"

McGrath says he is taking this issue into consideration. "YA does tend to sell much more in paperback, and YA purchases are made by the kids themselves. Because there is no paperback component to the children's list, that de facto seems to discriminate against YA titles. We're going to try to address these issues in the next month or so." While he didn't reveal his plans, the most obvious solutions would be to expand the children's list to include paperback titles or, less likely, to create a separate children's paperback list.

One change that Scholastic's Marcus would like to see implemented is expanded review coverage of children's titles. As it is now, the children's books insert appears in the New York Times Book Review only twice a year. "I find it interesting that they have chosen to say, 'Oh, children's books are so important that we're going to devote more time to them,' but they're certainly not sacrificing any column space."

At this early stage, McGrath has yet to decide if the new list will result in more reviews of children's literature. "We may well, as we always have, take certain books in the children's category and review them in the part of the Book Review nominally reserved for grown-up books. We've done that with the last two Potters, and I hope we'll continue to do that. But how we'll review them differently remains to be seen."

Jacqueline Woodson, an award-winning author of children, YA and adult novels, doesn't believe that reviews are the crucial factor to parents when they decide what books they will buy for their children. "No one but school librarians, teachers and children's book publishers reads them. With the list, more people can now see what books are out there in a way that they weren't seeing them before."

In fact, libraries and schools -- whose sales figures are not included when compiling bestseller lists -- constitute 50 percent of the children's and YA book market. A highly visible list of what's new in children's literature could encourage trade consumers -- i.e., parents and their kids -- to play a more active role in that market.

"Parents are often in a quandary about what's new, what's good and what's available for children," explains librarian Ilze Long, an assistant branch manager who supervises the children's department at the Reston Regional Library in Virginia, a branch of the Fairfax County Public Library, the sixth largest system in the country. "From my 20 years' experience, I think parents will look to the New York Times children's bestseller list for advice."

While McGrath is careful to clarify that the bestseller list is "not necessarily a guide to anything other than what people are buying," he agrees that "parents buying books for kids are looking for whatever guidance they can get. There's very little of it out there, and if you're a parent, here at least is something that just tells you what other people in the same boat are doing."

Love it or hate it, the children's bestseller list is here to stay. Marcus concedes that Scholastic will do its "best to figure out ways to promote new works. The Times bestseller list has always been a bestselling list to look at and learn about new books. But we'll also be looking at other bestseller lists as an indication of what America is reading."

As for those of us who are out to sate our inner child, or an actual one, we'll be reaping the benefits at the bookstore checkout line with 15 more titles at 40 percent off.

Thursday: A profile of Lemony Snicket, whose "Series of Unfortunate Events" has landed on the New York Times Book Review's bestseller list for children's books .

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