Books for Advanced Reader

[Cj]

My son is almost nine years old and in the third grade. He reads well above his grade level. He brought home a computer generated list based off his Lexile score (1151), but most of them seem inappropriate for him. He is set for now with a stack of non-fiction books, but I do want some fiction with age-appropriate content. Any suggestions? Thank you so much!

[Sallyavena]

John Flanagan's Ranger's Apprentice series is a really good one (and there are 12 books in it!) Brandon Mull has a couple of great series out as well...Fablehaven is probably the most age appropriate. I'm not sure if you can get to my lists or not by clicking on my name, but I have a list going of good reads for precocious readers. My kids were all well a head of their grade level early on (they are all teens now) and I've been right were you are.

[Beth A.]

Sally, can you put up a link to your list? Or what's the name of the list so I can search for it? TIA

[Cheryl]

My kids struggled a great deal with this. Treasure Island has a surprisingly high lexile. Harry Potter 3 is kinda high. The teachers let the kids start at the begining of the series to get to the higher lexiles. The problem there is that our kids start reading when Harry and friends are in high school while our kids are much younger. Some of the content is a little better to wait on. I will ask my kids what else worked. They like Eragon. I can't remember it's lexile though.

[Sandy]

You might want to check out the book lists at Ambleside https://www.amblesideonline.org/curri... It is geared towards classic homeschooling but they tend to stick to quality Literature. Also Sonlight Book list are great. http://www.sonlight.com/core-d.html Though a Christian company most of the literature is secular. I highly recommend ordering a free catalog to use as a reference.

[S.A.]

You may want to give Firebringer by David Clement-Davies a try. Very good, long, epic, and clean story. It's an animal fantasy about Scottish red deer. To me the story is like Bambi on steroids.

[Rachel]

They don't gauge reading levels with Lexile in our schools, but I have an older son, who was reading well above his grade level in Elementary and I've listed some books that he enjoyed at a similar age. I'm assuming your son has a range that also falls below 1151L, so here are a few suggestions, most of which aren't at his high, but may still be challenging enough to keep his interest.

Savvy-1070L; Scumble"Scumble"-900L

War Horse-1010L (gentler than the movie)

Hatchet; Brian's Winter; Brian's Return; Brian's Hunt; The River-960L-1180L (these are a series of survival stories, so you'd want to gauge how squeamish your son is with the harshness of man vs. nature).

The Mysterious Benedict Society Collection (series of 4)- 890L-900L

Igraine the Brave (a girl protagonist, but not at all "girly")- 900L

I know that the big rage for children right now is Fantasy, but if you have a child who is patient enough to appreciate the gems of reading about everyday people, doing everyday things, he might enjoy Ralph Moody's "Little Britches" series. Little Britches: Father and I Were Ranchers; Man of the Family; The Home Ranch; The Fields of Home; Mary Emma & Company; Shaking the Nickel Bush; The Dry Divide; Horse of a Different Color: Reminiscences of a Kansas Drover. Think of them as advanced "Little House on the Prairie" for boys. The reading level ranges, but some are high enough to give him a little challenge, while the subject matter is spot on for his age.-980L-1130L

SOME GREAT CLASSICS (with elementary age content):
My Father's Dragon- 990L

The Phantom Tollbooth- 1000L

Rabbit Hill- 1950L

Homer Price- 1000L

Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle- 1070L

Hope any of those spark an interest for him. Happy reading. =)

[Rachel]

Sally wrote: "John Flanagan's Ranger's Apprentice series is a really good one (and there are 12 books in it!) Brandon Mull has a couple of great series out as well...Fablehaven is probably the most age appropria..."

Sally--your profile is set to private which means most Goodreads members can't see your lists. I'd be interested in looking at it, if you want to change your status. Just FYI. =)

[Sallyavena]

https://www.goodreads.com/review/list...
Not sure if that will work or not. I'm not that savvy with goodreads, but you are always welcome to send a friend request my way. As for the list, it's heavy on the more 'girly' stuff because my boys are now 14 and 16 and it's my girls that I'm looking for now...they've liked plenty of the typical boy ones though. It also goes up a little older than you'd like in what might be appropriate for you son, so you might want to check things out on a site like Compass Book Ratings (they do a content review for things like language, violence and sex).
Here are some more that I thought of that are great for that age group: Mysterious Benedict Society, Chasing Vermeer, My Side of the Mountain, Captain Nobody, Last Newspaper Boy in America, Richard Peck has some good books, Elisabeth Enright has a great series called the Melody Quartet that is a lot of fun to read, Andrew Clements books are always good for a fast read at that level. Hope this all helps.

[Beth A.]

Thanks Sally. I'll send you a friend request.

[Sallyavena]

Me again...here's a link to a thread that I started a couple of years ago...my son was 14 at the time. He's read a lot of these and liked them (STORM, Young Samari just to name a few) that he's liked that were suggested here. Again you might want to check the content. I finally just had to talk to my boys about being willing to put a book down if it made them feel uncomfortable or had inappropriate stuff in it...I just can't keep up with everything they are reading. https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...