Thread of assistance for people who find it tricky remaining breezy about the books their dc choose in the library.

Wait until she's older and all she wants to read is Jacqueline bloody Wilson and Cathy bloody Cassidy. Can either of them write a book that doesn't involve broken homes/teenagers running wild and falling for boys from the wrong side of the tracks/people falling out/kids getting baby brothers and sisters they don't want/parents dying? It's so bloody depressing!

I know it's 'real life' but once in a while I'd like DD to read something a bit more lighthearted and to be frank, age appropriate. I'd even settle for the sodding Rainbow Fairies even though every book seems to be exactly the same!

Think she may becoming round to my way of thinking though, after the last CC book had her in tears in the middle of the night due to a chapter involving a terrifying stepfather and a police visit - me and the woman in the library saying it might not be suitable wouldn't stop her reading it, nightmares and being unable to sleep might just get through to her .

I just looked at the reviews of Olga Da Polga and note that she has a friend called Fangio the hedgehog.

I remember my Mum sighing at my library choices, she was wise enough to let me grow bored in my own time, I was a voracious reader & would get through 6 books a week, At 12/13 I was completely dedicated to working my way through Agatha Christie's complete works.

DD1 (5) was given a rainbow fairy book for christmas & now picks the drivel them out at every library visit. I have had to introduce a rule where she can only have one book per author (complete hypocrite given my above Christie addiction)

Have you noticed praying this is not just me now that if you're reading Les Miserables on the Kindle, nobody cares, but the instant you open the Mammoth Book of Lesbian Erotica or something equally ah, literary and worthy at least six random complete strangers will say "ooo is that an ipad?" and "ooo what are you doing?" and they all try and look at the screen as they say it...

I really did read crap as a child.
actually, i would read anything and everything.
when i went to the library, i would spend all my time reading the beano and jacky magazines, then chose 6 books and read them all at home.
Most of the books i read weren't even in my age range - i just picked what i hadn't already read!
and such crap! sweet valley (which i ended up buying anyway when i got enough pocket money every week to buy a book!#) - twins as well as high.
oh, i could write tomes on the crap books i read!

Each to their own just be glad they're reading. I can say this now my DD of nearly 10 is reading the free classics on her kindle having spent a small fortune since Xmas, 1 click purchases = bloody expensive

We too have endured rainbow magic mania, they were very tedious so was glad when she read them herself. We are thankfully coming out the other end and DD1 continues to read prolifically and huge sigh, a more varied selection. Famous Five, Magic Faraway Tree, andSophie and Magic wood, Mr Gum, Beast Quest and Harry Potter. Hang in there... if it wets their appetite for reading, then job done. Also libraries do stock a wide range of other fiction, well our local libraries do, as I work there. I often help children and parents source a range of books.

My 12 year old reads about 3 books a year.
My 15 year old about twice that.
I read 3 books a week......

Impressed that your DC choose books at the library, frankly. Our library has three computers loaded with educational games, which means my 3yo spends the entire visit making building block shapes with Pingu.

My own childhood reading habits were a mix of stories about animals (brave rescue dogs, My Friend Flicka etc.) and 'true' ghost stories that I would read obsessively by day and then fuel my insomnia with by night. Moving on to my tweens, it was all Stephen King, Dragonlance books, Titus Groan and - bizarrely - a surreptitious burst of obsession with girly trash like SVH and Mallory Towers. Supplemented by my mum's Anais Nin books, which were quite eye-opening.

I let them choose what they like from the library, or from book stalls or charity shops. But then I stuff the house with worthy literature of my choosing, and my latest tactic is to load the kindle with freebie classics, and they love technology so much they'll read anything if it comes with a button to click.

I loved SVH! And the books about when they went to uni. I even had one about the Wakefields through the eras, e.g. 18th century France! Also loved Babysitters Club, Point Horror, Goosebumps, Mallory Towers... I'm now a teacher and still love reading :)

DS loves reading :) has worked through most of the Beast Quest books, Horrid Henry and Roald Dahl stuff :) he's 8. Actually he's currently sitting reading a Weight Watchers cookbook!

Might need to start a thread about this, but as a teenager I read a series from the library about four girls at high school I. America and then they went on to college together, there was a book for freshman, sophomore, etc, I think it was class of 1990 etc? Anyone remember?

Ds is 8 and he loves those fairy books. They're rubbish! Dd loves Jacqueline Wilson but is now drifting towards more 'teenager' type books (she's 11). They frighten me slightly! I was reading Enid Blyton and the Brontes at her age.

My DD chooses wildly advanced books based on the cover, that go largely unread.

She then goes to the other extreme and chooses picture books.

And I give up, and just go to Waterstones in my lunch hour to get her 'gifts'.

I'm sorry Margo I know you are suffering but that just made me laugh aloud.

I'm very glad my mother never interfered with my teenage addiction to Molly Parkin.

Not a library choice but I have to plaster a fixed grin on my face when my daughter - let's call her Juniormargo - chooses her "Juniormargo's adventures with the Disney Princesses" book that her grandma bought her.

Cinderella went to the ball and spotted her friend Juniormargo there. Cinderella was so happy and so was Juniormargo. Cinderella married the prince and Juniormargo often went to visit Cinderella and her prince. The End.

Haha first novel I read on my kindle was Riders. First time I had read any jilly. V enjoyable.

Rhondajean - thank you! Although now I want to read it. Bugger.

I've just read the whole Georgia Nicolson series by Louise Rennison and have almost wet myself laughing. I still like reading teenage fiction.

Finally read the last two Trebizon books (v cheap on kindle) and my god they are dire.

And i loved SVH in my youth. So it was set early.

do always proclaim wuthering heights to be favourite novel though

DD is only three but only likes books with princesses or horses. I am more embarrassed about my own choices. It's much easier to hide Jilly Cooper in the kindle though.

I used to tell myself that studying English in my degree and postgrad earned me the right to read crap for a bit. 20 years on I have to accept I love reading crap.

I read a large number of books about the Loch Ness Monster as a teenager

IIRC it's a roc. It's sitting in a hard place. And the protagonists are required to remove something from between the two.

Hmm, good point. I suggest you purchase something a similar size, Dickens might work, and borrow the dust jacket...

I refuse to read another Rainbow fairy book (dear god just how many are there now....?) so dd has to read them to herself and that is my one consolation - that she does actually read. Mermaids, unicorns, princesses, ballerinas and magical small animals also feature on dd's preferred book pile.

OTOH I am eager for her to move on - but OTOH I'm afraid of what she might move on to.....