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What book(s) would pull my 15-year-old son back to reading?
SouthernHope
2119 replies216 threads Senior Member
in Parent Cafe
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Replies to: What book(s) would pull my 15-year-old son back to reading?
you could also introduce him to creepy-pasta wiki as well. It is a site for people that enjoy creepy stories and a good site for freelance writers as well. I personally have written a story on there. I wouldn't suggest it for kids under 13 as it can have graphic violence,language and some adult content as well though. somewhat similar to Edgar Allen Poe
what me and my mother do is go to the used bookstore and buy a bunch of books as they usually have very good books for under 5 dollars and read them. one of my personal favorite series is samurai detective http://www.goodreads.com/series/55879-samurai-detective it is a very fun read and has some fun tidbits about samurai history in it. he may also like the Hannibal Lecter series (pretty mature series about serial killers). Where the red fern grows is another great stand alone book.
If your son likes softer love stories the Nicholas Sparks series may be a good fit.
i dont really know much about Game of thrones. but i heard the tv show is great.
Speaking as a male and someone who remembered hearing many complaints about some of the listed titles above....those may not be the best choices.
Gone With The Wind is good for Civil War...especially Southern "Lost Causers" and romantic buffs, but the romantic parts and long length (Over 1000 pages) can be offputting to most adolescent males and those who haven't read for a while. This book is something I'd only recommend to adolescent boys with an unusually large tolerance for romantic themes and willingness to read an exceedingly lengthy work.
I read the Great Gatsby and while I liked parts of it, many classmates, especially male classmates found the romantic parts and the life in higher SES '20s society to be annoying and/or unrelatable.
Also, while Jane Austin is a great writer, many adolescent boys during my HS days dreaded having to read her works for HS class because it was so centered on romance and human relationships and lacked enough action and technology to keep us interested. Some titles like Jane Eyre are so depressing that it adds to this sense of dread...as I found from my own experience reading it for English lit.
Granted, it's a few notches better than reading Henry James' Turn of the Screw. No sir/ma'am....I didn't enjoy it.
Unwind series
Everlost series
Holes
Stephen King - Cell, The Green Mile, From a Buick 8
Inkheart series
Peter and the Starcatchers
Xombies: Apocalypse Blues
Dean Koontz - The Good Guy
Maximum Ride series
John Green?
Full Tilt
Percy Jackson series
Divergent series
And John Green is quite simply a national treasure! I don't know one person who doesn't enjoy his books.
Edited to add maybe spy novels?
My kids read mostly sci fi and fantasy, but if your kid would rather read thrillers or mysteries that's fine too. Or maybe even non-fiction about sports or medical mysteries.
You've had some good sci-fi suggestions. Not mentioned, but my kids also liked David Weber's Honor Harrington books and Joe Haldeman's The Forever War books (military sci fi)
For fantasy my kids also liked Garth Nix ( especially the Abhorson trilogy). Diane Duane's various series.
For thrillers, Tom Clancy, Alistair McClean, Michael Connelly, Robert Crais, Lee Child.
For autobiography - Surely your Joking, Mr. Feynman (very funny early life of a Nobel prize winning physicist). There's a sequel too. Boy and Solo by Roald Dahl. Horrific childhood followed by adventures flying with the RAF in WW2.
For interesting essays: Freakonomics by Stephen Dubner. The Man Who mistook his Wife for a Hat by Oliver Sacks. (Many more collections if he likes that.)
Also he could try short story collections - not a genre I care for, but you could do worse than reading Edgar Allan Poe or Sherlock Holmes.
The Game of Thrones series is a good suggestion (my son devoured those at that age). But be warned, they are full of sex and violence (or so I'm told anyway). I'm a libertarian when it comes to what my kids read, but other parents may not be the same.
If he likes Jon Krakauer-esque adventures, try Alone on the Ice, Ice Masters, Ice Blink: The Tragic Fate of Sir John Franklin's Lost Polar Expedition, In the Land of the White Death, Endurance: Shackelton's Incredible Voyage, Touching the Void, Deadliest Sea: The Untold Story Behind the Greatest Rescue in Coast Guard History.
Although I love the classics myself, there are so many amazing Young Adult novels out there now, and I know that boys often prefer nonfiction to fiction.
Some suggestions:
http://blogs.kqed.org/mindshift/2013/06/ready-set-read-summer-fiction-ideas-for-kids-of-all-ages/
A list of summer reading lists: http://cybraryman.com/summerreading.html