Just about every other day, it seems, some villain, curse, disaster or another threatens the destruction of the world as we know it (or a world anyway, since of course there are any number of parallel universes and worlds besides our own). We usually don’t hear of these impending apocalypses because some clever child has gotten there first. With the help of family/ friends/ talking animals/ wizards/ fairies, that kid saves the world. These hero-children don’t always seem especially extraordinary. They’re poor, perhaps even orphans; they have no one to turn to except maybe a couple of rag-tag friends or siblings. If they’re really lucky, they can band together with other seemingly-ordinary-but-actually-heroic kids and form a group of day-saving youngsters. But whether it’s an individual effort or a team of the courageous, whether it’s our own world in jeopardy or a fantastic Other Land, these kids have secret strengths that make them ideal heroes when it comes time to battle the forces of evil (whatever they may be) and save the world. Many of the books on this list are the first in a line of series, because--obviously--the world needs to be saved over and over again.