Good Books for Young Boys

Shh. It’s his birthday and I’ve been hunting good boys for young boys.

It wasn’t very hard this year because he’s fixated on all things Star Wars.

His collection is so vast, however, I saw nothing to be gained by purchasing more Lego, so I turned to the book department instead.

It was easy to find the perfect choice for a beginning reader: Jane Yolen‘s Commander Toad in Space stories!

His reading is coming along and these appear to be about his level. He’s not quite ready for the Hardy Boys, though his father and uncles were reading them at seven.

I think it’s important to catch a child where his interests lie and space, for him, is not a final frontier but an opening for his imagination.

I bought all seven, but he’s only getting a couple for his birthday. I’ll save the rest until Christmas–when I can be sure he likes them.

Easy readers, yes, but 64 pages long, so the books–which are full of puns from Star Wars, Star Trek and other space cinema–feel more substantial story-wise.

(Commander Toad and his crew voyage on the Star Warts and young Jake Skyjumper is among the prominent characters).

Other books will come along we can share with him, and here are a few of our favorites.

The Horrible Histories Books tell historic stories in graphics, simple language and the more ironic, gruesome or surprising, the better.

We first encountered these British books while traveling in New Zealand, and bought several. We’ve since enlarged our library–and shared them–with many children, but particularly boys.

The language is simple enough for a mid-level elementary school aged child and they painlessly can learn a lot about history as a result.

Henry Huggins

Some books my sons enjoyed don’t seem to have aged well. I’m thinking of Beverly Cleary‘s wonderful Henry Huggins (which I once read aloud–the entire book–while standing in lines at Disneyland).

As a mother reading a book I loved as a child years later, I was shocked Mrs. Huggins allowed her son to ride a city bus downtown for his swimming lessons, and only became worried when he didn’t show up for dinner–when it was dark outside. Henry, of course, was struggling to get Ribsy into a box–which the bus driver wouldn’t allow on the bus.

We continued anyway, but the technology became challenging, too.  What type of telephone allows you to drop a dime into it?

My birthday boy wandered off before I finished reading the first chapter last summer. His father and uncles years ago, along with people who followed us to rides, loved the story.

Boxcar Children

The Boxcar Children by Gertrude Chandler Warner is another wonderful series that all my children adored. I see they have updated covers, and I hope they’ve updated the books.

My children went through all of them, delighting in the tales of four resourceful children.

As a mother in the modern age, well, kids need to learn sometime, right, how to live in the world?

My kids enjoyed Encyclopedia Brown books, and tried hard to figure out the mysteries before Encyclopedia himself solved them.

These were good books for young boys because the stories were set in real childhood and the solutions to the mystery were logical, not fantastical.

Adventures of Tintin

The Adventures of Tintin were first found by my then-nine year-old at the library. Our first encounter with “graphic” novels, they were written in the 1950’s and featured an intrepid boy and his dog Snowy.

I worried at the time they might not be good books for young boys, and grilled my kids on their take-aways from the series.  (People understandably complain about the racism and xenophobia).

They loved the pictures and the adventures. When questioned about the blatant racism, they shrugged. “That’s not how people are now.”

It’s worth noting my children enjoyed the books as part of their literary childhood.

We have a lot of fine reading ahead of us–even more than these series books.

But series books are good choices for new readers; they provide continuity of characters and language aimed at them.

I’ll recommend all these books for young boys–and will let you know what my current favorite one thinks about Commander Toad.

Surely he’ll recognize the puns?

What books would you recommend for a young boy?

What were your favorites?

Tweetables

Good books for young boys Click to Tweet

Series books for new readers Click to Tweet

Can Commander Toad compare to Han Solo or Captain Kirk? Click to Tweet

Is Henry Huggins now outdated? Click to Tweet