Family Reading Recommendations--Summer

[SweetSilver]

Any interest in a thread like this?  Is it redundant?

When people ask me for book recommendations for kids, I usually end up recommending a handful we have loved forever.  Great books, all.  But then I find that I didn't think about more current books we are reading.  So a regular thread to include books and other reading material as we enjoy them seems to me a good way to get beyond the classics we love.

I am new to this particular forum, so PLEASE let me know if there is another, ongoing thread just like this.

Let me know what your family is reading together, or what the kids are reading on their own.  Include any notes about "age appropriateness" if that might be ann issue.

My girls are 6.5 and 4.5.  Here are some picture books we have been enjoying:

Usborne's "First Thousand words in Spanish"

"Officer Buckle and Gloria" by Peggy Rathmann

"I'm a Pill Bug" by Yukihisha Tokuda

"My Cat, The Silliest Cat in the World" by Giles Bachelet (the "cat" is an elephant!)

"Monsters Don't Eat Broccoli" by Barbara Jean Hicks

"The Pirate Cruncher" by Jonny Duddle

"Billy and Blaze" stories by C. W. Anderson

"Monster Sleepover" by Scott Beck

DD1 has been enjoying the graphic novel "Perseus and Medusa".  It is a bit gory, but the story itself is a bit gory anyhow, and this one isn't much worse than other renditions.

Chapter books?  Unfortunately the last year or so there has been much resistance beyond "The Hobbit"  Now DD1 has begged me to read LOTR, and we are now at the beginning of The Return of the King.  She keeping up with it!  

Share some of your favorites, especially the gems hidden amidst all the classics.  Please Keep It Positive......

[Daffodil]

I think this is a great idea for a thread.  Right now, I'm reading The Mysterious Disappearance of Leon (I Mean Noel) to my 8 year old (and the 5 year old is listening too.)  I loved it when I was a kid, and so far DD seems to like it too.  Some other recent read-alouds that 8-year-old DD loved are: Star in the Storm, Ginger Pye, The Egypt Game, The Wind Boy, and Mr. Popper's Penguins.  (Mr. Popper's Penguins was mainly the 5-year-old's read-aloud, and he really liked that and also, somewhat to my surprise, Ginger Pye.)  He's really enjoying fairy tales these days.  I've been reading him random ones from Grimm's, and he thinks they're great.

[rainbringer]

dd and I are working our way through the books by Eleanor Estes.  We've read Pinky Pye and Ginger Pye, and on the last book about the Moffats. 

Other recent books we've enjoyed:the Keena Ford books by Melissa Thomson and Where the Mountain Meets the Moon by Grace Lin

[ollyoxenfree]

DD has been re-reading some favourites, most recently Tuck Everlasting and Runemarks. She's wanting to re-read Surviving the Applewhites by Stephanie Tolan, but I've actually had trouble finding a copy in our library system and the local bookstores, so it looks like I'll be ordering on-line. These books are young for her now, but I think she enjoys re-reading favourites in the summer.

[SweetSilver]

How old is she?

Originally Posted by ollyoxenfree 

DD has been re-reading some favourites, most recently Tuck Everlasting and Runemarks. She's wanting to re-read Surviving the Applewhites by Stephanie Tolan, but I've actually had trouble finding a copy in our library system and the local bookstores, so it looks like I'll be ordering on-line. These books are young for her now, but I think she enjoys re-reading favourites in the summer.

[SweetSilver]

Two recent favorite read-to picture books:

"George Washington's Teeth" by Deborah Chandra and Madeline Comora (they love this!)

"Traction Man is Here!" by Mini Grey  (a silly book about a boy and his "generic action figure with dazzle-painted battle pants")

[A&A]

An incredibly fun book to read out loud is The Magician's Elephant.       It has some sadness in it, though, so read it yourself first if you have a sensitive child. 

[ollyoxenfree]

Originally Posted by SweetSilver 

How old is she?

She's 15, so quite a bit older. She has a broad range in taste for reading (from Jane Austen to Judy Blume), like her mother   .(I still collect picture books because I think there's a special art in combining the illustrations and text). The books I mentioned are great for read-alouds or for independent readers at the 4th grade level or a little higher. I think she was around that age when she first read them.