National Reading Month: Creating a Nourished Mind
AmericanMom Team |
As we continue the nourishment of our homes, what better place to go next than our minds? Today’s popular culture being what it is, it’s easy to get dragged into popular books, movies, and TV shows that are more “guilty pleasures” than actual, edifying, investments in our own knowledge and growth as human beings. And that’s where National Reading Month becomes a valuable resource and reminder.
First of all, we’d like to celebrate good literature to begin with, but National Reading Month also gives us all the opportunity to set aside the entertainment fed to us, that we’re told we should like, and pick up stories, histories, and literature that serves our values and hearts a little more. It’s becoming harder and harder to find clean, good books these days, especially for young kids, so we wanted to curate a list of books for everyone in the family. Without a doubt, we got a little carried away, so keep an eye out for further lists!
Please note that these lists are only suggestions, and that 1) you must research these titles and determine your own child’s reading level, maturity, and ability to handle certain themes, and 2) anyone can read whatever they like! Reading should be fun, not a chore!
Adventure and Fiction for Girls & Boys
PC: Elaine Atherholt
The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins
The Lightning Thief by Rick Riordan
The Charmed Children of Rookskill Castle by Janet Fox
The Once and Future King by T.H. White
The Giver by Lois Lowry
True Grit by Charles Portis
A Series of Unfortunate Events by Lemony Snicket
The Westing Game by Ellen Raskin
The Book Thief by Markus Zusak
The Boxcar Children by Gertrude Chandler Warner
The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini
The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton
Nansen by Anna Gertrude Hall
The Great Gilly Hopkins by Katherine Paterson
Inkheart by Cornelia Funke
The Thief Lord by Cornelia Funke
Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children by Ransom Riggs
The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman
The Maze Runner by James Dashner
The Black Stallion by Walter Farley
Hatchet by Gary Paulsen
The Indian in the Cupboard by Lynne Reid Banks
The Phantom Tollbooth by Norton Juster
Adult Novels & Classics
Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte
Persuasion by Jane Austen
12 Rules for Life by Jordan B. Peterson
The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien
Hamlet by William Shakespeare
Les Misérables by Victor Hugo
War & Peace by Leo Tolstoy
The Supper of the Lamb by Robert Farrar Capon
Quiet by Susan Cain
Blackout by Candace Owens
The War of Art by Steven Pressfield
The Truth and Beauty by Andrew Klavan
The Stranger in the Lifeboat by Mitch Albom
One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society by Mary Ann Shaffer
All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr
The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd
Brave New World by Alduous Huxley
Eve in Exile by Rebekah Merkle
The River of Doubt: Theodore Roosevelt’s Darkest Journey by Candice Millard
The Road by Cormac McCarthy
Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman
The Help by Kathryn Stockett
Four Hours of Fury by James M. Fenelon
Code Name Lise by Larry Loftis
And There Was Light: Abraham Lincoln and the American Struggle by Jon Meacham
Black Rednecks and White Liberals by Thomas Sowell
John Adams by David McCullough
Beyond Band of Brothers: The War Memoirs of Major Dick Winters by Dick Winters
Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass by Frederick Douglass
Black Hawk Down: A Story of Modern War by Mark Bowden
When Character Was King: A Story of Ronald Reagan by Peggy Noonan
Grant by Ron Chernow
Happy Reading!
