Recommended children's booklists sorted by age or topic

Publisher: Penguin Random House Children's UK

Charlie Changes Into a Chicken

Chapter book

We love this laugh-out-loud series with a tongue-in-cheek humour and plenty of funny asides, but also a poignant side about bullying, overcoming adversity and dealing with big emotions.

Charlie magically changes into animals when he is worried or stressed (not necessarily chickens, though). Charlie’s worries pile up, with a brother in hospital, parents bickering and a school bully to deal with. Riproaring and hilarious antics follow suit as Charlie navigates temporarily changing into a spider, a rhino, a pigeon, snake and more.

Children with a wacky sense of humour will find this story really funny, and it provides plenty of opportunity to think and discuss the deeper topics too.

Percy Jackson and the Lightning Thief: The Graphic Novel

Attila Futaki & Jose Villarrubia & Rick Riordan & Robert Venditt

Graphic novel

Percy Jackson – now in stunning graphic novel form!

Look, I didn’t want to be a half-blood. I never asked to be the son of a Greek God. I was just a normal kid, going to school, playing basketball, skateboarding. The usual. Until I accidentally vaporized my maths teacher. That’s when things started really going wrong. Now I spend my time fighting with swords, battling monsters with my friends, and generally trying to stay alive.

This is the one where Zeus, God of the Sky, thinks I’ve stolen his lightning bolt – and making Zeus angry is a very bad idea.

Can Percy find the lightning bolt before a fully-fledged war of the Gods erupts?

Diary of a Wimpy Kid

Jeff Kinney

Chapter book

The Wimpy Kid books are well known for turning reluctant readers into book fans, enjoyed for their easy-to-read style, laugh-out-loud humour and integrated cartoon-style illustrations.

The books follow the ups and downs of middle school life as Greg navigates starting a new school, finding friendships and dealing with bullies.

How to Live Forever

Colin Thompson

Picturebook

Colin Thompson’s books are mystical and complex, they will appeal to children and adults alike and demand to be returned to as there is always a new image to see . . . something more to catch the eye. Peter and his family live among the Quinces in the cookery section of a mystical library, and at night, when the library comes to life, Peter ventures out of his home to find a missing volume: How To Live Forever.

Roller Girl

Victoria Jamieson

Graphic novel

An enjoyable sports-themed graphic novel recommended for Year 5 and Year 6.

This graphic novel oozes individuality. It’s the story of Astrid, a middle-grade girl on the cusp of adolescence and coping with all the problems that come pre-prescribed.

Roller Girl packs much in: friendship, mother/daughter relationships, being yourself and self-belief (also hair-dye), all under the backdrop of roller derby (to say it’s a sport not for the faint-hearted is an understatement)!

Castles

Colin Thompson

Picturebook

A wonderfully visual exploration of fantasy castles, this book contains wonderfully detailed illustrations of imaginary castles to pore over, each hiding a royal family as well as many inventive puzzles, mazes and visual puns woven into the details. From castles that float on clouds or hide under these to castles made of musical instruments, this is a popular choice for stimulating fantasy writing.

Chasing the Stars

Malorie Blackman

Chapter book

This is an exciting story from award-winning author Malorie Blackman that is suitable for mature readers in upper KS2. The plot is inspired by Shakespeare’s Othello, but the setting is space and the main character Othello is recast as a teenage girl. This is a thrilling science-fiction story that would make for an interesting project to compare it to Shakespeare’s original play.

Silly Verse for Kids

Spike Milligan

Poetry

One of the first books I remember reading and laughing my head off about was Silly Verse for Kids by Spike Milligan. To this day, Spike remains one of my comedy heroes because he was silly. I love laughing at silly things and I suppose I always will. So, poems like Granny, were (and are) a treat to read out loud.

Through every nook and every cranny

The wind blew in on poor old granny

Around her knees, into each ear

(Up her nose as well, I fear)

The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole Aged 13¾

Sue Townsend

Chapter book

I’m going to get a bit gushy about this book. I think this might have been the book that made me think that I might want to write down funny things. It is SO funny and SO sad and SO tender and SO warm and SO heartbreaking. It’s such a skilfully observed book that so evokes what it was like to be a spotty teenager in the mid 1980s that I honestly thought Sue Townsend might have reached inside my brain. I read and re-read this a million times and the good news is that the sequel, the Growing Pains of Adrian Mole is just as good.

Stuff

Maddie Moate & Paul Boston

Non-fiction

Do you ever wonder where your stuff comes from, and what happens to it when you’re finished with it? Did you know that you can make paper out of elephant poo? And plastic packaging out of seaweed? And did you know that if you throw away an old T-shirt, it can take 200 years to break down?

Written and researched by Maddie Moate, the star of CBBC’s Do You Know? and Let’s Go Live with Maddie and Greg, and illustrated by Paul Boston, this book is full of mind-bursting facts and extraordinary stories of the ingenious ways people around the world, and across history, have made, used and re-used the stuff around them.

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Publisher: Penguin Random House Children's UK

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