Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Recommended Resources Book recommendations: age 9-12

https://www.goodreads.com/list/show/47468.Gifted_Young_Readers

This list is not broken down by age, but I see it as a list that I want dc to go through by the age of twelve roughly. I don't really like breaking it out by age because one gifted reader may be five years beyond garde level and another may be only two. I see it as regardless of if they can read at a 12th grade level at 8 or 9, they still ought to have read all these children's classics so they relate to the great literature that is written for children. I don't care if it is way below their reading level so long as they enjoy it on an emotional level. I moderate the good reads list and I don't want stuff on there like Flat Stanley or Magic Treehouse because I don't see that as classic literature or rather literature
for gifted readers-- rather just a bridge to reading chapter books.they are great in fullfilling that need while kids are learning the confidence to read longer books, but they aren't in my opinion must read books that have higher order value to gifted children. Anyway, that list is along the same lines, just not broken out by age-- because as we all know that is so arbitrary when dealing with kids. Feel free to take the books from this list or add too it. My original intention was to post it as a link whenever people asked for book recommendations.

I second Out of My Mind by Sharon Draper. This was part of DS/DD's 5th grade Reading/Language Arts curriculum first quarter. I don't want to repeat recommendations so I will add:
other books in the series by Tui T. Sutherland, The Seven Wonders Series by Peter Lerangis, Hunger Games trilogy by Suzanne Collins, Hitler's Secret by William Osborne, and the Divergent trilogy by ???

My daughter just finished reading this book and loved it. Just the right type of humor.

By the way, this is my first post. Finally decided to join today, but wish I had earlier. I'll be following this thread!

DD10 read The Giver in 4th grade and loved it, so I bought The Giver Quartet for her to read (all 4 books) this summer:

The Giver
Gathering Blue
Messenger
Son

by Lois Lowry

She is currently reading (and enjoying very much) the first book in The Mysterious Benedict Society.

Other books she read and enjoyed in 4th grade were:
Kira-Kira (very emotional, the sister dies of cancer at a young age)
Hatchet
Holes

Then she needs to read some Terry Pratchett.

My DD loved Maurice and his amazing rodents and the Wee Free Men.

There are a ton of others too- some better than others

It's such a shame that Terry Pratchett has early Alzheimer's

The Artemis Fowl series, by Eoin Colfer.
The Simon Bloom series, by Michael Reisman.
The Phantom Tollbooth, by Norton Juster.
The Wizard of Oz series, by L. Frank Baum.

DD9 recently acquired the first three books in The Missing series by this same author, and she's devouring them.

DD9 really likes mysteries so we are currently doing a lot of Agatha Christie. (Due to 2E issues she listens to audio books. I say "we" because its mostly in the car.) Just finished "Death on the Nile" and started "Murder on the Orient Express" yesterday.

The Mrs. Pollifax series has also been a favorite.

She loved "Around the World in 80 Days" so we plan to do some more Jules Verne this summer.

She enjoys Dickens too. "A Christmas Carol" and "Great Expectations" were both favorites. She liked "Oliver Twist" but not my favorite.

Last fall I found an old book called "The Egypt Game" that she LOVED. It started a passion for learning everything possible about Ancient Egypt. That led us to Rick Riordan's "Kane Chronichles" series and then to all things Percy Jackson.

She and DH recently read "Frankenstein" which she enjoyed.

She liked "Tom Sawyer" but in a rare moved asked me to stop playing "A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court." Not sure if it may have been the narrator on that one, though. We are holding off on any other Mark Twain for a while.

The "Sisters Grimm" series is fun. You have to suspend disbelief a bit to get into the story but then it really takes off.

Will add to my list as I think of more.

My DS 11 just finished The Night Gardener by Jonathan Auxier. He's very picky and he loved it. He's now reading Peter Nimble and His Fantastic Eyes by the same author.

"The Incorrigible Children of Ashton Place" series (Maryrose Wood), about a (presumptively) gifted 15-year-old governess and her three students, who were raised by wolves prior to being taken in by an English nobleman. A little bit of mystery, a little bit of humor, many stray tidbits of edutrivia (she is a governess, after all!).