What are the "must read" Classics appropriate for a mature 8 year old?

[tammyw]

My daughter is a skilled reader and reads many books (currently reading all the Little House books). I'd love if there could be a list of appropriate classics where the stories are appropriate for her. These will be read either by her or read aloud by me. Thanks so much in advance!

[HollyBearsMom]

I don't know how "classic" these are but I loved the following and my now 9 year old started reading them around 8.

Nancy Drew/Hardy Boys

Frank L Baum Wizard of Oz series- he particularly loved Ozma of Oz and TikTok of Oz

My Side of the Mountain

Old Yeller

Island of the Blue Dolphin

All of Kind of Family series

[AAK]

How about the Betsy Tacy Books (origically published in 1940--reprinted often enough to be "classic" in my mind)

B is for Betsy (1939)

Secret Garden

Anne of Green Gable

Ginger Pye

Black Beauty

Misty of Chincoteague

The Penderwicks

Little Women

Where the Red Fern Grows

Tuck Everlasting

Wrinkle in Time

Ok, so some of these might not be old enough to be "classics" but I think of them as such.  Some of them your dd would be able to read herself, some you would probably need to read to her and (I think) all of them could be enjoyed by both of you.

Amy

[SubliminalDarkness]

I also don't know exactly how you define "classics," but as soon as my son was able to read them(I think he was 6) I got him every Roald Dahl book I could find. I loved them as a kid, and he loves them, too.

[tammyw]

Roald Dahl books are her favorite also (mine as well)! In fact, I just purchased a whole set of them at costco for $25. A fabulous deal. She's already read them all but loves them so much and these are  books she does like to reread.

The problem is she's read so many (lots of those already suggested, but not all so this is good!) I am just trying to make sure we don't miss any because I'm always on the search for quality books for her to read!

[kathymuggle]

It depends on the sensitivity and maturity of the eight year old.  

I would not want to read Old Yeller, Where the Red Fern Grows or Island of the Blue Dolphins with most 8 year olds - they are usually seen (for content) as grade 5-8 books.  YMMV.

I think Wrinkle in Time may be hard to grasp for some 8 year olds, but it is a very cool book.

I like Mr. Poppers Penguins.  It is an easy read, but does bring up some question relating to ethics (should we really order penguins from the antartic, lol?)

other thoughts:

Stuart Little

Charlottes Web (a bit sad...but nothing like Old Yeller or Red Fern grows!)

Frindel

From the Mixed up Files of Basil E Frankweiler 

The Phantom tollbooth

Some Beverly Cleary books might work - the Ramona series

Have fun!

[Daffodil]

I'm pretty sure I remember my 2nd grade teacher reading Island of the Blue Dolphins to us.  It could possibly have been 3rd grade, but no older than that.  I read it to 7 year old DD some time in the past year, and found myself surprised that my teacher had thought it was appropriate for such young kids.  DD loved it, though, and I also remember really enjoying it, so I wouldn't rule it out for an 8 year old.

Some other books I might call classics (even if some of them aren't very old):

The Jungle Book
Tove Jansson's Moomin books
Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass
Winnie the Pooh and The House at Pooh Corner
everything by Astrid Lindgren  (We particularly like Ronia the Robber's Daughter.)
The Secret Garden
A Little Princess

(Kids who have read and enjoyed the above two might also like Little Lord Fauntleroy.)
the Borrowers series
the Narnia books
Peter Pan
Coraline
Harry Potter

Inkheart, Inkspell, and Inkdeath
Half Magic and other books by Edward Eager
Five Children and It and other books by E. Nesbit

My Side of the Mountain

The Animal Family
The Princess and the Goblin
At the Back of the North Wind
the Mary Poppins books

Then there are books that are really enjoyable and interesting for a lot of kids, but that maybe don't seem quite as "classic."  (I could spend a lot of time debating with myself which books ought to be in my first list and which should be in this list, but I won't.)  Here are some maybe-not-quite-classics worth reading:

Toys Go Out and Toys Dance Party
The Silver Crown
Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH
The Indian in the Cupboard (and sequels)
the May Bird series
the Silverwing series
All-Of-A-Kind Family (and sequels)
books by Eleanor Estes
books by Beverly Cleary

books by Zilpha Keatley Snyder

I remember really enjoying the Freddy books by Walter R. Brooks and Joan Aiken's books (Nightbirds on Nantucket, etc.), but I haven't read them again as an adult, so I can't say for sure what I would think of them now. 

[spruce]

Originally Posted by tammyw 

My daughter is a skilled reader and reads many books (currently reading all the Little House books). I'd love if there could be a list of appropriate classics where the stories are appropriate for her. These will be read either by her or read aloud by me. Thanks so much in advance!

My kids have all loved The Hobbit at around age 6 (to listen to at around age 5, then they get their own copy usually at their 6th birthday). 

Also Oliver Twist (which is hard for me to read because of the sadness, but really grips a child's imagination).

We also love The Ogre Downstairs for teaching what it means to be part of a family. 

A.A. Milne's poems are great to use for recitation and copywork, and there's never any reason NOT to want to read Shel SIlverstein...I don't know how many times I've relived listening over and over again to "Sara Cynthia Sylvia Stout" or that one about the king who loved peanut butter sandwiches. ;)

Good luck, and congrats on raising a reader!

love, p

[tammyw]

Thanks for all the great recommendations so far! I have taken The Hobbit from the library before but it ended up going back before reading. I'm thinking this is one to buy. I'm embarrassed to admit it, but it's one book I've never read.

All of a Kind Family and sequels. How did I not KNOW there were sequels??? Oh me oh my, we absolutely loved the first book. I think I am in heaven :)

Someone mentioned Ramona and Beezus. I never would have thought about those. She's not read them yet!

[AAK]

Originally Posted by tammyw 

Someone mentioned Ramona and Beezus. I never would have thought about those. She's not read them yet!

Really!!!  Oh my, those are currently my 8 year old's favorites.  We are reading them in order.  After you're done with those the ones about the mouse are very charming (Mouse and the Motorcycle, Ralph S. Mouse and a third one can't remember).  

[SundayCrepes]

We are following the booklist as www.sonlight.com. (Just the secular books for us.) I see it as a source of book titles that I would not otherwise have considered. There is also winterpromise and Charlotte Mason. Others I'm sure, those are just the ones I know. So far I'm VERY impressed by their lists.

[Jane91]

There is what I think of as classics:

Adventures of Tom Sawyer

Pollyanna

The Wizard of Oz (and sequels)

Lang's The Blue Fairy Book (and sequels)

The Princess and the Goblin

The Prince and the Pauper

Treasure Island (and also Kidnapped -- though probably too mature)

Just So Stories

Swiss Family Robinson

Johnny Tremain

Peter Pan

The Jungle Book

Black Beauty

Pinocchio

Dr. Doolittle

Pippi Longstocking

The Black Stallion

Mary Poppins

Anne of Green Gables (and LM Montgomery's other series as well, especially "Emily of New Moon")

Little Women (and its sequels, Little Men and Jo's Boys, as well as "Under the Lilacs" and "Eight Cousins", and its sequel 'Rose in Bloom")

A Little Princess (and Secret Garden and Little Lord Fauntleroy)

The Wind in the Willows
Heidi (and there are a couple of pretty good sequels)

The Narnia books

The Hobbit

Charlotte's Web

Winnie the Pooh and The House at Pooh Corner

The Phantom Tollbooth

The 101 Dalmatians

National Velvet

Lassie Come Home

Other great reads, but not necessarily rising to the level of classics:

A Girl of the Limberlost by Gene Stratton-Porter

The Wolves of Willoughby Chase by Joan Aiken (and anything else by Aiken)

Daddy Long Legs (probably a bit too old)

Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH

Watership Down (probably a bit too mature, but still good)

The Littles Series

The Borrowers Series

Caddie Woodlawn

Various Series by Lloyd Alexander, but particularly the Prydain Series

The Witch of Blackbird Pond (also The Bronze Bow, but that has a definite Christain tilt FYI)

Cheaper by the Dozen

The "Shoes" series (starting with Ballet Shoes) by Noel Streatfeild

Carry On, Mr. Bowditch

The Ordinary Princess

The Boxcar Children Series

My Friend Flicka

The Yearling (though probably a bit too intense for her age)

A Walk in Wolf Wood (may be good for reading aloud, might be a bit old)

Also any good set of mythology books, covering Greek, Roman and Norse.

[AFWife]

EVERYTHING everyone posted! Wow, I'm taking notes for things that *I* need to read or reread.

DH would add Journey to the Center of the Earth. Make sure it's the unabridged version.

I can't remember if I saw it: Time Machine. It all depends on HOW mature and literate she is...

ETA: When I was around that age I read The Clan Of The Cave Bear.....but that's totally up to  you guys. (I wouldn't let her read the later books...they're a bit pornographic)

[Smokering]

Is she old enough for Eight Cousins, LIttle Women etc?

I loved Gerald Durrell books at that age - he was an animal lover and founded the Jersey Wildlife Preservation Trust (a zoo, but a really awesome one). You might want to pre-read a few, because some of his books contain a bit of vulgar language, if that bothers you - but not being much of a science geek, nearly everything I learned about nature/biology/preserving endangered species/zoos I learned from Gerald! My Family and Other Animals is maybe his most famous (and it's hilarious). Worth checking out, anyway.

Some kids love The Hobbit from the get-go, but if she doesn't don't be too surprised - put it away for a few years and try again.

If she has a wry sense of humour, Jean Merrill's The Pushcart War is fantastic.

[cappuccinosmom]

My dad has been reading the Swallows and Amazons series to my boys.  They *looooove* them.  They'd be a challenge for an 8 yo, but they're great, engaging, fantastic stories and I bet she'd find her pace by about halfway through the first book.

There are 13 or something, in all.  4 siblings "adventuring". :)  Dad gets them used, through Amazon.com

[Jane91]

Pushcart War was great! 

Personally, I found Under the Lilacs and Eight Cousins to be an easier starting place with Alcott than Little Women.  I had a Little Women that had been beautifully illustrated by Tasha Tudor, and I recall that being more a "being read to" book in 2nd grade, which I re-read myself maybe a year later.  Same with Swiss Family Robinson.

[Daffodil]

Another good starter Alcott book might be Jack and Jill.

[tammyw]

Wow, thanks everyone!! What a wonderful list of books. We've read lots of course, but a good reminder to read them again now that she is older, can better understand, and can read on her own.

I really, really appreciate it. I am constantly taking books from our library (through the online request system) and now you've given me many more to try out! I'm embarrassed to say we currently have more than 200 books from the library, lol! Lots of everything - some for me, some for my 4.5 year old, lots of non-fiction picture books, etc.

[Smokering]

I'd forgotten all about Jack and Jill!

The Princess and the Goblin and The Princess and Curdie, by George MacDonald, are also good. Also The Rescuers by Margery Sharp, and the other books in the Miss Bianca series - Miss Bianca in the Antarctic is one. And all the Noel Streatfeilds - Ballet Shoes, White Boots, When the Siren Wailed, etc - are pretty good fun at this age. Ooh, and Lois Lowry - some of them are a bit dark/serious, like Number the Stars and A Summer to Die (both awesome, though), but she has "fluffier" ones as well, like the Anastasia series. (Are those appropriate for an eight-year-old? I haven't met one for some time!) Ooh, and The Family From One End Street.

Apologies if I'm repeating suggestions here, I'm just staring sideways at my bookshelf. She's read the Anne of Green Gables series? LM Montgomery wrote heaps of other books too, all in a vaguely similar vein - the Emily trilogy, The Blue Castle...

[Jane91]

Actually, now that I think of it, there are a bunch of Gene Stratton Porter books that are very good, but not particularly well known now (though she was a best-seller in her day). 

A Girl of the Limberlost is definitely where I would start with an 8 year old girl.

Freckles is a book that loosely precedes A Girl of the Limberlost.  Don't need to read Freckles first, but the characters from Freckles reappear in Girl.

Also good is Laddie, A True Blue Story.  The Harvester is probably a little mature, but its one of my favorites of hers. 

I also remember enjoying The Five Little Peppers and How They Grew (I believe there were a bunch of sequels which I never read).  It was rather moralizing (though, quite frankly a lot of the late Victorian childrens' classics are moralizing) but as an only child, I liked stories with lots of sibs in them.

Also, I don't think anyone has mentioned The Last Unicorn and The Neverending Story -- its been so long, I'm not sure if they are a little too old for your DD, but they are great reads.

Also, by the same author as Witch of Blackbird Pond and the Bronze Bow (Elizabeth George Speare), Calico Captive and The Sign of the Beaver are also excellent (but maybe a bit mature). 

I blame Little Women for my purchase and attempt to read the Pickwick Papers in early middle school.  Turned me right off of Dickens for years, until I was forced to read Oliver Twist for class. 

Edited by Jane91 - 11/24/10 at 8:25am