I thought I would make a list of books my kids are reading during summer of 2023 as a fun way of tracking where my kids are at and to share book ideas with other book loving families. Last year I posted a couple of lists for what my kids were reading before 1st and 3rd grade and now that they are a year older their tastes have changed. I do want to make a few caveats before everyone gets their pitchforks out on what level is appropriate.

1. We do a lot of listening to books in the car during our commute. Most books are easier for kids to digest if they are listened to rather than if kids are reading to themselves so we are able to go up a level or two for our youngest and then talk about it. We also will watch the movie if available after reading books and this really helps with understanding some of the more difficult concepts.
2. My kids all read at above grade level. They haven’t always, but we read a lot and it helped them learn very quickly once they got started.
3. Every kid is different and learns to read at their own pace. It is much better to read at or slightly above your kid’s grade level than to read something way above and have them get frustrated.
4. The most important thing is that reading should be fun!

So with that I will get into the list of what they are reading. We are only a few weeks into the summer and we have already read several books. The favorite so far has been “A Series of Unfortunate Events” by Lemony Snicket. This series has been a hit with our daughter and our son likes it as well. We rewarded them for finishing the first three books with watching the movie for movie night and the kids loved it! They are listening to this series in the car but we also added it to our daughter’s Kindle since she is a voracious reader. If you have not read this series yet it is about a family of orphans that undergo mysterious events when moving from relative to relative after their parents die. There is a lot of problem solving, big words which are defined in the book and hilarity that both of my kids like.

Another series my daughter loves is “The Land of Stories” by Chris Colfer. These are not my son’s style yet but our daughter is obsessed. We were given these books by someone in our Buy Nothing group and I had never heard of them. They are the traditional fairy tales reimagined and from what I understand they are pretty good. I read part of the first book and it was well written. My copy has mysteriously disappeared from behind my bed so I suspect my daughter has borrowed it back to read again.

We found this “Mayor Good Boy” series by Dave Scheidt and Miranda Harmon at the library one day and both of my kids loved it. The series is graphic novels for grades 2-5 and it is about a dog focusing on silliness. I did not read much of these but they were a fast read for both of my kids and they read them a couple of times.

Power Rangers have been the obsession in 2023 for our youngest. We have finally moved on from Ninjago into this long running series. I had no idea that there were over 20 seasons of Power Rangers and honestly until this year I had not watched any of them but now I am an expert and these Shattered Grid graphic novels are a favorite of our son. They are a little bit more challenging to read but I love the message the rangers convey of helping each other and doing good for the universe. We bought a couple of them but we also found copies at our local library.

My daughter has been ready for more challenging books so I brought out some of the books my oldest read around this age. The City of Ember series by Jeanne DuPrau was a favorite of both the oldest and I. Now our middle daughter loves them too. These definitely took her much longer to read than other books she has been reading but she loved them. I kept this series in the car for her so she had something to read on our long car rides out and about. These are about a community that lives underground after a disaster and how they figure out why they are there and what lies on the surface. It is well written and perfect for kids that like a little bit of action and a mystery to solve.

Another book we just read this week was “Diary of a Wimpy Kid” by Jeff Kinney. The kids loved it and we watched the movie for our weekly movie night which was everything I remembered. Although I do have a copy of this one somewhere in the house which I ahem, bought several years ago and have misplaced, the kids listened to this one in the car on the way home from our trip. I am going to have to find our copy and then scout out some thrift stores for the rest of the series. Usually with popular books like these there are tons of copies floating around out there and it is better to buy them used. I would just get them at the library but I can already tell my son will read them repeatedly and I like to encourage that as much as possible.

Wow. We are only a few weeks into the summer and my kids have already read a ton of books! I can’t wait to see what they pick up at the library again next week. For now this list will have to do. If we find some other good books this summer I will do another post next month to let you know what we find. For now, happy reading!!!

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Welcome to our list of favorite dystopian novels. I am a huge fan of any dystopian novels and have been trying to read more of them now that we are regularly going to the library so I will keep adding to this as I read more. This list is by no means exhaustive so please leave a comment if you have a book to recommend!

The Girl With All the Gifts by M. R. Carey – This book really threw me for a loop when I read it because the premise is somewhat believable. It follows Melanie who is a talented girl on how she discovers who she is and how much bigger the world really is. There is also a movie adaptation which was decent but you should really read the book first because the way Melanie’s discovery about the school she goes to is rushed in the movie and very well written in the book. The movie is available on Prime Video and can be found here.

The Silo Saga: Wool, Shift, Dust, and Sil0 Stories by Hugh Howey

The three part series Wool, Shift and Dust is about a group of people living in bunkers in a post-apocalyptic world. These books are well written and the titles are incredibly accurate as to how information about the bunkers is revealed to it’s inhabitants. These books are not so likely to happen but they are a great read and you can’t help feeling for the characters and the predicament they are in. I have not read the Sil0 Stories yet but I am going to find a copy to see what they are about.

Day Zero by C. Robert Cargill – Written during a time when AI is all around and kids are taken care of by nanny bots this book is written from the perspective of a high end tiger nanny bot named Pounce who navigates saving his human while fighting off his fellow robots that are trying to take over the world. I love that this book was written from the perspective of a self-aware robot and not the humans it was trying to protect. It looks like C. Robert Cargill also wrote a book called Sea of Rust that I will have to check out as well.

The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood – The Handmaid’s Tale is a pretty popular TV series but it is based off of the book by Margaret Atwood which is excellent. Offred is a handmaid to an affluent man in the new world of Gilead where the bible is taken very literally. Infertility is a huge issue and those that can bear children are enslaved by the wealthy elite.

Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury – I will put this one on here although many people have read this book. Fahrenheit 451 is a classic about a world where books are banned and firemen light fires instead of putting them out. It follows Guy as he discovers there may be more to life than being a fireman.

The Giver by Lois Lawry – I will be totally honest and tell you I did not read this book until I was well into adulthood and my oldest daughter was reading it for middle school but I did read it in one night it was so good. The Giver is about Jonas who is coming of age in a world where everyone feels content in their pre-assigned roles. Jonas is given a glimpse into what was before and begins to question his world. There is a movie that goes along with the books that is pretty well done and can be found on Prime here.

Making this list of books reminded me that I need to read the other books in this series. It looks like there are four total and the whole set can be found here.

Parable of the Sower by Octavia E. Butler – Now I have not read these books but they have been highly recommended to me by multiple people so I am going to include them in my list. It looks like they are about a girl navigating her world after climate change has altered earth which is right up my alley. I plan on reading them in the next few months so let me know in the comments if you have read them and how you like them.

There are so many more books out there I could not include them all but I will update this list as I read more. Please let me know your dystopian book recommendations in the comments and happy reading!

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With summer starting I thought I would make a list of some of our favorite book series to read over the summer. I just graduated my third kindergartener and a lot of the other moms in my youngest’s class have been asking me for book recommendations. Sometimes I forget that the first time around you are not in tune with what is popular for kids so I made a list of the books we have been recommending for kids just starting to get into chapter books. Most Kindergarteners will not be able to read these on their own but they are great to read as a family! I have also used the trick of reading to an exciting point and then leaving the child with the book to read on their own and this always results in my kids trying to read further on their own.

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Magic Treehouse Series – This is by far the favorite with all three of my kids. We are still on our original set I bought for my oldest daughter and they went through a friend’s kids in between my oldest two. These are also available as audio books at most libraries.

Synopsis: Jack and Annie find a magic treehouse in the woods that take them on adventures during key periods in history. The all start out the same which is great for early readers relying on repetition to help them decode the text. There are also companion Fact Tracker non-fiction books which go into more details about facts brought up in the books which are great to add in after kids are reading more fluently.

Franny K. Stein – We are huge fans of Franny K. Stein at our house and once again, all three of my kids have this series on their favorites list.

Synopsis: Franny does things a little bit different and loves to do mad scientist things that the other kids don’t understand at first. Once the kids get to know more about Franny the accept her as she is. These books also have a lot of repetition at the beginning which is great for earlier readers.

The Alien Next Door – This series is great because there is some mystery involved in trying to figure out if the new kid is actually an alien. My son in particular loves this book series. I like that they don’t discover if the new kid is an alien right away and once they do different conflicts come up that require some thinking to work through.

Synopsis: A new kid named Zeke moves in next door to Harris and the two of them navigate how to be friends even though they are from different planets. There is a lot of critical thinking and problem solving in these books and they are less repetitive which is great for adults reading aloud.

Princess in Black – Another great series that our middle daughter loves is the Princess in Black series. The books have great illustrations for kids just moving into chapter books that help them decipher the words.

Synopsis: Princess Magnolia does not fit the usual princess mold and is a secret monster hunter. The series follows her adventures trying to balance both the worlds of frilly princess duties and hunting smelly monsters with her horse.

Narwhal and Jelly – Narwhal and Jelly is a graphic novel series that my kids love to read. They are pretty light reading with silliness and fun. I will be honest that I have not read these in a while, but my middle daughter has loved them tremendously since she was in Kindergarten. We have also given these to friends who have loved them as well. Graphic novels are a great way to get kids reading and the pictures help kids decode the text.

I hope you find something new in this book list. I have really enjoyed the process of teaching my kids to read. Each one was different but I have tried to instill a lifelong love of reading with them.

What books to you recommend for Kindergarten/First Grade?

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