Easier books for a 10 year old boy?

[Devaskyla]

Ds1 is nearly 10, but his reading skills are more about grade 3 level. I'd like him to read more so he can get better at it, but we need some ideas for books that are fairly easy to read, but entertaining for a kid his age.

He's read one chapter books so far, Terry Pratchitt's "Only You Can Save Mankind". He did finish it, but it took him about 3 months and I'm not sure how much he actually got from it. He didn't seem to be able to answer many questions about it since he spent more time on the mechanics of trying to read it than on the the story.

[zebra15]

How about the 'lighthouse' series from Cynthia Rylant?

http://www.amazon.com/Storm-Lighthouse-Family-Cynthia-Rylant/dp/068984882X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1312443992&sr=8-1

I think there are 4-6 books in this series. My son, who is an advanced reader, read them in Kindy and the material was fine and he occassionaly will still check them out of the library.

How about 'Nate the Great'?

http://www.amazon.com/Nate-Great-Marjorie-Weinman-Sharmat/dp/044046126X/ref=pd_sim_b_26

[ollyoxenfree]

Here are some books or authors that may appeal to that age. Some of them measure a little higher than others at Lexile, but sometimes that has more to do with occasional unfamiliar vocabulary or grammar than with actual ease-of-reading: 

Roald Dahl 

Sideways Stories from the Wayside School - Louis Sachar

Tales of A Fourth Grade Nothing, SuperFudge etc. - Judy Blume 

Bunnicula - James Howe

Series like Magic TreeHouse, Animorphs, Goosebumps (I'm showing my age, lol!), etc. 

Higher lexile scores, but the stories may keep him inspired to continue reading: 

Gordon Korman's series Dive and Everest

Maniac Magee - Jerry Spinelli 

Joey Pigza books - Jack Gantos

Frindle - Andrew Clements

Diary of a Wimpy Kid

You may also want to consider books that aren't novels. Graphic novels, Ripley's Believe it or Not collections, magazines, poetry.....

[hildare]

if he's into sports try the matt christopher (author) books. 

i've also seen kids that age and reading level really get into hank the cowdog series books. 

the louis sachar books olly mentioned are great, too. 

i've also seen kids like yours really benefit from audio books paired with text.  (some libraries will have packages/bundles or amazon has some like that too...(i was an elementary school librarian in a former life)

[Owen'nZoe]

Graphic novels and comic books are also what helped my son make the jump from reading-because-i-have-to to reading-for-pleasure. He loves old Calvin and Hobbs, Wallace and Grommit and Snoopy books, as well as Asterisk, Tin Tin, Ponyo and Mouse Guard.

One thing I've noticed with my son (and I'm sure this is true of other kids, too) is that even when he is reading way below his reading level, he is improving his skills. So, last summer, I don't think any of the books he read was especially challenging for him, but still he ended the summer 3 Guided Reading levels higher than he had started it.

[A&A]

The Goosebumps series. 

[kathymuggle]

Captain Underpants  - a little youngish, but still

Geronimo Stilton

Diary of a wimpy Kid

Graphic Novels (Bones is one)

Non-fiction:  Horrible History, world record books etc, are great

Check out this site for recommendations:

http://www.guysread.com/

[Devaskyla]

Thanks for the ideas! He reads really slowly still, so I'll probably just pick one for now and see how he likes it before I get into any of the series. I'll have to see what the library has.

He really liked the MacDonald Hall books by Gordon Korman that I read to him last year, but they seemed a little bit beyond him, he missed a lot of the jokes. I think they're for around 12 years old. He also seemed to really like the first Harry Potter book (finished reading it to him tonight) so I think comedy or fantasy are the way to go.

[TiredX2]

If he likes Fantasy, I'd really recommend "The Secrets of Droon" series.  They are written at a high 2nd-4th grade level and there are a LOT of them.  Both of my kids enjoyed them and they're convenient because there are so many of them and they're not that long.