The House at Pooh Corner - A.A. Milne

The book in which we learned how to play Poohsticks brought a bear and his friends to life via bucolic scenes and E.H. Shepard’s endearing illustrations.
 
More than Toad or Ratty in The Wind in the Willows, more even than  Paddington Bear, it was A. A. Milne’s whimsical characters of Pooh, Eeyore, Piglet and Tigger that did it for me.

Poohsticks